Sorcery Thrives on Success - Sorcerer (GLOG Class)

The core of this class is Skerples' Paladin of the Word, with some major caveats. It's less omnipotent - the pally is like a Sorcerer who knows every Name and no Hubris or backlash, as is fitting for one who speaks with the voice of the Authority rather than mimicking their tone and timbre to trick the world - but has some additional tricks up its voluminous silken sleeves. Besides, I think the collectability of Names is a feature rather than a bug, what mage doesn't enjoy collecting new magic? They're also a bit of a glass cannon, having a very powerful and flexible tool but also a severe weakness that a DM can easily use to stop them from just spellcasting their way past a challenge. An iron gate is as big an impediment to a sorcerer as it is to a fighter or thief, maybe moreso as they can't lift or climb over it without taking damage. A foe in full plate is a serious threat for a sorcerer, even a peasant wearing a horseshoe amulet is a problem, though if they're clever - as a magician should be - still not an insurmountable one. Turn the ground beneath his feet into quicksand, blow poison powder in his eyes, bewitch peasants to mob him, lure him into a building and collapse the ceiling, fight like a sorcerer - unfairly.

Credit also goes to the Second Apocalypse series for a lot of the flavour, even though the magic system is almost completely different.

GLOG Class: Sorcerer

Sorcery can be thought of as the antonym of philosophy; one shapes language to conform with reality, the other forces reality to conform to language. By their arts sorcerers speak to the world that is otherwise deaf to the concerns of men, and convince it to change. Sorcery is thus a supreme hubris, to engage in its use even lightly is to make the implicit statement that you know how the world should be ordered better than its creator.

You gain +2 Names per template, the second and fourth Templates also give you +1 to Saves, you cannot wear any armour unless another class allows you but you can wield shields. You cannot fumble with daggers, darts, powders, phials or poison.

Skill: One determined by your School and one other: 1. Alchemy 2. Astronomy 3. Poetry

Starting Equipment: Hooded silk robes of your School's colours, bronze dagger, soft slippers (+1 to sneaking), paper twist of blinding powder (save or be blinded for 1d6 rounds), an assumed name, one item from the table at the bottom.

A: Evocation, Iron-Doom, School, +1SD, 

B: Secret, +1SD

C: Secret, Mutter-Song +1SD

D: Secret, Truename +1SD

A: Evocation: Sorcerers are not limited by static spells, they are poets and meister singers who shout down the omnipresent voice of G_d and replace it with their own. They do this with Song Dice which are a bit like Magic Dice, but called something different and cannot be used interchangeably. As usual they are d6's and return to your pool on a 1-3, and are regenerated when you get a good rest. Evocation requires the sorcerer to sing loudly, so is impossible to perform stealthily.

If you roll doubles on any SD, you gain a point of Hubris. If you roll triples, you gain five.

The main limit on what a sorcerer can achieve is their knowledge of Names. You start knowing the name Man, which allows you to Evoke all humanoid sapient beings, and one other rolled from your School's list. When you gain a new template of Sorcerer you gain 2 Names, one of which must be rolled from your School's list, the other you may choose freely from your studies. You can learn new Names if you find them on your journeys, either learned from other Sorcerers (usually at great cost) or hidden in the warp and weft of the world.

With one template of Sorcerer you know the techniques Command and Sense.

At two templates you learn the technique Destroy and Empower.

At four templates you learn the technique Manifest.

A: Iron-Doom: Iron is the Last Form, that all matter descends into, and so lacks Tonós, the mystical tension - the desire for change - that sorcery acts upon. Note that steel is just iron with a different carbon concentration, it still counts. Your magic is thus bound by the following rules;

