Building Bhakashal - New Classes - The Thaumaturge
Building Bhakashal - New Classes - The Thaumaturge
Jayea the Verdant nudged her gess forward with a squeeze of the legs, the gess reacted to the slightest change in pressure or angle of force she used. Jayea was a Togmu, a humanoid frog, and a distant relative of the shambling black beast that she rode. Her small size meant the gess could move quite quickly through the marshes with her when needed.
Jayea had been asked by her patron, Burg Teever the Reckless, to determine why his supply of jimple flowers, which had been flowing from the small, distant settlement of Togmu for years, had stopped last month. The Togmu had given no warning or reason for the cessation of trade. Teever wanted to know what had happened, and hoped that her apprentice, the only Togmu under her tutelage, would have an advantage.
Jayea shifted on the top of the gess as it approached the village. There were signs of normalcy, Togmu fishing, collecting edible plants by the riverside, herding small wild hogs and several were working on elaborate, painted fabric screens, creating a mountain scene of great beauty.
Nothing to see here, Jayea thought.
The locals began to notice her, and she slowed down and opened up her arms, holding her hands palm forward and open, a sign that she approached in peace.
The Togmu, a calm and reasonable lot if there ever was one, waved her forward, and a small group of 5 or so approached her gess. The beast snorted and shifted weight from foot to foot as they surrounded her.
Jayea recalled the spells she had brought today, three scrolls were at her disposal: Friends, The Banquet of Munnar the Mad and Mir Thensic’s Searing Steam. She hoped they would be sufficient.
The Togmu walked her and her gess over to the gathering area. The village elders were already there, along with some of their hunters, it being a fine, sunny day and there being much to talk about.
Jayea was greeted by the Togmu elders with an elaborate series of gutteral noises, which she recognized immediately as a greeting of friendship. She did her best to return the greeting, not having used it for many years in the city.
Jayea spoke in her clearest voice, “I, the warlock Jayea the Verdant of House Hinn, speak with you today on behalf of Burg Teever the Reckless, Warlock of House Hinn. The Reckless one has a question for you.”
The elders croaked and cackled, Jayea was distracted by how well dressed they all were, even the Togmu who lived in smaller villages and settlements had elaborate, well tailored clothing to wear.
“We have just met you Jayea the Verdant, we Togmu are not eager to speak to those who we barely know”.
Jayea was hoping her status as a warlock and her existence as a Togmu might have waived these conventions, but alas it was not to be.
She decided to play her first ace in the hole.
“With your permission elders”, she took out a scroll. The elders looked at each other then nodded at her.
She unfurled the scroll and began to read The Banquet of Munnar the Mad. The words from her throat were low and resonant, the words on the scroll began to blur and shift. As she completed reading the scroll several tables that had been set up in the gathering area for meetings later today began to fill up with food, luxurious, delicious smelling meats, cheeses, breads and puddings, cool drinks, ripe melons and crisp vegetables, rich sauces and tangy berries.
Togmu loved food, preparing it, eating it, sharing it. The spread of food created by the spell was the equivalent of dropping a pile of gold on the table.
“Let us eat first, then discuss our concerns”.
This met with great general approval, and a large group of Togmu sat down to eat.
Jayea watched the table, scanned the group to see who watched her and who didn’t, looking for signs of concern or unease.
She noticed nothing unusual during the meal.
When they were finished, she turned to the Togmu elders and spoke as confidently as she could, “After sharing food together, I wish to ask my question of the elders”
There was nodding in assent around the table.
“For years you have done business with Burg Teever the Reckless, Warlock of House Hinn, trading jimple flowers, carefully bred and raised in your gardens, for fine spirits and rare herbs from the fields of Bhakashal. Last month this trade stopped, Burg Teever wishes to know why.”
The Togmu looked at each other, then looked at Jayea.
“We expected an emissary of Burg Teever to come here soon, we weren’t expecting one of our own! We have not been able to send to our jimple flowers for the past few weeks as a carrion crawler has moved into the marshes near our village, it is served by a pair of bandits that feed it wild boars and rabbits. They lure travellers to it for feeding and it tolerates their presence, once it has slain the travellers they collect whatever coins and items they leave behind. We have lost access to the special plants that we use as a mulch to feed the jimple flowers, as they are located where the carrion crawler has settled in. Without these we cannot meet our quotas.”
