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The world around Arlinac Town has special heroes called champions that have been given a calling, commission, or destiny by one of the Powers.
Errants, Troggles, and Story Finders are champions commisioned to help their Powers.
Buskers, Casters, and members of The Hiss are champions whose calling focuses on personal improvement.
Bounty Hunters, Remotes, and Inevitables are champions commissioned as killers.
It is simplest to read these rules about champions before reading about the Powers. Try reading this page first, before following any of its links.
Why does the PC have exciting and dangerous solo adventures? Why not stay safely in town with a more normal job? Why do others ask the PC to help them? Why not attempt dangerous adventures as part of a group?
Possible answers are that the PC is a champion, has been asked to help or rescue a champion, or opposes a wicked champion who serves one of the evil Powers.
In NAME talents are the primary way that characters differ by significant abilities. But talents involve process of slowly accumulating increasing power through experience. The existence of champions provides a second way that characters can be very different with special abilities without requiring any experience or slow accumulation.
Champions also form a useful layer in a plot's "onion of intrigue". Usually when a story features extensive intrigue one or more Powers are at the center. Their champions are often the second-to-central layer of influencing characters.
Finally, champions can be used as major allies or villains in a dungeon. Errants will always be potential allies to a good character unless a misunderstanding is causing conflict. The other kinds of champions can be either allies or villains, or even switch roles mid-story.
Errants are traveling warriors who serve Little Humble. She requests their service politely; they are free to refuse or to retire from the role when they wish. Most do retire after a few years of excitement and adventure. Errants come from all walks of life: Little Humble only requires an industrious person whose life demonstrates integrity.
Errants are never given specific missions. They simply travel by foot, seeking ways to help people and demonstrating a life dedicated to Sublimity Street. Those who own property or wealth usually leave it behind, managed by a relative or friend until they retire from being an Errant. Although nothing asks them to fight all dangerous monsters, right all injustices, or mend all situations where the poor or helpless are oppressed, many Errants refuse to leave a settlement until it has security and fairness.
(Similarly, nothing about the role an Errant encourages romance but many Errants find their true loves while serving as Little Humble's champions.)
Many Errants are skilled diplomats who prefer to resolve problems with words instead of violence. But all Errants are exceptionally skilled with unarmed combat and can attack with a blur of quick unarmed strikes that hinder and hurt an opponent. Even those Errants who avoid violence are capable warriors when they need to fight. Because Errants often earn the emnity of corrupt governing officials, many Errants prefer to resolve their personal disputes with an honorable duel instead of with a courtroom.
Errants must follow the teachings of Sublimity Street and are also bound to honesty. An Errant loses his or her status as a champion the first time he or she tells a lie or otherwise purposefully speaks so that a listener reaches false conclusions. Yet this requirement of honesty brings a boon: an Errant is aware of the untruth of any intentional lie he or she hears. (If the speaker ignorantly speaks a falsehood because of being genuinely misinformed, the Errant senses nothing special.)
Errants live a life that confuses and bothers people living lives of wealth and luxury. Errants leave the safety and comforts of their home to travel in search of problems to fix. The fight dangerous creatures and people but shun weapons. They always speak honestly, even when this angers or insults others. They eat and dress simply, even after being well-rewarded for their help.
An Errant can make an interesting PC. However, it is equally interesting to use NPC Errants. A courtroom trial might be postponed while the PC is sent to find an Errant and ask the champion to help the trial by detecting who is lying. The PC might need to help an Errant who is stuck in a tricky social situation or hunted by corrupt governing officials because he or she refused to lie.
Errants: Rule Changes
Whenever an Errant who fights unarmed successfully uses Wrestle/Disarm to cause one or more minor losses (representing the opponent being knocked down, grabbed, disarmed, etc.) the Errant may immediately use Melee/Press in the same action (representing a strike or kick). This allows the possibility of causing the opponent to suffer losses twice.
Protagonists in Wuxia stories are more properly called a Xiake or Youxia.
The word "errant" is a play on knight-errant. In the eyes of wealthy rulers, Little Humble's champions are just as often perceived as "doing things wrong" as they are "roving warriors".
Troggles are stout, winged humanoids made of rock. They were once normal people, but were permanently changed when they accepted an invitation from Speleoth to become one of his champions. Speleoth usually invites his elderly worshippers to become Troggles because the change makes them ageless and unsocial.