1. Sorcery cannot affect iron directly in any way. You cannot transform it, destroy it, move it, if there's any ambiguity the answer is no. The only sorcerous technique that works on iron is Sense.
2. An iron weapon cuts through anything created by sorcery like it was mist and shadows, even the most powerful manifestations take maximum damage from iron weapons, and sorcerous bonuses to Defence are useless against iron weapons.
3. Every inventory space of predominantly iron objects a person carries forces you to roll 1 Iron Die when trying to perform an Evocation that targets them, Iron Dice only count for determining doubles and triples.
4. Iron deals you 1 point of damage per point of Hubris (highly hubristic sorcerers have been known to instantly sublime into pillars of salt on contact with iron), per round of contact or per attack.
5. Iron armour subtracts the wearer's Defence score from any sorcerous damage, even if it doesn't normally allow a save. Indirect damage resulting from sorcery, such as a natural fire ignited with sorcery or falling rocks loosened by sorcery, deal their full damage but usually allow a save.

A: School: Choose a School where you learned sorcery from, this determines which Names you choose from, as well as starting equipment and what Perks and Drawbacks you get.

B, C, D: Secret: At each of these templates, you may choose from one of the following secret arts;

• Daimos: You may sing down daemons from the outer dark. You may summon any extraplanar entity whose name you know and whose HD does not exceed your SD*2 to perform [dice] tasks for you. When its final task is complete roll its HD and your SD and compare [sum] - if you get the higher it departs without any further fanfare, if it gets the higher it may remain in the world for a number of rounds equal to the difference. When you choose this Secret you gain knowledge of a daemon's name of HD equal or below your current number of templates in this class, additional names must be acquired through hunting down secret tomes, interrogating cultists and the like.
• Calling: You may roll your SD send messages to anyone whose true name you know across any distance, the message may be up to [sum]+[dice] words long. It may also contain images taken from your memory or imagination at a cost of 3 words each. If the target is asleep when the message is sent they receive it in their dreams.
• Chorus: You can harmonise your voice with others, allowing you to add half your number of templates rounded up in SD to another sorcerer's Evocations. Multiple sorcerers with this secret may all contribute, any Hubris incurred from the Evocation is divided between all in the chorus.,
• Skin Wards: You may roll SD and gain a personal magical shield of [sum] HP in strength, any effect that would damage you subtracts its damage from these HP first. It manifests when you are attacked as your Names leaping to defend you - wind blows away arrows, spars of stone block blows, your skin turns to bronze, etc. Iron deals maximum damage against Skin Wards.
• Witchfingers: You are proficient in a system of pressure point based martial arts that let you rend flesh and disrupt vital processes with seemingly impossibly light touches. It looks really weird, like you just poke someone in the neck and their carotid artery explodes, what the hell. Your fingers and toes count as light weapons that can deal piercing, slashing or poison damage, and if you hit someone with a critical hit or catch them unawares you can paralyze them for as long as you remain touching them with at least two digits. You can also do neat but useless martial arts tricks like balancing upside-down on one finger or breaking bricks with your nuts.
• Vox Dei: You can speak in a sorcerous language that every conscious being understands, even animals. This does not allow you to understand them if you don't know their language.
• Namesight: You can choose whether or not to see things whose Name you know. If you know the name of Stone you can choose for stone walls to not obscure your sight (though you might bump into walls if you're not careful) or clearly survey the sea and its life by choosing not to see Water.
• Commune: You can perform a ritual divination, rolling as many SD as you choose. You may ask [highest] questions, and receive answers of ‘Yes’, ‘No’, or ‘Unclear. If asking questions about something that you know the Name of, you may instead receive the answers: ‘Certainly’, ‘Possibly’, ‘Unclear’, ‘Consider Further’, ‘Unlikely’, or ‘Impossible’.
• Reconstruction: Requires Empower. You can restore creatures and objects to their intact state by repairing their Name. Roll as many SD as you wish, you restore [sum] HP of damage to the target. If you roll at least 2SD you can restore the target the use of a damaged sensory organ or mangled limb, and undo the effects of corrosion and decay on natural items (you can't reverse rusting for obvious reasons). If you spend at least 4SD, you can restore missing limbs and organs, even those that are missing as a result of a birth defect, and turn even an object burned to ashes back to its former state.
• Fidelity: Requires Manifest. At your choosing your manifestations no longer appear unreal and ghostly but are as solid-seeming and indistinguishable from the real thing as if they were created by G_d himself.

