Young & Unafraid: Wizards & Witches

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Posting random tidbits from my old DM stuff! This dates to March 2020, early Covid-era.

Towers & Huts

Wizard towers are the loci of arcane experiments, which usually take place in the surrounding property. The wizard lives in the tower, which is usually 1d4+2 stories tall. All wizards at least have their own bedroom and a kitchen (wizards don’t poop). The first other room serves to entertain guests or lecture students who either also live in the tower or at a nearby settlement. The other floors might be…

  1. Arcane Laboratory: Where the wizard performs smaller experiments.
  2. Magical Library: Takes 1 turn to try to find one spellbook, of which there are 3d6.
  3. Office: Where the wizard sits down to get work down. Maybe they have office hours.
  4. Recreational Room: Maybe there’s a giant chess board or a hookah. Or free weights.
  5. Student Dormitory: Home to 1d4-1 students. Any openings?
  6. Wizarding Wardrobe: Contains 1d10 occult outfits and 1d4 arcane accessories.

Witch huts are the homes of witches, who are really just wizards without the prestige of academia on their side. Witches always have an apprentice from a nearby village. They do not carry out large scale experiments, but something’s always happening inside the hut…

  1. Baking cookies.
  2. Brewing potions.
  3. Out delivering goods.
  4. Smoking herbs.
  5. Tending the garden.
  6. Washing cat in the cauldron.

Wizards and witches might be willing to shelter your party in exchange for something, like a rare ingredient you might come across on your travels. You could always just not come back to the wizard, but they’ll keep tabs and even know when you’ve decided to break your promise. The ingredient might look like…

  1. Century Egg: A bird’s egg covered in clay, ash, and salt. Wizards hate birds.
  2. Creepy Crawly: An insect or worm with magical properties.
  3. Delicate Poppy: A magical flower that blooms from the ground.
  4. Forbidden Fruit: A fruit that grows from a special tree.
  5. Magic Mushroom: A mushroom that might grow in a forest or cave.
  6. Radioactive Root: A root vegetable that you must dig out of the ground.
  7. Sensitive Seed: A seed that contains a kilojoule of magic potential.
  8. Wise Weed: An invasive plant that steals nutrients from crops.

Wizard Experiments

Wizarding experiments usually take place in the open field. Some experiments are more permanent than others, either because of their lasting effects or because they have become successful ongoing projects.

  1. Arcane Orchard: Each tree in this orchard grows the same kind of fruit. However, the fruit grown randomly changes each day. 1d6: Apples, Bananas, Cherries, Oranges, Peaches, Pears. The wizard also dabbles in pie baking.

  2. Augmented Athletics: Athletes freely come to the wizard to be magically and mechanically augmented to heighten the potential of the physical form. Steroids, stimulants, and robot arms are all given at no cost to study their effects on the test subjects. There’s a running track around the tower along with a boxing ring and a target practice area.

  3. Body Parts Farm: Abominations of mismatched body parts roam the field, mostly of arms and legs with mouths or ears attached between them. They look like walking tumors; some even have teeth that you can pluck out. The wizard sells body parts to a mysterious merchant. The abominations’ bodies are poisonous to discourage poaching.

  4. Dinosaurs: Just a bunch of dinosaurs. The carnivorous ones will try to hunt you. Dinosaurs have HD equal to how many feet tall they are. Figure it out smartass.

  5. Flying Monkeys: Monkeys with bat wings. The wizard calls them “my pretties”. All the time. They don’t have to every time. Like, you get it already. By the way, the monkeys are ugly but I guess that’s kinda cute. Like Jay-Z. They might try to bite your heads off.

  6. Golem Testing: The wizard creates golems of different materials to compare their strengths and weaknesses. Most of them are deactivated, except for two which are throwing punches at each other. When one beats the other, it will deactivate because it has lost its purpose. So, who really won out?

  7. Many-Headed Dogs: The wizard breeds dogs each with 1d6+1 heads. They are hostile and will fuck your shit if you let them, but they’re also just dogs. Their bark is only slightly worse than their many simultaneous bites.

  8. Paleolithic Park: Giant ground sloths, sabre-toothed tigers, and mammoths. The area is always artificially kept freezing for the animals. There are 3d6 people who live on the property, reliving the glory of their ancestors each day.

  9. Weather Machine: The machine generates the totally opposite weather of the surrounding area. If it’s dry outside, it’s pouring inside. If it’s hot as hell outside, it’s cold as balls inside. Your characters immediately become exhausted by the meteorological whiplash upon crossing the boundary.

  10. Zebra Generator: Mammals of many different kinds are transformed into having zebra stripes. They’re really pretty. Their purpose isn’t clear.

Comments

  1. ÈnziramireJanuary 12, 2024 at 2:37 PM

    > Washing cat in the cauldron.
    > Wizards hate birds.
    > The abominations’ bodies are poisonous to discourage poaching
    > Like Jay-Z

    this energy here is proof that those inchoate pre-scene interactions with the blogosphere ppl discussed were a true edenic age.

    ReplyDelete

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