Dark City Heroes I – Majestic

Gotham City, founded in 1635 by Captain Jon Logerquist on a site where a eldritch entity has lain imprisoned for forty thousand years. As the city grew its occult influence has expanded as mortals unknowingly tapped and channeled it – fostering cultists, empowering arcane rites, and awakening mystical potentials. The first heroes appeared in the 1800’s, exploiting the concealing shamanic magic of Masks* to fight the gangs that controlled the city without exposing their civilian identities and connections to the gangs revenge.

*To don a mask (or, for those with the right powers, to shapeshift) with the intention of being someone else… is to draw a mystical line dividing those identities that only powerful magic, skilled, determined and lengthy investigation, or direct revelation can violate. Thus has Superman concealed his identity for decades with nothing more than a pair of glasses.

Today Gotham remains, as it has for centuries, a city of twisting alleys, archaic secret-laden neighborhoods, forgotten nooks and structures, eldritch nexi, and hidden sorceries. It is older far than Batman – so what heroes might he have Eclipsed in his rise?

The game-setup question is more or less “What sort of young heroes might Batman have grown up around in Gotham City?” – and the rules of the that game are:

1. Level One Eclipse Builds.
2. Human – although human-looking Variant Humans Races or Birthrights are available for Heroes and Villains.
3. Half Cost for buying up Attributes with CP (commonly 6 CP for +1)
4. Bonus Feats at L0, L1, L2, and every two levels thereafter.
5. Handguns are considered to be Simple Weapons. Long Arms are Martial.
6. A Condensed Skill List – in this case:

Acrobatics (Dex)	Balance + Escape Artist + Tumble
Arcana (Int)	Spellcraft + Knowledge: Arcana
Athletics (Str)	Climb + Jump + Swim + Escape Artist (STR)
Background (Int)	Covers any five Craft, Profession, or Perform skills.
Deception (Cha)	Bluff + Disguise
Endurance (Con)	Control Shape + Concentration + Endurance
Handle Animal (Cha)	Handle Animal, Ride, Profession/Teamster, etc.
Insight (Wis)	Sense Motive + Gather Information
Linguistics (Int)	Speak Language + Decipher Script + Forgery
Martial Arts (Var)	It’s a superhero setting; invent two with attribute modifiers and give them a each a +4 bonus.
Perception (Wis)	Search + Spot + Listen
Persuasion (Cha)	Diplomacy + Intimidation
Religion (Wis)	Knowledge/Religion, Knowledge/The Planes, Heal, and performing various religious services and rituals
Scholar (Int)	Covers Knowledge / Architecture and Engineering, Geography, History, Local, and Nobility
Stealth (Dex)	Hide + Move Silently
Survival (Wis)	Survival + Use Rope + Knowledge/Nature
Thievery (Dex)	Appraise + Disable Device + Open Locks + Pick Pocket / Sleight of Hand
Use Device (Cha)	Use Magic Device, Use Psionic Device, and Use Technological Device. For practical purposes there isn’t much difference.

Majestic (Edmund Wells):

According to ancient tales, unicorns shed their horns every seven years – and those alicorns retain potent magic, being tokens of healing, purification, and strength. But unicorns are rare, and thus true alicorn is almost unheard of.

According to the modern world, unicorns never existed in the first place, and such tales are simply tales.

Meridith knew that it was nonsense, and the her grandmothers “unicorn horn” pendant was doubtless carved from the horn of some other animal – but if her sickly baby didn’t want to let it go and it amused him… it merely took fastening the chain to the side of the crib to keep it too high for him to do more than hang onto it.

She panicked a bit when she came back and found the pendant missing from the chain – but her son wasn’t choking and didn’t have it in his mouth. It wasn’t in the bedding or under the crib either – and he couldn’t possibly have swallowed it. He’d probably thrown it somewhere – and it would surely turn up eventually.

It never did, but eventually she forgot about it. The distraction of seeing her baby son fully recovered and happy again – and, later, of seeing him growing up strong and healthy – was more than enough to keep her from thinking about the mysteriously missing pendant until the memory faded.

She never knew that her grandmothers pendant – carved of true alicorn and given with love unknowing of its power to an innocent – had merged with her infant son, rendered him once  more healthy – and giving him the potential for unicorn powers.

As he grew young Edmund has often found himself acting as the protector of the smaller children. When he hit adolescence, he soon discovered his ability to transform into a Unicorn Stallion – as well as the ability to sense those who were truly evil, and who had to be stopped.

Since then… rumors that the Wild Hunt rides once more are whispered around the city. The police are equally puzzled, but are unwilling to publicly admit that they are keeping an eye out for a sword-wielding vigilante who reliably assaults only the most vicious and evil criminals.

Race: Human Variant (Atherian Light Birthright, 30 CP / +0 ECL).

All of their racial abilities are Corrupted. The Children of Light suffer a -5 penalty on all attempts to be stealthy or to deceive people, are easily identified by their radiant auras by any form of magical detection or by perceptive observers (Spot DC 20).

• +2 Charisma, +2 Dexterity, +2 Intelligence, and +2 Wisdom (16 CP)
• Innate Enchantment (7500 GP, 6 CP):
  • Command (2000 GP).
  • Protection From Evil (personal only, 1400 GP)
  • Enhanced Insight: +3 to the Insight Skill (personal only, 1400 GP)
  • Inspiring Word (personal only, +1 Morale bonus to Saves, Attacks, Checks, and Damage, 1400 GP)
  • Immortal Vigor I (+12 + 2x Con Mod HP, personal only, 1400 GP).
• Fast Learner (often Specialized in Channeling for Double Effect, 4 CP).
• Channeling/Positive Energy: 3 + Cha Mod uses/day (6 CP) with a +4 bonus to their Base Intensity (4 CP).
• Immunity/Time (reduced aging) (Common/Major/Minor, usually 4 CP but reduced to 0 CP due to relatively short campaign timescale (and standard comic book time).

The Children of Light suffer from some automatic disadvantages: they are Compulsively Truthful and Blocked (they can’t use negative-energy channeling, darkness-related magic, magical enhancements to stealth, non-healing necromantic magic, or anything else related to Darkness), for a total of -6 points

Basic Attributes: Str 10, Dex 12 (+2 Racial = 14), Con 12, Int 14 +2 Racial = 16), Wis 14 (+2 Racial = 16, Cha 14 (+2 Racial = 16). (3.5 28 Point Buy. For Pathfinder 20 point buy go to Con 13). In Unicorn Form: Str 20, Dex 17, Con 21.

Available Character Points: 48 (L1 Base) +10 (Disadvantages: Valuable, Hunted, and Broke, see below) +12 (L0 and L1 Bonus Feats) +2 (Duties) +6 CP (Fast Learner, only for Channeling) = 72 (78) CP

• Valuable. He turns into a Unicorn. There are any number of mystics out there who would like to have a Unicorn – or some pieces thereof – on hand.
• Hunted: He’s attacking the most evil mobsters, street gangers, and petty villains around. Some of them have surely taken notice.
• Secret (Identity). Well, superhero setting. This is almost a given for most heroic characters.

Basic Purchases (48 CP):

• Base Attack Bonus: +1 Specialized in Melee Combat (3 CP)
• Hit Points: 24 (L1;4d6, 32 CP) +12 (Immortal Vigor) +6 (6 x Con Mod) = 42 (Unicorn 66)
• Saving Throws (all gain a +2 Resistance bonus versus Evil):
  • Fortitude +0 (Purchased) +2 (Template) +1 (Con) +1 (Mor) = +4 (Unicorn +8).
  • Reflex +1 (Purchased, 3 CP) +2 (Dex) +1 (Mor) = +5 (Unicorn +6).
  • Will +1 (Purchased, 3 CP) +3 (Wis) +1 (Mor) = +5.
• Proficiencies: All Simple Weapons (3 CP).
• Skill Points: 4 SP (4 CP) +12 (Int Mod x 4) = 16 SP.
• Athletics (+4 SP +4 Str +1 More = +9, extra +24 for Jumping), Insight (+4 SP +3 Wis +1 Mor +3 Enh = +11, extra +5 to Detecting Lies), Martial arts (+4 SP +5 Str +1 Mor = +10), Stealth (+4 SP +3 Dex +4 Racial = +11), and Survival (+0 SP +3 Wis +1 Mor +3 Racial = +7).
• Human Armor Class: 10 (Base) +2 (Dex) +4 (armor) = 16 (+2 Deflection vrs Evil)
  • Modified Unicorn Armor Class: -1 Size, +1 More Dex +6 Natural = 22 (+2 Deflection vrs Evil)/
• Initiative: +2 (Dex). (Unicorn +3)
• Movement: 30 (Base) +30 (Enh) = 60 (Unicorn 90).

Usual Weapons:

• Unicorn Horn: +10/+10 (+1 BAB +3 Enh +5 Str +1 Mor) for 1d8+9, Crit 20/x2, 5′ Reach,
• Unicorn Hooves: +7/+7/+7 (+1 BAB +5 Str +1 Mor) for 1d4+6, Crit 20/x2, 5′ Reach,

I’m not worrying about the “Natural Weapons” rule. This is a PC, and doesn’t need to use GM shortcuts. In any case, rearing up to kick – or back kicking – isn’t too compatible with stabbing with a horn.

Abilities (30 CP):

Shapeshift with Growth, Beasts, Enchanted, and +4 Bonus Uses, Specialized and Corrupted for Reduced Cost (8 CP) / only to take (Urban) Unicorn Form.

Urban Unicorns are anthracite-coal black, with green, gold, red-gold, or orange eyes instead of white with sea-blue, violet, brown, or fiery gold eyes, their 1/day Teleport operates within their city and it’s suburbs instead of within their forest, and their “Wild” (City) Empathy works on police, officials, and city employees rather than animals. Otherwise, they’re just the same as standard SRD forest-dwelling Unicorns.

Unicorn Powers:

• Senses: Darkvision 60, :Low-Light Vision, Scent
• Constant Defenses: Magic Circle Against Evil, Immunity to Poison, Charm, and Compulsion.
• Spell-Like Abilities
• Detect Evil: at will, as a Free Action.
• Greater Teleport: from anywhere in Gotham to anywhere in Gotham 1/Day.
• Cure Light Wounds (1d8+5) 3/Day
• Cure Moderate Wounds (2d8+5) 1/Day
• Neutralize Poison 1/Day.
• Skills: +4 to Stealth, +3 to Survival.

• Damage Reduction 2/-, Specialized and Corrupted for Increased Effect / Only versus Physical Attacks, only works against metallic weapons (6/Non-Metallic Weapons, 3 CP).
• Enhance Racial Innate Enchantments/+4000 GP Effective Value (4 CP).
  • Personal Haste: +30′ Movement, +1 Attack when making a Full Attack (2000 GP).
  • Unseen Servant (2000 GP).
• Channeling:
  • Conversion to four Radiance effects of up to level two: Solar (Scorching) Ray, Glitterdust), Extended Color Spray (30′ Cone), and Pyrotechnic Flare (as per Pyrotechnics (Fireworks option only, but no fire is required) (6 CP).
  • Conversion to one Healing effect (Cure Moderate Wounds, 3 CP). .
• Use of Charms and Talismans (6 CP): These are actually more-or-less inherent – the difference being that, while they’re free instead of having a small cost, it will take days or weeks to trade them out via meditation and practice.
  • Charms (7):
    • All-Weather Cloak: He is not bothered by normal weather conditions. Of course, unicorns aren’t.
    • Amulet Of The Stallion: He has the sexual potency of a stallion.
    • Mandarin’s Pin: Mud, rain, and other crud slides right off him, he is always nice and clean and freshly groomed.
    • Silken Tongue: He can speak clearly, and cast his voice up to fifteen feet, even if his mouth is full or something is wrong with his voicebox (like being a Unicorn).
    • Sovereign Ointment: Can use Cure Minor Wounds up to 30x a day, but no more than 1d4+1 times per target.
    • Trackless Boots: He leaves no trail and cannot be tracked by non-magical means.
    • Vanishing Cloak. He can become invisible for 6-12 seconds (3 + Level/3) times per day.
  • Talismans
    • Dao Sigil: He heals an extra 1d6 damage and one attribute point per day and can (very slowly) regenerate lost limbs and organs.
    • Helm Of War: May reduce a critical hit to a normal hit up to seven times – but only regains one use of this per week.
    • Shimmermail: He gets a +4 armor bonus from his mythic aura.

Majestic isn’t particularly subtle. He’s a rather brutal vigilante who relies on closing with serious bad guys at high speed, goring them, relying on his resistance to bullets, knives, and similar weapons to let him deal with their thugs, and on his (rather modest) healing abilities to let him handle what damage does get through – or with injured bystanders. His usual routine is to go  out, quietly turn into a unicorn in some back alley or hidden location, and roam around dealing with the bad guys. If cornered, or when he’s done… he uses his once-per-day teleportation power to return to one of his “lairs” – hidden cubbyholes in abandoned buildings or unused subway stations – makes sure that no one else is currently around, turns back to human, and goes home.

So far it has worked reasonably well.

In play, like any other narrow specialist, Majestic is quite formidable – even before customizing with some unicorn martial arts. On the other hand, that’s not going to last. Unicorn powers are pretty useful at low levels – but they’re fairly trivial at higher levels. Like it or not, there all too soon comes a time in d20 where being kicked by a horse is no longer much of a worry.

Using Valdemaran Gifts, Part I

In this case the question is “What can you actually do with Valdemar-Style Gifts”?

Well, the answer in the original books is, of course, “whatever the plot demands and nothing more” – and over time we tend to see fewer magical options rather than more. After all, every time an author puts in a magical solution for a problem that actually works they close off future plotlines involving that problem – and that’s exactly what you don’t want when you’re writing a long-running series. If you keep it in mind, you lose plot options – and if you forget it, you can be sure that a lot of your readers will not. Either way, why make extra trouble for yourself?

Games, of course, are exactly opposite: Players who can’t use their characters special powers to solve problems get frustrated. Players who find their options too limited feel constrained, and lose interest. Players want to come up with clever, original, applications for things. If you tell them that they can’t do something they just thought of, they will want to know why not. The characters are not under the control of an author, they don’t have to follow the plot, and they don’t have plot armor. A bad die roll can kill off any character pretty much at random. Those are the things that make it a RPG rather than a novel. In a RPG… characters regularly wreck the setting, rather than leaving it more or less intact for the next book to be set in. ”

So this is going to focus on what the d20 RPG-style Valdemaran characters can use their powers to do, not just on stuff that would fit into the books.

On the other hand, I’m going to limit it to the general list of Gifts from the books; while there is nothing in d20 – or in the way that the Gifts are built – that would prevent you from having a Gift in Shape Shifting, Weaving Illusions, Destiny Manipulation, Building Guns, Self-Enhancement, Making Power Armor, Creating Ectoplasmic Constructs, or Necromancy, the setting is not set up to handle it.

The way the Gifts are built is fairly straightforward; a Gift lets you pick some sort of relatively narrow theme and produce level zero magical/psionic effects that fit into that theme pretty much at will. Stronger Gifts come in three levels: providing a limited (and slow to recover) reserve of power that can be used to boost your level zero effects up to level one (for strong Gifts), level two (for major Gifts), or even level three (for incredibly powerful Gifts). There are a few more details about how big the reserve is and how fast it recovers – but that’s about it.

The problem is that – when it comes to magic – a lot of gamers are much more used to “here is a list of things that you can do with that power” than they are to “you have a hammer; what are you going to build with it?”.

First up, a couple of general notes:

• Anyone with one or more trained Gifts gains access to Rite Of Centered Mind as a L0 effect.
• Two trained characters with the same gift can work together – each paying the cost (if any) for a use of their gift at a particular level to produce a combined effect of one level higher. That’s really only useful if you want first level effects (since level zero effects have no cost) or level four effects (requiring two characters with the same incredibly powerful gift working together to produce effects which are normally out of reach of even the most powerful Gifts).

Now, as for some options for specific gifts… I’m going to list some general uses and – since this is d20 and 3.5 and Pathfinder have an enormous list of spells to draw from – some spell effects that a Gifted character should be able to emulate.

Animal Mindspeech:

• Basic Level Zero Effects: Communicate feelings to animals and sense what they are feeling, quiet an upset animal, let an animal know that you mean it no harm, lure birds to feed from your hand, gain small (+2) bonuses to ride or handle animals, detect hidden animals nearby given some time to look for them, give animals simple ideas, get spiders to spin webs over an opening or object, get bees to let you have a honeycomb, get a dog to bark, keep bugs out of your bed, gain a general impression of what an animal saw or heard, get a bonus to spot incoming threats by sensing the reactions of animals in the area. Basically… you can relate to animals really well, train them much more quickly, and get some basic information from them.
• Level One Effects: Animal Messenger, Speak With Animals, Calm Animals, Charm Animal, Hide from Animals, Call Animal, Commune With Birds, “Alarm” (via animal lookouts), and Enrage Animal. You can also get small animals to harass someone, get animals to bring you small objects, send them to a destination, get larger bonuses to ride or handle them, or make a normal horse behave as if it was combat-trained for a few minutes.
• Level Two Effects: Animal Trance, Hold Animal, Wartrain Mount (variants induce other types of training), Alpha Instinct, and Summon Swarm, Safe Clearing (only affects animals and magical beasts), and Share Husk. You might also frighten or calm a group of animals, cause a normal animal to attack it’s master or to do something else quite abnormal, or very rapidly train or domesticate animals.
• Level Three Effects: I can’t think of many actual spells for this level – most characters have better things to do with third level spells than influence relatively normal animals – but at this level you might make animals fear an area for weeks or months, redirect a stampede, instantly domesticate and train an animal, direct an animal to do something extremely complex, get a map of an area and details about the people in it by surveying the minds of the animals there, reliably keep a powerful beast under control, or even spread disease though an area by manipulating rats, mice, and other vermin.

Yes, yes, I know… there was never anyone in the books who used Animal Mindspeech to do anything like THAT. Of course, there was never anyone in the books who had Animal Mindspeech on the level of Lavan Firestorms Firestarting Gift was there? You’ll see the same sort of thing in later gifts too.

Bardic Gift:

This one is never even clearly defined as far as I know, but here are some possibilities:

• Basic Level Zero Effects: Lullaby, Haunted Fey Aspect, Message, Ghost Sound, and (individual) Polypurpose Panacea effects. You can also induce various moods, make ideas occur to people your listeners, and convey vague impressions – making your tales so real that listeners can “almost see the battle!” or get “the distinct impression of the goddess comforting them!”. This tends to make listening to your music or stories very popular.
• Level One Effects: Aid, Heroism, Cause Fear, Lesser Confusion, Remove Fear, Charm Person, Aphasia, Hypnotism, and Demoralize. You could use this sort of manipulation to slowly addict someone to you or brainwash them, but it would probably take some time.
• Level Two Effects: Sleep, Calm Emotions, Enthrall, Heroism, Rage. Absurdity, and Inflict Pain. At this point you can inspire a mob, rabble-rouse very effectively, and spread rumors without becoming known as the source.
• Level Three Effects: Bestow Curse, Good Hope, and (Mass) Inflict Pain. You MIGHT be able to create a Major Image if the game master is feeling generous. You can also induce various minor mental problems in those exposed to your abilities – inducing terrible dreams, general depression, and other minor mental / emotional effects, such as undermining support for a leader. You can do the reverse as well of course – but it takes longer and rarely works as well.

Earthsense:

• Basic Level Zero Effects: Detect Poison and Know Direction. You can also do a lot of things which aren’t really in d20 but which probably should be – Detect Cursed/Wild Magic Areas. Detect Ley Lines and Nodes. Detect Quicksand and Unsafe Ground. Sense disturbances of Nature. Detect Pure Water. Identify Plants and Animals. Determine if something is safe to eat. Identify minerals – and get a +5 bonus on a Survival check.
• Level One Effects: Entangle, Goodberry, False Life, Detect Animals or Plants, Detect Snares And Pits, Hairline Fractures, Natures’s Paths, Pass Without Trace, Shillelagh, Underbrush Decoy, Enhance Herb (Paths of Power), and Greensight. You may also make small plants grow, detect the potency of herbs, follow trails more quickly, identify causes of death, get a +10 bonus on a Survival check, determine someone’s parentage, and detect aberrations,
• Level Two Effects: Tremorsense, Lay Of The Land, Expeditious Construction, Expeditious Excavation, Lesser Curse Terrain, Binding Earth, Forest Friend, Wild Instinct, Hide Campsite, Dentistry (Hedge Magic) and Briar Web. You can also dowse for water, oil, or mineral deposits, get a +20 on a Survival check, trace someone’s ancestry with a drop of their blood, cause corpses, wooden doors, and other unattended organic items to rot away in mere minutes, and bless children (allowing them to reroll their lowest attribute once per child).
• Level Three Effects: Defoliate, Plant Growth, Shifting Sand, Speak With Plants, Snare, Spike Growth, Stench Of Prey, Greater Thunderstomp, Forestfold, Nature’s Rampart, and Safe Clearing. You may also slowly heal regions of land, sense major disturbances in the realm, get a +30 to a Survival check, grow a tree (as per a Feather Token: Tree), or reroute ley lines – again, slowly.

Empathy:

We do have some ideas for Empathy thanks to Herald Talia – but she’s got all those pesky ethics to take the fun out of things.

• Basic Level Zero Effects: Empathy and (half-strength) Telempathic Projection. You can also tell if someone is being mentally influenced, let other creatures know what you’re feeling, find really meaningful presents for people, fit into groups easily, detect salesmen, manage children, tell when someone is trying to manipulate you, and get fairly reliable impressions of people (“I never liked him…”).
• Level One Effects: Telempathic Projection, Beguiling Gift, Adoration, Compel Hostility, Hideous Laughter, Innocence, Remove Fear, Unbreakable Heart, Undetectable Alignment, Unnatural Lust, Qualm, Rage, Reckless Infatuation, Cause Fear, and Miserable Pity. At this point – at least if you’re ethically challenged – you can play on peoples emotions, get them infatuated with you, sell them rubbish they don’t need, and tune your stories to their emotional responses.
• Level Two Effects: Detect Hostile Intent, Anonymous Interaction, Calm Emotions, Charitable Impulse, Detect Desires, Heckle, Heroism, Jealous Rage, Compassionate Ally, Matchmaker, Oppressive Boredom, Scare, Unadulterated Loathing, Draconic Malice, Dreadscape, Fear, and Zone of Truth. You can now read emotions with ease and override them almost entirely – a talent likely to get you ridden out of town on a rail or burned as a witch if you use it a lot and are silly enough to let people figure it out.
• Level Three Effects: Bestow/Remove Curse, Charm Monster, Confusion, Crushing Despair, Curse of Disgust, Detect Anxieties, Good Hope, Overwhelming Grief, Terrible Remorse, and They Know. You’re now able to warp minds severely and with effects that can last for years in extreme cases.

Farsight

• Basic Level Zero Effects: Know Direction. At this point you can have meaningful dreams, see around corners, give yourself minor sensory boosts, avoid stubbing your toes and knocking things over in the dark, and swear blood brotherhood – creating a low-grade link. You can also tell if people are all right by looking at a picture of them and boost your abilities with mystic links.
• Level One Effects: Aspect Of The Falcon and Improvisation. You can also “see” through minor obstacles, locate lost or mislaid personal items, tell who is on the phone or knocking on the door before you answer it, just know what escape routes are available, and ignore effects such as Blur and Concealment.
• Level Two Effects: L2) Locate Object, See Invisibility, Darkvision, Augury, and Sense Minds. At this point serious prophetic dreams are possible, you can buy knowledges without regard for actually learning them, see past closed doors and on the other side of walls, and use “gather information” as an instant effect.
• Level Three Effects: Clauraudience/Clairvoyance, Minor Dream, Pierce Disguise, Scrying, Stage Fright, Witness, See Beyond, Spirit Bonds, and Darkvision. Congratulations. You are a major seer and prophet, You can evaluate complex situations at a glance, easily get a “birds eye view” of most situations, and know far more than is strictly reasonable.

Next time around on this, the rest of the Gifts.

Apex Campaign, Star Fleet Timeline Cluster, Augment Victory Timeline. The Augment IV Racial Package

The human mind is built on ancient neural patterns – deep instincts, systems that process sensory information, logical and emotional feedback loops that keep it running, and even the patterns of motor neurons that operate the body. If you change any of those too much… the mind warps and changes, taking on a new form. The result is unpredictable, often no longer functional at all, and never much like a normal human being even when it still functions – and, so far, it has never been sapient. No one is quite sure why that’s true, but (at least in the Apex setting) there seems to be a component beyond mere physical reality.

So there are limits. You can transfer an existing mind into a mostly-artificial body – but if you want a NEW mind to develop properly… there has to be a childhood. You can make the senses sharper, or even very slightly expand their range – but not much past the limits of normal human potential or even an existing mind will soon go mad. There need to be bones, and muscles, and various internal organs. You can boost intelligence and reaction time somewhat, and you can enhance durability and strength considerably – but not too much or instabilities will soon develop.

And, at least so far… redesigned humans only develop more-or-less normally if they are born to existing redesigned humans. Trying to leave out a recognizably-human set of parents, infancy, and childhood, leads to failure at best and rampaging monsters at worst. At least the first generation (no second generation births have yet occurred) have to have transferred minds.

That need for growth, development, and maintenance along human lines is pretty limiting for the engineering too. You can’t just install bigger parts; they have to GROW in situ – for which you need something analogous to a circulatory system to transport materials, as well as something analogous to a metabolism and to both taste and smell (and eating thanks to those copied-over instincts). Sure, most of the bone structure can be magnetically-reinforced nanotubes and diamond with reinforcing magnetic fields instead of calcium – but it still has to grow and be filled with channels to integrate it into the circulatory system. The electro-contractile muscles and tendons may be stronger (and powered by the electrical energy delivered by the “nerves”), but the layout – and ways in which the arrangement doesn’t bend – is much the same. Joint locks work almost as well (given that they are generally stronger and tougher) on augmented humans as they do on regular ones. The skin may incorporate tougher polymers and resist chemicals a lot better, but it still has to grow, stretch, heal, and shed itself.

Fourth generation Augments were little more than speculations at the beginning of the Eugenics Wars (A.K.A. WWIII). While prototypes of limited parts of the technology where in testing, no complete design (let alone implementation) was available. Thanks, however, to an open-ended time loop engineered by one or more members of the so-called Q Continuum, development of the Type IV design continued – albeit with only a single sample and a small research team that spent most of their time catching up on what they did last time – through 281,223 iterations of the relevant several-year section of the loop before Armand, Blueblood, and Scotty intervened to prevent further looping. While progress – especially during the later loops – was infinitesimal each time, that many loops eventually resulted in a fully-developed design. Combining a through understanding of the physical side of the human brain, advanced genomic and proteomic systems, computers, cybernetics, and nanotechnology, researchers were eventually able to complete a full rebuild of the human body – including a virtualized and optimized brain replacing the old-style natural neural network, am optically-based peripheral nervous system, and superconducting energy storage system fed by a high efficiency fuel cell.

Unfortunately, attempting to generalize from the original single test case has left the basic design in the “open beta-testing” phase as bugs and issues are worked out.

Perhaps worst of all, Type IV Augmentation only seems to work on Star Fleet Timeline Terrans – the “reality-manipulating” homid subspecies – and cuts off all access to magic, psionics, temporal manipulation, and all the other natural-law-violating tricks of the “natural” races.

Name: Type IV Augment

Val Char Cost
8/30 STR -2
13/20 DEX 9
9/20 CON -2
7 BODY -6
8/30 INT -2
11 EGO 2
10 PRE 0
15 COM 2
7 PD 1
7 ED 3
3/4 SPD 0
10 REC 0
0 END -20
32 STUN 0

Characteristic Rolls: STR: 11/15-, DEX: 12/13-, CON: 11/13-, INT: 11/15-, EGO: 11-, PER: 19/23-. Run: 6″, Swim: 2″, Jump: 6″, Lift: 76kg/1600kg

Cost Powers END/Roll

6 Elemental Control: Artificial Body (15-pt reserve); Generic Limitation (User may not develop Psionic or Magical Abilities): -½; Generic Limitation (Cannot alter or improve these abilities): -1

• a-10 3d6 Aid to Attributes (Fade/5 min., Max. 22); Range: 0; Affects: All Powers of Special Effect, +2; Generic Limitation (Str, Dex, Con, Body, Int, and Spd Only.): -1; Generic Limitation (Does not heal damaged attributes.): -½; Generic Limitation (Effect does not stack with buying up base attributes above “10” or with buying up speed at all, cannot take speed above 4 in any case.): -½. 5 End when activated.
• b-5 Power System: END Reserve (180 END, 12 REC/turn); Side Effects (When an Augment takes BODY damage, a roll of 15+ will detonate their power reserves, causing a 3d6 physical killing explosion centered on them. ): 60/All,
• c-4 Armor (8 PD/8 ED); Always On (User is immune to normal medical techniques and healing powers.): -1; Hardened: ×1, ¼; Linked (To Attribute Enhancement): -½.
• d-6 Life Support (total); Generic Limitation (Technological Limitations: Provides high resistance and duratbility, not immunity.): -½; Costs END: -½; Reduced END: Half, +¼.
• e-5 Enhanced Perception (all) (+8 to PER); Linked (To Augmented Attributes): -½; Champions Advantage (Can record sensory input. ): +¼.

Integrated Electronics; Linked (To augmented attributes): -½

• (2) Absolute Time Sense
• (2) Ambidexterity
• (2) Bump of Direction
• (7) Eidetic Memory
• (2) Lightning Calculator
• (2) Perfect Pitch
• (2) Speed Reading

Package Disadvantages

• 5 Distinctive Features: Android; Concealability: Easily, 5; Reaction: Noticed and Recognizable, +0
• 20 Normal Characteristic Maxima
• 10 Unable to interbreed with normal life forms, greatly reduced fertility even with other Augment IV’s, usually need “repair” effects rather than “healing” effects (Infrequently, Greatly)
• 10 Cannot buy off restrictions on magical and psionic powers. (Infrequently, Greatly)
• 5 Cannot buy up Body (Infrequently, Slightly)
• 30 Susceptibility to Technology Nullifying Effects (1d6 STUN and BODY/Phase); Condition: Uncommon, +5. Note that this drastically restricts the range of universes that they can function in.

As normal for Apex racial packages, the “package” disadvantages are only counted at half value – leaving the Augment IV baseline “Race” with a grand total of zero points, just like the other races.

OCV: 7; DCV: 7; ECV: 4; Mental Def.: 0; Phases: 3, 6, 9, 12, PD/rPD: 15/8; ED/rED: 15/8

As perhaps befits a superhero campaign, the Apex game currently involves the primary timeline (consisting of several merged timelines, with – courtesy of Blueblood – the Astral Vortex that the Ethereal Cataclysm had left in place of the lost pacific continent of Mu replaced by Equestria and a scattering of other cartoon and anime locations), the Primary Mirrorverse, traces of an alternate Timeline and Mirrorverse that are proving difficult to remerge with their primaries, a timeline where the planet was collapsed into a Black Hole (the ongoing efforts to get rid of that thing are apparently giving rise to a likely future Shadow Universe), the High Astral (a source of mystical energy), an assortment of Afterlives in the Middle Astral, the Lower Astral domain of the Elder Ones, the Exile pocket realm (apparently located between the Middle and Lower astral), and Mars. Kicking around those areas (and wandering back and forth in time) the group has revived the Rolassin and the Ethereals, brought the Freshwater and Saltwater Lemurians, out of hiding, and restored the Hyberboreans to go with the existing Atlanteans, and the Africaans species, as well as several relic species of presapient Homids. Mars, of course, has it’s five sapient species as well, all now revived from extinction or near-extinction.

In the Star Trek universe next door there are several alternate timelines, including one where the Augments won the Eugenics Wars (courtesy of the player characters) and one where they lost – both with Elder Martians, possibly with something on Venus, and with the full selection of Star Trek aliens.

Saber Class Federation Starship (Hero System)

Space. The Final Frontier.

A quite unimaginably huge quantity of nothing in particular with occasional nuggets of passively-hostile matter in it (stars and unlivable planets), an even rarer sprinkling of habitable planets, and a very, VERY, few sapient races. Really, the defining feature of Space is that there isn’t really a lot going on there. After all, those nice, happy, biospheres? They take many millions of years of relative peace and quiet to develop.

What do we see in Star Trek though? From the original series alone we have “Errand Of Mercy”, “The Alternative Factor”, “Operation Annihilate”, “The Changeling”, “The Doomsday Machine”, “Obsession”, “The Immunity Syndrome”, “For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky”, “The Empath”, and “All Our Yesterdays” – all episodes of the original series dealing with world-wrecking threats.

Honestly, if the universe was actually anywhere near that dangerous there shouldn’t be any life-bearing planets LEFT. It’s pretty obvious that something was going on. For some reason… once a species starts using “Star Trek” level technology narrative starts becoming an actual force that influences events, all kinds of weird hazards appear, and planets start dying. Maybe Star Fleet is letting people haul along families and kids on their extremely dangerous quasi-military missions because they’re actually in no more danger there than they are on “civilized planets” – and represent a species-survival insurance policy to boot.

For our purposes, we’re assuming that Star Trek technology deals with one of the most fundamental aspects of reality – the informational level, which tells space, time, matter, and energy, what it is and how it acts. That’s why their devices run on technobabble and often make very little sense.

The trouble is that monkeying with that aspect of reality damages it. And the universe has mechanisms to fight back against things that damage it. That’s why it’s still here after all these billions of years. Monkey around with it’s structure too much and really weird, unlikely, and dangerous stuff starts to happen. Keep doing it, and it starts to personify it’s resistance. That’s where Q, The Squire Of Gothos, and Apollo come from. It’s why the barrier at the edge of the galaxy hands out superpowers and insanity with an even hand. It’s why absurd ancient war machines run perfectly but ships need constant maintenance. If you’re using FTL, and Replicators, and other insane technologies… the universe really is out to get you. Your best hope is to plant a few colonies that revert to primitivism. They’ll be left alone.

