Monstrous Core Classes
A fighter, thief, cleric, and wizard walk into a bar: you are playing an elfgame. What if we change the core classes? Are we playing a new game?
Here are four classes (really 3+) for a monstergame.
Pretender
Some call your kin "worms that walk" and say you ought to crawl.
A: Wriggling Mass
B: Face Stealer
C: Vermin Call
D: Infestation
∆: Instruct the Worms
Wriggling Mass - A
You don't take damage, except from fire. Anyone who stabs you, shoots you, punches you, etc, will quickly realize what you are.
Face Stealer - B
When you touch someone's skin, you taste them, and you can replicate that taste like a great chef recreating a dish they had a bite of. You can wear the face of anyone you have tasted, and broadly approximate their body structure. An acquaintance might not tell the difference, but a lover or close relative probably would.
Vermin Call - C
The worms and flies and rats hearken to your call. In a voice no one but them hears, you can conjure up a swarm of squicky things.
- With a sonorous whisper, your swarm comes forth slowly, bringing with it creeping dread to anyone watching.
- With a booming shout, your swarm comes forth all at once and all in hunger, setting upon everything around you.
- With a fatherly tone, your swarm does not come forth, but instead, hidden from prying eyes to perform one task.
Infestation - D
Now, when you taste someone by touch, you can infest them with yourself. The next night, they will become another Pretender. This new thing is not you, and not beholden to you, but you have things to teach it. For a time it might trade your knowledge for its labor.
Instruct the Worms (∆)
Die in a wet, earthen place; anywhere that worms could feast on what's left of you. It doesn't matter if you're buried or left to rot, but this won't work if your remains are burned.
You reconstitute in [templates]d6 days and crawl from the earth changed. You can swap any of your ability scores.
Rotten Traitor
Once, you were called "familiar". Well, your wizard got a bit too familiar with you one night, and you killed him. You're on your own.
A: Fret Not, Broken Pact
B: Mage Drain
C: Impressions
D: I Cast Myself
Fret Not - A
You carry on the seeming you bore for your wizard. You appear as either a mundane creature (like a cat), an inanimate object (like a teapot), or a phantasmal presence. People treat you as such until you start casting spells or talking to them.
Broken Pact - A
You have 4 MD and five spells drawn from whatever lists you desire. Your MD do not replenish, nor do you suffer Dooms. When you have 0 MD, you are dispelled: mundane creatures wander off into the woods, inanimate objects return to un-life, and phantasmal presences simply fade.
Mage Drain - B
You've finally figured out how to replicate the theft of your wizard's magic. You can drain the MD out of the world around you by desecrating magical objects and places. Rip up a grimoire, eat the embalmed heart of a saint, lap up the blood of another wizard. These MD still don't replenish however, so your merciless acts will have to keep pace with your sorcerous ambitions.
Impressions - C
You've become quite capable at making good impressions. When you would be the subject of a reaction roll, you can instead declare that you're viewed either as uncanny, fascinating, or adorable and important.
I Cast Myself - D
You can, with a lengthy ritual involving several friends, many candles, and a long night, make yourself a permanent fixture. During this ritual, you convert 4 of your MD into 1 regular MD that will actually replenish. After the ritual, you are no longer dispelled if you run out of MD.
Night Haunter
People get it twisted about vampires. They think you're some weirdo in a creepy castle, drinking blood and being unnaturally charming. Sadly, those kinds of rumors only serve to hide your presence.
A: Rules, Mosquito Bite
B: Brain Whisper
C: Stolen Memories
D: Apex Predator
Rules - A
You follow certain rules:
- You go unnoticed until you commit violence
- You subsist solely off fresh human blood
- You cannot speak to people, or understand their speech
Mosquito Bite - A
You can unhinge your jaw with a wet rattle and cough up a proboscis, which is such an awful image it counts as committing violence on everyone present for your Rules template. Your proboscis counts as a dagger, but you gain 1 HP each time you deal damage with it. People killed by your proboscis look like empty skins; you take not just blood but soupified organs.
Brain Whisper - B
You can look someone in the eyes and communicate a host of meaningful impressions to them. They'll remember this as a normal conversation, even though all that really passed was a glance.
Stolen Memories - C
When you kill someone with your proboscis, you gain some of their memories in a big jumbled info-dump. Ask the GM three questions: if your victim knew the answers to any, you learn them now.
Apex Predator - D
All this time feeding off humans has made you an apex predator. Any time you want, you can double your STR and DEX bonuses when you use them to chase down, overpower, or fight your prey. When you call on this ability, your motions are so fearsome and inhuman that it counts as committing violence on everyone present for your Rules template.
Baleful Chimera
Once upon a time, you stitched yourself together from the charnel of a battlefield. Your will to survive has since become a will to grow.
A: Stitch
∆: Monsterparts
Stitch - A
You are stitched together from spare parts, often stolen from fresh graves or places of great slaughter. You begin with a head, a body, two arms, and two legs. You can spend a night stitching a new part to yourself, and you are not limited to either the number or type of parts you began with. You can always become more.
You don't have HP. Instead, each of your parts has [templates] HP. When you take damage, you choose which part is struck. If that part is knocked to 0 HP, it is ruined. Excess damage doesn't roll over.
Monsterparts - ∆
Stitch the heart of a monster into your body.
You can use all the abilities of a particular monster when you stitch one of its parts to yourself. For example: a manticore's sting, a medusa's paralyzing gaze, a troll's regeneration. When you use these abilities, all your human parts take 1 damage.
Why?
The idea here is that you can change the game without changing your core rules. These four classes, if presented as your Core Four, imply a very different game: a game of monstrous things.
TLDR: An experiment in changing a little to change a lot.
Really, Why?
I'm trying to post more! Just look at some amazing creators in the scene right now; they're ever so inspirational.