Disabled! Your
character can drop below 0 hit points and still remain conscious a
number of points equal to his or her Constitution bonus. However,
the character is disabled, and not only can he take only one action per
round, but he will also take 1 hit point of damage if anything strenuous
is attempted. See Disabled in the Core Rules for
more info.
Heroic Attack!
A player who describes his attack action dramatically in at least three
creative sentences, gains a +1 otherworldly to hit bonus. This
also applies to skills. For instance, if a character actually
role-plays a diplomatic exchange and has at least three sentences of
exchange with an NPC before rolling for a Diplomacy check, then he also
gains the +1 bonus. This rule was instigated to encourage more
role-playing.
Colleges of Magic: The
spells have been divided into Colleges of Magic that are accessible by
all classes that use spells through runic languages. Each College
costs a varying amount of runic language points to learn depending on
your a character's class. Runic languages points are derived from
your characters Spellcraft ranks plus his primary spell casting ability
bonus. (If a character multiclasses and has two ability bonuses
then use the higher one.) The core classes section of this site
describes which colleges of magic are class colleges, cross-class
colleges, or exotic colleges. Core classes gain automatic access
to designated class colleges (For example a Ranger has Naturopathy
(Druidic Nature Magic) as a class college.) Classes can learn the
runic language of a cross class college for 2 runic language points per
spell level. Exotic colleges cost 4 runic language point per spell
level.
In this system it is possible to have a Druid who
casts spells from the College of Divination that aren't normally on the
3.5 druid spell list, or a specialist Wizard of Necromancy who can tap
into some Psionic Magic and Oracular Magic. In most cases it is
easier to access colleges just through multiclassing in a core class
that has the college you want as a class college. But in some
cases, a player might want to be able to do just a few spells from
another college, without having to commit to the class.
Spontaneous
Casting: In the World of Thandoria all magic using classes
cast spontaneously like the sorcerer and bard. There is no need to
memorize spells for the day, and thus limit yourself from access to
knowledge that you have within. It just doesn't make sense.
Your spell slots for the day (symbolizing the available packets of raw
magic power stored in your aura) can be used to cast any spell you know.
A focus component, like a spell crystal, a holy symbol, or wizard's
staff, must be used to cast effectively. With just a spell pouch
full of magic herbs, etc, casting times are doubled (except for druids
and rangers).
So why would anyone want to play a sorcerer now?
I crafted a new kind of sorcerer. First of all I gave all
sorcerer's d6 hit dice, a new class feature at 1st level called
Awaken Bloodline, and the Eschew Materials feat free.
Sorcerers have built in spell crystals as their chakras have
crystallized. Sorcerers also have different class colleges than
other classes with a focus on raw sorcerer-like power. Plus
sorcerers still gain more spell slots than any other character, they
just don't know as many spells.
God Scream!
When a character dies, his soul gets a God Scream, where he cries out to
his deity. Roll 1D20 and add the character's Charisma bonus.
The DC for a successful God Scream is 20. If the Scream succeeds,
then the character's soul ends up floating in extra-dimensional space
with the eternal power of his deity. His has one chance to
role-play with the deity to try and be brought back to life or to have
the deity assist his comrades somehow. Start rolling Diplomacy
checks! If the God brings a character back to life, the character
is forever changed in an irrevocable way (it's up to the Game Master to
figure out what zaniness is bestowed based on the nature of the deity).
In some obvious way the character then must serve the Deity in an overt
manner as a Chosen One of that deity.
Should a character making a God Scream roll a natural
1, look out! The character appears before a random deity (which
cannot be his own deity) in the Game Master's campaign, and a very
interesting role-playing encounter is in the offing. Hopefully the
character's very soul is not destroyed before the fateful encounter
ends!
Bloodlines: The
World of Thandoria has such a rich and detailed history. it would
be a shame to not have Bloodlines in the game, streaming from past
legendary characters and mythic creatures. All sorcerer's actually
start the game with an awakened bloodline. Other characters may be
born with a major or minor bloodline, based on the character's design.
Bloodlines bestow various bonuses upon a character as levels are gained.
Go here for more
on Bloodlines.
Cultural Classes:
All Thandorian characters have the option of gaining free
cultural class ranks in various cultural classes based on things like
race, astrology, guilds, social status, bloodlines, regions, etc.
Normally, these bonus classes require a minor training roll to achieve
(DC 5 plus new level). In essence they serve to further flesh out
a character on cultural level. I noticed through 5 years of play
with the D20 system, that players would avoid taking the skill
enhancement feats, like persuasive, when they could use their limited
feats for Cleave or Metamagic. This caused me to think of a way I
could bring more of the culturally enriching feats. For more about
cultural classes
click
here,
