F is for Familiars

Familiars

Familiars are as ubiquitous to witches as are cauldrons, pointy hats and brooms.

Despite their outward appearances, familiars are not animals, but rather spirits in the shape of animals. They can talk and understand human speech but only their witch can understand them. This connection is a mental one, but it is often described as speech. This connection also allows the witch to communicate with animals of the same kind. With their familiar present they can talk to any animal and understand what is being said. Some familiars also have a chance to know another language, which the witch then will know.

A witch starts at 1st level with a familiar. This familiar will show up when she first becomes a witch. The nature and form of the familiar will often be dictated by the circumstances of her becoming a witch. She may add other familiars as she progresses in level. The maximum number of familiars a witch may have is equal to her number of Retainers based on CHA. She may also only call a new familiar once per year and a day (alternately this can be once per level). This is for an additional familiar or to replace one that had been killed (familiars do not die of old age like natural animals). So a witch with a CHA of 18 can have a max of 7 familiars at a time, but will take her a minimum of 7 years (or levels) and 7 days to obtain them all.

A familiar adds 1 spell level of a spell the witch can learn. So a witch with a familiar can learn an extra 1st level spell, a witch with three familiars can learn any combination of three spell levels, so 1 3rd level spell, 1 2nd and 1 1st level spell, or 3 1st level spells. If the familiar is killed then the witch looses those spells the familiar knows. If she has cast those spells already this day then she loses an equal numbers of levels.

As the witch gains level the familiar also grows in power by gaining 1 hit point per level the witch gains and their armor class improves by -1 per level.

Anytime a familiar is killed or if the witch releases it she much make a saving throw vs. death or lose a number of hit points equal to that of the familiar.
Summoning A Familiar
At 1st level the witch gains her first familiar automatically. Once she gains a level she can attempt to summon a new one.

Summoning a new familiar is not something that can be done lightly. The witch needs to spend a day in deep meditation and purification. The day must begin for sunrise with the witch participating in a ritual bath and cleansing that must be complete before the sun has clear the horizon. She will spend the morning preparing the area for a familiar to come; laying out small treats for the type of animal she wishes; cheese for a rat, cream for cat, meats for a dog or wolf, and so on. She then will spend time preparing items for each sense, something for touch, taste, smelling, hearing and seeing. Then she will also appeal to the four elements, plus the fifth element of magic, and for the mind, body and spirit. So in total the witch must procure 13 items that are outside of the treat for the familiar to appeal to magic. These items must have significance to the witch and will be unique for each casting and each witch. In total these materials will cost the witch up to 100 gp.

The witch has a base chance of obtaining a familiar equal to 65% + 3% per level up to 10th level. So even at 10th level the witch has 1% chance of there not being a familiar within the area.
Any roll of 100% (00) will result in a Special familiar.

Regardless of the result of the summoning, the witch will have spent the day in the ritual and will not have prepared any spells for that day. Any materials spent cannot be reused.

Special familiars are not in the shape of animals but are often creatures of the Faerie or even the other planes. Special familiars cans speak to anyone capable of understanding their language.

List of Familiars
(roll d%, this is not the same roll as discovering a familiar)
Rolls of 00 result in a Special Familiar.

Roll	Familiar*	Additional Powers to the Witch
1-3	Badger	+2 to Constitution checks
4-6	Bat	+2 to Dexterity checks
7-9	Beaver	Double normal speed when swimming
10-12	Cat	Night vision (night is treated like a light spell)
13-15	Coyote	Surprised only on a roll of 1 on a d6
16-18	Crow	+2 bonus to Magic Wand saves
19-21	Dog	Surprised only on a roll of 1 on a d6
22-24	Eagle	Improved vision
25-27	Ferret	+1 to Dexterity checks, -1 to AC
28-30	Fox	+1 to Intelligence and +1 to Wisdom checks
31-33	Frog	+2 to Constitution checks,
34-36	Goat	+2 to Constitution checks
37-39	Hawk	Improved vision
40-42	Hyena	+2 to Dexterity checks
43-45	Jackal	+1 to Intelligence and +1 to Constitution checks
46-48	Lizard	+1 to Intelligence and +1 to Dexterity checks
49-51	Lynx	+2 to Dexterity checks
52-54	Mouse	+2 to Dexterity checks
55-57	Owl	+2 to Wisdom checks
58-60	Porcupine	Improved AC, -2 bonus
61-63	Rabbit	Surprised only on a roll of 1 on a d6
64-66	Raccoon	Surprised only on a roll of 1 on a d6
67-69	Rat	+2 bonus to Paralysis saves
70-72	Raven	+2 bonus to Death saves, can speak to others
73-75	Scorpion	+2 bonus to Poison saves
76-78	Snake	+1 to Intelligence checks, +2 to Heal
79-81	Spider	+2 bonus to Poison saves
82-84	Squirrel	+2 to Dexterity checks
85-87	Swan	+2 to Charisma checks
88-90	Toad	Wide-angle vision, surprised only on a 1 on a d6
91-93	Turtle	Improved AC -2 bonus
94-96	Weasel	+2 bonus to Rods and Staff saves
97-99	Wolf	+2 bonus to Spell saves

