Halloween Eclipse Part II – Lord Goth

Anek Borez, A.K.A “Lord Goth”

Eighth Level (ex-)Human Knight of Hades (ECL 12)

   Over the years, Lord Borez had defeated many demons, undead, and other horrors. He had aided in the defense of the realm in disputes with the neighboring realms. He had risen to be one of the most respected knight-protectors of the kingdom, even if he had become… more than a bit rigid and authoritarian as he aged. That was hardly unusual. Humans do that, and the elders provide a useful stabilizing influence in their lands and cultures.

   Over the years he had married, and had a family. He had been blessed with strong and healthy children – valiant sons and charming daughters, most of them as noble and firm of purpose as he himself.

   Most of them.

   One young daughter in particular was much more inclined to chaos, even if she was good. When her father forbade her to continue seeing a young nobleman from one of the neighboring (and far more chaotic) states she saw nothing wrong with eloping with the young man and skipping over the border.

   Borez was outraged at the disobedience, at the violation of his values, and at the prospect of a marriage-alliance with a nation and a house which he had fought in the past and which he continued to despise. What was the use of defending the realm if young villains were to be allowed to steal away his children?

   He took his most loyal men and best mounts and gave chase, even if that meant defying attempts by the royal guard to stop him and punching past the neighboring states border guards – only to find the young man violating his daughter when he located their campsite.

   When the blind rage was past, both the young noble and his daughter (who had attempted to stop her fathers murderous attack) were dead by his sword – and Borez refused to believe that it was unjustified, or even that he could have been wrong. If he had been wrong… then he was a murderer and a kinslayer, and that simply could not be true.

   By the time the ensuing war was over, thousands were dead, including most of his sons – and Borez had become a bloody-handed war criminal, savagely “avenging his daughter’s death” upon people who had nothing to do with it.

   When they finally dragged him to the scaffold, he swore bloody vengeance for that “injustice” upon everyone who had “betrayed him”. If the light too was going to betray him by failing to give him the “justice” that he demanded, then he would turn to the darkness.

   He descended into the darkness – first of death, and then of the lower planes – like a falling star, burning crimson with rage and innocent blood.

   His new lords were pleased indeed. Few fell so far – or so terribly. They bestowed equally terrible gifts upon him, and returned him to the mortal world to wreak his vengeance over and over again.

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………

   Long decades later, Borez surveyed his new body… Evidently the cultists had sacrificed a young man to provide it. Well, it was always fun having a youthful physical body again!

   And he had his mission. Spirits of darkness were being unleashed upon the world to possess corpses and raise them as undead, to spread chaos and misery, and to trouble the realm. They needed direction and organization. This sorry little cult needed to be built into a tool of terror worthy of the lower planes. The descendants of his old enemies needed to be hunted down and either corrupted or enslaved and sent screaming into the darkness.

   He would have his revenge!

   Currently Borez can usually be found “in disguise” as a startlingly handsome, languid, young man dressed in fine black clothing, sporting fancifully-jeweled “unholy symbols”, surrounded by youthful acolytes, and acting like the worst poseur in history. Of course, this is a superficial guise – but it still makes it easy for him to recruit bored young nobles and rebellious adolescents for his witch-coven in the service of the dark powers. As a side-benefit, it allows him to enjoy drinking, eating good meals, and disporting himself with his young recruits – all the pleasures which he foolishly denied himself before his fall.

   If it comes to a fight, he will spend two Power and use the Nightforge ability to create a full suit of adamant full plate armor – and possibly a weapon if his greatsword is too unwieldy for the available space – on the spot. Fortunately, Theurgy is not affected by armor, since it’s purely verbal.

   Borez is actually significantly lower level than I would normally have made a Knight of Hades; I would have preferred about level twelve as a base – but there was a request in for one of this level. The version below is, however, pretty heavily optimized; if they player characters aren’t, an encounter with Borez is likely to be pretty dangerous or lethal. Gods help them if he manages to lay an ambush and has his various minions ready.

   Anek Borez

   Human Racial Abilities:

• Bonus Feat: Used to upgrade Fast Learner to plus two skill points per level (3 CP) and to allow him to buy one daily use of Channeling (3 CP).
• Fast Learner, Specialized in Skills for +2 SP/Level.

   Knight Of Hades Template (from yesterday).

   Rithian Blademaster Package Deal (0 CP):

   The Rithian Blademasters are one of the oldest and most respected warrior-orders of the western realm. While they have several rival schools, the purity of the Rithian techniques is unquestioned and the honor of their school has been fiercely maintained across the centuries. More than a few great champions have come from their halls. They will NOT be pleased to hear that an undead horror is using, and abusing, their techniques, and will certainly sponsor efforts to eliminate such a dishonor.

• Block/Melee (4 CP) with Multiple (4 CP) and Riposte (4 CP), all Corrupted/only usable while using a sword.

   A Rithian-trained fighter can attempt (by spending an Attack of Opportunity and making a DC 20 Reflex Save) to block up to sixty points of damage from a successful melee attack up to twice per round – and if they do successfully block an attack (and have another Attack of Opportunity available to use), they get an immediate counterstrike at their full BAB. Given Borez’s horrific Reflex save, he can generally pretty well count on deflecting two melee attacks – and getting two extra attacks of his own – every round that he’s in melee as long as his opponents can hit him at all.

   Available Character Points: 216 (level eight base) +10 (Disadvantages; ) +16 (Duties: originally to his native realm, now service to his dark lords) +16 (Fast Learner, Specialized in BAB) +18 (L1, L3, and L6 Bonus Feats) = 276 CP.

   Basic Attributes:

	Str	Dex	Con	Int	Wis	Cha
Rolled	17	16	—	18	16	17
Level	+1	—	—	—	—	+1
Template	—	—	—	—	—	+4
Magic	+2	+2	—	—	—	+2
Total	20	18	—	18	16	24

   Well, those were some REALLY good rolls there. While I’m being generous, and rolling 5d6k3 for major villains – on the theory that they have to have some advantage to have managed to rise to that status – random chance has done very well by Borez here.

   Basic Abilities (148 CP):

• Hit Points: 12 (L1d12, 8 CP) + 36 (L2-8 d8, 32 CP) +4 (1d4 Bonus HD, 8 CP) +63 (9 x Cha Mod) = 115.
  • Borez always relied more on his ability to block attacks than on raw hit points, but as a Knight of Hades he isn’t doing too badly on the hit point front either. The bonus hit die does add a few hit points, but – rather more importantly – gets his effective level up to nine for his witchcraft, for his inherent spells (the minimum needed to use his fifth level effects), and for using his Channeling abilities.
• BAB +8 (48 CP)
• Saves:
  • Fortitude: Not applicable.
  • Reflex: +8 (Purchased, 24 CP) +4 (Dex) +7 (Cha) +1 (Resistance) = +20
  • Will: +2 (Purchased, 6 CP) +3 (Wis) +7 (Cha) +1 Resistance = +13
    • When “Berserk” add another +2 to Saves.
• Proficient with Light and Medium Armor with the Smooth modifier, Specialized/only to eliminate the Armor Check Penalty (13 CP), Proficient with All Simple and Martial Weapons (9 CP).

   Combat Information:

• Initiative: +6
• Move: 90′
• Armor Class: 10 (Base) +4 (Dex) +8 (Armor) +4 (Shield) +3 (Natural) +1 (Martial Art) = 30
• Usual Weapons:
  • Greatsword: +25/+25/+20 (+8 BAB +5 Str +7 Cha +4 Martial Art +1 Magic), for 4d6+19+1 Con Damage (2d6 Base +2d6 Negative Energy [+5 Str +7 Cha]x1.5 +1 Magic), Crit 19-20/x2.
  • Longsword: +25/+25/+20 (+8 BAB +5 Str +7 Cha +4 Martial Art +1 Magic), for 1d8+2d6+13+1 Con Damage (1d8 Base +2d6 Negative Energy +5 Str +7 Cha), Crit 19-20/x2. Usually adamant, since he simply creates these as needed.
  • Unarmed Attack: +24/+24/+19 (+8 BAB +5 Str +7 Cha +4 Martial Art), for 1d4+2d6+12+1 Con Damage (1d4 Base +2d6 Negative Energy +5 Str +7 Cha), Crit 20/x2.
  • Composite Longbow: +12/+12/+7 (+8 BAB +4 Dex), for 1d6+12 (1d8 Base +5 Str +7 Cha), Crit 20/x3.
    • Martial Arts: Automatically trips opponents on critical hits, +5′ Reach, may make up to six melee attacks as touch attacks in any one week.
    • When “Berserk” add +6 to hit, one iterative attack at -10, and +2 damage (+3 with Greatsword).

   Other Abilities:

   Advanced Blademaster Training (24 CP):

• Block/Missile (4 CP), Corrupted/only usable while using a sword.
• Immunity/the distinction between weapons and himself (Common, Minor, Major, Specialized in Swords, 3 CP). For true blademasters, their weapons are truly extensions of themselves; attempts to sunder or disarm them are simply treated as normal attacks against hem, and any touch-based powers and “unarmed” combat enhancements or martial arts which they may possess operate through their blades.
• Reflex Training/Combat Reflexes Variant (6 CP). He gets five attacks of opportunity per round.
• Improved Initiative +2 (3 CP).
• Immunity/Penalties for wearing armor (Very Common, Minor, Trivial, Specialized in eliminating Dexterity Bonus Caps – raising them by +2) (2 CP). With this ability, and the Chitin Mail effect below, Borez essentially suffers no penalties for wearing full plate armor.
• Fast Learner, Specialized in BAB for Double Effect (+2 CP/Level) (6 CP).

   The Lesser Mastery (10 CP):

   Powerful enchanted objects are rare and expensive, while few men possess the potential to wield the greater magics – but a great many people can learn a few techniques for channeling ambient magical energy into enhancing their abilities.

• Innate Enchantment: 11,000 GP effective value, Specialized/all effects are represented by exotic sigils on the skin, his innate magics block the effects of spells and powers that would normally supersede the bonuses they grant, and adding or upgrading enchantments requires strange and exotic ingredients (6 CP). All of his innate enchantments are Spell Level One, Caster Level One, Unlimited-Use Use-Activated, and Personal-Only where relevant. The effects include:
  • Chitin Mail: L1 Transmutation. For one minute per level of the caster whatever armor the user is wearing is treated as being one armor category lighter. The maximum dexterity bonus increases by two, the armor check penalty is reduced by two, arcane spell failure goes down by 15% (to a minimum of 5%), and the speed penalty is eliminated (1400 GP).
  • Enhanced Attributes/+2 Each to Str, Dex, and Cha (4200 GP).
  • Light Foot: L1 Transmutation. The user becomes extremely light on his or her feet, gaining a +30 circumstance bonus on his or her ground movement speed, a +10 circumstance bonus on jump checks, and DR 10 versus Falling Damage [only], for 1d6+2 rounds. The user is, however, considered one size category smaller in a Bull Rush, Grapple, Trip, or Overrun situation (1400 GP).
  • Personal Haste: Provides +30′ Movement and +1 attack at the user’s full BAB when making a full attack (2000 GP).
  • Shield: Provides a +4 Shield Bonus to AC and protects against Magic Missiles (2000 GP).
• Immunity to Dispelling, Antimagic, and Countermagic (Common/Minor/Great. Specialized in protecting innate enchantments only, Corrupted/only covers powers in this package (4 CP)
• A great many campaigns will limit characters to 11,000 GP worth of Innate Enchantments – enough to grant characters some interesting and useful powers, and to make them considerably more likely to survive at lower levels, but not enough to make any really major changes at high levels. This batch of abilities would normally cost 880 XP to activate – but we don’t really need to worry about that in an NPC.

   Blessings of the Darkness (24 CP).

   Long decades of service and honor as a mortal had earned Borez several blessings – some modest portion of the powers of a true Paladin. Of course – as often happens when a mortal finds such a path too difficult to follow and turns to darkness – the powers of the lower planes were more than happy to replace those lost blessings.

• Improved Augmented Bonus: May add his (Cha Mod) to his Reflex Saving Throws, Specialized/only works as long as he continues to enjoy the favor of the dark powers (6 CP).
• Improved Augmented Bonus: May add his (Cha Mod) to his Will Saving Throws, Specialized/only works as long as he continues to enjoy the favor of the dark powers (6 CP).
• Luck with +4 Bonus Uses (12 CP).

   The Lure of the Night (Net 12 CP):

   This isn’t a tremendous amount of power – although the ability to simply create his weapons and armor on the spot is pretty handy – but it is a good deal more than most villagers ever get, it’s fairly versatile, and it can be used without destroying his disguise. It’s also something that he can offer to teach new recruits. Besides, the small illusions – and the ability to deceive divination effects – both come in very handy in masking his true nature.

• Witchcraft III (18 CP). Total Power 30, Save DC 20.
• Pacts: Spirit, Souls, Gateway, and Hunted (-24 CP).
• Basic Abilities: The Adamant Will, Elfshot, Glamour, The Hand of Shadows, The Inner Eye, Shadowweave, and Witchsight.
• Advanced Witchcraft: +3d6 Power (6 CP), The Path of Darkness/Nightforge (one power to create 20 pounds of “adamant” for one hour, 6 CP) and The Dark Flame (one power for +6 Charisma for ten minutes, 6 CP).

   Minor Abilities (25 CP):

   OK, here we have some little stuff that really isn’t part of any of the other packages.

• Unholy Inspiration: +(Cha Mod) daily uses of Channeling (3 CP).
• Hardening Exercises: This buys off the Corruption on his natural damage reduction versus physical damage, taking it from 10/magic to 10/- (4 CP).
• Might of the Inferno: Berserker, +4 BAB and +4 Cha for ten rounds (1 + Level/3, currently four) times per day. Note that, as a cold-hearted Undead, Borez is immune to the mental-focusing effects of invoking this power.
• Enhanced Strike/Crushing. Once per minute he may apply all the damage from a full attack sequence as a single attack (6 CP).
• Adept: May buy the Bluff, Concentration, Diplomacy, and Intimidate skills for half cost (6 CP).

   The Hellfire Forge (8 CP):

   Borez has learned to channel his unholy power into a selection of vicious relics – forging them in the infernal flame of his own corrupted spirit.

• Double Enthusiast, Specialized in Relics for double effect (4 CP worth of Relics) (6 CP).
• Create Relic, Specialized and Corrupted/only points from Enthusiast, maximum of 2 CP Relics (2 CP).

   His usual selection includes:

   Torc of the Deceiver (2 CP Relic):

   This elegant silver neckpiece is inlaid with gold and studded with small gems, outlining the form of a serpent biting it’s own tail, and wearing a similar serpent-collar of it’s own.

• Shapeshift, with Shape of Death, Specialized and Corrupted/only allows shifting into a normal human and is essentially cosmetic. The user seems quite normal and can eat, drink, and enjoy the other pleasures of life – but his or her actual game statistics are unchanged. Unfortunately, any major use of dark powers (such as his Infernal Command abilities) will burn away the quasi-illusory shell like tissue paper (4 CP).
• Advanced Shape of Death/the user may become Incorporeal. Corrupted/this state can only be sustained for a few minutes at a time (4 CP).
• Cloaking/detection effects show the user as a normal human, Specialized/only works while the user is Shapeshifted into human form (3 CP).
• +2 Bonus Uses of Shapeshifting (3 CP).
• With a total cost of 14 CP, the Torc of the Deceiver is a 2 CP Relic.

   Obsidian Athame (1 CP Relic):

   This razor-sharp obsidian blade glitters with crimson sparks deep within when called upon, although the blade becomes cloudier as fewer “charges” remain in it. It’s powers are both Specialized and Corrupted/their “charges” can only be recovered (a maximum of once per day) by the using the blade to in the ritual sacrifice of a sapient being to the dark powers.

• +(2 x Cha Mod) uses of Luck (4 CP).
• +2d6 (10) Mana with the Spell Enhancement option (4 CP). Note that a sacrifice will only restore two points of this reserve – but Anek can call upon it to unleash a few really impressive spells if he must.
• With a total cost of 8 CP, the Dark Athame is a 1 CP Relic.

   The Shard of Dust (1 CP Relic):

   This fragment of fossil bone embedded in a limestone matrix links the user to the centuries of death which lie hidden in the earth and stone of the world.

• Channeling/Conversion to a Level Five Effect (9 CP). The spell is Dust of Ages – a version of Animate Dead that requires neither gems nor bodies. Unfortunately, the lack of a solid structure means that the creatures called forth are unstable, and will return to the dust from which they were summoned after 1d4+1 hours.
• With a total cost of 9 CP, the Shard of Dust is – just barely – a 1 CP Relic. Borez usually uses it when he wants some disposable muscle.

   Skill Points: 25 (CP Spent) +44 (Int) +22 (Racial) = 91 SP.

• Str (+5) Climb, Jump +40 (1 SP +24 Speed +10 Light Foot), Swim.
• Dex (+4) Balance, Escape Artist, Hide, Move Silently, Open Lock, Ride, Sleight of Hand +5 (1 SP), Tumble, and Use Rope.
• Int (+4) Appraise, Craft (Armorsmith +10 (6 SP), Weaponsmith +5 (1 SP)), Decipher Script, Forgery, Knowledge (Arcana, Architecture and Engineering +5 (1 SP), Dungeoneering, Geography +5 (1 SP), History +5 (1 SP), Local +5 (1 SP), Nature, Nobility and Royalty +5 (1 SP), Religion +5 (1 SP), The Planes +5 (1 SP)), Search, Speak Language +9 (5 SP), and Spellcraft +10 (6 SP).
• Wis (+3) Heal, Listen +13 (10 SP), Profession, Sense Motive +14 (11 SP), Spot +14 (11 SP), and Survival.
• Chr (+7) Bluff* +18 (5 SP), Concentration* +18 (5 SP), Diplomacy* +18 (5 SP), Disguise +18 (1 SP +10 Hat), Gather Information, Handle Animal, Intimidate* +18 (5 SP), Nightmare Storm Martial Art +17 (10 SP), Perform/Stringed Instruments +8 (1 SP), Use Magic Device.

Skills marked with an “*” are half-price due to Adept.

   Nightmare Storm Martial Art (Cha)

   This martial art focuses on channeling negative energy into the user’s hands and weapons, allowing him or her to cleave through armor to hit more accurately, absorb the energy of incoming blows with his or her bare skin, sense the life energy of foes, cause them to crumple when struck, and to disrupt their bodies with a mere touch. It is, however, a terrible strain on the metabolism of a living creature…

• Requires: Ability to channel negative energy and Imbuement (Unarmed Combat)
• Basic Abilities: Attack 4, Defenses 3, Strike, Synergy/Channeling Checks.
• Advanced and Master Techniques: Blind-Fight, Mighty Blow, Reach, and Weapon Kata (Pick).
• Occult Techniques: Inner Strength x2, Paralyze, and Touch Strike.
• Known Techniques (9): Attack 4, Defenses 1, Mighty Blow, Reach, Inner Strength, and Touch Strike.

   Notable Equipment:

• “Dark Ambassador”: A +1 Folding (a trivial “Hideaway” variant, it fits into a dagger’s sheathe) Greatsword (4350 GP). He usually has this up his sleeve so that he can appear unarmed.
  • Lesser Crystal of Return: Allows him to draw Dark Ambassador as free action or to call it to him from up to thirty feet away as a move action (1000 GP).
• Two very expensive Unholy Symbols; one securely fastened around his neck, the other mounted on a bracer on his left wrist (5000 GP).
• A Composite Longbow for a +12 Str Mod (1300 GP).
• A Handy Haversack (2000 GP).
• Dust of Tracelessness (250 GP).
• A Potion of Invisibility (300 GP).

Head	Hat of Disguise: Disguise Self at will (1800 GP).
Eyes
Throat	Chronocharm of the Horizon Walker: May take a half-move that does not provoke attacks of opportunity as a swift action three times per day (Upgraded, 3/day instead of 1/day, 1500 GP).
Torso	Vest of Resistance +1 (1000 GP).
Body
Waist	Belt of Endurance: 3 Charges/Day, spend 1/2/3 as a swift action to gain 12/18/24 temporary hit points. These last for up to ten minutes, but don’t stack with other temporary hit points (2300 GP).
Shoulders
Forearms
Hands
Ring	Ring of Retaliation. The evil version of a Ring of Vengeance; 3/day, when a critical hit is scored on the wearer, the attacker will be blasted with 5d6 profane damage, no save. No action is required (4500 GP).
Ring	Ring of Mystic Fire. +1 Caster Level with Fire-Based Spells, 3 Charges/Day, spend 1/2/3 charges as part of a spellcasting action to add +2/3/4 d6 of damage to a fire-based spell (7500 GP).
Feet	Boots of Stomping. 3/Day as a standard action topple creatures and objects in a 15′ cone, Reflex DC 15 to avoid falling if on the ground (600 GP)

   And figure about 600 GP worth of normal gear – A dagger or two, arrows, a blanket (mostly for keeping up appearances), pens, ink, and paper, a coil of silk rope, a light pack, a few alchemical items, tools, a musical instrument, a couple of courtier’s outfits (with the relevant jewelry), and so on.

   Oh no! That’s 34,000 GP! Almost as much gear as an ECL 13 non-player character or an ECL 9 player character could be expected to have! Nearly 6000 GP over his base 28,000 GP allowance! How could that happen?

   Personally, I figure that he raided a few merchants, pillaged a small town, or mugged a few low-level adventurers. He’s very powerful, he’s evil, he can easily defeat a small horde of low-level types, and he can teleport and walk through walls. Money just isn’t really a problem for villains; unlike monsters that hide in secret lairs and distant dungeons, townsfolk are really easy to find.

   His tactics are generally straightforward:

• In the face of minor opposition, he will rely on his passive or mundane talents – exploiting his spell resistance, high armor class, and ability to block attacks while he casually lashes out with a physical weapon. If he takes damage – unlikely in any conflict with lesser foes – he’ll let his Grant of Aid take care of it. He may even let lesser foes escape, or fall back, to maintain his pretense of being nothing more than a poseur.
• If he’s facing a powerful group of foes, or major magical opponents, he’ll generally lash out with magic first. He can, if necessary, unleash two quickened spells per round on his action and one quickened spell as a reflex action – and even if he saves the reflexive spell for a defensive effect or counterspell, one or two good blasting spells (usually boosted by his Ring of Mystic Fire) can go a long ways towards cutting down on his opponents. Unfortunately, with an effective caster level of only nine at the moment, his higher-level spells aren’t yet as effective as they might be.
• If he has a few moments to prepare, using the Shard of Dust (one of his usual Relics) to call up a few powerful skeletons is usually a good idea – and he does have a total of 30 ECL or CR worth of followers of up to CR or ECL 8. Personally, I’d give him a
  • A Nightmare (CR 5) to serve as a steed.
  • An Imp (CR 2) to serve as a contact with his dark masters.
  • A Barghest (CR 5) to devour victims that he wants to make sure do not turn up again.
  • And some Undead – perhaps a trio of Advanced Megaraptor Skeletons (CR 6 each) that somehow turned out to be stable after being summoned or some more-or-less random creatures drawn from the surrounding area.
    • Of those, however, only the Imp and perhaps the Nightmare and Barghest are likely to be immediately available; the Skeletons aren’t much for blending in and will have to be stashed somewhere.
• Borez prefers not to leave anyone alive who knows his real identity, and – unless there’s a good reason not to – he fights to kill. He WILL spend one of his attacks making sure that a fallen opponent is really dead, pursue fleeing opponents, and go after weaker targets first. Having to block a bothersome Attack of Opportunity is a small price to pay for moving past a warrior to take down a weak target. He isn’t sporting, and he doesn’t fight fair. The only reason he isn’t dripping with poison is that he would rather spend his money on more useful things.
• He knows perfectly well that – thanks to his high armor class, blocks, and damage reduction – he can withstand one heck of a lot of physical punishment. Ergo, he’ll focus on eliminating any spellcasting or energy-wielding enemies first.
• Regardless of the nature of his opponents, if he takes too much damage, he’ll try to escape – either by exploiting his movement charms and high movement rate or via Dimension Door or Teleport. He’ll normally save at least one spell slot of the appropriate level for that. He’s not the greatest genius in d20 history, but he’s no fool.

   OK: Borez is both figuratively and literally something of a monster. Hopefully any party that encounters him will be at least somewhat aware of what they’re up against, will have taken the appropriate precautions, will have characters with spell absorption and powerful defensive talents of their own, and will be good and ready for the fight. Otherwise he could quite possibly pull off a total party kill.

   Of course, this is a Halloween character. Go ahead, have a total party kill, and then let them all wake up with some of the creepy talents from last years Halloween article series. Here we have Part I, Part II, and Part III.

The Knights of Hades

   The Knights of Hades are the cursed spirits of noble knights, paladins, and other mighty warriors who. once dedicated to the forces of light. turned from that allegiance and swore themselves to darkness and destruction for reasons of affronted pride, unrequited lust, or blind wrath – and who then perished without renouncing that goal, or admitting that it was unjustified, despite knowing of their coming doom.

   Few mortal warriors are powerful, prideful, and frustrated enough to qualify – and those few are greatly valued by the powers of darkness. By virtue of their embracing both evil and death, they can be returned to the material planes as Undead, still possessed of much of their mortal powers (along with their new powers as powerful undead) – rather than having to wait to be summoned as easily-banished Outsiders.

   Knight of Hades Template:

Greater Undead Package (64 CP/+2 ECL).

   All of these effects are Specialized: the user becomes an undead horror, seeks to prey on the living, becomes vulnerable to being Turned (Channeling), and will find it essentially impossible to turn away from evil without dying. This does mean that a couple of the defenses are double-specialized, but – in this case – the effects don’t overlap, and so I’ll give permission for that.

• No Constitution score (0 CP). Includes immunity to ability damage (including all poisons), ability drain, energy drain, and effects requiring fortitude saves unless they work on objects or are harmless. Does not breathe, eat, or sleep, cannot tire, and can move, work, or remain alert indefinitely. They cannot be Raised or Reincarnated and are instantly destroyed at 0 HP.
• Negative Energy Metabolism (0 CP): Undead are healed and enhanced by negative energy and harmed or hindered by positive energy, instead of the reverse. As a side effect, they regain 10 HP whenever they would normally suffer a negative level, but treat Positive Levels as negative levels.
• Finesse (3 CP): May substitute their (Cha Mod) for their (Con Mod) when calculating hit points and related effects such as concentration checks.
• Immunity to things which affect biological processes (Very Common/Major/Epic, Corrupted: cannot heal naturally, must use other special abilities, 15 CP). This includes paralysis, stunning damage, nonlethal damage, diseases, death effects, critical hits, and most necromancy effects.
• Immunity to all mind-affecting effects (charms, compulsions, phantasms, patterns, and morale effects) (Common/Major/Legendary, Corrupted/the user loses all but vague memories of most positive emotions, 12 CP).
• Occult Sense/Darkvision (3 CP).
• Damage Reduction 5/-, Specialized/only versus physical attacks for Double Effect (10/-), Corrupted/not versus Magical Weapons (4 CP)
• Immunity to Energy Attacks. That’s Very Common, Major, Great/60 Points, Specialized and Corrupted/only works against cold and electricity (5 CP).
• Leadership: Greater Undead normally have other undead – or infernal – followers (3 CP).
• Imbuement with the Improved and Superior modifiers/unarmed variant (9 CP). The touch of the Undead can have a variety of effects depending on how powerful they are.
• +4 Turn Resistance (4 CP).
• Defender, Specialized for Double Effect (+2xLevel/5 rounded down Natural Armor, 6 CP).

   This sub-package is suitable for any character who wants to be undead. Just apply it as a +2 ECL acquired template and get some way to heal your injuries…

   Knight of Hades Upgrades

(over the Greater Undead package):

   Knights of Hades add the following items to the basic Greater Undead Package, leaving them subject to the same limitations. This does require that the limitations be upgraded a bit though; the Knights of Hades are major champions of the Dark Powers – and so their activities draw a constant stream of attacks, interventions, and opposition from good churches, higher powers, and other powerful creatures of good.

   Infernal Leadership Package (+35 CP):

• +4 Charisma (Half cost in a Template, 12 CP).
• Unholy Might: Augmented Bonus/adds (Cha Mod) to (Str Mod) for the purposes of combat and other applications of brute force (3 CP).
• Presence/Aura of Cause Fear (3 CP).
• Spell Resistance 10 + Level (6 CP).
• Grant of Aid with +12 Bonus Uses, Specialized/only heals hit point damage (6 CP).
• Upgrade Turn Resistance to Immunity to Turning (Common, Severe, Major, +2 CP).
• Returning. Unless you take care to entrap a Knight of Hades soul when you destroy it, or chase it back to the lower planes and disrupt it there, they tend to come back (3 CP).
• Major Privilege/can confirm Witchcraft Pacts and swear followers to the Powers of Darkness (3 CP).

   Infernal Command Package (58 CP):

   Newly-recruited Knights of Hades are generally powerful warriors, but usually lack the ability to cast, or effectively counter, spells. To counter this weakness, they are granted the direct command over magical energies. That doesn’t give them any particularly sophisticated effects to call on, but it certainly gives them a variety of options.

• Inherent Spells: 12xL1 (12 CP), 8x L2 (15 CP), 8x L3 (17 CP), 8x L4 (17 CP), and 8x L5 (17 CP). All Specialized and Corrupted: Only usable to power Theurgy, immediate commands only, blatantly displays the user’s nature when used via a burst of infernal energies (incidentally negating any attempt at stealth), attracts the notice of various powers of light. Caster Level = User’s Level, Save DC is Charisma based. Net cost: 26 CP.
• Metamagic/Easy and Metamagic/Elemental Manipulation with the Fast modifier and four levels of Streamline, all Specialized and Corrupted/Only works to Quicken his spells and to change the damage of damage-causing spells to Profane/Negative Energy damage, requires the patronage of the greater powers of the lower planes, who WILL demand regular services and offerings, must possess – and prominently display – a very expensive (2500 GP+) bejeweled unholy symbol to gain this enhancement (14 CP).
• Mastery x2/all Theurgy Verb Skills, Specialized for Double Effect (may “Take 20”)/Immediate commands only: No long-term enchantments, duration spells, triggered or waiting effects, etc (12 CP).
• Augmented Bonus/adds (Cha Mod) to all Theurgy Skills (6 CP). Note that it requires a Cha Mod of at least +3 to use fourth level effects and of at least +5 to use fifth level effects.
• Reflex Action with +8 Bonus Uses, Specialized and Corrupted/only for Theurgy, only allows a single spell to be cast despite the Quickening effect (6 CP).

   That gives our Knights of Hades a total template cost of 160 CP – in +4 ECL territory. If you’re converting a character into a Knight of Hades in Eclipse, simply add that to his or her racial package, eliminate any overlapping or conflicting elements (such as a Constitution bonus or Penalty), and see what you wind up with.

   If you start with a normal human though, you’ll still wind up with a +4 ECL modifier.

Eclipse d20 – Torak Rosul, ECL 19 Lord of Darkness

   This year for Halloween, we have the vampire-lord of a cursed land…

   Decay cannot be forever denied – but it can be diverted.

   When one refuses to accept the decay of the mortal body, that decay can, instead, be transferred to the immortal soul.

   Over time, all that is good and noble within such a cursed spirit will become utterly corrupt.

   The mind will become twisted as well, the victim of strange obsessions, of fantasies and madness.

   The body will become little more than an illusion, a specter of what once was.

   The circle of decay – the vortex of corruption surrounding such a creatures unnatural bridge between life and death – will widen, drawing beasts, innocent spirits, and the very elements of the natural world under the dominion of the lost and corrupted soul as it’s decay spreads into all it touches.

   There may be times of temporary surcease, as the fallen soul lies suspended between the worlds – but always the corruption will rise again until, at last, some fortunate – and often frightened – hero finally finds the keys to unbind the curse, and releases the soul into the surcease of true death at last.

   Only then will the balance be restored and the miasma of corruption be lifted from the land.

   Long centuries ago, a sordid tale played out – a tale of jealousy, betrayal, and kinslaying. Curses were exchanged, vengeful oaths were sworn, and dying mortals attempted – at all costs – to cling to the fading embers of life.

   Such tales have played out ten thousand times, and will continue to play out as long as mortals – for good or ill – endure.

   Unlike most such tales, one participant – a once-noble lord – possessed the ability to give his oath of death and vengeance, his implicit pact with darkness – and his doom – real power.

   Refusing death, he steals the lives of others in an endless – hopeless – attempt to cling to what he has lost and – perhaps this time – to find a way to restore his past.

