Thursday, December 16, 2021

Smoky Sputtering Torch (GLOG Classes: Monk 5e Conversions)

    5e conversion is easy! Subclasses have 4 thingies, GLOG classes have 4 thingies. The conversion is practically already done. While 5e content is often lame and bad, you can depend on me to make it worse; I have your back.

    These were made with the assistance of Liches Get Stitches and, more broadly, the double-secret triple-platinum Discord server for the ruleset formerly known as "GLOG".

Source: Divine ceremony by Reicheran


Monk


    Like barbarians, monks tap into a primal force of the universe. But where barbarians prefer terrific explosions of vitality and noise, monks seek enlightenment and careful control. Is it fair to call one more impressive than the other? Is a little natural talent somehow superior to mastery achieved over a lifetime of training? Can you hope to make something perfect by adding to it?

    All monks have a pool of chi which they use to fuel their kung-fu. This chi takes up slots in your inventory like exhaustion; just like exhaustion, you take a point of damage if something would occupy the same slot. When you take an hour to calmly and silently meditate (it is nigh impossible to do this in a city), you may fill as much of your inventory with chi as you wish.
    You may use chi to: leap 20' horizontally, reduce damage from an arrow or thrown weapon by 1d6, upgrade an unarmed attack to deal 1d6 plus your highest modifier damage (it's your job to explain why intelligence makes you punch better but it shouldn't be hard. You're a smart kid), make a pair of unarmed attacks immediately after making any other attack, or whatever cool shit you can get your DM to permit. You may only spend as much chi in a round as you have templates as a Monk.


Way of Mortal Combat

    You can read about him here. He works a little differently, don't bother me about it.



Way of Saintly Virtue

    You can read about him here. He also works a little differently, fuck off.



Way of the Drunken Master

    True Drunken Masters are indistinguishable from morons. You spend your nights playing your qin at the finest of whorehouses, and your days nursing a hangover with hair-of-the-dog by the pint. When fighting, you tilt and lurch like a murderous wino; when doing anything else, you tilt and lurch like a murderous wino. Literati and the upper-crust, inexplicably, adore you.

Skills: 1. Epic poetry 2. Courtly seduction 3. Formal duels
Starting Equipment: Wine-stained finery (as unarmored), kukri (wickedly curved, light), well-cared-for qin, wineskin of very strong brandy (3 doses), calligraphy set.
  • A Drunk "Technique", +2 Save
  • B Tipsy Sway
  • C Heaven Protects Children and Idiots, +2 Save
  • D Intoxicated Frenzy
Drunk "Technique"
    Despite your wobbling and teetering, you cannot fall off anything which can bear your weight (tightropes, ledges around buildings, the tops of peoples' heads in a crowd). Any roll that would knock you over has disadvantage (or vice versa if you're the one rolling).
Tipsy Sway
    Terrain and conditions that would slow a normal person do not slow you. Your bobbing and weaving, mostly through accident, makes it more difficult (disadvantage) to grapple you with ropes and nets and nigh-impossible to do so with bare hands. You could stumble through a grasping crowd without being brushed once.
Heaven Protects Children and Idiots
    If it is even remotely feasible for you to have avoided damage (this works on a car crash but not on a Sun Soul bombing), spend 2 chi and do so with a pratfall and a shiteating grin.
Intoxicated Frenzy
    Spend a chi to immediately make an unarmed attack against someone, by kneeing them in the kidney or slamming your forearm into their nose or some such. This works at any time, even during someone else's turn in combat. Outside of combat these attacks are plausibly an accident.



Way of the Sun Soul

    When the universe was young, bearers of Sun Souls were common. Over the eons most faded, or ascended. Many — but not all — of the g_ds themselves began as Sun Souls. In these blasted latter-ages of the world apotheosis is less common, but still possible.

Skills: 1. Archaeological burgling 2. Largescale architecture 3. Management
Starting Equipment: White loincloth (as unarmored), painted begging bowl, healthy and thorough tan, calligraphy set.
  • A Sunlit Body, +2 to-hit
  • B Solar Crown
  • C Radiant Arc of the Sun, +2 AC
  • D Sideration
Sunlit Body
    Fire and heat cannot hurt you (though smoke inhalation still can). Four hours of meditation in direct sunlight is as good as a full meal. You do not cast a shadow outdoors.
Solar Crown
    If you focus your chi into your crown and eye chakras, you can project a brilliant beam of sunlight from your forehead and a halo of the same from your scalp, both visible for miles. It takes one point of chi to maintain these lights for an hour.
Radiant Arc of the Sun
    If you focus your chi in your heart and stomach chakras, you can create a blazing sphere about the size of a cannonball. You can throw this sphere about 300' (it is weightless and ignores most air resistance), where it explodes in a brief but deadly flash. This deals 2d6 fire damage to all creatures within 30'. The sphere costs 2 chi to create initially, and for every additional chi you invest the damage increases by 2d6.
Sideration
    At-will, a crackling haze of charged particles rises from your skin. Anyone who approaches within 10' takes 1d6 plasma damage, and you take 1 point of damage when this happens. Metal objects in the area spontaneously weld together. Grapes explode. If this kills you, your soul has an X-in-20 chance of rising into the heavens as a new star (where X is the number of people your plasma-field killed at the same time as you). If this roll fails, your soul breaks into extremely valuable gemstone fragments and a harmless purple fog which dissipates into the atmosphere.