C: Mutter-Song: You voice is now so powerful you may perform your Evocations with a low, rumbling, throat-song that attracts less attention than normal. Your Evocations don't require you to make more noise than quiet conversation.

D: Truename: Pick one of your known Names, you gain a deeper understanding of it than other Sorcerers, so much so it sinks into your soul and becomes part of it. Create a unique passive special ability between you and your DM that is embodied in the chosen Name, you gain this ability permanently. Some examples are;

• Man: Immunity to involuntary transformation. Heal back to your perfect form unless killed.
• Animal: Assume the Named animal's form at will. Gain Named animal's physical capability relative to human size.
• Fire: See heat as well as light. Read piles of ash as easily as the text it once was.
• Iron: In every generation there's someone who tries to apprehend the truename of iron, the last guy had everything above the mandible instantly turn to salt, but maybe you'll get lucky.

Techniques

Command
R: [dice]*50' T: 1 [name] creature or object D: [dice] hours
You shout a single-word command to your target. If the target is sentient or under a force that is acting against your command (e.g. if you command a boulder rolling down a hill to STOP) it gets a Save to resist. If the command lasts more than a single round, the target gets a new save at the beginning of each of its rounds. You can spend additional [dice] to increase the effects.
+1 SD: Affect +2 targets.
+1 SD: You may increase then length of your command by +2 words.
+1 SD: You may increase the duration between checks by +2 rounds.

Sense

R: [dice]*50' T: [name] D: [dice] hours

You become aware of the presence of the [name] within the range of the Evocation. You can sense the distance and direction of all examples of [name], and if you know the true name of a specific individual or item you can also tell them apart from others that share a [name].

Destroy
R: [dice]*50' T: 1 [name] creature or object D: 0
Target take [sum]+[dice] damage. Save for half damage. This represents any command that deals direct damage (explode, die, split, tear yourself to shreds, etc.)

Instead of adding a SD to the [sum] of this spell, you can instead assign an SD to increase the number of targets by +2.

If you have 4 Sorcerer templates you can use this technique on targets who you do not know the Name of - rather than commanding them to be destroyed, you instead manifest your Names to attack them, in which case the damage type changes depending on the Name employed. E.g. using an "Eagle" missile to summon a ghostly eagle to rend your target with its talons would deal slashing damage.

Depending on the number of SD employed, you can choose one of the following forms (Somewhat stolen from here);

1SD: Missile, deals [sum]+[dice] damage to one target, no save.

2SD: Ball, deals [sum] damage to everyone within a [dice]*10' radius of the landing point, or half damage on a save.

3SD: Either;

1. Blast,  deals [sum]+[dice] damage to everyone within a 50' cone, save for half. or;
2. Barrage, deals 1d10 damage to [dice] targets, no save.

4SD: Either;

1. Lance, deals [sum]+[dice]*2 damage to one target, save for half. or;
2. Cloud, deals [dice]*d6 damage each turn in a [dice]*10' radius for as long as you maintain singing your Evocation. While preoccupied with your song you suffer disadvantage on all other actions and cannot perform any other Evocations, you may however move the cloud at a rate of your own walking pace as long as the endpoint of its movement is in range.

Empower

R: Touch T: 1 [name] creature or object D: [sum] minutes

You can reinforce an aspect of the target, rewriting their Name to make it stronger than it was before. Choose one of the target's numerical statistics, it gains a +[dice] bonus for the duration.

Manifest

R: [dice]*50' T: 1 [name] creature or object D: [sum] rounds or until dismissed

You can Evoke a Name strong enough to create an echo of it in reality, imperfectly mimicking G_d's own act of creation. A ghostly version of the [name] appears in the place targeted, it appears semi-transparent and obviously unreal but in every way behaves exactly like what it is - fire burns, water drowns, stone bears weight, etc. You may manifest up to a person-sized object or creature of up to 2HD, inanimate matter appears in whatever shape you desire when you Evoke it - ghostly walls and statues are fair game - creatures are obedient to your wishes. More powerful creatures may require more SD to manifest at all. Additional SD may be spent to increase the scale of the manifestation;

+1 SD - Increase the max HD of the manifested creature by 1.