   Here, in the deep and shadowed valleys of the forested mountains, the remnants of an ancient barony have waited for heros long indeed – long enough for the slow corruption of the area to become deeply-rooted and for hopelessness to have become a way of life.

   That once-lord is now usually known as Torak Rosul – a badly-corrupted form of a phrase in the old tongue, that once meant Blood-Drinking Corpse-Demon. It’s possible that – in his madness – even he no longer remembers his original name.

   Torak normally lurks in his secret crypt, buried deep beneath the mountains some miles from the ruins of his ancient castle.

   That doesn’t keep him from playing quite an active role in the area though. He can take Astral or Ethereal spirit-journeys using Dreamfaring, leaving his body behind – and, when he wants to do so, he can use his witchcraft to manifest a shadowy Astral Construct VI to use as a body on the material realm.

• In a wolf- or bat-like form he roams the forests, spying, checking the borders of his realm, and leading his packs of worgs. .
• In a humanlike body, wrapped in a shell of illusion, he takes the form of Elmain Varith – a local healer, wise-man, and sage, allowing him to easily monitor the activities of most “adventurers” who intrude upon his realm.
• As a healer, he sees most of the villagers children early on. Those who awaken his hunger, or who remind him of his own, centuries-lost, offspring, he will set his links upon and slowly drain from afar – so many children die young in any case – and finally steal their souls, either binding them into the bodies of wolves to create more minions or sealing them into the walls of his crypt, so that their imprisoned tender spirits will be constantly with him – and constantly available to fuel his power. Of course, he ensures that those he does not take grow up strong and healthy, well-fed and well-protected, to produce the next generation of his prey. The overall casualty rate is pretty close to what it is in other lands…
• In another humanlike body, he is a mysterious merchant – a man who brings strange and terrible bargains, bestowing prosperity and wealth in exchange for dark prices. As Ahriman Viscal, he recruits his spies and agents and gathers sacrifices.

   Torak may be quite mad, and utterly corrupt, but he is incredibly dangerous – and is a pervasive force within his lands.

• If you mention his name – or even his major aliases – there, he will hear you, and can reach out to use some of his lesser powers upon you.
• He can influence the minds of the population, turning them against you in murderous mobs, causing riots, soothing away warnings, and spreading fear and terror.
• He has many, many, servants.
• He can kill with words, wields terrible magic, and is quite deadly in physical combat as well.
• You may kill “him” – in his projected bodies – many, many, times, with no real effect.
• He is a gateway for the dark powers to spread their influence over the world.
• He is – in many ways – the prototype. Most other vampires are lesser, superficial, reflections of HIM, even if their power is far more self-contained.

   He is not, however, without his weaknesses.

• He is bound to his land, and his power is gravely weakened beyond it’s borders.
• He is repelled by the sacred, vulnerable to purification, and bound by social rituals.
• He must draw on external sources to recover his psychic Power – and his reserves, while great, can be exhausted.
• He must bind the land to him to use many of his powers within it, and to draw on it to fuel his dark magics – and those links can be disrupted and broken, gravely weakening him.
• He relies on the people of his land to provide offerings and service – but beneath it all, even his power cannot conceal what he is from them, and so they can be turned against him.
• He can replace his minions only slowly.
• His devices can be taken from him.
• One of his greatest strengths lies in secrecy – but there are always ways to seek out the forgotten past. His betrayed brother may live the life of a ravenous, maddened, werebeast roaming the hills and forests, but he cannot die while Torak endures. The spirit of his architect has passed beyond his power, but can still be reached by clever mortals. There are records in temples and other places that enjoy some protection from his power – and in other lands, which lie beyond his reach.
• There are traces of his life – and relics of his past which can torment and harm him – scattered across the land.

   He can be defeated. Do not expect it to be a quick and simple battle. You will have to first discover his presence, then exploit his weaknesses to reduce his power, and then – perhaps – you will be able to banish him.

   Hopefully forever.

   Torak Rosul

Accursed Elder Vampire, Child of the Dreadful Night.

   Available Character Points: 456 (Level eighteen base) +10 (Disadvantages: Accursed/vulnerable to relics of his forgotten past, Compulsive/searches for the reincarnated spirits of his family, and Insane) +36 (Duties; despite his own corruption of the land and predation on it’s people, Torak regards it as his duty to protect his realm from both foreign invaders and from other monsters) +4 (Unique Training, as an Champion of the Dark Powers. See; Godfire) +42 (seven bonus feats) = 548 CP.

   Human Racial Abilities:

• Bonus Feat (+3 CP to Fast Learner, Below, Specialized Adept/Buys Perform/Oratory and Spellcraft at half cost, 6 CP total).
• Fast Learner, Specialized in Skills for Double Effect (+2 SP/Level, 6 CP).

   Child of the Dreadful Night (Acquired +53 CP template):

• Shapeshift with the Dire, Shrinking, and Hybrid modifiers. Corrupted/only to take the form of predatory mammals (12 CP).
• Damage Reduction 10, Corrupted/Does not work when exposed to sunlight (24 CP).
• Unique Returning: A Child of the Dreadful Night can only be destroyed by finding a way to remove their curse and then killing them (18 CP).
• +4 Turn Resistance (8 CP).
• Defender: +(2 x Level/5 rounded down) Natural Armor (6 CP). .
• Reflex Training/Combat Reflexes Variant (6 CP).
• Improved Initiative +6 (9 CP).
• Cloaking/detects as a normal human (6 CP).
• Augmented Bonus x2: May add their (Int Mod) to their (Cha Mod) and (Wis Mod) for skill purposes (12 CP).

   For all their power, the Children of the Dreadful Night have several major weaknesses:

• They are repelled by sacred objects and places. They may not enter good temples and can be held at bay by a strongly presented holy symbol in the hands of a believer (sadly, this merely means that they must stand back and rely on less-physical attacks). Presenting such a symbol is a standard action each round.
• They are vulnerable to purification. Contact with purifying forces – sunlight, running water, fire, salt, garlic, exorcism rituals, sacred chants, and similar things – inflicts 3d6 damage per round or active exposure, bypassing their damage resistance.
• They, like the fey, are bound by social rituals. They must respect hospitality, be invited to enter a private home – unless, of course, they own the place (once invited, they are free to return unless the invitation is ritually rescinded), exchange gifts, keep their promises, honor debts, and return favors.
• They are unnatural and disturbing. They upset animals (-10 on relevant rolls), blight plants growing nearby, set off magical alarms, disturb ancient magics, twist areas towards evil, cause strange weather, and bring up undead from old graves by their mere presence.

   Thanks to these limitations, the entire package is considered Specialized for half cost (except for Defender, which is double effect). That reduces the net cost from 101 CP to 53 CP. Added to the 9 CP base cost for a human, that comes to a +1 ECL Racial Modifier.

   Basic Attributes:

	Str	Dex	Con	Int	Wis	Cha
Rolled	14	14	(13)	16	14	17
Level	—	—	(+1)	—	—	+3
Inherent	—	—	—	+4	+4	+4
Profane	—	—	—	+6	—	+6
Items	—	+4	—	+4	+4	+4
Wealth	—	—	—	—	—	+2
Total	14	18	—	30	22	36

   In manifested forms:

Wolf	37	17	—	30	22	36
Bat/Man	33	17	—	30	22	36

   Basic Abilities (146 CP):

• Hit Points: 12 (L1d12, 8 CP) + 54 (L2-18 d4, 0 CP) +247 (18 x Cha Mod) = 313
• BAB +11 (66 CP)
• Saves:
  • Fortitude: Not applicable.
  • Reflex: +10 (Purchased, 30 CP) +4 (Dex) +4 (Res) = +18
  • Will: +10 (Purchased, 30 CP) +11 (Wis) +4 (Res) = +25
• Proficient with Light Armor (3 CP), Proficient with All Simple and Martial Weapons (9 CP).

   Combat Information:

• Initiative: +10
• Move: 30′
• Armor Class: 10 (Base) +4 (Dex) +8 (Armor +2 Wealth) +6 (Shield +2 Wealth) +7 Natural +4 (Martial Art) = 39
• Unarmed Attack: +20/+15/+10 (+11 BAB +2 Str +1 Magic +4 Martial Art +2 Wealth) for 1d12 +1 (magic) +2 (strength) +2 (Wealth) +1d8+2 (fire) +2 Negative Levels. Crit 20/x3 (adds another 2d12+10).

   In Manifested Forms:

• Wolf or Man-Wolf Form: 85 HP, 50′ Move, AC 28 (10 Base +15 Natural +3 Dex), Attacks +19/+19 for 1d12+1d8+23+2 Level Drain Adamant Magic, Crit 20/x2 on dice. Form Options: Celerity +10, Damage Reduction 5/Magic, Knockdown (those hit must make a DC 22 Str check or be knocked prone), Fast Healing II, +4 Str, and +4 Dex.
• Bat, Dire Bat, or Bat-Man Form: 85 HP, 40′ Move, 60′ Flight (Good), AC 32 (10 Base +15 Natural +3 Dex +4 Deflection). Attacks +17/+17 for 1d12+1d8+20+2 Level Drain Adamant Magic, Crit 20/x2 on dice. Form Options: Fly III (60′, Good), Fast Healing II, Heavy Deflection and +4 Dex.
• Man-Form Options: 85 HP, 40′ Move, AC 32 (10 Base +15 Natural +3 Dex +4 Deflection). Attacks +17/+17 for 1d12+1d8+20+2 Level Drain Adamant Magic, Crit 20/x2 on dice. Form Options: Swim 30′. Tunnel 10′, Mobility, Fast Healing II, Heavy Deflection and +4 Dex.

   Skills:

   Skill Points: 41 (CP Spent) +84 (Int, Inherent bondrune boost applied at L4 as a young lord) +42 (Racial) = 167 SP.

• Str (+2 or +13): Climb, Jump +5/+16, Swim +3/+14
• Dex (+4 or +3): Balance +5/+4, Escape Artist, Hide, Move Silently, Open Lock, Ride +5 (-10 with normal animals), Sleight of Hand, Tumble, and Use Rope.
• Con (No Add):
• Int (+10): Appraise, Craft, Decipher Script +12, Forgery +12, Knowledge (Arcana* +31, Architecture and Engineering +11, Dungeoneering +12, Geography +12, History +15, Local +12, Nature +12, Nobility and Royalty +15, Religion +12, The Planes +15), Search, Speak Language, and Spellcraft* +31.
• Wis (+16): Heal +17, Listen, Profession, Sense Motive* +37, Spot +36, and Survival.
• Chr (+23): Bluff, Concentration* +44, Diplomacy +46, Disguise* +44, Gather Information +35, Handle Animal +13, Intimidate +25, Perform/Oratory* +44, Use Magic Device +24.
• “Unarmed” Martial Art/Int (+27/14 known abilities): Attack +4, Defenses +4, Strike, Expertise, Instant Stand, Sunder, Whirlwind Attack. Occult techniques are not usable due to his lack of constitution.

   Skills marked with an “*” are half-price due to Adept. No, I’m not bothering to account for synergy bonuses. I have included the wealth bonuses for the social skills, +2 masterwork references and tools can be assumed wherever applicable.

   Minor Powers (42 CP).

• Adept. May buy Concentration, Disguise, Knowledge/Arcana, and Sense Motive at half cost (6 CP).
• Dominion (6 CP). Torak usually has at least a hundred Dominion Points in reserve.
• Action Hero/Stunts (6 CP): This is – as it is for most bad guys – Torak’s final “save my neck!” option. He has 46 action points in reserve, since he is VERY reluctant to spend any.
• Luck with +4 Bonus Uses (12 CP).
• Reflex Training/three actions per day variant, with +4 Bonus Uses (12 CP).

   Witchcraft (213 CP).

   Over the long dark centuries, Torak has become one of the most powerful witches in history – although he does lump a few related abilities that technically aren’t witchcraft into the bundle:

• Fast Learner specialized in Witchcraft (6 CP). At L18 this provides 36 extra CP for Witchcraft.
• Seventeen levels of the Wilder Spellcasting Progression based on Cha, Specialized/power does not recover normally (51 CP). This provides 360 Power and the abilities of: Energy Wave (L7), Inertial Armor (L1), Mass Cloud Minds (L6), Psionic Dominate (L4), Psionic Freedom of Movement (L4), Mass Missive (a L5 upgraded version, can be sent to any area within one mile per level of the user, may send lengthy messages), Temporal Acceleration (L6), and Touchsight (L3). Save DC 23+Power Level.
• Pacts: Epic Quest (long since completed), Duties (hospitality, to guests who ask it and behave in accordance with the ancient customs), Essence (Torak does not appear in mirrors, and cannot use telephones and similar devices; he is only quasi-real and can only be seen, heard, or otherwise sensed directly, and even then only by those creatures with spirits of their own. Thus he cannot command constructs or non-sapient undead)), Vamparism (Torak’s Power does not recover naturally, but his touch does 1d4 damage and replenishes his power by the same amount), and Gateway (the more power Torak uses, the more corrupted entities from dark realms can pass out into the world) (Net -30 CP).
• Basic Witchcraft I, II, and III (18 CP) (+9 Power, and access to seven basic witchcraft abilities. Will save DC 26).
  • The Adamant Will (resist mental influences and mislead divinations), Dreamfaring (limited ethereal and astral projection), Elfshot (may lay minor curses), Glamour and Advanced Glamour (+6 CP) (projective telepathy, may enhance social skills or create L0/1-2/3 hypnotic, emotional influence, and communicative effects for 1/2/4 Power), The Hand of Shadows (minor telekinesis and animation effects for 2 Power), Healing, Hyloka (manipulation biophysical processes), Infliction (may cause up to 3d4/5d4/7d4 damage for 1/2/3 Power, +3 Power for 5’R, save for half), The Inner Eye (thought-sensing and sense-sharing, +6 on relevant rolls for one power per ten minutes), Shadoweave and Advanced Shadowweave (+6 CP) (minor illusions, 1/2/4 Power for L1/2/3 effects), Witchfire (minor molecular manipulations), and Witchsight (1 Power for one sense for one hour. Either +6 to checks or a sensory upgrade such as scent or darksight).
• Advanced Witchcraft:
• The Path of Coven Mastery:
  • Dreamgathering (6 CP): May hold as astral conference with his followers.
  • The Secret Order (6 CP): +4 Power and access to the remaining five basic witchcraft abilities.
• The Path of Spirits
  • Apparition III (18 CP): May generate a Level VI Astral Construct to use as a material-plane body while using Dreamfaring. This costs 2 Power + 1/Hour.
  • Seize the Wandering Soul (6 CP): The user may steal the spirits of the very ill or newly dead.
  • Hag-Riding (6 CP): May inflict attribute damage (up to 12 points per day, cannot reduce an attribute below six) on a willing victim or bound spirit to gain extra Power.
  • Spirit Binding II (12 CP): May bind spirits into bodies, lay the equivalent of a Lesser Geas for 3 Power, seal bargains for 1 Power, and issue simple commands (which work for up to three hours) for 3 Power.
• The Path of Darkness:
  • Voice of the Dead (6 CP): May communicate with and use social skills on the undead.
  • The Umbral Form (6 CP): May assume the form of a shadow for three power/hour.
  • Nightforge (6 CP): May create solid darkness equivalent to adamant. This lasts one hour and costs 1 Power per 20 pounds of material “created”. Victims of entrapment get a reflex save.
• The Path of Water
  • Dismissal (6 CP): May damage outsiders, Dispel Magic for 3 Power, or send extradimensional beings home for 7 Power.
  • Sympathetic Link (6 CP): May use blood, fingernails, etc, to work witchcraft effects at range.
  • Wrath of the Sea (6 CP): +6 Strength for 1 Power per 10 Minutes.
• The Path of Air:
  • Weathermonger (6 CP): Gust of Wind costs 2, Wind Wall costs 3, channeling an existing storm costs 2 Power, raising a storm costs 20 Power.
• The Path of Fire
  • Dance of Flames (6 CP): +6 Dexterity for 1 Power per 10 Minutes.
  • Leaping Fire (6 CP): Spend 2 Power for a move-equivalent action or +4 to an initiative check. Spend 3 power to be hasted for 3d4 rounds. Fast Heal (1d4+Cha Mod) HP/Round for five rounds for 1 Power.
  • The Inner Fire x3, Corrupted/does not grant access to spells of beyond the level that the user can use safely. Any higher-level spell slots must be used for spells that can be handled safely (12 CP) plus Journeyman and Master/+2 effective levels for use of Witchcraft, Specialized in The Inner Fire only (6 CP). This gives him an effective caster level ten and allows him to safely use spells of up to level five, preparing spells from the following lists. Note that these are SRD spells. If you have other spells available in your campaign, feel free to substitute some of them.
    • His Charisma grants him access to the Sorcerer/Wizard list, representing his constant arcane dabbling and many demonic bargains. He gets 4/3/3/3/3 spell slots and has eight higher-level slots to fill with spells of any lower level.
    • Sorcerer/Wizard Spells:
      • L1) Chill Touch, Grease, Expeditious Retreat, Magic Missile, Protection from Good, and Shield.
      • L2) Command Undead, Darkness, Protection from Arrows, Rope Trick, Scorching Ray, and Web.
      • L3) Dispel Magic, Fireball, Hold Person, Lightning Bolt, Nondetection, and Stinking Cloud.
      • L4) Arcane Eye, Bestow Curse, Confusion, Dimensional Anchor, Enervation, and Lesser Globe of Invulnerability,
      • L5) Cloudkill, Cone of Cold, Hold Monster, Prying Eyes, Teleport, and Wall of Force.
    • His Intelligence grants him access to the Druid Spell list, representing his mastery over the powers of corrupted nature. He gets 3/3/2/2/2 spell slots and has five higher-level slots to fill with spells of any lower level.
    • Druid Spells:
      • L1) Detect Animals or Plants, Entangle, Faerie Fire, Obscuring Mist, Pass Without Trace, and Speak with Animals.
      • L2) Cat’s Grace, Chill Metal, Fog Cloud, Tree Shape, Spider Climb, and Summon Swarm.
      • L3) Call Lightning, Contagion, Inflict Serious Wounds, Meld Into Stone, Poison, and Stone Shape.
      • L4) Blight, Control Water, Ice Storm, Protection from Energy, Reincarnate, and Rusting Grasp.
      • L5) Animal Growth, Baleful Polymorph, Call Lightning Storm, Commune with Nature, Summon Nature’s Ally V, and Unhallow,
    • His Wisdom grants him access to the Bard spell list, representing centuries of keen observation of people – and the ways in which they can be manipulated. He gets 2/2/1/1/1 spell slots and has one higher-level slot to fill with a spell of any lower level.
    • Bard Spells:
      • L1) Alarm, Comprehend Languages, Expeditious Retreat, Identify, Undetectable Alignment, and Unseen Servant.
      • L2) Glitterdust, Hold Person, Locate Object, Pyrotechnics, Summon Swarm, and Tongues.
      • L3) Clairaudience/Clairvoyance, Charm Monster, Gaseous Form, Glibness, Haste, and Slow,
      • L4) Detect Scrying, Freedom of Movement, Greater Invisibility, Modify Memory, Rainbow Pattern, and Shout.
      • L5) Greater Heroism, Mind Fog, Mislead, Seeming, Shadow Evocation, and Shadow Walk.

   The Deep Strengths of the Land (27 CP).

• Metamagical Theorems: Amplify, Easy, and Elemental Manipulation, with +6 levels of Streamline (-4 on the cost of each metamagic), Specialized/relies on mystical links to appropriate power nexi, which can only be set up 1-3 times per year and can be broken via exorcism, removal of the special talismans buried at the sites, or other meddling. He will not become aware of such meddling until he goes to use his powers – unless the Worgs which are usually guarding his power sources become aware of the interference. (27 CP).
  • In general, his spells require no components or are quickened, have twice the usual effects, and drain a level and cause victims to become exhausted if they inflict damage.

   The Dark Tongue (21 CP).

• Torak’s mere words hold a sinister and terrible power.
• Mystic Artist/Oratory (6 CP) with the Fast modifier (+6 CP) and with the Path of Whispers abilities of Subliminal, Conditioning and Compelling (18 CP) and the Path of Dissonance abilities of Distracting and Disrupting. That allows him to use the power of his voice eighteen times per day and provides access to:
• Manipulation: Fascinate, Hold Audience, Emotional Auras, Freedom, and Mass Suggestion.
• Synergy: Block, Amplify, Harmonize, Serenity, Rule the Horde, Concerto, and Carrier.
• The entire power is, however, Specialized: Torak’s influence is limited to the areas which he has claimed, and within which he has performed mystical rituals at various magical focal points scattered around those lands – opportunities for which come every few months at best. Those links can be severed by antimagic, exorcisms, and many other means – and he will generally not even become aware of that severance for some time.

   Unnatural Vitality (36 CP):

• No Constitution score (0 CP). Includes immunity to ability damage [including all poisons], ability drain, energy drain, and effects requiring fortitude saves unless they work on objects or are harmless. Does not breathe, eat, or sleep, cannot tire, and can move, work, or remain alert indefinitely. Cannot be Raised or Reincarnated and is instantly destroyed at 0 HP.
• Negative Energy Metabolism (0 CP): Torak is healed and enhanced by negative energy and harmed or hindered by positive energy, instead of the reverse. As a side effect, he regains 10 HP whenever he would normally suffer a negative level.
• Finesse: May substitute his (Cha Mod) for his (Con Mod) when calculating hit points (6 CP).
• Immunity to things which affect biological processes (Very Common/Major/Epic, Corrupted: cannot heal naturally, must use other special abilities, 30 CP). This includes paralysis, stunning damage, nonlethal damage, diseases, death effects, critical hits, and necromancy effects.
  • The conventional undead are immune to mind-affecting abilities. Given that Torak can already shield his mind quite effectively, and that I don’t really see why you can’t affect those parts of an undead creatures’s mind that actually exist, Torak isn’t purchasing this one. Similarly, he can give himself Darksight with a thought if he wants it, so he’s not buying that one either.

   The Root of All Evil – The Corruption of Wealth (15 CP)

• Major Privilege/May purchase a Wealth Level Template from The Practical Enchanter at 3 CP/Level beyond “Destitute”, Specialized/does not provide legal privileges, benefits to mounts, pets, and familiars, recognition, retainers, or per-level training bonuses. Torak has the “Affluent” wealth level (“Wealthy” with his use of a Horned Amulet, 6 CP), and so can support a dozen or so retainers at “Affluent” and plenty of people at “Well-Off”.
• Minor Privilege: Torak can easily use small occult rituals to produce Charms and Talismans (3 CP).
  • Remaining benefits of Well-Off: You get plenty to eat and drink, warm clothes, a good solid cottage, decent furniture, and live comfortably. You afford good weapons and armor if you need them and can use three Charms and a Talisman.
  • Remaining benefits of Affluent: You have many luxuries and a fine house, all your weapons and armor are treated as Masterwork, and you can use five Charms and two Talismans.
  • Remaining benefits of Wealthy: You gain a +2 Wealth Bonus to shields, armor, and weapons, may be treated as being made of special materials, +2 to Diplomacy, Gather Information, and Intimidate, +2 to any one Attribute, use of seven Charms and three Talismans.

   Torak usually provides subtle supernatural support for favored local villagers, using his malevolent powers to grant prosperity far beyond the norm, as well as providing small magics to help in daily life – although he tends to provide Black Magic Charms and Talismans mixed in with the more generally useful stuff. Such favors come at a price of course, – whether that is information, a bit of betrayal, or an unhealthy child who might not have lived anyway.

   Torak is especially fond of ploys such as cursing someone’s child with an terrible illness and then giving the desperate parent a “helpful” charm, such as a Bloody Bowl (The Practical Enchanter, page 204) full of medicine that will help for some months, allowing said parent to see their child healthy again – but it’s effects will gradually fade. The parent will find that, to maintain their child’s health, all they have to do is occasionally murder people and refill the bowl with their blood… Of course, they can kill murderers, bandits, and thieves that the local law would have killed anyway – but eventually their standards always start to slip.

• Why do this sort of thing? It’s because whenever someone draws on his power to commit a vile act, it helps restore his personal reserves: That’s Rite of Chi with +(2x Cha Mod) Bonus Uses, Specialized and Corrupted/Only usable to regain Power and Generic Spell Levels, not Mana, uses do not recover normally; he regains 1d6 uses whenever he completely drains someone’s life energy or when someone uses the powers he grants to commit a truly vile act or offers him large quantities of blood. (6 CP).

   Minions of Darkness (19 CP):

• Torak has Leadership with Beast Lord and Emperors Star twice, all Specialized and Corrupted for Triple Effect (except for Beast Lord, which is one-third cost). He must personally place enslaved souls into animal or mindless bodies, twisting them into dependable servants. Ergo, he must first acquire the souls, then the still-living bodies, then perform his mystical ritual to join the two together – and only then can he send forth his “new” (or recycled old) servants (19 CP).
• As an eighteenth-level character with a monstrous Charisma, this gives Torak a total of (Level 18 + 13 Cha Mod) x 2 x 3 = 186 ECL / CR worth of followers, each of whom enjoys the benefits of +6 to their BAB, AC, and Saves, as well as 36 CP worth of special abilities derived from having two spirits in one body. Those 36 CP go to buying the following package:
  • Returning: Torak can re-summon and re-embody his followers – or at least the implanted spirits – if they’re killed, although this is Specialized since it may take him quite some time to find another body and get around to it (3 CP).
  • Mystic Link with Communications, Power, Summons, and Travel Link, Specialized/controlled entirely from Torak’s end and it takes a full coven (at least a dozen) to anchor a “summoning”; his followers cannot locate him, summon him, or travel to him unless he activates those abilities (making this generally useless for escape). He, of course, can open communications with them, use spells on them, and call them to him pretty much at will (9 CP). Note that he can communicate with them even beyond death, so killing them will NOT prevent them from reporting what they saw before they were killed to Torak.
  • Innate Enchantment. All enchantments Spell Level One, Caster Level One, Unlimited-Use Use-Activated, and Personal-Only. 7000 GP effective value (8 CP). Effects include:
    • Wolfman. A lesser, specific, variant on Alter Self that provides a normal humanoid using it with +2 Natural Armor Fur, d6 Claws/Fangs, and a wolfish appearance. A wolflike creature using it, on the other hand, gains hands, comprehensible speech, and an upright posture but no mechanical bonuses. In either case, there are no other game-mechanic alterations. (1400 GP).
    • Focused Vigor I. Provides +12 + 2x Con Mod hit points (1400 GP). Normally all followers get the same thing, but the basic Immortal Vigor effect would be bad for any undead followers – so I’ll presume that this is a version that amplifies whatever life or unlife force the target happens to have.
    • Unholy Wrath. +2 Str, +2 Con, +1 Will, and -2 AC when in use (1400 GP).
    • Undetectable Alignment (1400 GP).
    • Rugged Metabolism Package: Fast Healing I – for 18 Rounds – 2/Day, Relieve Illness 1/Day, Relieve Poison 1/Day, and Lesser Restoration 1/Day (from the Hedge Wizardry list on this site and The Practical Enchanter, 1400 GP). Most of this won’t help the vampires, but most of the still-living minions are very glad to have it.
  • Immunity/the normal XP cost of Innate Enchantments (Uncommon, Minor, Trivial [only covers first level effects at caster level one], Specialized/only to cover their packaged abilities, 1 CP).
  • Immunity to Dispelling, Antimagic, and Countermagic (Common/Minor/Great. Specialized in protecting innate enchantments only, Corrupted/only covers powers in this package (4 CP)
  • Luck with +2 Bonus Uses (9 CP).
  • +3 specialities in Survival/Torak’s Domain and Knowledge/ Local/Torak’s Domain (2 CP). Torak doesn’t want anyone in his service to be ignorant of the local area and it’s quirks.

   Torak’s current followers include:

• Four packs of 12 Worgs Each (CR 2 each, total 96). Actually these are wolves with the spirits of murdered infants bound into them. They’ve been raised to be evil predators and minions of Torak – but the net effect is just the same as being born Worgs. Of course, if the player characters ever do manage to destroy them and Torak, their blackened spirits will be released to the lower planes. Isn’t it sad when that happens?
• Three Vampire Agents. These are the remains of a modest party of adventurers; a skillful fighter, a noble cleric, and a competent wizard, who came to the area to try and defeat whatever terrible evil it was that haunted the place. From the fact that they’re no vampire minions of Torak, you can probably guess at how well THAT worked out. Now they are occasionally dispatched on errands, but their primary job is to hang around the crypts and tunnels under the ruins of Torak’s ancient castle, fill the place with traps, and be an easy diversion and target for any other annoying parties of adventurers who turn up. If they wind up being slain by adventurers, Torak will put them right back into place after he brings them back. After all, everyone knows that vampires are really hard to get rid of permanently. They were each level six, and so now are each CR8 (24 total).
  • Yes, these stretch a point. He should probably be paying for their ECL, not their CR – but, given that most of his minions are Worgs, and are fairly ineffectual as far as minions for a 18’th level character go, I can’t be bothered doing the calculation. If you want to subtract a few Worgs, go right ahead.
• The Iskari Order is a small (levels 3×1, 4×2, 2×3, 4, 5, and 14, for a total of 40 levels) group of “benevolent priests” who care for the deranged and otherwise severely damaged. In fact, they are a selection of evil clerics and sorcerers who serve as the caretakers of the six unfortunate individuals carrying Torak’s Bondrunes (and having their own attributes drained to provide his “Inherent” attribute bonuses at a terrible cost to themselves) – as well as a few of their masters snacks.
• Two corrupted 11’th level Rangers and a 14’th level Antipaladin (Total ECL 36), who specialize in hunting down their master’s enemies and eliminating them with extreme prejudice. These guys are fairly heavy combat specialists, but – fortunately – lack magical support.
• A castle caretaker (a third level rogue) and a dozen small children (count as one level worth of followers) who help him take care of the place and occasionally run errands for Torak. Of course, the child-pack will gladly try to pull annoying intruders apart – and is just as damned as the corrupted infant spirits in the wolves.
  • That leaves six ECL worth of followers scattered around the local villages – most likely some more kids and a selection of minor villagers who are acting as spies for him. Alternatively, if the game master would rather have Torak out and riding about, give him a Nightmare Steed (CR 5) and just have the local village spies be another dozen corrupted little kids (counts as one level worth of followers).

   Normally, of course, Followers would be pretty reluctant to die for their master – but there’s no real question of that, so this bunch will pretty readily sacrifice their easily-replaceable bodies for Torak. Sacrificing their equipment is quite another matter though, at least for the higher-level followers who use the stuff…

   Equipment (18 CP):

   As a level eighteen character, Torak would be entitled to 440,000 GP worth of gear if he was a player character. In my book, major NPC’s get just as many goodies as the PC’s – and I think he qualifies as a “major NPC”. Ergo, his gear includes:

• Ravenwing is a +1 Adamantine Life-Drinker Great Axe. It inflicts two negative levels on the creature struck and one on the user (as he’s already undead, this merely gives Torak ten extra hit points for an hour with each hit). Twenty-four hours after being struck its victims must make a DC 16 Fortitude save for each negative level or lose a character level. It is Sapient and Lawful Evil. Ego 24, Int 19, Wis 19, Cha 10, Speech and Telepathy, reads all languages and magic. 120′ darkvision, blindsense, and hearing. Spot +14, Listen +14. It’s has the power to Detect Magic and Produce Flame (caster level two for 1d8+2, allows DC 15 reflex for no effect if used at range rather than a roll to hit, otherwise it simply adds to attacks) at will, Continuously Detects Scrying, and can cast Hold Person 3/Day, Slow 3/Day, and Lesser Globe of Invulnerability 1/Day. As a construct, it is inherently immune to all mind-affecting abilities. 96,000 GP.
  • Torak had Ravenwing forged especially for him long ago, and granted it sapience and merged it with his own body (Innate Enchantment/Absorption Variant, 6 CP) centuries ago. It now watches over and protects Torak’s body while Torak himself is out dreamfaring. Thanks to Ravenwing’s presence, Torak’s “unarmed” attacks are considered +1 Adamant – and inflict 1d12 damage and two negative levels. Worse, each time he hits, he gains a ten hit points. If Ravenwing is currently operating Torak’s body it simply uses the basic bonuses for one of his minions (+6 BAB and all Saves).
• The Crown of Ebon Glory grants a +6 Profane Bonus to Intelligence and Charisma (90,000 GP). Innate Enchantment/Absorption Variant with Altered Bonus Type (original Enhancement Bonus changed to Profane, 12 CP).
  • If Torak is slain, a sufficiently-powerful magical rite can be used to recover both Ravenwing and the Crown from the remains – and most evil characters would consider both items (especially, the Crown, since the Profane Bonus will stack with an Enhancement bonus) to be major treasures, well worth a few little quests to find the ingredients for such a ritual.