Of course, those few species that manage to hit that barrier going fast enough to crash on through… tend to figure out what they’re doing before they destroy themselves, ascend to some form of semi-godhood, and pretty much retire. After all, nothing in this level of the universe really means anything much to them any longer (even if some do hang around giving patronizing lectures to everyone else).

That’s why building a Federation-Style ship in the Hero System is relatively cheap – and ANYTHING but safe or reliable.

In any case, these are the voyages of the ESS (Equestrian Space Ship) Crazy Horse – Prince Bluebloods personal space yacht. He, of course, wears a gold shirt and follows in the womanizing footsteps of Captain Kirk.

Saber Class, Federation Light Cruiser:

• Crew: 1 Short-Term Emergency, 3 Minimum Sustained, 30-50 Normal Mission Crew, Emergency Transport up to 200.
• Power Plant: Cochrane Matter-Dilithium-Generated Antimatter Warp Core. Maximum pseudovelocity ~1000 C (Old-style approaching Warp 10, New-Style about Warp 8).
• Length: 30 Meters, Width: 12 Meters, 3 Decks (Primary, Lower Engineering Space, Upper Bridge) totaling 5509 Square Feet
• Mass: 425 Metric Tons.
  • Like it or not, much of every Federation ship is made of force fields and wishful thinking. – which is why it has a Cargo Capacity of some 300 metric tons and room for a years supply of raw materials and spare parts.
• Armament: Phaser Batteries, Photon Torpedo Launchers, Tractor/Pressor Beam.

Sabers are one of the smaller starships (and are much smaller still in the Hero System, which is mostly set up for personal craft rather than naval vessels), the Saber Class is used for Diplomatic and Science Missions, Scouting and Secondary Exploration (after larger and better-equipped vessels deal with the preliminary surveys), Combat (Fleet Support and Skirmish), and System Patrol functions. While surprisingly powerful for it’s size, it’s size is still “small”. Compared to major ships it’s defenses are relatively weak and it’s armament light. It is, however, fairly fast, it’s laboratories are excellent (if cramped), and it’s sensor systems very good. Notably, most of it’s crew and passenger spaces are pretty cramped.

That does, however, bring us to Transporters:

Transporters are marvelous things! They allow you to teleport yourself across tens of thousands of miles, straight into the action! Of course they also…

• Allow you to park your ride tens of thousands of miles away, leaving you unable to get back to it when something (all too commonly) goes wrong, or if your ship is on the far side of the planet, or is under attack and has to have it’s shields up (or, even worse, leave without you), or if there is unspecified interference.
• Create massive safety hazards. They can get you lost in weird dimensions or distant worlds, accidentally move you through time, destroy vital equipment, give you weird disorders, make you older or younger, turn dangerous injuries into fatal ones in trying to get you to the doctor, materialize you high in the air or in solid rock, turn you into a ghost, become unreliable at short (intraship) ranges, embed random objects in your body, be diverted to unintended destinations by various external means, fuse creatures together into new ones (who want to live!), and can even malfunction and outright maim or kill you.
• Are horrendous bottlenecks. They’re the only reasonably quick way on and off the ship, require targeting locks, cannot penetrate shields and various dense materials, are disrupted by various force fields, ores, and materials, are extremely hazardous or impossible to use at warp speeds (even if careful matching of direction and speed makes it possible sometimes), and require skilled operators. At least as importantly… they NEVER seem to be working when simply getting out of there would solve your current difficulties.
• Are Security Risks: They can trade you for evil twins, split you into good and evil halves, be activated from the outside regardless of your attempts to stop them, are fairly readily traceable, record all kinds of personal data, can be hacked to control, modify, or transform the subject in all sorts of ways, can be used to duplicate or steal sensitive devices and information, or even be used to duplicate people – allowing one, for example, to tap into a transporter and capture people for interrogation without anyone ever missing them because they’re only copies.

Sure, all of this stuff was supposed to be very rare – but when it comes to major characters, one in a million shots come up nine times out of ten. Personally, I would say that having transporters as your primary method of getting on and off a ship is quite a big disadvantage – so that’s how I’m classifying them. They give the game master free license to fool around whenever they’re used. That also saves having to build the things, since they’d probably cost more than the rest of the ship functions put together, would far, FAR, exceed the active points limit of the game, and really aren’t nearly useful enough to be worth that kind of price tag.

Vehicle Characteristics

• STR 10/70 (0 Points)
• DEX 5 (-15 Points)
• BODY 6/18 (-4 Points)
• SPD 2 (5 Points)
  • Size Increase-12 (60 Points): 128 hexes (5,509 sq ft), 64 inside, 128 passengers, 18″ long x 7.1″ wide, 400,000 kg, KB -12, DCV -5 (Mod -7)
  • DEF 3; Coverage: Complete, -0; Protects: Top and Bottom, -0 (3 Points).
  • Ground Movement (0″, NC: 0″, 0mph); Non-Combat Multiplier: ×2, +0 (-12)

Elemental Control: Starship Powers (15-pt reserve); OIF (Drive and Power Systems): -½; Focus Type: Vehicular, -½; Focus Mobility: Bulky, -½; Primary Starship Systems Only: -½; Attracts Q, Negative Space Wedgies, and General Weirdness: -½, Subject to dramatic systems failures as hits, damage, or drama accumulate, regardless of actual “damage”: -½ (4 Points)

Drive Systems;

• Impulse Drive / Flight (10″, NC: 1,250″, 930mph); Non-Combat Multiplier: ×125, +30; Stall: None, -0; Extra Time: 1 turn, -1; Extra Time Required: Only At Startup, ½ (8 Points).
• Warp Drive / Faster-Than-Light Travel (1000 LY/Year); Extra Time: 1 turn, -1; Extra Time Required: Only At Startup, ½ (3 Points)
• Poorly-Controlled Time Warp / Extra-Dimensional Movement; Dimensions: One, +0; Time Travel: Any Time, +40; Extra Time: 5 min., -2; Generic Limitation (Time and Timeline Travel Only): -½; Generic Limitation (Unreliable in GMO ways.): -2; Mass Multiplier: ×1, +0; Carrying Mass: None; Charges: 1, -1¼; Recoverable Charges (Must resolve mission): -2 levels (5 Points).

Defensive Systems;

• Shields / Force Field (10 PD/10 ED); Reduced END: Zero, +½; Hardened: ×1, ¼ (5 Points).
• Shields / Power Defense (12 pts); Champions Advantage (Defends against informational attacks): +½; Linked (To Force Field): -½; Hardened: ×2, ½; Reduced END: Zero, +½; Costs END: -½ (3 Points).
  • “Informational Damage” is a +1 advantage for attacks that target Power Defense or Mental Defense. Basically such attacks bypass defenses that don’t have a +1/2 advantage “stops informational attacks” – a variant on NND applied to attacks that already target a relatively rare specific defense.
• Shields / Mental Defense (12 pts); Champions Advantage (Defends against informational attacks): +½; Linked (To Force Field): -½; Hardened: ×2, ½; Reduced END: Zero, +½; Costs END: -½ (3 Points).
• Outer Hull Integrity Field / Armor (7 PD/7 ED); Hardened: ×1, ¼; Reduced END: Zero, +½; Costs END: -½ (5 Points).
• Flash Defense (Sight, 6 pts); Reduced END: Zero, +½; Costs END: -½ (5 Points).
• 4d6 Damage Control / Aid To Any One Damaged Cunction (Fade/turn, Max. 24); Range: 0; Affects: Single Power of Special Effect, +¼; Reduced END: Zero, +½; Restore Only Lost Characteristics and Powers: -½; Extra Time: 1 turn, -1; Charges: +8, -½ (3 Points);

Sensor Systems;

• Computer Augmentation / Enhanced Perception (all) (+7 to PER); Reduced END: Zero, +½; Costs END: -½ (4 Points).
• 360-Degree Sensing (All); Reduced END: Zero, +½; Costs END: -½ (5 Points).
• Ship Scans / Radar Sense; No Range Penalty: +½; Reduced END: Zero, +½; Costs END: -½ (3 Points).
• Navigational Warp Sensors / Danger Sense 14- (Out of Combat, Anywhere); Works: Out of Combat, +5; Range: Anywhere, +15; Extra Time: 1 min., -1½; Extra Time Required: Only At Startup, ½; Generic Limitation (Only to detect upcoming navigational hazards during high-speed travel): -2; Auxiliary Cost (Analytical; Provides data on the nature of the navigational or ship hazard): 1 (cost 5); Reduced END: Zero, +½; Costs END: -½; (5 Points).
• Life Sensors / Detect Life Forms (+0 to PER); Time Required: Instant, +2; Range: Ranged, +5; Addition (Discriminatory Sense): +5; No Range Penalty: +½; Reduced END: Zero, +½; Costs END: -½ (3 Points).
• Deep Scans / Detect Technology (+0 to PER); Time Required: Instant, +2; Range: Ranged, +5; Addition (Discriminatory Sense): +5; No Range Penalty: +½; Reduced END: Zero, +½; Costs END: -½ (3 Points).
• Environmental Sensors / Detect Environment (++0 to PER); Time Required: Instant, +2; Range: Ranged, +5; Addition (Discriminatory Sense): +5; No Range Penalty: +½; Reduced END: Zero, +½; Costs END: -½ (3 Points).

Environmental Systems;

• Life Support (total); Generic Limitation (Subject to upper limits, weird effects often penetrate): -1; Reduced END: Zero, +½; Costs END: -½ (5 Points).
• Internal Lights, Gravity, Etc / Change Environment (2″ rad.); Effect: Variable, +1; Reduced END: Zero & Persistent, +1; Selective Target: +¼; Generic Limitation (Only internal): -1 (3 Points).

Facilities;

• Hailing Frequencies: High Range Radio Hearing; Based on EGO Combat Value (No lightspeed delay, interstellar range): vs. ECV, +1; Invisible (Encrypted, Frequency-Hopping, Etc): To All Senses, +1; Reduced END: Zero, +½; Costs END: -½ (4 Points).
• Labs and Computers / +3 to Crew Skill Checks; Reduced END: Zero, +½; Costs END: -½ (5 Points).
• 1d6 Synthesizers / Transform to Supplies (Major, Limited Class); Range: 205; Area Effect (One-hex): 1 hex(es), +½; Reduced END: Zero, +½; Cumulative: +½; Extra Time: 1 turn, -1 (5 Points).

Weapons Multipower (60-pt reserve); Original Series Powers Only: -½; OIF (Weapon Systems): -½; Focus Type: Vehicular, -½; Focus Mobility: Bulky, -½; Starship Weapons Only: -1; Attracts Q, Negative Space Wedgies, and other Weirdness: -½; Subject to dramatic systems failures as hits, damage, or drama accumulates: -½ (12 Points).

• Phaser Battery: 1D6 Transform (Damaged Systems) (Minor, Limited Class); Based on EGO Combat Value: vs. ECV, +1; Autofire: 5 shots, ½; Reduced END: Zero, +1; No Normal Defense (Only blocked by informational defenses): +½; Cumulative: +½; (1 Point Ultra Slot). Thanks to the limitations on the ship defenses in this setting, this generally produces weird malfunctions and alarms rather than definable “damage” – even if not much actual effect is getting through.
• Phasers On Stun: 2D6 Energy Blast; Based on EGO Combat Value: vs. ECV, +1; Reduced END: Zero, +1; Area Effect (Radius): 64″ radius, +1; Increased Area: ×16, +1; Autofire: 5 shots, ½ (1 Point Ultra Slot).
• Photon Torpedoes: 1D6 Ranged Killing Attack; Area Effect (One-hex) +½; Autofire: 5 shots, +½; Penetrating: +½; Armor Piercing: 1, +½; Charges: 250, +1 (1 Point Ultra Slot). Only usable at reasonably “close” range.
• Tractor Beam: Telekinesis (STR 11); Manipulation: Coarse, +0; Reduced END: Zero, +½; Area Effect (Radius): 32″ radius, +1; Increased Area: ×16, +1 (1 Point Ultra Slot). Only usable at reasonably “close” range.

Total Vehicle Cost: 145 CP, -70 CP Disadvantages = 75 CP. Cost to Character: 75/5 = 15 CP.

• (-15): Distinctive Features: Federation Starship; Concealability: Not Concealable, 15; Reaction: Noticed and Recognizable, +0
• (-10): Requires Dilithium, Antimatter (Infrequently, Greatly)
• (-15): Reputation: Federation Starship (14-)
• (-10): Watched: The Authorities (8-); Capabilities: More Powerful, 15; Non-combat Influence: Extensive, +5; Geographical Area: Unlimited, -0; Only Watching: ×½; Punishment: Harsh, 0
• (-20): Uses Transporters as the primary way to get on and of. (All the Time, Greatly)

Putting virtually everything into a Starship Powers elemental control – and adding “costs endurance / zero endurance cost” on powers to make them eligible to be in an elemental control – is definitely a cheap way to build this ship. On the other hand, it says that – if the power goes out – pretty much EVERYTHING stops working,

It’s also not too important. The characters are superheroes. as a general rule their best bet at doing much of anything is to get out and do it themselves rather than try and rely on a vehicle to do it for them. As such, this entire ship is mostly an excuse to cruise around and get into trouble – and why should they have to pay a lot of points to do that? They do THAT anyway. 

Eclipse d20 – The Demigodling-Noble Template

So you want to play a Nobilis-style character in d20 – someone who has suddenly been drafted into a war against terrible threats to the world and has been granted great power to fight that war with, suddenly becoming a part of an elite group with similar power sources but with differing styles. Congratulations! You are now a Green Lantern / Empowered Warlock / New God / Wielder Of The Power Cosmic / Knight Of The Fey / Tailed Beast Host / Harbinger / Animorph / Power Ranger / Exalt / Noble!

Or you might just be a Wild Card Virus Victim or something. It can be hard to tell.

So what are the requirements for being given this power? In Nobilis it basically comes down to “being there”, but Nobilis doesn’t actually concern itself with distinctions between mortals – whereas in d20 Mortals can surpass Gods and other cosmic powers. Granting the power of a Noble to an infant or low-level character won’t necessarily make for an effective soldier in the cosmic war. Just like Green Lantern Rings need somebody who’s strong-willed, competent, and reasonably healthy to make for effective Green Lanterns, the Nobilis Package needs someone who’s already competent (in d20 terms) to make an effective Noble.

Ergo, this is going to be an Acquired Template that may be applied to any sapient, playable, creature that is at least Level Eleven or equivalent.

So to convert your character into a Noble take the following Acquired Template – compiling the various design elements from the previous articles.

Mythic Noble Acquired Template

(210 CP / +6 ECL, Requires Sapience, Level 11+).

Choose Your Estate – the aspect of reality you are bound to (52 CP).

• Describe your Estates major traits in four or five sentences. Rate them with values of 1-3 (one for minor qualities, 2 for notable ones, 3 for really central ones) totaling seven (0 CP).
  • Perhaps Sunlight… Brings Warmth And Life (2), but can Sear And Burn (1), It Returns Each Morning To Awaken The World (2), and it Reveals The Hidden (2).
• Gain Dominion (Your Estate) (6 CP).
• Gain Occult Sense/Your Estate. You can detect things related to your estate, whether that’s something affecting it on a large scale or its relationship to particular creatures. Note that – since you are the embodiment of your Estate – you can make perception rolls to figure out where attacks are coming from, even if they’re being launched by magic from another dimension. They are, after all, “things affecting your estate” (6 CP).
• Gain Returning with Rewrite (12 CP). You may only be permanently killed by breaking your connection with your Estate and may make minor rewrites of your abilities between adventures.
• Gain +1d6 (4) Mana, Specialized and Corrupted for Reduced Cost; controlled by the game master, only to power self-transformation “Persona” spells to adapt the user to the local environment, has whatever effects that the GM thinks will be fun (2 CP).
• Gain Blessing, Specialized and Corrupted for Increased Effect (Treats “your Estate” as a valid target, permits easy communication) / only to allow communication with the Estate and to get instances of it to act within their nature (for example, a gun might go off or misfire) or to fully transfer yourself into your Estate, leaving your body behind and undefended to possess and act through one or more instances of it (6 CP).
• Gain Immunity to the disorientation of spreading your “self” over massive areas (Uncommon, Minor, Major, 6 CP), allowing you to – for example – find which of the hordes thousand fires has the chieftains council going on around it, at least presuming that you have an appropriate estate.
• Gain two instances of Double Enthusiast, Specialized and Corrupted for Increased Effect / only to take on an Affliction (below) related to your Estate (12 CP) plus Adaption (Specialized for Increased Effect / may spend 2 Mana to change the points around instantly, Corrupted for Reduced Cost (cannot change otherwise), only for your Estate-Related Afflictions, above, 2 CP), plus Blessing, Specialized and Corrupted / only to lend someone else an Affliction (2 CP). You may take on an Estate-Related Affliction (below) and give one to someone else too.

Roll Your Miraculous Attributes (50 CP):

• Aspect: 4d6 Mana, Specialized and Corrupted/only for use in Reality Editing, only to produce effects calling for raising the user’s normal abilities to superhuman levels (8 CP).
• Domain: 4d6 Mana, Specialized and Corrupted / only for use Spell Enhancement, only for use with the “Shaping” ability below, only for effects targeting objects or the environment (8 CP).
• Persona: 4d6 Mana, Specialized and Corrupted / only for use Spell Enhancement, only for use with the “Shaping” ability below, only for effects targeting creatures, including yourself (8 CP).
• Treasure: 4d6 Mana, Specialized and Corrupted / only for use with “Treasure” effects (8 CP).
• Gain Rite of Chi with +20 Bonus Uses, Specialized and Corrupted / only to recharge the “attribute” pools above, only works between sessions or when the game master opts to award a die (12 CP).
• Gain Shaping, Specialized and Corrupted for Increased Effect (Level 0 and 1 Effects) / only for effects related to your Estate. Note that this includes Destiny Spells related to your Estate, but they’re no more controllable than usual. Thanks to that “Increased Effect” modifier, 1 Mana will get you up to fourth level effects, two to seventh level effects, and three to tenth level effects. Going beyond that requires adding some of the “Compact” modifiers to the effect (6 CP).

Select Your Bonds and Afflictions (48 CP):

• Gain Reflex Training / Can invoke a Bond as an Immediate Action when it’s trigger condition is met (6 CP).
• Take a Major Bond: Inherent Spell (Improvisation, Level One) with Multiple +4, Specialized for Increased Effect (Double the effect of points) and Corrupted for Increased Effect (Points spent stack with the benefits of the Aspect Innate enchantments and may also be spent on Caster Level Checks and to increase the DC of saves against your abilities – although it costs 2 points to increase the DC by +1) / can only be activated when a specified trigger condition applies and the user only gets a single first level spell, rather than the two that Inherent Spell would normally provide (12 CP).
• Take Two Minor Bonds: Inherent Spell (Improvisation, Level One) with Multiple +4, Specialized for Reduced Cost and Corrupted for Increased Effect (Points spent stack with the benefits of the Aspect Innate enchantments and may also be spent on Caster Level Checks and to increase the DC of saves against your abilities – although it costs 4 points to increase the DC by +1) / can only be activated when its trigger condition applies and the user only gets a single first level spell, rather than the two that Inherent Spell would normally provide (6 CP each, for a total of 12 CP).
• Take 18 CP worth of Afflictions – rules that you must live by (18 CP). Possible Afflictions include:
  • Power From Adversity: An “Accursed” Disadvantage (-3 CP) coupled with Rite of Chi with +8 Bonus Uses, Specialized and Corrupted for Reduced Cost / activation is under control of the game master, never activates at all unless the associated “Accursed” disadvantage is proving to be a serious hindrance at the moment (9 CP).
  • Strength Of The Phoenix: An “Accursed” Disadvantage (-3 CP) coupled with Grant of Aid with Mighty and +6 Bonus Uses, Specialized and Corrupted for Reduced Cost / activation is under control of the game master, never activates at all unless the associated “Accursed” disadvantage is proving to be a serious hindrance at the moment (9 CP).
  • A Natural Imperative: 1d6 (4) Mana with Reality Editing, Specialized and Corrupted for Increased Effect / only for enforcing a particular personal “rule” (6 CP), plus Rite Of Chi with +8 Bonus Uses, Specialized and Corrupted / only to refill the pool above (6 CP). Both are Specialized Again for Reduced Cost / activation is under control of the game master, may backlash if blocked or logically impossible within the limits of the level of Reality Editing it can handle.

Claim Your Destiny (12 CP): Select two from…

• Creation: Action Hero / Crafting if you want to create some mighty work, Specialized and Corrupted for Increased Effect / spending Action Points requires a great deal of inter-player discussion and planning. (6 CP).
• Growth: Action Hero / Invention if you want to discover or develop new things for all to use. Specialized and Corrupted for Increased Effect / spending Action Points requires a great deal of inter-player discussion and planning. (6 CP).
• Transformation: Action Hero / Influence if you wish to restructure the relationships between the great powers of the world – or to raise up new powers and cast down old ones (6 CP).

Choose Your Panoply (48 CP): Possible options here include:

• Spark Of The Divine (12 CP): Innate Enchantment (11,100 GP value):
  • Inhuman Speed: Personal Haste (2000 GP): +30′ Move, +1 Attack when making a full attack sequence.
  • Immortal Vigor I (1400 GP): +12 + 2 x Con Mod HP.
  • Inspiring Word (1400 GP): +1 morale bonus on saving throws, attack rolls, checks,and weapon damage.
  • Wrath Of Heaven/The Infernal (1400 GP) +1 Sacred (Infernal) bonus to Attacks and Damage.
  • Skill Mastery (1400 GP): +2 Competence Bonus to all Skill and Attribute Checks.
  • Fortune’s Favor I (1400 GP): +2 “Luck” bonus to all Skill and Attribute Checks.
  • Resist: (700 GP): +1 Resistance Bonus on all Saving Throws.
  • Divine Health (1400 GP): 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).
    • This package provides +2 to Saves, +2 to Attack Checks, +5 to Skill and Attribute checks, +2 to Damage, +30′ to all Movement Modes, +(12 _ 2 x Con Mod) hit points, +1 Attack when making a full attack, 36 points worth of Rapid Healing per day, and helps out with poisons, diseases, and attribute damage – quite enough to make you significantly superhuman even without Miracles or Heroic Scaling.
• Heroic Durability (12 CP).
  • Damage Reduction 3/-, Specialized in Physical Damage for Double Effect (6/-) (6 CP). That will let you bounce small-caliber bullets, arrows, and similar annoyances unless they’re backed by more-than-human power.
  • Damage Reduction 3/-, Specialized in Energy Damage for Double Effect (6/-) (6 CP). That will let you dip your hand in molten metal, stand around in a burning building to have a chat, handle considerable electrical shocks, and even helps with spells, force bolts, and “divine” or “infernal” damage. It’s all energy.

• Treasures (6 CP Each):
  • Mundane Treasures are normal things that get souped up. For this you want some Rune Magic (Specified Treasure, such as Cars), Specialized and Corrupted for Triple Effect / only for that particular treasure at (3 + Att Mod) x 3 (6 CP). This will let you summon, repair, and boost beyond all reason, mundane treasures of the appropriate type.
  • Followers and Allies and such get are bought as Leadership or Companion with various modifiers, all Specialized / you have to spend Mana to get them to do anything important for you (6 CP).
  • Symbolic Treasures – where a particular symbol or set of symbols acts as channels for your power and senses – can be purchased as Immunity/The Distinction Between the Symbol and You (Uncommon, Major, Great, Specialized / must expend 2 Mana to activate with respect to specific instances of the symbol) (6 CP).
  • A collection of minor devices (Charms and Talismans from The Practical Enchanter) can be purchased as: Shaping, Corrupted and Specialized for increased (level one and possibly weak level two) effects/can only produce the effects for which the user has the appropriate foci ready, can only support a limited number (seven and three) of minor charms and more notable talismans at one time, charms and talismans take some time to attune for use (6 CP). Another option that doesn’t cost Mana, since they’re pretty minor by d20 standards even in less-magical worlds.
  • Powerful Magical Devices are usually purchased as a Create Relic package: Create Relic, Specialized and Corrupted/only for making a particular four-point Relic or four-point collection of lesser Relics (2 CP), plus Double Enthusiast, Specialized for Increased Effect and corrupted for Reduced Cost / only for making those particular relics (4 CP) – for a grand total of (6 CP). They don’t usually require Mana, since they’re associated with a very high Treasure rating anyway.
  • Labs and such can be purchased as “Where Does He Get Those Wonderful Toys” from The Golden Ones sample powers list. These can allow you to have a collection of minor items to use on your adventures.
  • For a collection of more-or-less “normal” d20 magical devices, buy Natural Magic / Reality Editing, Specialized and Corrupted for Increased Effect / only for Reality Editing, only to summon, repair, or briefly boost up your normal wealth-by-level equipment (6 CP). Now you have a full-scale panoply of stuff – at least once you’re of a high enough level.
  • Mysterious Devices – like the sword Severance, or the Chalice Of Spring, or the Remote Control Of The Machine God or The Flying Dutchman’s Phantom Pirate Ship – are purchased as Natural Magic / Reality Editing, Specialized and Corrupted for Increased Effect / only for Reality Editing, only to produce effects within a specific theme (6 CP). This can produce some pretty impressive miracles at times – but not very often.
  • For a mess of Technological Tools and Gear, purchase Innate Enchantment (5000 GP = 100,000 Dollars or Credits worth of d20 Modern / Future equipment) for (6 CP) and supply yourself with gear that simply appears when you need it and disappears otherwise.
  • If you just want Money, buy a Stipend or Privilege/Landlord. In either case, this basically defines you as being rich, having a nice lifestyle, and so on (6 CP).

But wait! Don’t I get any credit for being drafted into a cosmic war?

No you don’t. EVERY high-level d20 player character is a part of the cosmic wars. That sort of thing is what the game is all about – and it’s important to remember that – while your Noble is going to be ECL 17+, a level 17+ “Mortal” can be just as formidable as you are.

And there you go. You are now a Lesser Power, a lieutenant of the Great Powers in the War Of Seven Spheres / Battle Between Good And Evil / war between Apokolips and New Genesis / Transformer-Decepticon War / Sith Wars / Blood War / Heralds And Voidbringers / Shadows And Vorlons / Dalek-Timelord Time War / Khorne and Tzeentch / War For Reality!

This really isn’t anything new, but why not?

What about Excrucians and Imperators?

• Excrucians get +2d6 on each of their Miraculous Attributes (16 CP), an extra +12 Bonus Uses on Rite Of Chi (6 CP) to restore those attributes (increasing the cost of their template to 232 CP or +7 ECL) and are created from Sapient Undead of CR 13+. Like all undead, they can be clever and pleasant – but they exist to destroy all life and return the universe to the void.
• Imperators are true Gods with Godfire. Their Avatars usually have the Excrucian’s boosted version of the Noble Template.

And that’s about it – save for noting that it’s important to remember that the default d20 universe is a lot bigger and more variegated than the Nobilis universe and there are lots of pieces of it that other powers control. YOU may be the Sun Lord, but there are plenty of other Sun Lords out there with control of their own suns.

Hero System – Artifact Smartphones

And as a whimsical bonus for today… it’s Blueblood‘s Artifact Smartphone, for those times when you just HAVE to stay in touch.

Not surprisingly, a Smartphone is purchased as exactly what it is – a Computer. In fact, it’s a not particularly powerful computer. Still, even the basic zero-point model is has all the usual Smartphone functions and – as a magical artifact – is capable of getting onto pretty much any network from pretty much anywhere in the multiverse, can control your household gadgets, can straighten your desk, can fetch you coffee, and can feed local languages (and some other stuff) directly into your head.

Advanced models are quite another thing altogether. At a cost of four, five, or six points they can have all kinds of functions, even if they DO tend to drain the supplemental battery at great speed. Blueblood has never bothered to upgrade though; he generally prefers to use his own powers.

Smartphone Computer

Value	Characteristic	Points
8	INT	-2
1	SPD	0
	Total	-32

 

Points	Powers	END
32	Artifact Smartphone (0 Points)
(2)	Elemental Control: Electronics (4-pt reserve); Usable By Others: Power Lost, +¼; OAF (Phone): -1
a-4	Radio Listen and Transmit; Datalink: +½; Cellular / WiFi / Bluetooth Service Only: -1; No Range Penalty: +½; Transdimensional: Any Dimension, +1, This will let you connect to any network from pretty much anywhere.
b-2	Eidetic Memory; Always On (Memory is either perfect or utterly gone): -½, Limited Storage Space: -½.
c-2	Images (Normal Sight); Reduced END: Zero, +½; No Range: -½; Generic Limitation (Screen Only): -4; Observer PER Penalty: 0, +0.	0
d-6	Pocket Secretary and Remote Control / Telekinesis (STR 10); Manipulation: Fine, +10; Reduced END: Zero, +½; Strength 0 Only: -2; Maximum range of 6 Hexes: -¼; Only functions as a secretary – operating devices, fetching coffee, sketching, etc: -2.	0
e-5	2d6 Aid: Programs/Databases (Fade/week, Max. 12); Range: 0; Affects: Single Power of Special Effect, +¼; Extra Time: 1 min., -1½; Activation: 11-, -1; Must have program available to load: -2; Reduced END: Zero, +½. This allows the user to load maps (area knowledge), languages, databases, and so on. All of it should be Usable By Others/Power Lost, so you can load a total of 10 points worth of information.	0
f-6	Basic Computer Functions
(2)	Internal Clock / Absolute Time Sense.
(2)	GPS/Bump of Direction.
(2)	Calculator / Lightning Calculator.
(1)	File Loading / Speed Reading; Computer Files Only: -1.
(0)	Camera (Eyes)
(0)	Microphone (Ears)
(0)	Speakers (Voice)
(2)	High Fidelity Playback / Mimicry	11-
(0)	Touchscreen (Touch)
g-5	Standard Software:
(2)	Security Features / Immunity To Unauthorized Use; Frequency: Common.
(1)	Voice Mode / English (Or language of choice) (Fluent Conversation); Literacy: Standard, 0.
(1)	Office Software / Professional Skill: Secretary.	11-
(1)	Media Library / Knowledge Skill Digital Media.	11-
(1)	Games Library: Professional Skill / Entertainer.	11-
(1)	Map Database / Knowledge Geography.	11-
(1)	Virtual Object/Image/Map Generator / Professional Skill Artist.	11-
(0)	For Translation, local maps, and databases, use the “Aid” to load an appropriate skill.
32	Advanced Artifact Smartphone (2/7/All Multipower functions for 4/5/6 points).
(4)	Superior Battery / END Reserve (64 END, 4 REC/turn); Focus (Phone): Obvious Accessible, -1; Generic Limitation (Only for use by user; The phone cannot use this power): -¾; Usable By Others: Power Lost, +¼.
(16)	Special Functions / Multipower (48-pt reserve); Focus (Phone): Obvious Accessible, -1; Generic Limitation (Only for use by user; The phone cannot use these powers): -¾; Usable By Others: Power Lost, +¼; Concentrate: 0 DCV, -½; Extra Time: full phase, -½
u-1	Security Override / Security Systems; Ranged: +½; Costs END (4 per use): -½	21-
u-1	Systems Override / Systems Operation; Ranged: +½; Costs END (4 per use): -½.	21-
u-1	Air / Water Vehicle Controller / Combat Piloting; Ranged: +½; Costs END (4 per use): -½.	21-
u-1	Ground Vehicle Controller / Combat Driving; Ranged: +½; Costs END (4 per use): -½.	21-
u-1	Holoimager / Images versus Sight (Hearing, Sight, 2″ radius); Range: 215; Observer PER Penalty: 3, +9; Increased END: ×2, -½.	8
u-1	6d6 Regeneration Ray / Standard Healing; Ranged: +½.	5
u-1	Environmental Field / Life Support (total); Area Effect (One-hex): 1 hex(es), +½; Costs END (4 per phase): -½.
u-1	Shields / Force Field (10 PD/10 ED); Area Effect (Radius): 3″ radius, +1.	4
u-1	1d6 Reality Reprogramming / Transform (Major, Anything); Range: 205; Increased END: ×2, -½; Cumulative: +½.	8
u-1	Summon Pokemon (1 50-point creatures); Range: 0; Summon: Limited Group, +¼; Increased END: ×2, -½. Training your Pokemon effectively is up to you.	12
u-1	Beam Me Up: Extra-Dimensional Movement to the Enterprise (or another specific locale); Dimensions: One, +0; Time Travel: None, +0; Mass Multiplier: ×4, +10; Carrying Mass: 200; Increased END: ×2, -½.	8
u-1	3d6 Disintegrator Beam/Killing Attack (RKA); Range: 280; Increased END: ×2.	12
32	Total Powers

 

Nobilis and Eclipse – Bonds, Gifts, Shine, and Cool

And to finish up with Nobilis’s major mechanics…

Bonds:

Bonds, at least as Nobilis defines them, can be strengths, motivations, emotional commitments, beliefs, or weaknesses – but, unlike an Affliction, invoking them is voluntary. Nobody is forcing your character to act on their “Love For My Family” bond; they just get bonuses when they do (or, if you’re using them like Mortals do… they can help reduce penalties that would otherwise hinder you). Invoking a powerful bond can help a Nobilis “Miracle” break through an opponents defenses. You make an extra effort because something is important to you. Bonds help define who and what you are and what you stand for.

Of course, in Nobilis not all bonds are created equal. “Love For My Family!” will give you a nice boost when you need it to help out your family – but “Demonstrate My Might!” will probably give you that nice boost on two-thirds of the things you do. That is not a good thing, especially given that d20 games are full of character optimizers. Ergo, the boosts from a Bond are going to have to be limited uses to help hold that sort of thing in check – and the game master will have to keep a careful eye on what the activation conditions are to make sure that they aren’t effectively “at any moment I find convenient”.