+1 SD - Create a wagon-sized amount of matter.

+2 SD - Create a house-sized amount of matter.

+3 SD - Create a castle-sized amount of matter.

Bonuses

If you know the true name (the one given by their parent or creator) of the person or object you target with your Evocations, they suffer disadvantage on their save. Not everything has a true name, but works of art, unique artifacts and THREE WORD NAME swords do.

HUBRIS

At 5 or more Hubris, your voice takes on a scratchy, unpleasant roughness, and echoes slightly when you speak above a whisper. Disguising your status as a sorcerer becomes difficult at this point.

At 10 or more Hubris, whenever you perform Evocations sigilic haloes - intricate rings of arcane notation - appear around your head and hands. Those with the power to see souls have their reactions to you immediately drop a step.

At 15 or more Hubris, when you try to manipulate something that you don't know the Name of, you have a 2:6 chance to fail. Either your hand passes right through it or it is as immovable to your touch as if it was pinched between the fingers of G_d.

At 20 Hubris, G_d's own creation itself ignores you save for the commands you give it. If you do not know the Name of something, it is as if it doesn't exist for you. If you do not know the Name of Air, you begin to suffocate, if you do not know the Name of Fire, you freeze, if you do not know the Name of the Sun, you cannot see by day, nor can you see by night unless you know the Name of the Moon, if you do not know the name of Earth then you fall through it like it was an illusion. Chances are you don't know enough Names to survive for long.

You can lose Hubris (generally no more than 1-3 points at a time) by spending time (at least a week) abstaining from all sorcery, receiving absolution from powerful divine beings, or telling someone your true name.

SCHOOLS

The Khagan Munsu

The Munsu are one of the only Schools that enjoy governmental recognition, rather than being a loose collection of power-hungry occult scholars banding together for mutual protection. They are the descendants of the Wind Screamers, hereditary shamans of the Tong steppe, who once practiced sorcery on a master-apprentice system until the great uniter Achujam Bachural Khan ordered the Mandate of Stars & Flames, an official call for all sorcerers within his domain to present themselves before his court, with rich rewards promised for those who attended. Those who answered the Mandate were formed into the Munsu (Tongen for "Ministry"), the sorcerous left hand of the Khaganate throne, who would accompany their armies, run the Yam - the khaganates' postal service - and perform their tutelage in a structured form designed to serve the needs of the Khaganate and its relentless expansion. Their first duty was exterminating all who refused the call.

Robes: Sky blue, fur-lined.

Skill: Riding

Bonus Equipment: Riding horse and tack, a bronze paiza giving you freedom of travel throughout the khaganate and obliging citizens to give you lodging and provisions.

Perk: You start with knowledge of the Secret of Calling. Also, it's technically illegal for peasants to be cheeky to you.

Drawback: When you sleep you have a 1:3 chance to receive a vision from the capital giving you orders. Failure to complete assignments may result in being called to the capital to give an accounting.

Names: 1. Fire 2. Wind 3. Tower 4. Sun 5. Cloth 6. Gold 7. Horse 8. Cloud 9. Eagle 10. Eye 11. Earth 12. Sword

The Ešhugal

The Ešhugal are a clan of mercenary sorcerers, formed from the dregs of the ruling caste of the Sassál Imperium and their neighbouring long-time enemies from the Autarchs of Cthond. Both empires had long since passed their golden age by the time the ironmen came to bring an end to the reign of the sorcerer-kings across the continent, and had lapsed into a period of extreme decadence characterised by wanton licentiousness, extremes of vulgar excess and disregard for the laws of man and G_d. Unwilling to perform the hard work of their ancestors in rebuilding their shattered fortunes or to give up the life to which they had become accustomed, they formed the Ešhugal - from a Sassálid term meaning "congress of princes" - charging exorbitant fees to anyone willing to pay them for their forebearer's hard-won lore.

