Demon Lord Companion Preview 5: GM Tools

The last chapter of the Demon Lord Companion scoops up some additional tools for Game Masters to use when creating adventures in their games, offering new mechanics for magical places, trinkets, new relics, and a small selection of creatures. For this last preview, here a couple of goodies from the book.

Haunted

A haunted place is steeped in death, having once borne witness to bloody, terrible crimes. So horrific were these acts that the spirits of the dead were bound to the site, condemned to relive their final moments again and again until the world dies. Whenever the total of an attack roll or challenge roll in a haunted area is 0 or less, roll a d6 and consult the Hauntings table to see what happens. The haunting extends or originates from a point you choose within short range of the triggering creature.

Hauntings

Roll  |  Effect

1. An apparition appears and remains for 1d6 rounds
2. A loud shriek erupts. Each creature that is within short range of and able to hear it must get a success on a Will challenge roll or become frightened for 1 round.
3. A foul odor spreads through a sphere with a 5-yard radius and lingers for 1 round. Creatures in the area make Perception challenge rolls with 1 bane.
4. The temperature within a sphere with a 5-yard radius plunges for 1 minute. Liquids in the area, including potions, freeze solid, thawing 1 minute after being removed from the freezing area.
5. Blood, feces, or other organic material spread in a 1d3-yard radius.
6. Spirits attempt to control the living. Each creature within short range of the haunting must get a success on a Will challenge roll or become compelled. A compelled creature uses actions to attack its allies. At the end of each round, a compelled creature can make a Will challenge roll. Success removes the affliction.

Blood Moon Medallion

A disk wrought from reddish metal and embossed with a skull-like visage, the Blood Moon Medallion hangs from a rusty chain that catches and pulls the hairs from its wearer’s neck.

Raise the Dead Once each night, the Blood Moon Medallion allows a wearer to use an action to cause one corpse of Size 1 or 1/2 within short range to become an animated corpse. If you use this power, make a Will challenge roll. On a success, the animated corpse is compelled by you. On a failure, you gain 1 Insanity, and the animated corpse is hostile to you. In either case, corpse remains animated, as well as compelled or hostile, until it is incapacitated or until dawn comes.

Brownie

Of all faerie folk, brownies have the greatest sympathy for mortals. Where other faeries consider humans and their ilk to be lumbering fools, little better than talking animals, brownies find humans’ short lifespans tragic and the hardships mortals endure intolerable. Thus, brownies lend aid to people whose hearts are pure and who treat the land with respect.

Brownies help humbly and quietly. If a family leaves brownies a bowl of milk or some other treat, those brownies then spend the night hours mending clothing, preparing meals, and doing other chores needed to keep the household in order. Although naturally helpful, brownies avoid revealing their presence. Kind children might receive small gifts—a pretty flower, a colorful rock, or a bully’s finger—from these hidden friends.

Brownies stand under 6 inches tall and weigh just a few ounces. A typical brownie has a spindly body and delicate, angular features. Most brownies wear acorn caps and clothes made of squirrel skin.

Although brownies use Elvish when talking to other fey, they know the Common Tongue.