Still, common Bonds include things like “I always escape!”, “I love my family!”, “Nobody drives Megas but me!”, “I will save them all!”, “No one can take what is mine!”, “I am the good guy!”, “I love to gloat and monologue!”, “I can’t resist drinking!”, “I follow the Code of Bushido!”, “I leap into things without thinking!”, “Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night shall stay me!”, “Protect the Innocent!”, and “Follow the Plan to Victory!”. When a bond is threatened or can be invoked, its trigger condition is met. “I always escape” can thus be activated whenever you’re about to be captured or have been captured and need to escape. “I love my family” can be activated whenever your family is threatened or you want to do something for them. “I love to gloat and monologue!” can be activated whenever you get a chance to gloat and monologue, and so on. Basically you should have a chance to activate a Bond fairly often – but not all the time.

The basic structure for Bonds is thus

• Reflex Training / Can invoke a Bond as an Immediate Action when it’s trigger condition is met (6 CP).
• Each Bond is purchased as an Inherent Spell (Improvisation, Level One) with Multiple +4, Specialized for Reduced Cost and Corrupted for Increased Effect (Points spent stack with the benefits of the Aspect Innate enchantments and may also be spent on Caster Level Checks and to increase the DC of saves against your abilities – although it costs 4 points to increase the DC by +1) / can only be activated when its trigger condition applies and the user only gets a single first level spell, rather than the two that Inherent Spell would normally provide (6 CP).
  • If you want a stronger bond, Specialize it for Increased (Double) Effect and pay 12 CP. A weak one? Cut down on the number of uses and pay just a bit less. A major motivating factor? Pay some more for even more uses.

Gifts:

In Nobilis, Gifts are special powers that aren’t necessarily related to your Estate. You have them just because you have them. Perhaps you’re unaffected by fire, or have wings and can fly, or can touch people and cast them into another realm. In Nobilis these are specialized miracles. In d20… these are absolutely normal. Can you materialize a deadly sword from nothing? That’s Spirit Weapon and Imbuement – and is a trick that every Soulknife, or Bokor (Binder), or any of dozens of other character types can pull off. You’re a shapeshifter? A werewolf? An elf? You have dragon powers? You can use mystic martial arts? You can touch people and toss them forwards through time?

Congratulations. You’re an d20 character, just like everybody else. Just buy some powers to suit yourself.

Shine and Cool:

For the last of the major Nobilis mechanics we have Cool and Shine. Both Cool and Shine are technically skills (passions? qualities?) available to Mortals, but in Nobilis we’re only really interested in player characters – and these are two of the Nobilis mechanics that go out of their way to illustrate that. Most Nobilis characters will have some of both, and it’s not at all hard to have “5″ in one or both since mortal qualities are cheap. Lets have a look at Shine first.

Shine:

According to the Nobilis rules, whenever a mortal wants to honor you or implement your agenda they can use your Shine as if it were one of their own Passions or Skills, making it the basis for an Intention. You don’t have to interact with them to this happen, although you do have to more-or-less approve of their action (you don’t have to know about it though; you’d only have to be inclined to approve if you did know about it).

So my Estate is “Making An Effort” (Side benefit! The game master can’t even get rid of me without ending the game since no one will ever be able to make an effort to do anything again if I’m destroyed). Any mortal who decides to make an effort honors me. So any mortal who decides to get up and do something (or invest a point of will in an intent) can draw upon my Shine 5 in place of their own Passion or Skill.

Yay! Without any real effort on my part, I have just given every mortal in the universe great skills, health, wealth, magical powers, athletic abilities, and unending happiness! At least as long as I approve of whatever it is they want to do… Fortunately, I dislike Child Abuse, Murder, and a lot of other stuff like that.

Although that may not help much. After all, even Nobilis’s relatively tiny cosmology includes a few billion worlds and Shine 5 isn’t that uncommon among Nobilis characters. How likely is it that pretty much any action you could want to take has a patron with Shine 5 somewhere out there? Presumably the Gods of Murder, Massacre, Crime, Anger, Weapons, and more all approve of Murder and at least one of them is sure to have a nice high Shine score.

Er… no. Eclipse does include a way for actual gods to bestow enhancements on their followers – Endowment and Greater Endowment – as well as plenty of ways to buff up people in the area (Mystic Artist, boosting spells, Presence, Executive, Dominion, and a lot more) – but there isn’t any equivalent to Shine because Eclipse tries to have mechanics that will actually function in a game. This mechanic doesn’t even function as written in Nobilis. There’s no cost, because abilities that don’t work are free.

Cool:

Then, of course, we have the opposing ability – Cool.

Cool acts as a penalty on mundane actions that cause problems for, injure, or influence someone cool or an organization, person, or situation that the Cool person is actively watching over

So if I have Cool 5 and my Estate is “Depression” (“Depression is not doing anything”), anyone who actually does something is injuring my Estate/Self. As long as I am watching over my estate… all mundane actions everywhere in the Nobilis multiverse take a -5 penalty. Mortal magicians may still derive some motivation from their Bonds, but for the most part… all the mortals in the multiverse lie down and die because Depression is so Cool.

No, Eclipse doesn’t really include any way to make everyone, everywhere, fail at everything, with little or no effort on your part. That’s because it’s really, REALLY, boring. Especially since it’s a VERY big multiverse, and that means that this will have been going on since long before the player characters were born. (And would mean that they were never born at all since having and caring for children involves doing stuff).

So according to these rules in Nobilis… mortal abilities are actually totally irrelevant to mortals. Only Nobles – who are immune to other people’s Shine (although not to Cool when taking mundane actions) actually have any use for mortal abilities – although there’s no reason that they would ever have acquired any in the first place since they spent their time as mortals in a world where mortal skills are totally irrelevant.

Nobilis isn’t actually played that way of course. Its “mechanics” really only apply to player characters. They only exist to differentiate them, to give the players something to fiddle with, and to provide a way for the characters to say “I’m just coasting”, “I’m making an effort”, and “I’m going all in” – which the game master compares to an internal difficulty scale consisting of “they can win this one easy”, “they can win this one if they make a minor/major effort and/or get really creative” and “they can’t win this one” – with the definitions of “winning”, “losing”, and “injuries” being open to interpretation and discussion by everyone at the table.

Nobilis and Eclipse – Estates, Persona, and Domain

“Estates” are one of the core concepts of Nobilis – and are entirely subjective, described by seven “points” worth of sentences, assigning more “points” to more central properties. Your estate could be Time, or Dragons, or Clockwork, or Pillows, or Cooking Programs, or Sid Mier’s Computer Games, or pretty much anything else. It really doesn’t matter what you call it, since it’s defined by those (usually four or five) sentences – not by external expectations. Are you a power of “Cold”? Perhaps…

• (2) Cold isolates the heart, destroying an entities traits.
• (2) Cold is an undisturbed void, rejecting reality through not caring.
• (1) Cold is the death of self, with mind and body soon to follow.
• (1) Cold is outside, always waiting to force its way in.
• (1) Cold is eternal and timeless, while all else passes.

Or perhaps…

• (3) Cold negates energy, for all ends in cold.
• (1) Cold crystallizes, preserving what lies within.
• (1) Cold allows things to function far beyond their limits.
• (1) Cold opens the way for new beginnings.
• (1) Cold lurks in the depths.

Or perhaps…

• (2) Cold rides the winds everywhere, stealing heat and life.
• (1) Cold kills, desiccates, and shatters.
• (1) Cold is winter, the season of scarcity, famine, and death.
• (2) Cold is ice, from the smallest snowflake to the greatest glacier.
• (1) Cold isolates and entraps, preventing or forcing interaction.

The Nobilis book also gives a couple of other examples for “cold”.

• (2) Cold freezes things.
• (2) Cold makes things sick.
• (1) Cold is melancholy.
• (1) Cold descends.
• (1) Cold is the snow and the ice and the dark.

Or:

• (1) Cold slows things down.
• (1) Cold chills the heart.
• (3) Cold brings silence, stillness, and peace.
• (2) Cold is driven to fill emptiness.

Or you could be a power of mathematics, necessity, finance and logic, and still call it “cold” (although altering the rules of logic is a REAL headache).

For that matter, you can be a power of Illogic or Acausality and make anything at all happen as long as it has no rational connection to whatever you did to cause it. You could also make A = Not-A – at which point nothing can be distinguished from anything else.

In any case, Domain and Persona give you powers based on your Estate – Domain focused on affecting objects and the environment and Persona focused on affecting creatures (including yourself). You get a bunch of minor stuff that you can always do and you get major stuff that you can do, but not at all often.

Of course, Nobilis then goes on to say that “The Power of Fire can make someone more fiery, or give them a dangerous feel, or make sure that now and again in life their plans will burn them.” – without talking about what Estate of Fire it’s referring to. What if the Fire Estate that’s currently in play is all about nuclear fusion, metabolism, explosions, and cooking?

I’m going to ignore that bit. D20 focuses a lot more on consistency.

Buying the Domain and Persona Attributes:

• Both of them are 4d6 Mana, with Rite of Chi with +4 Bonus Uses, all Specialized and Corrupted / only for use Spell Enhancement, only for use with the “Shaping” ability below, only for effects targeting objects or the environment (Domain) or effects targeting creatures, including yourself. Rite of Chi, only recharges the specific mana pool it was purchased for and then only between sessions or when the game master opts to award a die (24 CP in total).

You’ll also need:

• Dominion (Your Estate). This lets you draw power from administering, defending, and otherwise promoting your Estate, as well as allowing you to use it to influence large-scale events (6 CP).
• Occult Sense/Estate. You can detect things related to your estate, whether that’s something affecting it on a large scale or its relationship to particular creatures. Note that – since you are the embodiment of your Estate – you can make perception rolls to figure out where attacks are coming from, even if they’re being launched by magic from another dimension. They are, after all, “things affecting your estate” (6 CP).
• You can produce minor effects related to your estate. That’s Shaping, Specialized and Corrupted for Increased Effect (Level 0 and 1 Effects) / only for effects related to your Estate. Note that this includes Destiny Spells related to your Estate, but they’re no more controllable than usual (6 CP).
  • This is also the foundation for higher-level Estate-related “Miracles”/Spells. Thanks to that “Increased Effect” modifier, 1 Mana will get you up to fourth level effects, two to seventh level effects, and three to tenth level effects. “Imperial Miracles” or Grandiose Edits can reach level 13, but pushing things that far generally leads to all kinds of backlash.

This is incredibly cheesy. Applying “Specialized For Increased Effect” to the Mana used in Spell Enhancement is pretty ridiculous. This sort of thing is only acceptable if EVERY major character is using equally horrible cheese. Fortunately, in a Nobilis styled setting… they all will be.

• Adaption: Nobilis characters are avatars of their Estates, As such, they adapt to how their Estate fits into the local environment as a basic function of their Persona attribute. They will learn local languages within a few moments of their arrival, take on a suitable local guise (while remaining clearly themselves), and fit into their local role – whether that happens to be as one of the octopus people of an undersea dimension, a towering kaiju in a dreamworld of battling powers, the depths of space, or a mere exotic culture. Thus, if the game master decides to set a session in an exotic city or an alien dimension or something, Nobilis characters need not worry about “can they speak the local languages?” or “can they breathe the local air”.
  • This is an automatic self-polymorphing effect – a small part of their innate Estate-related Shaping – which is entirely under the game masters control (although a Noble may ask the game master to spend 1-3 of his or her Persona mana to trigger it – (lets say if they’re lost at sea with no boat and are about to drown). This will occasionally call for effects of well above level one, so this is they need to buy +1d6 (4) Mana that counts as part of the Persona Pool for recharging purposes, Specialized and Corrupted for Reduced Cost; controlled by the game master, only to power self-transformation spells to adapt the user to the local environment, has whatever effects that the GM thinks will be fun (2 CP).
• You can become one with your Estate, either possessing an instance of it (wherever that is) or “communicating” with it. That’s Blessing, Specialized and Corrupted for Increased Effect (Treats “your Estate” as a valid target, permits easy communication) / only to allow communication with the Estate and to get instances of it to act within their nature (for example, a gun might go off or misfire) or to fully transfer yourself into your Estate, leaving your body behind and undefended to possess and act through one or more instances of it (6 CP). Sadly, possessing more than one instance of your Estate at once requires an Immunity to disorientation to work effectively. Ergo, buy Immunity to the disorientation of spreading your “self” over massive areas (Uncommon, Minor, Major, 6 CP), allowing you to – for example – find which of the hordes thousand fires has the chieftains council going on around it.
• You may take on an Affliction related to your Estate – or give one to someone else. That’s two instances of Double Enthusiast, Specialized and Corrupted for Increased Effect / only to take on an Affliction related to your Estate (12 CP) plus Adaption (Specialized for Increased Effect / may spend 2 Mana to change the points around instantly, Corrupted for Reduced Cost (cannot change otherwise), only for your Estate-Related Afflictions, above, 2 CP), plus Blessing, Specialized and Corrupted / only to lend someone else an Affliction (2 CP).

Persona and Domain 4-5 are a problem; they’re where you can Create, Animate, Summon, Destroy, Adopt, or Cast Out (make something a part of your estate or not a part of your Estate, so that it transforms – although how is up to the game master). And while this is limited to a relatively small scale… unlimited Raise Dead, Create Undead, Slay Living, Animate Object, Summoning, and similar effects generally wreck the game.

The trick here is to recognize that such abilities aren’t really “unlimited” in Nobilis either; they may not have a base cost at this level – but trying to use your “Life” Estate powers to raise all the dead of a great battle will very shortly bring you into conflict with other powers. Nobilis conflicts expend resources to pump up your miracles very quickly too – so there won’t be many chances to use the free stuff there either. Finally, of course, the game master has a lot more input on what you get from any given attempt in Nobilis than in d20, where they’re basically just high level spells. That’s one reason why I’ve given the various Nobilis “Attributes” mana / “Miracle Point” pools of 4d6 instead of 5. They have some to spend on such effects, and so will get to use them about as often as they get to use them in Nobilis anyway. There’s no further cost here, since I’ve already included that.

That gives the equivalent of Domain and Persona 5 a total cost of 60 Character Points. Once again, that’s relatively cheap in d20 because most Nobilis “Miracles” are actually pretty straightforward in d20 terms. They may be high-level spells – but they’re just spells. D20 is a system where Raistlin – a mortal wizard – could challenge the entire pantheon of his world and destroy them all (OK, that was second edition, but the settings haven’t changed that much). In d20, power is a smooth scale; there isn’t any sharp division between “Mortal Magic” and “Divine Powers”.

Ponies Of The Eclipse – Stygian and The Pony Of Shadows

After the write-ups for the six Pillars of Old Equestria Alzrius requested a writeup for Stygian, the Pony Of Shadows – and so here we go. As always, the first thing to do is to look at what Stygian and The Pony Of Shadows are actually shown doing – admittedly, mostly in campfire tales and in the My Little Pony: Legends Of Magic comic book series.

• To start with the obvious, pony names are often pretty good indicators of their talents. Stygian is “of or relating to the river/deity Styx”- a part of the Greek underworld, associated with darkness, witchcraft, and hidden lore, and with dark waters that granted near-invulnerability,. That’s really rather suggestive. Moreover, Equestria includes Tartarus (another part of the Greek Underworld), Minotaurs, Centaurs, Hydra, Manticores, and more – all elements of Greek Mythology made real and tangible in the setting. It may be worth taking Greek Mythology references fairly seriously.
• Stygians Cutie Mark has never been revealed. He covers it all the time, just like Sombra. That’s also rather suggestive, and more than a bit ominous.
• Stygian is supposed to be fairly young. Of course, given that it’s a kids show, most of the characters are fairly young – so this isn’t exactly a power unless he’s immortal as the Pony Of Shadows. (The Pony Of Shadows was no longer in charge when his world was revisited more than a thousand years later – it had apparently been taken over by an alternate version of Discord – but we aren’t exactly shown that much of the alternate world in either case and we’re not told why there was a change).
• Stygian is an expert on the sea, biology, and folktales, is at least competent at strategy and tactics (that’s probably pretty rare among generally-peaceful ponies) and astronomy, and is apparently quite knowledgeable about the various creatures of Equestria. That’s more than a bit weird for a villager. Serious scholarship kind of calls for either access to libraries, mentors, and support for your studies or a great deal of natural talent in a field to develop everything from scratch (and is likely to go badly wrong even then; Aristotle was very clever, but most of his “scholarship” was very badly flawed, to say the least). Secondarily, that’s a LOT of fields of study for a youngster with no resources to master. A way to support himself and a teacher or teachers of some sort would make this a lot more reasonable.
• On the practical level he’s a competent sailor, a skilled maker of baskets, a horticulturist, a good housekeeper, and can apparently handle an immense list of other chores (presumably involving other practical skills) in one evening. He’s good enough at survival to wander the wilderness in relative safety, became a successful commercial author (after being freed from the darkness) and may have various other practical “village” skills or spells.
• He was a skillful telekinetic, with excellent fine control and – as shown in My Little Pony: Legends Of Magic #8 – enough telekinetic strength to hold back water across a canal with force barrier. Even if it was only ten by ten… that puts the total force in the ten to twenty ton range. Admittedly the writers probably had no idea of what they were showing, and unicorn telekinesis tends to be as strong as the story calls for (since he then found lifting Rockhoof mildly awkward), but even lifting Rockhoof seems likely to be fairly impressive for your basic unicorn. Perhaps it was a force barrier or “wall” effect though? Those might be a lot easier.
• As a unicorn scholar, who has specifically noted that “he wanted to go back to studying spells (Legends Of Magic #9), his magic is probably fairly versatile, even if mostly focused on practical spells and effects that could be found and practically employed in a seaside village.
• When the Sirens attacked his village, he was the only one to escape their influence. He stated that it was because he was “out of range” – but he got more than close enough, and then resisted for long enough to go and consult his books before running away. Even if the sirens gave a concert, surely the place had farmers, woodcutters, and others who worked much further away and who didn’t come? Why didn’t any of THEM get away? Some special resistance seems likely.
• He then evaded, escaped, or fought giant sea serpents, crab monsters, timberwolves, and gryphons, and possibly more obstacles than would fit in the single page devoted to his solitary travels to reach Rockhoof’s distant, apparently “northern”, viking-styled village.
• He gathered a group of heroes to stop the sirens, even getting crochety old Starswirl to come along. Sure, ponies are generally helpful and willing to go a long ways to help others (as established in the first couple of episodes!) but surely legendary heroes had other urgent requests to deal with. Ergo, he’s probably fairly – and perhaps unnaturally – persuasive.
• He could command the minions of an alternate-universe version of himself. This might be a power, or it might just be that they were too obedient/cursed/stupid/whatever to tell the difference.
• That alternate-universe version of himself had, however, apparently killed off most of the pillars, eliminated or chased away all other ponies (at least there were none shown), commanded many minions, had corrupted large areas of the world, and wanted to become a cross-universal corruptor (strongly implying that he’d either finished with his current world or was being forced to run – and he didn’t seem to be running). Evidently, given time, the Pony Of Shadows became fairly dangerous directly and extremely corruptive.
• When he confronted the alternate-universe Pony Of Shadows, their magic proved ineffective against each other – canceling out, despite the Pony Of Shadows supposedly being much more powerful than plain Stygian.
• He borrowed the Pillars signature artifacts and went to Ponehenge to make copies of them so that he “could be a Pillar too”. Given that several of those artifacts are purely symbolic, that may have been purely irrational thinking – which would help explain why the Pillars misinterpreted what he was up to. It’s hard to understand something that makes no sense.
• When he was prevented from making copies of the Pillar’s artifacts he wandered off, only to return later hosting a powerful force of darkness. Again, that seems likely to be an uncommon (if dubious) talent, simply because – while it seems likely that a lot of ponies get really upset – most of them don’t wind up hosting mighty evil forces.
• Starswirl The Bearded, scholar of magic, didn’t know how to deal with him as The Pony Of Shadows. That rather implies that there was something pretty unusual about the magic that was in use in that form – and perhaps normally.
• Stygian actually seemed to be fairly strong and versatile for a Unicorn in practice. Why wouldn’t that power be apparent to others?
  • Stygian can Teleport at least three ponies at a time for fairly long distances – possibly hundreds of miles – in Nightmare Knights #2 – but that series is only halfway completed, and didn’t even start until October 2018, so I think that it probably represents a somewhat later version of the character who has picked up at least one more level; otherwise his journey to find the Pillars would be just a bit less impressive. So no teleportation for this version.
    

For his primary attributes…

• Strength: He’s a really scrawny little guy, so his Strength is going to be pretty underwhelming.
• Constitution: He seems to be reasonably tough and enduring though, pointing towards a decent Constitution. Sure, he needed more rests than Rockhoof while they were traveling together, but a stream locomotive probably needs more rests than Rockhoof.
• Dexterity: When it comes to Dexterity Stygian is probably fairly average for a pony. He did move pretty quickly, and with no obvious fumbles, when he needed to – but it was nothing all that impressive.
• Intelligence: Genius plus. He definitely seemed to have a better appreciation for what might go wrong with a plan than Starswirl did despite being much younger and presumably less experienced, he’s apparently a self-trained scholar in many fields, and he has a LOT of skills.
• Wisdom: Wisdom is always a bit harder to pin down, but being a field naturalist, and surviving solo journeys across the wilds of early Equestria, implies that (at the least) there’s no major deficiency here – and he certainly shows a reasonably strong will, both in resisting the Sirens (whether he used a power or not) and in setting out on a solo quest to bring help.
• Charisma. Rockhoof finds Stygian pretty affable, and he’s apparently pretty persuasive – but he’s certainly not that good at being the center of attention, dominating a group, or showing that much force of personality. Of course, some Charisma is pretty much built into ponies.
• Finally, while Stygian is fairly adamant about “not being a hero”, he certainly is one from an observers standpoint – so I’m going to use the same 25-point attribute buy as I did for the rest of the Pillars.

When it comes to level, Stygian did a lot of wandering around as a scholar, then went on a quest to find the Pillars, and then participated in some degree in the various adventures after he started finding them. Since the low-level adventurer template would keep him from advancing at the breakneck speed of a normal d20 character, I’m going to put him at level three. That would actually be a bit high for his known “number of encounters” – but presumably he did some things that didn’t make it into the comics. After all, he was a pretty busy guy even before he started collecting the pillars.

The world of My Little Pony is a world of friendship, harmony, and rainbows. So… why ARE their true villains? Sure, Trixie, the Flim-Flam Brothers, Spoiled Rich, pre-reformation Diamond Tiara, and even Discord were really annoying, but they mostly just misinterpreted or failed to “get” all that happiness.

So what is powering a (possessing) Nightmare? Or Tirek? Or Sombra? What powers dark magic?

For Nightmare… it was Jealousy. For Tirek, Greed. For Sombra, Fear.

For the Pony of Shadows? He seemed to be powered by the greatest of all dark magics in the world of Friendship Is Magic – Friendship Betrayed. For the Pony Of Shadows may have been somewhat separate from Equestria-primes version of Stygian – but as the MLP: Legends Of Magic annual showed… over the years they would have become one, for that alternate version of Stygian bore tattered batlike wings. He had ascended to become a Dark Alicorn. So it is time to create…

Stygian Shadow, potential Prince Of Friendship Betrayed.

Basic Attributes: Str 8 (-2 Unicorn = 6), Dex 12 (-2 Pony = 10), Con 12 (+2 Pony +2 Enh = 16), Int 18 (+2 Knack, +2 Unicorn = 22), Wis 13, Cha 13 (+2 Enh = 15) (Pathfinder 25 Point Buy).

Available Character Points: 96 (Level Three Base) + 10 (Disadvantages: History (a bit of a freebie for most converted characters), Obligations (takes responsibility for all kinds of things), and Accursed (tends to be misunderstood, ignored, and uncredited) +18 (Unicorn, L1 and L3 Bonus Feats) = 124 CP.

Basic Abilities (36 CP):

• Hit Dice: 6 (L1d6, 2 CP) +9 (L2-L3d6, 4 CP) +12 (Template) +15 (5 x Con Mod) = 42 HP. With pony damage reduction this makes him reasonably durable.
• Skill Points: 6 (Purchased, 6 CP) + 36 (Int) + 18 (Fast Learner) = 60 SP
• BAB +1 (6 CP). Stygian isn’t stupid, but he just isn’t a physical fighter.
• Saves:
  • Fortitude +0 (0 CP) +3 (Con) +1 (Tem) = +4
  • Reflex +3 (9 CP) +0 (Dex) +1 (Tem) = +4
  • Will +2 (6 CP) +1 (Wis) +1 (Tem) = +4
• Proficiencies: Simple Weapons (3 CP).
• Initiative: +0 (Dex)
• Move: 40 (four legs, 20 on three or less).
• Armor Class: 10 (Base) +7 (Force Armor III) = 17. May rise to 24 when he adds a Force Shield III.
• Stygian really doesn’t do physical combat, so he has no “usual attacks”.

Sage (35 CP):

• Adept x 2 (12 CP). Pays half cost for Knowledge: Arcana, Geography, History, Local, Nature, and Planes, Linguistics, and Spellcraft.
• Fast Learner (6 CP), Specialized and Corrupted for Increased Effect / only for Knowledge Skills.
• Universal Jack Of All Trades, Specialized and Corrupted / Only for Craft and Profession skills (4 CP).
• Augmented Bonus / Adds (Int Mod) to (Wis Mod) for Skill Check Purposes, Specialized and Corrupted / only for Profession Skills (2 CP).
• Augmented Bonus / Adds (Con Mod) to (Int Mod) for Skill Check Purposes, Specialized in Knowledge Skills Only (3 CP).
• Tactician (8 CP): Mystic Artist (Knowledge / History) with Echoes, Specialized for Double Effect, Corrupted for Reduced Cost / only to use the inspiration abilities, only to provide bonuses in combat against specified enemies, requires that the player provide a plausible plan.
  • This is actually pretty potent; sure, it only lasts for ten rounds once a fight starts – but a good plan / +2 Positive Levels from Mass Greatness can go a long ways in ten rounds.

Skills:

• Craft (Universal): +1 (JOAT) +6 (Int) = +7
• Diplomacy: +6 (6 SP) +1 (Cha) +3 (Tem) = +10
• Fly: +3 (3 SP) +0 (Dex) +8 (Fly Speed as the Pony Of Shadows) = +11
• Heal: +6 (6 SP) +1 (Wis) = +7
• Knowledge: Arcana, Geography, History, Local, Nature, and Planes: +6 (3* SP x 6 = 18 SP) +6 (Int Mod) +3 (Con Mod) = +15.
• Linguistics: +6 (3* SP) +6 (Int) +3 (Tem) = +15
• Perception: +6 (6 SP) +1 (Wis) +3 (Tem) = +10
• Perform (Sing): +3 (3 SP) +1 (Cha) +2 (Race) = +6
• Profession (Universal): +1 (JOAT) +1 (Wis) +6 (Int) = +8
• Spellcraft: +6 (3* SP) +6 (Int) +3 (Tem) +2 (Race) = +17
• Survival: +6 (6 SP) +1 (Wis) +3 (Tem) +3 (Unicorn Skill Mastery) = +13
• Swim: +6 (6 SP) -3 (Str) = +3

Stygian Magic (53 CP).

Like Trixie Lulumoon centuries later, Stygian wields a strange, and often frightening magic. He is so used to thinking of it as “wrong” that he conceals his cutie mark and has denigrated his own skills to the point where he believes himself weak, ineffective, and incapable of fighting. Stygian doesn’t lack power though, even if it doesn’t show up very well on Equestria’s usual scales. What he lacks is self-confidence.

Mana-Powered Witchcraft III (18 CP) with Finesse (Uses Int Mod in place of Cha Mod for Witchcraft, 6 CP). Will Save DC 19, Base Power 11. (The Superheroic World Template provides him with 3 Mana – equivalent to 12 Power – per round).

Basic Witchcraft Abilities:

• The Adamant Will. This allowed him to resist the Sirens,
• Elfshot: He can inflict minor hindrances on opponents. This is rarely worthwhile unless he’s trying to do something subtle or create an opening for someone else.
• Hand of Shadows: He can perform a wide variety of telekinetic tricks (and do lots and lots of chores).
• Infliction. The basic “I do magical damage” effect. In his base form Stygian isn’t very good at this, although he can vary his attacks to whatever he thinks is most likely to scare off his targets. It’s not generally his first option though.
• Glamour, He can enhance his persuasive abilities and project mental orders to creatures that have been bound to his will – even if they were so bound by an alternate version of himself.
• The Inner Eye, Specialized for Increased Effect / Only to “hear” whispers of the Akhasic Record (+10 Insight Bonus to a skill check for 1 Power) or the outer ones beyond reality (this provides an excuse for taking any desired knowledge skill, for prophetic or weird dreams and nightmares, and so on).
• Witchfire. Stygian uses this – in conjunction with boosting metapsionics – to generate basic force effects, such as Mage Armor, Shield, basic barriers – such as the one he used to hold back all that water.

Advanced Witchcraft Abilities:

• 2d6 Mana as +6d6 (21) Power (12 CP). Even if somehow cut off from the flow of Mana, Stygian has some reserves.
• Metapsionics / Amplify, Specialized and Corrupted / only for Hand of Shadows and Witchfire (force effects) (2 CP). With this ability Stygian can spend more Mana to boost his Hand of Shadows to handle much heavier weights and his Witchfire force-effects to create reasonably durable force barriers and Force Armor/Shield effects of up to level three.
• Tenebrium’s Coin, Specialized and Corrupted / Stygian always has access to basic supplies for a scholar – food and drink, camping gear, ordinary clothing (such as it is for ponies anyway), reference books, a lamp or candles, blank journals, pens and ink, and a comfortable lifestyle, but cannot accumulate or spend funds from this ability (2 CP).
• Ridden By The Loa, Specialized and Corrupted / Stygian only knows of one entity to channel per +2 or part thereof of his total Knowledge: The Planes bonus, must intentionally seek out a “weak point” between the dimensions and conduct a ritual to for the first “summoning” of such an entity (and must do so again if the link so created is later broken), cannot upgrade his level of control or use The Adamant Will to resist or expel such an entity, and (unfortunately) is focused on nigh-incomprehensible Lovecraftian Entities (2 CP).
• Metapsionic Theorem / Elemental Manipulation with two levels of Streamline, Specialized and Corrupted / only to automatically add a Dispel Magic or Dispel Psionics effect to his Witchcraft-based single-target attacks (6 CP).
• Reflex Training (Three extra actions per day variant) with +3 Bonus Uses, Specialized for Reduced Cost / only to use Witchcraft (5 CP).

The Pony Of Shadows: Stygian plus a (157 CP / +4 ECL Acquired “Black Pharaoh” Template):

The Pony Of Shadows is Stygian channeling Nyarlathotep, the Crawling Chaos, Corrupter Of Worlds. Unfortunately, even with a +4 ECL Lovecraftian Template stacked onto him… Stygian is still only an ECL 4 character at base. Without time to grow he is severely limited.

• Journeyman, Master, and Grand Master (Hit Dice, 24 CP)
• +6d4 Hit Dice (48 CP). While an extra thirty-five hit points never hurt, the real bonus here is that Witchcraft’s “casting level” is based on hit dice – so this gets his “casting level” up to nine. In Equestria that’s a fabulous level of raw power.
• Apparition, Specialized for Increased Effect (Construct VIII) / must take the “Enveloping” ability (see The Practical Enchanter / Psychic Constructs), can only be manifested around himself, can only take one specific construct-form with the choices of A) Fly 40′, Armored (+1 Deflection Bonus to AC), B) Fast Healing II, Trample, Versatile (Increased Flight to 80′), and C) Energy Bolt (Adds +5d to Infliction effects) and Enveloping (6 CP). This forms the dark body of the Pony Of Shadows.
• Immunity to Casting Level Requirements (Very Common, Major, Major, for six levels off the requirement, Specialized and Corrupted / only for the Construct-VIII effect, as given above (5 CP). This gets his casting level for the Apparition effect up to level fifteen.
• Additional Advanced Witchcraft Disciplines:
  • Master Of The Sabbat, Specialized and Corrupted / only for use with Elfshot, only to lay curses of slow corruption, only usable once per day to a game master decided maximum effective level of curse (2 CP). The Pony Of Shadows can corrupt lands, creatures up through Alicorns, and entire worlds – but it will take considerable time and effort.
  • Seize The Wandering Soul (6 CP): Entrap unanchored souls. A dark and terrible power.
  • Spirit Binding (6 CP): Bind souls into creatures or objects. Another dark and terrible power.
  • Nightforge (6 CP): Create solid objects of shadow.
  • Mouth Of The Earth (6 CP): Upgrade Infliction to d8’s and add other effects.
  • Ashen Rebirth (Shadow) with Teleportation (12 CP). Become a creature of shadow.
  • Leaping Fire (6 CP): Accelerate it’s own movement, healing, and attacks,
• Other Abilities:
  • Cloaking. Detection and Scanning Magic will simply show a normal unicorn pony of little power (6 CP).
  • Celerity: +10′ Ground Movement (6 CP).
  • Reflex Training (three extra action per day variant) (6 CP).
  • Amorphous (6 CP). The Pony Of Shadows can move through cracks and spaces that are logically too small for it.
  • Immunity to Aging (Uncommon, Severe, Major, 6 CP).

The Pony Of Shadows does not wish for simple destruction, It seeks madness, corruption, and to lead intelligent beings into destroying themselves. Thus it’s attempt to corrupt Celestia and Luna, so as to send them against still more worlds, rather than simply passing through the mirror-portal, lurking, and slowly corrupting the world with it’s own power. Unfortunately for it, it’s not really all that good at interacting with normal creatures, so it’s attempts at corruption are both direct and more than a little crude.