Special Familiars

Familiar	Alignment	Additional Powers to the Witch
Batling	Lawful	Improved hearing and +2 polymorph save bonus
Bear	Neutral	+2 to Strength to checks
Bendith ý mamau	Neutral	Improved hearing and a +2 wands save bonus
Blink dog	Lawful	Witch may dimension door once per day as the blink dog’s power.
Brownie	Lawful	+3 bonus to all Dexterity based rolls and effects
Butterfae	Neutral	+2 Wands saves and +2 to Spell saves
Cait Sidhe	Neutral	+4 to Wands saves
Celestial Animal	Lawful	Same as normal animal, +2 to Spell saves
Dire Animal	Neutral	Twice the bonus as a normal animal of it’s kind
Elemental, small	Neutral	Gain +5 to saves to the Elemental element
Fiendish Animal	Chaos	Same as normal animal, +2 to Poison saves
Imp	Chaos	Regenerate 1 hp per day
Mephit	Chaos	Gain +5 to saves to the Mephit’s element
Pseudodragon	Lawful	+3 to saves vs. Dragon Breath
Skitterwing	Chaos	Gain +5 to saves to charm and mind affecting magic
Sprite	Lawful	+2 bonus to all Dexterity based rolls (Reflex, AC)

Perform ritual. Roll d% to see if you summon a familiar, if yes roll a d% to see what you get.  A roll of 00 on either roll is an automatic special familiar.

More soon.
--
Section 15 Copyright Notice

Open Game License v 1.0a Copyright 2000, Wizards of the Coast, Inc.

System Reference Document Copyright 2003, Wizards of the Coast, Inc.; Authors Jonathan Tweet, Monte Cook, Skip Williams, Bruce R. Cordell, based on original material by E. Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson.

Liber Mysterium: The Netbook of Witches and Warlocks is Copyright© 2003, Timothy S. Brannan and the Netbook of Witches Team.

Basic Fantasy Role-Playing Game Copyright © 2006-2008. Chris Gonnerman.

Labyrinth LordTM. Copyright © 2007, Daniel Proctor. Author Daniel Proctor.

"Witch's Familiars" Copyright ©2011, Timothy S. Brannan

E is for Elegy

An elegy is a poem of mourning.

It is also the title of a 2009-2010 story arc of Detective Comics featuring the new Batwoman. In many ways Elegy is Batwoman's origin story,  but it is also the origin story of her arch-enemy and the secret connection they have.

After reading "52" I became a big fan of the new Batwoman.  She was a different character than either Batman or Batgirl.  You knew what motivated them, what caused this new Batwoman to don the cape and cowl?   Elegy tells you what motivates Kate Kane, what drives her and why she has to do what she does.

I'll let you in on a little secret, I don't actually read a lot of comics.  I pick up a collection every now and again, read some things that were popular years ago, or a trade paper-back, but I don't actually follow anything.  I am a bigger DC fan than Marvel by a long shot and I tend to watch any super-hero cartoon, TV show or movie that I can, but monthly comics, I rarely if ever read those.

I picked up Elegy since I was a fan of Batwoman.
I am very glad I did.

Elegy is not a story that could be told with the Batman or even any of the Batgirls.  It had to be Batwoman.