   His external gear includes:

• A Crystal Ball with Telepathy (70,000 GP). Note that – since this lets him send messages and sets up a telepathic link – both his personal telepathic powers and mystic artistry will work over the link.
• The Ward Major of his Sanctum (QV, 28,800 GP).
• A Headband of Intellect +4 (16,000 GP).
• A Vest of Charisma +4 (16,000 GP).
• A Periapt of Wisdom +4 (16,000 GP).
• Gloves of Dexterity +4 (16,000 GP).
• A Cloak of Resistance +4 (16,000 GP).
• Bracers of Armor +6 (36,000 GP).
• A Ring of Counterspells (Dispel Magic, 4000 GP).
• A Ring of Shielding (as per a Shield spell, CL 4, 8000 GP).
• Dust of Tracelessness (200 GP)
• Quaal’s Feather Tokens/ a Swan Boat and a Tree (850 GP)
• A Handy Haversack (2000 GP),
• Boots of Striding and Springing (+10′ Move, +5 to Jumps, 5500 GP)
• A Belt of Harm (7 Charges of Use-Activated Harm, only on the wearer, 10,000 GP).

   That leaves him about 10,000 GP worth of his allotment to pay for other items. His Wealth Template covers conventional luxuries, artwork, fine tapestries, and similar stuff however.

• Charms (7): Horned Amulet (+1 Wealth Level), Diplomatic Sash (creates illusory clothing), Dream Essence (brings marvelous dreams), Captain’s Torc (+4 to Listen, voice can be clearly heard at greater distances, -1 to saves versus sonic attacks), Trackless Amulet (leaves no trail), Tinkerstone, and a Dream Anchor.
• Talismans (3): Miasmic Dust, Shard Blade, and a Spirit Pearl (contains an Ice Devil, it’s powers can be tapped up to three times a day with an opposed will check, on a failure, the creature is free to use one of it’s powers as it wills).

      The Lair of the Midnight Sun (12 CP):

• Torak’s crypt is sizable complex of luxurious underground rooms. It’s his Sanctum (6 CP), and is protected by Occult Wards (a sizeable assortment of CR 9 traps and barriers, 3 CP) and several Bone Devils (Guardians, Specialized/there are only a few, 3 CP). Within it he can gains the abilities of:
  • Occult Ritual (4 CP), Corrupted/always requires a sapient blood sacrifice. Torak’s rituals are truly elaborate affairs, calling for altars, engraved and inlaid magical circles, and an assortment of other occult paraphernalia – which is why he has to have an established sanctum to use them.
  • Dominion/Ears of the Wind. Supported by the energies of his lair and its imprisoned souls, Torak can listen in on conversations whenever he is mentioned, Corrupted/this only works within his own realm within his realm (4 CP).
  • Dominion/Curse. Within the center of his power, Torak can lay terrible curses upon his foes (6 CP).
  • Immunity/Range. Very Common, Major, Great, Specialized and Corrupted/only works to let him use a witchcraft power or his power-draining touch (1d4 Power theft, 1d4 damage turned to Power if the target his no Power) on anyone who mentions him within his domain when the Ears of the Wind brings such activities to his attention (10 CP).
• The Lair is also a Rank–5 Ward Major (28,800 GP). Int 18, Wis 20, Chr 11. 32 Skill Points (Net: Spot +10, Listen +10, Spellcraft +9, Arcane Lore +9 (library), Perform +5 (Background Music via Unseen Servants), Profession/Butler +10, Craft/Woodworking +5, and Craft/Tailor +5. The ward will usually exercise it’s skills through it’s masses of Unseen Servants and routinely makes Aid Another attempts. It also gains a +10 bonus on any internal perception checks, and will use it’s unseen servants to sound the alarm if there is any disturbance.
  • Minor Powers (4): Enduring (area has Spell Resistance 30, triple hardness, and the items inside are protected from the ravages of time), Counterspells (use the Cursed Necropolis list), Forgotten (records and memories of it tend to fade for non-residents) and Servant Legion (it has hundreds of Unseen Servants to call upon).
  • Major Power (1): Veiled. The Ward and it’s contents are concealed with Nondetection, Mirage, and Veil effects as needed.

   Normally, of course, Torak remains hidden in his lair, protected by his wardings, walls, traps, devilish bodyguards, guardian spirit-axe, and minions, listening to the soft music and the faint wailing counterpoint of hundreds of imprisoned souls, and either scrying with his crystal ball or sending his spirit out to roam his lands in disguise. He will find the spirits he has lost, and he will gather them to him, and none shall ever touch them again…

   Torak is very, VERY, powerful. He also has an incredible range of powers and abilities. Fortunately, you don’t actually have to bring him into play for quite awhile; he’s at the center of a series of mysteries, and enough sub-adventures to support quite a long campaign. He can even be helpful if the characters are currently protecting the people of his lands.

Torak Rosul – Followers

   For today, it’s a fragment; this years Halloween special is Torak Rosul, a vampire-lord (albeit not a template-based vampire) of surpassing power.

   Unfortunately, that full writeup is taking awhile – so here we have a small segment: the notes on Torak’s minions:

   What he actually has is Leadership with Beast Lord and Emperors Star twice, all Specialized and Corrupted for Triple Effect (except for Beast Lord, which is one-third cost). He must personally place enslaved souls into animal or mindless bodies, twisting them into dependable servants. Ergo, he must first acquire the souls, then the bodies, then perform his mystical ritual to join the two together, and only then can he send forth his “new” (or recycled old) servants (19 CP).

   As an eighteenth-level character with a monstrous Charisma, this gives Torak a total of 180 ECL / CR worth of followers, each of whom enjoys the benefits of +6 to their BAB, AC, and Saves, as well as 36 CP worth of special abilities derived from having two spirits in one body, including:

• Returning: Torak can re-summon and re-embodied them – or at least the implanted spirit – if they’re killed, although this is Specialized since it may take him some time (3 CP).
• Mystic Link with Communications, Power, Summons, and Travel Link, Specialized/controlled entirely from Torak’s end and it takes a full pack to anchor a “summoning”; they cannot locate him, summon him, or travel to him unless called to him. He, of course, can open communications with them, use spells on them, and call them to him pretty much at will (9 CP). Note that he can communicate with them even beyond death, so killing them will NOT prevent them from reporting what they saw before they were killed to Torak.
• Innate Enchantment. All enchantments Spell Level One, Caster Level One, Unlimited-Use Use-Activated, and Personal-Only. 7000 GP effective value (8 CP). Effects include:
  • Wolfman. A lesser, specific, variant on Alter Self that provides a normal humanoid using it with +2 Natural Armor Fur, d6 Claws/Fangs, and a wolfish appearance. A wolflike creature using it, on the other hand, gains hands, comprehensible speech, and an upright posture. In either case, there are no other game-mechanic alterations. (1400 GP).
  • Focused Vigor I. Provides +12 + 2x Con Mod hit points (1400 GP). Basically a version of Immortal Vigor that amplifies whatever life or unlife force the target happens to have.
  • Unholy Wrath. +2 Str, +2 Con, +1 Will, and -2 AC when in use (1400 GP).
  • Undetectable Alignment (1400 GP).
  • Rugged Metabolism Package: Fast Healing I – for 18 Rounds – 2/Day, Relieve Illness 1/Day, Relieve Poison 1/Day, and Lesser Restoration 1/Day (from the Hedge Wizardry list on this site and The Practical Enchanter, 1400 GP).
• Immunity/the normal XP cost of Innate Enchantments (Uncommon, Minor, Trivial [only covers first level effects at caster level one], Specialized/only to cover their Werewolf abilities, 1 CP).
• Immunity to Dispelling, Antimagic, and Countermagic (Common/Minor/Great. Specialized in protecting innate enchantments only, Corrupted/only covers powers in this package (4 CP)
• Luck with +2 Bonus Uses (9 CP).

   His current followers include:

• Four packs of 12 Worgs Each (CR 2 each, total 96). Actually these are wolves with the spirits of infants bound into them. They’ve been raised to be evil predators and minions of Torak – but the net effect is just the same. Of course, if the player characters ever do manage to destroy them and Torak, their blackened spirits will be released to the lower planes. Isn’t it sad when that happens?
• Three Vampire Agents. These are the remains of a modest party of adventurers; a skillful fighter, a noble cleric, and a competent wizard, who came to the area to try and defeat whatever terrible evil it was that haunted the area. From the fact that they’re no vampire minions of Torak, you can probably guess at how well THAT worked out. Now they are occasionally dispatched on errands, but their primary job is to hang around the crypts and tunnels under the ruins of Torak’s ancient castle, fill the place with traps, and be an easy diversion and target for any other annoying parties of adventurers who turn up. If they wind up dead Torak will just bring them back and put them right back into place since everyone knows that vampires are really hard to get rid of permanently. They were each level six, and so now are each CR8 (24 total).
• The Iskari Order is a small (levels 3×1, 4×2, 2×3, 4, 5, 14, total 40) group of “benevolent priests” who care for the deranged and otherwise severely damaged. In fact, they are a selection of evil clerics and sorcerers who serve as the caretakers of the six unfortunate individuals carrying Torak’s Bondrunes (and having their own attributes drained to provide his “Inherent” attribute bonuses at a terrible cost to themselves) – as well as a few of their masters snacks.
• Two corrupted 11’th level Rangers and a 14’th level Antipaladin (Total ECL 36), who specialize in hunting down their master’s enemies and eliminating them with extreme prejudice.
• A castle caretaker (L3) and a dozen small children (count as one level worth of followers) who help him take care of the place and occasionally run errands for Torak. Of course, the child-pack will gladly try to pull annoying intruders apart – and is just as damned as the corrupted infant spirits in the wolves.

   Normally, of course, Followers would be pretty reluctant to die for their master – but there’s no real question of that, so this bunch will pretty readily sacrifice their readily-replaceable bodies for their master. Sacrificing their equipment is quite another matter though, at least for the higher-level followers who use the stuff…

Federation-Apocalypse Session 135 – The Clash of Blades

   Back in the New Imperium, in blissful ignorance of most of what had been going on elsewhere, Kevin, Marty, Ryan, and company were preparing to board the Hellstorm and engage in a desperate struggle against the powers of darkness…

   Well, actually, Ryan was diverting himself with worries about his own allies (for which some of his friends from the old days had, admittedly, given him ample cause), Kevin was focused on bringing his OWN dark powers back under control, and Marty was looking forward to a little bit of delightful hand-to-hand! Kevin might be good at taking out the minions, but it was time for the main event!

   Still… he could always nuke the bridge from the inside! Or vent the entire ship to space! Or tear the Hellstorm in half with raw oratory and the power of his mind!

   Aw, who was he kidding? Any of those might be fun – although he wasn’t sure that he OR Kevin OR Ryan could pull off that last one – but there was still nothing like going in with a knife! He WAS the invade-and-take-over specialist after all!

   He towed Kevin along. The kid looked pretty abstracted at the moment and it wouldn’t do to let him run into a counter-boarding party in that condition. He’d probably grant them a wish or something in the interests of not being bothered, when stabbing would be far more suitable.

   Ah, stabbing. Lots and lots of stabbing…

(Marty) “You okay there Kevin? You look… delirious.”

(Kevin) It… will…. be….. fine….. just… need…. a….. little…… time………

(Marty) “Okay, you sit tight. I’m going to take the thralls and board this sucker!”

   Good grief! Kevin was sounding like Gelman on a really bad day!

   Marty got together some of the Thralls who weren’t busy assisting Menthas – with the Forgelight entangled with the Hellstorm, a lot of crew positions had become redundant – and had them try to take a look at the sensors. It would be nice to have SOME idea of the layout of the ship they were about to board!

   Unfortunately that was fairly useless. They could tell that there was a major power center – radiating both neutrino surges and demonic power – towards the lower back of the ship, but there was just too much interference to get any decent indication of what the interior spaces were like.

   Clairvoyance was no use either. Too much magic, demonic power, and dimensional disturbances again – not to mention some areas apparently being shielded.

   Dammit. The only way he was going to get directions was if the computer felt cooperative – and it was far more likely to lie – or if they found a map of the area printed on the wall or something (and THAT would be likely to be a fraud too on a hellship!).

(Kevin, blearily muttering quotes) “Audacity! always Audacity!”

   Marty frowned… Oh well! It was something like a building, even if it was drifting in space – and he’d assailed a lot of those in his time!

   He had about fifty extra thralls above their usual companions – and the three-hundred NeoDogs who were supporting Menthas. He left twenty to handle the defense in case there was an attempt to board THEM, and set out to do a little on-site probing with sharp pointed things! Thirty – forty or so with their usual bunch – should be big enough to take on small groups of defenders without being cumbersome since they were all telepaths anyway! And forty versus a demonic super star destroyer was certainly audacity!

   Besides, it was hard to say how many of the crew survived the Nightmare Storm. They wouldn’t have been in the best shape to resist that…

(Ryan) “Hmm, it looks like the interior has been extensively redone since the last time I was in here.”

(Marty) “What changes are you seeing?”

(Ryan) “Well in many ways it would be more proper to say that the interior of this place is more like a pocket dimension now than the interior of a ship. Best to stay on your toes, this place is likely to be highly morphic and will try to prey upon your mind and sanity.”

(Marty, grinning) “What sanity?”

   Ryan groaned to himself… Blasted toons! They were always nuts, and they had always had driven him nuts, and it was hard to argue with one who acknowledged his own basic craziness!

(Marty) “Anyway, can you give me any specifics on what you’re seeing in that dimension?”

(Ryan) “Well I suspect you still understand that certain behaviors are not to be carried out, like skinning the skin off someone just to see how long you can keep them alive. And I doubt you feel the need to tear out your eyes and rip out your tongue.”

(Marty) “Okay, that is pretty damn screwed up. First step, put up the old mental defenses.”

(Ryan) “Oh now there is an unpleasant one, seeing someone consumed by negative energy cell by cell. Yes, I think I will be adding a few layers of mental defenses to everyone here… I take it you are heading to the bridge then?”

(Marty, grinning roguishly) “Where else would Revan want to have a dramatic duel?”

(Ryan) “Heh, beware of any giant chasms then. In the meantime, I am going after the main power core, then the main computer core.”

(Marty) “Going to blow them up? Well, try to give us fair warning. It’d suck if I took Revan down, then got vaporized.”

(Ryan) “I was hoping to avoid explosive shutdowns. I was leaning more towards the scattering critical components across the Manifold solution.”

(Marty) “Eh, suit yourself, we’ll be heading off. Good luck.”

(Ryan) “Same to you, I will head towards the bridge when my team is done.”

(Kevin, through the Thralls) “Menthas? Do you have enough support to hold out for a time? I’m going to be leaving Bard with you; he’s covered by the Contract with the Hellstorm, so the pressure shouldn’t step up when Marty and I leave.”

(Menthas) “I should be able to hold for some time – but not indefinitely.”

   Marty sighed. It looked like he was going to have to resort to tactics… Blast it! Planning ahead had always kind of seemed like cheating to him! That was why he’d been leaving it to Kevin! A bit of planning ahead was perfectly in character fora a dark lord!

   He had the Thralls use the high-magic zone that was currently boiling around Kevin to set up some additional mental shields, negative energy protections, other energy protections, some environmental protections, and other defenses to augment the ones Ryan and company had set up. If it was a hell-dimension, it could be about to get pretty unpleasant!

   Hm… He had the Thralls focus a lot of defenses around Kevin. The kid was normally quite capable of handling his own defenses – but he HAD just tapped into a major bit of darkness there, and they were about to confront a Sith Lord and a sapient demonic starship. They might try to manipulate him.

   He reminded himself to be ready call for other defenses on the fly. The place sounded more like a psychological kind of hell, but better safe than sorry!

   Hm. Was Kevin just a traditionalist? He did seem to stick with the classics a lot…

   The two groups stepped out into the Hellstorm and took their separate ways.

   Marty found that navigation wasn’t easy – the Hellstorm was a nightmarish jumble of passages, with crusty reddish-black walls, flickering lights, and horrific stains and unmentionable debris scattered everywhere – but the Thralls and his understanding of basic building layouts was still SOME help.

   The intermittent screaming and howling echoing through the passages didn’t help though. On the other hand, at least when those came along they drowned out the whispers that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at the same time.

(Whispers) “Join us, embrace the nightmares. You know he is plotting against you!”

   That stirred up Kevin a bit; he was beginning to take an interest again – even if he was still pretty distracted.

(Kevin) “And who would you bunch be?”

(Whispers) “We are the ones that have given into the darkness. It is a part of us just like it is a part of you.”

(Marty) “Yeah, well, we’re not giving into it. We like our other parts too much.”

   Perhaps unsurprisingly, that set off the first attacks – mangled humans, clothed in nothing save for blood, filth, and various implements of torture that were working on them or peeling their skin back, who came out of the ventilation and service shafts.

   What was left of a woman who was being slowly torn apart by metal hooks attacked Marty – biting into his shoulder with her lipless bleeding mouth and somehow inflicting massive injuries.

(Marty) “Lady, I’m not into THAT!”

   He hurled her down the corridor; unlike some of his colleagues, he was no gentleman!

   He considered using his new talents in pleasure magic to sedate her – but the local rules were pretty strongly against it, and it turned out to be a bit beyond his new-found powers.

   He had to toss her away again. At least there weren’t enough of the others to get past the Thrall-guards to Kevin – even if they were forcing them to use a lot of their power on self-healing.

   He started hewing his way through the maddened, soulless – but still extremely dangerous – husks. They exploded in eruptions of blood and gore that were far beyond what should have been contained in their frames.

   By the time he was done, even his healing powers were starting to run low…

(Whispers) “Why do you resist? It is in your nature to destroy and seek pleasure……”

(Marty, growling) “I’m more than some animal!”

(Kevin, rather abstractedly) “How… crude. Is THIS supposed to be tempting?”

(Marty) “Yeah, that was icky! I’ve seen hentai less disgusting than that.”

(Whispers) “Perhaps….”

(Kevin, interrupting) “Yes, the occasional visit to a house of horrors can be entertaining, and some people feel a need to be punished – but this is just silly!”

   Real power was derived from having souls in your service! You could build up a following of tormented, sadomasochistic maniacs, but it was an enormous amount of work, little or no fun for ANYONE, and they drifted away quickly! That was why the classic had always been temptation! This was… shortsighted, destructive, and ultimately useless except as a way to cause pain and suffering.

   Ah. It was entirely possible that the Hellstorm did not have a soul at all – or, if it did, it was simply demented. Such foolishness was typical of lesser horrors. Destruction, pain, and terror for their own sakes, rather than as tools to be used in pursuit of your ambitions.

(Marty) “Come on Kevin, we don’t have time for this bull!”

   Uh-oh. They must really have crossed a realm-boundary when they entered the Hellstorm. Kevin was drifting into his “Angel of Darkness” persona… How did you qualify for a halo and demon-wings at the same time anyway? Maybe it would be best to gate through to Revan? But he – or at least the Hellstorm – would probably make that difficult anyway.

   The corridor continued onwards, with the way now lined with remnants of corpses. At least they seemed to be past the more violent amongst the living dead now… heading deeper into the abyss. Most of the bodies were partially-eaten, abused, and mutilated. A number of what appeared to be former imperial officers and storm troopers were crawling around on all fours, ripping feebly at bodies, and making the screaming and howling sounds they’d been hearing. At least they seemed to be too far gone to notice them immediately…

   Marty looked at the blue-white thunderbolts and black-and-crimson fire beginning to flicker around Kevin… it would be best to hurry. There was no telling how long the kid would be able to hold it together under this kind of pressure.

   The Thralls reported that the creatures crawling around had been driven mad with torment, had had a wide variety of horrific nightmares unleashed upon them, had had their souls driven out, and had been afflicted with a LOT of leaking demonic energy. Most of the damage was beyond repair at this point – the souls had long since departed – and attempts at magical healing would be like throwing a new coat of paint over the halls and mopping. Besides… it looked like most of them hadn’t had souls to begin with. They could heal the physical damage – but that would just let the empty shells attack them better.

   Which, by the way, they were currently starting to do.

(Kevin, absently) “Forget them. There’s little to be done for them anyway.”

   Marty probed… it looked like… just continuing along the corridor was certain to result in several more encounters with various depraved manifestations of the local reality. At some point though, should they persevere, they’d come across an avatar of the local reality – an “End Boss”. Defeat whatever that turned out to be, and they should reach the bridge – regardless of whether or not they were actually headed in the “right” direction.

(Kevin) “Oh geez! This thing has been patterned after some old game! One of the really crude ones, like that ancient “Doom” thing that was mentioned in history class!”

(Marty) “Hey, I remember that game!”

   Don’t think about cacodemons, don’t think about . . . DAMMIT!

   Meanwhile, of course, the officers and troopers were galloping – well, OK, shambling, crawling, and slithering – towards them with mindless expressions of voracity.

   Kevin grinned suddenly. He wouldn’t want to unseal the grand powers of darkness for a bit – but the corridors were fifteen feet high and at least that wide, and he’d seen this bit in a dozen holo-productions.

   He started skipping from head to back to shoulder across the onrushing horde, tumbling acrobatically to avoid any potential strikes. There was no point in having all those genetic boosts to strength and agility that his parents had paid for (since they’d been open-minded enough to give him the animal genegrafts rather than sticking with the purebred human genetic toolbox) if you never used them!

   Marty gaped for a moment – the kid had never done that before! – but shrugged. It certainly wasn’t a bad idea; as much as he hated to admit it, fighting these mindless minions had no point… He told the Thralls to levitate themselves – or shapeshift to hummingbirds or some such – and follow their master while he used his own Light Foot skills to run along the walls, with occasional launches off of hungry Imperial troops.

   You know, using your acrobatic talents to dodge past frustrated enemy goons was also kind of amusing! Still… it would have been more fun if he hadn’t been aware of just where they were.

   There was much bouncing along the tops of depraved heads and running along the walls as they skipped past just out of reach of their attackers, readily evading their various attacks.

(Kevin) “So long suckers!”

   That took them – in short order, as the local reality gave it up as a bad job – to a large, arena-style, room flooded with about six inches of rust-colored (or bloody) water. The walls were the color of dried blood and decaying metal, and the room was sweltering, steamy mess. The only sound seems to come from a periodic drip of water – and the only exit was a set of large, Star Wars style, blast doors at the top of a stairway landing at the far end.

   Mr “Boss” was waiting for them – and the local reality seemed to have fallen back on some sort of video game imagery again. The “Boss” was an eight-foot-tall humanoid wearing only some sort of rough leather skirt and a pyramid-shaped helmet. He was wielding a long “knife” that was nearly eight feet long itself.

(Marty) “Oh Crap! We’re in Silent Hill! I’ve played that one!”

   Kevin drew a complete blank there. Probably some sort of game or practice scenario or some such that had been current when Battling Business World was created. That would make it… early twenty-first century or so?

   Marty stepped forward. This would make a good warmup! Besides… letting Kevin get involved would probably confuse things. The kid kind of felt that HE deserved to be richly rewarded, not punished! He, however, had the guilt to challenge the avatar of punishment. Pesky conscience.

   The thing wasn’t quite his match on the attack, but it could apparently take – or at least block – nearly limitless amounts of punishment.

   Kevin spun sacred-energy construct-armor around Marty – he was pretty sure that THAT kind of power wouldn’t go out of control – but he couldn’t keep that up too long, no matter how amusing it was to see the local reality bending away from it! Even the minor teleportation that his armor was giving him barely allowed him to keep ahead of the thing – and it was absorbing all his strikes with hardly a sign of damage.

   This was not good. What were the local rules like? Did he have to come to some sort of terms? Fight until he’d caused some monstrous amount of damage? Did it work more like the game, or was it truly invulnerable?

   It certainly didn’t seem to feel pain!

(Marty) “So what’s under that helmet, anyway?

   Still no sign of pain – and it ignored his taunts with the cold impersonal response of a machine. It suddenly appeared behind him again as he blinked, and he barely managed to dodge to the side in time to avoid having that knife suddenly materialize in his chest. It still caught him in the ribs though, inflicting another massive wound – and forcing Kevin to renew the armor again.

   Damn! Trying to get through the door was no use either! It looked like you HAD to deal with the guardian first!

(Marty) “Dammit! What do you want from us?”

   Pyramid-Head pointed to Marty, then proceeded to poke the tip of its blade into its hand. It then squeezed it’s hand and let the blood drip into the water they were standing in.

(Marty) “Oh. Well damn. Why didn’t you just say so.”

(Marty, privately to Kevin) “Can you see anything wrong with what he seems to be suggesting? Because I can see several possible horrors resulting – still, it might be our only way through!”

   Kevin, could, of course think of any number of things that could arise from voluntarily-offered blood. (If an involuntary offering would do, Marty wouldn’t need to donate blood; he’d just lost quite a lot of the stuff…).

   They had one of the spare Thralls they had along drip some in – despite the whispers suggesting a full filleting.

   The door slid open, revealing what looked to be the bridge of the ship on the other side.

(Pyramid-Head) “Sacrificing the blood of another to spare yourselves, how appropriate. You may pass.”

   Aw! Now Marty felt guilty again!

   They went though anyway, as Pyramid Head stepped to the side and silently faded away. It was likely to be a trap – but even if Revan had gone totally dark side, it was beginning to look like they might be here for a rescue – or a mercy killing – and not a duel.

Eclipse d20 – Nullfields, Antimagic, Dismissal, and Arcane Overloads

   Here we have some compiled answers for Alzrius, since – once again – things were getting rather lengthy for the comment threads.

   The Nullfield spell in The Practical Enchanter notes that, when used for creating a golem’s magic immunity, spellcasters can design spells that beat said magic immunity for the cost of the spell being +3 levels. Would that also be the formula to create a spell that can affect a creature through a nullfield or standard antimagic field? – Alzrius

   Not precisely; Golems – being animated by magical energies – have to leave ways open for some types of magic to operate on themselves. Thus they have “chinks in their armor” (or gaps in their defenses, or however you want to express it), and are at least partially vulnerable to specific spell effects that target those flaws. Just as importantly, golems of the same type follow the same design – and so have the same chinks. Thus, for a mere +1 spell level, you can design a spell which targets a specific set of “chinks” and so will bypass the magical defenses of a particular type of golem. For +3 spell levels you can design a “smart” spell – one capable of seeking out the flaws in a golems defenses and adjusting itself to target them.

   Or at least that’s the logic underlying the rules given for the Nullfield spell – and the explanation for why each type of Golem is at least partially affected by a few, fairly specific, spells.

   That approach won’t work in a straight-up Nullfield spell, which has no chinks at all. Antimagic spheres, however, do have one chink; the caster can dismiss them. We know that’s an active effect because spells with fixed durations will run out their durations normally if the caster dies – ergo, he or she can’t be sustaining them in any way. Turning them off must be a magical action simply because it’s directly affecting a spell – and only magic does that (and the default SRD position is that there is no real distinction psionics and magic).

   Can that chink be exploited? The SRD doesn’t actually have much to say about dismissing spells. What we’ve got is:

   (D) Dismissible: If the Duration line ends with “(D),” you can dismiss the spell at will. You must be within range of the spell’s effect and must speak words of dismissal, which are usually a modified form of the spell’s verbal component. If the spell has no verbal component, you can dismiss the effect with a gesture. Dismissing a spell is a standard action that does not provoke attacks of opportunity. -The d20 SRD.

   Like so many short and simple rules which offer no explanation of how they work, that leaves a lot of doors open. I’d tend to assume that only the original caster – not just someone else who happens to know a particular spell – can dismiss a spell. Of course, I also suppose that someone could use the Use Magic Device skill to try and impersonate the original caster – perhaps at a DC of (15 + the true spell casters caster level) if they know the spell, and something like (25 + the true spell casters caster level) if they don’t since they’d have to fake both being the caster and the dismissal effect.

   There doesn’t seem to be any reason why you couldn’t design a spell that sought out that trigger, faked being the spellcaster, and dismissed a targeted spell. Of course, that would only work on spells that were dismissable in the first place and is a lot more complicated than the “hit it with a big hammer (or disruption or however you want to describe it) and break it!” approach used by Dispel Magic.

   That would leave the caster with a spell that’s far more complicated (and thus higher level) than Dispel Magic, which can only target a single spell at a time rather than many spells (again like Dispel Magic), which really requires knowing what spells are active on a target to be used, and which only works on dismissable spells – although, it would, admittedly, almost always work on those. It’s no surprise that it’s rarely researched; almost every spellcaster would rather have Dispel Magic to begin with.

   Now, Alzrius would like to know what that spell would look like – and that’s an easy one. Here we are:

• Dismissal: Illusion (Shadow), Level: Bard 4, Sor/Wiz 5, Components: V, S, Casting Time: One Standard Action, Range: Medium, Effect: See Text, Duration: Instantaneous, Saving Throw: None, Spell Resistance: No.
• Dismissal adapts itself to the structure of a target spell, effectively impersonates the caster, and – in a momentary flash of darkness – Dismisses the spell. Unfortunately, Dismissal can only target one spell at a time and only works on Dismissable spells. Equally unfortunately, spells of anti-magic, anti-divination, and protection from other spells are more difficult to analyze effectively – and so require an opposed caster level check similar to that required with Dispel Magic, although Dismissal has no upper limit on the check.
  • Improved versions of the spell are possible: Enhanced (+2 spell levels) versions gain a +10 bonus on the opposed caster level check if one is called for. Mass (+4 spell levels, or only +3 spell levels if all the spells to be affected have to have the same caster) versions will attempt to dismiss up to one spell per level of the caster.
  • While perhaps the most popular – and perhaps the only really practical – use of this effect is to try to get rid of Antimagic, the spell generally can’t be cast while actually within such an effect; it can’t magically summon the shadow-energies on which it relies in the first place.

   Now, according to the general notes on Antimagic under the Greater Antimagic Field spell (Eclipse, page 130):

   Antimagic can be broken by sheer overload – by an external spell that exceeds twice the level of antimagical spell used or by an internal spell of at least three times the level of the antimagical effect used (usually something that only gods and powerful epic characters can pull off). -Eclipse, The Codex Persona.

   And that brings us to:

   Regarding that rule about overloading an antimagic field/nullfield, does that take metamagic into account? I ask only because conventional wisdom is that metamagic doesn’t increase the spell’s actual level (Heighten Spell notwithstanding), hence why an empowered maximized magic missile wouldn’t get past a globe of invulnerability. So a spell that’s supercharged on metamagic would still fail no matter how heavily it was strengthened, right? – Alzrius

   That’s generally correct. Metamagic apparently represents advanced techniques for manipulating magical energy – making a spells structure more complex without actually increasing the amount of raw power it involves. Unfortunately, a spells “level” is based both on it’s inherent complexity AND on it’s raw power – so even without the power, a spell enhanced by metamagic normally occupies a higher-level-than-usual spell slot. Of course, it is possible to learn to apply most metamagics without increasing the level of the spell slot needed – but those are advanced techniques.

   If you want to take advantage of the extra power inherent in a higher-level spell slot, you’ll need to build the equivalent of the “metamagics” you want to use into the formula. That’s a good deal more effective since the extra power can make up for a drop in efficiency (and the complexity that would be needed to obtain that super-efficiency). Thus the rule that spells with “built-in” metamagic are of somewhat lower level than spells upgraded to equivalent effects with metamagic.

   Now, when you’re opposing antimagical effects, such as an Antimagic Sphere or a Globe of Invulnerability, the complexity of the effect makes very little difference; it doesn’t matter if you throw an elegant sculpture or a simple lump of rock at a concrete wall; all that matters is how hard you hit it. Ergo, what’s important there is the base spell level.

   Classically the base spell level can be augmented by the “Heighten Spell” metamagic, but in Eclipse you don’t need a feat to simply beef up a spell a bit. Of course, those are spell levels you can’t use to add more interesting effects – and since it’s not a metamagic, you can’t use the techniques that reduce the spell level cost of adding metamagics to boost the effective level of all your spells.

   For a technological analogy, a Golem could be considered something like a well-insulated electrical machine or piece of electronics. If you hit an uninsulated point with a serious electrical discharge you can probably fry the insides. If you hit the insulation, nothing much is going to happen unless you’re applying enough voltage (“spell levels”) to overload and destroy that insulation directly. An antimagic field, however, is essentially just a big mass of insulation, with no vulnerable gaps OR insides. If you want to get rid of it by blasting it, you’ll have to overload it’s resistance and destroy it.