Robes: Magenta and gold

Skill: Apothecary

Bonus Equipment: Box of drug-taking paraphernalia and 3 doses of black lotus.

Perk: You start with knowledge of the Secret of Daimos. In any large settlement you can find underworld connections like fences, drug dealers and assassins with ease.

Drawback: You are cripplingly addicted to black lotus, if you don't get a dose at least every other day you are at disadvantage on all actions.

Names: 1. Poison 2. Wheel 3. Daemon 4. Sand 5. Smoke 6. Silk 7. Water 8. Plant 9. Crystal 10. Serpent 11. Hair 12. Fire.

The Viparti

Alone among sorcerers, the Viparti are seen as holy rather than damned by the majority of people - even if theologians dispute the matter with some vigor. They are descended from the mage clans of the Kikala Plateau, who had long warred with eachother over the land, causing much chaos and strife among the people who inhabited it. They saw the coming of the ironmen as a punishment for their crimes and their remnants formed a covenant to study sorcery for the sake of enlightenment rather than personal power. The site of the convenant was a burned-out village of no name on the banks of the Vipar river. Today there now stands a monastery in this very place, which takes in any child whose parents cannot afford to keep it on the proviso that they never speak the child's true name again.

Robes: Yellow, red trim

Skill: Acrobatics

Bonus Equipment: Bronze singing bowl w/ wooden striker, sutra scroll.

Perk: You start with knowledge of the Secret of Witchfingers. You can remain dimly conscious of your surroundings while "sleeping" in a meditation pose.

Drawback: You have taken a vow of poverty. You cannot own more than you can carry on your person or you take 1 Hubris per day until you get rid of the excess. Books, scrolls and items containing Names don't count if you choose to store them in a Viparti monastery for the use and edification of your brothers.

Names: 1. Lighting 2. Rain 3. Mountain 4. Wood 5. Water 6. Dagger 7. Rope 8. House 9. Falcon 10. Wind 11. Sickness 12. Dragon

The Black Pyramid

The most ancient, storied and reviled of all Schools is the Black Pyramid, both sorcerers and autocratic oligarchs of the Magocracy of Hanok. They were once reckoned as among the weakest of the sorcerous empires, their independence maintained through webs of fealty, trade and bribery more than their sorcery. But when the ironmen came down from the uttermost north, it was Hanok alone that was prepared to wage the conventional war that their iron battle gear demanded.  With its swolen armies of slave-soldiers purchased to reinforce their otherwise paltry numbers of sorcerers-of-the-line, Hanok and the Black Pyramid emerged the only remaining magocracy on the continent and the only fully intact School. It is a position they have clung onto with ever increasing paranoia since. The slave army of Hanok have since gone from being spell-fodder expected only to soak up damage to a highly trained and equipped elite fighting force, the Dalesin, and what of Hanok's wealth that doesn't go to furnishing them with glittering immaculum wargear is spent mining and importing iron - to be loaded onto bulk freighters and dumped into the deepest recesses of the sea.

Robes: Black with geometric silver embroidery

Skill: Politics 

Bonus Equipment: d3+1 body slaves (stats as level 0 commoners)

Perk: Start with the Chorus secret. You are basically above the law within the boundaries of Hanok.

Drawback: You gain +1 to all Hubris gains, most sorcerers have a bit of a G_d complex but the Black Pyramid's arrogance puts them all to shame.

