In my last post, I said I would try to create a more wizardly caster for domain play. Here is the fruit of that attempt.
They ended up relatively similar to most other wizards. I started with the ethic that a class for a domain game should point to and reward how a certain kind of character should act in the longer, larger framework of domain play. It should point to and reward fighters for raising armies and accumulating holdings, etc. Well, it turns out much that a wizard should be doing is already in the foreground of a more typical D&D adventure, because Wizard Kings should be making magic items, communing with otherworldly beasts and spirits, and so forth, aka a pretty typical spell list.
As a result, I think plopping down most GLoG wizards into a setting will work just fine. But to pursue specialization to its furthest practical extent, here are two classes that emphasize two particular modes of wizard play. The Tower Wizard is an old curmudgeon living in a weird house all alone, while the Court Magician occupies the space of mentor and advisor or twisted vizier, depending on your approach. Assume typical GLoG magic, mishaps and dooms.
As with my last post, I stole from the best work I could find within this niche. The Tower Wizard’s tower is 75% copy-pasted from Phlox, Reverse Spell is copy pasted from Loch’s magus, the best abilities of the Court Wizard are stolen from Squig’s famous Sage, Skerples and Arnold are imitated with reckless abandon, to name a few.
THE TOWER WIZARD
They say the land has a power of its own, and they are right. It flows in invisible rivers called leylines, burbling towards and through the ancient solitary places, repulsed from the teeming boundary-making of civilization. It’s only natural that any wizard interested in true power set up shop out in the middle of the wilderness where the leylines are strongest. Beware! All the best spots already have a mage or twelve camped out there, or else magical beasts drawn by the smell of the mana.
Each template, +1 Wizard Tower template and +1 Will
Starting assets: dagger, spellbook with 3 spells, monochromatic robes, eccentric hat, hobgoblin-sized net
A: +1 MD, Eye of Alienation, Book Casting
B: +1 MD, Reverse Spell
C: +1 MD, Chimmerical Oneiromancy OR Summon Outsider OR Necromancy
D: +1 MD, Signature Spell
Wizard Tower (start with 1d4+1 stories)
A: +1 story in height. Reroll 1 MD in each spell cast in the tower.
B: +1 story in height. Mishaps and dooms incurred in your tower are also critically successful.
C: +1 story in height. Change the face of one MD by 1 in each spell cast in the tower (Turning a 4 into a 3, for example)
D: +1 story in height. The tower now fires beams that can damage anything large, but less than the tower’s height.
At your option, each story of your tower can have some funky magical effect passively ongoing. Something like “reverse gravity” or “totally silent”.
Eye of Alienation: One of your eyes changes to a random color. It can now see invisibility, and detect magic. If you lock eyes with another person you can tell how many MD they have. In your quest for power you have lost sight of how normal people behave. -[2xTemplates] to will checks related to social tasks with humans
Book Casting: If you are casting directly from a spellbook or scroll, you may take a turn (or, say, 10 minutes) to cast the spell with an effective [dice] of 1 and a [sum] of 1, sacrificing power for the certainty of your MD returning.
Reverse Spell: When you cast a spell you know, you now have the skill to do so backwards, resulting in the opposite effect, such as a darkness spell creating light, or a spell which heals wounds causing them.
Chimerical Oneiromancy: You may perform a ritual in the space between the waking and dreaming worlds where you combine multiple creatures into one. Create a large ritual circle with sand, with yourself in the center and your subjects within the circle. Secure a golden knife to your hand and a keep a stone or cherry pit in your mouth. DO NOT SWALLOW THE STONE. Once everyone has fallen asleep, you will all be as one in the space near dreaming. Cut yourself free from the joined flesh with the golden knife, then mold and scrape it to shape. When you awaken, your subjects will have combined into a chimera. You may create any number of chimerae this way, but you may only control a cumulative total of 3 HD worth (increasing to 6 at C template, then 10 at D), with any additional chimerae acting on their own agenda. Chimerae typically have a stat bonuses adding up to their HD and the special abilities of the parts that make them up. When a chimera you created dies, take 1 damage.
Signature Spell: Pick one spell you know, one you’ve cast a lot. Slap your name to the front and give it a special quality (Ashurtan’s Bouncing Haste, Vizzidrix’s Terrifying Baleful Polymorph, etc). Whenever you cast that spell, you may choose to add 1 MD for free.
THE COURT MAGICIAN
Sometimes called “Eunuch Mages” by Tower Wizards for their associations with intrigues and lacking towers, Court Magicians are typically attached to a throne or community, specializing in providing counsel on the strange and unearthly. More sociable than their Babellian cousins, they are sought out by the ambitious and the credulous. From this position of trust, we see characters occupying the spectrum from wise mentor to twisted vizier.
