Savage Worlds New Edge: Demonic Ritual
Posted by Joshua on Oct 6, 2008
Requirements: Novice, AB:Demonology
Demonic Rituals take 1 hour to perform per Rank of the demon being summoned. The TN for the ritual is 4 for a Novice demon, +1 per Rank of the demon. A raise on the summoning roll grants a +2 to the attempt to compel the demon. The demon appears at the end of the last hour of summoning, at which point the Demonologist must make a Spell-casting vs Spirit roll to compel the demon to do his bidding. If successful, the demon must perform one task for the summoner. If the Demonologist fails on the initial attempt to compel the demon, the demon may either return to whence it came or break the summoning circle and attack or possess the summoner. The Demonologist must know the true name of the demon he is attempting to summon; Demonologists collect the true names of demons and hoard them jealously, since while a demon is performing a task for (or worse, is in a pact with) one Demonologist it will not heed the summons of another. Taking this Edge gives the Demonologist the name of one demon of whatever rank he chooses for free; additional names have to be acquired in-game, or by taking the Edge again.
Success
The demon will use all of its normal abilities and powers to carry out the task. If the task is ongoing (such as guard this room), the demon may attempt to break the compulsion (spirit vs. spell-casting) whenever the Demonologist sleeps (treat as once per day for simplicity) and once more if the Demonologist is killed; if the demon fails to break the compulsion that final time, it is bound until released by magic. If the demon manages to break the compulsion, it can never be re-summoned by that Demonologist, and it will attempt to seek out and kill him (this becomes that demon’s Major Habit until the Demonologist dies). Generally it is safest for the Demonologist to specify tasks that can be accomplished quickly by the demon, before the Demonologist needs to sleep again.
Failure
The demon may leave, and the summoner may not attempt to summon that particular demon for 1 year and 1 day. If the demon chooses not to leave, it may attempt to break the summoning circle as an Action; this occurs in the same round as the Demonologist’s attempt to compel the demon, so the Demonologist has already used his Action. The demon makes a Spirit roll vs. the original summoning roll. If it succeeds, then it can leave the circle. Starting the next round it is dealt cards as normal, and on its Action it may try to attack the Demonologist, possess the Demonologist (Spirit vs. Spirit), flee physically, or retreat to its home. The Demonologist may attack it or attempt to compel it, but cannot reform the circle. If it does not succeed in breaking the circle, then the Demonologist may attempt to compel it again or dismiss it. It may not attempt to break out of the circle again until and unless the Demonologist once again attempts to compel it.
Savage Worlds Arcane Background: Demonology
Posted by Joshua on Oct 6, 2008
Demonologists get their powers from consorting with demons. Demonologists have three ways of using demons to perform magic: as familiars, by performing rituals to summon them and strike a deal or compel them to perform a service, or by forming a permanent pact. Demonologists may take the Arcane Familiar Edge multiple times. The Demonologist may only take Power Edges if there is a pact with a demon, and those Edges are actually applied to the demon (so if the demon is ever exorcised, the Demonologist loses them).
Arcane Skill: Spell-casting (Smarts)
Starting Power Points: 10 (these are actually the demon’s points and are lost if the demon is ever exorcised)
Starting Powers: 3 (see above)
Demonic Familiars
Demonologists can take a normal animal and bind a minor demon to it to serve as a familiar. Use the Arcane Familiar (AB:Magic) rules from the Fantasy World Builder Toolkit. The familiar has no special demonic powers other than the ones described in the Familiar Edge.
Demonic Pacts
The key to most Demonologists power is the pact they form with a particular demon. This allows the demon to dwell within them, and for them to use the demon’s powers as their own, but it comes at a price, namely the risk that the demon will take them over, either temporarily or permanently.
All demons have one Attribute: Spirit. Their Spirit is determined by the Rank of the demon, from d4 for a Novice to d12 for a Legendary demon. All demons have one Major Habit; this is a vice that the demon will try to indulge in to the maximum extent possible if it ever gains control of the body it shares with the Demonologist. Demons do not get Bennies when they are in a pact with a Demonologist. The GM may choose to create stats, skills and Edges for the demon, in case it ever manifests physically, but while the demon is inhabiting the body of a Demonologist, they are irrelevant. All Demons are also Wild Cards and get a Wild Die on their rolls.
As an Action, the Demonologist may force his demon to use one of its powers. Roll the Demonologist’s Spell-casting die without the wild die. On a roll of a 1 there is Backlash (the demon tries to take control), otherwise the demon will use the power as directed (roll the Demon’s spell-casting die and wild die). The Demonologist may spend Bennies normally on the Demon’s spell-casting roll.
Backlash
On a roll of a 1 on the Demonologist’s spell-casting die, the demon attempts to seize control. The Demonologist now makes a Spirit vs. Spirit test against the demon. If the Demonologist loses, the demon takes control. Regardless of the outcome, whoever is now in possession of the body is Shaken.