Equipment:

• Charms: Astrolabe, Foulflesh Amulet, Loaded Brush, The Ocean’s Arms, Sands Of Time, Traveler’s Bedroll, and Vanishing Coat (Cloak),
• Talismans: Preserving Chest (for specimens), Rubydraught, and Stone Of Sustenance.
• Stygian presumably keeps a pocket-knife, current journal, bit of rope, snacks, and other minor items wherever it is that ponies keep things, but ponies don’t rely on equipment very much.

Stygian is more or less right. He’s not a hero. Under normal circumstances he can provide a nice boost to a group of heroes, repair or build pretty anything, is a bottomless well of exposition, and can throw some decent protective spells. He’s an invaluable sidekick to a hero or heroes, but just doesn’t have much offensive punch – leaving him safely in the rear echelon providing support services. Of course, he has a lot more offensive capability and options when channeling a spirit – but when he resorts to that he pretty much loses control to the spirit he’s channeling. .

Now, if only he could figure out what this odd little golden thing – like a bit with most of the center drilled out – that he found in Rockhoof’s volcano was. He keeps getting this odd urge to put it on, but it’s not like there’s any portion of his anatomy where the silly thing would fit.

Since these have appeared over and over again, they’re here at the bottom for easy skipping:

To summarize the low-level adventurer template, those affected get:

• A -3 penalty on unskilled skill checks.
• Very slow level advancement, by direct session-based character point awards rather than experience points. Succeeding in goals helps, but killing things and taking their stuff does not.
• The status of valuable trouble magnets – they’re rare and find trouble everywhere they go.
• A +3 bonus on five skills which suit their backgrounds and training. Sadly, this cannot be applied to active magical skills.
• Extra hit points equal to [12 + (2 x Con Mod)].
• Two minor special talents. For the full list see the Template. For Stygian we’ll take a +2 bonus to his Intelligence and Enduring (providing him with a +1 bonus on his Saves).

To summarize the Basic Pony Modifiers:

• Quadruped. In general ponies are slow and have trouble moving while using tools or weapons.
• Attribute Modifiers: -2 Dex, +2 Con. An additional +2 Con and +2 Chr are dispellable magical bonuses.
• Damage Reduction 9/- versus both Physical and Energy Attacks, only DR 2/- versus melee attacks by living creatures.
• Endure Elements. Ponies pretty much ignore the weather.
• Ponies heal 1d8+1 damage per round three times per day.
• Ponies are always treated as having lots of pockets, even in the nude.
• Ponies get minor cartoon effects, such as hair that responds to moods, blushing through fur, and so on.
• Ponies may begin or participate in spontaneously choreographed musical numbers that provide bonuses for group tasks.
• Have a base pool of 1d6+3 Mana, regaining 1d6 with an hours rest up to three times a day and 1-2 points per day regardless.
• Get a +2 Racial Bonus to Perform/Sing

To Summarize The Unicorn Subrace Modifiers:

• Occult Talent provides their usual minor spellcasting while the use of Mana powers it.
  • L0: Dancing Lights (in many trivial variants), Daze (with various special effects), Detect Magic, and (Skill) Mastery (provides a +3 competence bonus on a particular skill for ten minutes per level, +6 if it only covers a limited aspect of a skill).
  • L1) Greater Mage Hand.
• Immunity/Being unable to Concentrate on more than one thing at a time (covering up to three tasks and/or spells of up to level three at any one time).
• Upgrade their basic Mana supply with the Spell Enhancement Natural Magic option.
• Metamagic: Amplify / Only applies to Occult Talent abilities.
• A +2 Racial Bonus to Knowledge/Arcana (2 CP).
• +2 Intelligence/-2 Strength.
• One Bonus Feat.
• Executive, Corrupted for Increased Effect (add the user’s Int Mod to his or her effective level of use)/requires 2 Mana/hour to power. Unicorns are good at coordinating groups, and can provide substantial bonuses.

. 

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. Here’s a Featured Review of it and another Independent Review.

The Practical Enchanter can be found in a Print Edition (Lulu), an Electronic Edition (RPGNow), and a Shareware Edition (RPGNow).  There’s an RPGNow Staff Review too.

Ponies Of The Eclipse – Somnambula, Pillar of Hope

The “Power Of Hope” is just about as undefined as the “Power Of Heart”, and can range from simply inspiring others on through being virtually all-powerful (at least if you go with the “Heart is an AWESOME power!” trope). Ergo, the first thing to do when writing up Somnambula is to take a look at what she’s actually shown doing. She…

• Helped out her neighbors when they were in need. So she’s a nice person. Of course, being a nice person doesn’t require any special powers – and, to be fair, it seems like “being a nice person” is pretty much the default for a pony. Really obnoxious ponies are fairly unusual.
• Guessed a riddle. Of course, it was one that was uniquely suited to her thanks to a bit of narrative causality and anyone can guess a riddle. That doesn’t necessarily call for any special powers, but perhaps a bit of Lore or (more likely) Luck is in order. Maybe a Narrative skill too, although that is a bit farfetched.
• Crossed a narrow bridge while blindfolded. Well… lots of real people have crawled across catwalks and ledges and such when they couldn’t see. She had a voice to guide her, could feel her way, and is inherently on all fours to start with. This required some determination, but no special powers. Still, perhaps some Luck is in order again.
• Got swallowed by a giant snake – which happened to have a livable interior – and directed other ponies towards the mouth to get out, giving them bits of her necklace to light the way. This required determination, unbridled optimism (most animals DIGEST the things that they swallow), and a plentiful supply of light sources. Still no real indication of any major special powers though.
• Kicked the head off a large timberwolf. This calls for a decent knack with Pegasus Pony Air Magic (to use the high-pressure impact-boosting effect) – but it’s not that impressive in My Little Pony terms. Rainbow Dash kicked chunks out of four sizeable trees (starting 56 seconds in) just to set up a campsite. Given that timberwolves have been shown to be fairly easy to knock apart (if difficult to “kill”), this doesn’t seem to be beyond the basic powers of a normal pegasus pony.
• Created an effect which hurls away a bunch of… well, semi-illusory (and apparently pretty light) mummy/zombie things created out of dreams by a cursed amulet. This was centered on her, but didn’t have much effect on her or her friends. So… a Whirlwind Push maneuver? Using Pegasi Air Magic to create a high-pressure blast of air to toss them away? Some sort of Light Burst from her necklace? Some combination of those? Positive Energy Wave? A variation on Pathfinders level three Anti-Undead Shell effect? Calling on the Vishanti for the Light of Truth? Dispel Illusion? Hard to say, but SOMETHING. Still… an air blast and bright light from her necklace certainly seems to cover what we’re shown. I’ll probably give her some alternatives anyway, just in case.
• Threw a potion bottle and hit a small target. Either good aim, a bit of air magic to guide the shot, or Luck (whether a power or the basic “the heroes make the shot when they need to” narrative imperative).
• Made a fairly high-speed loop and a sharp turn in flight. So she’s a reasonably agile flyer. Of course, Pegasus Ponies have “Perfect” maneuverability anyway. This still helps to justify some Luck or a skill booster though.
• Is a cheery optimist who always hopes for the best and she apparently offered advice on politics and rulership that was better than what someone who was raised to rule could come up with. I’m going to call that “Luck” again (for taking 20 on coming up with some good advice), simply because “divine providence warps the universe so that whatever advice you gave works out” really isn’t a reasonable power to buy and because actually being sensible enough to offer good advice normally doesn’t fit in well with plans that involve “letting the giant monster eat me….”. It also means that I’m really reaching here, but so be it!
• Makes a good motivational speaker. Admittedly, that’s a knack, but – once again – it doesn’t really call for any special powers. A professional-level skill (that’s +5 to +8 or so), Luck, or a skill booster would probably do it – but I think I’ll call it evidence for Bardic-type powers, simply because otherwise all I’ve got so far adds up to very little more than “Luck with Bonus Uses”, “a bit above average with her racial air magic”, and “shiny necklace”.

So, presuming that it IS Bardic Powers… Well, she was in a small village. Farming villagers usually don’t have either a lot of time or need for motivational speakers, yet rather a lot of ponies were gathered to hear her speak in what was apparently a regular event. Evidently whatever benefit her powers provide, it is both well worthwhile and temporary (to keep them coming back). Well, that’s easy enough.

Finally, of course, she strikes me as a bubbly, happy, teenage almost-hippy who wants you to get in touch with your “inner self” and let “the light within” shine forth to illuminate the world – thus the bit about the light from her necklace illuminating the whole kingdom (which seems unlikely physically, but makes a good metaphor for being an advisor to the throne). Ergo, I’ll put her at Level Three, just like Flash Magnus.

Pegasi: live fast, get sealed into limbo young.

Oh well. Fortunately, when you’re using four templates – the Superheroic World Template (providing free Mana to work with every round), the Low-Level Adventurer Template, the basic Pony Template, and the Pegasus Template, you don’t need a lot of levels to have a good deal of power.

Somnambula, Pillar of Hope

Level Three (ECL 4) Pegasus Inspirational Traveler

Since most of the template summaries are pretty much the same as last time, I’m boxing them for easy skipping if you’re so inclined.

.To summarize the low-level adventurer template, those affected get:

• A -3 penalty on unskilled skill checks.
• Very slow level advancement, by direct session-based character point awards rather than experience points. Succeeding in goals helps, but killing things and taking their stuff does not.
• The status of valuable trouble magnets – they’re rare and find trouble everywhere they go.
• A +3 bonus on five skills which suit their backgrounds and training. Sadly, this cannot be applied to active magical skills.
• Extra hit points equal to [12 + (2 x Con Mod)].
• Two minor special talents. For the full list see the Template, for Somnambula we’ll be taking Impervious (for a+2 to Saves) and Photographic Memory.

To summarize the Basic Pony Modifiers:

• Quadruped. In general ponies are slow and have trouble moving while using tools or weapons.
• Attribute Modifiers: -2 Dex, +2 Con. An additional +2 Con and +2 Chr are dispellable magical bonuses.
• Damage Reduction 9/- versus both Physical and Energy Attacks, only DR 2/- versus melee attacks by living creatures.
• Endure Elements. Ponies pretty much ignore the weather.
• Ponies heal 1d8+1 damage per round three times per day.
• Ponies are always treated as having lots of pockets, even in the nude.
• Ponies get minor cartoon effects, such as hair that responds to moods, blushing through fur, and so on.
• Ponies may begin or participate in spontaneously choreographed musical numbers that provide bonuses for group tasks.
• Have a base pool of 1d6+3 Mana, regaining 1d6 with an hours rest up to three times a day and 1-2 points per day regardless. For Somnambula I’ve rolled 6 – low-average. Still, she usually only needs it for her Harmonic Convergence power, and then only one point.
• Get a +2 Racial Bonus to Perform/Sing

To summarize the Pegasus Subrace Modifiers:

• 40′ Flight, with perfect maneuverability
• Cloud-Walking
• Adept (Rune Magic/Air, Mastery and Casting, Flight, and Knowledge/Nature (Specialized for Double Effect in Weather Prediction and air-related phenomena).
• +3 Racial Bonus on all Adept Skills (effectively +6 for the specialized Survival)
• Damage from high-speed collisions, crashes, and similar impacts is one-fourth normal to a maximum of 6d6.
• Resist Lightning 10 (stacks with general energy resistance).
• +2 racial bonus to Spot (Perception in Pathfinder).
• Additional +6 Racial Bonus to Spot (Perception)/Specialized, only to make up for range, fog, and other atmospheric penalties (3 CP).

 

Basic Attributes: Str 10, Dex 12 (-2 Pony = 10), Con 14 (+2 Pony +2 Magic = 18), Int 14, Wis 13, and Cha 16 (+2 Magic = 18) (Pathfinder 25-Point Buy).

Available Character Points: 96 (Level Three Base) +6 (Disadvantages: History and Foolhardy – a version of Insane) +12 (L1 and L3 Bonus Feats) = 114 CP.

Basic Abilities (36 CP):

• Hit Dice: 16 (L1-3, d6, 6 CP) +20 (12 + 2 x Con Mod Template) +12 (3 x Con Mod) = 48 HP.
• Skill Points: 6 (Purchased, 6 CP) + 12 (Int) +24 (6 x Cha Mod) = 42 SP.
• BAB +1 (6 CP).
• Saves:
  • Fortitude +2 (6 CP) +4 (Con) +2 (Knack) = +8
  • Reflex +2 (6 CP) +0 (Dex) +2 (Knack) = +4
  • Will +2 (6 CP) +1 (Wis) +2 (Knack) = +5
• Proficiencies: None.
• Initiative: +0 (Dex)
• Move: 40 (four legs, 20 on three or less), Flight 40 (Perfect, +8 on Fly Checks).
• Armor Class: 10 (Base) +4 (Shimmer Mail) +4 (Martial Art) = 18

Other Abilities (78 CP):

• Adept (Perform/Acting, Wing Dancer Martial Art, Diplomacy, and Bluff, 6 CP).
• Luck (6 CP) with +12 Bonus Uses Specialized in Saving Throws (9 CP), +8 Bonus Uses Specialized in Skills and Checks (6 CP), and +4 Bonus Uses Specialized in Attacks (3 CP). This is spectacularly unexciting, but quite useful. When it’s really important… Somnambula pretty much ALWAYS pulls through.
• Mystic Artist (Perform / Acting), Specialized for Double Effect (double potency of effects) and Corrupted for 2/3’rds cost (4 CP); The initial activation requires at least three minutes of exposure to the user’s performance, only allows the use of Inspiration and Synergy Mystic Artist Abilities (never Manipulation), can only produce beneficial effects, and requires a compatible alignment and general philosophy to take effect on listeners.
  • Basic Modifier / Echoes, Specialized and Corrupted: Does not work with advanced mystic artist abilities, only allows the use of Inspiration and Synergy Mystic Artist Abilities (never Manipulation), can only produce beneficial effects, and requires a compatible alignment and general philosophy to take effect on listeners (2 CP).
    • Somnambula’s entire life, like Pinkie Pie’s, is basically performance art – in her case, outrageous optimism, bubbly good cheer, and a deep surety that everything will turn out all right in the end.
• Harmonic Convergence: Mana Powered Innate Spell / High Prayer (The Practical Enchanter, basically a double-strength Prayer) L5, reduced to L3 by costing 5 Mana instead of 2 to cast (6 CP),
• Indefatigable Optimism: Augmented Bonus / Adds (Con Mod) to Charisma-based skills (6 CP).
• Universal Jack Of All Trades (12 CP): +1 to all Charisma-Based Skills, effectively has one skill rank in all unrestricted skills – avoiding the -3 penalty for being unskilled. Somnambula is annoying that way; she can throw together a good legal defense, sail a ship, analyze molecular structures, cut gems, forge swords, and do pretty much anything else with great competency based on nothing more than luck and a positive attitude.
• Advanced Improved Augmented Bonus (Adds Cha Mod to Int Mod for skill purposes), Specialized and Corrupted/only applies up to level five, only for calculating skill points, points may only be spent on Charisma-based skills (6 CP).
• Occult Skill / Narrative, with +3 SP on paying off the “irrelevant” surcharge (6 CP).
• Occult Skill / Stealing The Scene, with +3 SP on paying off the “irrelevant” surcharge (6 CP).

Skills (42 Skill Points Total):

• Bluff +6 (3*SP) +4 (Cha) +4 (Con) +3 (Tem) +1 (JOT)= +18
• Diplomacy +6 (3*SP) +4 (Cha) +4 (Con) +3 (Tem) +1 (JOT) = +18
• Flight +6 (3* SP) +3 (Race) +1 (Dex) +8 (Perfect Man) +3 (Tem) = +22
• Knowledge/Nature (Specialized for Double Effect in Weather Prediction and air-related phenomena) +6 (3* SP) +3 (Race) +1 (Int) = +10, effectively +20.
• Linguistics +2 (2 SP) +1 (Int) = +3. Somnambula speaks three extra languages.
• Narrative +6 (6 SP) +4 (Cha) +4 (Con) +1 (JOT) = +15
• Perform/Acting +6 (3* SP) +4 (Cha) +3 (Tem) +4 (Con) +1 (JOT) = +22
  • Mystic Artist Abilities (9): Inspiration: Competence, Greatness, Excellence, Mass Greatness, and Mass Excellence. Synergy: Group Focus, Amplify, Harmonize, and Serenity.
• Perform/Dance +1 (1 SP) +4 (Cha) +4 (Con) +1 (JOT) +2 (Syn) = +12
• Perform/Singing +1 (1 SP) +4 (Cha) +4 (Con) +2 (Race) +1 (JOT) = +12
• Rune Magic/Air Casting +6 (3* SP) +3 (Race) +4 (Cha) +4 (Con) +1 (JOT) = +18
• Rune Magic/Air Mastery +6 (3* SP) +3 (Race) +4 (Cha) +4 (Con) +1 (JOT) = +18
• Spot +1 (JOT) +1 (Wis) +2 (Race) = +4, extra +6 only to counter penalties for range and atmospheric conditions.
• Stealing The Scene +6 (6 SP) +4 (Con) = +10
• Wing Dancer +6 (3* SP) +4 (Cha) +4 (Con) +3 (Tem) +1 (JOT) = +18
  • Known Techniques (9): Defenses 4, Mind Like Moon, Synergy (Dance), Instant Stand, Inner Strength, and Healing Hand. This gives her just a bit of healing ability and considerable skill at dodging attacks.

+3 Skill Specialities: Air Mastery / creating pressure waves (1 SP), Offering Good Advice (1 SP),

Somnambula’s Glowpaz Necklace:

“Glowpaz” is a greenish crystal that is apparently plot-luminescent. It glows brightly when given as an award, somewhat when the bearer needs light, and apparently not much at all when the bearer is trying to be sneaky – but I’m going to presume that it’s based on the will of whoever’s holding the stuff rather than on plot points and that the Prince who gave it to her wanted it to glow brightly. In Eclipse terms, it’s a relic:

• +2 in Charisma Based Rune Magic/Light Magic Mastery and Casting, Specialized for Reduced Cost / only to generate basic light effects (no worthwhile illusions, hypnosis, etc – although a Color Spray would work), does not stack with similar items or actually having the skill, and Corrupted for Increased Effect (the user need not spend Mana to produce illuminating effects (2 CP).

As a “natural” relic, this has an effective cost of 1/3’rd point (generally rounding down to 0) and will allow anyone with a +0 or better Charisma Modifier to generate cantrip level light effects at caster level one. Those with a +2 or more can get first level effects at higher caster levels. Somnambula, with an effective +9 for charisma-based skills due to her Indefatigable Optimism and Jack Of All Trades abilities, can generate second level light effects at caster level five.

• Larger chunks of Glowpaz or collections of smaller pieces can fairly readily be turned into slightly more powerful (1 CP) relics – providing a +8 base in Light Magic Mastery and Casting as above, but otherwise essentially the same. If the necklace is this powerful, Somnambula will have an effective skill of +17 – enough to generate fourth level light effects at an effective caster level of eight. That’s sufficient for effects like Brightest Light, Celestial Brilliance, and Wrathful Mantle (at least if the game master feels that it fits under “basic light effects”. It is a fairly good candidate for her anti-dream/undead/whatever burst however).

Somnambula is, of course, the party bard. She isn’t bad on her own, but she really shines when she’s boosting the rest of the party; After all, she can use Harmonize to combine double-strength Mass Excellence (Two +8 Bonuses – Saves? AC? Attributes? Attacks? Damage? All good!) and Mass Greatness (two positive levels and 2d10 temporary hit points) – triggering it with a quip or phrase. Then she can stack a double-strength Prayer effect on top of that. That’s pretty impressive even by superheroic standards – enough to make a bunch of random villagers into a reasonably effective force.

Ponies Of The Eclipse – Flash Magnus, the Pillar of Bravery

A thousand years ago Flash was a cadet in the Royal Legion of Cloudsdale – which really tells us very little. Still, even today, most “cadets” are teenage trainees, Cloudsdale is just one city (and so probably had a relatively small military, accounting for some of that organizations apparent informality), and Equestria’s Rank-And-File seems to be expected to take charge whenever danger pops up – which is sort of a “Junior Officer” role.

So, when a problem pops up in Equestria, the nearest individual(s) with combat training take charge of the civilians. They draft those with useful abilities to help deal with whatever it is and get the ones without useful talents out of the way. This would never work in real life – but ponies are clearly labeled, hard to seriously injure, recover quickly, and almost never get killed, so drafting suitable bystander to help deal with a monster or other emergency is actually fairly reasonable.

This also explains why Twilight and company tend to wind up dealing with monsters attacking Ponyville; Twilight has authority over the local guards by virtue of being a princess and probably has some training. Celestia would have to be pretty silly to have totally neglected a students physical education and basic combat training when she knew that said student might have to fight Nightmare Moon – and she’d probably pick up some more from simply being around Shining Armor. Ergo, if there’s a monster attack, and Twilight is available… she grabs the people nearby with useful talents (such as her generally-exceptional friends) and they deal with it. Similarly, Applejack – who is the best qualified to deal with it – deals with a stampede and the Mayor presumably does the paperwork.

Finally, this makes trying to take a detachment of six pegasi – at least three of them partially-trained youngsters – through the Dragon Territories, and then leaving one of the kids in charge of the rescue plan when the dragons do attack, make some trace of sense. Dragons or not, the pegasi weren’t expecting any trouble – and when there was trouble, the one who stayed to face it and came up with a plan was automatically assumed to be in charge – cadet or not.

It also explains why there was no trouble over him “violating orders” to help out a griffon village later on. He was there, he took charge, and it worked out – making him right. No real-world military could function that way, but given ponies, the magic of friendship and harmony, and what’s basically a town militia, it’s at least comprehensible.

As for his actual abilities… He doesn’t really seem to be on the top end of the normal-pegasus scale for speed, or militarized weather manipulation, or even combat skill – although he’s presumably at least decent at all of them. He doesn’t actually seem to be terribly bright either, but he does mean well – and in Equestria that goes quite a long way all by itself. He IS fast, evasive, reasonably strong, quite acrobatic, and lightning-resistant, but the only thing he’s got that pretty much every other military-trained pegasus doesn’t have is a magic shield – and he has to get that into position; it doesn’t automatically protect him.

And there’s a reason for that.

If you’re nigh invulnerable, or have powers far beyond those around you, or your defenses aren’t always at risk of failing… you don’t NEED bravery. THAT is why Flash Magnus is pretty much a normal pegasus pony with a neat shield – because if he doesn’t get the shield in position in time (a risk with every attack made against him) he’s going to get hurt. Probably not too badly given that he IS a pony and they’re pretty tough anyway, but just a little bad luck – such as missing several times in a row – could easily bring him down. That is what makes being at the forefront, being the bait, and being the first into danger, an act of courage rather than basic tactics.

So what we have here is Captain America with wings. All-around competent, and with reasonable tactical skills (at least for a setting where you can’t do anything that would confuse a small girl too much), a valued member of the Pillars because of his courage, determination, loyalty, and being the only one who has any real idea what he or she is doing in a fight.

Secondarily, he hasn’t wandered the world extensively like Mistmane or Mage Meadowbrook or (especially!) Starswirl The Bearded even if he did start off with a solo encounter with some dragons and then participated in a few group encounters with Gryphon diplomacy, the Pillars against the Sirens, and so on. Ergo, level three, or ECL 4 with the +1 ECL Pegasus Pony package.

Flash Magnus, Pillar Of Bravery

Level Three (ECL 4) Pegasus Military Officer

.To summarize the low-level adventurer template, those affected get:

• A -3 penalty on unskilled skill checks.
• Very slow level advancement, by direct session-based character point awards rather than experience points. Succeeding in goals helps, but killing things and taking their stuff does not.
• The status of valuable trouble magnets – they’re rare and find trouble everywhere they go.
• A +3 bonus on five skills which suit their backgrounds and training. Sadly, this cannot be applied to active magical skills.
• Extra hit points equal to [12 + (2 x Con Mod)].
• Two minor special talents. For the full list see the Template, for Flash Magnus we’ll be taking +2 Dexterity and Internal Compass (so that he never gets lost).

To summarize the Basic Pony Modifiers:

• Quadruped. In general ponies are slow and have trouble moving while using tools or weapons.
• Attribute Modifiers: -2 Dex, +2 Con. An additional +2 Con and +2 Chr are dispellable magical bonuses.
• Damage Reduction 9/- versus both Physical and Energy Attacks, only DR 2/- versus melee attacks by living creatures.
• Endure Elements. Ponies pretty much ignore the weather.
• Ponies heal 1d8+1 damage per round three times per day.
• Ponies are always treated as having lots of pockets, even in the nude.
• Ponies get minor cartoon effects, such as hair that responds to moods, blushing through fur, and so on.
• Ponies may begin or participate in spontaneously choreographed musical numbers that provide bonuses for group tasks.
• Have a base pool of 1d6+3 Mana, regaining 1d6 with an hours rest up to three times a day and 1-2 points per day regardless. For Flash I’ve rolled 8 – at the high end of the usual pool.
• Get a +2 Racial Bonus to Perform/Sing

To summarize the Pegasus Subrace Modifiers:

• 40′ Flight, with perfect maneuverability
• Cloud-Walking
• Adept (Rune Magic/Air, Mastery and Casting, Flight, and Knowledge/Nature (Specialized for Double Effect in Weather Prediction and air-related phenomena).
• +3 Racial Bonus on all Adept Skills (effectively +6 for the specialized Survival)
• Damage from high-speed collisions, crashes, and similar impacts is one-fourth normal to a maximum of 6d6.
• Resist Lightning 10 (stacks with general energy resistance).
• +2 racial bonus to Spot (Perception in Pathfinder).
• Additional +6 Racial Bonus to Spot (Perception)/Specialized, only to make up for range, fog, and other atmospheric penalties (3 CP).

Yes, that’s a whole bunch of racial stuff. That’s because ponies come with a whole load of powers and abilities straight out of the box, even if taking them out of the box does make them a lot less collectible.

Base Attributes: Str 13, Dex 16 (-2 Pony +2 Knack = 16), Con 14 (+2 Pony +2 Magic = 18), Int 12, Wis 13, Cha 12 (+2 Magic = 14) (Pathfinder 25-Point Buy).

Available Character Points: 96 (Level Three Base) +6 (Disadvantages: History and Foolhardy – a version of Insane) +6 (Duties to the Cloudsdale Military) +12 (L1 and L3 Bonus Feats) = 120 CP.

Basic Abilities (66 CP):

• Hit Dice: 23 (L1-3, d8, 12 CP) +20 (12 + 2 x Con Mod Template) +12 (3 x Com Mod) = 55 HP. Usually starts with three additional temporary hit points from Personal Greater Heroism.
• Skill Points: 12 (Purchased, 12 CP) + 6 (Int) + 18 (Augmented Bonus) = 36 SP.
• BAB +2 (12 CP).
• Saves:
  • Fortitude +0 (0 CP) +4 (Con) +4 (Resistance) +4 (Morale) = +12
  • Reflex +4 (12 CP) +3 (Dex) +4 (Resistance) +4 (Morale) = +15
  • Will +2 (6 CP) +1 (Wis) +4 (Resistance) +4 (Morale) = +11
• Proficiencies: All Simple and Pegasi Weapons plus Shields (12 CP).
• Initiative: +3 (Dex)
• Move: 40 (four legs, 20 on three or less), Flight 40 (Perfect, +8 on Fly Checks).
• Armor Class: 10 (Base) + 3 (Dex) +4 (Shimmer Mail) +3 (Martial Art) (Usually) +4 (Shield Bonus from air-based Force Shield effect) = 24.

Usual Weapons:

• Strike: +9 (+2 BAB +1 Str +2 Martial Art +4 Morale), 1d4+1 (Str) +4 (Morale) (may add +3d6 Concussive Strike, for 1 Mana), Crit 20/x2 plus Fort DC 16 Blinding Strike. May inflict Lethal or Nonlethal Damage and make a Whirlwind Attack. Counts as being armed or unarmed as desired.
• Javelin: +11 (+2 BAB +3 Dex +2 Martial Art +4 Morale), 1d8 +1 (Str) +4 (Morale), Crit 20/x2, Range 30. May spend 1 Mana on a wind assist to add +1d8+1 damage, raise the range to 120, and increase the critical range to 19-20/x2. With his Tulthara Charm (see Equipment, below) he may opt to inflict lethal or nonlethal damage and will never run out of Javelins.

Other Abilities:

• Advanced Improved Augmented Bonus (Adds Dex Mod to Int Mod for skill purposes), Specialized and Corrupted/only applies up to level five, only for calculating skill points (6 CP).
• Adept: Acrobatics, one Wind Gallop Martial Art, Knowledge /Military Tactics, History, and Gear and Perception (6 CP).
• Skills (All save Rune Magic skills +4 Morale):

Purchased Skills:

• Acrobatics +6 (3* SP) +3 (Dex) +3 (Tem) = +16
• Flight 6 (3* SP) +3 (Race) +3 (Dex) +3 (Tem) +8 (Perfect Man) = +27
• Javelin Storm Style Martial Art +6 (6 SP) +3 (Dex) = +13
  • Abilities (7): Attack 2, Power 1, Crippling, Expertise (may trade off attack bonus for AC), Inner Strength, and Vanishing.
• Knowledge/Nature (Specialized in Weather for double effect) +12 (6) (3* SP) +6 (3) Race = +22
• Knowledge/Military Tactics, History, and Gear +6 (3* SP) +1 (Int) +3 (Tem) = +14
• Perception +6 (3* SP) +1 (Wis) +3 (Tem) = +14 (Additional +6 versus atmospheric penalties).
• Perform/Sing +2 (2 SP) +3 (Cha) +2 (Race) = +7
• Rune Magic/Air Casting +6 (3* SP) +3 (Race) +2 (Cha) = +11. Effective Caster Level 5.
• Rune Magic/Air Mastery +6 (3* SP) +3 (Race) +2 (Cha) = +11. May use second level effects.
• Stealth +4 (4 SP) +3 (Dex) = +11
• Wind Gallop Martial Art +6 (3* SP) +3 (Tem) +3 (Dex) = +16
  • Abilities (8): Defenses 3, Attack 2, Strike, Blinding Strike, and Whirlwind Attack.

• Fortune (Evasion Variant, 6 CP). If Flash makes a successful Reflex save he takes no damage. This is actually pretty normal for combat-trained Pegasus Ponies: “no be there” seems to be one of their major defensive strategies.
• Reflex Training: Combat Reflexes Variant (+3 Attacks of Opportunity per round) (6 CP).

Pony names tend to be pretty descriptive and fairly often tell us something about their personal talents – and here we have Flash (“a brief burst of energy”) and Magnus (“the great”) for a name. Moreover, he seems to be a pegasus-style Paladin; a guardian who will always place himself between friends, innocents, and the helpless, and any danger. So…

Flash

• Opportunist: Can use a personal-enhancement air magic effect of up to level two as a part of another physical action (6 CP). He usually uses this to pull off incredible acrobatics, make instant high-speed aerial turns, boost his armor class, boost his speed, expand his physical attacks to affect a small area (knocking down a line of creatures by flying through them or spinning to affect a small radius). boosting the impact of one of his attacks, or similar tricks.
• Reflex Training, Three Action Per Day Variant, Specialized for Increased Effect (provides a full round action, but can only be used when heroically going to the rescue of someone else, 6 CP).

Magnus:

• Mana-Powered Inherent Spells:
  • Greater Warding Rune (The Practical Enchanter, L3, reduced to L2 by costing 3 Mana, adds +4 + (CL/6) Resistance Bonus to Saves for one minute per level, 6 CP).
  • Personal Greater Heroism (The Practical Enchanter, L4, reduced to L2 by costing 4 Mana, +4 morale bonus on attack rolls, saves, checks, and weapon damage, immunity to fear effects, and temporary hit points equal to the caster level, Max 20. Lasts ten minutes per level, 6 CP)
  • Greater Blink (d20 base, L5, reduced to L2 by costing 5 Mana. Note that this is more than he has available from the Superheroic Template with his Constitution Modifier, so this is a limited-use effect that taps into his personal mana reserve – albeit by only one point. His special effects run more towards moving in and out of cover, moving so fast that opponents cant keep track of him, and vanishing into the shadows than becoming invisible, but the mechanics are the same (6 CP).

Netitus

Flash’s shield was capable of (mostly) protecting him from Dragonfire and the Siren’s magical (sonic?) blasts and survived being used as a dragon plaything. Ergo, the shield itself is close to indestructible and will protect the user from a good deal of energy damage and at least some simple physical damage if properly deployed. It’s obviously a Relic, and the build looks like this:

• Returning, Specialized for Reduced Cost / does not apply to the user, simply renders the shield itself nigh-indestructible (3 CP). There are, of course, ways to destroy it – but none that are likely to come up in combat.
• Immunity to Energy Damage (Very Common, Major, Minor), Specialized and Corrupted for Increased Effect (36 points)/ user must be able to raise the shield against an incoming attack, must expend an Attack of Opportunity, and must successfully make a DC 20 Reflex Save to make use of this immunity (10 CP).
• Immunity to Physical Damage (Very Common, Major, Trivial), Specialized for Increased Effect and Corrupted for Reduced Cost (10 points of protection, 3 CP).
• Blessing, Specialized for Increased Effect (May protect a small area) and Corrupted for Reduced Costs / only to allow the user to extend the two immunities above to one or more persons behind him or her if it is successfully used against an area effect attack (4 CP).

With a net cost of 20 CP, this is a 3 CP Relic – in a setting where characters may have up to 4 CP worth. Given that the build for Mage Meadowbrook included the ability to equip her companions with a single 1 CP relic each, this works out perfectly. It’s also pretty much a build for Captain America’s shield, but the resemblance is hard to deny anyway.