All Troggles can fly nimbly, despite their solidity and weight. Troggles neither eat nor sleep; some of the oldest Troggles have developed a prejudice and look down upon "lesser" humanoids burdened by these needs and unable to fly. A person who turns into a Troggle loses the use of his or her old race's special ability.
Troggles are always given a task by Speleoth. Most are asked to live in one of Speleoth's favorite dungeons or cave-complexes and help defend it from invaders. A few travel to gather information or deliver messages for Speleoth.
Troggles can speak with cave animals: troglobites, troglophiles, and trogloxenes (centipedes, millipedes, bats, beetles, flies, spiders, crickets, salamanders, rats, swifts, mites, snails, bears, foxes, raccoons, wild cats, fish, snakes, and frogs). Troggles assigned to defend a dungeon or cave will organize and train many cave animals. Many Troggles enjoy cross-breeding cave animals to create new and exciting monsters.
Troggles love to eat turnips. This desire can temporarily distract one from its assignment.
All Troggles grow stronger and tougher under a certain sensory condition. Examples include being in complete darkness, while banging rocks together, when stinky, while eating, or when very hot or very cold.
Troggles: Rule Changes
A Troggle's flight exempts it from most movement issues involving difficult terrain.
When a Troggle benefits from its specific sensory condition it gains a 1-point situational advantage to the Melee/Press, Wrestle/Disarm, and Block/Dodge skills.
Troggles are based on both gargoyles, Fraggles, and the various types of troglodytes popular in other role-playing and computer games.
The champions of Yarnspinner are Story Finders: people empowered to recover forgotten but historically significant stories. Yarnspinner never gives his Story Finders a specific quest, nor does he reward them when they finish finding a story. Instead, his Story Finders travel as they wish, knowing they will sense when a location has a story they can discover.
Story Finders have a special ability: when they touch an item or enter a location they sometimes see a vision of past acts of heroism or villainy related to the item or location. They usually must use this ability and more traditional types of research (questioning the locals, reading civic records, etc.) to completely find a story.
A few Story Finders who dislike travel work as detectives, attempting to make their special ability more useful at home. But most Story Finders decide to embrace their destiny and set aside their old lives. These usually find a strange, annotated map to help them get started—typically in a library, museum, dusty attic, or park.
Story Finders: Rule Changes
Story Finders sometimes have visions about an item or location related to their quest. The content of these visions does not depend upon the character's Identify/Lore skill rating. Sometimes a Story Finder knows he or she needs to spend extra time with the item or location to receive more visions.
The profession of Story Finder is taken from Sean Russell's Swans' War trilogy.
My favorite RuneQuest setting was Griffin Island with its large player's map delightfully annotated with handwritten rumors. Yarnspinner's annotated maps are a tribute to that masterful game supplement.
Restarting life as a Busker involves both commision from Maw Lute and commitment to her. Buskers share the ability to create food and small items by performing.
When a Busker performs music then food appears: fruits, vegatables, breads, and cheeses. More food appears if the performance is in front of a crowd: a greater amount and variety when crowd is larger. The food will appear on empty plates or in empty containers if these are available.
When a Busker juggles he or she can create small items among the things juggled. Each day the Busker can create items with a total cost in coins up to his or her Wonder skill rating.
Anyone can petition Maw Lute to become a Busker. The petitioner must donate a complete hoard or collection that has sentimental value. This is placed on one of Maw Lute's altars and vanishes. If Maw Lute responds then the petitioner must give up all his or her hoards, which usually requires giving away most wealth and possessions. Furthermore, Maw Lute usually requires potential Buskers to discard hoarded pride for a month by dressing poorly in torn or patched clothing and wearing a hat with donkey ears.
Buskers mark their role by decorating their hair with feathers. A Busker who voluntarily removes the feathers for a week ceases to be a Busker.
All Buskers understand and learn to demonstrate Maw Lute's appreciation for food and entertainment. Yet as Maw Lute has both motherly and greedy natures, her Buskers tend to become either maternal or selfish. The caring ones travel to impovershed settlements and create food for people recovering from famine, draught, or other disaster. These learn to use performance to aid mourning as well as create festivity and see themselves as "hoarding gratitude" which they can live off after retiring from years of such public service. The miserly ones find well-paying employment at wealthy households where they provide food and entertainment for social events. These hoard normal wealth, both in their wages and in a few coins worth of precious metal they can create each day by juggling.