Demonic Possession
Once a demon takes control of the body, it will remain in control until it sleeps, or it gets a 1 on its casting die (which causes another struggle for control). If the Demonologist botched the spirit test in the struggle for control, then the demon may remain in control even if it goes to sleep, though it will still have to struggle again if it gets a 1 on its casting die. While the demon is in control, the Demonologist has no awareness of what is going on in the outside world.
During the time when the demon is in control, it will attempt to indulge in its favorite vice to the exclusion of all else. For instance, if it craves alcohol, it will wander off in the middle of a battle in search of a drink. It will defend itself if directly attacked (because the pact forces it to), and avoid placing itself in obvious immediate danger (sitting down in the middle of a stampede to have a drink), but it cannot or will not consider the costs and benefits to anybody else of its actions or voluntarily defer gratification for a greater reward later. A character can make a successful Persuasion roll to bribe the demon, but demons don’t consider themselves bound by any promises that aren’t magically reinforced, so it won’t stay bribed if it spots a better opportunity. The demon may or may not choose to try to hide the fact that it’s possessing the Demonologist, depending on its past experience; if every time it’s gained control in the past, the Demonologist’s companions have tied it up and knocked it out, it will pretend to be the Demonologist at least until it can sneak away. If the companions don’t seem to be in any position to stop it from indulging itself immediately, though, it won’t engage in a long charade unless it’s particularly cunning.
Because control reverts to the owner of the body when the demon becomes unconscious, demons will do everything that the setting allows to avoid falling asleep until absolutely necessary.
Demons and Experience
Whenever the Demonologist gains an Advance, he may choose to improve the demon by taking a Power Edge that applies to the demon. Whenever the Demonologist goes up a rank, the demon’s Spirit attribute automatically advances a die.
Notes
If at all possible, the GM should let the player still play the character while the demon is in control, since otherwise the player can be left sitting out a significant portion of the game. If the GM doesn’t like the possibility that the player’s character will not regain control of his body even after the demon has to sleep, remove the effect of a botch on the Spirit vs. Spirit roll. If that’s still too long, you could allow the player more frequent attempt to break out, but you might want to reconsider letting players take AB: Demonology in the first place.
This Looks Like A Job For…
Posted by Joshua on Oct 6, 2008
This month’s blog carnival, hosted by The Chatty DM, is on the theme Super Heroes in RPGs.
Superhero RPGs are actually one of my favorite genres, though my current game group….well, let’s just say that our last couple of attempts didn’t work out. I don’t want to be pointing any fingers at Badger Lord (Master of the Super-Sonic Tunneling Vampiric Badgers) or Kikko-Man (chinese food delivery bicyclist with the power to create illusions…of chinese food), but it’s never really clicked as a campaign. I’ve had much better luck with one-shots where the PCs have super-powers, but the setting doesn’t assume any of the standard superhero tropes.
In the past, though, ah, the glorious past….
I believe our very first super-hero campaign, back in High School, used Superhero 2044, the very first superhero RPG ever, but we played them all at one time or another: Superworld (one third of the Worlds of Wonder), Villains and Vigilantes, Champions…I don’t really remember much about it, although I do recall that it had a somewhat unusual setting (it all took place on an island nation in the year 2044) and that my brother Alex’s character in that, a super-speedster called Silver Streak, was carried over into successive campaigns as we tried new systems. I think that was also the original home of an NPC hero that reappeared in campaign after campaign of mine, PyroMan of the International Agency Command.
The next one we tried was Villains and Vigilantes, which I remember mostly for its generation of super-powers via rolling on random charts. Thus was born one of my only PC super-heroes of that era (since I mostly GMed): Kodiak, Bear Detective… a private eye who could shapeshift into a bear and had laser-beam eyes. I decided that the bear form was actually his real one, and his power let him shapeshift into human form.
Somewhere in between Villains and Vigilantes and Champions, I created a home-brew system, and most of our super-hero gaming was done in that, though towards the end of High School we did some gaming with Champions. I liked it a lot, but most of my gaming group didn’t want to be bothered with the bookdeeping, either for character generation or playing out the combats. They were much happier with the freewheeling style of my home brew.
Notable characters of that period include:
- Silver Streak: super-speedsters, perrenial in every system
- Thunder-Fist: martial artist with kinetic energy absorbtion powers that gave him an “Iron Fist” like attack.
- Defender of Israel: an Israeli Captain America, played by my brother’s Israeli girlfriend
- The White Princess of Oz : I think this was played by my kid sister…
- Megaman: powered suit that gave the user one super-power at a time, based on Ultra Boy of the Legion of Superheroes; this was about 7 years before the Capcom game…
In college and beyond, I played a lot of Champions, but that’s a story for another time…