   Using your analogy that a golem is like a well-insulated machine, at what point can you simply overcome its “insulation” with brute force the same way you could a Nullfield or an Antimagic Sphere? Surely, if a power word kill can punch through a Nullfield (since it’s ninth level, and thus one level about twice the spell’s level), a spell of similar or greater power could hit through a golem’s magic immunity. Would that permanently collapse its immunity the way it would the spell, or would only spells that powerful get through, with the immunity still remaining intact? – Alzrius

   Under those rules you can, indeed, break through a Golem’s Nullfield. Throwing a ninth-level spell (that allows Spell Resistance, can actually target a Construct, and isn’t already one that would affect the target Golem due to those “chinks”) at a Golem will indeed overload it’s magical defenses – although it wouldn’t otherwise affect the Golem, since the spells power would be expended on overloading the Nullfield as per d20’s usual rules about barriers.

   The Golems unlimited-use use-activated Nullfield enchantment would immediately start to rebuild the spell – and so the Nullfield would be restored on the Golem’s next action. Until then, it could be affected by common spells. Unfortunately, since the Elemental Infusion effect changes a Golems enchantments into Extraordinary Abilities, they can’t be dispelled.

   Of course, if the Golem was constructed using the suggested Ambient Magic limitation (as the standard models are, since it saves the creator 14,560 GP and 582 XP) and you throw another appropriate spell of level nine or higher to break down it’s Nullfield again the next round, it won’t be able to erect another Nullfield for a full minute – which will probably be plenty of time to blow the thing into little pieces. Whether that’s worth two spells of level nine-plus and some lesser ones (as opposed to healing up the fighters afterwards or doing something really clever) is a decision for the party.

   Epic-level Golems are – presumably – constructed using higher-level variants on the Nullfield spell, and so their defenses would require even higher level spells to break. I’d guess that most epic-level golem-builders would use at least a seventh level version, requiring a spell with a base level of at least fifteen to break through.

Eclipse and the Hero System

   One recent request was for a comparison of Eclipse Character Points to Hero System Points. Now, the requestor is using the Fifth Edition Hero System, while I mostly use the Fourth Edition (I have mountains of books for it and it works just fine) – but the changes don’t seem very large anyway, so it shouldn’t make much difference. I’ll probably be referring to “Champions” in a lot of places though, since “Hero System” often seems awkward.

   Converting points between systems is always difficult; they are, after all, simulating very different ideas about how the game world works – and their attributes are very different.

   To illustrate that, it’s best to start with the baseline. In d20, the average person will have attributes of about ten – and no bonuses for them. He or she will have 1d4 or 1d6 hit points.

   In Champions/Hero System, the average human being has attributes of ten, including hit points (body).

   Now that is superficially very similar indeed.

   What those numbers actually mean is very different though.

   Lets look at a very straightforward attribute.

   Strength.

   In d20, if a character should somehow have Strength 40, he or she has a near-godlike attribute. If he or she attacks an average person, he or she is virtually guaranteed to connect (barring the automatic 5% chance of a miss on a “1”), and will kill them instantly.

   In Champions, that Strength-40 character is not at all impressive among strong heroes, has only a 50% chance of hitting a normal opponent (presuming that said normal opponent doesn’t – sensibly – abort to a dodge maneuver and reduce that chance to about 25%), and (given average Body damage results on 8d6, which is quite likely) – will require four hits to kill. So, in Champions, Strength is roughly one-sixth to one-tenth as effective as d20 strength for everything except calculating how much weight a character can lift – something that’s almost meaningless in most games, since most weights are arbitrarily assigned by the game master (either “you can’t lift that” or “you can lift that” – albeit possibly only with a mighty effort or a roll).

   Champions strength does add to Physical Defense, Stun, and Recovery – but d20 characters don’t need or use Physical Defense (since almost every d20 attack would count as a Killing Attack in Champions), their Stun and Body both fall under Hit Points (and go up for free), and they don’t need to spend endurance to power their abilities (making Recovery meaningless except for Healing – which also automatically goes up with level in d20). Unlike d20 strength, Champions strength doesn’t add to your chance to connect with an attack.

   In d20 a ten foot fall has a 50% chance of leaving our average human dying. That’s probably a little high – but people quite often die of simply tripping and either hitting their head or breaking something in the real world.

   In Champions/Hero System a fall of 30 meters – about a hundred feet – has a considerably less than 50% chance of leaving a normal human dying. On the average, they’ll take eight body and thirty-three stun – and will be up and walking away in less than a minute. It will take them some time to heal up all the bruising – but it’s just not quite the same is it?

   OK, lets take a different approach. Champions provides some general character categories with a maximum point total for each. Now, in Eclipse, level zero is for kids and other incompetents, level one is a baseline normal, level two is a skilled normal, experts and such will be level three, and pulp heroes and action movie characters will be around level four to five. Around level six, characters can routinely break most normal limits; your starting superheroes come in around this point. Around level eleven, you have legendary heroes. At level sixteen or so you get the classical demigods – and epic levels will cover most classical gods.

   That approach actually produces some fairly straightforward equivalencies.

Champions GeneralCharacter Type	MaximumHero Points	EquivalentEclipse Level	Eclipse Points /Bonus Feat Points
Incompetent Normal	0	-1 to 0	24
Normal	25	1	48 (+6)
Skilled Normal	50	2	72 (+6)
Competent Normal	100	3	96 (+12)
Hero	150	4-5	120-144 (+12)
Superhero	250	6-0	168-224 (+18-24)
High-Powered Super	375+	11-15	288-384 (+24-36)
Demigodling	Unspecified	16-20	408-504 (+36-42)

   Now, those aren’t exactly precise.

• The Champions total includes permissible disadvantages, because Champions disadvantages are a major part of the character. The Eclipse totals do not include any disadvantages, since Eclipse disadvantages are never worth more than twelve points – and many characters don’t bother with them.
• The Eclipse totals do not include the Fast Learner ability, or Duties, or Restrictions. Those can add several character points per level, but the amount varies from character to character – which makes general calculations difficult or impossible.
• Eclipse characters do not have to pay character points for their attribute arrays, or for their (relatively modest) level-based increases, while Champions characters do. On the other hand, Eclipse characters generally cannot take points out of their attribute totals to pay for other things – which is what lets Incompetent Normal characters in Champions have a few skills and talents. That’s one major reason why the relationship shifts from Eclipse offering somewhat more points at the low end to somewhat fewer points at the high end.
• Eclipse characters get free skill points and hit points with levels, rather than having to buy them. On the other hand, they don’t necessarily get to act more often than anyone else and combat is usually resolved via lethal force rather than by mere unconsciousness or retreat.
• Eclipse characters can buy gear with money, rather than with character points. That’s normal in Champions at lower power levels, but superheroes and high-powered superheroes normally have to pay points for everything. Eclipse and The Practical Enchanter have some modifiers that can be applied to produce that effect (just as there are ways to build an equipment allowance in Champions), but it’s not the default position.

   Within those restrictions, however, we have a pretty reasonable comparison: Eclipse characters get a few more points early on, and lag slightly later on – but in the prime “Hero and Superhero” range where each game is mostly played (150 to 350 points in most of the Champions games I’ve seen, levels 4-12 in most of the d20 games I’ve seen) – the point totals are pretty similar. By that standard, Eclipse Points and Hero Points are just about equivalent. Champions characters tend to have a modest number of unlimited-use abilities as opposed to fantasy characters who often have many abilities which can only be used a few times a day – but either system can build characters that work in either way.

   Now, there are some practical differences. For example:

• d20 skills are considerably cheaper to increment. They also – at the very high end (outside of the usual ranges we’re considering) – allow their user’s to accomplish some downright supernatural stunts. The difference is less drastic than it appears though; in both Champions and d20 a great many skill checks are opposing another character’s skills – and so the difference tends to cancel out within the system. If you wanted to duplicate a really high-order d20 skill in Champions, you’d just have to buy some minor associated powers to go with the basic skill – upping the cost again.
• Champions attributes are considerably cheaper to increase directly. Champions assumes that characters can mutate and otherwise far surpass the human norm without the use of any special powers – unless, of course, the “normal characteristic maxima” rule is in play.
• Eclipse, like most d20 rules sets, assumes that character attributes are a lot more fixed – in essence, that “normal characteristic maxima” is the default rule. In d20 a character is unlikely to become inherently many times stronger over the course of his or her career. Thus directly increasing characteristics is quite expensive in Eclipse. Of course, d20 attributes don’t mean quite the same thing – and are fairly readily increased with items, through inherent bonuses, by acquiring templates, and in several other ways. In particular, if you’re playing in a superhero setting, the Superheroic Rule from page 161 should be in play – giving each character (Con Mod) free points of Mana to spend each round. That can make it quite easy to boost an attribute or two – as can various forms of Innate Enchantment. For examples of each approach, we have the Iron Raptor (Superheroic Mana) and the Strongman and the Basic “Mutant” Template (Innate Enchantment).

   For an overall comparison?

• Both Eclipse and the Hero System can produce similar characters on similar numbers of points.
• Eclipse tends to produce characters with larger numbers of limited-use abilities, while Champions tends to produce characters with smaller numbers of unlimited-use abilities – but those are only tendencies. An individual character can go either way. For some samples for Eclipse, here’s the Wraith (an unlimited-use level one short-range teleporter), Baron Ectar (a supervillain who can blast things with his voice), Timothy and Verendior (a child and his pet monster), Cadmael (an anime-styled Sorcerer with unlimited use of his spells), and – for that matter – the entire Mutants of the Eclipse series.
• Low-end Eclipse characters tend to be more interesting, complex, and playable than low-end Hero System characters – but that same increase in complexity makes Eclipse characters harder to set up at the high end. While the nice folks over at PCGen are working on getting PCGen to handle Eclipse, that’s not ready yet, and Champions does have several character-generation programs available right now. The sample template and character list is over HERE.
• Eclipse, and the forthcoming PCGen datasets, are available as freeware, while the Hero System and its primary character generating programs are not. On the other hand, the Hero System is backed by a considerably larger company, and has more supporting material out than I can readily provide – although you can use almost any d20 source material with Eclipse. Eclipse is compatible with the vast majority of d20 rules sets and material after all.

   Overall, if you’re happy with Champions, already own the Hero System books, and aren’t looking for a change, there’s no reason to switch (although I’d encourage you to download the freeware edition and check it out; it costs nothing and should at least provide ideas). After all, I wrote Eclipse, and I continue to play both Eclipse and Champions – albeit leaning heavily towards Eclipse.

   Eclipse: The Codex Persona is available in a Freeware PDF Version, in Print, and in a Paid PDF Version that includes Eclipse II (245 pages of Eclipse races, character and power builds, items, relics, martial arts, and other material) and the web expansion. It will be updated with Eclipse III when that’s done as well

Justifiers-TORG Part II – Robin Hood, Fox-Beta

   Now that we have the Justifiers Cosm described in TORG terms, here we have a character for it – one “Robin Hood”, a fox-beta christened by a player who couldn’t resist the joke. .

   Unlike many other TORG characters, Robin mostly contented himself with adding a few ranks to his most frequently-used skills, instead spending most of the possibilities he acquired on buying off damage and pulling off spectacular stunts This tactic made Robin THE central figures in combat for most of the early campaign; the players would – of course – play for time and cards when confronted with a major menace – and then would spend the cards that they’d been hoarding to support Robin as he “lost patience with the sparring” and spent possibilities on some incredible attack that usually demolished bosses or scores of minions.

   Here we have Robin’s background files and starting setup.

   Extract, Ceti Kell Files, Non-human Assets:

   Fox-Beta class humanoid 107av9, Cognomen “Robin Hood”; Age 24, Field planetologist with scout cross training, veteran of four prior survey missions (Reference; Wyrm, Tantho, Argos, Utgard). Promoted to O2 (I’st lieutenant) 2309 /17. Assigned Auron survey mission scientific section 2311/86. Psionic, primary mode telekinesis, secondary mode creativity, buyback debt 2.8 E+7 credits, current bank 1.3 E+6. Min 10, Str 8, Tou 12, Per 10, Dex 15, Cha 7, Spi 8. Primary training and genetic records ref; Pharos (Ceti Prime) beta lab 9. Chose to retain cyber replacements for right eye, ear, and skull segment after Tantho survey, had microcomputer/transceiver installed in skull segment after Utgard survey. Ht 143cm, Wt 41 Kg, silver fur, blue eyes, unmated male. Evaluation: Extremely fast learner, finished training in 23% of the normal time. Likes to try “dramatic solos”, but this psychological quirk does not negate his remarkable talents. Shows a slight over-reliance on raw talent, but still rates as a remarkable success; it is recommended that the line be continued in the next fox-beta generation. Currently assigned to Auron survey mission.

   Planetary Data Extracts: Wyrm, Tantho, Argos, Utgard, Auron.

   Wyrm (Tran IV), Class F2 blue-white sun with red dwarf companion, closest approach increases solar input ~10% for half-year period every 23 years. Two moons, dense atmosphere, land surface 36% in 3 major continents and numerous islands, extensive swamp areas. Semitropical climate, biosphere similar to earths cretaceous period complicated by numerous toxic plants and an extremely dangerous “dragonlike” predator. 1.2 gravities, 33 Hr day, 426 day year, radius 7100 Km, relatively poor in metals, very rich in unusual biochemicals. 2302/183.

   Tantho (Aldor III), Class G6 yellow sun, 1 major moon, 2 minor, moderate, slightly oxygen – rich, atmosphere, land surface 43%, 4 major continents, 3 minor, 2 major interior deserts. Temperate climate, fairly ordinary biosphere, defended by a small force of ancient robots from an abortive colonization effort. Fortunately for the survey team the robots and their supplies had been degrading for millennia, and their remaining resources were not insurmountable. .94 gravities, 23.12 Hr day, 328 day year, radius 6100 Km, unusual crystal veins with a multitude of technical uses. 2305/26.

   On the Tantho survey Robin was struck and gravely injured by a missile while entering a supply cache. A normal human or beta would have died – the hit inflicted six wounds – but, fortunately for him, as a possibility-rated character he could buy three of those wounds off with a possibility.

   Argos (K’rull I), Class M9 orange dwarf primary, thick atmosphere with high CO2 level, land surface 18%, many islands, 0 continents. Warm climate due to greenhouse effect with extensive cloud cover, painfully dim days. Extensive volcanism due to tidal effects of nearby sun and eccentric orbit, biosphere thus primarily oceanic, sentient, psionic, quasi-cetacean species, dangerously strong telepaths, highly developed mental techniques and “oral” culture but otherwise nontech. 1.18 gravities, 39.4 hr day, 97 day year, radius 7800 Km, rather poor in metals but seawater extraction useful. 2308/19.

   Utgard (Loge II), Class K0 yellow-red sun, 1 moon plus varying captures from close asteroid belt, atmosphere thin and O2 poor, land surface 43%, supercontinent, 2 minor continents, frequent meteorite impacts. Arctic climate, massive centauroid species, sentient but low- tech, biosphere mostly oceanic and tundra of continental edge, natives migratory/nomadic herbivores preferring subsurface homes. 1.6 gravities, 18.2 Hr day, 287 day year, radius 8300 Km, rich oil reserves, luxury scents, and woods. 2310/98.

   During the Utgard survey Robin got an unusual chance to study the local aborigines for several weeks; they caught him, took his gear, and locked him up as a curiosity. His friends couldn’t find him, and it took quite a while to escape on his own. The experience has left him with a minor phobia about ropes, cages, and giants.

   Auron (Destin VIII), Class B giant blue-white sun, 3+ major moons and rings, moderate O2/N2 atmosphere, land surface 50%+, temperate climate. Extremely high metal content and radioactivity, unusual energy discharges, possibly ancient colony or working relic, continuous auroras. 1.1-1.3 gravities, day 16-26 Hrs, year 3240 standard days, radius 5000-5200 Km, survey team transmated 2311/116 to arrive 11/291, team consists of:

• Major Robert Alton, bighorn sheep beta, planetary sciences specialist, commanding.
• Capt. Indira Talasin, sea lion beta, medical and social sciences, 2’nd in command, psionic (healer, empath, danger sense).
• 1’st Lieutenant Robin Hood, fox beta, planetary and life sciences primary, secondary scout training, psionic (telekinetic, creativity).
• Chief Warrant Officer Telira Ashe, cheetah beta, pilot and electrical engineer.
• Warrant Officer 1’st, Gunnar Norstedt, raccoon beta, electrical engineering specialist.
• Warrant Officer 2’nd Mirlena Uhlman, wolf beta, mechanical engineer with security cross training.
• Sergeant Griss Lugard, tiger beta, scout/field doctor.
• Corporal Ross Murdock, bat beta, scout and social sciences, psionic (psychometry, animal control).
• PFC Laura Stanislovock, falcon beta, security and life sciences.
• PFC Jean Gautier, polar bear beta, security and pilot.

   Sergeant Lugard and warrant officer Norstedt were killed in the cosm transfer and ensuing crash landing, the rest are operating out of a valley in the rockies near the rocky mountain national park. Robin is officially on extended reconnaissance, in reality none of them are really sure of what, if anything, to do.　  

   Given the likely importance of Auron, Ceti Kell is likely to send quite a few more teams before they give up…

   “Robin Hood”, Fox-Based Beta Class Humanoid 107av9

   Initial Possibilities: 8 (two spent on an additional skill add).

   Home Cosm: Justifiers

Magic	6
Social	20
Spiritual	5
Tech	28

   The fox-beta strain has been genegineered for improved balance, reaction time, endurance, and agility, giving them a +2 bonus to toughness and dexterity. Their innate animal traits give them +2 on scent perception and natural weapons with a damage rating of (str+3).

   Robin suffered massive head injuries during the Tantho survey, necessitating cyber-replacement of his right eye, right ear, and a substantial piece of his skull. The replacements function as follows:

• Eye: IR/Normal/UV pickup with digital processing and image enhancement. It gives a +3 on visual perception in general, telescopic and microscopic magnification up to 60x and compensates for low-light or flare conditions. It also gives a +1 on his fire combat value when using a laser sight, as the spot can be more easily seen.
• Ear: Has an extended frequency range, “parabolic” amplification, and the ability to suppress background noise or “home in” on sounds, giving a +3 on hearing perception in general.
• His skull has computer and transceiver implants. The computer has translator, reference, and radiolocation programs (language +3, scholar +1, may “find” radio signals) among others, can record signals from the eye and ear, and use the transceiver as a remote datalink. The transceiver is quite normal, used for RF signal monitoring, communications, etcetera. Basic broadcast range of 24, indefinite with satellite assistance.

Attribute	Value	Action
Mind	10	Test
Strength	8
Toughness	12
Perception	10	Trick
Dexterity	15	Maneuver
Charisma	7	Taunt
Spirit	8	Intimidate

Physical Capabilities:

	Value	Limit
Running	12	12
Swimming	5	5
Jumping	4	4
Climbing	2	2
Lifting	8	8

   Personal Data:

• Height: 4 ft, 8 inches.
• Weight: 89 pounds/40 Kg
• Hair: Silver
• Eyes: Blue
• Apparent Age: 20’s (?)
• Real Age: 24 years
• Occupation: Planetary scout
• Identity: Locally unknown
• Legal Status: None on earth, property of Ceti Kell Inc. in home cosm, now presumed dead.
• Other Aliases: None as of yet.
• Birthplace: Ceti Kell beta lab 9, on pharos ceti prime.
• Marital Status: Single
• Group Affiliation: None earthly, assigned to Auron survey team.
• Base Of Operations: A valley in the rocky mountains, near the park
• Ethnic Origin: Fox-Beta
• Religion: Deist
• Education: Intensive survey training, field planetologist.

	Add	Total
Dexterity Based		+15
Acrobatics
Beast Riding
Dodge
Energy Weapons
Fire Combat	+1	+16
Flight
Heavy Weapons*	+1	+16
Lock Picking
Long Jumping
Maneuver
Melee Weapons	+1	+16
Missile Weapons	+1	+16
Prestidigitation
Running
Stealth	+1	+16
Swimming
Unarmed Combat	+1	+16
Spirit Based		+8
Faith*
Focus*
Intimidation
Reality*	+1	+9
Mind Based		+10
Apportion Magic*	+1	+11
Artist
Conjuration Magic*	+1	+11
Medicine*
Science*	+1	+11
Survival	+1	+11
Test Of Will
Willpower
Charisma Based		+7
Charm
Persuasion
Taunt
Perception Based		+10
Air Vehicles*	+1	+11
Alteration Magic*
Divination Magic*
Evidence Analysis
Find	+1	+11
First Aid
Land Vehicles
Language
Scholar	+3	+13
Space Vehicles*
Tracking	+1	+11
Trick
Water Vehicles
Strength Based		+8
Climbing
Lifting

*These skills cannot be used unskilled.

   As a psychic – and one predating any “official” rules for it – Robin simply used the magic system with a slight modification: all psionics required a tech axiom of 26. The other axioms were irrelevant – and “Spell manipulation” was impossible

   Psychic Knowledges: “Living Forces” (Biofields) +1, “Inanimate Forces” (Field Theory) +1, “Light” (Electromagnetism) +1. 

 

Spell	Skill	Total	Back- lash	DC	Effect Value	Bonus To	Range	Dur.	Cast Time
Tele- kinesis	Apportion/ Inanimate	9	12	9	20	Effect	15	12/4 Min	3/4 Sec
Kinetic Bolt	Apportion Inanimate	10	13	9	16	Effect	9	9/1 Min	3/4 Sec
Cylink	Apportion Light	11	14	10	15	Effect	17	14/10 Min	5/10 Sec
Pyrotics	Apportion Inanimate	11	13	10	24	Duration	9	11/2 Min	5/10 Sec
Creation	Conjuration Light	12	16	12	17	Effect	11	12/4 Min	7/25 Sec
Safety Field	Conjuration Inanimate	13*	10	11	24	Duration	5	18/1 Hr	0/1 Sec
Psychic Healing	Conjuration Living	14*	11	14	16	Effect	3	14/10 Min	5/10 Sec
Weapon Focus	Apportion Living	15*	14	10	25	Duration	0	11/2 Min	2/2 Sec
Amplify	Conjuration Living	15*	16	11	16	Duration	0	9/1 Min	0/1 Sec

   Effects marked with an “*” were known, but were beyond his skills to use – at first.

• Telekinesis: Allows him to move masses of up to 100 Kg (Value 10) by mental force at a speed of up to 100 meters / turn (value 10). The result points from the bonus roll may be added to either value, but, sadly, must first be factored through the power push table.
• Kinetic Bolt: A simple telekinetic attack with whatever is handy. Air and liquids do stun damage, using almost anything else does normal damage. Such attacks are made at +5 to hit as they can be steered en route. Anyone subjected to these bolts finds it difficult to concentrate, giving other attackers a +2/+2 advantage.
• Cylink: Allows him to use his computer implant to manipulate other circuits and computers by psionically linking it to them, and amplifying its signals enough to override them. The effect is resolved on the general result table against the “system resistance”, normally 6 (simple systems) to 18 (The most complex, redundant, shielded, and secure military systems). This cannot be used on complex circuits without an implant, as they are beyond direct comprehension otherwise. The effect value is modified by +(27-target systems tech level).
• Pyrotics: Shifts a targets temperature, inflicting up to damage value 12. Living targets have additional problems, those with Toughness below 25 suffer a -3 on their bonus totals due to fever, chills, burning pains, etc. It can be used against areas up to 4m across at damage value 10. It can be “left on” a target or controlled.
• Creation: Is the ability to summon and shape light energy into various forms, as illumination, holograms, flares, or destructive, laserlike, discharges. Image quality and targeting are determined by an apportion skill roll, the initial value determines the amount of energy available. For example, an effect value of 20 can be discharged in one damage 20 bolt, 10 damage 15 bolts, or sustain an illusion for the powers duration. “Left over” energy is lost when the duration runs out.
• Safety Field: Generates a classic “life support field” around him, providing considerable protection from environmental dangers such as heat, cold, lack of oxygen, and being drenched in acid. Against such, the field has a value of 24, but against focused assaults it merely adds 2 to the users armor value.
• Psychic Healing: Briefly “supercharges” the targets body with life energy, greatly accelerating healing. The spell removes 1D20 points of shock damage, removes K/O conditions if no stun damage remains, and allows a normal healing roll after only 10 minutes. The effect value must exceed the recipients Tou for it to work.
• Weapon Focus: Lets him channel negative bioenergies through a weapon, raising its base damage value by two to a maximum of 25. Missile weapons can be “charged” as they are fired throughout the powers duration, but this only raises their base damage by 1 (24 maximum).
• Amplify: Infuses the users body with energy, briefly enhancing any single physical characteristic (Str, Tou, Dex) by three points, to a maximum of 16.

   Psychic Backlash:

Total Misses Backlash By:	Effect	Maximum effect from
0-1	1 Stun	Safety Field and Psychic Healing.
2	“O”, 1 Stun	Telekinesis.
3	“K”, 1 Stun	Kinetic bolt and Pyrotics.
4	2 Stun	Cylink and Weapon Focus.
5	“O”, 2 Stun
6+	“O”, 2 Stun, Knockdown	Creation and Amplify.

   Weapons:

Weapon	Damage	Short	Medium	Long	Tech	Notes
MCr. Rapier	16	melee			27	See below
Gauss Pistol	23	3″-15″	60″	450″	27	20-R clip and +1 “to hit”
Shuriken	11	3″- 5″	10″	15″	15	Carries a total of 12.
Slingshot	12	5″-10″	20″	60″	18	QV Special loads below

   Major Equipment Descriptions:

• Chronometer (standard survey issue): A “conventional” multifunction and multi- planet digital watch, also functions as a bio-monitor, inertial locator, emergency beacon, and mini-recorder using molecular circuitry. Tech 26.
• Fuel Cell recharger and power cells.
• Gauss Pistol: This weapon fires heavy slugs using an intense magnetic field, quickly, with minimal recoil, and virtually silently. Almost any metallic slug will do, but handmade slugs are at -2 on the damage value. The clip holds 20 rounds and the battery which powers the whole thing. Damage rating 23, explosive rounds 25 (but see “contradiction at range”), AP 21/-4 armor. This is a selective fire tech 27 weapon, ranges 3-15, 30, 60, 450, +1 to users “fire combat” skill. He usually carries six clips – four of normal ammon, one armor piercing, and one explosive.
• Helicopter (standard survey issue): Tech 26, speed value 15, Toughness 24, 2 seats, lift value 14, may mount a laser cannon and/or two wing machine guns. Powered by a microfusion cell, it has an autopilot/computer, a fairly effective stealth mode, surveillance camera, radio, and autowinch. The cabin is equipped with a fuel cell recharger, hot/ cold chest, hotpot, thermos, and stopper.
• Identity Disk and Implant (standard survey issue): An optical memory chip tuned to the owners biofields, it degrades within 48 hours if lost. The implant is similar, but almost irremovable.
• Laser Sight: Adds +1 to users “fire combat” rating.
• Medical Kit (standard survey issue): Equivalent to the Tornaga MedKit from Nippon Tech, +3 on all first aid rolls, tech 24.
• MonoCrystal “Rapier”: Tough, thin, and light, with an edge about ten molecules wide. While this gives it a +3 damage bonus over an ordinary (tech 15) rapier, it also makes it an useful cutting tool, as applying steady pressure will drive it slowly through almost anything. Damage value of Str+8, to a maximum of 25.
• Multi-scanner (standard survey issue): An instrument package capable of picking up energy sources, life forms, chemical, and physical structures, within limits. Using it requires a science roll at +3 on general results table, tech 27.
• Slingshot: A normal hunting slingshot, Str +3, Str +4 when using steel pellets, ranges 5-10, 20, and 60. Special loads contain explosives, acid, “smoke”, or various gases, all at value 18 and tech 23. He normally carries 12 of each special load.
• Stopper (standard survey issue): Treat as an adjustable taser.
• Survey Uniform: The standard issue uniform is easily cleaned, highly water resistant, and provides some protection from chemical and biological agents. With the hood up and a standard respirator mask in place it allows short-term operation in a vacuum (Tou+10 time value). A few moments work on the boots can fold them out into passable swim fins or snowshoes. It is woven of a synthetic “kinetic fiber”, which has a base armor value of 5, the limb coverage gives a total of 6 (Tech 25, Fatigue 2). The uniforms can be equipped with various special-purpose liners, notably antiradiation, biochemical seal, water recycling (90% efficient, runs for a week on a small fuel cell), and thermal (maintains comfort for 48 Hrs (or more depending on local conditions), per cell).
• Survival Pack (standard survey issue): Respirator mask, condenser canteen, flashlight, 60-day ration pack, flaregun, tarp, cord, rope, hammer/axe, 24 spikes, sleeping/shelter bag, packcase, water purification tabs/kit, miscellaneous kit (Compass, lighter, fishhooks, line, whetstone, gloves, survival manual, sunglasses, sewing kit, etc) supplement tablets, folding shovel, filter straws, knife, grapnel, stimpills, monofilament “saw”, micro-fabric parachute, salt, wire, and “space blanket”. Tech varies, 20-24. (Standard survival kits include a Machete, monocular, long-range radio, survival rifle, water, signal mirror, and pyroconcentrate tabs, but he’s left these behind as unnecessary).

Family Business

   Regrettably, due to a family emergency, I won’t have time to post anything today. Hopefully everything will work out and there will be time for something tomorrow. Any requests?

TORG Justifiers

   Since TORG has been brought up, one of the more interesting features of that game – and one that played an important role in the novels – was that characters didn’t have to come from one of the major Cosms. They could, instead, come from any universe that the player and game master were willing to come up with material for.

   In the Justifiers RPG nasty interstellar corporations were minimizing the expenses of planetary exploration by using “betas” – genetically engineered anthropomorphic animal slaves – to do the dirty work. If they survived they could eventually earn their freedom. The rules were mediocre at best – to the point where fan conversions to other systems are easier to find than the original rules – but the setting was pretty good, and dealt with some fairly heavy themes, such as the nature of humanity, the rights of aborigines and other life-forms, and (obviously) slavery.

   Ergo, here we have the Justifiers Realm for TORG – although you could just as well go to any other game system with it. For d20, I’d pull out the Eclipse anthropomorphic animals templates on this site, use d20 future equipment lists, limit special-powers purchases to low-grade psychic abilities, start out at about level three or four (in contrast to the original rules, where characters usually started off so incompetent that it took a small miracle to survive their first mission), and use slow advancement.

   The Justifiers Cosm:

• Axioms: Magic 6, Social 20, Spiritual 5, and Technology 28.
• Reconnection: Use the difficulty numbers for the Cyberpapacy

   Physically, the cosm is a universe similar to earth’s, albeit with a human-dominated interstellar civilization centered on Tellus, home of Tellus Transmat Specialities Incorporated. There are some eighty settled worlds and many colonies in the local galaxy.

   Habitable worlds are absurdly common in the Justifiers cosm due to the activities of an elder galactic race known simply as the Ancients. They – driven by their own telepathic powers, which made a population of 20,000 per world far too mentally “noisy” to stand – first tried seedships and then indulged in huge “planetforming” projects. Even at Technology Level 31 they couldn’t reshape enough planets. They went to war, and fought until one world developed, and used, an “ultimate weapon” – a psionic amplifier powerful enough to blanket the galaxy with an irresistible telepathic command to “Die”. Automatic defenses struck back too late; the Ancients went extinct in a single day.

   They left behind many thousands of habitable worlds – each stocked with whatever selection of species had caught the local engineers fancy. Over time, the cosms technology axiom (the maximum possible local level of technology) drifted downwards a bit – but the social axiom has gone up to where even powerful telepaths can stand each other. Fortunately, the mental command was attuned to technical minds, and didn’t affect primitive races. The spirit and magic axioms may very from world to world by up to +/- 3.

   The Justifiers cosm has no governments, the worlds are owned and run by (sometimes violently) competing mega-corporations. Stockholders and corporate managers must be human, they are the upper class citizens. Human corporate employees are middle class citizens, those involved in independent (usually small) businesses are lower class citizens. Noncitizens have limited legal rights, they include “free” betas, indigents, and local aborigines. Prebuyback betas (who haven’t paid back the vast “debt” the corporations claim they owe for their creation and education), indentured aborigines, and “alphas” (bioengineered animals, sentient but nonhumanoid), are property. Children of humans and betas are considered betas. If either parent of a child is owned by a corp, the child is also. Even free betas can’t own stock or join the Galactic Workers Alliance (the galactic union). Betas only got these limited “rights” because of union pressure; the GWA (quite correctly) viewed their introduction as a major threat.