Names: 1. Wolf 2. Stone 3. Bone 4. Spear 5. Glass 6. Crow 7. Darkness 8. Silver 9. Orb 10. Hand 11.  Mist 12. Iron

1d20 Places to find a Name

Names can turn up anywhere, the Schools watch for them falling from the sky as meteors and conduct expeditions to places no man has ever been in hope of finding rich sources of them. There are even ways of "farming" them, after a fashion, rituals that can prompt them to reveal themselves in a semi-reliable fashion. Here are some places you might find a new Name;

1. Inside a geode, humming in resonance with sorcery, crack it and hold the hollow to your ear.
2. Woven into the strands of a spider's web, visible only in the new morning's dew.
3. Carved into a cliff face by repeated lightning strikes.
4. In the freckles on the back of a harvest fayer's prize pig.
5. Scored on the inside of the skull of the last sorcerer to know it, at the bottom of a mineshaft.
6. Hidden in the background of a mad painter's last work.
7. In a group of unusually lucky street children's nonsense-rhyme.
8. Written on a parchment in the mouth of a desiccated corpse that walked out of the desert.
9. In a set of chalk geoglyphs that can only be observed from above.
10. In the cracks left in the side of a temple by an earthquake.
11. In the blood splatter left on a wall by an infamous serial killer.
12. In the heartwood of a tree split open by a wildfire.
13. Read from the entrails of a two headed calf.
14. In a birthmark on the inner thigh of the most expensive prostitute in the land.
15. In a flaw at the heart of a gemstone.
16. In the pattern of barnacles on the hull of the most feared pirate ship on the sea.
17. Entwined in the mycelium beds of a fairy ring.
18. Trapped, echoing around the bottom of a lightless chasm.
19. Whispered once a century by a comatose giant.
20. Inscribed upon the eye of a sun-blind stylite.

Sorcerous Appurtenances

1. Pair of thick leather gloves. Let's you handle iron without your skin turning to salt.

2. A black silk pavilion tent, preternaturally cool and quiet inside, takes more than one person to set up.

3. A palanquin or lecticia, complete with 4 burly slave bearers of initially grudging loyalty.

4. A sealed glass sphere of daemon fire, deals 4d6 damage in a 10' radius when broken against a hard surface.

5. An ear horn, let's you hear conversations on the other side of doors and pinpoint the origin of faint noises.

6. Filigreed bronze bracers, counts as a small shield.

7. A heavy brocade cloak, warm and stylish, heavy enough to make someone stumble if you swung it at them.

8. Set of vicious looking torturers' tools, (+1 to Interrogation).

9. Dose of black lotus, the gold-standard for sorcerous narcotics, lets you reroll 1SD per Evocation for 1d6*10 minutes, disadvantage on all non-sorcerous tasks while under its effects from vivid audiovisual hallucinations.

10. A disk of obsidian polished to a mirror-shine. You can view cognitohazards like medusas and angels in it without danger.

11. A jar of rust monster saliva. If struck with it, save or have 1d3 randomly determined iron items crumble to dust.

12. Bundle of scrolls containing 3 of the following subjects; 1. Ancient Classics 2. Erudite Theology 3. Political Theory 4. Advanced Mathematics 5. Astronomy & Astrology 6. Erotic Poetry.

13. Box of rosewater and pistachio candies.

14. A x5 telescope in a leather case.

15. Devotional amulet to a prominent local cult.

16. Ostentatious cameo ring containing a small hidden chamber.

17. Pouch of incense that allows the breather to perceive invisible entities while rendering them incapable of comprehensible speech for d6 x 10 minutes.

18. A dog-eared copy of the heretical philosophical work "A Modest Defence of the Arcane".

19. Pomander with a highly distinctive perfume, used to form mnemonic connections. Allows a second save against sensory or memory-altering effects when smelled. Needs to be periodically refreshed with expensive ingredients.

20. A bizarre curiosity;

1. A collar that prevents the wearer from performing magical feats.
2. A stone that glows in the presence of the Holy, and also on really hot days.
3. Scarf treated with poison-neutralising alchemy.
4. The tongue of a dead Sorcerer, scored with Names, allows an Evocation to be cast with +1SD 3 times, but attracts the presence of all undead within a 10 mile radius for 24 hrs when used.
5. Sealed beaker of liquid crystals, can foretell the weather with 50% accuracy, denatures after 2D6 months unless refreshed.
6. SUNK COST FALLACY, a medium (+1) khopesh of immaculum, hilt bound in gazelle hide. Has a 2:6 chance to know a factoid about any ruins its blade is tapped against.