Other Equipment:

• Charms: Cleansing Wand, Contraceptive Charm, Ditty Bag, Firespice Shakers, Fireworks Pouch, Sovereign Ointment, and a Tulthara (creates Javelins “made of lightning” which may inflict lethal or nonlethal damage at the user’s option).
• Talismans: Helm Of War, Mother’s Tears Amulet, and Shimmer Mail.
• Outside of the usual basic supplies (some rope, rations, a water bottle, personal items, and the rest of a basic travel kit) Flash – like most ponies – really doesn’t use a lot of equipment.

Flash Magnus is fundamentally very different from his companions. They were all solo heroes to start with – while Magnus was a Soldier. He’s competent in a wide variety of tactical roles, he can use weapons other than his favorites, and if confronting major monsters his reaction is not to confront them directly with his massive magical power, it’s to pull them into a trap set up by his comrades. In a team full of rugged individualists used to adventuring on their own, Flash Magnus is the one who keeps them organized and on-mission rather than each doing their own thing.

For further development… his biggest needs are more attacks (Personal Haste if the game master is willing to put up with it, Bonus Attack otherwise), better saves to make the use of his Shield more reliable, and pumping up his Constitution and Dexterity a bit. Otherwise he’s really quite competent; Pegasus Air Magic has a wide variety of combat applications, his attacks are already pretty good, he has ranged options, he has melee options, he’s highly mobile, and Netitus will – with a little luck – let him tank a good bit of incoming damage.

Prince Blueblood’s Aggravating Pony Overlord List Part VI – The Mendaciously Meandering Miasmic Morus Maze of Meticulously Mangled Mutinous Management Maxims

Previously on the Aggravating Pony Overlord Channel…

• Prince Blueblood’s Aggravating Pony Overlord List Part I – The Throne Room.
• Prince Blueblood’s Aggravating Pony Overlord List Part II – The Grand Ballroom of Aberrant Aphorisms.
• Prince Blueblood’s Aggravating Pony Overlord List Part III – The Wine Cellar Of Dubious Drunken Declarations. 
• Prince Blueblood’s Aggravating Pony Overlord List Part IV – The Glorious Gardens of Gratuitously Garbled Gnomics.
• Prince Blueblood’s Aggravating Pony Overlord List Part V – The Palatial Personal Parlor Of Perilously Prepared Pretentious Proverbs.

1. If someone says “This isn’t a cartoon!” I will glance at myself and say “Really?” in a questioning tone. If they have been amusing enough so far I will add a horrified “OH NOOOOOOO!!!!” and teleport away, leaving only a slowly dissolving after-image of myself with an expression of horror on it’s face!
2. If any of my kids fall in love, I will make sure that their crush is a reasonably decent sort and is not just using them! If that checks out, the pair (or group, it’s not like I don’t keep a harem!) will be supplied with plentiful travel funds, reservations wherever, contraceptives (if desired) and toys of choice (if any) and told to go for it! Sex is fun, grandchildren are great, and it’s not like I’M a model of decorum!
3. If I am confronting an Eldritch Abomination I shall remember that I qualify as a Cute Eldritch Abomination myself, and there shall be tea and cookies! And possibly dancing! I haven’t done the Lord Of The Shoggoths Line Dance Show since the last Eldritch Elder Invasion!
4. If dealing with Vampires, Werewolves, Mummies, or some similar potentially sensible horror-movie creature I will talk first! If forced, I will point out that – while they are good at terrorizing normal humans – I am at LEAST a cartoon superhero wizard and can put them in the core of the sun, toss them into a black hole, or banish them to some eldritch elder dimension if I have to!
5. I shall train my own ninja, pirates, and ninja-pirates, starting with adorably fluffy kittens and puppies! That way when my ninja puppy trips an opponent out a window, cuddles will be entirely appropriate!
6. I will disguise myself (perhaps with a mustache, hat, or glasses!) and join any team of heroes gathered to oppose me, proclaiming myself to be my heroic dimensional alternate, a counterbalancing mystic force, arcane rival, or some such! That will let me know what’s going on, help keep the heroes gainfully employed, and – if and when I successfully help overthrow myself – I will be starting off in the upper tier of the successor government and will doubtless be the only one with administrative skills, and so I shall continue my rule with a fresh start, new public support, friendly heroes, and without interruption!
7. I will encourage my kids to be rebellious scamps who sneak out to go adventuring – but only after I have arranged for some reasonable form of immortality for them and a nigh-unbreakable magical link so that I can pull them out of messes! But I will mostly get the heroes to do it! They will never be able to resist rescuing a bunch of youngsters running away from an Evil Overlord if no one tells them that they’re trying to escape school and bedtime! Of course, if any of the kids turn out to be incompetent dimwits, I shall shunt them to suitable pointless positions! I am an Aggravating Overlord, I can be as nepotistic as I wish, and they’re still my kids!
8. I shall not be a corrupt CEO or any other style of corrupt leader! I am a Wealthy, Immortal, Decadent, Pleasure-Seeking, Superheroic Unicorn Wizard! What will being corrupt get me that I can’t have already anyway? Smoother ice cream?
9. Trampling my foes beneath my hooves will ruin my hooficure! Blood splatters look terrible on my coat! Screams of agony spoil the music! There will be none of that barbaric nonsense in my realm! If something along those lines is absolutely required for some reason there is always Vogon Poetry!
10. If I am told that I am an alien, descendant of an eldritch power, heir to something, the prophesied one, part of some deal with the underworld, or anything similar, I will start laughing! I escaped from a cartoon into reality and created both myself and fifty generations of my family history from pure fanfiction and egotism, and I didn’t include any of THAT nonsense! (Except when I did! I am a Cartoon! Consistency is not one of my major attributes!)
11. I will hit on female opponents with combat propositions! They’re already attacking me, so what have I got to lose? And it’s not like anyone can seriously attack someone who is currently reeling from a smack with a hammerspace mallet! It would be unsporting and would break the running gag!
12. I will knock loudly – and repeatedly – and announce my presence before entering a sauna, bath, hot pool, or similar establishment . This will save me from getting unavoidably whacked with hammers and things until I’ve had time to actually make at least one indecent proposition!
13. I will not go for the domineering, master of sex slaves routine, or any similar perverse cliche, unless some of the mares in the harem request them for a role-playing night! It’s not like I have any shortage of willing partners who want to try out quirks!
14. Listen very carefully, I shall say ‘zis only once! Watching the heroes try to figure out just what you might be suggesting with an innuendo involving wet celery, egg whisks, and flying helmets is amusing enough that I shall use the mysterious perverse quirk routine! After all, it worked for Allo Allo!
15. My allies do not all have to be ponies! Griffins and other monsters work fine too! There is much to be said for diversity and a combined lack-of-arms strategy!
16. If I am having a flashback, I shall drag everyone else into it with me! I am immune to paradox, but I bet that most of the heroes are not!
17. If the heroes attempt to send a comic relief character who always bumbles their way to victory against me, I shall allow the kids to join the ensuing pie fight and clown-off, with the victor being whoever can raise the most money for charity! Given that my funds are nigh limitless and that the power of heart will be on my side, my “victory” is inevitable – and the comic relief can return to the heroes and announce that he or she was defeated, but the battle nevertheless raised a great deal of money for orphaned children!
18. Fanboys and Fangirls will be offered harem jobs if they’re qualified and cute enough! If they are not they will be sent to places so distant that no one there has ever heard of me to spread the word (whatever they think THAT to be). Hero-worshiping playthings can be a lot of fun and it’s not like they’re ever going to be anything but a hindrance in any other role!
19. If I am (somehow!) actually being overthrown and cannot escape, I will act like a petulant five year old and embarrass the heroes as much as possible! If I can manage to convince them that I have been a disposable figurehead all along, so much the better. To this end, there will be some sinister figure lurking nearby, to attack (machine gun, grenades, whatever) and injure (but certainly not kill) both some heroes AND myself, shout something unintelligible about “DOOM!”, and then make a cackling escape of its own. Given that this will be a well-shielded summoning protected from divination, and will vanish as soon as it’s out of sight, they will never catch it!
20. If I ever feel the need to wear a mask, it will be a classic domino affair, suitable for parties or Zorro! It will be conceal my identity just as well as some elaborate demonic mask of power (Unicorn, remember?), is far less likely to attract swords of bullets, and is far, FAR, more stylish! And, as a bonus, you can nuzzle other ponies just fine while wearing it!
21. The only acceptable reason for approaching the Moral Event Horizon is to cast “Reverse Gravity” on the ethical singularity, and ascend past wherever the heroes stand on the good-guy scale on the resulting cosmic eruption of virtue, thus leaving them with no reason to object to my sudden transcendence!
22. If someone actually manages to badly hurt me, I shall do a dramatic death scene and dissolve into little sparkling lights. I regenerate quickly – even if killed – ANYWAY and I do need to use SOME special effect for my teleportation and dimension hopping! Who says that it CAN’T it be “leaving everyone with the impression of a dramatic death scene”?
23. I am not limited by logistics, rationality, or sanity, and I shall not assume that the heroes are either! Numbers mean nothing! Of course, if I am up against a reasonable hero, there is something to be said for targeting his ammunition dumps, food stores, fuel reserves, and other supplies. Reasonable heroes seem to think that they need that kind of stuff!
24. Family time takes priority over nefarious plotting! When I am busy attending a wedding, birthday, anniversary, or any other events important to wives, concubines, or children, the heroes can just come back tomorrow! After all, if they try anything at that point, they will be on the wrong side of so many tropes that I probably will not have to lift a hoof! Which is good, because one is occupied with a mare and the other with my drink!
25. If a popular and known-to-be-fictional hero appears to stop me, I shall play along with their cliches rather than getting into an existential debate! After all, I’M fictional and I managed to sneak into reality, so there’s no reason why they shouldn’t have managed it too!
26. Non one ever defeats an Overlord until he or she has used every weapon in his or her arsenal! So I will have a wide variety of powers (and every possible flavor of pie) and will keep adding more – including some that I can swap out! That way any heroes will have to work their way through an infinite list before they can defeat me!
27. I will not attempt to “steal” Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving, Hannukkah, Memorial Day, Boxing Day, Independence Day, or any other popular holiday! Instead I shall invite their avatars over for tea and become well-known for my generous support of such festivities! For no attack launched on someone celebrating a holiday is ever successful and that will both give me a day off and provide a reasonable chance of watching the heroes battle Santa or the Easter Bunny! The home movies will keep me laughing for YEARS!
28. Super-Soldiers, Proud-Warrior-Race-Guys, and Villainous Henchmen only become effective AFTER they turn on their Creators, Manipulators, or Masters! Therefore I shall only recruit them on the rebound from whoever was trying to use them! Then they can teach the kids!
29. I shall study the Greats! Overlords like Aku, Bavmorda, Ahab, Hook, Jareth, Megamind, Zod, Kurgan, Kahn, and Ming! They REALLY knew how to ham it up and chew the scenery – and I am quite possibly MADE OF HAM and I EAT scenery!
30. If a serious villain turns up to spread evil and misery, or kidnaps one of my kids, or otherwise interrupts my aggravating overlordship, I shall join forces with the heroes right away! After all, I am protected from heroism by the power of the farce – and can give the heroes a nice fruit basket! But when it comes to defeating serious villains, that’s what heroes do!
31. I will keep the air conditioner running, levels of alcohol in my system that would be lethal for any normal creature, and enjoy my ability to always stay nice and clean and my cartoon immunity to disease! Whatever it is that causes Villain Decay, I’m not catching it!
32. If the heroes are the offspring of my lieutenants, I shall ensure that they get safe visitation days and college funds and give their younger siblings part-time jobs as pages in my household so that they can throw water balloons at their older siblings whenever they get too serious. Nothing spoils a heroic narrative like a six-year-old sibling with a water balloon!
33. If someone leaves a giant statue of me or any other creature outside my gates I will call up some builders and landscapers and turn it into the centerpiece of a carnival honoring myself! If someone is hiding inside, I will ensure that the exit is stuck until the evening rush and that all nearby restrooms are coin operated!
34. If a God or Goddess is intervening to assist my opponents I will adjourn to the realms of the gods to find out what their problem is! I don’t stick my nose into THEIR portfolios, and even if I’m not a member of THEIR pantheon, I expect a similar level of respect when I’m being aggravating! Which is in itself aggravating! RECURSION FOR THE WIN!
35. All the enhancement potions, super-soldier serums, and similar boosting effects that I give to my minions will be short-term only. Anyone who wants something permanent will have to buy it in the gift shop or volunteer to get experimented on! After all, such things ALWAYS exact a price proportionate to the power that they provide, and better it be “powered up for a few hours before taking a day off to sleep” than “go permanently insane with permanent super powers” unless that’s really what they want!
36. Traveling performers and such can book the music hall down the block! If they want to perform for ME they can get accredited, build up a reputation and a repertoire, submit an application and a proposal, and go through a security check just like everyone else! Or they can get a recommendation from Leisure Suit Larry! Whichever!.
37. If some mystic balance must be maintained, I will have a mechanic check it over and then set it spinning! Gyroscopes are a lot more stable! And it can’t be me upsetting it anyway! There are PLENTY of things out there that AREN’T aggravating to balance out me!
38. If I am having a tantrum, my minions will be fully authorized to hit ME with a pie, and will have orders to do so! Tantrums aren’t really much fun anyway and pie fights make an excellent countermeasure!
39. I will abuse time travel to train with the great masters! Not only are the arts a nice hobby but it will let me buy a lot of otherwise unknown original works at discount prices to decorate my residence with! Go ahead, blow the place up, destroy priceless pieces of history! At least until I abuse time travel some more to get them back!
40. If confronted with a sealed cosmic power in a can, an omnipotent artifact of doom, or any similar macguffin I will add a minor fascination charm and a cigarette-lighter charm to it and use it to get free drinks and break the ice with women! The accumulated sleaze will soon drain all narrative importance from it and give me plenty of time to find out if the obvious booby trap is actually somehow useful!
41. My citizens shall be well-educated, so that any would-be rebels will be able to realize that the odds are against them and that they have hundreds of other options! That way they can bog down endlessly in debates, discussions, and petitions!
42. If I am engaged in a war, SOMEONE is losing their job! All conflicts come down to a tiny band of heroic adventurers against me anyway, so wars are pointless, messy, and wasteful! Why not just skip to the main event and let the taxpayers (and those cute new girls in my harem) get on with their jobs!
43. If some terrible entity demands a sacrificial victim that has some special quality, I shall find a more reasonable entity that is willing to take a retainer and work for cash or just for the LOL’s! It’s a big multiverse and there is no need to work with obnoxious, demanding, occult entities when there are plenty of more reasonable ones out there!
44. There is nothing like existential confusion to aggravate people! I shall leave both my subjects and the heroes opposing me hopelessly confused at every opportunity; and preferably unsure as to whether I am good or evil or just crazy! Consistency is for Overlords who aren’t cartoons!
45. I will ensure that all heroes have evil (and grandstanding, if not especially effective) twins and vice versa! It will help keep things interesting if no one knows who is who!
46. I will have an Evil Grand Vizier, of the sort who will advise everyone that he or she is a treacherous master of exotic poisons, twirl his villainous mustache or peer through her villainous spectacles at them, and then offer everyone tea and cookies that he or she had especially made!
47. When some terrible quest needs to be accomplished, I shall send off the youngest kid who’s successfully completed an immortality ritual and a linking effect! Those things are most fun when you’re young and it’s always the youngest one who goes who succeeds anyway! I shall also give them a cat! Those always help!
48. I will invite a selection of witches, fairy godmothers, mysterious gypsies, and similar occult types to my kids parties! Some suitably modified curses and blessings make a fine basis for pretty much any fantastic fantasy career!
49. If any gods or goddesses want me to judge something, or decide who is best at something, or otherwise settle something, I shall remain utterly flippant! If they wanted a serious opinion on something they wouldn’t have come to ME!
50. There shall be monster preserves with a limited number of no-kill monster fighting permits available for heroes to practice their skills! You never know when you’re going to need either a hero or a monster or a pair of them who have had a recent bonding experience!

And hopefully the various time-sinks that have kept me from writing for the past month have been dealt with…

Ponies Of The Eclipse – Mistmane, Pillar of Beauty

Mistmane – or at least her role as the “Pillar of Beauty” – is a bit awkward. After all, beauty isn’t really a quality that you have. It lies in other people’s perceptions.

Checking some definitions… “A set of qualities in a person or thing that pleases the senses or exalts the mind or spirit”. “An especially graceful, ornamental, or excellent quality”. “An exceptionally good example of something, regardless of whether or not it is a “good” thing.”.

There is physical, mental, and spiritual beauty, the dagger-like beauty of a deadly stratagem, the beautiful elegance of a brilliant mathematical proof, the bloody beauty of a tiger pulling down its prey, and even a warped beauty in a scene of utter carnage. There is beauty in friendship, love, and sacrifice – and in the maniacal purity of obsessive hatred.

There have been people who have thought that torturing children was pleasing to the senses, exalting to the mind and spirit, and an excellent example of the finer things in life – a thing of marvelous beauty. Thankfully, most people do not agree – but that alone shows that there is no consensus on what is “beautiful”.

I personally would say that there is more beauty in a scarred, crippled, and elderly, but still enduring, survivor of war, loss, and suffering, than there is in any vain supermodel – but that is merely MY perception.

Mere appearance often has little to do with beauty. Beauty lies in the mind that perceives it, not in the outside world.

And if Mistmane (who struck me as rather physically ugly to start with and seemed to gain some character from her magical “aging”), had somehow given up what most of us would describe as her inner “beauty” – some or all of the positive elements of her personality and perhaps a part of her ability to relate to others (the primary function of Charisma in d20 terms) regardless of the motive – she wouldn’t be hero material. She’d be Granny at best, or more likely Hydia from the Volcano of Gloom, or the Wicked Witch of the West.

Damaging her physical appearance was a side effect. Mistmane’s aspect is not mere physical “Beauty”, but a much deeper and far greater Beauty. Her aspect is Accord – forgiving wrongs and overlooking conflicts to come together to solve greater problems. Cooperation – not quite Harmony, but perhaps the best that could be expected of a relatively new federation of once-quarreling tribes. Still, in Accord… there is the seed of Harmony.

Perhaps quite literally.

That is why (at least in my version) she has that moving magical mane, an effect she shares with Princess Celestia, Princess Luna, King Sombra, and the Pony of Shadows – all individuals channeling a power beyond themselves.

So, Mistmane was a pretty young mare with high-end magical talent, an excellent spellcasting education (if only fair by modern standard since there have been advancements over the last thousand years) , and a good deal of natural power (in superheroic d20 terms a high constitution). She returned home from school on being informed that one of her best friends had become the local ruler, only to find that said friend had gone a bit mad with jealousy as well. She defeated and cured her old friend, restoring beauty, prosperity, and good government to the area in the process, before wandering off across Equestria to look for further adventures in being nice to people.

So what is Mistmane seen to do? Well – presuming that Rarity’s campfire-tale version of a story from a thousand years ago has all the details right (which honestly seems pretty unlikely) and throwing in what the Wiki’s say she does in the comics, she is seen to…

• Escape an entangling/grappling effect. That’s L0) Untie, boosted up to L1) Liberating Command, with the usual Unicorn option to power it up further to escape other forms of confinement, dogpiles, and similar restraints. .
• Communicate with Animals and Plants That’s L0) Influence Animal, powered up to L1) Speak with Animals, L2 Speak with Plants, and L3) Influence Animals (lets you try to persuade groups of animals and grants a +10 enhancement bonus on social skills against them).
• Attempts to Purify a Timberwolf. That’s probably L0) Purify Food And Drink boosted up to L3) Remove Curse. She might also be able to manage L3) Neutralize Poison.
• Cause a plant to suddenly grow and grapple someone. Similarly, she can fix up a sick tree and – for a short time thereafter – a trail of flowers sprouts where she walks. So… L1) Enhance Plant (prettier, stronger, more fruit, stronger medicinal effect – double something at CL1+, 3x effect at CL4+, quadruple something at CL 7+), L2) Plant Strike (cause a nearby plant – even if small – to execute up to (Cha Mod in total) combat maneuvers on those targets adjacent to it – such as a Grapple, followed by a Hold/Pin), and even L3) Plant Growth or L3) Diminish Plant. She has a slight disadvantage on this particular set of effects – they cause her to leave an obvious trail of flowers for a bit – but that’s really too minor to worry about in game terms.
• Project multiple magical blasts – although they might be representing telekinesis. I’ll presume an actual combat spell – L1) Magic Missile – although she can power it up to provide a variety of secondary or enhanced effects.
• Summon a Flying-Serpent Psychic Construct (Water versus Fire) that defeats a similar construct and then either grapples an opponent, ties them up in vines, or dissipates while Mistmane casts a spell to tie an opponent up in vines. Probably L1) Summon Psychic Construct, powered up to get higher level ones.

OK, up to this point this is Improved Occult Talent (three level zero and three first level effects plus standard unicorn boosting effects) – the standard unicorn bonus feat option for having an advanced magical education. Given a high constitution and the superheroic world template (or a reserve of Mana) to work with and boost those effects, you get a versatile mage with a wide selection of fairly low-level effects.

• She’s also seen to clean up, and make minor repairs on, an entire village and it’s landscaping – including possibly removing a curse of ugliness -albeit at a significant, and apparently permanent, personal cost. Of course, in game terms… none of that has real effect save, perhaps, acting as a large-area Mending spell. Whether or not things look nice just isn’t a major element in the d20 rules. This is a powered-up version of Mending, Prestidigitation, or an effect that does cantrips. I’ll call it Cantrip Mastery (L2, produces up to three arcane cantrip effects targeting any desired target in a 20′ radius within short range. Thus you could Mend a lot of stuff, apply a Ray Of Frost to six opponents, and Drench all the torches in the area. A L3 version produces four effects in a 30′ radius within medium range. That’s useful, and fairly versatile, but still… I bet that most casters would prefer something like Fireball, Fly, or a nice battlefield-control effect).

So that’s Mana-Powered Inherent Spell (L3 Cantrip Mastery, 6 CP). Her grandiose effect was achieved by spending more Mana (+3 points), using the Compact Metamagic to pay for another +3 (by accepting a permanent curse of damaged appearance), and +2 levels worth of the Magic Of Accord (Below), to achieve an Amplified effect across a massive area.

And, of course, she has the standard unicorn racial Occult Talent package – all of which can be boosted as usual.

• L0: Dancing Lights (in many trivial variants), Daze (with various special effects), Detect Magic, and (Skill) Mastery (provides a +3 competence bonus on a particular skill for ten minutes per level, +6 if it only covers a limited aspect of a skill. In her case it’s Craft/Landscaping).
• L1) Greater Mage Hand.

The Magic Of Accord:

• Metamagical Theorems, all Specialized/only for use with Occult Talents and no more than three inherent spells, no more than two Amplify (only +1 CP since Unicorns get part of it already), Area (3 CP), Compact (3 CP), and Sculpting (3 CP),
• Streamline III (two levels of each of the above Metamagics save Compact), Specialized and Corrupted for Reduced Cost/no more than two levels in total may be applied to any one effect, only when acting on behalf of others or working in a group endeavor, shows a tell-tale physical sign (moving ethereal mane) (6 CP).

The Magic of Accord is, in fact, a lesser, and somewhat unbalanced, version of Alicorn Magic – but it’s about as much of that power as is available to a Unicorn who lacks Earth Pony and Pegasus Magic. It does, however, give Mistmane exceptional flexibility and control over her magic when acting in Accord with others – a trick that Starswirl the Bearded (who is something of an anti-social loner) has never mastered. That alone makes her a renowned sorceress and allows her to make a substantial magical contribution to a group that contains a more powerful spellcaster in Starswirl and a more versatile healer/item crafter in Mage Meadowbrook.

Mistmane The Enchantress, Pillar of Beauty Accord.

ECL 5 (including a+1 ECL racial template) Unicorn Pony Enchantress

To summarize the low-level adventurer template, those affected get:

• A -3 penalty on unskilled skill checks.
• Very slow level advancement, by direct session-based character point awards rather than experience points. Succeeding in goals helps, but killing things and taking their stuff does not.
• The status of valuable trouble magnets – they’re rare and find trouble everywhere they go.
• A +3 bonus on five skills which suit their backgrounds and training. Sadly, this cannot be applied to active magical skills.
• Extra hit points equal to [12 + (2 x Con Mod)].
• Two minor special talents. For the full list see the Template. For Mistmane we’ll take a +2 bonus to her Constituition) and Enduring (providing her with a +1 bonus on her Saves).

To summarize the Basic Pony Modifiers:

• Quadruped. In general ponies are slow and have trouble moving while using tools or weapons.
• Attribute Modifiers: -2 Dex, +2 Con. An additional +2 Con and +2 Chr are dispellable magical bonuses.
• Damage Reduction 9/- versus both Physical and Energy Attacks, only DR 2/- versus melee attacks by living creatures.
• Endure Elements. Ponies pretty much ignore the weather.
• Ponies heal 1d8+1 damage per round three times per day.
• Ponies are always treated as having lots of pockets, even in the nude.
• Ponies get minor cartoon effects, such as hair that responds to moods, blushing through fur, and so on.
• Ponies may begin or participate in spontaneously choreographed musical numbers that provide bonuses for group tasks.
• Have a base pool of 1d6+3 Mana, regaining 1d6 with an hours rest up to three times a day and 1-2 points per day regardless.
• Get a +2 Racial Bonus to Perform/Sing

To Summarize The Unicorn Subrace Modifiers:

• Occult Talent provides their usual minor spellcasting.
• Immunity/Being unable to Concentrate on more than one thing at a time (covering up to three tasks and/or spells of up to level three at any one time).
• Upgrade their basic Mana supply with the Spell Enhancement Natural Magic option.
• Metamagic: Amplify / Only applies to Occult Talent abilities.
• A +2 Racial Bonus to Knowledge/Arcana (2 CP).
• +2 Intelligence/-2 Strength.
• One Bonus Feat.
• Executive, Corrupted for Increased Effect (add the user’s Int Mod to his or her effective level of use)/requires 2 Mana/hour to power. Unicorns are good at coordinating groups, and can provide substantial bonuses.

Basic Attributes: Str 8 (-2 Race = 6) (+3 for one level of Self-Development = 9). Dex 14 (-2 Race = 12), Con 16 (+4 Race +2 Knack = 22), Int 12 (+2 Race = 14), Wis 14, Cha 14 (+2 Race = 16). (Pathfinder 25-Point Buy).

Available Character Points: 120 (Level Four Base) +10 (Disadvantages: Blocked (Polymorph Magic), Compulsively Nice and Forgiving, and History) +12 (L1 and L3 Bonus Feats) +8 (Duties: Pillar of Equestria) = 150 CP.

Basic Abilities (50 CP):

• Hit Dice: 20 (L1-4, d6, 8 CP) +22 (12 + 2 x Con Mod Template) +24 (4 x Com Mod) = 66 HP.
• Skill Points: 12 (Purchased, 12 CP) + 14 (Int) + 14 (Fast Learner) = 40 SP
• BAB +2 (12 CP).
• Saves:
  • Fortitude +0 (0 CP) +6 (Con) +1 (Knack) = +7
  • Reflex +2 (6 CP) +2 (Dex) +1 (Knack) = +4
  • Will +2 (6 CP) +2 (Wis) +1 (Knack) = +5
• Proficiencies: All Simple Weapons (3 CP) and Oriental Weapons “Suitable For Women” (3 CP).
• Initiative: +1 (Dex)
• Move: 40 (four legs, 20 on three or less).
• Armor Class: 10 (Base) + 1 (Dex) +4 (Shimmer Mail) +3 (Martial Art) = 18

Other Abilities (100 CP):

• Magic Of Accord (Above) (16 CP).
• Inherent Spell (as above, 6 CP)
• Fast Learner, Specialized in Skills for Double Effect (6 CP).
• Adept (Atheric Dance, Craft/Landscaping, Perception, and Knowledge/Engineering, 6 CP)
• Mystic Artist (Landscaping) (6 CP), with Composition (Specialized, only as a Prerequisite, 3 CP), Influence (6 CP), Mass Influence (6 CP), Acclaim (6 CP), Song of Power (Specialized, only as a prerequisite, 3 CP), and Touch The Soul (6 CP).
  • At a net cost of 36 CP this is pretty expensive – but Mistmane’s magical landscaping can deeply influence cultures, illustrate philosophical points, empower her to achieve remarkable things, and – at it’s peak and once every thousand years – change the world. Mistmane never fully understood it (or she might have completed her ascension to Alicorn)- but her beautiful Gardens of Accord would help bring the suspicious tribes, insular villages, and local leaders of Equestria together as one nation and would, in the end, usher in the Age of Harmony (and likely Discord, since he put in an appearance soon after the Tree of Harmony did).
  • At +20, this allows her to incorporate Inspiration (Emotion, Competence, Greatness, Excellence) and Synergy (Block (prevents weeds and minor changes in her gardens), Amplify, Harmonize, and Serenity) functions into her gardens – over and above her ability to influence the wider world with them.
    
• Luck with +8 Bonus Uses (18 CP).
• Privilege (Fabulous Beauty, 3 CP).
  • Mistmane sacrificed this ability to empower her grand spell of renewal – which is why her high charisma currently manifests itself as looking like everyone’s cheerful grandmother. The points wound up accidentally being invested in the flower she used as a focus, giving it Returning (the flower is essentially indestructible, 6 CP), a Mystic Link (with Power Link, 6 CP) to her, and Grant of Aid (6 CP) with +2 Bonus Uses (3 CP) – the net cost of 21 CP making the flower a three-point relic.
• Skill Emphasis (Craft / Landscaping, 3 CP).
• Skill Focus (Craft / Landscaping, 6 CP).

Skills:

• Aetheric Dance Martial Art +7 (3* SP) +3 (Tem) +6 (Con) – +16
• Craft (Landscaping) +7 (3* SP) +2 (Int) +3 (Tem) +5 (Feats) +3 (Enh) = +20
• Diplomacy +4 (4 SP) +3 (Cha) = +7 (Specialized in Animals for Double Effect, +10 Enh = +24).
• Escape Artist +4 (4 SP) +1 (Dex) = +5
• Handle Animal +2 (2 SP) +3 (Cha) = +5
• Knowledge / Arcana +4 (4 SP) +2 (Int) +2 (Race) = +8
• Knowledge / Engineering +7 (3* SP) +2 (Int) +3 (Tem) = +12
• Knowledge / Nature +2 (2 SP) +2 (Int) = +4
• Perception +7 (3* SP) +2 (Wis) +3 (Tem) = +12
• Perform (Sing) +2 (2 SP) +2 (Race) +3 (Cha) = +8
• Sense Motive +3 (3 SP) +2 (Wis) +3 (Tem) = +8
• Spellcraft +4 (4 SP)
• Swim +2 (2 SP) -1 (Str) = +1
  • Specific Knowledge: Oriental Cultural Arts (1 SP).

Aetheric Dance Style (Con):

• Requires: Unicorn Magic
• Basic Techniques: Defenses 4, Synergy/Knowledge/Arcana, Synergy/Spellcraft, Toughness 2 (Variant, +2 on saves made during magical duels), Attack 2 (Specialized for Increased Effect / with spells during Magical Duels).
• Advanced Techniques: Mind Like Moon, Weapon Kata (Shuriken or Chakram), Deflect Arrows, and Improved Initiative (Specialized, only during Magical Duels).
• Occult Techniques: Healing Hand, Inner Strength, Serpent Strike, and Vanishing.

Known Techniques (8): Defenses 3, Toughness 2, Improved Initiative, Inner Strength, and Healing Hand.

Equipment:

• Charms: All-Weather Cloak, Automatic Writer (Uses Loaded Brush), Bracers of Force, Druid Boxes, Grace of Miravor, Sands of Time, and Stunstone.
• Talismans: Loaded Brush, Shimmer Mail (Mages Kimono), and a Sunstone.

Mistmane is a powerful – if rather subtle – force for cooperation, cultural change, and peace – but isn’t really much for fight scenes and is best off sticking with someone who can block incoming attacks. As a more conventional adventurer she’d be well advised to acquire a damage blocking effect as an Innate Spell or to find a way to upgrade her Psychic Constructs so that she can “wear” one and let it absorb the damage. Worse, as usual for superheroic mages, she’d need several levels worth of Mana and Rite of Chi to get it back with to function effectively in more conventional settings.

Still, she’s an excellent example of a standard superheroic mage; she’s got a rather limited list of base effects that she can use all she wants. She can vary them to fit the situation and boost them to some extent – but most of the game-breaking powers (easy long-range teleportation and that kind of thing) are basically out of her reach. 

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. Here’s a Featured Review of it and another Independent Review.

The Practical Enchanter can be found in a Print Edition (Lulu), an Electronic Edition (RPGNow), and a Shareware Edition (RPGNow).  There’s an RPGNow Staff Review too.

Ponies Of The Eclipse – Rockhoof At Level Four

For this particular request, it’s an upgrade to Rockhoof – basically “what he might be like after some experience” with specific reference to his past adventures and “A Rockhoof And A Hard Place”.

There’s another good reason for doing that. Given that Equestria is a low-level superheroic world (providing a constant supply of Mana for it’s heroes to work with); Rockhoof is an excellent example of the standard “Super Strongman” type. He lacks only Flight to be a splendid example of what PS238 calls the most common super-power package of all – “FISS”, or “Flight, Invulnerability, Super-Strength”. Even as he is… he’s a pretty fair approximation of what Superman was like in his early adventures, back when he was just leaping around rather than truly flying – and he could always work his way up to true flight in another level or two.

So why not? For those who want to play such a character (and are playing in a superheroic setting where it’s possible), he’s a general example of the build.