   World laws:

• The Law of Robotics states that: “Complex robotic systems quickly become undependable and often hostile, unless directly supervised”. Due to this, the cosm uses no robotics beyond simple industrial units.
• The Law of Economy states that: “The more the local tech level surpasses the tech level of the item being manufactured, the cheaper and more reliable the item becomes”. This is one reason why many commonly used items in the cosm are of lower tech levels.
• The Law of Genius states that; “Only a few geniuses per generation make real advances”. Due to this law the cosms technology is very uneven, some areas have not advanced significantly in many, many, generations.
• The Law of Centers states that; “The point of greatest advancement, power, etcetera, is always at the center”. This law means that the first place to introduce some- thing always has an advantage in dealing with it. In game terms, the origin point offers a +2 on whichever axiom level governs whatever-it-is (which is why aboriginal magic is almost always confined to their homeworlds).

   Justifiers Special Technologies:

   Transmat Technology: Matter transmitters have major drawbacks, to avoid “overlapping” existing matter (and causing explosions) requires complex receivers or lots of vacuum. The transmission wave travels at “only” twelve times the speed of light, although the trip seems instantaneous to users. The power needed, maximum range, and maximum volume expand in quantum steps. A T-1 field is a laboratory toy, a T-2 suffices for planetary links, and a T-3 can send up to 27,643 cubic feet 6.27 light years. Such fields are used to “blind beam” small reentry shuttles to low orbits around remotely detected worlds, the crews then survey, “prove”, and erect a station on it. If enough crews fail, the world is presumed too hostile. Trans-mat technology is “only” tech (25 + T-Rating), but the central components are incredibly expensive to produce at tech 28. Due to the Law of Centers, Tellus Transmat Specialities Incorporated has been able to keep control of transmat technology.

   Cybertech: While the Justifiers realm has excellent cybertechnology it is rarely used. It just isn’t cost efficient compared to bioengineering – unless time is short or the complex gear used to induce regeneration is unavailable. Planetary survey teams usually have a small stock of cyber-prosthetics along. Unsupported, with limited cargo space and minimal personnel, survey teams cannot afford crippled personnel or regeneration gear, making cybertech cost effective. Such “generic” cyberware is designed to replace the natural abilities of many bioengineered types, and thus gives most users “new” abilities. For this reason it is often retained afterwards but, as all officially necessary abilities are already bioengineered in, the cost of the unit is added to the recipients debt. Note that at tech 27 Neuracal and jacks are replaced by inductive pickups.

   Betas and Survey Crews:

   Exploring planets is dangerous, so much so that union survey crews became overly expensive, at least to corporate managers. The Alpha- and Beta- class constructs were an effort to cut costs, as property, they need not be paid, only trained. The GWA forced a compromise, now alphas can only hold a few jobs and betas owe only their “buyback” to a Corp for creating them, “paying it off” sets them free. Most betas accept their lot even with vastly inflated buybacks as the corps run the schools.

   “Normal” betas have attribute totals of 1D6+59, 12 skill adds, 0-3 innate abilities or natural tools, and limit values which vary by up to three from human norms. This total includes their genegenineered bonuses. They may have cyberware, but rarely have very much of it. As no darkness device is involved, and the technology is more sophisticated then the cyberpapacys in any case, they do not suffer from cyberpsychosis. Possibility-rated betas have base attribute totals of 66, plus any engineered bonuses. While “rated” betas are rare, planet proving is very dangerous, it’s not too uncommon to find two or three possiblity-rated characters in a single crew. 

   Standard Basic Gear: (1 set per Crewman and two spare sets): Survival pack, thermos, backpack, issue uniforms (3), binoculars, mess kit, chronometer, mess kit, medical pack, antiradiation uniform liners (For use on Auron), medium pistol, stopper, assault rifle, and ammunition. Various personal items are usually added to this list.

   Supplemental Scout/Security Gear (1 set per scout or security crewmember plus one spare, 5 total); Tactical scanner, carbide armor, laser pistol, and laser rifle.

   Gear for other specialities: Other specialists have whatever is appropriate (usually various scientific instruments or tools) but the supplies include an assortment of underwater, climbing, and camping gear.

   Justifier Items and TORG Equivalent Items:

• Stopper: Treat as an adjustable taser.
• Various Pistols: Pick equivalents as desired.
• Assault Rifle: Use M16 ranges, base damage value 21, 30 shot magazine, tech 23.
• Laser Cannon: GWI Godsfire, Cyberpapacy Pg 111-16
• Cargo Handlers: Exoskeletons, Str +8, Tou +4, Dex -4, Chr -6, Per -2. Large and clumsy but useful for heavy work.
• Carbide Armor: GWI Destroyer armor with no fatigue penalty, tech 27.
• Laser Pistol: GWI Godlight
• Laser Rifle: GWI Godbeam
• Tactical Scan: Helmet unit, IR/UV/Radar pickups and display, +4 to weapons skills and obvious tactical advantages. Also includes scrambled communications, map displays, sensory protection, and navigation gear. Tech 27.

   The Survey Shuttle is the biggest and most expensive piece of equipment a survey crew has (of which they are well aware, as they’re liable for damages). They are 18″ tall, 24″ wide, and 70″ long, and has a volume of 27,600 cubic feet – nearly at the limit of the T-3 transmat field. Before landing, it automatically launches basketball-sized communications and weather satellites. The shuttle is a lifting body with fairly minimal drives, it can make orbital surveys and reenter, but cannot relaunch. For durability and easy maintenance the design was kept as simple as possible; the computers, instruments, drive, and microfusion reactor are tech 24, but most systems are tech 23 or less. The equipment is another matter, much of the medical, scientific, technical, and combat gear has tech levels of up to 27. The main cargo bays contain portable science and vehicle / tool buildings, modular vehicles (ATV car, hovercraft, helicopter, ATV truck or a submersible), assorted processing, power, and fabrication units, plus miscellaneous gear. The setup is compact but complete, intended to build everything except the core components of a transmat station from local resources while still supporting investigation, exploration, defense, and contact work. The equipment includes food and water (with recycling) for 90 to 120 days, after which the survey teams needs must be met from local sources (the corporations regard this as a reasonable test of a worlds ability to support a colony; if it leads to a few teams starving to death, oh well).

   Exactly how a shuttle and it’s crew will get to earth is up to the game master. Possible methods include something exotic happening to the transmitter, peculiar planetary energy discharges, some piece of Ancient technology, and someone’s souvenir being an eternity shard. However it arrived, the local area will probably have it’s tech axiom “bent” to 24, just enough to work the microfusion reactor (judging from the conflicting reports of “Cold Fusion” such devices are just over earth’s axiom boundary). It could become involved in a number of ways if the game master wishes, after all, it does have the most sophisticated medical, scientific, and technical facilities on earth – as well as a considerable arsenal which includes some tech 27 tactical nuclear “grenades” and the core components of a transmat station. Getting the crew’s cooperation is tricky, but they can easily make that vital component, analyze that mysterious slime, or design that gadget. However, with their background, they’ll probably want to be paid well, possibly in the form of assistance in obtaining US citizenship. Optionally the shuttle may be a hardpoint of it’s home reality, in this case it will generate a dominant zone of Justifiers reality in a one-kilometer radius and create a pure zone in a 25 meter radius. This would be convenient for, if puzzling to, the crew. Besides… just maybe you can transmat between cosms if there’s a link open between them. If the transmitter could be set up, this could be a useful “back door” to the invading cosms, at least if you can overcome the small problem of arriving above the atmosphere.

Recordings from the Holocron of Kira Keldav – Session 35

   I could already tell that our arrival around Coruscant was going to cause chaos at the very least. The local Ben was widely known to have destroyed galactic civilization, we had a super weapon in our possession, and we were about to request that the Jedi join us. This could hardly look any worse for us unless we destroyed a moon by accident in the course of this.

   Lazlo and Handell suddenly volunteered to head on ahead of us on the Asrai to scout a safe route for the Ratsoogomoz and drop beacons while also heading on to Coruscant and warning the locals of our arrival. I wasn’t sure I liked the way Lazlo said some of that, especially the bit about “warning” the locals, but I had to agree that we were less likely to be shot at if the locals were told to expect us.

   After they left, it came time to tell Ben he needed to disguise himself or I would do it for him the hard way. After some complaining and arguing, Ben elected to hide himself in a full suit of armor designed to completely obscure his identity in lieu of plastic surgery. I had to sigh when said armor turned out to be rather similar to the classic Vader design in the holos, complete with distorting voice mask. I suppose it wouldn’t work to claim I don’t know these people when I am arriving with them and I am the unspoken leader of this ragtag bunch of misfits.

   Kira hadn’t noticed yet, but Ben was finding the rumors that were spreading through the crew of the Ratsoogomoz quite amusing. The current gossip was that Kira was so powerful a dark lord that his mere voice could kill – as had been demonstrated by the disappearance of Darth Ben and all the collateral damage done to the bridge when their Lords had spoken to him on the intercom. He’d save that tidbit for sometime when they needed an emergency boost to orbit; Kira might just hit the roof hard enough to supply it.

   Not much that could be done there except to respond to any questions as they occur. In the meantime, I decided I needed to make some upgrades to my equipment given amount of combat we are likely to face once we go after Zandaras. The blaster I have been using just didn’t have the punch I needed against armored opponents. Working with Ben and Alys, we were able to increase the power output of the blaster, but that put more stress on the crystal and it would burn out shortly. Ben started drawing up designs on a larger crystal like what rifles have, when I suddenly had a thought.

   Lightsaber crystals were under a similar amount of stress and would quickly burn out. However, a Force user could repair flaws in the crystal as they formed so long as they formed a good link with the crystal itself. Maybe a similar thing could be done here?

   It took some time, but we did find a lightsaber crystal furnace that the Sith left behind. I made two crystals of the shape and size needed for two blasters and made another for a lightsaber. I don’t plan on dual wielding lightsabers or blasters anytime soon, but it is nice to have spares made in case I need them. Valerie had tried out the dual lightsabers in practice once while I was still at the Academy, and even tried the shield style too, but seemed to prefer the two-handed style when she wasn’t using her bare hands and those shield generators. I favored the shield style myself.

   With the crystals made, we then assembled a pair of blasters. The crystals worked well as I was able to repair the flaws that started to develop and the blaster was able to generate a significantly harder punch when fired. Only problem we found in response to this was the fact that this drained the power cell at a ridiculous pace, especially on auto-fire. One of the Sith-employee technicians that had come with the base then noted that lightsaber power cells had a much higher power density than normal power cells, and since we were already using some lightsaber parts it only made sense to use some more.

   The suggestion made a certain amount of sense, although it took some fabricating to make the power cell fit in the socket. That neatly solved the power problem, and it also meant I only needed to carry a single set of spare power cells with me instead of the two I had been carrying. With the basic configuration now working and tested, I started to tinker with swapping out and altering the more minor components to make it a better fit for me. Surprisingly, this meant the casing materials and such started to resemble the materials used in my lightsaber. Master Soung had spoken about a resonance with a lightsaber, and I have tinkered with my lightsaber for the last two years now, but only now am I really beginning to understand what he meant by that.

   With the finished blaster in hand, I set up some target dummies in one of the cargo bays and tested it out. The blaster worked well, although my aim was terrible. Alys provided some pointers, but it largely came down to practicing enough with it to become good. So I spent my time practicing and finishing assembling the spare lightsaber and blaster using the designs of the originals.

   Meanwhile, Handell and Lazlo had laid a trail of beacons and had arrived at the outskirts of Coruscant. They were surprised to find that several trails of navigation beacons were already being put back into place. They were purely local given the scale of the galaxy – but they were marking out at least the beginnings of a network of paths linking Coruscant and some of it’s most vital sources of supply. That was obviously a crash construction program – but it should have taken a lot longer than this, considering the likely rate of losing ships trying to get the things placed… Ah; intuitive navigation. The Jedi had to be taking the ships out – probably loaded with beacons – and bringing them back with the most vitally needed cargos.

   It obviously wouldn’t be enough, but it was surprisingly sensible of the Jadi. Had they foreseen that something was going to happen but had been unable to see clearly what since Ben and his superweapon had been so close to the galactic black hole?

   Unfortunately, a lot of the in-system hazards and defenses were no longer marked either. Handell crept in very slowly…

   The in-system traffic control and defenses picked them up almost immediately. Well, there couldn’t be more than a tiny fraction of the traffic they’d been designed to handle at the moment. The presumption was that they were either a risk-taking trader, piloted by a Jedi who’d been out in the galaxy and needed to get back, from a very nearby world – or (just possibly) a scout for an upcoming Sith invasion.

   They – well, OK, mostly Lazlo – wound up having to explain a great deal about coming from another universe, about acquiring the superweapon, about the idea that it could be used to reverse it’s own effects, about the fact that THEIR Ben was NOT Darth Ben, and on and on. Several times over. To a variety of interviewers. What made it worse was that all the capable Jedi were out trying to rebuild the navigation grid – which meant that even getting one to come and listen to their story was quite a project. The fact that neither of them actually understood anything about how the weapon – or the trans-dimensional stuff – really worked didn’t help them explain.

   They eventually got through simply because no one could see any possible benefit in providing such a warning if they were planning some sort of an attack or something – even if someone finally did turn up a Sith Lord dead ringer for Lazlo – albeit one that had been dead for 16,000 years.

   Sigh. That was what he got for challenging them to run a search on the data banks. Handell wasn’t a lot of help either. He knew better than to be telling traffic control crazy stories – and habits that old and strong were pretty difficult for him to overcome.

   Ben, meanwhile, was examining all his alternates selves data… So; you projected a hypertunnel – or hyperdimensional tunnel – into a black hole. As mass was drained from the black hole, it set up a hyperfield. That was normal enough; it was simply a variation on the basic principles of the hyperdrive on a massive scale.

   The radius of the resulting hyperfield was apparently determined by how close to the center of the black hole the mass drain was set up. The strength was determined by how fast matter was being transferred – essentially by the energy input. The type of field – and it’s “aim” were determined by the tuning, modulation, and secondary characteristics of the projected portal.

   It looked like the hyperportals tended to be anchored a bit by mass – which might help explain why they usually wound up inside the galaxy…

   He also wrote a speech to address Coruscant with, but Kira burned it and made sure that he got nowhere near the communications gear.

   He put most of the details in his current “burn before reading” notebook, which Jacob – having heard about Ben (and feeling himself safe in his illiteracy) promptly got into and covered over with crayon drawings of forest monsters. Knowing Ben, if he ever did go back and check his notes, he’d presume that those were part of the inspiration and try to incorporate them into his designs…

   Jacob also spent a lot of time – with Wilhem’s help – trying to figure out just what had made Killer Jacob different from himself. Had it been something genetic, or was it just what Sith training from youth did to Atavist talents?

   Alys spent most of her time thinking. She was actually pretty likely to see her parents again – and she hadn’t really been expecting that to ever happen again. What to tell them? How much to tell them? Was there something she ought to try to do for them?

   At least Coruscant produced a very large proportion of the raw calories that it needed via forced-growth algae farming. There really wasn’t any choice about that; otherwise they’d soon no longer have a breathable atmosphere. That sort of thing was so important that they covered it in the required basic schooling…

   Telera and Shipwreck busied themselves with practice, re-equipping, and exploring the oddities of their second base – finding quite a number of interesting things. Khadim and 10CH mostly spent their time in studying – and in installing even more equipment in themselves. No reason not too when there was plenty of manufacturing capacity going unused.

   We arrived on the edge of the Coruscant system days later. The Republic fleet in orbit around the planet was expecting us and wanted a debriefing to confirm what Lazlo and Handell had told them. Unfortunately, the Republic seemed to be of the opinion that it was too dangerous to strip the planet of most of the Jedi just because we thought that we could reverse the damage that had been done. It was far “safer” to stay here and reestablish what routes they could while letting the Jedi intuitively navigate vital supplies into the system.

   We finally did get to the Jedi Council – or at least the people who were currently holding down those seats; three geriatric cases, a couple of weakly force-sensitive bureaucrats, and a bunch of half-trained children.

   They turned out to be a lot easier to convince than the military. It also turned out that there were a lot of ships available. Coruscant did lie on a hyperpath nexus; lost ships often turned up there – and the galaxy was full of those these days.

    Unfortunately, Coruscant was also full of rioting, rebellion, and small civil wars. A total breakdown was a lot closer than anyone else they’d talked to so far had been willing to admit.

   The Jedi were willing to take the chance if the cooperation of the civilian authorities and the military could be obtained. They didn’t see many other chances.

   This began a colossal governmental and military argument regarding what was the safer route to take. Some of the strategic analysts and I were of the opinion that the Sith were winning given the current circumstances. Some of the others in the discussions felt that the risk of losing the Jedi in some hyperspace accident gambling on an insane plan was unacceptable; even taking them away for more than a few weeks was likely to lead to a Republic collapse anyway – and their loss would certainly kill the recovery project. Yet another group was advocating a gracious surrender to the Sith. Then there were the bunch advocating that the Republic be taken over by the military and the Jedi and Sith eliminated. There were religious kooks, insisting that the disaster was a judgement on the galaxy for allowing the use of the force; they wanted to have a private apocalypse and return Coruscant – and the rest of the galaxy – to a primitive life. Some fanatic loonies wanted to blow up Coruscant rather than submit to the inevitable Sith triumph.

   There were even a subversive bunch who wanted to steal the superweapon and blackmail the government with the threat of wiping out the new beacon network, as limited as it was.

   Alright, taking a note of those names as they may become important back home.

   Fortunately, the lunatic fringe groups advocating completely unworkable or suicidal plans were a minority for now, but they were likely to pick up momentum as the situation became more desperate. Sadly, things were getting more desperate with our arrival and the leaking of the news we had a superweapon in orbit. This development at least gave credence to the idea that the Republic was on the verge of collapse as things currently stood, ergo something drastic had to happen if the Republic was to have any hope of surviving this at all.

   The officials and strategists weren’t happy at all when I suggested having Sith help me save the galaxy instead of the Jedi if they were going to be this obstinate. That – and the repeated pointing out that the Sith Empire still had its navigation grid – finally got everyone to quiet down and agree to the idea of rescuing the grid in principle. The Jedi had already given their own consent to the idea and so the collection of Jedi began. It took several days for the recall to complete, but soon the base was filled with just about every Jedi in the system and nearby with a shred of power.

   And most of them were giving me dirty looks.

   The Republic had been allowed to poke around the Ratsoogomoz – and they had soon started wanting to arrest and execute the crew of the Ratsoogomoz for their part in destroying civilization. I had to admit getting annoyed at this and asked the Republic officials who they were willing to replace the crew with that had qualifications in running the system. I also told them that the Sith who used the weapon was killed as far as it mattered, and the remaining two Sith were “forced” to leave the sector. Ergo, the ones most responsible were either dead or run for the rim. The crew couldn’t be held accountable when the Sith were known to execute anyone not following orders.

   Alys, meanwhile, had been trying to explain matters to her parents – who had been delighted to see her. They’d thought she was dead – or at least lost for good. They were worried that Corwin might be involved with the military junta movement.

   Alys was also most upset to find that her father was injured; he’d ben caught in a building collapse and had suffered a broken arm, ribs, and a crushed foot – and was getting along on old-style splints due to the bacta shortage.

   That was too much to bear. They had plenty of bacta aboard the Ratsoogomoz – and so she took them up for treatment.

   The timing turned out to be either very good of very bad, depending on how you looked at it. The Ratsoogomoz broke orbit while her father was still in treatment… It looked like her parents were along for a trip to another universe. Shipwreck had finally managed to derive a set of coordinates from Alys to Alys – and Ben had turned them into settings – and they were getting underway with no further delays. There were too many rumors spreading across Coruscant already.

   Ben’s announcement of how good it was to have a second super weapon in our possession was not helping my mood either. Nor was my finding Jacob snorting our bacta supplies. The discovery of more bioweapons deep in the bio labs aboard the Ratsoogomoz was just the icing on the cake. We knew about Jacob (who was dumped out the airlock earlier) and Xiang, but we also found local versions of De’arc (apparently turned into a living drug factory) and Dr Orin (turned into some sort of living bomb).

   Alright, why is it that no matter what universe I go to, I am in the midst of copies of the insane nutjobs in my life? At least Valerie wasn’t a bio weapon or an insane Sith unlike the rest of these nuts. Something is wrong when the Sith that regularly beat the snot out of me is beginning to look good in comparison. We handed the bio weapons over to Republic custody. Not that Coruscant needed bioweapons right now, but I was also fairly certain there was only so much damage those people could get up to by themselves.

   I was also getting rather annoyed with the questions, koans, advice, chastising, lectures, and all from the Jedi when Ben announced the modifications to the Ratsoogomoz were complete. After I walked the Jedi through how to work the dimensional navigation technique, we fired up the hyperdrive and headed off. I will admit, this time I had a lot more backing power wise than any other time I’ve tried this trick as all the Jedi on board assisted in the dimensional steering.

   We then arrived in a heavily irradiated zone, and Shipwreck quickly confirmed that this looked to be the galaxy we were looking for. We picked up the communications and navigation grid quickly enough. With some use of our Republic codes, we sent out a general broadcast to everyone in range of the grid to contact us. Unfortunately this resulted in us getting bombarded with over 80,000 collect calls (since they didn’t have override codes or access to their bank accounts) from people stranded in this galaxy. It took some time sorting through that mess until we eventually decided to send out another broadcast telling everyone to engage their hyperdrives when they detect the beacons vanishing. We at least located Alys though.

   The communications system can try it’s luck at billing me for all those collect calls though.

   With that sorted out, we made a course for the galactic black hole…. again. Handell, again, was not happy to be asked to do this. At least this time we had a functional, if inaccurate, grid to use as a navigational aid. He finally relented and laid in a course to the black hole.

   After we arrived, Ben and Shipwreck started talking excitedly about something. From what I could gather, the black hole was emitting radiation and wasn’t in the center of the galaxy. It was also nearly 26,000,000,000 standard stellar masses. Not really understanding why this was unusual, all I got was that this couldn’t be natural for the black hole to be doing this the way it was. Ok, fine, I still didn’t quite understand why a black hole spewing radiation unnaturally in a dead galaxy was our problem. At that point I was told it was also emitting a weak hyperspace field across the galaxy and that this would interfere with our return trip if we attempted it – or some such thing. It didn’t make a lot of sense to me.

   Well damn it.

   It was decided to send a probe into the black hole to determine what was going on. How they still managed to talk to it as it dipped past the event horizon was beyond me. There was more fooling around with sensors and Ben and Shipwreck talking excitedly while I looked on wondering what all the fuss was about. Eventually I was told they had detected a ship in there that had been running a hyperdrive tunnel system for three-quarters of a billion years. Somehow this tunnel was responsible for irradiating much of the galaxy and sending it off-center.

   Ben found it fascinating – and several things fell into place… The inside of the black hole was in stasis-level time. That explained a lot of things – and meant that waiting an hour or so and a lot of tinkering with his hyperwave receiver could get him a trickle of data from his probe, at least until the incredibly blue-shifted incoming radiation destroyed it. So the black hole was not being dragged along with the rest of the galaxies time… It had to be something to do with the intense gravity. The “Event Horizon” was just where the time-shift occurred.

   The hole itself was in an ecliptic orbit, oscillating back and forth through the galactic core. According to what information Handell could pull out of the navigation grid with their military codes, there was a trail of sorts – the disturbances it had left as it passed through the starfield – and his computations gave him a (very rough) estimate of some three-quarters of a billion years of such passes. At a guess, at that point, SOMETHING had moved the black hole out of place, to somewhere between five and ten thousand light years from it’s position at the core.

   The radiation field was tuned to particle-annihilation frequencies and came out of hyperspace. It looked like it was the result of particles being scattered out of the black hole though that weak hyperfield.

   Wait; if someone had taken a tunnel-drive equipped ship into the black hole – whether or not they meant too – it would have generated an intense transport field just outside the event horizon as it entered. The Black Hole would have… suddenly been under hyperdrive. It would have moved a long ways. As the ship went deeper, it would have generated a far larger and more diffuse field. Only enough to transport particles, and destroying most of those. Creating a radiation field tuned to particle-annihilation frequencies which would gradually expand across the galaxy.

   Such a ship might only survive for a few minutes or hours – but in the near-timelessness of the black hole, that might be several billion years. Someone – perhaps an early civilization with an experimental hyperdrive that they didn’t fully understand – had accidentally killed their entire galaxy. Inside the hole, that ship was still detectable – but was there any way to reach it through the stasis effect?

   I was all for firing a torpedo at the damned thing, but I was told this wouldn’t work due to time distortions. Jacob then volunteered to go in and use his atavism ability to hold his timerate constant before shooting down the problem ship. I felt this plan was beyond suicidal but I wasn’t about to stop him if he wanted to suicide spectacularly.

   Jacob, in fact, had given in to the Light Side on that one; it would be insanely risky – but he couldn’t leave the rest of this galaxy to die as the radiation field continued to expand. He spent a good deal of time attuning himself to the Force in this universe, and linked himself to the timefield generated by the stars of the galaxy (who actively helped; they didn’t like having the black hole wandering around) – which would also serve to anchor his links against the pull of the black hole – and headed in.

   Everyone else went to great extremes (spending force points) to give him as much protection as they could, the best ship possible, and every other advantage they could cobble together.

   Jacob took a ship the others jury-rigged together and plunged into the black hole. At which point I felt the local time rate shift by a nearly 10% loss. At first I tried to compensate until I saw that no one else had perceived this change. Interesting, it seems Codex powers will enable me to feel when the local time rate changes on me.

   Reports came in from Jacob regarding what he saw. It looked like the intense radiation inside the black hole was slowly evaporating the skin of the ship. The pilot and crew were almost certainly dead. I had to admit the images we got back had a haunted quality to them and I felt an odd fascination to learn more about who they were, where they had come from, and what had happened to them. A ship over three-quarters of a billion years old was a discovery way beyond anything the galaxy had known.

   Jacob felt much the same way… A relic of one of the earliest civilizations in the galaxy. The first ever hyperdrive. It was a pity to destroy it – but he couldn’t sense anyone still alive to rescue. It looked like the radiation storm had been lethal in moments.

   Sadly with no easy way to retrieve it, and our ability to leave hampered by its existence, it was necessary for us to destroy it. Jacob fired his torpedo and destroyed the ship before leaving the black hole via hyperdrive. Jacob was put into medical care once we retrieved him and then we set about putting the grid back to its original galaxy. That proved easy enough given our resources. Ben and Handell did something with the hyperdrive before apparently moving the black hole back to the center of the galaxy.

   That was easy actually; they simply projected a properly-tuned tunnel into the black hole – and let Handell steer it by manipulating the field they were projecting. Once the Black Hole was back where it belonged, they used it – and the massed efforts of their Jedi – to return the navigation grid.

   Alys had done some soul-searching about abandoning her new friends – but had eventually decided to leave them her hyperdrive information and backups and return home. It had been an interesting vacation, but it really wasn’t her world – and she was somewhat flattered that the others had come across the dimensions to find her.

   With that all sorted out and the grid returned to its rightful place, we made our return there to drop off the Jedi. While the others were joyous of our success, I was brooding. We had found out how to build to functional superweapons: one that could destroy civilization, and another that could destroy most life in the galaxy. The common thread between these weapons was the fact that both required a black hole to operate. Apparently the only way to build one that works was to use it inside someplace the Force cannot reach: inside a black hole.

   That worried me more than anything. More than one of these guys had expressed entertaining the idea of joining the Sith. The Jedi have also spawned more Sith than any other organization out there. This new knowledge was far more dangerous than anything we’ve learned thus far and I can’t say I trust these people with this information. Problem gets to be, I don’t have the skill to mindwipe everyone and killing them all is beyond my means too. But that would mean returning home with a base full of people more than willing to tell all their secrets and the operating instructions on how to truly destroy the galaxy and/or civilization.

   I wasn’t happy to say the least. Plus I was concerned what sort of mischief that Holosith could get into with knowledge of how the Codex works. The Jedi were more than willing to dump the Codex techniques into the pile marked “Too dangerous to use” and end it there. That meant if I was to leave anyone with the knowledge to counter Sith-Faded, then I had to find someone outside the Jedi.

   I knew of only two people who were proven to be able to handle both the Force and the Codex, and I knew where one was, and had a sneaking suspicion I knew where the other one was too.

   Time to make some calls I think.

The Illusion of Game Balance – Part II

   A post a few days back on the Illusion of Game Balance led to a rebuttal, which can be found over HERE. The points made over there so far could be (very briefly) summarized as:

   1) The more attention a particular Role gets in a rules set, the more options and abilities it will offer – and thus it will be unbalanced in comparison to other roles.

   2) Game Balance is indeed a function of the rules, rather than the actual play of the game (with the rules, players, and game master all interacting).

   3) Game Balance “is about providing the potential for all things to be important. This is directly tied to being in the rules, and why rules need to be properly balanced… TORG is the game that comes to mind that mechanically rewards as many different styles of play as possible in one game, if we want to talk about your definition of game balance, and does it with an ever-expanding ruleset. For your Crunchy Players, it has a lot of crunchy rules bits to play with. For your Power Trippers, it’s got a lot of weapons and superpowers that make you powerful. For your Drama Players, the Drama Deck gives you opportunities to create plots and to shine in the spot light. If one side gets to strong, the game master is allowed to move or even change cosms mid stride, and suddenly, things that used to work just don’t anymore, and it’s all in the rules. TORG really is one of the best games to achieve mechanically a balance between Player Ability. Not that it was perfect, either, but it was very satisfactory.” – Kensan Oni.

   Now…

   (1) simply isn’t necessarily true. “You are omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent” is only six words. The rules for being a realistic flying squirrel are a lot longer and far more complicated than six words – but somehow I suspect that a character created using the flying squirrel rules will be a good deal weaker than one created using that six word rule.

   (2) is essentially an argument over terminology; using “Game Balance” where I’d say “Rules Balance” – although I must note that I’ve never seen genuine “Rules Balance” for all possible role’s yet. Every RPG system that I’ve ever seen that was complex enough to be really interesting had imbalances, exploits, and lousy roles.

   (3), however, is far more interesting. TORG is an excellent game system and can be a lot of fun. It  offers a very good illusion of BOTH “Game” and “Rules” Balance – and it’s worth a detailed look at how it does that. I’ve been running the occasional game of TORG since it came out back in 1990. It’s one of the few games (along with World Tree, Shadowrun, Champions, AD&D, and a few others) where I own multiple copies of the same edition.

   Still, let us look at the basic rules of TORG for a moment.

• In TORG, all player characters are presumed to be Storm Knights.
• They are all possibility rated and start with a base of ten possibilities.
• They all get to use the Drama Deck.
• They all get 66 attribute points to split between seven attributes. That averages 9.4 – and an attribute of 8 is average.
• They all start with 16 skill points.
• Anyone who starts with any knowledge of magic gets 12 points worth of Arcane Knowledges.

   Being Possibility Rated lets you roll again and add on tens and twenties, instead of just on tens. It lets you shrug off wounds that would kill a normal person. It lets you instantly acquire skills. It lets them bend reality to make things work in areas where the laws of nature are against you.

   It lets you quite routinely accomplish feats that a normal human wouldn’t expect to have work one time in a hundred thousand For example, to reach a total of 41+ on a roll, a normal human needs to roll four tens in a row (well, OK, three tens and then 10+) – an 11 in 160,000 chance. A Storm Knight – even without spending a possibility to roll again and add – has a roughly 1 in 200 chance with assorted permutations of 10’s, 20’s, and other die rolls. If the player opts to spend a possibility, and use a few cards, he or she can pull off stunts in that range quite dependably.

   In other words, every character – including that orphaned street kid – starts off with attributes that are well above average (on a powers-of-ten scale yet), with plenty of skills, the ability to instantly acquire skills that would take a normal person months to learn, the durability of an action movie hero, and the ability to pull off incredible stunts.

   So much for all the “normal person” roles out there. Just being a possibility rated starting character says “junior superhero”. The label may say “Orphaned Street Kid”, but the actual character is closer to “Batman”.

   Now, the Drama Deck is also very important. A few well-played cards can easily turn a scene around. For example, when one group was surrounded by a dozen super-advanced hovertanks from the cyberpapacy they stalled for a few rounds to collect cards, then Robin popped up and – backed by everyone else’s cards – destroyed all one dozen tanks with a single multi-target attack with his automatic pistol. He was pleased that there were only a dozen though, since his magazine only held fifteen shots – and I refused to let him blow up more than one tank with a single bullet even though the rules would technically have allowed it.

   In terms of analysis, the important thing about those cards is that you don’t have to actually succeed at anything useful to get more. You just have to attempt an approved action against a soft target each round – which means that your character doesn’t actually need to do anything useful for the player to make a major contribution to the party. All you really need to do is to be there, get more cards, and play them when the other players ask you to do so. With access to the Drama Deck, you could be playing an ordinary hamster and still be a valued member of the party.