Before I go on I have to mention the artwork.
J. H. Williams III had been lauded for his work on this book, but I am not sure that even those do him justice.
The art work here is another layer of story telling above and beyond the great story by Greg Rucka. There are parallels drawn between the two foes that make you think that we have a rivalry to well, rival that of Batman and the Joker.  But that is the easy stuff to sell because it is so good.  The look on Kate's face when she is dumped by her girlfriend is tangible.  She says she is ok, but her look says so much more.   That is something you never see in the Batman.  Both characters are full of sadness and loss. Kate's though is closer to the surface, not beat down like Bruce has done, or she thinks she has done.  Kate is more vulnerable; not because she is a woman, but because her pain is still real to her, her multiple losses, all the reversals of fate.  She just wants to do the right thing, the honest thing, the just thing, but each time reopens a wound.  Elegy rips her old wounds open and drowns them in salt.

Ok on to the story.  Caution, Spoilers Ahead.

The story is told in flashbacks while the Batwoman is working on a new case.  The Cult of Crime is back in town and the Batman is giving his approval for the Batwoman to take it on her own.  She investigates and only turns up a few clues.
She returns home to where we meet her father, a retired Army officer, is helping her out via two way radio ala Batman Beyond.  Frankly it's a great idea, two heads are better than one.  She works out and has to rush to a breakfast date, only to get the aforementioned dumping.   With the Cult of Crime in town though she can't dwell on that.

We get flashbacks to her life at Westpoint.  She was then an up and coming officer with high marks.  Just past "Ring weekend" the young Kate Kane is brought into the Commandant's office where she is told she is under suspicion of "homosexual activity" and is asked if she wants to deny it, reminded that if she doesn't she will be expelled. Kate recites the Cadet Code of Conduct about not lying nor allowing others to do so. She admits to being gay and is kicked out of the academy.

Let me go back to the art for a second.  Look at the sequence of Kate's face. She is sad, angry and then finally resolved because she knows there is only one right answer the answer is the Truth she can't deny who or what she is.  She is a Westpoint Cadet and they never lie. Neither will she.

For the first time (we think at this point) Kate has no where to go and nothing to do.  She returns home to tell her Army officer father what happened and he tells her he is proud that she stood by her honor and told the truth.  That's it.  Kate struggles a bit.  She doesn't care for her new step-mother at all (we find out her mother was killed, but that is it for now).  A chance meeting with a mugger in the streets though changes that.  She is actually about ready to beat the thug into a bit of pulp, shouting at him "think I'm some victim? I'm a soldier!" till she (or rather the mugger) is rescued by the Batman.

I want to come back to this later.  Rescued is such a loaded word here, but I use it on purpose.  I want to get to why later.

Kate then decides (between tattoo sessions I am guessing) that her new purpose in life is to be a vigilante.   That is till her father discovers.  He helps focus her attention. She trains with people he knows for the next couple of years.  He tells her if she is serious then she is going to war and in war you define your objectives and your winning strategies.  She comes back and her father has decked out their version of the "batcave" with state of the art surveillance, urban combat weapons (but the "Batman Rule" is always in effect) and a new costume done up in red and black, the colors of war in her Jewish faith (I have to take Rucka's word on that one, never heard it before, but it sounds right).  Though she is not happy with the heels on her boots.  In newer parts of the story we see they have been replaced with proper bad guy stomping red combat boots.

More details are discovered with the Cult of Crime.  But frankly at this point those details are only a means to an end.  That end is Alice.  Alice is the new High Madame of Crime and she has a very personal interest in Kate/Batwoman. She is also Joker-level crazy.  This gets to my one real issue with this.  WAY too many bad guys know all about her "Secret Identity" for a character that was introduced as a closeted, lipstick lesbian, everyone seems to know her secrets.  Alice in particular knows a lot of them.

We get up to the final confrontation.  Alice has kidnapped Kate's father and wants to us his knowledge to launch some missiles (I thought he was retired.  Maybe still active??).  So the ruse of fighting Batwoman was just to get to her father. Or was it.  Reading on it seems that was just a ruse to get at Batwoman.  Alice and Kate fight. Kate manages to stab Alice, Alice stabs Kate.  They are over the Gotham river and in a rare lucid moment Alice, no longer talking in 3rd person, tells Kate that "she has our father's eyes". She then falls to her death (seemingly).