Both types of Buskers are highly respected. They often declare blunt truths to people of high rank, secure that the town or city would riot if an authority figure angered by plain speaking succumbed to mistreating an honest Busker
Buskers themselves most respect those Buskers who have learned to "hoard without having". They apply this phrase to a Busker owed so many favors and so much gratitude that he or she can retire comfortable although penniless, and to a Busker paid so much for performing that it is possible to live in luxury without any saved money.
A few Buskers never develop a public use for their ability and hoard neither gratitude or wealth. Some degenerate and eventually live alone in poverty only creating enough food to survive. Others live recklessly as gate-crashers of fancy parties. Maw Lute warns fallen Buskers of both types of her disapproval by changing their created food to avocados, olives, buttery crepes, and fatty cheeses. If they do not begin to use their role publicly and hoard something then they fatten up and are taken away by a Dragon.
The word "busker" simply means street performer. These fantasy super-buskers have a very direct way to get food and a few coins by performing.
As a literary figure, the jester represents a source of advice known for plain speaking and common sense. The traditional jester wears a parti-colored outfit and hood with donkey's ears.
The jester becomes The Fool in tarot: an innocent starting a long journey whose experiences will teach strength and wisdom. This version of the jester adds feathers and tears in the clothing to the outfit.
Usually only one person at a time enters the dungeons that Futhorc creates under ruins. But sometimes Futhorc organizes a competition in which many people race to be the first to complete a dungeon and claim its final spell-scroll. When these people enter the doorway to the dungeon each enters his or her personal copy of the dungeon.
The winner of the contest becomes a Caster. Futhorc believes that "champions" should be those who have won, not those who are serving.
The Caster is able to gain permanent use of any one spell-scroll: when the chosen scroll is read it vanishes as usual, but instead of the effect happening once it becomes an ability the Caster can use whenever he or she wishes. Most Casters learn the most potent healing ability whose scroll they can afford to buy. A few are sentimental and instead of buying a scroll learn one of those they obtained themselves in the dungeon. Because of Casters, powerful spell-scrolls are worth a small fortune.
A Caster may enter more of Futhorc's contests. If he or she wins again, an additional spell-scroll will become usable at will.
If the stories told by traveling merchants can be trusted then Futhorc's constests happen only once per century in some villages, towns, and cities, but they happen weekly in others. In Arlinac Town the contests happen irregulary, about ten times per year.
Casters: Rule Changes
When a Caster casts one of his or her spells it tires the caster (costs one minor loss). A memorized spell can only be used when the Caster still has at least one minor loss available to "spend".
The champions of Lamia are dedicated to her but do not serve her.
Those of Lamia's followers who have lived violent lives but intensely desire to increase in virtue are changed by Lamia. These changed people are called The Hiss. From the waist down they have a snake's tail. The members of The Hiss work together to be repentant and virtuous.
The Hiss form societies based upon five cardinal virtues: honesty, loyalty, charity, integrity, and humility. Members advance through five stages as the cardinal virtues are mastered. All newly created Hiss have black tails and are selfish but will always keep their word. Those who have mastered loyalty are no longer selfish when pursuing their community duties and their tail color changes to deep red. Those who mature further develop charity and will sometimes give beyond what duty requires; these have orange tails. Those who develop integrity are generous and kind in all situations and have yellow tails. The most mature, the elders among The Hiss, have mastered humility and always consider others instead of themselves; these have green tails. The changes in tail coloration are gradual as spots, stripes, or speckles of the next color slowly appear and become more dominant.
Among The Hiss many stories attest that those who obtain humility are personally approached by Llamia, who offers to restore them to their old bodies. But the offer is always refused because the elders prefer to remain in The Hiss society to help others follow the path of virtues.
A few legends claim that The Hiss have the ability to put their virtues in physical form. One of The Hiss who has developed loyalty, charity, or integrity can enter a trance and shed its snake skin. This causes the loss of that highest-obtained virtue; the individual immediately beings acting less mature. However, if the shed skin is eaten by another of The Hiss who is ready to obtain the crystallized virtue then the eater will effortlessly gain that virtue.
Societies of The Hiss exhibit a beautiful yet strange culture and craftsmanship. Members of The Hiss retain their memories and intelligence, but also aquire snake-like temperament and habits. They initially only cooperate with other Hiss whom they know. They are fond of eating eggs and freshly hunted game animals. As hunters they become skilled at archery and the use of poisons, but they prefer to flee from melee combat. Many of the Hiss keep small snakes as friends: more than pets, for the Hiss can speak with all snakes and many other reptiles.