   The Drama Deck does make it easy for a player to introduce subplots and such – but a player or a game master can do that in any game; all the player needs to do is either come up with an interesting idea and agree to cooperate with the game master in implementing it or to simply start something (presuming the game master is competent enough to develop such free hooks). Drama Deck subplots are a good crutch for players who are reluctant to try to introduce elements of their own into a game though. That’s why I created a similar deck for some of White Wolf’s games. (It’s the Scion Legend Cards file in the downloads box).

   Of course, in TORG, it’s very difficult to make an ineffectual character. I have, in fact, one player who often tries that – and in TORG, it turned out to be impossible. He tried to be ineffectual in combat, but in TORG all seven attributes have major combat applications. Worse, using Maneuver (Dexterity), Trick (Perception), Mind (Test of Wills), Charisma (Taunt), and Spirit (Intimidate) are all almost as effective as actually attacking, and yield extra cards more often. Thus his elderly, noncombative, shakespearian actor turned out to be more effective in battle than many of the more diversified combat specialists.

   The skills were so general that there was no way to actually take useless ones either.

   Is this bad? No, of course not – but it does have its consequences, just like any other game design decision. It makes it easy to write adventures, since you can presume that any small group of random characters will be similarly durable and effective. It makes it easy to introduce new characters into an experienced group, since the card-play will make them valuable in any tense situation no matter how specialized or behind-the-curve their talents are otherwise.

   On the other hand, that same effect subtly devalues player decisions during character creation, since most of them don’t really matter much – and can make it easy for players with experienced characters and practice using the system to stomp over pretty much any opposition, right on up to the cosmic-evil-in-a-can Darkness Devices themselves.

   In fact, one experienced group managed to casually destroy a Darkness Device by simply using their cards and other resources to achieve two grossly high Reality skill checks – pushing it through two reality-transformations in a single round. As per the basic rules, the first drained all it’s possibilities and the second destroyed it.

   Now, TORG isn’t especially mechanically balanced; it’s just that Possibilities and the Drama Deck overshadow most attempts to build high-powered starting characters. That doesn’t last if a player is clever and determined though. Arselin, for example, was a serious magical specialist; he took Mind 13 (the maximum, ten times as intelligent as a normal person), Strength 3 (the minimum, one-tenth that of a normal person), Toughness 12, Perception 12, Dexterity 11, Charisma 7, and Spirit 8 (exactly average). He spent most of his initial possibilities on more spells – and got through his first adventure on the strength of his magic without spending a single possibility on anything. By dint of hoarding his possibilities and drama cards (which can be turned in for more possibilities at the end of an adventure), and spending every possibility he got on more magic, he was soon an archmage capable of improvising grandiose effects. Now it was dramatic when he whipped up a force-sphere to protect the group when they were trapped in a sinking submarine at a depth of 3000 feet, took it on a magical-telekinesis powered sub-orbital jump to the other side of the planet inside of ten minutes, and then created a decompression spell to make sure no one got the bends when he dropped the force-sphere – but it certainly outshown several of the other characters. Of course, Robin had regularly outshown everyone during the early sessions, since he had routinely spent almost all of his possibilities on immediate boosts in combat.

   That, of course, is without even considering exploits. A few characters tried exploring some of those. Stormlord (Super Skills: Reality and Weird Science) demonstrated the most direct path to near-infinite power (get into a reality storm and use your super-reality skill to suck in an endless supply of possibilities). Richear thought about the magic system carefully – and when he was cornered in the Cosm of Marketplace chose to suicidally combine that knowledge and a nodding acquaintance with physics to improvise a spell that destroyed the planet by conjuring a substantial mass of free electrons. Another mage came up with a way to summon entities that were far more powerful, and tougher, than any Darkness Device (although he never did it; the player felt that it wouldn’t be any fun and so had his character decide that it was just too risky) – and there were lots of other exploits to use as well.

   By the “giving all roles equal chances to shine” definition TORG is anything but balanced. It’s mechanics only really support a very narrow range of roles (action hero to superhero, regardless of labeling). Moreover, by its own statement, only the one-in-many-thousands who happens to be a Storm Knight is really important to play. It disguises that lack of “balance” fairly well by giving all the characters a good deal of power to start off with, by using the Drama Deck to make sure that – at least initially – character-design decisions play a secondary role to simply being there, and by encouraging the players to slap any sort of cosmetic disguise they please over their characters basic action-hero framework.

   It’s easy to make sure that all the roles you offer get “equal chances to shine” when you actually drastically limit the variety of roles available. Just start off by giving them all very similar underlying abilities, seriously curtail the initial effects of player choice, and limit the effects of all but the most dedicated attempts at character development (in TORG that’s done by allowing – indeed, by often almost requiring – Possibilities to be spent for immediate benefits rather than being saved for later in buying character upgrades).

   You can provide a pretty good illusion of “Game Balance” that way, but it’s still an illusion; you’re just drawing attention away from all the rest of the world and to the limited set of roles you want people to be playing.

   Simply from observation, actually “providing the potential for all things to be important” through the game rules is apparently impossible; I’ve collected hundreds of game over the past decades – and I have yet to see one that accomplishes that, even barring exploits and determined players.

   On the other had, I’ve also run most of those game systems – including systems like the original Marvel Super Heroes, where it was easy to wind up with characters like Julie Power (a little girl who could fly) and The Mighty Thor, God of Thunder, on the same team. It’s always been pretty easy to make sure that everyone got their moments of glory and had a chance to contribute to the game and the group’s success. The same goes for running AD&D parties with levels spread from four to sixteen, or for similar “imbalances” in hundreds of other games. The rules – including the times I’ve run systems that were invented on the spot – really don’t matter much. Producing the illusion of game balance is easier with a well-designed rules set that supports your style of play, but it’s the same illusion regardless of the rules – and it’s always the job of the game master.

   At a small convention, I once left the last game slot open for requests; what I got was four of them – a request from a trio of gamers for high-level AD&D, a request for Continuum II (from Charles, who wanted to play Garm, the golem-death-machine guardian of the great northern glacier), a pair of players requesting Shadowrun, and a request for Battletech.

   So I gave a few moments thought to converting effects, than gave each set of players a separate briefing on the situation and on their victory conditions, brought them together, and played out a four-sided encounter with each side using their own game system. Eventually, through a mixture of battle, treachery, and expedient alliances, three of the four sides managed to achieve their victory conditions – the Battletechers obtained a foundation for their later development of personal “elemental” armor (and swore never to come near this insane sector of space again), the AD&D characters got a good report for their sponsors and a selection of weapons from the Shadowrunners and Battletechers, the Shadowrunners managed to abscond back to their own time with many of the secrets of Battletech Clan Technology (which was used to start the course of development which would later lead to the Star League), and even Garm wasn’t too unhappy – while he didn’t manage to evict all those pests from his glacier, they left on their own eventually.

   Were the four entirely incompatible rules systems in play at the same time “Balanced”?

   Mechanically? Of course not. In play? They worked just fine. Everyone had a good time, the fights were exciting, and the gamers wanted to play again – and were disappointed that the convention was over.

   I think that “everyone had a good time” is one of the major goals of gaming – but rules alone aren’t going to get you there. Yes, a good, smooth, rules system can help, but “Game Balance” is something that only exists in the perceptions of the players; you know that it’s not something objective because two people can look at a rules system and disagree as to whether a particular rule is balanced. “Game Balance” is a part of having a good time though, and so it’s always up to the game master to provide that perception – that illusion – for the players.

Kadian Package Deals

   Those Thralls who have had time for advanced training (or, in a few cases, have arrived with the equivalent) can have any of several different package deals. Those who haven’t had such training already are being rotated back through Kadia to get it as quickly as possible.

   For that matter, it’s perfectly possible for other visitors to study some of these package deals – although two of them – Familiar and Magician – will require that their users have some basic abilities (Rite of Chi to regain power for the Familiar and both Specialized Occult Ritual and a rather high constitution for the Magician) to build on.

   Similarly, a Thrall can have two package deals; they just have to spend their twelve customization points on buying the second one.

   Kadian Administrators primarily exist due to Mr Gelman, who pointed out the need to have some sort of management in place other than grabbing the nearest Thrall, pointing at a problem, and saying “get some guys together and deal with that!”. The first thing to develop was for all of them to get some basic administrative skills. Next up, we have some advanced training and the following package deal…

• 3x Enthusiast, Specialized in Skills (3 CP).
• Innate Enchantment: All enchantments Spell Level One, Caster Level One, Unlimited-Use Use-Activated, and Personal-Only, 6000 GP effective value (7 CP).
  • The Counselors Word: May use Aid Another by providing advice (2000 GP).
  • Rapid Assessment. May take a full minute to think about something or consult neurally-linked databases (but not to do anything else) as a move action (1400 GP).
  • Instant Learning: May switch a single point in Enthusiast with a mere minute of study, 3 Uses/Day, (1200 GP)
  • True Skill: +20 on a skill check, 3/Day (1200 GP).
• Immunity/the normal XP cost of Innate Enchantments (Uncommon, Minor, Trivial [only covers first level effects at caster level one], Specialized/only to cover their Administrative abilities, 1 CP).
• +3 Speciality in Profession/Administrator/Thrall Teams (1 CP).

   Kadian Bookies are – as yet – pretty rare. They’re the product of Martin’s efforts to train his kids to follow in his own, rather crooked, footsteps. As yet, they’re all very young – equivalent to seven or eight years old at the most. That doesn’t make them – whether as Thralls or as Gamblers – any less dangerous.

• Broad Skills (all +Int Mod): Bluff (1 SP +Int Mod), Gamble (1 SP +Int Mod), Knowledge/The Underworld (1 SP +Int Mod),
• Psychology (1 SP +Wis Mod), Sense Motive (1 SP +Wis Mod), Sleight of Hand (1 SP +Dex Mod), and Streetwise (1 SP +Wis Mod) (7 CP).
• Skill Speciality: Bluff/Appear Innocent and Guileless (1 CP).
• Innate Enchantment, Specialized/only half value. All at Caster Level One, Spell Level One, Unlimited-Use Use-Activated. 2500 GP effective value (3 CP): True Skill 3/Day (1200 GP), Undetectable Lie 2/Day (800 GP), Hypnotism 1/Day (400 GP).
• Immunity/the normal XP cost of Innate Enchantments (Uncommon, Minor, Trivial [only covers first level effects at caster level one], Specialized/only to cover their Bookie abilities, 1 CP).

   Kadian Familiars are trained to improve their abilities as familiars and bodyguards. This is one of the more basic – and most common – training packages available to them.

• Intensive Training: Augmented Bonus/May add Con Mod to Dex Mod for Skill Purposes (6 CP).
• Deep Reserves: +2 Bonus Uses on their Rite of Chi, Specialized/only for Power, requires ten minutes of meditation to use (2 CP).
• A +3 Speciality in Spot/ambushes, assailants, and hidden weapons (1 CP).
• Power Words, Specialized/requires ten minutes of preparation to store a spell, must be able to gesture to release them (3 CP).

   Kadian Magicians can handle one truly major effect of their choice, and are tolerably skilled ritualists in general. They’re relatively uncommon, but they’re around because Kevin needs people who can handle the occasional emergency gate, or major magical request, while he’s not available to take care of it.

• Grand Ritual: Inherent Spell: Specialized and Corrupted for Triple Effect (a level nine spell of some type)/requires a lengthy ritual, various minor ingredients, and draws on the power of Kadia – where caster level requirements are not an issue – and thus requires the expenditure of magic points anywhere else. Since magic points are a very limited resource, and this calls for five of them, any given 18-constitution Thrall can only use his or her ritual once every other day. Common rituals include Gate, Species-Changing (and other grand transformations – basically re-arranging a basic +1 to +2 ECL race), and various Greater Invocations (any Abjuration spell of level seven or less, any Conjuration spell of level seven or less, and so on) (6 CP).
• Unspecialize their Occult Ritual ability to full use (+3 CP).
• A +3 Speciality in Spellcraft/Ritual Magic (1 CP).
• A +2 Skill Emphasis in Spellcraft, Specialized in Occult Rituals (1 CP).
• +1 Skill Point in Knowledge/Arcana (1 CP).

   Kadian Werewolves exist mostly because Marty imported – and Kevin Enthralled for him – a number of young werewolves. Secondarily, Kevin rather likes werewolves (he thinks they’re cute and fuzzy), Marty thinks they’re fun to party with, and Limey thinks they make excellent pets.

• Innate Enchantment. All enchantments Spell Level One, Caster Level One, Unlimited-Use Use-Activated, and Personal-Only. Specialized/comes with wolfish instincts (and the need to make occasional will checks to resist such impulses), pack loyalty, and the traditional signs of being a werewolf. 7000 GP inherent value (4 CP).
  • Wolf-Shift. A lesser, specific, variant on Alter Self that provides +2 Natural Armor Fur, d6 Claws/Fangs, and a wolfish or full-wolf appearance without other game-mechanic alterations (1400 GP).
  • Speak with Animals (1400 GP).
  • Enhance Attribute/+2 Wisdom (1400 GP).
  • Wrath. +2 Str, +2 Con, +1 Will, and -2 AC when in use (1400 GP).
  • Rugged Metabolism Package: Fast Healing I – for 18 Rounds – 2/Day, Relieve Illness 1/Day, Relieve Poison 1/Day, and Lesser Restoration 1/Day (from the Hedge Wizardry list on this site and The Practical Enchanter, 1400 GP).
• Immunity/the normal XP cost of Innate Enchantments (Uncommon, Minor, Trivial [only covers first level effects at caster level one], Specialized/only to cover their Werewolf abilities, 1 CP).
• Immunity to Dispelling, Antimagic, and Countermagic (Common/Minor/Great. Specialized in protecting innate enchantments only, Corrupted/only covers powers in this werewolf package (4 CP).
• DR 2/-, Specialized versus physical attacks only, Corrupted not versus silver, both for Increased Effect. +6/Silver to base DR, if any (3 CP).

   Those aren’t especially powerful werewolves without the rest of the Thrall-powers – but this does cover most of the minimum hollywood package.

Kevin’s Divine Endowment Bonuses

   Lord Kevin, thanks to a complex series of feedback loops, is now bestowing some sixty-eight points – close to three levels worth – of benefits upon his faithful followers. In general, that’s his agents and priests and wanna-be agents and priests.

   He hasn’t really thought about the fact that the eligible candidates include people who would like to work for him but who are bound by other commitments, people who THINK that they’re doing what he wants when they’re really not, people who are being misled by self-serving “priests”, anyone who develops the ability to tap into that power without actually being a faithful follower (by buying an immunity to that requirement), and various other complications.

   In fact, it’s entirely possible to be tapping into Kevin’s power-boost even while actively opposing Kevin, as long as you’d rather not be doing so if you had a free choice.

   In other words, in one of the usual recipes for trouble, he’s handing out power without checking on the people who are getting it. In fact, he’s so enmeshed in feedback loops that – at this point – it will be nearly impossible for him to bring things under control.

   In any case, those powers now include:

• One level of Full-Package Clerical Spellcasting with the Negative Energy and Witchery Domains (10 CP). This includes:
  • Three Level Zero and One Level One Spell Slots, plus One Domain Spell Slot. These are most commonly filled with : Light, Suppress Energy, and Detect Magic [all of which can be converted to Charm Person for one power] for level zero, Cure Light Wounds [may be converted to Amplify Psychic Power] and Lesser Disruption for level one.
  • Spell Conversion to the Witchery Domain Spells.
  • Two Domain Feats – Normally 12 CP worth of Witchcraft or additional Power.
  • A Witchcraft Pact: The Spirit Pact. This means that – if they’re killed – their spirits will be drawn to Kadia, Kevin’s afterlife-realm. It also provides them with the remaining 6 CP needed to purchase full basic Witchcraft. That’s (Str+Dex+Con)/3 Power and seven abilities from the basic Witchcraft list – normally including The Hand of Shadows and Healing.
• +1d6+2 Power (3 CP). With their usual Relic, this provides (Str+Dex+Con)/3 + 4d6 +2 Power. That’s not an enormous amount, but it’s enough to use a fair amount of Witchcraft.
• Rite of Chi with +2 Bonus Uses, Specialized/only usable to recover Power and requires ten minutes of meditation to use (4 CP).
• Immunity to Sensory-Based Mind Control. Immunity (Uncommon / Major / Minor, blocks effects of up to L3 and provides a +4 on saves against more powerful effects) (4 CP).
• Dimensional Adaption: Enthusiast, Specialized for double effect: Only for the “Identities” skill, Corrupted: only changes in new realm, reduces the cost of Identities by 2 SP. For wannabes in the Manifold, this will usually provide +16 CP worth of local privileges, wealth, and so on (2 CP).
• Broad Skills (all +Int Mod): Appraise (1 SP +Int Mod), Gather Information (1 SP +Cha Mod), Parenting (1 SP + Wis Mod), Search (1 SP +Int Mod), Sleight of Hand (1 SP + Dex Mod), Spellcraft (1 SP +Int Mod), and Wealth (Core) (5 SP +Cha Mod) (11 CP).
• Narrow Skills (All +Int Mod +5 Training): Dimensional Navigation (1 SP +Wis Mod), First Aid (1 SP +Wis Mod), Negotiation (1 SP +Cha Mod), and Profession/Administration (1 SP +Wis Mod) (4 CP).
• Reflex Training, three bonus actions as required per day (6 CP).
• Luck with +2 Bonus Uses, Specialized in Saving Throws (4 CP).
• Shapeshift with +2 Bonus Uses (9 CP).
• Occult Ritual, Specialized in Summonings, Bindings, and Pacts (3 CP).
• Relic Mastery: Enthusiast x2, Specialized in Relics for double effect the first time, to let them have 4 CP worth of relics of their choice (6 CP).
• Create Relic: Specialized/two-point Relics maximum and Corrupted/only for use with their points from Enthusiast (2 CP).

   Would-be followers can usually be assumed to have created some personal relics:

• A Psychic Focusing Crystal which provides +3d6 Power (1 CP).
• A Warding Eye of Kadia: Grant of Aid with +4 Bonus Uses (2 CP).
• A relic providing an advanced witchcraft talent of choice or some other one-character point Relic (1 CP).

   Full Thralls can usually be expected to have created:

• A Psychic Focusing Crystal which provides +3d6 Power (1 CP).
• A Warding Eye of Kadia: +4 Bonus Uses for Grant of Aid (1 CP).
• Two other one-point relics of choice.

Federation-Apocalypse Session 134c – The Foreshadowing

   In and about the Linear Realms Dr Brenner was experimenting… He’d accepted that Kevin and Marty were making moves on an infinitely bigger playing field than he had dreamed existed – and had decided that making a place for himself in their organization would be the best way to go. With the prospect of near-immortality before him, there was no reason to rush into anything more.

   Amazingly enough, that decision had brought power with it. It wasn’t much compared to the incredible power that this “Kevin” bestowed on his “Thralls” – but it was more than he ever would have credited!

   He’d asked the servant-canines that he’d been assigned, and had been informed that anyone who believed in Kevin’s existence – and really wanted to work for him – got a certain amount of power.

   That was hard to believe – but when he tried pitching the “Faith of Kevinirl” to a few of the more easily impressionable local idiots – along with rosy promises of heavenly delights and power, more than a bit of chemical and psychic manipulation, and service to himself as the high priest and “interpreter of Keviniril’s will” – it worked on a couple of them, and that convinced more.

   He’d long known that religious cults were easy to start – and he’d known that a few of them taught a few minor skills to their true adherents – but he’d never before credited the notion that such small things might actually be supernatural gifts from some sort of deific power!

   And THIS… This wasn’t just a few clever tricks, this was genuine power. Power that could be used…

   It wasn’t long before he had hundreds of semi-fanatical adherents, that believed that – by serving him – they could have power now and ascend to paradise with Keviniril later.

   And the best part was that it was even more or less true!

   Still, there had to be limits as to how far “Lord Kevin” would let people take advantage of him, no matter how many servants and how much inexplicable power he possessed. There had to be some way to establish some of those limits…

   His canines, unfortunately, had had very little direct contact with their Lord. They had volunteered, and had been ceremonially inducted into Kevin’s service – and had soon afterwards been assigned to him.

   They did know that Kevin tended to talk and bribe enemies into submission, that he gave them power in exchange for their loyalty – and that they were eager to serve him in any way that he might require!

   So; Kevin lavished resources on his problems, preferred soft methods of resolving conflicts, and tended to talk first?

   Hm. The youngster who’d set up the contract with him had apparently been disciplined for it, but the contract had not been repudiated – so Kevin respected contracts, right down to bargains made on his account. He was certainly over-generous with power, and with the creatures that he empowered. A few visits to Kadia had been enough to establish that he could trade Slave-children in Kadia for many other things than just Smartclothes! Even, apparently, for the services of more canines like the ones that he already had – and death apparently simply returned them to Kadia. .

   Just how far could he push this child-godling?

   Ah. He could test – and when he did go over the line, wherever it might be located, he could count on a chance to apologize, talk, and step back before any serious consequences would even be considered – at least the first few times.

   Now what provocation could he most easily explain?

   Ah. his contract called for him to stop taking organs out of children, not for him to necessarily trade all he acquired – and not for any particular kind of treatment of the canines, even if their “ultimate ownership remained with Kevin”. Ramirez had expected to be fixed for his assault on him – and therefore that wouldn’t be too abnormal. That could serve as a test of the limits of the canines obedience too, as well as their pain tolerance – and if he was called on it, he could always point out that he’d agreed not to breed them, and was just making sure – and hadn’t been sure what anesthetics could be safely used on them.

   He called them in and explained – testing in more ways than one.

(Canine) “Aww… Yes master. Can we use pain control for that?”

(Brenner, evilly) “This is also a pain threshold experiment.”

(Another canine) “Can we whimper? We’re really quite sensitive there.”

(Brenner) “Oh, that’s all right. Do that all you want.”

   Impressive… No serious protests, no resistance, and rolling over obediently for the procedure without restraint or compulsion. Afterwards he let them use pain-control and self-healing and fed them. There was no reason to be cruel now that it was obvious that they’d obey almost any order – and would willingly sacrifice themselves to do so.

   Now all he had to do was await a response from Kadia while he continued to expand his base in the Green Galaxies and checked out criminal opportunities – and chances to acquire more child-slaves to sell in Kadia – in realms across the Manifold. There were many, many, realms too small or limited to have attracted the attention of the great powers as yet – but there was plenty of profit there for him.

   The only response from Kadi was a message that – if the service of his current aides was unsatisfactory – he could be assigned some new ones. Apparently they’d been assigned to him, and having them fixed was well within his rights!

   Kevin, in fact, wanted to make sure that his Thralls term of service was not ALL fun. They needed to know that signing such a pact should be carefully considered first, since not all masters would be at all nice to them – and that they COULD be exploited ruthlessly, although he normally chose not to do so. Ergo, if a bit of abuse was part of an assignment – well, that was the way that it was going to be.

(Brenner, half to himself, half to his canine servants) “Will he let me do whatever I please to you?”

(Canine) “We’re assigned to your service master. We are entitled to transfer our spirits back to Kadia if confronted with long-term torture, paralysis, desensing, burning alive, being skinned, or similar mistreatment – and we have been instructed not to breed while in your custody. Having our tails bobbed, ears cropped, or vocal cords cut, being neutered or spayed, or similar domestic-animal modifications is entirely within your rights, as is punishing us or conducting various experiments.” (There was a brief pause) (anxiously) “Haven’t we been serving you well master?”

   Brenner was shocked… They were telling him exactly what he could and couldn’t do to them? And it was that lenient? Well they didn’t seem to lie…

(Brenner) “Yes, yes you have.”

   Astounding… His telepathic talents were new and limited – but they seemed to be reasonably content to know that Kevin had assigned them to him, and that they were serving him as he desired – although they did hope that he wouldn’t repeat his surgery on them. It had hurt quite a lot.

   Wait, Repeat it? How… Oh yes, they could regenerate themselves if he gave permission. There was no reason to do it to them again though; he’d only been torturing them to test their limits.

   Was there any reason to let them regenerate though? If he couldn’t breed them, their being sexed was of little use to HIM – which was, or course, all that mattered. Still, it seemed that Kevin”s permissions were exceedingly lenient as far as his options went. They might be less aggressive fixed though. Did he want them less aggressive? They did need to defend his holdings…

   He ran them through some combat exercises and evaluations.

   Hm… Well, they were slightly calmer and less aggressive, no longer distracted by sexual stimuli or signals, and had one less point of vulnerability while fighting. They were a bit less satisfied with life – but they’d get over that as their hormones settled down and they continued to serve as Lord Kevin had ordered them to.

   Excellent! He’d trade some more kids for the services of some more canines! He needed them for his expansion project over in the Green Galaxies anyway! Those offered essentially limitless room and endless resources – and he had an entire galaxy to himself there!

   He was a bit disappointed to find that the best he could do was to trade twenty or so kids – with at least two who were willing to become Thralls – for the services of a single canine for fifty years or two kids for a year of service by a human Thrall. Even that was on an one-trade-at-a-time basis; it looked like the Thralls no longer had the authority to fully approve contracts on certain subjects on their own – and the full list of where Kevin was operating was classified.

   Still, the major realms were easy enough to discover, and the pattern was obvious. It would be simple to avoid overlapping any of Kevin’s current operations! There were plenty of realms – especially in the outer circles – where he could easily acquire slave-children to sell; he just had to be a bit less ethical than Kevin’s usual agents were – and that was no difficulty.

   Brenner had another forty-odd canines under his command in short order. The canines were more dependent, and thus more easily controlled, and the instincts suited him perfectly. He didn’t know that they were actually, as per the orders in Kadia, shapeshifted human Thralls – not having grown up with Neodog instincts gave them considerably more flexibility on certain topics – but he certainly wouldn’t have cared much if he had known.

   There was a certain amount of repeating of the “aww” reaction, but if that was what their current master wanted, then that was how it was going to be.

   He also purchased some concubines.

   Kadia offered a bewildering array of options there as well – but he stuck with tall athletic blondes. They were his favorite – and it would be nice to have some women who wouldn’t try to run away as soon as they started to really get acquainted with him!

   Kadia was wonderful! You could trade worthless child-slaves for money, supplies, services… It was like they were a universal currency that reproduced themselves! There wasn’t much of anything – at least within VERY lenient limits – that wasn’t available in Kadia!

   He set up an estate, and stocked it with concubines and canines, just on general principles and to have a private retreat. The “no aging” and “no death” features of the realm were quite attractive – but he had to admit that staying there permanently would be silly! Better to just sell enough kids to buy rejuvenation treatments while he built his kingdom in the Green Galaxies! He had an undeveloped, idyllic galaxy to himself, and it would be a dreadful waste not to put it to use! It was time to go into real estate and possibly nationbuilding…

   Granted, it would be a totalitarian dictatorship at best, but it would be his nation and he was going to be the one in charge! He could even breed kids there, and bring them back to Kadia to sell, as well as going big game hunting in Kadia and his untamed realm. You couldn’t do much of that in the Linear Realms! He could just use his usual pack for that – and if some got killed, replacements could be sent from Kadia in short order! After all, he’d bargained for a term of service, not for any particular canine.

   The canines actually rather enjoyed going hunting too, and were as eager to please as ever.

   Kadia, of course, had all kinds of creatures. In the Green Galaxies there were an immense variety of flyers (tiny through colossal birds, some odd fish, a few squidlke things that jetted around, bats, and flying squirrels), tree-climbers (monkeys [tiny through multi-ton], squirrels, sloths, and leaf-grazers), a selection of aquatic creatures, and relatively few large carnivores – although those were exceptionally good sport even if they did eat one of his canines from time to time.

   Perhaps he should add a game preserve to his base? It was currently large enough to handle a few thousand inhabitants – and there was endless room to spread out and construct more housing around his manufacturing and import facilities. Anyone who ran off would have no source of supplies more advanced than wood, stone, and crude ores, and could be hunted down at leisure, either to be recaptured, enslaved, or slain for the sport of it!

   With his unethical operations in full swing, Dr Brenner started another small project. What use was building an empire without an heir? Now that he had concubines, it was time to father a few…

(Unusually for this campaign, Dr Brenner’s plans here slipped into the future, ergo the following segment is only applicable if conditions do not change – which is all too likely).

   He had three concubines a year produce one – too many kids tended to make excessive noise and get where you didn’t want them – and inspected them all when they were seven. The best one per year he kept to raise. The other two – including, of course, any with flaws, underachievers, defiant kids, and the less clever ones – went up for sale in Kadia with the rest of the children that his operations brought in. Children who passed the initial tests, but who became too defiant or showed flaws later on, were sold in Kadia as well.

   He never did become aware that there was a modest conspiracy amongst his Thrall-Concubines; THEY saw going to Kadia, and becoming Thralls, as a vast improvement over being raised by Dr Brenner – and cheerily encouraged their kids both to sign up as Thralls if they did wind up in Kadia and to defy their father if they were amongst the ones he picked to keep.

   It didn’t always work. For all his evil, Dr Brenner didn’t abuse his own kids. They might turn on him if he did that. He’d seen all the movies… He was impressed though. his concubines seemed to be passing on much of their own genetic augmentations; his children were downright superhuman in some ways.

   The concubines are actually simply passing on the basic Genegrafted Core Human genemods:

• Animal Genegrafts: Shapeshift, with Attribute Modifiers, Hybrid Form, Clear Speech, and Variants (human appearance). Specialized/single form only, Corrupted/cannot actually change forms (9 CP)
• This gives the user a set of animal-species modifiers (as adjusted for medium size). The Thralls normally get Leopard Genes (+6 Str, +8 Dex, +4 Con, +10 Move, +1 Natural Armor, +8 to Agility and Stealth skills, Low-Light Vision, and Scent). While this exploit is generally only allowed in the Federation-Apocalypse game, it’s much too good a deal to pass up there.
• +1d0 HD, Specialized/does not actually supply hit points (2 CP). This is needed to qualify for the Genegrafts.
• +4 Int (only 12 CP thanks to being half price for being in a template and to the local world laws which half the price again).
• Fast Learner, Specialized in Skills (3 CP).
• Immunity/Aging (uncommon/minor/minor, 2 CP). They can expect to live for several centuries without much of any signs of aging.
• Grant of Aid, Specialized/requires several hours and Corrupted/does not improve with level. They can recover 1d8+5 damage OR 1d3 points of attribute damage OR one negative level once per day, 2 CP) with the Regenerative option, Specialized/requires lots of food, rest, and basic medical attention (1 CP), allowing them to slowly (in 1d4 weeks) regrow lost limbs and organs.

   It’s very common for people with this racial template to spend their first few points (or first level bonus feat) upgrading their Fast Learner (3 CP to +2 SP/Level), Bonus Hit Die (2 CP to + Con Mod HP), and Grant of Aid (+1 CP to let it improve with level) abilities.

   Like all Federation-Apocalypse racial templates, this one is extremely powerfulfor a +0 ECL species – especially since it includes that shapeshift exploit.  Still, as usual, mere physical  bonuses don’t mean much in a setting where combat is often army to army or starship to starship.

   Unfortunately, he couldn’t find any way to make them actual, utterly-loyal Thralls. He’d seen the movies, the mad scientist’s beautiful daughter or stalwart son almost always betrayed him… Giving them to Kevin was an option, but hardly a good one unless he could arrange full ownership: they’d be Kevin’s then rather than his. There simply didn’t seem to be any reasonable way to duplicate Kevin’s godlike powers and apparently-divine decrees. Still, there should be SOME way to do something similar!

   He got cracking on studying the reality-manipulation power that seemed to underlie all of Kevin’s other godlike abilities.

   He learned to sense the dimensional barriers easily enough – but learning to manipulate them still seemed beyond his power unless he drew on his canine servants. They could show him many of the abilities, but that didn’t help him develop Gatekeeping at any reasonable speed.

   He got frustrated, and took it out on the canines with random spur-of-the-moment beatings – mostly out of habit; it was what he’d always done with his human minions and playthings.

   At first they just cowered and whined, without trying to run away or resist – but they soon picked up on the fact that this was stress relief, and that Dr Brenner would PREFER that they run and hide and make him search for them. The hunt would relieve his nerves – and if they “won”, they’d get a nice big steak later on!

   That was almost fun! Much better than being punished with tail-cropping, debarking, ear-cropping, or the even nastier surgical options!

   He had the canines watch the kids too. It was only prudent.