Kate goes back to the HQ, her father begging her to stop along the way.  She takes two blood samples, hers and Alice's.  She gets them analyzed and Alice is her twin sister that she had assumed was dead for years.

In one more flashback we see Kate's life when she was a little girl living with her mom, dad and twin sister.  Briefly, she is kidnapped along with her mom and sister by terrorists.  Her father does get an army team in to save her, but shots are fired and her mother and sister are killed.
Kate dedicates her life to service to honor her Army Officer mother and twin.

When Kate gets the confirmation she goes to the Cult of Crime and tells them that if they come for her father again she is going to kill them all.
The story ends with Kate still not talking to her father.

--

There is so much happening here and I didn't even get into the relationship Kate has with mer step-mother, her dance with Maggie Sawyer, what happened with her and Renee Montoya,  or how Betty "Flamebird" Kane is her cousin.   It has been said before and it is true;  This is not a female Batman.  Kate's Batwoman is also propelled by loss and grief and anger, but they are different.  She built her entire life after her mother's death on the idea that she would be the best officer she could be and serve to honor them.  When that is removed she was lost in a way that Bruce Wayne never was.

When I said before that she was "rescued" I meant it.  She was never in danger of that mugger.  The mugger actually had more to fear from a very capable and very deadly opponent with no outlet what so ever for her aggression, anger  and sense of loss.  The Batman showing up saved her.  Not the man, but what the man stands for. The symbol.  That is why she is the Batwoman and not some other new costumed hero.

The parallels in the art in the book between Alice and Kate are amazing. I am rather disappointed in myself for not guess who Alice was sooner.

I mentioned also that Kate is more vulnerable than Batman is. Again, not because she is a woman, but  because her pain is still so fresh and her choices still weigh on her.  Because of that her heroic actions are greater.  We know she can fail, we know she hurts (and sometime physically given her chest wound from 52 is still not 100% healed) and yet she still goes out there, every night.  The Batman goes out every night because that is what he is.  Kate chooses her life, the ups and the many downs.

Elegy manages to be poignant yet not preachy. Kate certainly is not a perfect character.  She is still brash, has a chip on her shoulder and even with out the Batwoman gig she would still have troubles in her relationships (as seen with Renee). But she is trying and I think that is the reason why her series would do well.

Elegy is the best comic I have read in a very long time.  I like Kate, I like Batwoman and I want her to do well. It would make a great movie.  Maybe when Nolan is done with Batman he can turn his sights to a Batwoman.

You can read more here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batwoman:_Elegy
http://www.amazon.com/Batwoman-Elegy-Greg-Rucka/dp/1401226922/

D is for Dresden Files

When the Dresden Files RPG was announced I had a vague idea of the books. I had watched and enjoyed the series on Sci-Fi (back when they still were Sci-Fi and didn't show Wrestling). But I never gave the books much thought.  Over the course of the last couple years all the other books I was reading in the Modern Urban Supernatural genre kept bringing up the Dresden Files and Harry Dresden.

So I bought the game and I liked it a lot. It is cool and neat. And I quickly put it away!  The game is so full of spoilers for the books.  I had read the first book, Storm Front, and remembered it was a bit like the Sci-Fi channel movie.  But the game went so far beyond that. So I figured before I could properly read the game I needed to read the books.  So for the last six months I have been going through all the Dresden Files books.  I have been "reading" them on audio-book during my commute.  I have gotten them from my local library and I have gotten rather used to hearing James Marsters in my car.  By the way, I never really liked Spike as a character and never thought much of Marsters as an actor, but hearing him read these books has really changed my opinion of him.

Anyway I am almost done with Turn Coat now which as I understand it is the next to the last book so far.  There is a collection of short stories and a new book out soon.  I should be ready for it.  One thing I have enjoyed about listening to the book in my car is while I am driving through Chicago is every so often I'll hear of a place and immediately think of where that is in proximity to where I am at.  I once even drove by one of the grave yards mentioned in the book while it was being talked about.