While, we don’t have much information on most of Rockhoof’s historical adventures, the Legends of Magic series does indicate that there were a fair number of them. Looking at the “A Rockhoof And A Hard Place” episode, we basically have a long string of “too strong and breaking things” jokes (which was a bit hard to swallow: there was plenty of fragile stuff in the past and apparently Rockhoof wasn’t a walking disaster area back then) along with a few “socially clueless” jokes (also kind of hard to swallow; he spent his youth as a scrawny weakling who presumably did not want to be kicked in the face; he should know better. Perhaps something happened?). Still, Rockhoof does demonstrate a very physical style of storytelling – and has presumably picked up a few levels with his historical adventures. It’s pretty arbitrary, but I’ll peg him at level four.

Rockhoof, the Pillar of Strength, Strong Man of Old Equestria

Level Four, ECL 5, Experienced Earth Pony Athletic Superhero.

To summarize the low-level adventurer template, those affected get:

• A -3 penalty on unskilled skill checks.
• Very slow level advancement, by direct session-based character point awards rather than experience points. Succeeding in goals helps, but killing things and taking their stuff does not.
• The status of valuable trouble magnets – they’re rare and find trouble everywhere they go.
• A +3 bonus on five skills which suit their backgrounds and training. Sadly, this cannot be applied to active magical skills.
• Extra hit points equal to [12 + (2 x Con Mod)].
• Two minor special talents. For the full list see the Template, for Rockhoof we’ll take Might (a +2 bonus to his Strength) and Enduring (providing him with a +1 bonus on his Saves).

To summarize the Basic Pony Modifiers:

• Quadruped. In general ponies are slow and have trouble moving while using tools or weapons.
• Attribute Modifiers: -2 Dex, +2 Con. An additional +2 Con and +2 Chr are dispellable magical bonuses.
• Damage Reduction 9/- versus both Physical and Energy Attacks, only DR 2/- versus melee attacks by living creatures.
• Endure Elements. Ponies pretty much ignore the weather.
• Ponies heal 1d8+1 damage per round for a round three times per day.
• Ponies are always treated as having lots of pockets, even in the nude.
• Ponies get minor cartoon effects, such as hair that responds to moods, blushing through fur, and so on.
• Ponies may begin or participate in spontaneously choreographed musical numbers that provide bonuses for group tasks.
• Have a base pool of 1d6+3 Mana, regaining 1d6 with an hours rest up to three times a day and 1-2 points per day regardless.
• Get a +2 Racial Bonus to Perform/Sing

To Summarize the Earth Pony Modifiers:

• Mana-Powered Berserker (+8 Str) with no fatigue. In effect, an Earth Pony with a Con of 14+ (their average) can run a continuous +8 bonus to their Strength.
• Nature Sense (very vague save for items related to agriculture).
• +4 to resist bull rushes and knockdowns
• Pays half price for Rune Magic (Homesteading) Casting and Mastery, Knowledge/Nature, and Survival. (Yes, Homesteading Magic covers digging ditches, plowing fields, and so on via magic. Some appropriate spells for use with Homesteading Magic can be found under Hedge Magic – such as Plow and The Laborer’s Word). These skills also receive a +3 Racial Bonus.
• Immunity to Fatigue and Exhaustion.
• A +3 bonus on any one hoof-based Martial Art.

Basic Attributes: Str 16 (+18 Ber +2 Knack +12 Enh = 48), Dex 16 (-2 Pony = 14), Con 14 (+2 Pony, +2 M  +1 Level = 19), Int 10, Wis 10, Cha 10 (+2 M = 12). (Pathfinder 25-point point buy).

Available Character Points: 120 (L4 Base) + 6 (Disadvantages; History and Obligations (Pillar of Equestria)) +8 (Duties to his Village – or to wherever he adopts now) +12 (level one and level three bonus feats) = 146 CP.

Basic Abilities (69 CP):

• Hit Dice: 12 (L1d12, 8 CP) +20 (12 + 2 x Con Mod Template) +18 (L2-4d8, 12 CP) +20 (5 x Con Mod) +114 (Str Mod x 6, see “Divine Physique” and “Belt of Strength”, below) = 184 HP.
• Skill Points: 18 (Purchased, 18 CP) + 28 (7 x Con Mod substituting for Int Mod) = 46 SP

Skills:

• Acrobatics: +7 (7 SP) +2 (Dex) +3 (Tem) = +12 (Jump +50).
• Bluff +1 (1 SP) +1 (Cha) +19 (Str), Specialized for Double Effect (Combat Only) = +42
• Diplomacy +1 (1 SP) +1 (Cha) +19 (Str) = +21
• Intimidate +1 (1 SP) +1 (Cha) +19 (Str) = +21
• Knowledge/Nature +7 (3* SP) +3 (Race) +0 (Int) = +10
• Perception +2 (2 SP) +1 (Wis) = +3
• Perform (Storytelling)  +5 (5 SP) +1 (Cha) +19 (Str) = +25, +30 when telling tales of heroism. Corrupted for Increased Effect (listeners find his tales inspiring no matter how absurd they are, but he often accidentally breaks things while telling them).
• Profession/Farmer +4 (4 SP) +0 (Wis) +3 (Tem) = +7 (Includes making basic farm tools, such as replacement shovels – since he’s specifically noted as having had his destroyed many times).
• Profession/Sailor +4 (4 SP) +0 (Wis) = +4. Rockhoof picked up the basics after he joined The Mighty Helm, since they used a ship. He’s no great expert, but he is an able-bodied seaman. Unfortunately, his knowledge of Navigation is long out of date.
• Survival +7 (3* SP) +3 (Race) +0 (Wis) +3 (Tem) = +13
• Swim +2 (2 SP) +19 (Str) = +21
• Homesteading Rune Magic Casting +7 (3* SP) +3 (Race) +1 (Cha) = +11
• Homesteading Rune Magic Mastery +7 (3* SP) +3 (Race) +1 (Cha) = +11
• Martial Art / Jade Mountain Stance Style: +7 (7 SP) +3 (Race) +13 (Permanent Str) +3 (Tem) = +26.
• Perform (Sing) +0 (0 SP) +2 (Race) +1 (Cha) +19 (Str) -3 (Tem Unskilled Penalty) = +19
  • Specific Knowledge/Heroic Tales, Sagas, and Chants (+15 to knowing them, +5 to telling them) (1 SP).

The Jade Mountain Stance Style (Str):

• Requires: Hooves
• Basic Techniques: Attack 2, Power 3, Strike, and Toughness 4.
• Advanced Techniques: Breaking, Combat Reflexes, Improved Disarm, and Weapon Kata (Any one simple weapon or farming implement, with a preference towards pruning hooks, shovels, hand axes, and similar items).
• Occult Techniques: Healing Hand, Inner Strength, Ki Focus (Str), and Focused Blow.

Known Techniques (13): Attack 1, Power 1, Strike, Toughness 4, Breaking, Combat Reflexes, Improved Disarm, Weapon Kata (Shovel), Healing Hand and Inner Strength.

• BAB +2 (12 CP).
• Saves:
  • Fortitude +2 (6 CP) +4 (Con) +1 (Tem) +19 (Str) = +26
  • Reflex +2 (6 CP) +2 (Dex) +1 (Tem) +19 (Str) = +24
  • Will +2 (6 CP) +0 (Wis) +1 (Tem) +19 (Str) = +22
• Proficiencies: Earth Pony Reinforced Shovels (1 CP).
• Initiative: +2 (Dex)
• Move: 40 (four legs) +30 (Light Foot) +30 (Haste),= 100 (50 on two or three legs).
• Armor Class: 10 (Base) + 2 (Dex) +4 (Shimmermail) = 16. Rockhoof is still not so good at not getting hit. Fortunately, he does not really need to be.

Usual Weapons:

• Unarmed: +22/+22 (+2 BAB +19 Str +1 Martial Art, Personal Haste), for 1d6+19, Crit 20/x2, lethal or nonlethal. 3 Attacks of Opportunity, see “Concussive Parry” below.
• Shovel: +22/+22 (+2 BAB +19 Str +1 Martial Art, Personal Haste), for 1d8+13, Crit19-20/x2, lethal or nonlethal, B or S, Trip, usable as a shovel. 3 Attacks of Opportunity, see “Concussive Parry” below.

New Weapon (Pathfinder Design System): Earth Pony Reinforced Shovel. Simple, One-Handed (mouthed), Melee Weapon (6 Design Points), Additional Design Points (+1 Point, +15 GP. Earth Pony shovels need to be heavily reinforced to stand up to earth pony strength), B or S damage (1 Point), Improved Critical Threat Range (19-20, 3 Points), Improved Damage II (2 Points), Tool (Shovel, 0 Points), Special Feature (Trip, 1 Point). Net Result: Simple Weapon, Medium-Sized. Damage 1d6, Crit 19-20/x2, inflicts B or S damage, Trip Weapon, freely usable as a shovel, 20 GP.

• Shovel-Thrown Rocks: +23/+23/+23 (+2 BAB +19 Str +3 Competence -1 Rocks), 1d6+19, Crit 20/x3, Range Increment 80′.

Other Abilities (77 CP):

• Add Odinpower and Odinmight to his basic Berserker ability, for a total of +18 strength (+6 CP).
• DR 2/-, versus both physical and energy attacks (3 CP).
• Upgrade his racial Mana Pool with a form of Natural Magic (Reality Editing), Specialized and Corrupted for Increased Effect / only to support the user’s heroic narrative and let the user’s abilities function without normal scaling restrictions (2 CP). This is great for engineering and digging massive trenches, but so-so otherwise.
• Concussive Parry: Opportunist (6 CP): Rockhoof may make an attack of opportunity against any attack that enters his threatened area. If his attack roll exceeds that of the attacker he can subtract the damage he “inflicts” on the attack from the damage IT would normally inflict, reducing it to a minimum of zero. If this completely negates the damage from an attack, it also negates any other effects it might have, such as requiring a saving throw.
  • This is a powerful defense, but this IS a superheroic setting, so why not? In other settings it might get defined as an Inherent Spell to limit it’s uses – but a superhero will just fuel it with mana and get exactly the same result anyway.
• Reflex Training: Can spend Mana to maintain his “Berserker” strength enhancement and his Innate Enchantments without it requiring an action of any kind – even while asleep or unconscious. Corrupted for Reduced Cost / he must do so as long as he has Mana available. (4 CP).
• Innate Enchantment, Specialized for Increased Effect (effects are considered extraordinary abilities and cost no experience to acquire) / Requires two mana to activate for one minute. Is blatantly obvious in operation since he bulks up a lot (11,310 GP Value, 12 CP).
  • Lob (L1: The user may hurl three items at his or her full BAB and with no need for getting out or loading ammunition or for a physical weapon (or proficiency therewith). This is otherwise treated as if the user was using a medium-sized Halfling Staff Sling. Only while wielding a shovel (x.8), only for throwing rocks (x.8) = 1280 GP.
    • In general: 1d6+Str Mod bludgeoning damage and a -1 to hit for using rocks instead of bullets, Crit 20/x4, Range Increment 80 feet, requires a normal roll to hit. In combination with his Reality Editing he could also throw lots of dirt and junk to make clouds of dust and difficult terrain if he wanted to.
  • (Weapon) Mastery (Halfling Sling Staff, Cantrip): +3 Competence Bonus to BAB with a Halfling Sling Staff (or magical simulation thereof). x.7 Personal-Only (700 GP).
  • Thousand Pound Stance (Target gains a +8 versus Bull Rush, Grapple, Trip, Overrun, being lifted or thrown, or similar situations, for one minute. x .7 Personal Only = 1400 GP). Note that this changes the -4 Penalty for Light Foot to a +4 Bonus.
  • Resist Energy (Provides resistance 10 to all energies), x.7 Personal-Only = 1400 GP
  • Personal Haste: User gains a +30′ enhancement bonus on all movement rates and +1 attack at his or her full BAB when making a full attack (2000 GP).
  • Light Foot: User becomes very light, gaining a +30 circumstance bonus on his or her ground movement speed and, a +10 circumstance bonus on jump checks, as well as DR 10 versus Falling Damage [only]. The user is, however, considered one size category smaller in a Bull Rush, Grapple, Trip, or Overrun situation. x .7 Personal Only = 1400 GP.
  • Heroic Will: Protection From Evil, Personal Only (x.7), 3/Day Only (x.6), Only when the GM feels that the user is being compelled to do something against their personal code or otherwise is likely to summon a mighty surge of will to throw off possession/mind control/etc (x.25) = 210 GP.
  • Heroic Rally: Remove Fear, 2/Day Only (x.4), user must make an adequate inspiring speech (x.6) = 480 GP.
  • Coincidental Catch: Feather Fall, 2/Day Only (x.4), activates automatically (x1.5), but only works 50% of the time (x.4) = 480 GP. When a hero falls off a roof or gets dropped, there is a substantial chance that SOMETHING will happen to break his or her fall.
  • Heroic Health: Relieve Illness (from the Hedge Wizardry spell list) 1/Day (x.2), Personal Only (x.7) = 280 GP. Relieve Poison (from the Hedge Wizardry spell list) 1/Day (x.2), Personal Only (x.7) = 280 GP, Lesser Restoration 2/Day (x.4), Personal Only (x.7) = 560 GP. Fast Healing I (from The Practical Enchanter, for 18 rounds, 2/Day (x.4), Personal Only (x.7)) = 560 GP.
• Hard Training: Finesse (substitutes Con Mod for Int Mod when computing skill points, 6 CP). Thanks to Pathfinders ruling that changes like this are retroactive, this gets him quite a few skill points.
• Double Damage against inanimate objects, Corrupted/also applies when he accidentally damages stuff (4 CP).
• “Muscular Spectacle” / Augmented Bonus, adds Str Mod to Cha Mod when using charisma-based skills (6 CP).
• Finesse, Uses Str Mod in place of Dex Mod for Ranged Combat, Specialized / only for throwing rocks with his shovel (3 CP).
• Mana-Powered Inherent Spell/Trebuchet Special (L3 Transmutation). You can grab an unresisting individual (or adjacent group of up to four if you have sufficient strength to lift them) and throw them to any location within medium range accessible via a normal parabolic trajectory. The landing is harmless and, during the trip, they are considered to be stationary while the world moves by them (6 CP).
• Divine Physique: Advanced, Improved, Augmented Bonus: Adds (Str Mod) to (Con Mod) when calculating Hit Points. Specialized and Corrupted/only works for levels 1-5 (6 CP). This gets him an extra 78 HP, or 114 when his Belt of Strength is active
• Divine Endurance: Improved Augmented Bonus x3 (Add Str Mod to all three saving throws), Specialized / only while being noble, helpful, charging in to face the foe, standing between others and danger, and otherwise being a big boy scout or Superman/Captain Marvel expy, Corrupted / Costs 2 Mana per Use. That’s +13 to all saves, or +19 when his Belt of Strength is active (12 CP). Note that this means that he can normally only boost two saves a round.
• Minor Privilege (3 CP). Rockhoof gets invited to all the parties and has lots of willing female companionship.

To summarize his various defenses, he can attempt to parry incoming attacks. If he’s still hit, he has DR 6/- versus physical attacks, DR 16 versus Falling Damage, and Energy Resistance (All) 12. If damage still gets through, two points of any melee damage inflicted by a sentient being and nine points of any other damage is converted to nonlethal damage.

Equipment:

• Charms: Captain’s Torc, Conjurer’s Tattoo (His Shovel), Contraceptive Charm, Foothold “Boots” (hoofwrappings), Impervious Glue, Resounding Horn, and Tinkerstone.
• Talismans: Ditty Bag, Helm Of War, and Shimmer Mail.
• Relic: Thur’s Belt Of Strength (Inherent Spell, L3 Personal-Only Enhance Strength/+8 Str for one minute per level, Corrupted for Increased Effect / uncontrollably drains mana to renew itself, makes the user clumsy and prone to breaking things as well as removing any sense of tact or awareness that maybe you should take the thing off sometimes. Net +12 Strength and a lot of environmental and social damage (1 CP Relic).

Rockhoof is now capable of withstanding enormous amounts of damage, bouncing arrows from his skin, resisting minor energy bolts, partially blocking fairly serious attacks with his shovel, dishing out rather a lot of damage, and will be unaffected by most poisons, diseases, or other special effects – although he can be overloaded if he’s hit with more than two a round and has moments of vulnerability (when he’s spending some of this rounds mana keeping his strength boosted). Still, at this point… he’s your basic Colossus, fully capable of going toe-to-toe with massive elementals, lesser giants, and similar menaces. In comparison to normal characters… the Superheroic World Template adds at least +3 CR, a high-efficiency Eclipse build is about +2. and he has a +1 to start with – making him roughly equivalent to a normal character of level ten or higher.

He also has his full allotment of Charms and Talismans and has picked up one minor Relic on his adventures.

Faster than a speeding pegasus! More powerful than an avalanche! Able to leap small hills in a single bound! Look! Up on the mountain! It’s Rockhoof!

Prince Bluebloods Aggravating Pony Overlord List Part V – The Palatial Personal Parlor Of Perilously Prepared Pretentious Proverbs

Previously on the Aggravating Overlord Channel…

• Prince Blueblood’s Aggravating Pony Overlord List Part I – The Throne Room.
• Prince Blueblood’s Aggravating Pony Overlord List Part II – The Grand Ballroom of Aberrant Aphorisms.
• Prince Blueblood’s Aggravating Pony Overlord List Part III – The Wine Cellar Of Dubious Drunken Declarations. 
• Prince Blueblood’s Aggravating Pony Overlord List Part IV – The Glorious Gardens of Gratuitously Garbled Gnomics

And today it’s more Pony Overlord rules, for those times that you just want to be irritating…

1. All of my guest quarters shall actually be miles away and linked to my fortress by an authorized-use-only teleportation doorway with guard-operators standing by all night! Servants, kitchens, air conditioning vents, and so on will be purely local, so anyone who wants to get out and sneak around can stealthily explore the wrong place entirely!
2. Members of my legions will get free training and tuition as well as substantial pay raises for increasing their qualifications! Adding things like “Lay Therapist”, “Hostage Negotiator”, or “Plumber” will be strongly encouraged! I want the general public to assume that my guards are omni-competent and can be turned to to resolve any problem and I want heroes to have to deal with guards who will be attempting psychotherapy and non-violent conflict resolution between pies!
3. Everybody thinks that plans calling for intervention from magic unicorns are impractical, but I shall show them that they are wrong!
4. Occasionally I will dig out and erect a massive crypt-dungeon, filled with formidable defenses, clever traps, and terrible monsters, then ceremoniously hide a locked and warded chest in the central crypt, offering no public explanation! The chest will hold a supply of glasses and good liquor, a high-quality first aid kit, a random bonus prize, and personally signed certificates of graduation from the Blueblood Academy for Adventurers. I will then offer to hire graduates if I ever need an artifact or something retrieved from an ancient temple of doom, liche’s crypt, or similar location.
5. My employees will have decent tailoring, good grooming, elocution lessons, regular visits to the spa, and decent hygiene! If they want to act like uncouth barbarians, I shall open a gate to Valhalla and see if Odin would like to run an exchange program for some bored Einherjar who would like to try a modern deathstyle for a bit and train with modern weapons and pies!
6. I will instruct my fashion designer that – when designing for a pony – it is accessories, not outfits! After all, it’s not like any conceivable outfit could possibly be much of an improvement on ME!
7. My guards will be perfectly capable of functioning in the dark! Between night-sight gear, spells, training, and blindfolded combat practice it shouldn’t be any problem at all and it will give the visually handicapped a chance to shine!
8. My stronghold shall be overstaffed, for many hands makes for light work! Outsiders who show up claiming to be there to do maintenance, make repairs, or install special equipment will be directed to appropriate properties around the city that are in need of work! I have lots! Their activities will then be reviewed and rated online! They had best hope that they are actually good at repairs!
9. When my employees park their vehicles to do something on foot, they will do it in full confidence that attempting to bypass said vehicles biometric security locks will lead to being dosed with knockout gas, entangled with mystic chains, or whatever other random security feature the weekly security competition has put in this week.
10. I will not add unsuitable females to my harem! One night stands are one thing, but who needs troublemakers in the family?
11. If my chief engineer upsets me (or gets too frustrated with me using magic to do things) I shall reassign him to the Kerbal Space Program! It’s not like I have a lot of real engineering to be done anyway; I am a magic unicorn pony!
12. I shall not fill the corridors with traps! I have kids, servants, and hundreds of minions, many of whom will doubtless be injured for every hero who is mildly inconvenienced! Instead there will be occasional clearly labeled dead-end side-corridors leading to nonlethal containment traps that the heroes can assume are protecting something important and meddle with to their hearts content!
13. If the Girl Scouts are delivering my Thin Mints, a servant will meet them at the door with the required forklift and take them around to the kitchen. They will then be offered tickets to an amusement park, but NOT a tour of my stronghold unless it’s “bring your child to work” day and they happen to be some employees offspring.
14. When I install “Spiked Deadfalls”, “Scorpion Pits”, “Shark Tanks”, “Piranha Pools”, or any similar “death trap” or “execution” device, they shall actually be illusions over teleportation portals that will drop those who pass through randomly into the homes of energetic old ladies armed with broomsticks, cantankerous old men with shotguns loaded with salt, highly skilled female martial artists who happen to be in the shower, or in front of a monstrous family watching TV who can be counted on to scream “A HUMAN! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES KIDS, I’LL HOLD IT OFF! CALL THE POLICE!”.
15. When the heroes inevitably toss ME into one of those “death traps” I shall let my natural background music swell and announce that I have come to grant whoever is there a wish – and presuming that it is at all reasonable, I shall not be a Jackass or even a Literal Genie about it. As a side benefit, when I’m teleporting or dimension hopping, I’m more likely to get a friendly reaction to my abrupt appearance!
16. While I shall invariably taunt my enemies as I escape, the fact that I usually do so by teleporting or dimension-hopping (at least when no water slide is available) means that such taunts must be prerecorded! They will be delivered by automated Taunt-O-Matic (TM!) systems. Being an Aggravating Overlord calls for the occasional sacrifice!
17. I will not send out droid, undead, or golem armies against heroes who are reluctant to kill living beings but have no qualms about destroying constructs. Instead I shall place kittens and puppies in need of difficult and lengthy rescue efforts in their way and save the army of constructs for things like dam-building, mining, and other tedious large-scale projects where they might actually accomplish something useful.
18. I shall not be typecast! My every outfit and hairstyle will be a bold fashion statement and always different! It’s not like they won’t be able to identify me anyway! How many other Aggravating Unicorn Pony Overlords have YOU seen?
19. My doomsday devices shall have digital timers that reset to various random numbers every few seconds after they are tampered with! When they happen to hit zero there will be a blinding moment of flash photography and the resulting picture will be published with the headline “Blundering “Heroes” Accidentally Trigger “Doomsday Device”. Child’s Birthday Cake Ruined” since any such “Doomsday Device” is actually going to be an elaborate baking oven.
20. If my guards are defeated in battle, I will route my attackers through several video-game worlds instead! Perhaps they can show me how to get past “Waterfall”, “Animal Antics”, “Ninja Gaiden”, “Dr Wiley’s Castle”, “Aztec”, “The Perfect Run”, “Through the Fire and Flames”, “The Water Temple”, “The Dam”, and :”Turbo Tunnel”!
21. If I have something the heroes vitally need, and one of them or their hangers-on suddenly offers to warm my bed (and I find them sufficiently appealing), I shall take full advantage of the situation while ensuring that the actual item is in a safety-deposit box in a random bank while I am only carrying a copy! If they’re going to be underhanded, I shall be underhanded too – and I will still get something for my trouble!
22. I will not triumphantly grab and try to use some ancient mystic/psionic/alien/lost science artifact! Those things never work right until they’ve been analyzed, properly attuned by being “paid for” in some fashion, and put into your inventory! Besides, I wouldn’t be an Overlord if I didn’t have plenty of power and artifacts already!
23. I will be very selective in my hiring of character assassins! Entirely too many columnists, comedy hosts, and writers will happily turn on you at a moments notice or do hackwork that is all too easily revealed as a hired hit piece!
24. I shall not conceal my weaknesses! Fine wines, pretty mares, good food, great personal accessories, and more do attract me, while dirt, damage to my hair, incompetent minions, poor hygiene, and noxious odors all repel me! I am, however, neither stupid nor incapable of self-control! I can and will ignore such things when something important is going on!
25. Any important facilities, storage areas, escape pods, and similar necessities will be found INSIDE my defenses! Leaving important stuff unprotected is asking for it and I do that enough anyway!
26. I reserve the right to fire minons who are excessively irritating know-it-alls who say “I told you so!” too much! It’s not like ANY plan is likely to hold up when a bunch of crazy heroes comes through anyway, so they’re not exactly making a useful contribution there!
27. When my mechanisms, spells, rituals, and mad science devices fail, they will do so in great bursts of colored light and loud bangs with symphonic accompaniment! Everypony loves a good fireworks display!
28. I will employ stone, metal, modern safety techniques, and warding spells to make sure that my stronghold is proof against fire, flood, storms, natural disasters, and various other hazards while requiring minimal maintenance! Cheap construction always costs you more in the long run!
29. I shall hire some competent people to run my intelligence, census, and similar services! There is no use trying to give orders to make things sillier if you do not know what is going on!
30. If a hero feels a need to speak to me in person, there is always videoconferencing! Otherwise he or she can await one of my general audience days, just like everybody else! And bring a fruit basket!
31. I will have many projects going on at once! This is what Delegation and Subdivisions are for! If some heroes disrupt one project, well, there shall be a dozen more that actually get finished!
32. Drugs, rituals, artifacts, and pacts offering immortality will be carefully examined for difficulty and drawbacks and filed accordingly! While I have Immortality ANYWAY, the kids don’t always inherit it and I can only bestow it up until they move out! If any of them want to put up with whatever drawbacks a given method has (there are always SOME) I will gladly help them get it set up!
33. Any classical monsters working for me will be provided with new riddles, weaknesses, or vulnerable points! There is no point in having a guardian or enforcer that can be defeated by any kid with access to Google!
34. Just in case there is a background music failure, I will have a backup background music system installed, complete with an AI to pick something appropriate. What is a good scene without background music?
35. I will keep my priorities in order! Dramatic Escapes (Family first, and with less drama), Cool Scenes, Being Annoying, Bad Puns, Expanding My Harem, Teaching Moments, Coming Up With Evil Explanations for Nice Deeds, Chocolate Desserts, Ruling Effectively, and Finding More Heroes to Amuse Me, in that order!
36. If a Hero or (especially!) Heroine starts a transformation sequence, I will wait until it is halfway through to interrupt and point out that they are now naked. If necessary, I will use my powers of transmutation on their clothing to ensure that this is so – and to make sure that it remains true. There’s nothing like a bunch of naked heroes doing a Benny Hill chase scene!
37. My word is my bond! My Safeword, on the other hand, is Power Word Escape!
38. Collecting Dread Artifacts of Great Power is always fun until you try to use them for something important, at which point they invariably backfire! I will use them only for trivia, and when a hero steals one because “He does not know what he has his hooves on!” I shall laugh uproariously when it blows up in his or her face! Besides… Aggravating Overlord Vastly Wealthy Influential Magic Cartoon Unicorn Wizard here, remember? It’s not like dread artifacts are going to do much that I can’t find a way to do anyway!
39. I will make sure that any invisibility devices that I either use or leave around to be stolen will stop working at dramatic moments! What good is a dramatic moment with no audience?
40. Any robots will have concealed power systems, well inside. The vulnerable external power pack will be a popcorn grenade trap (because a hero who tries this obviously needs more grains!) Set to go off when somebody grabs it!
41. Zombie, Ghoul, Vampire, Wraith and other undead armies are GROSS. Also useless and prone to going out of control. The necromancer down the block can HAVE them. A squad of scantily dressed lovely cat girls and/or handsome and virile horse boys looking for someone to protect and rescue them from me is FAR more effective at delaying heroes – and lets me get rid of them. Where do the blasted things keep coming from anyway?
42. I shall not be cheap. What use is being incredibly wealthy if you do not spend your money? Hordes are for dragons, and look how much good they do THEM.
43. Any idea that crosses my mind will get serious consideration! After all, how can I be stopped if even I do not know what I am up to at any given moment?
44. If cornered I will break out the emergency eyepatch, pirate shirt, and ninja-to. Then I shall be invincible! Or in a mental hospital. If it works for the Joker, it will work for me!
45. I shall have small, cute, furry things with big eyes handle my personal security! Even if the heroes should somehow work up a desire to attack, the law of cartoon cute will stop them.
46. If I must resort to generic villainy, I shall go to a discount club and invest in an entire pallet of the large economy size. Do you have any idea how embarrassing it is to run out of villainy?
47. Any offerings of cringing slaves, frightened children, or beautiful young virgin women will be accepted, sorted out by the staff, given meals and appropriate treatment, and either sent home or – if they actually want a job – given the usual security checks and evaluation. (See Legions Of Cuddly, Harem, and Staff). Adults who show up four or more times will be referred to social services! Children who prove to have been around this four or more times will be given a swat on the rear, a good scolding, and a note sent to their parents or social workers! If they have neither they will be assigned some social workers! I am not a babysitting service most of the time!
48. If I feel a need to demonstrate my utter decadence, ruthless domination, or extreme edginess I will hire in some people to play the necessary roles! The look on the heroes faces when some of the heads “mounted on the wall” ask them how they’re doing is priceless!
49. Whenever a policeman comes to arrest me, or solo hero tries to capture me, or I am somehow trapped in the company of someone utterly unlike me, I shall consider how amusing they seem likely to be and then either 1) Teleport, or 2) Use my “change genre” power to make it a “Buddy Picture” just in case it wasn’t already.
50. If the heroes attempt to break or reform me by listing off all my flaws, errors, failures, and bad habits I shall listen closely! They will almost certainly remind me of several fun things that I need to do again!

Healing Magic in Classical Fantasy and Ponies of the Eclipse – Mage Meadowbrook

Healing in Classical Fantasy Worlds

Healers aren’t especially uncommon. A lot of people like to help others – and being one of the people who makes it stop hurting, saves lives, and delivers babies comes with social respect, a certain amount of authority, and good-to-excellent pay.

Or at least it does if you’re good at it – and magical healers tend to be very, VERY, good at it.

That’s a problem with ponies, or any other setting, class, or effect which offers both access to healing magic and near-unlimited use of spells. If one of the local casters has “Cure Light Wounds”… then long-term injuries are not going to exist unless you make up special rules for them. If they know a few more spells – “Lesser Restoration”, “Cure Disease”, “Neutralize Poison”, and perhaps a few others along those lines (even if they’re lesser variants which have to be cast several times to obtain the same effect) then there won’t be hospitals, epidemics, or much in the way of medical problems outside of congenital defects (if there’s no spell for those) and the infirmities of extreme old age.

But Equestria DOES have hospitals. So even the most gifted healers are going to be limited to natural cures, alchemy, special-purpose items and potions, and the following spell list:

• Cantrips: Check Health#, Congenital Cure* (fixes a congenital defect over the next month), Contraception#, Know Usage (identifies the medicinal potential of various substances and plants)*, Painkiller#, Stabilize (Standard), Transfuse#, and Wake Up (gets a living but unconscious or even a brain-damaged target awake and coherent for one minute/caster level)*
• Level One Spells: Dentistry#, Expel Parasites#, Healing Lorecall (SC, Note that this works with the Healthful Rest spell, even if you don’t take the time to complete the rest), Healthful Rest (SC) (or the Restful Sleep Pathfinder version), Lesser Restoration, Pharmacist* (+10 to making medicines), Relieve Poison#, and Relieve Illness#.
  • #: From the Hedge Magic spell list. *: Original Spell.

The rarely-required Regeneration can be induced with a Dao Sigil Talisman (Charms and Talismans can be found in The Practical Enchanter), but takes a very long time. Instant Healing is available through the Sovereign Ointment Charm or the Rubydraught Talisman, but those are very limited use.

Mage Meadowbrook, Pillar of Healing

Level four (ECL 5) Earth Pony Physician and Artificer.

As a filly, Meadowbrook learned her mother’s healing skills – but when an epidemic of Swamp Fever (a magical disease with no known cure that turned its victims into trees) swept through the village and her mother fell ill, she surpassed her training to find a cure. With her village safe and it’s ponies recovering, she set forth to cure other stricken villages – and continued on to find and administer cures for many other magical ills, as well as learning to use the magical properties of the natural world to brew powerful potions and forge useful enchantments. In her travels across Equestria she, and her curious healers mask, became legendary while she was still quite young.

Mage Meadowbrook is principally noted for her Eight Enchanted Items, for her ability to make Magical Potions, Dusts, and Brews and other “:alchemical” concoctions, and for her Healing Skills. Secondarily, she’s quite agile and – as befits an earth pony – is quite tough and strong.

Eight Enchanted Items… Isn’t it pretty odd that the number is so definite but there’s no actual mention of what any of those items were? Wouldn’t there have been a time when she only had seven, and wouldn’t it have been possible for her to have picked up a ninth? Even Twilight didn’t seem to know what any of the eight items were – although she was sure that there were only eight. Even more puzzling… when Mage Meadowbrook actually made an appearance, she didn’t seem to need or use any items besides her potions and her mask.

Evidently her eight enchanted items were legendary, but (outside of her mask) they weren’t actually a part of HER panoply and legend – and that’s downright weird. When you read about King Arthur, you’ll read about Excalibur, it’s sheath, the Siege Perilous, and the Holy Grail, (among other items). If you listen to the legends about Thor you will hear about his chariot and goats, his belt and gauntlets, and his mighty hammer. And yet we don’t hear about Meadowbrooks Eight Enchanted Items or see her use any of them. Why not?