Each template, +1 Advisee, and +1 Will
Starting assets: Liveried robes, signet ring, dagger, spellbook with 3 spells
A: +1 MD, Eye of Madness, Unanswered Questions, Advice
B: +1 MD, Grant Deep Insight, Diagnose and Ward
C: +1 MD, Hooks, Magic Illusions
D: +1 MD, Raiment of Many Colors
Eye of Madness: One of your eyes changes to a random color. It can now see invisibility, and detect magic. If you lock eyes with another person you can tell how many MD they have. In your quest for power you have lost sight of the basic limits of sanity. -[2xTemplates] to will saves.
Unanswered Questions: You have a stat called Unanswered that starts at 0. Whenever you find really strange mysteries, note them down and add 1 to your Unanswered stat. When in the presence of a source of great knowledge, roll 1d6. If it is less than or equal to your Unanswered, learn the answer to one of your questions and reduce your Unanswered by the amount rolled. More details and guidance with the OG Sage here.
Advice: You are esteemed as wise and knowledgeable, and many seek your council. Name 3 monsters, 2 nations, and one school of magic. If you advise someone before they depart on a journey, they gain +1 to hit against those monsters, +2 save against that school of magic, and know any pertinent folkways of those nations on their journey. Each template, add one kind of monster, nation, school of magic, or other similar topic. You can advise [Template] Advisees each season. If an Advisee uses your advice to achieve a great goal (like clearing a dungeon or being elected mayor), gain 10 xp. If they recount their journey to you, you may gain 1 Unanswered Question from their tale (if there’s a good one), and they gain 10 xp.
Grant Deep Insight: If you spend a minute or so watching someone, you can roll 3 Will checks to learn what their next immediate course of action is, why they’re taking that particular course of action, and how you could best change their mind. Once you’ve done this, you can’t do it again until tomorrow, and you can’t do it to the same person two days in a row. Your Advisees may use this power once per journey.
Diagnose and Ward: You have completed your study of the physical arts, gain the Apothecary skill. With an hour’s examination you can determine how to cure a patient of a magical affliction. This could be something like “bathe a moon root in milk under their bed for three days” for minor ailments, or “swallow 3 Angel tears” for major troubles. If you spend at least two hours a day looking after someone’s health, you may give them advantage or disadvantage on saves against poison and either +/-2 to saves against magic.
Hooks: If you have unambiguously been the one to save someone’s life, if you have given them a magic treasure you have personally forged, or if you have answered an Unanswered Question they’ve brought you as their Advisor, they trust you implicitly and must save to doubt your fidelity and knowledge.
Magic Illusions: Pick 3:
-Teleport up to 30 ft in the same room if you are even momentarily out of sight.
-At will, switch which of your hands is holding something
-Can pull coins from behind ears, delighting everyone. Up to 10 gold in passive income each season.
-Scry within 10 ft.
-Animals smaller than you do not take up inventory slots
-Damage your spells deal to allies is always reduced to minimum.
Raiment of Many Colors: So great is your connection to magic that power clings to you like a robe. Whenever you wish, you may reveal it’s true form , bathing your clothing in shimmering rainbow light, granting a bonus to your AC and saves equal to the number of unexpended MD you have. It also gives off light like a torch and grants +1 to reaction rolls from any with equal or less HD than you.
Reflections
-In the system I have in mind, the +1 will each template that these classes gain gives them a bonus on crafting magic treasures, an important thing for wizards to accumulate.
-It’s important for the Tower Wizard to gather otherworldly servants. I chose to give them the Chimmerical Oneiromancy feature just because I haven’t seen much done with chimeras, personally. But it could be equally profitable to give them an avenue to a different form of magic lackeys. For example:
Summon Outsider: Perform a 10 minute ritual, incant exhortations, talk backwards, burn candles, draw gateways to other realms, and call forth an entity whose true name you know (start with 1 at random) by expending an MD. It will serve you faithfully for [sum] hours. (Here’s 99 good entities to summon,). Or…
Necromancy: Perform a 1 hour ritual focused on a corpse. For each HD the corpse had in life, stuff it with 10 gold worth of unholy unguents, or else it will rise in a weaker form outside of your control.
-Regarding spell lists, I think the Tower Wizard works well with very classic wizard spells, but I’m sure there’s plenty of mileage out there for anyone who wants to make them weirder as a group. The Hedge Mage and Orthodox spell lists from Loch’s Heartless class are great examples of classic spells with some oomph (and even a few dealing with making magic buildings stranger). Illusion and charms are more the Court Magician’s milleau, so I might suggest the Enchanter spell list from the Heartless or Skerples’ Illusionist spell list.
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