   He never realized that that let the canines in on the concubine’s little conspiracy, or that the kids who spent a lot of time with the canines, and who were nice to them, tended to wind up being sold in Kadia too. Kadia was better!

   They virtually all volunteered for Thralldom there, even lying about their ages if necessary. Some even cycled back through later (after making very sure that their evil father would never recognize them in their canine disguises) since they knew their father well and were prepared for him – and it gave them an opportunity to help recruit their younger siblings and to protect other Thralls from getting stuck with the job.

   Back in Kadia, Kevin more or less forgotten about Dr Brenner; he thought that he’d set up an acceptable solution to the problem. Marty checked back eventually though; the guy had been eviscerating kids, and Marty both liked kids and was less inclined than Kevin to toss things into the “problem solved” category. Human problems were only solved when you’d beaten the daylights out of them or otherwise gotten them to knock it off and made damned sure that they knew better than to restart whatever it had been that pissed you off!

   He requested the occasional report on Dr Brenner – and pointed out the problems to Kevin as the first few years worth of Dr Brenners kids started showing up for sale in Kadia. Considering what Dr Brenner thought they might be used for, that was just… too ruthless to even describe.

   Kevin did consider the matter… still, he had allowed youngsters from the Five Worlds to sign up as Thralls very young due to their lack of other places to go – and it did get them affection and security. Normally a very young child required consent from their guardian as well as their own consent, but purchased slave-kids often didn’t have guardians or anyone who wanted them back, and if they wanted to agree… well, small children were pretty much treated as pets anyway.

   Marty felt that was… well, good for the little Brenners then. They could get away from their evil father and get some affection from the… Dark Lord?

   Kevin, of course, liked having young souls snuggling up to his evil darkness to be petted and cuddled and be his property! Binding them that way was incredibly addictive after all…

   As far as Dr Brenner himself was concerned… Kevin didn’t approve of him at all, but as long as he was sending the kids he acquired to Kadia, Brenner wasn’t an especially urgent problem. He did make sure that the Thralls watching Brenner’s kids made every effort to keep them from growing up to be more little monsters though.

   As far as Dr Brenner’s treatment of the Thralls assigned to him went – well, the Thralls had agreed to that kind of treatment, and were warned that it could happen in advance. As long as Brenner kept his abuse of the Thralls fairly short term and within acceptable limits – (enough to make sure they realized that pacts like his did have downsides was a good idea anyway – it was acceptable. It wasn’t like Kevin didn’t have plenty of volunteers for worse assignments – and his attitude towards his Thralls was pretty casual anyway. They had been people, with freedom and dignity, and they would be people again – but for now they were pets and property.

   There were rules!

   Rules were important!

   Maintaining rigid control and sticking precisely to his rules helped him keep the darkness under control! Even in the Dragonworlds he stuck precisely to the social rules of what was “acceptable” evil! The darkness would not rage forth, or inflict itself upon others, while he had anything to say about it!

Federation-Apocalypse Session 134b – Ambition and Hubris

   On a considerably larger scale, the researchers had located several possible plasma- and energy-source realms for the Midnight Gardener project – although it might be necessary to design a specialized realm for the final source. Someplace where machinery the stations could be enchanted to be self-repairing or some other method of defying entropy indefinitely was available.

   The stations themselves were ready, or at least the basic frameworks were, and they could be expanded on site.

   It was time to open the gates and place them, to staff them with some Thralls to maintain the overlay zone and secondary gates, and to start the plasma-feed tests.

  The positioning would be anything but exact, and it would take millennia before the new nebula and stellar nurseries glowed in the skies of the galaxies worlds – and half a million years before the plasma-feed and forming stars began to drift into and feed the outer spiral arms of the Milky Way – but the pilot project and proof-of-concept would be underway. What was the expansion of the universe for if not to provide room for it’s inhabitants to build?

   There was plenty of space between the galaxies for new ones to be constructed – but that was a project for the future. For the moment, Kevin would settle for beginning the long-overdue maintenance of the Milky Way.

   The Core Universe could not be allowed to die. The number of human souls – and, for that matter, of new alien souls and races (and young souls to Enthrall, and let adventure while it would be most fun for both them and him) – had to increase perpetually. At least according to the Ouratha, none of the other races of the galaxy were yet thinking on that kind of scale – and SOMEONE had to do it.

Besides… if he could persuade the people of Core that the Core Universe need not ultimately die of energy-starvation, it might weaken Famine – who was probably drawing strength from that belief.

   And it would send Ryan though the roof, which was always fun!

   He’d want a prepared statement, and to invite some reporters, to witness the first full activation.

   For project Midnight Gardener, the classic “Cosmos” look – a semi-cathederal, an image display behind him, and a podium – would do nicely, as it had for so many centuries.

   The future has always lain in darkness. With the growth of science, humanity peered into that darkness – and saw the coming fall of night and the end of all things. The bright youth of the cosmos would pass. The final brilliant blue-white giants would flare and die. Their light would be a distant memory as – in five or six billion years – the nebula of the galaxy, the nurseries of the stars, would be depleted, and the ever-slowing formation of new stars would grind to a final halt.

   In that future, in twenty billion years, the last of the sol-type stars will be dying, fading into dim and slowly-cooling embers. The light of creation will fade into a dim red glow of long-lived red dwarves and the galaxies beyond our local cluster will have passed beyond the observation limit due to cosmic expansion. The long twilight of the cosmos will have begun, with nothing to look forward to except a night which will never see another dawn.

   Entropy and death would triumph, as the cosmos faded into a random scattering of particles adrift in a lifeless void.

   With the Opening, Humanity saw an escape; the Core Universe might be doomed – but the ability to call new realms into being, and the ability to reset old ones, meant that the Manifold was as eternal as anyone could want.

   But it soon became apparent that the Manifold too had limitations. True fertility – the ability to bring new Souls into the cosmos – waned with time away from the Core Universe. The Manifold offered individual continuation, but the slow drift into ever-more scattered fantasies across the ages still meant the stagnation – and the eventual end – of the human race, as it meant the end of all races.

   But there is another path. A choice of futures. With an Opener and enough Gatekeepers, the limitless resources of the Manifold may be imported into the Core Universe. New stars can be set alight, to hold back the infinite night. New worlds can be born – and burned-out and unstable stars can be removed.

   Today we are taking the first step upon that path. Today we begin the cultivation of our Cosmos, the beginning of it’s transformation from a wilderness into an eternal garden of light, set to shine forever against the darkness.

   It will be a hundred thousand years before new stars begin to form in the nebulas my feed-stations are creating, and perhaps half a million before those new stars will begin to be assimilated into the galaxy – but the project is underway. I have enough Gatekeepers in my service – and I will not permit either the Core Universe or the human race to die.

   I invite those who wish to examine, or participate in, that project to do so.

   What is the expansion of the Core Universe for if not to allow room for it’s inhabitants to build?

   There… That should get some reactions.

   It did indeed draw quite few varied reactions, with a shotgun-load of varying perspectives on the idea – and his implementation of it – even from the initial reporter-audiences (along with some annoying comparisons to a certain supernova event and a few “hubris” and “arrogance” comments). Oh well. That had been sort of inevitable. Save for a planet moving or two, that supernova had been the most notable example of a human making changes to the stellar environment since the Opening.

   The Core military and Governments, of course, got even more nervous about Kevin when their sources among the reporters passed the recordings on to them. Help move a planet, move a planet on his own, decide to rebuild the galaxy without really consulting anyone… What were the limits? What would he be trying to do next? Even if he really was benign, could any youngster be trusted with that much power and influence?

Federation-Apocalypse Session 134a – The Soulless and the Ensouled

   Back in Kadia, there was a bit of a surprise brewing for Marty… Over the past half a year, the Thralls had rescued (or hired) most of the ensouled population of Battling Business World – and some of the local phantasms with enough links to the ensouled had come along for the ride.

   One of them was Martin, Marty’s father.

   The Thralls had recognized that the man was a Phantasm – but he was linked to Marty, so all that meant was that, in serving him, they were indirectly serving Marty! So few of them got a chance to serve Lord Kevin or his friends directly that there was always a great deal of competition for even the roughest jobs – and this was hardly one of those!

   Martin had been rather surprised to have a couple of youngsters turn up on his doorstep wanting a semi-retired alcoholic bookie to come on a trip – but they were obviously corporate interns of some sort, and they’d promised him a party. Rather more importantly, they’d said that they could get him back in contact with his son – and it wasn’t like they could lay any kind of meaningful trap for him of had any likely reason to want to do so.

   Jumping to another dimension was mildly interesting, but no real surprise. Martin had been a part of the cosmic bookie network for most of his life – and knew a lot more about the Manifold and Marty’s general activities than his son had ever suspected that he might. You needed to know things like that to quote profitable odds on the spot on any bet that anyone proposed!

   Kadia looked to be full of entertainment. The very air was invigorating! It made him feel a lot younger in fact – and, as Battling Business World phantasm, Martin was only as old as he felt.

   The Thralls got him settled into a nice penthouse apartment – which was what he seemed to want – and his natural talents increased rapidly (and lost their alcohol dependence) as he developed a kadian identity. It wasn’t long before he was drinking a great deal less, vacationing regularly, partying wildly every night, and taking bets on the side again – and soon after that, with even a tiny share in Marty’s enormous resources to back him, he was running a high-class casino, betting parlor, and bar, with free drinks and food for the gamblers…

   He was slightly disappointed to discover that gambling was neither illegal nor controlled in Kadia – even if the confounded local sapient devices WOULD offer a simple evaluation of the odds for most basic bets on request. Police raids and gunfights had always been good fun! Still, that just meant that you had to rely a bit more on persuasion and alcohol and a bit less on the marks – er, the gamers – being entirely ignorant of what REASONABLE odds were.

   Not being able to take a baseball bat to a debtor’s knees – according to the federally-approved debt collection protocols – was a bit confusing though. Oh well, he’d deal with the debt collection problem when it came up! There were bets and girls to take!

   The Thrall-girls were more than willing to oblige him in that way as well. They didn’t mind shapeshifting to look a little older to suit his preferences – and, since Martin had always had a soft spot for young children, vaguely missed having Marty around, and did want more kids of his own, those were be easy enough to bear for him as well!

   Martin wasn’t much for infants – too smelly and noisy – so they took care to use fast time, telepathic education, and developmental magic to jump them straight to the “early childhood” stage (there was no point in wasting time with things like waiting for neurons to multiply and learning to crawl) – but most phantasm-kids in Battling Business World just turned up as five or six year olds after a couple had been together for a bit anyway, so Martin didn’t find that in the least bit surprising.

   Martin was rather surprised to find that “debt collection” was not a problem after all, despite the lack of allowable violence protocols… Moderate-level deadbeat debtors got put on some sort of automatic credit-transfer arrangement and paid on the installment plan.

   He took a second look at the local laws the first time his Thrall-aides presented him with some teenage indenture-slaves from the Linear Realms who (against the computerized advice) had bet themselves too far into debt with no one else to cover for them – and whom he could now keep or put up for sale. The rules were somewhat more ruthless than he’d assumed at a glance, but looked fair enough… The computers would not allow youngsters to overbet until they hit the local age of majority – which seemed to be fourteen. He wound up shaking his head, having them slave-conditioned (it was cheap enough), and putting them up for sale – or, in a few later cases (older teenage girls who were really cute or younger teens who were unusually pathetic), adding them to his harem or staff respectively, He was a bit of a sucker for crying youngsters. After all, he hadn’t abandoned Marty, or put him up for adoption, when the infant had landed on his doorstep – and now he had a lot more resources.

   What few moral scruples he had quietly succumbed to alcohol and indifference. After all, indenture-slavery in Kadia was not a bad deal for youngsters who were silly enough to bet themselves into it! It was certainly better than life in the slums or on the streets back in Battling Business World or this “Linear Realms” place that most of them seemed to come from!

   Martin – after a disappointing adult life in Battling Business World – enjoyed life in Kadia to the hilt, rather than pussyfooting around about taking full advantage of its benefits like Marty was. His activities – and his full-scale harem of Thrall- and slave-girls -would be enough to make Marty blanch.

   The next time that Marty spends some time in Kadia, he’s likely to get hit with a big dose of “HI BIG BROTHER!” from twenty or thirty young half-siblings.

   Fortunately, the Thralls all have enough parenting and child-care skills to make up for Martin’s decidedly “free-range” attitude towards raising kids – and Kadia was a good place for that anyway.

   Marty Seniors rank six local ID includes – of course – buying off his arthritis and alcohol dependence (6 CP), removing the limitations on his Deep Sleep and Body Control (6 CP), providing Bonus Uses on his Cosmic Awareness power (6 CP), major Kadian Privileges (Access to Thrall-services and backing, as well as funds 6 CP), Basic Shapeshifting (6 CP), Rite of Chi with +4 Bonus Uses (12 CP), and access to basic Rune Magic (Hexcrafting, +3 SP in Wisdom-based Mastery and Casting for spells of up to level one at an effective caster level of three).

   Phantasms cannot actually have Mana or Reality Editing; without a soul to maintain their identity, having either would soon transform them into something unrecognizable. They can, however, have a reserve of psychic or magical energy that works almost the same way. While such a reserve WON’T let them operate gates, manipulate reality in Core, or override the local reality, it will still let them produce small objects and events or power rune magic and other abilities. On the other hand, unlike those with souls, they can buy Rite of Chi to renew such energy reserves as well. Overall, there’s no cost change.

   Back at the battle in the New Imperium, Ryan, as a master of time, had spent a bit of his power on a quick review what had been going on before he arrived – and was more than a bit appalled. He’d been busy, and Kevin had seemed to be managing the dark power he’d accidently infused him with minimal problems, so he hadn’t really paid much attention to what the boy was up to.

   OK, “minimal” included being a lecherous, ruthless, arrogant, slave-trader – but at least the boy had confined his more obnoxious activities to volunteers and draconic challengers. It was still very wrong of him to bind other youngsters that way – no matter how well they understood what they were getting into – but he (apparently) wasn’t either being reduced to madness or out ravaging worlds with that dark power. It had looked like he really hadn’t gotten a very big dose. Running a trading operation across the Manifold had seemed more or less benign despite the modest slave-trading – even, perhaps, a lesser reflection of his own activities.

   It had been worrisome when he’d actually observed a few of the boys “Thralls” in action and seen how much power they’d been given, and it had become more worrisome when he realized that the kid possessed Godfire – but he hadn’t seemed to have been USING it for much! He’d mostly seemed to rely on talking and minor witchery! But this… the boy didn’t NEED a Death Star! He’d unleashed the darkness and he’d destroyed or crippled nearly three hundred capital class ships in less than a minute! That rivaled or exceeded the power of the Hellstorm itself! Even IT needed weapons to destroy things on such a scale… Could Kevin really be containing that much dark power? The boy still might be personally fragile – the old “glass cannon” syndrome – but at this point he wasn’t going to count on it.

   Come to think of it… The ship reported that the boy had brought along nearly three hundred of his “Thralls” who could channel positive energy to assist Menthas. That had to be a rare talent in darkness-bound demon-thralls! That implied that the boy had… thousands or tens of thousands of them. Perhaps more. He should have realized that when the boy had sent fifty with the power-combinations that he had requested on request – but he would never have imagined that the boy could empower so many!

   He made a mental note to have some of his own agents do a more in-depth investigation of what the boy had been up to for the past few decades! And to move both Kevin – and Marty, who was showing signs of some pretty appalling abilities himself – a long ways up the priority list! They both needed counseling, addiction-treatment, and reform at the very least!

   Neither Kevin nor Marty would later feel either surprised or comfortable about that.

   Kevin, in particular, would feel drastically underappreciated. After all, he could be letting the dark power run amuck and be blowing up worlds like the Hellstorm, or be torturing billions like Serah and Matthias, or be sending people to millennia of torment like Necrosis, or be up to many other horrible things! Instead he was rescuing people and worlds (even if it did further his own ends and serve to populate Kadia), recruiting voluntary and well-paid servants, and indulging himself with a few girls – and yet people thought that HE needed reforming! He was a Dark Lord, not a malevolent one! Quite a few of his hangers-on weren’t even sure that he WAS a Dark Lord, or if he was so subtle that he was fooling himself!

   OK, that complaint WAS a bit self-contradictory in several points, but it was an emotional one after all.

   He might be an Evil Dark Lord – but humanity couldn’t afford to become a race of plaster saints! It NEEDED the darkness!

   Marty had to admit that – if he was Ryan – he probably wouldn’t want Marty to reach cartoon godhood! Cartoon characters caused enough mayhem without that level of power…

   Marty was planning to become the embodiment of some of his spheres of influence so that he could take on the Number Lords. He would need it; the Number Lords had several millennia of experience (and hubris) on him – not to mention (pun or not!) Greater Numbers!

   That was something that Kevin didn’t dare to do. In his case giving up control that way could be very very bad.

   Also in Kadia, Kevin had been taking advantage of his new multi-presence ability to continue some projects…

   Having his phantasmal dragon-children checked to see if any had acquired a soul was easy enough – the Thralls could handle that bit of monitoring – but they evidently still hadn’t had enough publicity to attract any. That had been easy to fix too… A few dream-links to some old age homes and similar places out in the Manifold (however foreign such places were to a Core youngster born in the gap between the last of the old-style humans who hadn’t been given longevity treatments and genes and the centuries-delayed first deaths from old age among the humans who had) and some information on the assorted goodies, opportunities, and excitements – along with the perils – of those roles soon led to a slow-but-steady stream of souls taking on those incarnations.

   Those few who fell into slave-roles were promptly promoted out of those positions again – at least if that wasn’t, for some peculiar reason, what they’d wanted – and they all were, like Eogam, offered a place in Kadia and Thralldom with few responsibilities if they wanted it. Most did.

   Kevin was surprised at how simple that had been – but then concluded that massive bribes worked just as well to get people to do what you wanted after they were dead as they did while they were alive. It was just the form that differed.

Recordings from the Holocron of Kira Keldav – Session 34

   After Handell completed a short jump away from the galactic Core, we found ourselves outside the high energy radiation zone… Strange, such a short jump shouldn’t have brought us outside the radiation zone if the entire galactic Core was saturated with it. A couple of more jumps and we began to pick up subspace transmissions from a nearby world – mostly in-system traffic and mechanical attempts to make contact outside the system. That was pretty odd. According to what alternate-Alys remembered, that shouldn’t be there either.

   Shipwreck fired up his sensor pack and did weird things with the Force and – I am beginning to suspect – with the Codex as well. It looked like we had arrived in the nebula remnant of a supernova and that the galaxy wasn’t saturated with radiation, or at least not much more than usual. A couple of the worlds we’d come nearest to could even be picked up transmitting on subspace and hyperspace, but there was no signs of the subspace and hyperspace relay networks or the navigational beacons.

   Wait a minute.

   I understand now, we ended up in the universe this Alys was from originally and not the one she entered ours from. This is the one Darth Ben presumably snatched the networks from. Eh, it was already clear that things were now quite a mess here. I figured the odds of a coherent galactic civilization reforming taking a couple centuries at the very least with another millennia or two to completely recover. Provided the Sith don’t get too strong a foot hold in the meantime. This is one of the reasons I hate super weapons.

   Alys was very pleased. This meant that Ben’s theory was right; Darth Ben had wiped out long range communications and travel – but the vast majority of the people were just fine. Her parents and siblings (not to mention the friends and relatives) might be just fine as well if Coruscant hadn’t collapsed with the loss of interstellar travel. Even if she wound up back in the “Destroyed Galaxy” again, knowing that for sure would make the situation a lot more bearable.

   Ben was calculating… Hm. Presuming that the locals still had their records – and they should – if they skipped past the uninhabited zones and settling for dropping beacons on the routes that they KNEW were good, they should be able to have a minimal network up and running in a mere… two or three centuries. The galaxy was large, ranges were relatively short, and it took a LOT of beacons and relays to make even a skimpy grid. Drat. That would give the local Sith a couple of centuries to expand before they’d hit any effective opposition though – and a major advantage for several centuries after that. This galaxy was en route to a Sith Empire.

   At the very least we needed to get to a world, regroup and plan how we are going to proceed. Handell took us very carefully via a series of micro-jumps to the nearest world we could detect broadcasting. I felt it best not to argue with the precognitive pilot to go faster regardless of my estimates of the odds of a problem.

   Soon enough we ended up in orbit around a minor Republic world called Vorpos. While it was definitely a minor backwater in the grand scheme of things, and there wasn’t much of a fleet presence. The local defenses did pick us up, and gave us an automatic hail asking for identification – followed within seconds by an over-eager live communications officer who was apparently wildly excited at the prospect of news from the rest of the universe… We decided it was highly prudent to not let Ben answer the comm. As the others argued who should answer, I went ahead and answered it. Seriously, even if they have heard of the infamous Kira Keldav here, he can’t be any worse than the guy that just single-handedly destroyed galactic civilization.

   The planetary official on the other end of the line obviously didn’t recognize me and seemed to be assuming I was a Jedi. He probably knew enough to assume that any visitors had to be using intuitive navigation techniques. Fair enough, I can work with that idea for the time being. When we were asked if we knew anything about what had happened, I explained Ben’s theory as best as I was able. That more or less confirmed what the locals thought – although we had a lot more technical details than they did. At first I was concerned they would pick up on that fact, but luckily they just seemed to assume we were well informed.

   This led to a discussion regarding the nature of the transition of the grid from this universe to the one we picked Alys up from. The interesting fact we picked up on reviewing the facts was that the grid had been transitioned as a unit instead of scattered haphazardly across the galaxy. Ben seemed to get real excited about this for reasons that weren’t readily apparent to me, but I was more concerned about what that implied. There shouldn’t be any reason why the grid was transported as a unit intact in my mind. It was one thing with ships and people as they are contiguous chunks of reality, but the grid was anything but contiguous. So why was the relative distances between the relays kept?

   Ben and Jacob were wondering too. Was it something to do with the fact that their transitions had a huge margin of error – but were always within the galaxy? Or was it just that the grid had been transferred in a single operation?

   Ben nearly gave way to the temptation to get on the communications system and start quizzing the locals directly in search of more detailed information before he remembered that it might not be a good idea.

   Not that it mattered – but the locals wanted advice (and perhaps a glimmer of hope). I didn’t see how to give it to them though; trying to rescue several trillion ten to a thousand ton relays and bringing them back here was going to be an enormous effort by most any measure. Lazlo’s suggestion of getting some droids to do it for us really had no grounding in reality. We just didn’t have the resources to send billions of drones across a galaxy collecting relay nodes – and (as Ben and Handell pointed out) drone ships had a nasty tendency to vanish anyway. Even if we did have a large cargo vessel to serve as transport between the two universes, the sheer scope of the problem was beyond our ability to affect. We might be able to rescue some of the larger and more powerful nodes that way, but that was a drop in the bucket compared to what was needed to rebuild. Even if we got the locals involved, it would be faster and more cost effective to have them more or less restart constructing the grid from scratch. At least they could use known safe (well, safer) routes and dead reckoning to get along until then.

   Just as I was about to give up on the idea as a lost cause, Ben announced that it should be possible to bring the grid back in one piece, just like it was sent away. Asking for clarification, it turns out he thinks the weapon was still out there, could be reused, and could be adjusted to jump the relay system back to this galaxy – and that, as long as the relationships were preserved, the local could just apply a transform function and start re-organizing the grid, rather than rebuilding it. Of course, that meant either building a new super weapon – or stealing the original one.

   Damn him to Hell.

   I was trying to keep this to a rescue Alys and help the locals out mission and Ben keeps focusing on his damned super weapons. Not satisfied with my attempts to limit the scope of this journey, he now has managed to find an excuse for us to capture it. And he’s managed to do it in such a way to ensure I have no real choice but to help him retrieve his damned super weapon if I didn’t want to abandon these people. Damn him.

   Then began the debate on where said super weapon might be located. I figured the smart thing to have done was pull it back into home territory where it might be better defended and not used against me. If they had dropped a series of relays on their way to the galactic Core, they might even have an easily navigable way back to their territory. I figured the best bet then was to look for the trail of network beacons and follow them back if they weren’t preemptively shut down to prevent such tracking.

   Ben insisted though that the weapon would still be near the galactic black hole. Apparently Ben felt the potential need to destroy civilization (again) outweighed the danger of losing the weapon to the enemy. To me this sounded like lunacy, but for my plan to work we needed to head to the galactic black hole anyway to find the relay trail. I’m sure if Jarik was still here he would have been taking bets on who was right: Ben or me.

   Ben was sure that he could guess what he would do… After all, with the navigation grid down, the near core would be virtually unapproachable. If anyone DID come to get you, you could use the superweapon to make them vanish as well – and he’d have been able to continue his research in the galaxies biggest space-time laboratory. How could he possibly have passed that up when the investment was so small?

   Lazlo didn’t really see the point. This wasn’t their universe (and shouldn’t people be expected to take care of their own business to some extent?), and such a mission would put Handell at more risk. Still, no one ever listened to him anyway.

   Handell wasn’t especially happy to hear that we wanted to go as close as we could to the galactic black hole without actually going inside it. Especially with no relay network to help provide fine tuning of the navigational coordinates. I can’t say that I blamed him, I didn’t want to go anywhere near the thing, but circumstances were conspiring against me on this one. Handell sat there with the navigation computer for one heck of a long time – and I could feel his precognition reach outwards and forwards in time far further then I could have managed. Trying to stay as out of the way as possible, I tapped into the Codex enough to neutralize my own Force presence and precognition to limit interference I was generating.

   Finally Handell tapped out a course into the navigation computer and announced the jump to hyperspace. Strapping myself into the seat, I found myself gripping the arm rests tightly as we made the transition to hyperspace. A few hours later we dropped out of hyperspace after a few finishing-up microjumps and Handell declared success. Heading to the cockpit, I was treated to a rare sight. About a third of the starry background was blocked by a black nothingness that I can only presume was the black hole’s event horizon. I could see the enormous jets shooting out the poles and the accretion disk spiraling mass inwards to be devoured by the all consuming darkness. For something that supposedly consumed everything including light, this black hole certainly lit things up.

   Ben was puzzled. He could see that matter was escaping from the accretion disk and that there was abnormal turbulence nearer the black hole. That could only happen if it had picked up an enormous amount of energy from somewhere – something on a scale that even most of his projects would have trouble supplying. Had an awful lot of matter just been tossed in, or had the superweapon really affected things on that kind of scale? That didn’t fit in entirely with his theory of a hyperfield generator powered by the jets.

   Jacob was puzzled too. There were VERY strange disturbances going on here! Something quite profoundly unnatural had happened. Something that had disturbed the foundations of the universe – and even if it wasn’t HIS universe, that didn’t strike him as a very good idea!

   Besides… he didn’t like that black hole a bit. It seemed like a hole in everything to him. And he really hoped that that wasn’t literal.

   Heeding Telera’s warnings, I didn’t reach out to sense it with the Force. I’ve heard enough stories of people disappearing doing stupid stunts around a black hole to not try something like that. Still, I was able to perceive some things passively. I couldn’t really get my mind wrapped around just how massive the thing was beyond the fact that it dwarfed anything else I’ve seen. But what disturbed me more than anything was the sheer empty nothingness I felt coming from it. This wasn’t like what I felt from alternate Valerie when she negated her Force presence as this was a complete absence as opposed to a negation. The sensation of something being so massive and yet so empty was disconcerting to say the least. I hadn’t felt that kind of emptiness around even a dead star.

   Ben tried his early-edition precognition trick – and found that he was mostly warning himself to have a dimensional tunnel effect ready to go if he was being sucked into a black hole, and not to launch a shuttle into it, and several other things NOT to try around black holes – but, at least, that meant that they’d likely be doing something around the black hole. (Wait, did that mean that hundreds of alternate future Bens had dies to get him this information?) That meant that the superweapon probably was here. He and Kira started trying to narrow down in which sector they were likely to find it – and managed to narrow the field a great deal.

   After heading that way (very very cautiously), they did indeed find a few detectable navigation beacons – and decided to start scanning. If there were beacons, that meant that there might be a superweapon – or perhaps a Sith fleet – around somewhere. The radiation level was very very high – but their shields were good enough to let them stay there safely for quite awhile, and it helped mask their own small signature.

   Shipwreck began his weird magic again with the ship’s sensors. If it wasn’t obvious already that he was heavily cheating somehow, then this proved it as I felt the Force did really weird and unnatural things around him as he proceeded to pull useful information from the sea of chaotic radiation noise that was all around us.

   Much to my surprise and to Ben’s glee, after a search it looked like the super weapon was still here. It was in an unstable orbit around the black hole requiring continual thrust to maintain. At first I figured it was a sort of dead man’s switch to destroy should it get close to be taken over, but I was told the opposite was true. Should thrust be lost, the weapon would shoot off into deep space. Why they chose to keep it here for the last several months was lost on me. I would have thought it smarter to leave the area than to go through such ridiculous means to ensure safety.

   Also surprising was how similar the weapon looked to the Zomogoostar. It was almost a spot on match for how the place looked before Jarik’s temporary change of management. It even had neutronium power systems in order to provide absolutely-reliable power for the engines under the continual drain it was being subjected to. Ben started excitedly talking about some sort of convergence principle trying to make all universes the same down to the personal level. Now that was utterly ridiculous in my opinion. We already had one universe where I was marrying Valerie and another where I died after becoming an evil holosith. Where was the convergence in that? Never mind the fact that it currently seems like I am on a completely different path than either Akira or Dkira and Valerie has her own schemes in play. Maybe a macroscopic convergence with lots of pieces reused over and over again, but I highly doubt something is trying to make all Kira’s the same.

   Ben sighed a bit. Coincidences there would be, but that MUCH virtually-identical engineering resulting from completely different motives? SOMETHING had to be going on.

   That orbit was going to make boarding the thing much harder to pull off. The Asrai only had sufficient power to pull a rendezvous for a minute or two. It didn’t have that much thrust, and would have to swing in and out on it’s own hyperbolic orbit, and that would only match for a few minutes before the weapon would pull away. In that time we either had to dock or board the base potentially while under fire. It didn’t help matters that we had seen a demonstration not too long ago on how neutronium systems could eat ships and asteroids. Ben felt it unlikely that the Asrai’s power systems could handle the strain of holding us near the weapon and power the hyperspace transporter system he built at the same time – not to mention that it would take hours that we didn’t have to tune. That meant we had to either board the old fashioned way or dock at one of the bays.

   I briefly contemplated just throwing enough asteroids at the weapon until it became too heavy to maintain it’s orbit, but decided it was impractical. Especially since Ben was so intent on capturing it. Handell started us on an approach after deploying the stealth screens; they’d make the radiation problems worse – but we could handle that for a little while… Amazingly, nothing fired at us or tried to turn us into neutronium as we approached and docked in one of the unused landing bays. I guess the stealth system works better than I had anticipated or no one was watching the sensor scans very well.

   Disembarking from the Asrai, we were approached by maintenance droids demanding to know who we were and why we had come onboard the asteroid. Ben proceeded to explain it as one of his experiments having successfully concluded which the droids bought (droids aren’t usually all that hard to fool), but the droids absolutely freaked when they saw Jacob. Some careful questioning revealed that apparently the local Ben was keeping an insane killing machine version of Jacob as a pet. Looking at Jacob, I suppose there wasn’t that much different as this one was an insane killing machine by my own estimates. Oh wait, the local one was a berserk insane killing machine.

   Just lovely.

   As attempts to placate the droids were only partially effective, we diverted them with getting us a remote to disengage the docking clamps on the Asrai and told them to give the remote to Handell.

   Jacob, wondering what had HAPPENED to the local “him” to turn him into a being that everyone else regarded with such horror tried reaching out to find himself and do a little probing. It should be safe enough with his counterpart in deep hibernation; the resonance effect shouldn’t be too bad if being in stasis stopped it entirely.

   It wasn’t. His counterpart drew deeply on HIS life-force, and – through him – on all the lives around him, and exploded out of hibernation. Alarms started shrieking, orders were broadcast to set up all the containment systems, pull out the heavy weapons, and to take up defensive positions to try and contain Jacob – again. The droids went to lock themselves in a utility closet.

   Given all the excitement to use for cover, we left the Asrai with Handell, Telera, 10CH, Welhem, and Khadim in the Asrai to hold he escape route (or be available as reinforcements) as we went off to try to take the base over. It didn’t take long before local security stumbled upon us and Lazlo and Ben proceeded to argue with the guards and order them around. Then one of the guards pointed to Jacob, screamed that he was loose from hibernation, and freaked.