Jayea sighed, a carrion crawler, that was an unexpected wrinkle.
“I thank you for your gift of knowledge, elders, I will see what I can do to help. Where is the crawler?”
Jayea bowed and turned to her gess, mounting the large, ebony beast.
“The crawler is near the large cluster of yin root trees at the bend in the river, it sleeps at the base of the tree, the bandits have a camp close by with tents.”
Jayea nodded, pulled the reins of her gess and rode away.
She found the camp easily, and rode her gess to a location about a quarter mile away. She took out a spyglass and watched their camp for several hours, studying the bandit’s movements, watching where they looked as they sat in their camp, and watching the movements of the crawler. Just the look of the thing made her shudder, it was revolting. Still, it seemed to be following the same schedule as the bandits. As the sun came down the crawler settled in, right after finishing a meal that Jayea would have preferred not to see consumed, and began to sleep.
Jayea waited for an hour after the creature fell asleep, left her gess in the grasses, and began to sneak up on the bandits. The darkness was welcoming, she moved with practiced silence through the tall grass and arrived at the edge of the camp. The bandits were sitting outside the tent, their fire reduced to glowing embers, drinking and loudly complaining about the Noble House hunting parties that were coming closer to finding their crawler every day.
Jayea crept up as silently as she could, the bandits gave no indication of noticing her presence. She waited until one of the bandits was involved in rummaging through a pack for something, and she moved with deadly swiftness, running the sharp blade of her short sword through the back and out the chest of the first bandit. He gasped, cried out, and slumped forward.
Dead.
The second bandit shouted a curse in Saan, wishing that Jayea’s ancestors would suffer torments in the afterlife for her sin, and grabbed for his broadsword. Jayea had the initiative, she grabbed a dagger from her arm and whipped it forward in one smooth motion, it tore across the left arm of the bandit.
More curses, and more hateful words, spewed from his lips. He lunged forward, bringing up his broadsword for a ground to sky blow, but Jayea easily dodged the swing, the bandit was clearly hurting from the dagger, and no doubt a bit drunk.
The bandit stumbled forward far enough that Jayea had a shot at his side as he moved past, her sword sliced open the bandit’s side like a ripe melon, taking the wind out of his sails. He stumbled and fell to the ground.
“Mercy, I surrender, take what we have, I don’t want to die here, not like this!”
Jayea moved down to one knee and drove her sword into the bandit’s belly, twisting it hard.
The bandit’s eyes’ opened wide, then he wheezed, and fell silent.
“You are too loud, I didn’t want you waking up the crawler”, she spoke to the dying bandit,
“The birds will pick your bones”.
Jayea turned to the crawler’s location, it appeared to still be there, sleeping. She crept over to a spot nearby and climbed a yin-root tree. From here she would be able to cast a spell from hiding. Once ready, she took out her sling, set it on a branch, and took out the second scroll she had brought.
She began to read the incantation for Mir Thensic’s Searing Steam, a spell she had transcribed three times now. This was her last casting of the spell, but she was happy to use it here. Jayea had no desire to melee with a carrion crawler.
The words on the page began to shimmer and shift, and Jayea the Verdant felt the magic rise within her, she pointed her palms at the crawler, and a small disc appeared in the air, a portal to the demi-plane of steam, and a cone shaped torrent of searing, scalding steam roared out and crashed into the sleeping crawler.
The beast emitted a low, horrific moan, a sound Jayea would be happy to never hear again, as the steam burned it alive. The creature was badly wounded, and began to flee it’s hovel, several of it’s feet not working properly, it careened back and forth as it left.
Jayea wasn’t satisfied. She drew back on her sling and let fire, the stone flew true and smashed into the creature in a badly burnt spot, it screeched this time, another sound that disturbed her greatly. It stumbled, and almost fell, then tried to return to its hovel.
Jayea shot again, this time missing. The beast shambled forward slowly, she reloaded and fired a third time, this time tagging it in its soft head, and again eliciting a scream of pain.
This time it stumbled, lurched to the left, and collapsed.
Another corpse for the marshes to consume.
Jayea the Verdant climbed down the yin-root tree and walked to her gess. Mounting the beast, she began to ride back to the Togmu village to speak to the elders, then to the city to find Burg Teever the Reckless and let him know that trade would be restored soon. Her reward would be new scroll spells, or perhaps access to his laboratory and library to research a new spell.
