Grimoire: Elemental Melee Spells

GURPS Magic lacks a lot of the 'traditional' spells that games like D&D have. This is probably by design; most damage-dealing spells in D&D are variations upon "you do fire damage" or "you do lightning damage" and so on for each element. GURPS takes a more basic approach, with one or two spells per school that deal damage with an amount you can choose.

That said, there are still some gaps. One of the things that was conspicuous was the lack of sword spells, so that mages could brandish blades of pure fire. Lightning Whip is a great spell... but why not do the same for other elements or colleges? After the jump are a few simple spells that fill these gaps.

Ars Mundi: Coldfire

The Great Archmage Talistandra Orvalus XII is credited with the discovery – posthumously, of course. Her death baffled the College for months before enough of the event was reconstructed using divination and scrying magic. Orvalus' remains were found in her tower, along with the burnt remnants of her books, clothes, bookshelves, wands, staves, cat, owl and collection of novelty tea cosies, all scorched and clearly destroyed by flames. Yet when her apprentice arrived later that day, he found the entire tower covered in a thick layer of frost, even though it was a pleasantly balmy day in early spring.

Like any true academic, Orvalus was absolutely delighted about her discovery, even as it burnt her alive.

Equipment Locker: Prismatic Muskets

One of my earliest posts was about redpowder, a weird science alternative to gunpowder that produces lasers instead of explosions. I gave some instructions for how to convert the statistics for ordinary gunpowder weapons into prismatic weapons, though it always felt a bit awkward explaining how to do it rather than showing you.

Since the first post on redpowder was largely talking about it as a setting element, this will be a much more equipment-focused post, with the intent to make the rules easier to follow. I'll present some sample prismatic arms, and restate and update the rules for redpowder weapons, and include some brand new options.

Dramatis Personae: Arilith, Demon-Touched Sellsword

This post contains a small amount of content that might be disturbing. If implied sexual assault disturbs you, skip the first paragraph.

To say Arilith went to the school of hard knocks would be the understatement to end all understatements. Her mother, violated by a demon nine months earlier, abandoned her mere minutes after birth, naked and crying on the cobblestones of an alleyway in a pool of uterine fluid.

Looking back on it, Arilith figured it wasn't too bad a start in life. From there, the only way to go was up.

A good samaritan followed the sound of crying and picked the newborn baby up. Arilith was left at a temple in the city, where the monks and nuns raised her, always with barely-concealed distaste at her demonic heritage. Other orphans lived in the temple, too, but Arilith was always treated more harshly than them – with her fiendish taint so visible, the monks considered it their duty to straighten her out and make sure she didn't follow her blood, doling out tougher punishments and harsher penalties for rule-breaking and misbehaviour. Of no great surprise to experience parents, it didn't work, and Arilith ran away from the temple at thirteen.

Her life from there on out was a litany of pain and struggle. Forced to beat, lie, cheat and steal for her bread, she become harsh and hard as iron. Eventually she found employment as a thug and strongman for local criminals, years later legitimising into a caravan guard. With combat experience under her belt, she joined a mercenary company for a few years, taking part in two separate campaigns when her host was hired by the sitting duke. After interpersonal conflicts made life with the company impossible, she struck out on her own, renting her services as a guard, mercenary and sellsword.

Playbook: Focus Enchantment

While I'm not posting a lot, I'm still keeping my ear to the ground within the GURPS blog-o-sphere, especially the GURPS Day summaries over at Gaming Ballistic. One post that caught my eye was the Southern-Style GURPS post on some tweaks to the GURPS Magic enchantment system. It reminded me that, during a fit of worldbuilding for a fantasy setting a while ago, I too made an alternative enchantment system. Handily, I also wrote up a summary intended for players, so I've already spent a while polishing the description to make it look and read well. So I thought I'd share it!

Equipment Locker: The Swordstaff

An entirely fictitious weapon, the swordstaff (plural swordstaves) is exactly what it sounds like – a sword stuck on the end of half of a quarterstaff, favoured by technical fighters, melee-capable mages and show-offs alike.