The Hiss are supernaturally gifted at languages, and can learn an unfamiliar language in only a few hours. They are also able to mimic any voice they have heard, as well as sounds from nature.
The Hiss: Rule Changes
Members of The Hiss do not need to use the Animals/Wilderness talent when communicating with reptiles, for they can speak normally with them.
All but the newest members of The Hiss have a Shoot/Throw skill rating of at least 4.
On kiosks and notice-boards in village greens, town squares, and city markets Old Man River puts magic wanted posters demanding justice for severe violations of the Water-Way (mostly slander, house-breaking, boat-stealing, and murder). For those appearing on a wanted poster for the first time the punishment specified is time in the stocks. Repeat offenders must be slain. Posters are always specific to a single criminal: a crime performed by a group of criminals generates multiple posters.
When a poster is removed a new copy appears. The old copy exists as long as someone is carrying it in their hands or on their person. People can carry multiple posters, whether of the same or different posted originals. When the criminal has finally been punished in the appropriate manner then all copies (posted or carried) of that poster vanish.
Everyone who carries a wanted poster becomes a Bounty Hunter. They gain an extrasensory ability to know the distance and direction to the criminal, as well as to all other Bounty Hunters carrying that criminal's poster. This ability is only active when the Bounty Hunter closes his or her eyes. On the blackness before closed eyes the criminal appears as a bright red dot and other Bounty Hunters appear as bright white dots.
Old Man River rewards Bounty Hunters who successfully punish the criminal they hunt (whether subduing a first-time offender and bringing him or her to the stocks or slaying a repeat offender) with a quiver of enchanted arrows. These arrows help with hunting certain animals or monsters.
Bounty Hunters: Rule Changes
The enchanted arrows provide a 2-point equipment bonus when used against the appropriate creature. Most quivers given as rewards include ten "practical arrows" useful for hunting deer or other game animals and ten "heroic arrows" useful for hunting Lionkin, Fell Animals, or other monsters.
Cultists called Remotes serve Frosty Kostkey as his champions. They are unparalleled machinists because Frosty Kostkey supernaturally changes many of their machines, enabling them to function unceasingly without maintenance. As with all of Frosty Kostkey's worshippers they are able to construct his temples that create zones of Winter.
Remotes have one further and especially uncanny ability. When in a zone of Winter they can touch a machine and transfer their consciousness into it. This allows them to move any of the machine's moving parts and sense through any of the machine's sensory apparatus. The Remote's body enters a state of suspended animation in which their bodies age but do not require nourishment or rest. The Remote can return to his or her body at any time. Destroying the inhabited machine automatically returns the Remote to his or her body, without distress to the Remote.
A few Remotes live in Frosty Kostkey's Ice Strongholds, inhabiting turrets and war machines. But most live in towns and cities, secretly using their abilities to infiltrate the settlement and spread rumor and terror. By sowing gloom and despair they attempt to distract the other Powers from Frosty Kostkey's future plans to conquer the settlement.
Traditional children's stories about Remotes often, for no apparent reason, feature male Pixies. The Segacious debate why young minds so enjoy hearing about short, malicious, green-clad workers busy building deadly machinery and steam-powered, flying sleighs in hidden laboratories in snowy lands.
Remotes: Rule Changes
Remotes always have skill in Machinery. But they do not use the Machinery talent. Instead they have an effectively infinite Machinery talent rating as long as they faithfully serve Frosty Kostkey.
A desperate person consumed by hate or revenge can beg Gnash for help in destroying a certain object or killing a certain person. If their heart is so ruthless that this plea catches Gnash's attention then he makes them one of his champions: an Inevitable.
An Inevitable cannot be killed. Cuts, impacts, fire, acid, and other dangers do no harm. However, an Inevitable gains no extra strength and no more difficult to confine or trap than any normal aggressive fanatic.
The Inevitable has two days to complete his or her mission (destroy the object or kill the person). If he or she fails then Gnash turns the Inevitable into a Zombie. However, any day in which Inevitable kills any intelligent adult is not counted by Gnash. Thus Inevitables often kill innocents merely to gain time for their mission of revenge..
If the Inevitable succeeds in his or her goal then the Inevitable dies immediately and peacefully.
Inevitables: Rule Changes
Inevitables ignore most types of minor and major losses. Only losses that represent being restrained (grabbed, tripped, pinned, etc.) still apply—and nearly all of these are only minor losses.
The best way to defeat an Inevitable is to use a permanent restraint: inside a sturdy cage, at the bottom of an unclimbable pit, etc.