DIY 30 #7: Magic of the Star Elves

... or just a taste of the magic, really. I can't go revealing everything to my players on this blog!

But Ikasha is a member of the party of characters adventuring in my Greyhame Game, and she is a Star Elf, clad in a body of flesh fashioned for her by the Goblin King before his demise; and so Ikasha knows a few of the spells of the stars, which I will describe here.
I will note that magic-users are not able to just "come by" these spells as they level up--they must find some means of learning them in-game, perhaps through communication with Star Elves and then spell research, or perhaps through an ancient spellbook secreted away in a dungeon somewhere ...


Cloak of Dust
level 1
range: the caster
duration: permanent until dispelled
A spell used by Star Elves to form a corporeal body for themselves out of star dust. If used in this way, the body has from 1-8 hit points which act as "temporary hit points" for the Star Elf and will be "used up" first. Once the body's hit points are diminished to 0, the body crumbles away, revealing the luminous semi-ethereal body of the Star Elf.
May also be used as "armor" for the caster. This "armor" of dust grants AC 3; the first time the caster is struck in combat, this AC is reduced to 5; after the next hit, AC is reduced to 7; after the next hit, the dust is fully dispersed and the spell dispelled.


Starfires
level 1
range 240', 20' radius
(inspired by a similar spell from Master of Magic)
By means of this spell, the caster throws a portion of the cold fires of the stars against her undead enemies. It will destroy 2-16 hit dice of undead of up to 4 HD, and cause 1-6 damage to any undead of higher HD caught within its radius.


Shine
level 2
range: caster
duration 1 round + 1/level of caster
This spell causes the caster to shine with the brightness of a star.
All who look directly at the shining caster are blinded for 2-5 rounds (at -4 "to hit" and a penalty of +4 to AC); a save versus spells prevents this blindness.
Those who attack the caster but turn their gaze to avoid the brightness attack at -2 to hit, but save against blindness at +2.


Irradiate
level 2
range 240', one object or creature
The target of this spell receives a large dose of radiation. For living creatures, this means 2-12 radiation damage. A save versus death rays will reduce the damage to 1-6.
This is a potentially lethal dose--from 5-12 radiation damage itself forces a save versus poison to avoid immediate incapacitating nausea, and a save versus poison at the end of the session to avoid death.

DIY 30 #6: Star Elves

In the depths of space, strange things lurk, things alien and inscrutable to man. When the stars themselves were singing over the world, singing for their lost child, the players in my Greyhame Game came into contact with just a few of these bizarre entities; meanwhile the townsfolk of Brakeridge and its surround were threatened by the slavers of the Star Beasts, who descended in their black ships to carry men and women away to the stars.

But the Star Beasts in their black ships are not the only dwellers in the vast abysses. Shining in the depths, singing their eerie songs, sailing on the solar winds that blow ethereally across the void are luminous beings without body--the Star Elves. Not truly Elves, nevertheless of all terrestrial races they resemble Elves the most, and their language is rooted in the same starsong that sounded over the world when the Elves first stepped down under starlight.

One such of this race of star-beings walks the earth now, clad in flesh and accompanying the Greyhame characters. Ikasha is her name, and she looks like this (of course):

She was lured down from the solar winds by the ancient magic of the Lord of Werewolves, and given a body of flesh by the Goblin King, and then was held in the dungeons of the Greyhame Mountain as the Goblin King and Lord of Werewolves attempted to negotiate some kind of alliance with the star-things. But the stars and the other Star Elves were uninterested in anything terrestrial creatures might attempt to offer them; they only wanted their child back, and so the stars began to sing above the world, calling for her (but she couldn't return to them!) and slowly approaching the world ....

But the characters rescued her from the dungeons beneath the Howling Tower (I don't think I wrote a play report for that session). It turned out that Ikasha loved having the sensations of a corporeal body, and wanted to remain on the earth for a time. The characters had her communicate with the Star Elves on a Throne of Seeing in the dungeon, and the Star Elves agreed that so long as Ikasha was happy with her body and sensations, they would allow her to remain.

And so the doom of the world at the hands of the Star Elves and their fellow alien creatures was averted ...

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Star Elves
AC 0 (or 9/as-armored when embodied)
HD 1-12 (per level, max level 12 like Elves)
THAC0 per level
damage: touch 1-6 cold fire + 1 radiation damage

irradiating presence -- revealed in their full luminosity, a Star Elf irradiates the area immediately around itself (in melee range), causing 1 radiation damage per round (metal armor is enough to shield against this radiation damage); undead are also affected by this radiation

turn undead -- per a cleric of a level equal to the Star Elf's hit dice

semi-ethereal -- not truly ethereal, Star Elves may pass through anything through which light may pass, e.g. a Star Elf could pass through glass, or through a chink in a door, but would not be able to pass through solid stone

cast spells as an Elf of the same level as their hit dice, though the magic of the Star Elves is alien and unknown to Earthly magic-users

save as Elves
240' ethereal movement, or as an Elf when clad in flesh or otherwise embodied
morale 9

Star Elves are luminous beings, literally shining bodies of coherent light. If they require a body for some reason, they have a kind of magic that allows them to form a body of stardust or nebular material which to inhabit; this body could resemble anything, but the Star Elves tend to prefer a slender Elfin form.

Fire and Incorporeal Undead

... Immediately [Frodo put on the Ring], though everything else remained as before, dim and dark, the shapes [Ring Wraiths] became terribly clear. He was able to see beneath their black wrappings. ... In their white faces burned keen and merciless eyes; under their mantles were long grey robes; upon their grey hairs were helms of silver; in their haggard hands were swords of steel. ... Desperate, he drew his own sword, and it seemed to him that it flickered red, as if it was a firebrand. Two of the figures halted. The third ... sprang forward and bore down on Frodo.