Perhaps because they were tools instead of independent items like Starswirls Mirror? Did she keep changing them out so they varied from story to story? Maybe she only used her Mask and loaned out the other seven items? Or perhaps all of those? Because I have a power package for that. Meadowlark was probably a Houngan Conjurer,

• Create Relic, Specialized and Corrupted/only usable to make one-point relics, only usable with points from Enthusiast, requires that the user come up with a neat ritual, and all relics carry a disadvantage – although this does help reduce their cost (2 CP).
• Enthusiast x3, Two Specialized and Corrupted for Triple Effect, one Specialized for Double Effect and Corrupted for Decreased Cost (8 CP to get 8 “floating” CP to be made into temporary relics) / points may only be used to create relics (known as “conjures”), relics have a maximum cost of one point and no one can use more than one at any one time. This will let her have eight conjures at any one time.
• Adaption, with the same limitations (+1 CP) so that she can change them around in a day if she needs to instead of requiring a week or so.

There: for a mere 11 CP Mage Meadowbrook can provide a customized two-feat boost – albeit with an accompanying disadvantage – to each member of any party she is associated with. She can thus be famous for her Eight Enchanted Objects, and still have no one having any idea of what they actually were because they’d change from story to story.

Similarly, Mage Meadowbrooks “potions” do a lot more than what d20 potions can do. They can produce active, external, magical effects rather than being limited to things that affect the drinker. Fortunately, there is a power package ready for that too.

• Create Relic: Specialized and Corrupted / only to make limited-use items (Apply “Specialized / Does Not Recover to the items created, only select abilities that normally offer a limited number of daily uses) costing a maximum of 3 CP each, only using points from Enthusiast (2 CP).
  • Mage Meadowbrook tends to talk about requiring rare ingredients and such – but this rarely actually seems to limit her, so it’s basically flavor text.A list of sample items that can be created can be found HERE, under “where does he get these wonderful toys”.
    
• Double Enthusiast x2, Specialized for Increased Effect (provides four floating CP per instance) and Corrupted for Reduced Cost / points may only be used with Create Relic, limited as above (8 CP).
  • This provides Mage Meadowbrook with a small magical arsenal. It will take quite some time – days or weeks – to rebuild it if she exhausts it, but she can stockpile or create quite a few things. The game master may allow her to use her base relic allotment in this way as well, substantially increasing her arsenal.
    

So…

To summarize the low-level adventurer template, those affected get:

• A -3 penalty on unskilled skill checks.
• Very slow level advancement, by direct session-based character point awards rather than experience points. Succeeding in goals helps, but killing things and taking their stuff does not.
• The status of valuable trouble magnets – they’re rare and find trouble everywhere they go.
• A +3 bonus on five skills which suit their backgrounds and training. Sadly, this cannot be applied to active magical skills.
• Extra hit points equal to [12 + (2 x Con Mod)].
• Two minor special talents. For the full list see the Template, for Meadowbrook we’ll take Plague Survivor (+4 on saves versus illnesses, -2 on any attribute damage taken) and Sensitive Nose (Can easily detect the scent of poisonous substances).

To summarize the Basic Pony Modifiers:

• Quadruped. In general ponies are slow and have trouble moving while using tools or weapons.
• Attribute Modifiers: -2 Dex, +2 Con. An additional +2 Con and +2 Chr are dispellable magical bonuses.
• Damage Reduction 9/- versus both Physical and Energy Attacks, only DR 2/- versus melee attacks by living creatures.
• Endure Elements. Ponies pretty much ignore the weather.
• Ponies heal 1d8+1 damage per round for a round three times per day.
• Ponies are always treated as having lots of pockets, even in the nude.
• Ponies get minor cartoon effects, such as hair that responds to moods, blushing through fur, and so on.
• Ponies may begin or participate in spontaneously choreographed musical numbers that provide bonuses for group tasks.
• Have a base pool of 1d6+3 Mana, regaining 1d6 with an hours rest up to three times a day and 1-2 points per day regardless.
• Get a +2 Racial Bonus to Perform/Sing

To Summarize the Earth Pony Modifiers:

• Mana-Powered Berserker (+8 Str) with no fatigue. In effect, an Earth Pony with a Con of 14+ (their average) can run a continuous +8 bonus to their Strength.
• Nature Sense (very vague save for items related to agriculture).
• +4 to resist bull rushes and knockdowns
• Pays half price for Rune Magic (Homesteading) Casting and Mastery, Knowledge/Nature, and Survival. (Homesteading Magic covers cooking, cleaning, making and mending basic clothing, helping make tools, agriculture, and general pioneering. Earth ponies can get lots of work done and raise crops in extremely dubious locations. Some appropriate spells for use with Homesteading Magic can be found under Hedge Magic). These skills also receive a +3 Racial Bonus.
• Immunity to Fatigue and Exhaustion.
• A +3 bonus on any one hoof-based Martial Art.

Basic Attributes (Pathfinder 25-Point Buy): Str 12 (+8 Ber = 20), Dex 14 (-2 Pony = 12), Con 14 (+2 Pony +2 M = 18), Int 14, Wis 14, Cha 13 (+2 M +1 Level = 16)

Available Character Points: 120 (L4 Base ) + 6 (Disadvantages; Obligations (Pillar of Equestria) and History) +8 (Duties as a Healer) +6 (First and Third Level Bonus Feats) = 140 CP.

Basic Abilities (68 CP):

• Hit Dice: 10 (L1d10, 6 CP) +20 (12 + 2 x Con Mod Template) +14 (L2-4d6, 6 CP) +16 (4 x Con Mod) = 60 HP.
• Skill Points: 25 (Purchased, 25 CP) + 14 (Int) +10 (Fast Learner) = 49 SP

Skills:

• Acrobatics: +7 (3* SP) +1 (Dex) = +8 (Jump +12 due to speed).
• Craft/Alchemy +7 (3* SP) +2 (Int) +3 (Tem) = +12
• Diplomacy +1 (1 SP) +3 (Cha) = +4
• Heal +7 (3* SP) +2 (Wis) +3 (Tem) = +12
• Iron Hoof Skirmisher Style +7 (3* SP) +5 (Str) +3 (Race) = +15
• Knowledge/Geography +4 (4 SP) +2 (Int) = +6
• Knowledge/Local +7 (3* SP) +2 (Int) +3 (Tem) = +12
• Knowledge/Nature +7 (3* SP) +2 (Int) +3 (Tem) = +12
• Linguistics +5 (2* SP) +2 (Int) = +7
• Perception +7 (3* SP) +2 (Wis) +3 (Tem) = +12
• Profession (Swamp Rat) +1 (1 SP) +2 (Wis) = +3
• Perform (Sing) +2 (2 SP) +3 (Cha) +2 (Race) = +7
• Rune Magic (Homesteading) Casting +5 (2* SP)+3 (Cha) +3 (Race) = +11 (Effective Caster Level Five)
• Rune Magic (Homesteading) Mastery +5 (2* SP) +3 (Cha) +3 (Race) = +11 (Can use second level effects)
• Spellcraft +2 (2 SP) +2 (Int) = +4
• Stealth +7 (3* SP) +1 (Dex) = +8
• Survival +7 (3* SP) +2 (Wis) = +9
• Swim +1 (1 SP) +5 (Str) = +6

Specific Knowledges: Equestrian Diseases (1 SP).

Skill Specialties: Making Medicines, Natural Remedies,and Knowledge/Local/Where to find natural remedies (3 SP)

The Iron Hoof Skirmisher Style (Str):

Requires: Str 16+, Hooves

• Basic Techniques: Attack 2, Defenses 4, Strike, Toughness 1, and Synergy/Acrobatics.
• Advanced Techniques: Blinding Strike, Crippling Blow. Improved Disarm, and Mobility.
• Occult Techniques: Healing Hand, Inner Strength, Light Foot, and Vanishing.

Known Techniques (8): Defenses 4, Strike, Crippling Blow, Inner Strength, and Light Foot.

• BAB +2 (12 CP).
• Saves:
  • Fortitude +2 (6 CP) +4 (Con) = +6
  • Reflex +2 (6 CP) +1 (Dex) = +3
  • Will +2 (6 CP) +2 (Wis) = +4
• Proficiencies: Throwing Vials/Bottles (1 CP).
• Initiative: +1 (Dex)
• Move: 40 (four legs)
• Armor Class: 10 (Base) + 1 (Dex) +4 (Martial Art) +4 (Shimmermail) = 19
• Usual Weapons:
  • Kick: +7 (+2 BAB +5 Str), 1d4+5 (+4d6 with Thunderhoof Strike), Crit 20/x2. May inflict lethal or nonlethal damage without penalty.
  • Thrown Container/Rock: +3 (+2 BAB +1 Dex), damage depends on contents, range increment as per Light Crossbow thanks to Bracers.

Other Abilities (72 CP):

• Houngan Conjurer Package (As above, 11 CP).
• Magical Brewing (As above, 10 CP).
• Fast Learner, Specialized in Skills for +2 SP/Level (6 CP).
• Adept: Acrobatics, Craft/Alchemy, Heal, and Knowledge/Local (6 CP).
• Adept: Iron Hoof Skirmisher, Perception, Stealth, and Linguistics (6 CP).
• Luck with +4 Bonus Uses, Specialized in Skills (6 CP)
• Mana-Powered Inherent Spell: Thunderhoof Strike (L3, cast as a part of an attack action, adds 1d6/Level, 10d6 maximum, to the damage inflicted by a blow, 6 CP). At the moment this is only 4d6 with her single attack – but an extra 4d6 on your kick is actually pretty good.
• Mana-Powered Occult Talent, Specialized for Increased Effect (Double Spell Formula: 8 Cantrips and 2 First Level Effects) / requires messing about with assorted herbs and medicines and a DC 20 Craft/Alchemy check – although she may “take 20” on this (6 CP).
• Mana Powered Occult Talent, Specialized for Increased Effect (L0 slots count as L1, the L1 slot counts as two L1 Slots for a total of six level one slots) / requires messing about with assorted herbs and medicines and a DC 20 Heal check – although she may “take 20” on this (6 CP).
  • These two occult talents give her access to the full list of Equestrian Healing Spells (above), although she channels her magic through medications and skill instead of direct spellcasting.
• Luck with +4 Bonus Uses, Specialized in Saving Throws (6 CP).
• Privilege: Mage Meadowbrook is recognized as an expert healer, a plaguebreaker, and a master of potions and brews throughout the land, and – as such – enjoys a welcome and local support everywhere she goes (3 CP).

Equipment:

• Healers Mask: This is her personal Conjure, and provides two six-point Immunities – to swarms and to the side effects of magical plants – allowing her to gather her ingredients in relative safety. It’s unfortunate side effect is a -5 penalty on Perception rolls, since wearing it makes it difficult to see, hear, or smell properly.

Unlike most of the other Pillars, Meadowbrook is something of a specialist in enchanted items – and so it should be no surprise that she makes use of a full set of Charms and Talismans (from The Practical Enchanter).

• Charms: Blemish Cream, Bracers of Hurling, Cleansing Wand, Druid Boxes, Ice Chest, Ring of Mist, and Sovereign Ointment.
• Talismans: Dao Sigil, Rubydraught, and Shimmermail

By normal d20 standards Mage Meadowbrook isn’t an especially powerful healer. She can relieve illnesses and some conditions, accelerate healing, and fix a variety of minor problems all day long – but she can’t instantly heal massive wounds or wipe away major conditions without an appropriate potion or brew – and her brew-and-potion resources have to be split between healing, defensive, offensive, and utility effects. She can fight reasonably effectively too, but is no match for a dedicated warrior. She can provide basic boosting items for her friends, but cannot produce major enchantments for them.

And really, that’s about what you’d expect from healers apprentice who went adventuring as early as she possibly could. She did a lot of minor adventuring on her own, dabbles in pretty much everything you need for undertaking minor adventures / ingredient-gathering fetch-quests, and can take care of herself – but her skills are best used as party backup.

Ponies Of The Eclipse – Rockhoof, the Pillar of Strength

Faced with a dreadful emergency, a scrawny, youthful newspaper boy farmers son threw himself into attempting to save those who were endangered – refusing to stop or give up despite his having no chance whatsoever to actually handle the problem. In the face of the onrushing mortal peril his sacrifice – however willing – seemed doomed to fail. Then, in a bolt of lightning flash of light, Billy Batson the boy became the mighty Captain Marvel Rockhoof, gifted with fabulous strength, speed, and durability as long as he remains morally upright doesn’t party too much. With the strength of Hercules, the endurance and durability of Atlas and the speed of Hermes, Captain Marvel Shazam Rockhoof went on to become a mighty hero,

OK, there are some nods to Norse Runes and “Viking” motifs in there too, but Rockhoof is pretty blatantly a four-color superhero character like The Mighty Thor rather than some sort of fantasy barbarian. Classic fantasy strong men are huge, strong, and tough because they are the scions of long lines of hulking mighty men who grew up in the wilds among other great warriors, often had divine blood, eat and burn off tremendous amounts of food, and get absurd amounts of healthy outdoor exercise. They run around leaving trails of bloody corpses as they smite their opponents with massive deadly weapons because they are mighty warriors and that is what they do. Enkidu, Hercules, Conan… they didn’t suddenly become powerful out of moral authority or self-sacrifice. Neither did they start their heroic careers by digging a big ditch with a shovel or by performing any other bit of basic engineering. They battled other heroes, strangled snakes when they were mere infants, and slew great enemies as kids. Rockhoof… simply isn’t a mighty warrior. Even if Rockhoof is fairly good at fighting when he must, ponies just do not tend towards the “charge in and kill them all” style of combat. There’s a distinct absence of “Blood for the Blood God, Skulls for the Skull Throne!“, “Blood and Souls for my Lord Arioch!“, “Lava quod est sordium!” (Cleanse that which is unclean!), “Jai Mahakali!” (Glory to Great Kali!”), or even “CROOOMMMM!!!“. Instead… you get a lot more “nice young man who made eagle scout and is currently out helping the neighbors!”.

So it’s a good thing for Rockhoof that Equestria is a superheroic world where characters get (Con Mod) points of mana to spend every round isn’t it?

As for his specific powers… Rockhoof can move a lot of earth and stone very quickly (including throwing boulders), hit really hard, jump a long ways, run very fast, and withstand major attacks. He also acquired – or at least activated – most of his power in a single moment of heroism as an adolescent or young adult rather than developing it over time like Starswirl, so it probably isn’t based on him being high level. Fortunately, with the Superheroic World Template in play, it can be based on Mana-fueled specialization at level one.

He probably got another level or two while out adventuring, but there’s not a lot of information on that – so here he is at the start of his heroic career.

Secondarily, considering the abilities displayed by Maud Pie, Big Macintosh, and various other Earth Ponies in what looks like a considerably more densely populated equestria… Rockhoof very likely isn’t actually the “strongest earth pony of all time”. While he may have been known as such in the distant past and in legends, that was without actual testing, after centuries of story-polishing, in comparison with a rather modest sample size, and (perhaps most importantly) not in a RPG full of players who dabble in character optimization. For, if you put stats on it, they will find a way to outdo them.

In any case, it’s on with the game statistics!

Rockhoof, the Pillar of Strength, Strong Man of Old Equestria

Starting (Level One, ECL 2) Athletic Superhero.

To summarize the low-level adventurer template, those affected get:

• A -3 penalty on unskilled skill checks.
• Very slow level advancement, by direct session-based character point awards rather than experience points. Succeeding in goals helps, but killing things and taking their stuff does not.
• The status of valuable trouble magnets – they’re rare and find trouble everywhere they go.
• A +3 bonus on five skills which suit their backgrounds and training. Sadly, this cannot be applied to active magical skills.
• Extra hit points equal to [12 + (2 x Con Mod)].
• Two minor special talents. For the full list see the Template, for Rockhoof we’ll take Might (a +2 bonus to his Strength) and Enduring (providing him with a +1 bonus on his Saves).

To summarize the Basic Pony Modifiers:

• Quadruped. In general ponies are slow and have trouble moving while using tools or weapons.
• Attribute Modifiers: -2 Dex, +2 Con. An additional +2 Con and +2 Chr are dispellable magical bonuses.
• Damage Reduction 9/- versus both Physical and Energy Attacks, only DR 2/- versus melee attacks by living creatures.
• Endure Elements. Ponies pretty much ignore the weather.
• Ponies heal 1d8+1 damage per round for a round three times per day.
• Ponies are always treated as having lots of pockets, even in the nude.
• Ponies get minor cartoon effects, such as hair that responds to moods, blushing through fur, and so on.
• Ponies may begin or participate in spontaneously choreographed musical numbers that provide bonuses for group tasks.
• Have a base pool of 1d6+3 Mana, regaining 1d6 with an hours rest up to three times a day and 1-2 points per day regardless.
• Get a +2 Racial Bonus to Perform/Sing

To Summarize the Earth Pony Modifiers:

• Mana-Powered Berserker (+8 Str) with no fatigue. In effect, an Earth Pony with a Con of 14+ (their average) can run a continuous +8 bonus to their Strength.
• Nature Sense (very vague save for items related to agriculture).
• +4 to resist bull rushes and knockdowns
• Pays half price for Rune Magic (Homesteading) Casting and Mastery, Knowledge/Nature, and Survival. (Yes, Homesteading Magic covers digging ditches, plowing fields, and so on via magic. Some appropriate spells for use with Homesteading Magic can be found under Hedge Magic – such as Plow and The Laborer’s Word). These skills also receive a +3 Racial Bonus.
• Immunity to Fatigue and Exhaustion.
• A +3 bonus on any one hoof-based Martial Art.

Basic Attributes: Str 16 (+18 Ber +2 Knack = 36), Dex 16 (-2 Pony = 14), Con 14 (+2 Pony, +2 M = 18), Int 10, Wis 10, Cha 10 (+2 M = 12). (Pathfinder 25-point point buy).

Available Character Points: 48 (L1 Base ) + 6 (Disadvantages; History and Obligations (Pillar of Equestria)) +2 (Duties to his Village – or to wherever he adopts now) +6 (level one bonus feat) = 62 CP. Rockhoof started off Blocked – unable to spend Mana on anything but Rune Magic – so he couldn’t use his Berserker strength boost, making him pretty feeble in comparison to other Earth Ponies. But then in a desperate situation, he spent his last four character points buying that limitation off at a dramatic moment, thus activating his strength enhancement, innate enchantments, and four-color reality editing.

Basic Abilities (29 CP):

• Hit Dice: 12 (L1d12, 8 CP) +20 (12 + 2 x Con Mod Template) +4 (1 x Con Mod) = 36 HP.
• Skill Points: 12 (Purchased, 12 CP) + 0 (Int) = 12 SP

Skills:

• Acrobatics: +1 (1 SP) +2 (Dex) +3 (Tem) = +7 (Jump +45).
• Profession/Farmer +1 (1 SP) +0 (Wis) +3 (Tem) = +4 (Includes making basic farm tools, such as replacement shovels – since he’s specifically noted as having had his destroyed many times).
• Knowledge/Nature +2 (1* SP) +3 (Race) +0 (Int) = +5
• Survival +2 (1* SP) +3 (Race) +0 (Wis) +3 (Tem) = +8
• Homesteading Rune Magic Casting 4 (2* SP) +3 (Race) +1 (Cha) = +8
• Homesteading Rune Magic Mastery 4 (2* SP) +3 (Race) +1 (Cha) = +8
• Martial Art / Jade Mountain Stance Style: 4 (SP) +3 (Race) +13 (Str) +3 (Tem) = +23.
• Perform (Sing) +0 (0 SP) +2 (Race) +1 (Cha) -3 (Tem, Unskilled) = +0

The Jade Mountain Stance Style (Str):

• Requires: Hooves
• Basic Techniques: Attack 2, Power 3, Strike, and Toughness 4.
• Advanced Techniques: Breaking, Combat Reflexes, Improved Disarm, and Weapon Kata (Any one simple weapon or farming implement, with a preference towards pruning hooks, shovels, hand axes, and similar items).
• Occult Techniques: Healing Hand, Inner Strength, Ki Focus (Str), and Focused Blow.

Known Techniques (12): Attack 1, Power 1, Strike, Toughness 4, Breaking, Combat Reflexes, Weapon Kata (Shovel), Healing Hand and Inner Strength.

• BAB +1, Specialized /Ranged Combat Only, Corrupted/Throwing stuff with shovel only (2 CP).
• Saves:
  • Fortitude +0 (0 CP) +4 (Con) +1 (Tem) = +5
  • Reflex +2 (6 CP) +2 (Dex) +1 (Tem) = +5
  • Will +0 (0 CP) +0 (Wis) +1 (Tem) = +1
• Proficiencies: Earth Pony Reinforced Shovels (1 CP).
• Initiative: +2 (Dex)
• Move: 40 (four legs) +30 (Light Foot) +30 (Haste),= 100 (50 on two or three legs).
• Armor Class: 10 (Base) + 2 (Dex) +4 (Shimmermail) = 16

Usual Weapons:

• Unarmed: +14/+14 (+13 Str +1 Martial Art, Personal Haste), for 1d6+13, Crit 20/x2, lethal or nonlethal. 3 Attacks of Opportunity, see “Concussive Parry” below.
• Shovel: +14/+14 (+13 Str +1 Martial Art, Personal Haste), for 1d8+13, Crit19-20/x2, lethal or nonlethal, B or S, Trip, usable as a shovel. 3 Attacks of Opportunity, see “Concussive Parry” below.

New Weapon (Pathfinder Design System): Earth Pony Reinforced Shovel. Simple, One-Handed (mouthed), Melee Weapon (6 Design Points), Additional Design Points (+1 Point, +15 GP. Earth Pony shovels need to be heavily reinforced to stand up to earth pony strength), B or S damage (1 Point), Improved Critical Threat Range (19-20, 3 Points), Improved Damage II (2 Points), Tool (Shovel, 0 Points), Special Feature (Trip, 1 Point). Net Result: Simple Weapon, Medium-Sized. Damage 1d6, Crit 19-20/x2, inflicts B or S damage, Trip Weapon, freely usable as a shovel, 20 GP.

• Shovel-Thrown Rocks: +4/+4/+4 (+2 Dex +3 Competence -1 Rocks), 1d6+13, Crit 20/x3, Range Increment 80′. He’ll probably want to learn Finesse to base this on Str instead later on.

Other Abilities (33 CP):

• Add Odinpower and Odinmight to his basic Berserker ability, for a total of +18 strength (+6 CP).
• DR 2/-, versus both physical and energy attacks (3 CP).
• Upgrade his racial Mana Pool with a form of Natural Magic (Reality Editing), Specialized and Corrupted for Increased Effect / only to support the user’s heroic narrative and let the user’s abilities function without normal scaling restrictions (2 CP). This is great for engineering and digging massive trenches, but so-so otherwise.
• Concussive Parry: Opportunist (6 CP): Rockhoof may make an attack of opportunity against any attack that enters his threatened area. If his attack roll exceeds that of the attacker he can subtract the damage he “inflicts” on the attack from the damage IT would normally inflict, reducing it to a minimum of zero. If this completely negates the damage from an attack, it also negates any other effects it might have, such as requiring a saving throw.
  • This is a powerful defense, but this IS a superheroic setting, so why not? In other settings it might get defined as an Inherent Spell to limit it’s uses – but a superhero will just fuel it with mana and get exactly the same result anyway.
• Reflex Training: Can spend Mana to maintain his “Berserker” strength enhancement and his Innate Enchantments without it requiring an action of any kind – even while asleep or unconscious. Corrupted for Reduced Cost / he must do so as long as he has Mana available. (4 CP).
• Innate Enchantment, Specialized for Increased Effect (effects are considered extraordinary abilities and cost no experience to acquire) / Requires two mana to activate for one minute. Is blatantly obvious in operation since he bulks up a lot (11,310 GP Value, 12 CP).
  • Lob (L1: The user may hurl three items at his or her full BAB and with no need for getting out or loading ammunition or for a physical weapon (or proficiency therewith). This is otherwise treated as if the user was using a medium-sized Halfling Staff Sling. Only while wielding a shovel (x.8), only for throwing rocks (x.8) = 1280 GP.
    • In general: 1d6+Str Mod bludgeoning damage and a -1 to hit for using rocks instead of bullets, Crit 20/x4, Range Increment 80 feet, requires a normal roll to hit. In combination with his Reality Editing he could also throw lots of dirt and junk to make clouds of dust and difficult terrain if he wanted to.
  • (Weapon) Mastery (Halfling Sling Staff, Cantrip): +3 Competence Bonus to BAB with a Halfling Sling Staff (or magical simulation thereof). x.7 Personal-Only (700 GP).
  • Thousand Pound Stance (Target gains a +8 versus Bull Rush, Grapple, Trip, Overrun, being lifted or thrown, or similar situations, for one minute. x .7 Personal Only = 1400 GP). Note that this changes the -4 Penalty for Light Foot to a +4 Bonus.
  • Resist Energy (Provides resistance 10 to all energies), x.7 Personal-Only = 1400 GP
  • Personal Haste: User gains a +30′ enhancement bonus on all movement rates and +1 attack at his or her full BAB when making a full attack (2000 GP).
  • Light Foot: User becomes very light, gaining a +30 circumstance bonus on his or her ground movement spee and, a +10 circumstance bonus on jump checks, as well as DR 10 versus Falling Damage [only]. The user is, however, considered one size category smaller in a Bull Rush, Grapple, Trip, or Overrun situation. x .7 Personal Only = 1400 GP.
  • Heroic Will: Protection From Evil, Personal Only (x.7), 3/Day Only (x.6), Only when the GM feels that the user is being compelled to do something against their personal code or otherwise is likely to summon a mighty surge of will to throw off possession/mind control/etc (x.25) = 210 GP.
  • Heroic Rally: Remove Fear, 2/Day Only (x.4), user must make an adequate inspiring speech (x.6) = 480 GP.
  • Coincidental Catch: Feather Fall, 2/Day Only (x.4), activates automatically (x1.5), but only works 50% of the time (x.4) = 480 GP. When a hero falls off a roof or gets dropped, there is a substantial chance that SOMETHING will happen to break his or her fall.
  • Heroic Health: Relieve Illness (from the Hedge Wizardry spell list) 1/Day (x.2), Personal Only (x.7) = 280 GP. Relieve Poison (from the Hedge Wizardry spell list) 1/Day (x.2), Personal Only (x.7) = 280 GP, Lesser Restoration 2/Day (x.4), Personal Only (x.7) = 560 GP. Fast Healing I (from The Practical Enchanter, for 18 rounds, 2/Day (x.4), Personal Only (x.7)) = 560 GP.

To summarize his various defenses, he can attempt to parry incoming attacks. If he’s still hit, he has DR 6/- versus physical attacks, DR 16 versus Falling Damage, and Energy Resistance (All) 12. If damage still gets through, two points of any melee damage inflicted by a sentient being and nine points of any other damage is converted to nonlethal damage.

Rockhoof really doesn’t need a high level. Being a fairly generic good guy and using the constant flow of mana provided by the superheroic world template to fuel strength, durability, and being able to swiftly accomplish huge amounts of work makes him about the most classical type of superhero there is. He’d still be pretty dangerous in a standard game – but he’d need to spend some levels on buying mana and the ability to quickly recover it to fuel his abilities with, which would make him a fairly powerful warrior, but not a superhero.

Faster than a speeding pegasus! More powerful than an avalanche! Able to leap small hills in a single bound! Look! Up on the mountain! It’s Rockhoof!

Ponies Of The Eclipse – Starswirl The Bearded

And for today we have a special request from Alzrius…

Star Swirl The Bearded. Pillar of Sorcery. A pony who invented more spells than anyone else in history.

So what do we know about his various abilities? He…

1. Is stated to be “the father of the amniomorphic spell”. While this implies that it’s a thing that he invented but left to others to develop fully, all we really know about the spell is that it might be a pun. (Amnio = Pot, Morph = Shaping, ergo “pot shaper” – making Starswirl the Bearded a Hairy Potter).
2. Created a Dimensional Travel spell and device that apparently risks destroying the world if overused. Putting it into a mirror with very limited access apparently helped, but still made quite a mess later – at least until Twilight fiddled with it.
3. Created a Destiny Switching spell that really messes up peoples lives and needed revising by someone who understood what they were doing to work properly. It MIGHT have been designed to combine ponies powers or to allow him to ascend into alicornhood or for any of several other things. Who knows?
4. Created a Time Travel spell that was very limited use, apparently only caused closed casual loops, and which didn’t work very well. It was left to Starlight Shimmer to turn it into something more useful.
5. Dumped the Sirens into another world for the people there to deal with. This has been shown in two versions – one involving several unsuccessful musical battles against the Sirens, the other apparently simply using his dimensional portal spell. In either case, it made a lot of trouble later.
6. Is stated to be more powerful than Twilight – although how they’re measuring “power” is never defined.
7. Generated a pretty good shield bubble, although the Pony Of Shadows seemed to readily shatter it.
8. Taught various students. Whether or not he taught them WELL is quite another question.
9. Was an arrogant insensitive jerk and really messed things up with Stygian.
10. May have moved the sun and/or moon (there are some serious problems with the accounts), but this too apparently did not go very well.
11. Used a candle to light the way in a cavern. Why he didn’t just make magical light is unknown. Even presuming that it was early in his career… making light seems to be a basic part of being a Unicorn.
12. Apparently managed to turn the Changelings loose by monkeying with things that he should have left alone (something of a personal theme there).
13. Apparently became friends with Scorpan (despite not really understanding friendship). That’s a bit weird, but maybe they had some mutual hobbies or something.
14. He probably had a high constitution, since he seemed pretty enduring and didn’t seem to slow down much with age.

Secondarily…

1. Given that Twilight is a fan and that Starswirl made a lot of spells, it wouldn’t be too unreasonable to guess that some of the spells she’s studied were his creations. So he might have made one or more of the Mustache, Musical Breeze, or other minor spells that she’s learned. Sadly, we’ve no further evidence on this front – and even if we did, it’s not like most of those are fabulously impressive spells. Perhaps they were early efforts?
2. Twilight Sparkle stated that “everypony knows that Star Swirl was an expert at everything from transfiguration, [to] dimensional calibration, [and] teleportation”. On the other hand, most ponies have never heard of Starswirl, so this goes wrong in the first two words. Given that Starswirl is a legendary figure and that Twilight is a blatant fan, this statement needs to be regarded with some skepticism.
3. In Princess Twilight Sparkle and the Forgotten Books of Autumn (a decidedly secondary source), Moon Dancer mentions the spell “Star Swirl’s Seven Safeguards”. Perhaps he felt a need for a lot of safety precautions? Of course, we’re never told what this spell did or if it worked properly. It could have been pretty much any set of defensive spells.

So… Starswirl The Bearded. Amazingly powerful magical genius? Or sloppy jerk of a magician who consistently fouls everything up? Perhaps both? After all, they’re hardly mutually exclusive – and there is something that connects them. We are explicitly told that Starswirl never understood friendship. And isn’t “Friendship is Magic” a bit of a theme on the show?

In Equestria, failing to understand Friendship is failing to understand Magic.

And with that we have consistency; Starswirl had experience. He had raw power. He had intelligence. He was experimentative and inventive – but he was a solitary medieval-style wizard. He used rules-of-thumb, ill-understood and unconnected theorems (some doubtless quite wrong), and intuitive leaps to design his spells – so it’s not surprising that his forays into designing major spells had considerable problems. It’s the same reason why so many cathedrals collapsed (often more than once) while they were being built; the architects were trying to scale up from smaller buildings by rule-of-thumb, rather than really knowing what they were doing.

So:

Starswirl The Bearded.

ECL 7 (including +1 ECL racial template) Unicorn Pony Sorcerer.

Starswirl was unlucky. While he was born with an enormous well of magical power, it was actually too much; it overwhelmed the instinctual spells that Unicorns usually had available and left him unable to do anything EXCEPT have wild surges long past his early childhood. As a foal, Starswirl was forced to study magic intensively, and explore exotic methods of casting spells, simply to keep up with other Unicorn foals and get some use out of his power. Still, while he wound up socially isolated, that intensive focus allowed him to eventually learn to harness his raw power – and to channel it into an ever-expanding array of powerful effects, far beyond what any normal unicorn could ever be expected to master.

As an adult, Starswirl found himself respected, but still isolated and without friends. Worse, his somewhat erratic greater abilities often frightened those around him. Unsurprisingly, he took to wandering – exploring foreign lands, meeting people that he hadn’t frightened, seeking out ever more exotic magic, and cultivating his power.

He would return to Equestria more than a century and a half later, to find the population arguing and the realm under siege by various perils. He helped move the sun and moon, took apprentices, taught a youthful Celestia and Luna, and eventually passed on his celestial duties to them – and when they took charge took to wandering the land helping to drive back the monsters. He would eventually be recruited by Stygian as one of the Pillars of Equestria – but his old inability to deal with people fouled up that relationship as well, leading to him and the other pillars being quite unnecessarily trapped for somewhat more than a thousand years (timekeeping was sort of difficult while Discord was in charge: various accounts place the duration of his reign at anywhere from “about an hour” to “several thousand years”. He apparently saw no need for the passage of time to be at all consistent).

To summarize the low-level adventurer template, those affected get:

• A -3 penalty on unskilled skill checks.
• Very slow level advancement, by direct session-based character point awards rather than experience points. Succeeding in goals helps, but killing things and taking their stuff does not.
• The status of valuable trouble magnets – they’re rare and find trouble everywhere they go.
• A +3 bonus on five skills which suit their backgrounds and training. Sadly, this cannot be applied to active magical skills.
• Extra hit points equal to [12 + (2 x Con Mod)].
• Two minor special talents. For the full list see the Template, for Starswirl we’ll take Evasive (a +2 bonus to his AC) and Enduring (providing him with a +1 bonus on his Saves).