Though as a Chicagoan (of sorts, moved here 17 years ago) its the Kennedy, not the JFK. It's DUI, not DWI. It's not Coke, it's Pepsi (ok that one is just me). Things that would be said if you grew up in Missouri (like Jim Butcher did, where it is the JFK and DWI).  Nor is it as easy to get a cab as Harry seems too, but then again he is a wizard.  There weer other minor issues (he drove from downtown to Deerfield in a few minutes?  The guy HAS to be a wizard for that!) but nothing that was a deal breaker for me.

Dresden Files the RPG is a different story.  I liked the background already; supernatural going ons in Chicago and the developer Fred Hicks once claimed that he loved the WitchCraft setting as a possible choice for the Dresden Files RPG.  I am just not a huge fan of Fate.  I do understand that they have taken it to new and wondrous places and that it is not very similar to FUDGE at all anymore, but I am still skeptical.  I will though review the game on it's own merits and not my pre-conceived notions of the system.

I have played in a Chicago-based Unisystem game that has some similar tropes of the Dresden books.  Though our Chicago is also 1 part Cine Unisystem, 1 part Ghosts of Albion, 1 part World of Darkness and 1 part just good old fashion knowledge of the area.

I'll certainly convert some characters sometime.  The issue though is the whole Wizards and Technology deal. Makes converting the Hex Girls difficult and Willow down right impossible.

More I guess when I am done reading the books and the game.  Maybe I'll re-watch the series too.

Woo Hoo. I leveled up!

According to Trey over at The Sorcerer's Skull I just leveled up to Level 7 Pundit!

Thanks all!

(file under: Silly)

C is for Charmed

I am not ashamed of this, but all things considered I vastly prefer Charmed to Buffy. I don't even consider myself a Buffy fan to be honest, more of a Willow & Tara fan. But I am an unapologetic Charmed fan.

There is the whole witch thing to be sure.  And the Charmed Ones are rather easy on the eyes.  But I think my friend and former TV writer Robert Black said it best,  Charmed never forgot who their audience was and never forgot they were a TV show.

You can see his post from an archive of the Original Other Side here, http://web.archive.org/web/20040518093406/http://www.xtreme-gaming.com/theotherside/tenways.html

I am at a really good place in my gaming life.  I get to game all the time now with various groups. I get to talk to the people that make this hobby happen and they are really cool.  And I get to write the stuff I like.

But I'd kill to be able to write a Charmed RPG.

While I know the demographics of the show and your average gamer are not exactly the same, I think with the amount of "modern supernatural" fiction being published today that a Charmed game would be fantastic.  Buffy sold well, Dresden Files is doing nicely.  Granted those are properties with significant geek/gamer buy-in and at the time of their games the properties are still active.

I would like to point out that with all the stuff I have written about witches and magic in the things I have published that this game would be a natural for me. ;)

The world of Charmed is richer and it is a drama about sisters that happen to be witches and living in a supernatural world. Not one about witches that happen to be sisters.  The differences sound subtle but have huge potential differences on how a story can be told.  Charmed featured, not just witches and demons (the typical fare in my book) but all sorts of other races, creatures and groups with agendas of their own; and just because two groups were working for the same side they didn't always get along.  For example the Charmed Ones and the Elders or even the Valkyries.

I think there are better stories one can tell in the Charmed universe, actually I know so.  One of the premises of Season of the Witch was to take two Buffy characters and put them into a more Charmed like universe and tell a story.  It worked. It worked really well in fact.

Of course my system of choice for this would be Unisystem, but I can also see doing it in something like Mutants & Masterminds or even Cortex..    Maybe I need to chase down the company that owns the game rights (I know, or rather knew, who they are) and see if they want to hire me cheap.  If Eden were to do it and publish it I'd even consider doing it for free.

There are a couple of versions of Charmed on the web.
Andrew Peregrine, author of Victoriana 2nd ed and Hellcats and Hockeysticks did one way back when.  You can still find it here, http://www.peregrine.madasafish.com/charmedrpg/.

Jeff Slick also did one years ago, but all his copies seem to be gone.  I did find thins one though, http://www.scribd.com/doc/44502892/Charmed-RPG-Netbook.

I like both, but there are things I'd do different in each one.

At the end of the day though I think a Charmed RPG may never be.  More is the pity too.  I think I could really rock on writing it.

Special: C is for Companion

Yes I know. No A-to-Z posting on Sunday and C is Monday's letter.  But I do have a C for Monday.