Jayea spent the ride back contemplating what spells she would scribe on her return....
The Thaumaturge
A thaumaturge is a spider (thief) warlock (magic-user) combination, but they do not memorize spells.
Instead, the thaumaturge masters the art of reading magic and casting from scrolls only. The Thaumaturge is a scholarly type, who has learned magic from both tutelage and extensive research. Their thief skills are directed towards obtaining magic spells to aid them with research and penning further spells.
Thaumaturges are valued for their scroll scribing skills, and many are employed for that purpose by powerful Noble Houses.
Stats
HD: d6
Weapons and Armor - As spider
Level Progression - As Warlock
Ability Requirements - INT 15 DEX 10
Thaumaturge Abilities
All thaumaturges get access to the weapon proficiency profile (number of initial weapons, new proficiencies and non-proficiency penalties) of a spider, the “to hit” table of the spider, and the best of saving throws between the spider and the warlock.
A thaumaturge gets all of the spider abilities, including backstab, at equivalent level to a spider.
A thaumaturge has a 10% per level chance of reading an unfamiliar language
A thaumaturge has a 5% per level chance of reading magical writing/symbols
All thaumaturges act as sages with a major field in supernatural and unusual and a special category of dweomercraft/magical writing.
A thaumaturge has a [(2% x DEX) + 5%/level] chance of forging documents or recognizing forged documents.
A thaumaturge can cast any warlock spell from a scroll, regardless of level, according to the following procedure:
15 INT - Success: [55% +1% per caster level - 2% per spell level] - maximum 95%
16 INT - Success [65% +1% per caster level - 2% per spell level] - maximum 96%
17 INT - Success [75% +1% per caster level - 2% per spell level] - maximum 97%
18 INT - Success [85% +1% per caster level - 2% per spell level] - maximum 98%
If a failure is determined the odds of the failure causing harm to the caster are equal to 5% x the level of the spell less the caster’s level. Failures can be everything from doing damage to the caster, to damaging others in the area, or corrupting/compromising the effects
A thaumaturge may use the sheer force of will to counter a harmful result from a spell, but doing so burns one point of intelligence permanently. If the loss of a point of intelligence would cause them to drop below 15 intelligence, the point loss comes off of wisdom instead. A maximum of 3 points of wisdom can be lost this way, after that there is no safety valve for casting
Scribing Spells - A thaumaturge can scribe spells once they have made a successful “to know” roll on the spell, then they can then write it on scrolls, etc. Their chance of scribing the spell successfully is the same as their chance of casting it, except the bonus for their level is doubled to 2%. Failure/harm results are rolled for in a similar fashion as above, an unsuccessful scribing can be deadly.
To scribe the thaumaturge must create the ink with a drop of their blood, squid ink, diamond dust, and a special component related to the spell (e.g. gorgon blood for a petrification spell), as well as the listed material component for the spell from the PHB) boiled together for 2 days and attended to by the thaumaturge. With this ink a scroll spell can be written. Ingredients cost approximately 100 gp per level of spell scribed.
Researching Spells - Spells can be researched if the thaumaturge has access to a suitable library. The odds of successfully researching a new spell are ½ odds of casting one, less the level of the spell, and requires 2-4 weeks of research, - 1 day for each point of intelligence above 14. The failure/harm odds are as above. If the attempt is unsuccessful each additional week of research adds +5% to the odds, max 25%. If the last check fails the spell is not possible for that thaumaturge. If the thaumaturge has help, take the average of the INT scores for all assisting, add this value in % as a bonus to the base odds of success, and use this for the thaumaturge’s chances.
Note that because a thaumaturge does not memorize spells, they will have wildly varying spell casting power. Sometimes they will be overflowing with spells, other times they will have few. They can scribe scrolls faster, more cheaply and more efficiently than a regular warlock, but, particularly at lower levels, the thaumaturge will have access to fewer spells as once they are cast they are gone. However, a thaumaturge will try to gain access to a library (usually their patron’s), often in exchange for their superior scroll scribing skills, and use this as a method of gaining access to more copies of the spells they have. Remember that once a thaumaturge is successful on their “to know” percentage for a spell they can then attempt to scribe it again. So even though they can’t cast it from memory, they can scribe it any time after they have learned the spell for the first time. Most of a thaumaturge’s loot will go to spell scribing resources.