Aragorn cautions Frodo not to put on the Ring

At that moment Frodo threw himself forward on the ground, and he heard himself crying aloud: O Elbereth! Githoniel! At the same time he struck at the feet of his enemy. A shrill cry rang out in the night; and he felt a pain like a dart of poisoned ice enter his left shoulder. Even as he swooned he caught, as through a swirling mist, a glimpse of Strider leaping out with a brand of flaming wood in either hand. ... (J.R.R Tolkien, "A Knife in the Dark", The Fellowship of the Ring, pp 240-1, Ballantine Books)

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I was just (on 15 April) playing in Aleksandr Revzin's iteration of Michael Curtis' Stonehell Dungeon in a certain pink-lit, pain-oriented temple-area of the dungeon, and a number of incorporeal undead appeared through the walls to attack our party. I was pretty sure they were wraiths; when they touched and level-drained to death a first level fighter-comrade, I was more sure they were wraiths. Technically I still don't know ...

But when another comrade, using a character who is a droid-body sent down by an orbiting starship, fired a ray gun at one of the wraiths (FLAILSNAILS is weird sometimes all the time), and Revzin our referee was considering whether it should affect an incorporeal undead, the same question ran through my mind. If I were referee, how would I adjudicate this?

Good thing I've done some thinking about this with my radiation rules. I'd adjudicate that a ray gun, as a kind of Coherent Radiation Emission Weapon System (CREWS for you Iain M. Banks fans), would affect such a creature, given that radiation damage does. So all well and good so far ...

But then I was thinking, what about fire? It's not coherent, but it is kind of a radiation ... or, one could say, it's also incorporeal, and so could affect bodiless things just as it does those embodied in flesh. Either way, it seems to me that open flames and fire in general should definitely affect incorporeal undead, even those "only affected by silver or magical weapons." After all, Aragorn and the hobbits are able to drive back the Ring Wraiths with torches at Weathertop! And fire is one of the main folkloric means of destroying a vampire, another kind of horrible undead ... Why not let miserable first level characters faced with lesser wraiths fight with fire??

Viggo Mortensen was good, but Bakshi's Aragorn (top image)
just seemed far and away more Aragorn to me

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All of which is a longwinded way of saying that I think torches should deal 1-4 damage against even incorporeal undead, while burning oil (though it cannot "cling" to something incorporeal) can burn from the ground below to cause 1-8 damage against the same.

Which is not to say that extremely cold undead (as many tend to be ...) will not immediately put out a torch or an oil-fire, either by mere presence, or in the course of being affected by it ...

I'm sure others have come to the same conclusions, and others the opposite. But for my game, I think incorporeal undead are affected by silver or magical weapons, or fire.

Radiation Damage

I've been chewing on an idea for radiation, its damage, and the sickness caused therefrom, for my game ... for reasons ... mostly involving the Star Things currently descending over the Greyhame Mountain region.

The first glimmering of this idea came to me through listening to episode 9 of "The Hall of Blue Illumination", a podcast dedicated to M.A.R. Barker's Tekumel setting; around the 1:20 mark (first link, episode 9), Victor J. Raymond mentions radiation damage and how Barker adjudicated that neither cure disease nor neutralize poison spells worked against its effects. What its effects were, alas, we know not--but the idea of radiation as a separate damage has stuck with me over the past few months ...

So anyway, I've got some super-secret write-ups for monsters and spells that cause radiation damage; this damage will apply to hit points as normal damage, but has the added effect that after certain thresholds, the damage causes "radiation poisoning/sickness." Trouble is, what's the threshold?

The chart on Wikipedia for "Whole Body Absorbed" Grays (Gy) seems like a good place to start, given its clear number values and possibilities for nausea, headache, and mortality. Unfortunately, the chart jumps from 1-2 Gy absorbed with 0-5% mortality, to 2-6 Gy with 5-95% mortality! Admittedly, this mortality is over the course of weeks; but dealing 3 damage to a character and having them die ~50% of the time after several weeks regardless of level ... just doesn't seem sporting.

So let's assume 1 radiation damage = .5 Gy (half a Gray). It can still be lethal pretty quick (6 such damage gets one to the "50% mortality in a few weeks" range), but still allows concrete understanding plus the possibility to run away really fast / put something between you and it really fast.

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Radiation Effects

1) up to 2 radiation damage: sunburn, no other side effects

2) 3 to 4 radiation damage: save v. poison at +2 or nauseous all session, at end of session save v. poison or at -1 on all rolls for 1-4 weeks

3) 5 to 12 radiation damage: save v. poison or nauseous for 1-4 weeks, at end of session save v. poison or die in 1-4 weeks; successful save indicates survival, but nausea continues additional 1-4 weeks (i.e. 2-8 weeks of nausea)

4) 13 to 16 radiation damage: save v. poison at -2 or nauseous for 1-4 weeks, begin vomiting and otherwise incapacitated by severe headaches in 1-6 turns; at end of session save v. poison at -2 or die in 1 week, successful save indicates survival, but incapacitated for 1 week, nauseated for 2-8 weeks after that

5) 17 to 60 radiation damage: save v. poison at -4 or confused per the spell by nausea and severe headaches for remainder of session; at end of session, save v. poison at -4 or die in 1-3 days, successful save indicates survival but with 2-7 weeks incapacitated by sickness

6) 60+ radiation damage: save v. poison at -8 or die in 1 turn; success indicates that death is staved off 1-6 turns, but the character is confused per the spell for their last few turns

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There should probably be additional debilitating effects of radiation sickness after, but I'll admit, I'll probably be more generous than Barker as regards spells like neutralize poison etc. curing radiation damage.

Still, we'll see. This is a rough draft. It hasn't actually presented itself in my game yet ... yet ...