The Companion Edition of D&D was one of the near mythical books for me growing up.  As I mentioned yesterday that I began my game playing with the Basic/Expert, known today as B/X, sets from the early 80s.  The expert took the game from 3rd to 14th level and the Companion book was then going to take the game from 14th to 36th level.  Even though I knew of AD&D at the time, I thought that the Companion book was going to be the way to go. So I waited for it.
And waited.

And waited some more.

Finally I gave up waiting and dove into AD&D instead, leaving Basic D&D behind.  Eventually a Companion Rules Set did come out.  But it was for the new Mentzer-edited Basic set (now called BECMI) and I no longer had any interest in it having discovered the world could also have Assassins, half-orcs and 9 alignments.

I did manage to read it once.  I was in college and it was at Castle Perilous Games in Carbondale. Of course now AD&D 2nd Ed was the new hotness and I had no desire to look backwards.   What I saw though at the time did now impress me.  I think the entire Mentzer set at the time (AT THE TIME mind you) made me think of it as D&D for little kids (now I see it differently).

Fast forward to the Old School Revolution/Renaissance/Resurgence/Recycled and I have re-discovered the Basic sets (all of them) in their imperfect glories.  And I am not the only one that must have felt a little gipped by not getting a Companion book for B/X.
JB over at B/X Blackrazor designed his own Companion rules.
If it is not exactly what the companion was going to be, it is really, really close.

I have gushed on and on (and on) about how much I love this book here and elsewhere.  If I went on anymore then Jonathan owes me advertising. ;)

But I have to add this. B/X Companion I think is the best embodiment of the what is the spirit of the OSR, not to diminish the to efforts of others (hardly at all), but the B/X Companion gives us something new, something that we didn't have before.  Something, for me at least, that I have been waiting years for.

I only have two issues with the book.  First I want a PDF of it.  It is  my only old school book that I can't cart around with me everywhere. Though now according to JB the pdf is on the way! Second I wish he had used the OGL so others could expand on it, make modules for it.  But no big deal, I am just thrilled to have it.

Speaking of which, I did get a chance back in the day to get my Companion fix in.  My DM ran the module CM2 Death's Ride under AD&D and it nearly killed us all.  In a perfect world I'd run Death's Ride again using the B/X Companion.  Maybe one day I will.

In general I like the idea of the Companion rules, either of them. They take the rules into a different place; a place that the Basic or Advanced rules had not previously done well.  The idea of running a kingdom or even traveling the planes.  Great stuff.

B is for Basic D&D

Ok that was silly yesterday, but now lets get down to the serious business of serious blog posting.  Seriously.

I am fairly well known in these circles for my enjoyment of the new 4th ed D&D game.  It's fun. Really what else should it be?  If I want to play something that feels like an older edition of D&D then I have older editions of D&D still on my shelves.   Which is interesting because lately my current favorite edition of D&D is the Moldvay/Cook versions of Basic and Expert.

Like so many other gamers my age I had been exposed to the AD&D 1st ed books and LOVED the Monster Manual.  And like so many others I asked for D&D for Christmas.  I didn't get this:

I got this:

Of course I was not sure what the difference was.  I had been using a really piss-poor scan of someones Holmes Basic book that was I was sure was blue.  This one was red in a purple box.  But it said D&D on the cover and that made it official D&D to me (funny how that hasn't changed much in the past 30 years).

I played this edition and then eventually got a hold of the Expert Set too.  We played AD&D, but I still used these books.  OR maybe we played D&D and used the Advanced books too.  It was a good time in any case.

With the release of such cool products like Basic Fantasy, Labyrinth Lord and the B/X Companion (more on that tomorrow!) I have been able to get my Basic D&D fix all over again.

The rules are light, to the point and very, very fun.
I have gone back now and re-bought both the Moldvay Basic and Cook Expert sets (my originals were long since lost), the Holmes Basic and even the Mentzer Basic set and Rules Compendium.  But it is this version is the one I consider "mine".  When people say Red Box, this is what I think of first.  Sure there are some "odd" things about it.  I got really used to the alignment system in AD&D and races as classes seemed odd to me then and they still do.  But these books are just such good fun that I can overlook all of that.