To summarize the Basic Pony Modifiers:

• Quadruped. In general ponies are slow and have trouble moving while using tools or weapons.
• Attribute Modifiers: -2 Dex, +2 Con. An additional +2 Con and +2 Chr are dispellable magical bonuses.
• Damage Reduction 9/- versus both Physical and Energy Attacks, only DR 2/- versus melee attacks by living creatures.
• Endure Elements. Ponies pretty much ignore the weather.
• Ponies heal 1d8+1 damage per round three times per day.
• Ponies are always treated as having lots of pockets, even in the nude.
• Ponies get minor cartoon effects, such as hair that responds to moods, blushing through fur, and so on.
• Ponies may begin or participate in spontaneously choreographed musical numbers that provide bonuses for group tasks.
• Have a base pool of 1d6+3 Mana, regaining 1d6 with an hours rest up to three times a day and 1-2 points per day regardless.
• Get a +2 Racial Bonus to Perform/Sing

Here we have a small problem: a Basic Pony’s Mana is “Specialized/only usable with innate racial talents” and “Corrupted/no natural magic option”. The Unicorn Template buys off the Corruption, but Starswirl needs to be able to use his Mana with learned abilities – so he needs to replace that racial specialization with with Corrupted / Only usable for Spell Enhancement” at a net cost of 2 CP.

To Summarize The Unicorn Subrace Modifiers:

• Occult Talent provides their usual minor spellcasting – but in Starswirls case this is Blocked.
• Immunity/Being unable to Concentrate on more than one thing at a time (covering up to three tasks and/or spells of up to level three at any one time).
• Upgrade their basic Mana supply with the Spell Enhancement Natural Magic option.
• Metamagic: Amplify / Only applies to Occult Talent abilities.

This is another item that needs upgrading. In Starswirls case it needs to apply to both his Path Of The Dragon effects and Inherent Spell – but since he’s taking them to build his own magic system that’s allowable. It will, however, cost another 4 CP.

• A +2 Racial Bonus to Knowledge/Arcana (2 CP).
• +2 Intelligence/-2 Strength.
• One Bonus Feat.
• Executive, Corrupted for Increased Effect (add the user’s Int Mod to his or her effective level of use)/requires 2 Mana/hour to power. Unicorns are good at coordinating groups, and can provide substantial bonuses.

Basic Attributes: Str 8 (-2 Unicorn = 6), Dex 12 (-2 Pony = 10), Con 18 (+2 Level +4 Pony = 24), Int 16 (+2 Unicorn +2 Age = 20), Wis 10 (+2 Age = 12), Chr 8 (+2 Pony +2 Age = 12). (Pathfinder 25 Point Buy).

Starwswirl is Old, even with his extended lifespan. He thus would normally suffer –3 to Str, Dex, and Con while gaining a +2 to Int, Wis, and Cha. Fortunately for him, he is capable of casting Greater Age Resistance daily – effectively negating his aging penalties.

Available Character Points: 168 (Level Six Base) +10 (Disadvantages: Incompetent (-3 on all Social Skills), History, and Blocked (Starswirl does not get the usual innate Unicorn spells; he had to develop them), Compulsive (defender of Equestria)) +30 (Unicorn and L1, L3, L5, and L7 Bonus Feats) = 208 CP.

Basic Abilities (95 CP):

• Hit Dice: 12 (L1d12, 8 CP) +29 (L2-L6d6, 10 CP) +26 (12 + 2 x Con Mod Template) +49 (7 x Com Mod) = 116 HP.
• Skill Points: 17 (Purchased, 17 CP) + 45 (Int) + 18 (Fast Learner) = 80 SP
• BAB +3 (18 CP), +2 BAB Specialized (only with spells and rays, 6 CP).
• Saves:
  • Fortitude +4 (12 CP) +7 (Con) +1 (Tem) = +12
  • Reflex +3 (9 CP) +0 (Dex) +1 (Tem) = +4
  • Will +3 (9 CP) +1 (Wis) +1 (Tem) = +5
• Proficiencies: Light Armor (3 CP) and Simple Weapons (3 CP).
• Initiative: +0 (Dex)
• Move: 40 (four legs, 20 on three or less).
• Armor Class: 10 (Base) + 0 (Dex) +2 (Tem) +4 (Armor; Chain Shirt Equivalent) +3 (Martial Art) = 19

Normally I’d note some of his usual attacks here – but Starswirl is very much a primary caster, so they really don’t matter much.

Other Abilities (113 CP):

• Racial Ability Upgrades (Noted Above, 6 CP).
• Block (Arcane) with Master (DC reduced to 15) (12 CP):
• Fast Learner, Specialized in Skills for +2 SP/Level (6 CP).
• Luck with +4 Bonus Uses, Specialized in Saving Throws (6 CP).
• Adept (6 CP): Half Price for Craft (Alchemy), a Ray Mastery Martial Art, Spellcraft, and Survival.
• Adept (6 CP): Half Price for Knowledge/Arcana, Geography, History, and the Planes.

Skills:

• Craft (Alchemy)+9 (4 SP*) +5 (Int) +3 (Tem) = +17
• Heal +4 (4 SP) +1 (Wis) = +5.
• Intimidate +3 (3 SP) +1 (Cha) -3 (Incompetent) = +1
• Knowledge/Arcana +9 (4 SP*) +5 (Int) +3 (Tem) = +17
• Knowledge/Geography+9 (4 SP*) +5 (Int) = +14
• Knowledge/History+9 (4 SP*) +5 (Int) +3 (Tem) = +17
• Knowledge/Nature +9 (9 SP) +5 (Int) = +14
• Knowledge/The Planes+9 (4 SP*) +5 (Int) = +14
• Linguistics +9 (9 SP) +5 (Int) = +14
• Perception +9 (9 SP) +1 (Wis) = +10
• Perform (Singing) +5 (5 SP) +1 (Cha) +2 (Pony) -3 (Incompetent) = +5
• Profession (Sailor) +4 (4 SP) +1 (Wis) = +5
• Ray Master+9 (4 SP*) +5 (Int) +3 (Tem) = +17
• Spellcraft+9 (4 SP*) +5 (Int) +2 (Unicorn) +3 (Tem) +2 (Syn) = +21
• Survival+9 (4 SP*) +1 (Wis)
  • Specific Knowledges: Equestria In The Pre-Discordian Era (1 SP), Races Of The Pre-Discordian Era (1 SP).
  • +3 Skill Specialties: Spellcraft/Spell Research (1 SP), Spellcraft/Celestial Manipulation (1 SP), Knowledge/Arcana/Exotic Magical Systems (1 SP).
  • Martial Arts Abilities (9): Attack +2, Defenses +3, Synergy/Spellcraft, Mind LIke Moon, Inner Strength, and Healing Hand. Starswirl isn’t much of a healer, but in an emergency he can do a bit of it. It is extremely draining if he does too much though.

This comes to 80 skill points.

• Occult Contacts x 3 (Celestia, Luna, Scorpan, 6 CP). Starswirl may be a cranky old man, and has had is arguments with all three of these folks – but they know him, will listen to him, and generally feel that he’s owed something. Note that, if Scorpan is no longer around, Starswirl will soon pick up a new powerful contact – most likely Twilight Sparkle.
• Privilege: Crown Stipend (3 CP). Starswirl is effectively retired, and his (reasonable) expenses are covered by the Equestrian Crown.
• Create Artifact (6 CP). Starswirl is capable of creating potent magical devices, but it usually involves quests and enormous amounts of trouble.
• Mystic Link with Communications, Specialized and Corrupted/his notes and journals automatically record a great deal of information about his adventures, notes on his various spells, and other information. Even when he has little time to update them, they are generally quite complete. Sadly, there is no direct communication, they tend to require extensive study to decipher, and important bits may be scattered all over the place – although as long as any fragment of his journals survives, the rest can always be found and recovered (2 CP).
• Life Extension: Immunity / Age (Uncommon, Major, Minor, 4 CP). Starswirl has lived a great deal longer than the average pony, and has a good long time to go.
• Action Hero / Invention, Specialized and Corrupted for Triple Effect / only to invent spells, spells with base levels beyond what a Unicorn could use “naturally” (via Occult Talent) are invariably flawed – with dangerous environmental side effects, being partially uncontrollable, or other similar problems, spells are very difficult for others to study and learn (20 CP). At level six this means that he’s had a total of 510 action points to spend on creating spells.
• Shaping and Pulse Of The Dragon, both Specialized / only as prerequisites (6 CP).
• Heart Of The Dragon, may cast L0 and L1 spells (powered by Mana), Specialized and Corrupted / can only cast spells that he has personally researched (at a cost of 1 Action Point per L0 spell and 2 per L1 Spell), while he may use additional Mana to boost the effects as Unicorns usually do, each additional boosted spell in the sequence must also be researched – albeit as a L0 (if starting with a L0 effect) or L1 (if starting with a L1) effect (6 CP). As usual for a Unicorn, he needs to have his horn free to cast his spells.

Known Level Zero Spell Sequences (0-3 Mana, 4 AP per sequence, 13 sequences – 52 AP).

1. Message. (Boosted: L1) Enhance Backround Music, L2) Whispering Wind, L3) Gust of Wind).
2. Dancing Lights. (Boosted: L1) Light, L2) Scorching Ray, L3) Fireball).
3. Daze. (Boosted: L1) Daze Animal, L2) Daze Monster, L3) Daze 1d4 Monsters),
4. Detect Magic. (Boosted: L1) Identify, L2) Greater Detect Magic, L3) Witness).
5. Spellcraft Mastery (+3 competence bonus for ten minutes per level). (Boosted: L1) Ray Mastery (+3 Competence Bonus to hit with Rays for one minute/level), L2) Sidestep (+2 Competence B0nus to all Saves for 10 minutes/Level), L3) Celestial Intervention (+30 Competence Bonus to Spellcraft rolls to manipulate the heavens in realms where this is possible)
6. Moustache. (Boosted: L1) Disguise Self, L2) Disguise Other, L3) Adjustable Disguise).
7. Drench. (Boosted: L1) Hydraulic Push, L2) Flurry Of Snowballs, L3) Hydraulic Torrent).
8. Alter Scent. (Boosted: L1) Cleansing Sphere, L2) Instant Campsite, L3) Nauseating Trail.
9. Breeze. (Boosted: L1) Alter Winds, L2) Gusting Sphere, L3) Wind Wall).
10. Lullaby. (Boosted: L1) Sleep, L2) Calm Emotions, L3) Deep Slumber).
11. Virtue. (Boosted: L1) Phantom Blood, L2) Heroism, L3) False Life (Lasts up to one day).
12. Sift. (Boosted: L1 Detect Chaos, L2) See Invisibility, L3) Arcane Sight).
13. Dust Cloud, (Boosted: L1) Grease, L2) Glitterdust, L3 Ash Storm).

Known Level One Spell Sequences (1-4 Mana, 8 AP each, 9 Sequences = 72 AP):

1. Dispelling Touch (Boosted: L2) Dispelling Ray, L3) Dispel Magic, L4) Ruin Delvers Fortune).
2. Greater Mage Hand. (Boosted: L2) Telekinetic Volley, L3) Telekinetic Maneuver, L4) Mass Unseen Servant).
3. Obscuring Mist (Boosted: L2) Fog Cloud, L3) Stinking Cloud, L4) Hallucinogenic Smoke).
4. Benign Transposition (Boosted: (L2) Baleful Transposition, L3) Dimension Step, L4) Dimension Door)
5. Stand (Boosted: (L2) Dimension Hop, L3) Swipe (Pathfinder), L4) Dream Walk).
6. Wizard’s Pack (The Practical Enchanter) (Boosted: L2) Knights Move, L3) Blink, L4) Dimensional Anchor).
7. Barrier (Immediate Action, 5×5 Force Wall absorbs up to 20 damage, similar to Stone Shield). (Boosted: L2: Barrier Dome (As per Barrier, but protects a small group), L3) Greater Barrier Dome (as per Barrier Dome, but up to 40 damage), L4) Lesser Globe Of Invulnerability.
8. Magic Missile (Boosted: L2) Spiritual Weapon, L3) Force Punch, L4) Resilient Sphere).
9. Spell Focus (+3 to Caster Level for next spell), (Boosted: L2 Alchemical Tinkering, L3, Amplify Elixir, L4: Silent Arcane Concordance).

Starswirls Greater Magics are bought as Mana-Powered Inherent Spells. While these can be boosted as usual for Unicorn Ponies, each effect costs one mana per level of the effect (instead of 2 + 1 to 3 for boosts). must be researched at a cost of (2 AP per level of each spell in the sequence), and becomes unstable and dangerous once he exceeds what he can safely cast (ECL / 2, Rounded Up – currently 4). His Inherent Spells are thus considered Specialized.

Amniomorphic Magics (6 CP, 80 AP):

• Mana-Powered Inherent Spell I: L3) Cosmetic Shift (permanently alters minor details, such as hair color). (Boosted: L4) Elemental Body I, L5) Geniekind, L6) Sonic Form).
• Mana-Powered Inherent Spell II: L4) Aspect of the Wolf. (Boosted: L5) Baleful Polymorph, L6) Extended Polymorph (lasts 10 minutes/level), L7) Greater Age Resistance.

Dimensional Magics (12 CP, 192 AP):

• Mana-Powered Inherent Spell, Corrupted/costs 1 Mana per spell level, not just 2 (4 CP): L3) Dimensional Grotto (The Practical Enchanter, Spacewarp with the Supportive modifier). (Boosted: L4) Greater Blink (this version costs 1 extra Mana), L5) Teleport, L6) Baleful Teleport)
• Mana Powered Inherent Spell II, Corrupted/costs 1 Mana per spell level, not just 2 (4 CP): L4) Bard’s Escape (Pathfinder, costs +1 Mana). (Boosted:, L5) Precipitate Minor Breach, L6) Mass Planar Adaption (Pathfinder), L7) Greater Teleport).
• Mana Powered Inherent Spell III, Corrupted/costs 1 Mana per spell level, not just 2 (4 CP): L5) Plane Shift, (Boosted: L6: Tactical Teleportation, L7) Teleport Object, L8) Maze).
• Mana-Powered Inherent Spell IV: L6) Tides Of Time (Limited Time Travel; Creates Closed Casual Loops only), L7) Gravatic Sphere (60′ Radius), L8) Destiny Exchange (the cutie-mark exchange spell). L9) Time Stop.

Starswirls spell lists cost a total of 396 AP and contain some 112 spells. He has enough AP left to have created another 64 cantrips and additional 25 first level spells (albeit with no further boosted versions unless you buy him some more action points), for a total of 201 spells (“More than two hundred spells!”). It also contains a number of spells at the higher end that are beyond what he can safely control even if he didn’t have that limitation already built in – which makes them very likely to go wrong indeed. Personally, I’d assume that he has the full list of level zero and level one Hedge Magic spells, another 31 assorted Cantrips, and four more first level spells of choice.

Equipment: Equestria is normally considered to be a world of Literary Magic Items – allowing the use of Charms, Talismans, and Relics. Starswirl doesn’t seem to use any Relics – and Charms and Talismans are kind of redundant for him; he doesn’t need minor magical conveniences, he has an immense array of magical powers with no real usage limitation. A few bits of normal equipment (most notably the pony equivalent of a Chain Shift and various basic supplies) can be presumed, but Ponies usually aren’t too big on equipment either. I could make his Bells minor relics of some sort – perhaps they’re relics that provide protection from particular major threats – but there’s really nothing to justify it.

In Equestria, with the Superheroic World Template in play, Starswirl is on the boundary of demigodhood. Sure, his most potent spells cost him some of his personal Mana to cast (and so can’t be used very often even if they DID work reliably) – but he’s a powerful, experienced, superheroic mage. He’s not quite up to competing with Dr Strange, Dr Fate, the Dread Dormammu, Black Adam, or the superheroic versions of Merlin and Morgan Le Fey – but he’s definitely up there with Magick, Agatha Harkness, Mordred The Mystic, Shaman, Zatanna, and the other second-tier types. About all he needs is the four-color template and a couple more levels and he’d break into the top tier.

Without the Superheroic World Template this build really will not work unless you tack on three to five levels devoted to building up a nice big Mana Pool and lots of Rite Of Chi to recover it – at which point you have a rather specialized mage who mostly uses lower-end spells but who has access to a few higher-level and quite expensive spells in emergencies. That’s not even a particularly exotic build.

Prince Blueblood’s Aggravating Pony Overlord List Part I – The Throne Room

Today, in celebration and parody of Peter’s classic “Evil Overlord List“, here we have Prince Blueblood’s take on it – Part I of the Pony Overlord List.

1. I will not set myself up as a god. I am a cartoon pony and I am BETTER than that.
2. My Legions of Cuddly will have Pony Suits that completely conceal their faces, sexes, and all other identifiable details, complete with voice masks! As well as the necessary month-long training course in how to walk, function effectively, and ham it up while wearing one!
3. My ventilation ducts will be big enough to blow hurricanes into my rooms for dramatic cape-billowing effects – and my capes shall have breakaway safety clasps, so that they can easily be dramatically tossed aside to be carried away by said winds!
4. My virtuous and well-loved relative whose power I have usurped will be kept on as a figurehead and not told that I have taken over so that I can spend more time partying while they handle all of the boring stuff.
5. Shooting is excellent for my enemies! They shall be photographed in all their most exasperated and embarrassing moments and will be the subject of many snarky articles and skits on Saturday Night Live!
6. The Unicorn Horn which is the primary focus of my power shall be kept on top of my head, where it shall poke holes in hats!
7. I will gloat over my enemies lack of fashion sense before having them subjected to a celebrity roast on a major network!
8. When I’ve captured my adversary and he says, “Before you kill me, tell me what this is all about!” I shall say, “I thought you knew! I just do things! Get out there, brush off your inventiveness, and don’t come back until you’ve come up with an ingenious evil scheme explaining my actions that I can take credit for!”
9. After I kidnap the beautiful princess, I will take her to major parties and try to seduce her by showing her how sparkly my plans are! That gym membership, the toning exercises, the spa staff, and all the rest is oh so worth it!
10. All of my vehicles and structures will include a large, red, self-destruct button in an utterly obvious location! It will be clearly labeled “Self-Destruct! Do not push!”. When you push it, you will immediately find yourself smoking three cigarettes and wanting more, stuffing on butter, pasta, and sausage, drinking vodka, wanting to watch TV all day, and averse to exercise!
11. I shall interrogate my enemies by playing “Truth Or Dare” with them in my inner sanctum! Or, if they are all cute enough, Spin The Bottle! The embarrassment alone shall probably do them in!
12. You are rated on the greatness of your enemies! I will leave them as many clues, signs, and easy escapes as they need to make themselves look incredibly fortunate and competent at all times!
13. One of my advisors will be an average World Of Warcraft nerd! No plans will be implemented until he has ignored them for several weeks and then talked about how useless they are in killing bosses on TeamSpeak! By that time any obvious shortcomings have probably come up in the planning committee!
14. The hero may have my last drink and cigarette! If I’m down to the last, I need to go shopping while he’s consuming them!
15. All my equipment will have flickering digital countdowns, even if they mean nothing at all! They are extremely distracting to your enemies and have a wonderfully ominous effect!
16. I will always ask defeated enemies to fill out a customer satisfaction survey! I need to know which of my tactics is most annoying!
17. I will have lots of sons! And I shall indulge their plans to get fun stuff for parties as much as possible! Why be an Overlord at all if you are not going to take advantage of the privileges? Also, bring me canapes, brandy, and pretty young mares!
18. I will have lots of beautiful daughters! They will provide a reason for my wickedness, for how else will I be able to attract a sufficient supply of handsome heroes for them to marry?
19. I will indulge in maniacal laughter! Not only is it fun, but if you don’t give your opponents time to do something it will be boring!
20. I will hire a talented fashion designer and use her to deflect incoming cakes and pies! On the day that she comes up with something fashionable to do with them VICTORY WILL BECOME INEVITABLE!
21. If a power-granting energy field is bigger than my head, I shall see if it is also available commercially in a convenient pill or potion form!
22. I will keep a special cache of party supplies and train a Swedish bikini team in their use! That way, even if the heroes manage to sabotage my party cannon, a party can be airdropped in when a tab is pulled!
23. Whenever someone manages to damage my hair I shall cry “No! This CANNOT BE! My hairstyle is INVINCIBLE!”
24. All of my machinery shall be rube Goldberg contraptions, with only one safe spot to stand in when they are in operation OR blowing up! And I shall be standing there, like Leslie in The Great Pie Fight!
26. All prisoners shall be sent to my bedchamber! I used all the space for dungeons making my bedroom larger than most football stadiums anyway!
    (They can play hide-and-seek there, and maybe find my best robe; it’s been missing for MONTHS).
27. I will never build anything important! Hieronymus Machines are MUCH more reliable than actual mechanisms! And they frustrate those scientific hero types no end!
28. My pet monsters shall be kept under the bed and in the closet, so that they can leap out and cuddle people! No hero would ever harm a giant friendly fuzzy thing that wants to be petted no matter how encumbering it is to be snuggled!
29. I shall dress in nothing much, since I am a pony! But I will have roses to carry in my teeth and snack on occasionally!
30. All incompetent conjurers, bumbling squires, useless minstrels, and cowardly sleight-of-hoof artists in my realm will be recruited for the circus! They are a precious resource of entertainment and need jobs!
31. All foolish, young, big-chested, tavern girls in my realm will be required to attend sex education classes with all the other kids and will get free health care, including contraceptives, just like everybody else!
32. Any messengers who bring me bad news will face heated sarcasm which they will have to take back to the people who sent me such bad news in the first place instead of doing their jobs and FIXING THE PROBLEM! They will also get a good tip and a cell phone so that the news won’t have to wait while they come in person next time!
33. I won’t require high-ranking mares in my organization to wear anything at all! Ponies usually don’t! But if they want to, that’s their business! I’m not commenting on ANY females clothing unless invited, and even then only in the vaguest of positive terms!
34. I will turn SOMETHING or other into a snake! I’m sure it will help somehow! Perhaps with finding all the heroes who have gotten lost in the ventilation ducts…
35. I am not a goat. I will not grow a Goatee. Save it for Grogar.
36. My prison will have plenty of team-building, job-training, and morale building exercises! There’s no point in locking people up if they’re not going to be better people when they get out!
37. If my trusted lieutenant tells me that my Legions are losing to the heroes, I will immediately rebrand them as a delaying tactic and announce that everything is going just as I planned it!
38. If an enemy has a younger sibling or offspring anywhere I will find them and give them front-row tickets for any confrontation! And for the mecha battle that comes next! Kids love that sort of thing!
39. I will not ride into battle no matter who says that I must! It would be WEIRD!
40. I will be chivalrous, sporting, and obnoxious! If I have an unstoppable superweapon, I shall dismantle it carefully! After all, if it is unstoppable than I would eventually be one of its victims because once started it WILL NOT STOP!
41. Once my power is secure it will be very boring, so I shall build time travel devices to go back and compete with myself for dominion! After all, if I won already, I must be the best opponent around!
42. When I capture a hero, I will also ensure that I capture whatever cute animals or child sidekicks capable of opening doors, stealing keys, and cutting or chewing ropes, happen to be following him around! They are cute and cuddly and help attract the mares!
43. When I capture the beautiful rebel and she claims she is attracted to my power and good looks and will gladly betray her companions if I just let her in on my plans I will immediately let her participate in my plans for a really fun evening!
44. I will cheerfully employ bounty hunters who work for the fun of it. Why should I care if they’re mostly ineffectual when I’m not actually wasting resources on them anyway?
45. I will not bother keeping track of who is responsible for things in my organization. I change my mind all the time anyway.
46. If somebody says “What can one man do?” I shall say “Pretty much anything a million men can do; it will just take longer! Go back to advisor school!”
47. If I learn that a callow youth has begun a quest to destroy me, I shall wait until he grows up a bit and offer him a good job with better pay and health insurance. Youthful idealism wears thin pretty fast!
48. Any beast that’s working for me is getting paid accordingly, just like the rest of the staff! And it will just have to put up with me when I have a bad day, just like everyone else! Being an Overlord does come with SOME privileges after all!
49. If I learn the whereabouts of the one artifact that can destroy me, I shall promptly commission another counter-artifact, just like I did for the last fifty such artifacts!
50. My main computers will run on Windows. If they run on anything else they might as well be bricks; even I will never be able to hire enough staff who can properly use the things to get anything done!

The Iron Men of the Eclipse

Iron Man is another problem. Looking at the Marvel Wiki, he’s had more than fifty different suits of armor – eighty if you count what-if, alternate dimension, and other versions – most of them with many undefined capabilities and not a few of which were stored inside his body. There have been many different control systems, and some just turn him into a super-cyborg and are never “taken off”. Others go running around on their own or can be remotely controlled. And, of course, other people – like James Rhodes and Doctor Doom – have been “Iron Man”, not to mention all the alternate-dimension versions and the suits of armor he’s handed out to other characters.

So neither the armor, the wearer (if there even is one), nor the history are consistent. Iron Man isn’t a CHARACTER, he/she/it is a FRANCHISE.

So we’ll have to make some assumptions here.

We’re talking about Tony Stark. He’s a Superhero in a superheroic world, so the Superheroic World Template applies and he’ll be spending 24 CP on the Four Color Package. His four-color minor bonus is Immortal Vigor (for some extra hit points),

Now Tony does have some innate superhuman abilities.

• He’s super-intelligent.
• He gets bonuses on high-tech skills.
• He is unreasonably durable for a human (armor can’t protect you against g-forces and massive bodywide impacts; you just get crushed against the inside of it).
• He can produce high-tech gear with logically insufficient tools and materials, although he does need a workship of sorts.
• He can analyze technology with very little in the way of instruments or time.
• He can get absurd amounts of work done in very little time.
• Sometimes – through one means or another – he has cybrenetic telepathy.
• Sometimes (albeit certainly not always) he has regenerative powers.

OK, so it’s Inherent Spell I, II, and III (Group Skill Bonuses, Boosted Intelligence, a specialized version of Fabricate, for a total of 18 CP). He has some Damage Reduction (6 CP) worth, and an Occult Sense (6 CP) for how technology works. In much later adventures / at much higher levels he adds Inherent Spells IV and V to give him Cybrenetic Telepathy and Long-Term Regeneration – but our initial cost is 30 CP.

Next up, we have his Armor.

The really cheap way to build Iron Man (not unexpectedly) requires one of the few things on this site I’d call an exploit: You just take:

• Double Enthusiast, Specialized for Increased Effect (four floating CP) and Corrupted for Reduced Cost/: only to build “power armor”, can only be changed in a laboratory or machine shop (4 CP).
• Create Relic, Specialized in making Power Armor Only, Corrupted / requires the use of a lab, a machine shop, and various high-tech supplies (2 CP).

Now you basically build Warlocks package as a Relic.

• Arc Reactor Power Surge: Natural Magic(s): Reality Editing and Spell Enhancement, Specialized for Increased Effect and Corrupted for Reduced Cost / only to affect his innate enchantments / technological gear, only to amplify the effects, effects are fixed with each one of his abilities, only gets (Int Mod) boosts per system, effects are low mana cost but of brief duration; in effect (and to avoid assigning and then tracking a wide variety of durations) he simply gets to allot (Con Mod x 3) Booster Points between his various abilities each round (8 CP).
• Advanced Tech: Innate Enchantment can normally be used to buy the equivalent of mundane equipment – but it’s rarely worth bothering with in fantasy based games. With a 1-to-20 GP-to-Credits conversion ratio and both d20 Modern and Future in play however… mundane equipment is suddenly a LOT more attractive. Still, even superheroes don’t automatically have access to super-technology, so I’m going to treat having access to the d20 Future lists to “buy” stuff from as a an Immunity / normal limits on equipment availability (Very Common, Major, Great (for +4 Tech Levels over the usual PL4 base), Specialized and Corrupted / only for Innate Enchantment purposes, any systems that require ammunition or fuel must have it supplied by normal purchases, 10 CP).
• Innate Enchantment (up to 11,500 GP / 230,000 Credits base value), Specialized for Reduced Cost / the armor can be disabled or remote-manipulated by enemies, has an unstable AI which can run amuck, takes damage when the user is struck by a major attack (gradually degrading it’s systems) and especially powerful attacks can cause it to shut down entirely until rebooted (6 CP). This is how Warlocks power package works, and it’s a perfectly fine version to start with.

In any case, that’s 24 CP, making his armor a four-point relic – exactly what’s available.

Now, for each version of his armor… just buy necessary innate enchantments and modern / future gizmos. Pick the upgrades for when he channels more power into them, and you can build all the different suits of armor that you please.

And that lets you buy a decent suit of “Iron Man” armor as a single feat. Of course, if you allow this for one character… you’ll have to allow it for everybody. Now I’ve actually played in such a game – a long time ago under the old Marvel Super Hero rules – where Tony Stark (as an NPC) joined our group and made booster armor for every player character. Somehow it wound up evening out the randomly-rolled power differences between the characters a great deal. Tony was never any help otherwise though; he kept over-designing his own armor and having it stolen, or running amuck on it’s own, or otherwise becoming a part of the problem.

You don’t want to do that? Good for you; this is why this is labeled an Exploit. To create a much more reasonable method…

Iron Mans Armor is usually subject to one or more of the following limitations. Applying one counts as Corrupted two counts as Specialized, and applying all three counts as Corrupted and Specialized. While the same limitations apply to each power in a suit, the effects can differ – some powers may have increased effects, others will have reduced costs, others may have some of each.

• The armor is external, extremely obvious, and quite well known. It cannot be worn in normal social situations, and must be transported and donned before use, and occasionally runs short of power.
• The armor can be disabled or remote-manipulated by enemies and has an unstable AI which can run amuck.
• The armor takes damage when the user is struck by a major attack, gradually degrading it’s systems. Especially powerful attacks can cause it to shut down entirely until rebooted.

Each power in the armor can be affected by these restrictions differently, resulting in a vary large number of possible armors. Early versions – while Tony was lower level and had fewer points to invest in his armor – mostly used Reduced Cost, resulting in weaker armor. Later versions usually went for increased effect, although this seemed to hit an upper limit somewhat below characters like Thor or the Hulk. The very latest versions seem to have gone for dropping the “external” limitation – making it slightly weaker and more expensive (thus sopping up the points that come with an increase in level) and making Tony into a cyborg rather than a power armor user.

Personally I think that loses a lot of what makes Iron Man Iron Man, but I suppose that – after more than fifty years of appearances – a change-up is pretty inevitable.

To make things fully modular, the points come from Double Enthusiast, Specialized and Corrupted for Increased Effect (6 CP per incidence), Points are only usable to buy armor functions, can only be changed given time in a workshop or lab given hours, days, or weeks to work (depending on the extent of the changes being made). Since this means that the maximum cost of any given function is 6 CP, the armor has upper limits – which is why Tony has never been able to do more than delay Marvel’s upper-level powerhouses.

Over the years, as Tony has gone up in level… he’s bought more incidences of Double Enthusiast – allowing him to add more functions and to go for “Increased Effect” as opposed to “reduced cost”. Thus early versions were relatively weak and had few special functions, while later versions were more powerful and versatile.

The usual list of armor functions includes:

• Damage Reduction. Iron Man usually isn’t all that hard to hit (if he was, he couldn’t show off his mighty armor), so his defenses are best represented by Damage Reduction.
• Flight. This is usually fairly high speed, but the Four Color Template handles that.
• Superhuman Strength. While on the high side, this never really reaches the level of the major “strength” characters – if only so as to leave them something to do.
• Concussive Energy Blasts. These are probably at about the 10d6 level, since they usually seem pretty comparable to everyone else’s default powers.
• A “unibeam” – originally a very bright floodlight/spotlight//laser, now occasionally used for almost anything.
• Universal Energy Resistance (most often the Dragonstar variant that includes Life Support, b ut if it’s less stressed in this version Air Bubble can go in the Innate Enchantment, below)).
• Navigation, communication, sensory enhancement/protection, and related electronic functions. Honestly, on this stuff… I’d just go for a bit of Innate Enchantment and given him the equivalent of a smartphone, GPS, nightvision/flash goggles, sound suppressor earphones, and similar junk. It’s all cheap enough that a point or two should do it.
• Most external suits also have some “theme” – deep space operations, stealth, or whatever – and a few special functions for it. Quite a few of the modern ones come with a cloaking system as well – basically invisibility, if usually only versus electronic sensors. Self-repair is kind of optional given that damage to the suit is basically a special effect – but it can easily be quantified if you wish.

Most of this can be covered by Mana-Powered Inherent Spells (I-III usually) and a bit of Reflex Training to let him activate more than one personal-enhancement effects at a time. That, of course, means that it will often take several rounds to fully don / activate the armor from scratch – although functions will come online as they are powered up. That too works nicely with the usual portrayal in the comic books.

To buy all this at current levels… we’ll want at least 10 instances of Double Enthusiast (60 CP), that Reflex Training (6 CP), a bit of a Mana Pool for emergencies to represent the ARC reactor reserve (12 CP plus recharging with Rite of Chi and Bonus Uses only for that, 6 CP), At earlier levels? It’s slower to put on (dump the reflex training), he has no special power reserve, and he has a LOT fewer points invested – possibly as few as ten to twelve. His Mark I suit will be weak and primitive, but it will cover everything it needed to.

As for the rest of his points… some knowledges and technical skills (adept and fast learner will help), hit dice, privileges, favors, and connections, and – as TommyNihil suggested – the “Mad Science” version of Occult Ritual.

Iron Man won’t actually have the raw power of many characters of similar level, but there is something to be said for enormous versatility.

There aren’t that many “Iron Man” style characters on the blog – most of them are more “fantasy” themed – but there is Doctor Wrath and Tomonoko (“Tomo”) Sayuki, both Power-Armor types. There are several cyborgs and a couple of mecha pilots too, but those don’t really fit the theme as well. There’s Jarvain Michell and his Mecha, Gar Ashwood, a Pathfinder/Dragonstar Soulmech Gunslinger-Detective, Jamie Wolfe – a MLELF Cyborg Super-Soldier, Kristin Stanwell. A cyborg firearms expert, the various How to build Terminators (Basic Builds, Power Sources, Explosions, and Robot Buddies), Garm, and Adam, Praetorian Nightmare: a melee death-machine nightmare for entire high-level parties.

And I hope that helps!