   Ben might have soothed that over with the “I’ve got this modified copy under control” routine, but one of the guards had turned in the alarm to the commander – and the bridge promptly opened an audiovisual communications link with the guards that Ben had been trying to order around. A few moments of confrontation with himself resulted in the guards getting orders to capture – or, if necessary, kill – these new intruders. With his counterpart now attempting to actively probe with HIS powers, Ben developed a splitting headache – and without the raw power of the Dark Side to back him, he was no match for his counterpart.

   Damn it all.

   Suppressing my Force signature as much as I could, I slid off into the shadows as Lazlo tried to stall the guards with nonsensical argument about what was going on. Just great. The Sith would know we were coming. Still, if they focused on the main group, maybe I could pull a Valerie and sneak up on them to take them out. Not being one to like suicidal situations, I took the opportunity of no one paying attention to me to phase through a wall. That was far easier than I expected it to be. Wait, alternate Valerie warned me about using Codex techniques in the presence of seriously warped space. It could make some tasks a lot easier to pull off but required more skill to keep from losing control. If I wasn’t careful, I could easily fall out of the cosmos more readily here. Damn that meant I had to be even more judicious in my use of Codex powers, one of my few real edges in combat.

   Looking back on my companions I was struck by a nasty thought: was I leaving them to die? Hard to tell, but I certainly didn’t want to be caught in the situation I knew was coming when we absolutely needed to kill the Sith in charge. Wearing ourselves out fighting security and Jacob would make us easy pickings for the Sith. No choice then but to leave them to fight while I used the distraction to pull off a set of assassinations. Hopefully they can survive long enough for me to cut the head off the snake.

   Wait… sneaking aboard the base, trying to get past the guards, a choice of dangerous routes to the bridge where a Sith commander was waiting, incredibly deadly force predator on the loose… DAMMIT! He’d just DONE THIS!

   Back in the corridor, Lazlo’s attempt to resolve conflict through conversation had – in the face of a Sith commander yelling for the intruders heads – fallen through. Fortunately, they were in too close to use heavy weapons – and Lazlo and Ben (at least with his armor and shield generator) were capable of taking quite a few pistol shots while Alys took out the heavier weapons with trick shots. Unfortunately, Lazlo’s sheer strength convinced the guards that he was ANOTHER bioweapon – and led them to call for heavier backup.

   Ben sighed. If enough of the guards got entangled with them, he could see what was going to happen. Either they’d lose – and get dragged before the Sith or killed by Jacob-the-death-machine when the guards no longer had the resources to hold him off, or they’d win with damage, reach the Sith, and be attacked from behind by Killer Jacob. Either way, a disaster. If he could bring the guards over to their side to deal with Killer Jacob though – and it was obvious that they were terrified of him – that might work.

   He used his own powers to become a life force beacon – and could soon feel Killer Jacob heading their way.

   I was now in one of the engineering tunnels I suspect the Furipedes back home called home. The place was not really meant for human access at all. Hearing the sounds of battle beginning, I decided I could risk using my Force senses to locate my prey and began to work my way through the tunnels. More often than not, I had to crawl or slide along than walk. Thankfully, the explosions, blaster fire, and irresponsible flinging around of Force techniques provided me with enough cover to use my own Force powers to hasten my approach.

   Finally dropping out of an air vent into a hallway, I was certain I had set off numerous alarms in my little detour, but thankfully it seemed like everyone was too busy with the conflicting reports of intruders and escaped bioweapons to bother checking on something detected in the air vents and engineering tunnels. I could feel what felt like three Sith on the other side of the doorway. Not one to fight fair, especially when outnumbered, I pulled out one belt of thermal detonators and checked them over. Looked like the locking mechanism to prevent easy activation with telekinesis was working properly as I armed them and set the timer. All I had left to do was phase through the blast door, drop the belt and phase back through before anyone even realized I was here. Three easy kills for only a few dozen credits worth of explosives.

   I phased just when the asteroid lurched in one direction and I kept going along the original trajectory. I went right through the blast door and saw that I was about to go right through the viewport window at a acceleration of twenty four gravities.

   Back in the battle with the guards, while Kira had been working his way through the tunnels, Killer Jacob had indeed eventually put in an appearance – casually pushing a twenty-ton block of stone along ahead of himself as a shield and twirling a half-ton bar of structural metal he’d ripped out of something along the way in one hand. Ben got what he wanted – the guards dropped the fight with them and were more than willing to work as a group to hold off Killer Jacob – but looking at the creature he wasn’t sure that their combined efforts could!

   The first few moments of THAT  fight didn’t go well at all – even Lazlo and several guards working together couldn’t hold back that advancing boulder – and Ben frantically tried to use his precognition. He was a specialist in that, he ought to be able to see SOMETHING even past the force feedback from his counterpart. There had to be a way to deal with THIS universes force predator!

   Unfortunately, that just got him entangled with Darth Ben up on the bridge again – and showed him nothing but visions of falling into the black hole.

   Up on the bridge, Darth Ben gasped, reversed the drives, and started the hyperspace warmup. It might just be a false vision – but he wasn’t taking any chances on falling into the damned black hole!

   It took two tenths of a second for the pseudogravity systems to reverse their pull. For a brief moment, everyone in the base was subject to the equivalent of a twenty-four gravity field – towards the front of the ship, the bridge, and the black hole.

   Down in the corridor, it brought Killer-Jacobs boulder-shield and the guards and party “down” on top of him. That gave them a lot more injuries – but Jacob managed to use his own force powers to activate Ben and Alys’s stasis belts while they were falling. They came through all right – but Killer-Jacob drew massively on Jacobs life force, as well as on the injured guards, to heal his own injuries.

   Killer Jacob was pre-empted by the local guard commander rolling thermal detonators past the boulder – but Lazlo – who’d been putting Jacob into stasis before he died (and letting Ben and Alys out) – made him stop before he could finish Killer-Jacob off. Lazlo thought there was too much danger of melting the rock – and of secondary injuries – before Killer-Jacob was dead.

   Ben finally had an idea. If he could just avoid being flattened by that girder that kept thrusting past the rock long enough to get Killer-Jacob into stasis… Perhaps he could use the Variable Star to help hold the boulder back for long enough?

   That nearly got all of them smashed into pulp, but they pulled it off – and the guards were willing to accept an “order” to dump Killer-Jacob out an air lock while he was in stasis. They could just claim confusion as to which Ben had issued the order later on. Alys had pretty well seized command of the guard contingent anyway.

   Meanwhile, back with Kira…

   Oh yeah right, not wanting to go into space even if I did have a breath mask and a stasis belt, and having only a few moments to react, I couldn’t see any way out of this. Suddenly I remembered Valerie telling me that inertial and gravitational mass were different. Slipping into hypertime and dropping the phasing, I found much to my surprise that my approach to the viewport was slowed significantly. Apparently she is right, gravity acts the same during hypertime, but inertia does not – or maybe it doesn’t if you don’t want it to. It was a simple matter to flip around and gently land feet first on the window.

   Now wait a moment, when did I become able to think this clearly regarding physics? And why do I understand the fact that if I hadn’t stopped myself before I had gone through that window that I would be on an escape trajectory from the galactic black hole? Are my Codex and Force abilities actually increasing my ability to process this kind of information?

   WINDOW!

   Looking down at the window I was standing on, I could see a worrisome spiderweb of cracks propagating out from my feet. Oh crap. Flinging the thermal detonators to one side, I did a Force enhanced leap from the window to the opposing wall I had just come through, hoping to phase through it again. About halfway there, the window finally failed and the air began to rush out of the room – carrying my belt of thermal detonators with it. Losing my upward momentum, I fired the variable star at the blast door to buy myself a few precious moments while I reoriented my powers again. My aim was a bit off though and I began a swing towards one of the consoles and swung past two of the Sith.

(Sith #1) Is that one of your bioweapons?

(Sith #2) Nope, not one of mine.

   I then collided with the console hard. Luckily the armor and my own Force powers prevented me from taking any damage, but I lost precious moments activating another belt of detonators as one of the Sith charged me and made to thrust his lightsaber into my heart. Not having any time to think and reacting more on instinct than anything else, I stupidly backhanded the lightsaber blade with my bare hand. My hand suddenly felt like it was on fire.

   SON OF A BITCH!

   That hurt like hell. Amazingly I still had my hand. The only damage appeared to be a mild burn mark and a lot of red irritation. Oh and the pain of an intense sunburn on my skin. How the hell did I just do that? I’ve never done that before and had only heard of Valerie talk about it. She never demonstrated it in front of me, and I just did it on what I can only say was instinct. What is going on?

   While I was stupidly staring at my hand along with my attacker, the other one recovered enough to grab me telekinetically and flung me into a blast door. I felt my body and head impact and my ribs begin to compress and strain under the force of the push – until I instinctively phased through the door. That sent me flying through another corridor as I heard explosions from the room I just left as the thermal detonators went off. My head stopped swimming again and I found I had come to a stop in a large chamber with what I can only presume was an escape pod system. Then I noticed that I was actually in a vacuum. Hurriedly donning my breath ask, I whimsically considered it strange that it now takes me several moments to realize I was in a vacuum now. I know phasing tends to slow such things down, but still it seems silly to have to take a few moments to realize I am in a vacuum without a suit.

   Pushing myself into the escape pod, I did some basic first aid on my arm as I took stock of the situation. My senses clearly indicated that – despite self-protective use of the Dark Side – one of the Sith was fairly seriously wounded, another was somewhat wounded – and one was unharmed. Oh damn; this bunch is just as tough as we are!

   They also clearly seemed to think me some bioweapon with a weird set of monotalents. That meant the next time I fought them, use of full Force abilities might well catch them off guard again. Usually Jedi and Sith didn’t have weird talents like that, only techniques. Time to challenge their assumptions again. Cycling the airlock, I entered the corridor leading back to the bridge. One of the two remaining Sith came over the intercom. I recognized his voice as belonging to Ben. Probably the mad super weapons designer Ben.

(Ben) How did you do that? That’s obviously a Force technique, but I failed to detect any Force signature when you do that.

(Kira) And why should I tell you?

(Sith) Obviously not a Jedi, you must be a Sith then.

(Kira) Well I can hardly be what you might consider a typical Sith.

(Sith) Fair enough, now tell us how you do that and we might consider letting you live.

   Well drat, so much with surprising them with also being a Force user. That precognition of theirs is good. They obviously know where I am and presumably have weapons and soldiers at the ready to try and overwhelm me – or at least are calling them. I need to catch them off guard again. But how do I do that when they know where I am and have a decent idea of what I am capable of?

   Wait a moment, it’s mad-Scientist Ben.

(Kira) Well it’s simple enough really. You use the Force to bind things together in order to facilitate the use of certain techniques. The same is also true in reverse. Disconnect yourself from the Force well enough and you can manipulate your own personal reality to some extent.

(Ben) Interesting. Let’s see the full extent of what can be done with this then.

   And Ben then proceeded to disappear from my senses. From the swearing of the other Sith over the intercom, I can only assume that Ben had disappeared in truth and not just my senses. Not a brilliant thing to be doing when next to a galactic black hole either. That’s two down and one to go.

(Kira) Apparently he lacked control.

   At which point I felt a painful buzz in my legs as I can only presume the floor was electrified. Levitating for a brief moment, I connected one of the variable star tips to the ceiling and hung there. Thankfully I had the variable stars anchored to the armor and the armor acts as a harness or else I would have had a hard time holding this position for long.

(Sith) You’ll pay for that.

   A turret lowered from the ceiling on either side of the corridor and turned to fire at me. That armor plating looked too thick for my blaster to punch through though. Pulling out my shield with one hand and my lightsaber with the other, I blocked the one turret with the shield and through my lightsaber at the other one. That neatly severed the power cable and I pulled my lightsaber back to me with telekinesis. I neatly impaled the other one and was plotting how to kill the remaining Sith when he came over the intercom again.

(Sith) Since I presume your colleagues would be upset if I killed you, would you be willing to discuss terms under a truce? I do have plenty of other weapons if you insist on being killed…

   I wasn’t particularly inclined to the idea. If this bunch had used a super weapon once already, they were likely to try it again. The fact that these guys were reasonable enough to actually get one built – and even to develop one that actually worked – only made it a more pressing need to kill the bastard. I was about to tell the guy to shove his terms when Alys and Ben came over the intercom encouraging me to join them in discussing terms. Damned idiots now are so fixated on stealing the super weapon that they can’t recognize a serious threat when they see one. Unfortunately, if I kept fighting, there was a very good chance that they would all turn against me for being “unreasonable”.

   Damn it all.

(Kira) Fine, I agree to discuss, but can’t make any promises on the conclusion.

(Sith) Fair enough.

   Dropping to the unelectrified floor, I entered the bridge to find it a smoldering mess. The remaining Sith definitely looked injured, but I could also tell his power with the Force and the Dark Side was considerable. A straight fight with them was not to be tried unless absolutely necessary. The others were busily getting Jacob patched up and discussing exchanging all our secrets in exchange for the asteroid when they arrived shortly afterwards… Damn it people, just because the Varen seem like nice people to you guys and this one is willing to talk to save his own hide does not mean that it’s safe to be giving away all sorts of dangerous secrets to these people! Too late now though. I was especially unnerved when the Sith announced he was going to be sacrificing poor apprentices to learn the Codex techniques based on what little theory I gave him earlier.

   The local Sith were interested… Without Darth Ben they had their doubts about being able to get anything further out of their superweapon, and this bunch obviously had a lot of useful secrets – and claimed to be able to controllably navigate between dimensions. This was definitely A Ben, but it wasn’t THEIR Ben. If these people wanted the semi-useless superweapon, there was no reason not to let them have it in exchange for that many useful secrets – especially since they seemed to have a pretty fair idea of how it worked anyway and it really wasn’t that big an industrial project. You just needed a black hole to make it work.

   Great, now this universe is going to have a Sith mass producing Faded. Ben hopeful speculation that it would lead to sanity I ignored as wishful thinking and naivety. I still haven’t figured out the secrets to keeping the Codex and the Force completely balanced and I suspect a lot of the sanity I have been retaining thus far is because I want to retain it. A Sith is going to have very different motivations to learn the Codex. This guy could potentially become a Sith/Faded hybrid even.

   We got the base and a significant amount of the crew in exchange for most of what information we had to give them. Thankfully Ben hadn’t given away the coordinates for our galaxy or the Codifier galaxy at least. I watched the Sith and their favorite people all climb aboard the shuttle and leave once the negotiations were concluded. I was tempted to hit the missile launcher button as I watched them go only for Telera to appear behind me.

(Telera) They negotiated in good faith.

(Kira) They’re also Sith.

(Telera) You were also trained by the Sith.

(Kira) I haven’t used a super weapon to destroy civilization either.

(Telera) The choice is certainly yours, I am just an observer in all of this – although I suspect that any attempt to fire on their ship will set off some kind of self-destruct or otherwise become a disaster, even if the control circuits are working after all your thermal detonators. Would you expect them to walk in front of a gun otherwise?

   Well damn. That was probably true enough. The Sith were nothing if not paranoid.

(Kira) And what do you think you are observing?

(Telera) At the moment, the differences between you, Akira, and Dkira, and the similarities.

   That made me pause. That woman had the annoying talent to say the right thing at the right time to make you stop and think regardless on how impulsive you wanted to be. The Jedi all had that talent to some extent and Telera seemed to be a master of it. I watched the shuttle depart into hyperspace and hoped I made the right decision. Still I think it best to get some sort of backup plan going for the locals in case something goes wrong. I hate planning like this as I am no good at it. About the only thing that seemed plausible to me was see if the local Kira or Valerie might be open to or worth training. And if Kira wasn’t a major figure in the news here, then that meant he didn’t exist, never left Alderaan, or never left the Academy. I don’t like thinking about the last possibility.

   Ben was now talking about bringing the weapon to Coruscant. Apparently he wanted lots of Jedi to help steer the thing when he brought the grid back to this universe and felt that Coruscant would have plenty handy to help out. Personally, I was concerned about the stability of a Coruscant cut off from galactic civilization for months. Ben waved it off with a proclamation that would could probably end whatever war might have broken out readily.

   Looking at the super weapon we were now carrying to Coruscant and that fact we had a gleeful Ben proud of his ownership of it, I was certain he was right, just not in the way he thinks.

   Ben was slightly annoyed… It really didn’t work as he’d been thinking it did. He’d been thinking it was a colossal hyperdrive field generator that was powered by the jets from the black hole, and that wasn’t what it was at all. This thing… projected a transdimensional hyperspace tunnel directly into a black hole.

   How the devil… WAIT. It had drained off… 37,416 standard stellar masses from the black hole. The hypertunnel hadn’t collapsed because there was no energy-balance problem between universes, and whatever leaked would simply be scattered. The event horizon had contracted, and the outer layer of the accretion disk had started to drift away! So that was what had happened… So that had generated some sort of hyperspace disturbance? But wouldn’t a hyperfield be required? But a hyperfield was generated by discharging a steady stream of mass-energy into a hyperspace interface… OH! That was why tunnels went unstable! The mass-energy leaking in and out of them generated a hyperfield around the ends, and that would rip them out of the universe or implode them if they ran for too long! So the generated galaxy-wide hyperfield had augmented the drive fields that were activated at the right moment and enabled a dimensional transition. The effect was tuned by the characteristics of the activating tunnel. And the destination would be complimentary to where the mass was being sent.

   Wait, he was missing something there. He’d have to think about it. There’d be time. They’d need a lot more Jedi to steer this thing, and to tune the return tunnel to get their beacons back. They’d need Shipwreck to try and track the link between the two Alys’s too, without getting tangled up with Alternate Alys’s natural link with her home dimension.

   Anyway… this base was a LOT like their own. Better shields and sublight engines, facilities for manufacturing a bit worse, biolabs set up a bit more for sapients and a bit less for microlife – but almost identical otherwise. And even with similar numbers of personnel now. Was it simply incredible coincidence, was the Force lazy, or was the convergent principle – if any – just really strong?.

   Hmm… there was a version of Xiang too… Another bioweapon, and one being studied because she’d been supposed to be a slightly augmented warrior-assassin who could be easily programmed to relentlessly pursue a target – but every time they woke her up she picked out a target somewhere in the galaxy – apparently at random – and went after them. Could she possibly be a pure agent of convergence?

   Kira groaned. Now they’d gotten the damned superweapon – at the price of giving the local Sith yet MORE information – and they were… going to fly it to Coruscant, where they – and what the locals were sure to see as the man who’d destroyed civilization throughout the galaxy – were going to demand that the Jedi come and cooperate with them.

   This was getting worse and worse!

Advanced Armor Training

   Armor is very useful against most primitive and medieval weapons. Sure, a heavy crossbow bolt, or a longbow, or military pick, or quite a few other weapons could sometimes punch through it, and you could still be beaten to death right through flexible armor, but armor would still deflect some attacks and cushion a lot of the ones that it couldn’t deflect. It was a vital component of military life up until quite recently – when the offensive punch of weapons started to reach the point that armor capable of deflecting them was too heavy to use.

   In role-playing games, armor tends to get downplayed. After all, most games revolve a lot more around fantasy than realism, and people want their lightly-armored rogues, scholarly unarmored mages, and swashbucklers to be effective combatants too.

   Others, of course, want their armor to really be effective – so here’s how to use Eclipse to build some armor-boosting Feats. Since a standard Feat is worth 6 CP, if you want to build a standard-style Feat for your character, just pick options that total 6 CP. If you want to spend more than one Feat, just spend another 6 CP.

   If you want to start dropping and adding other abilities, you might as well go to a full Eclipse point-buy character.

   So what do you want to do with your armor?

• Add Damage Reduction: Buy Damage Reduction, Specialized/against physical attacks only, Corrupted/only while wearing armor. That’s DR 2/- for 1 CP, 3/- for 2 CP, 4/- for 3 CP, 5/- for 4 CP, 6/- for 5 CP, and 8/- for 8 CP, with costs increasing sharply from there on out.
• Increase the Maximum Allowed Dexterity Bonus: That’s Immunity/Penalties for wearing armor (Very Common, Minor, Trivial, Specialized in eliminating Dexterity Bonus Caps only for half cost. That’s 2 CP to raise the (Dex Mod) cap by two points, 4 CP for 4, 6 CP for 6, 12 CP for 8, 18 CP for 10, and 24 CP for 12 – which is the limit, and probably well past the point of diminishing returns.
• Increase the Armor Bonus: That’s Defender, Specialized and Corrupted/does not improve with level, only while wearing armor. 2 CP for +1 AC, 4 CP for +2 AC, and (since the Specialization loses meaning after that) +4 CP per additional +1 AC.
• Make it an Effective Weapon: That’s Martial Arts, Corrupted/only usable while wearing armor. That’s 1d4 for 2 CP, 1d6 for 4 CP, and 1d8 for 6 CP.
• Make you more Intimidating: That’s Augmented Bonus/Adds Str Mod to Cha Mod with respect to Charisma-Based Skills, Specialized in Intimidation, Corrupted/only while wearing armor (2 CP).
• Overcome the Speed Penalty: Buy Celerity, Specialized/only to overcome movement penalties for wearing armor. That’s normally +10′ for a total cost of (2 CP). If you want to reduce this to the ability to overcome 5’of the penalty, Corrupt it to reduce the cost of (1 CP).
• Reduce it’s Effective Weight: That’s Immunity/the weight of armor (Uncommon, Minor, and either Trivial (1 CP) to ignore the weight of light armor, Minor (2 CP) to ignore the weight of moderate and light armor, or Major (3 CP) to ignore the weight of light, medium, and heavy armor. If you just want to reduce the weight by – say – 50%, that will be Corrupted – reducing the costs to (1 CP) for light and medium armor or to (2 CP) for light, medium, and heavy armor.
• Reduce the Armor Check Penalty: That’s either the Smooth modifier on the armor proficiency, Specialized/only negates the Armor Check Penalty (1 CP for Light, 4 CP for Light and Medium, 8 CP for Light, Medium, and Heavy) or – to simply reduce it – buy Immunity/Penalties for wearing armor (Very Common, Minor, Trivial, Specialized in eliminating Armor Check Penalties, That’s 2 CP to reduce the penalty by two, 4 CP for 4, and 6 CP for 6. Beyond that, it’s cheaper to just buy “Smooth” as above and negate the penalty entirely.
• Reduce the Arcane Spell Failure Percentage: Buy the “Smooth” modifier for the armor type in question, Specialized in eliminating the spell failure percentage. This eliminates it entirely at a cost of 1 CP for Light, 4 CP for Light and Medium, 8 CP for Light, Medium, and Heavy armor. If you only want to reduce the percentage, you can Corrupt this as well – but it’s hardly worth the bother.

   If you want to give it magical properties, or short-term boosts, or have it (effectively) made out of some special material while you’re wearing it, you can do that too. You’ll probably want to use Imbuement, Innate Enchantment, or Inherent Spell to do things like that – but, unfortunately, all of those abilities are a little too complicated for a simple mix-and-match approach and rather look like they go beyond “training” anyway.

   Eclipse: The Codex Persona is available in a Shareware PDF Version, in Print, and in a Paid PDF Version that includes Eclipse II (245 pages of Eclipse races, character and power builds, items, relics, martial arts, and other material) and the web expansion. It will be updated with Eclipse III when that’s done as well

RPG Design – The Illusion of Game Balance

   A lot of work goes into the search for “game balance”. Answers to “frequently asked questions”, errata, rules patches, rules revisions, and entire new editions appear in an endless stream in attempts to “balance” printed games while online RPG’s constantly revise, recode, and expand.

   The problem is that “balance” in a complex rules system is as elusive as perpetual motion – and the two searches bear a strong resemblance, right down to the long-discarded ideas which get dragged out again and again by new would-be machine or game designers.

   For an example, lets take a look at the largest, longest-running, most well-supported, and most elaborate and throughly patched rules system in history. It’s been worked on by tens of thousands of well-educated and dedicated designers, testers, and modifiers for many decades. It constrains itself to real-world physics, no special powers, a simplified version of human history, and only covers humans (and thus avoids all the complications of coming up with systems for magic, psionics, and similar fantastic elements). It’s the most elaborate and throughly researched rules system in history.

   It’s called “Law”.

   Now, anyone out there who thinks that the law has a shorteage of loopholes, unbalanced situations, and exploits should go and watch the news for a bit.

   You really can do better than that in a game system. The more you limit the options and player input, the more balanced you can be.

   Here’s a well-balanced game system:

   Roll a six sided die. On a 1-3, I win. On a 4-6 you win. To avoid player manipulation of the roll, we’ll have a random shaking machine do it and test the die to make sure that it’s fair. If something weird happens to the die or machine, get another and reroll until a winner emerges.

   There. If we eliminate any real player input, make the rules absolutely rigid, limit things to an extremely simple situation, and make sure that the physical apparatus is unbiased, we CAN have a balanced game.

   Of course, no one will be interested in playing unless there’s a prize involved. After all, there’s no reason to.

   Lets move up a bit. Take Chess. Chess is pretty balanced isn’t it?

   Well no. Now we’re allowing the player’s skills to have an input. That makes the game interesting – but in actual play suddenly things are no longer balanced.

    Relatively recently, Kiril Georgiev played a total of 360 games simultaneously – winning 284, drawing seventy, and losing six – during a marathon that lasted fourteen hours and eight minutes. In the 1920’s Alekhine played blindfold chess against 28 teams of four players each, scoring 22 wins, three draws and three losses.

   That kind of imbalance really won’t do for a casual recreational game. It’s not much fun.

   We can reduce this problem though. We can make sure that the game involves a good deal of hidden information and has random factors. That will lessen the advantages offered by player skill without eliminating them – thus retaining interest longer and adding the welcome element of uncovering mysteries to the game play. Sheer statistics will still offer a massive advantage to skilled and clever players if the game goes on for long enough though.

   You want the game to go on for a very long time and yet you still want weaker players to stick with it instead of opting out?

   You can stretch things a bit by making it a team event, so that stronger players will tend to carry the weaker ones along – but that’s a stopgap at best. The players who aren’t making as large a contribution, or who find themselves constantly in the background, will tend to lose interest anyway. It’s always the stars of the team that get the most attention.

   A sufficiently simple game may be able to get along with some sort of handicapping system, such as you find in Golf. The trouble with that is that you have to get people to play a good deal, and keep accurate records of it, to establish those handicaps – and even so the upper levels of golf require constant rulings on variations in the courses and equipment. Just as importantly for our purposes, golf games are relatively short – so chance still plays a substantial role.

   To sustain a truly long-term game, what you really need is an active human presence, who can make exceptions or overrule the letter of the rules when he or she needs to correct a blatant imbalance. As a side-benefit, they can regulate that hidden information option.

   In law, that individual is called a “Judge”. You don’t want people opting out of the law and going in for vigilantism because they see the law as “unfair”. Similarly, you don’t want people opting out of your game, whether it’s by single-handedly ignoring rules they don’t like (“Cheating”) or by not playing at all. Whether as a publisher or as a buyer, you’ve invested time and money in the game – and you want people to play.

   That’s also why online MMORPG’s keep getting revised. They still have judges, they’re just a little more remote than they are when everyone is sitting around a table and implement their decisions by code changes instead of by announcing a decision and making a few notes.

   So: unless you have a group of puzzle-obsessed theoriticians, if you want a truly long-term game, you really can’t get along without a Judge. It’s going to be his or her job to manage the hidden information, correct imbalances, plug – or allow if they’re fun – loopholes, and compensate for the differences in skill and luck between the players.

   I’ve had a player or two that I – in second edition AD&D – gave twelfth level characters to when the rest of the players were using characters of under level six. Those players planned so poorly, and fell so in love with their own poor ideas, that giving them far more powerful characters was the only way to keep their actual in-play contributions in line with those of the other players.

   That game continued for several years – good evidence that the solution worked. It was “balanced”, albeit not in any way that most mechanical rules systems would recognize.

   There’s only one final jump to take. A lot of games simulate a world of sorts. Chess can be taken as an (exceedingly) abstract simulation of medevial politics and warfare. Other games, such as Axis and Allies, or Seakrieg, or many other wargames, are far more explicit.

   There are two basic viewpoints on that – the gamist view, which says that “this is a game, with mechanical rules, and that the setting is irrelevant flavor text”, and the simulationist view, which sees the game rules as being there to provide a necessarily-limited simulation of a world.

   The gamist view has a simple answer to players who want to try things that the rules don’t cover, or complain that the rules aren’t accurately simulating a situation. “It’s a game and these are the rules”.

   That’s the classic answer for games like Chess, where questions like “where does the knight go if I move it over the side of the board?” are meaningless – and for a lot of games (in fact, for almost all of them that don’t use a referee) it’s normally (if not quite always) very much the best answer.

   I completely scandalized the chess club back in high school when, during the course of a quick game with a friend of mine who wanted to improve (and was losing as he pretty much always did), he said “Hey, lets change this! Knights are Queens, Rooks are Knights, Bishops are Pawns, Pawns are Bishops, and Queens are Rooks!” and I said “Why not?”. We continued on that basis quite amiably – but there was widespread protest and (literal!) outcries of “You can’t do that!” from the rest of the chess club, who took chess far more seriously than we were.

   Still, some people do ask such questions – and that’s why there’s Fairy Chess.

   The Simulationist view pretty much requires a judge, and – barring unusually cooperative players – won’t work in games like chess which don’t usually have one. You and a friend may be able to agree that “a piece which exits the chessboard leaves the battlefield, and can reappear on any edge square fifteen turns later by traveling around in the wilderness. If the king flees the battlefield, however, the battle is lost” – but it’s hard to get that kind of cooperation even when you’ve only got two people playing. Trying to get it in a group of five or six is close to impossible.

   One of the great benefits of using a Judge in a game system is that a good Judge will allow the players to exercise their creativity. As soon as you start allowing that kind of thing at all though, you’ve made the jump to a role playing game. The players might be taking the roles of gods, or generals, or entire armies – but now they’re playing the role of an entity or entities that exist in an alternative world and are exploring solutions and moves that the rules don’t cover.

   Since you’ve got to have a Judge for a role playing game, you want people to be willing to take the job without being paid for it – which means that you’ll want to make it an enjoyable and relatively easy job.

   That means holding down the number of rules, ensuring that you’re using general systems and principles that are intuitive and easy to apply, and leaving the game master an active role in the game – characters to play and rulings to make. You’ll want to avoid shackling his hands with detailed rules for everything, massive tables of modifiers, or piles of sourcebooks to sort through. That sort of thing isn’t much fun.

   That’s sensible enough anyway. There may be a few gross oversights in any system that need patching – but endlessly tweaking things (that are almost always working just fine for everyone in your audience who really understands the role of a Judge) in search of “balance” only works until people start playing with the rules and find the new exploits. The more special cases, patches, and rules you add, the more exploits you’ll create. You’ll never achieve more than a (very temporary) approximation of “balance” through mechanical means.

   If you could, law libraries would fit into a few feet of shelf space, rather than taking up small buildings.

   Sadly, recognizing that limitation is in direct opposition to the notion of getting more money from your audience by publishing an endless stream of supplements and expansions. True mechanical “balance” may be an impossible fantasy, but it’s often a profitable one. Issues of “balance” – usually quoting issues that only a tiny segment of the participants or Judges involved have any problem with – provide a wonderful justification for an endless string of new rules.

   In law creating new, and ever more specific, rules to deal with rare or irrelevant issues can carry politicians to re-election, and the endless volumes of material that such efforts produce provides employment for swarms of lawyers, clerks, and secretaries. In games this sort of effort usually involves publishing an endless string of new sourcebooks.

   A game system can put up with a few of those – but too many will start to strangle it as they overburden the Judge. A new edition will set the process back for somewhat, but the only way to stop it permanently is to create a basic set of rules that’s as complete as possible in just a few books and publish nothing much more except setting material, how-to-use-it guides, and scenarios after that – all of them entirely optional and setting-specific.

   You doubt that? Look at law again; professionals spend lifetimes studying the law – and you probably can’t pay your game judges to spend a lifetime studying your game system. Eventually all the expansions get to be too much, and they have to start over. In games, that’s called “buying a new game” (or at least starting a basic game without using all that source material you’ve invested your time in – and without buying any more).

   In law that same process is called a “revolution”. It takes longer to build up to that point because people have a lot more invested in their social system than in your game system – but the result is the same in the end.

   Personally, I’d recommend against trying to take that route – but then I hope that people will still be using and playing my games many years from now and I never expected publishing games to make me rich anyway.

   “Balance” is a chimaera and an impossible dream, but it’s one that an awful lot of players and Judges believe in. Unfortunately, you can never find “Balance” in any simulationist game system that’s complex enough to be really interesting to play – and there’s no point in wasting your time looking. You’ve got a Judge. If you’re in need of “balance”, go ahead and let him or her rule on the issue and forget about consulting another book of rules.