Way of the Kensei

    That other schools ignore the sword is a missed opportunity. For a sword is not merely a weapon. Most "weapons" are, in reality, tools; spears are tools of hunting, nunchucks are tools of threshing, and staffs are tools of walking. But a sword is an extension of the self, a part of the self, just as much as hands and feet. You can't say you have mastered your self until you have mastered your sword.

Skills: 1. Nature painting 2. Lying to authorities 3. Horses, + proficiency in bladed weapons.
Starting Equipment: katana (medium, but using wisdom instead of strength), wakizashi (light), brightly-colored traveling clothes (as unarmored), letter of introduction (from important NPC), calligraphy set.
  • A Sword Saint, Extra attack
  • B Respect
  • C Advanced Striking Technique #5 (Lethal), +2 to-hit
  • D Exemplary Edge Maintenance
Sword Saint
    You may parry and guard like a sword-shepherd.
Respect
    You're recognized as a member of the Right Sort, even if you were born a peasant, or are currently wearing shabby hobo clothing. Nobles and military officials and minor divinities will tolerate backtalk and advice from you (don't expect this to work on emperors or tigers, of course). Members of the Right Sort are permitted more-or-less open warfare against each other without interference from Johnny Law.
Advanced Striking Technique #5 (Lethal)
    The golden age of the Kensei is long over and most legendary techniques have been lost to time. Not this one, though. Nobody could forget this one. By spending a point of chi, an attack from your sword can hit a visible target at any range. For each additional point of chi you invest, roll another of the sword's damage dice and add the result to the total damage.
Exemplary Edge Maintenance
    In your hands, every sword is a magical +1 weapon with the enchantment "Reroll a missed attack once per day".



Way of the Long Death

    To die quickly is easy. To live forever is difficult. But to die forever... few accomplish this. The followers of the Long Death resemble their cousins, the liches, only superficially. They possess martial arts instead of arcane powers, and where normal liches seek an eternity to gain knowledge and magic, the monks of the Long Death only wish to study one thing.

Skills: 1. Forgotten ancient culture 2. Human anatomy 3. Esoteric religion
Starting Equipment: Dusty yet festive clothing (as unarmored, +1 to reaction), steel mask which completely conceals the face, travel sewing kit, bottle of eau de cologne (10 doses), calligraphy set.
  • A Dead Vespers
  • B Hour of Reaping
  • C The Touch of the Long Death
  • D Lessons Internalized
Dead Vespers
    You are undead. Sunlight and running water hurt you like fire (and, incidentally, so does fire). You do not need to sleep or eat, and cannot be poisoned. You don't have darkvision but you can see the chakras of intelligent beings, even through a blindfold (which is good because you're going to have to wear one during the daytime). Healing spells and potions damage you, and you cannot heal by resting. You must repair your body with a needle and thread at a rate of 1HP an hour. You can sew on reasonably-fresh limbs if you lose your old ones, which might let you re-roll physical stats if they're particularly high-quality. If you are reduced to 0HP your body falls apart at the joints, but you can be sewn back together by your friends if they recover all of your chakras (if they recover at least four of the chakras you'll still be O.K. but they have to sew new ones in, and you must re-roll a mental stat for each original chakra you lost and take the lower value).
Hour of Reaping
    You can, at-will, project an unwholesome aura. Living creatures who can see you get a sudden nagging feeling they need to get the Hell away from you as fast as possible. Provokes morale checks from most NPCs.
The Touch of the Long Death
    A graze from a finger inflicts 2d8 points of necrotic damage to a creature per chi you invest. This damage is dealt at a rate of 1 per day, and permanently lowers the max HP of the victim. Magical healing counteracts the remaining damage, but does not regenerate the missing max HP.
    The experience of living in a rotting body is excruciating, and yet the victim feels obligated to keep a written record. At the moment of annihilation they make a save; if they fail, they become undead. This is the beginning of the journey you once took
Lessons Internalized
    If you kiss a dying humanoid who has at least as many HD as you, you can draw their soul out between their lips and swallow it. This permanently increases your HP by 1 (up to a maximum of 8HP*level). Most people would rather leap into the sea than let this happen to their soul. Doing this before witnesses provokes an immediate morale check, or a reaction check if there are enough of them to cut you to pieces at the joints and lay those pieces on a pyre.



Way of the Open Hand

    Swords! Liquor! Magic! How terrible! The monastic life should be about simplicity, sobriety, and meditation. Time spent studying war and sorcery is time that would have been better spent praying for the benefit of Creation or developing one's own discipline, perhaps beneath a waterfall of some sort. All a monk really needs is a good heart, the ability to vaporize human beings with his bare hands, and a sense of humor.

Skills: 1. Cooking 2. Gab 3. Ancient history
Starting Equipment: Saffron robe (as unarmored), clay lantern on a bit of rope, wooden flask of oil (3 doses), calligraphy set (the brushes have bone handles).

  • A Lesson of the Buffalo, +1 HP
  • B Useful Heart, +1 HP
  • C Thirteen Blows Between One Heartbeat and the Next, +1 HP
  • D Timeless Body, +1 HP
Lesson of the Buffalo
    While you aren't carrying a weapon or a tool, your inventory space is doubled. Weapons and tools have rigid handles, or metal heads. If someone shoots you with an arrow or stabs you with a knife, you aren't "carrying" that arrow or knife.
Useful Heart
    If you would fail a save of some kind, you may spend a chi point and reroll it. You may spend a chi point to heal 1HP.
Thirteen Blows Between One Heartbeat and the Next
    There is no limit on how much chi you may spend in a round.
Timeless Body
    You do not age if you do not wish to. While you sit in silent and unblinking meditation, you do not require food or water or rest or air.



Way of the Shadow

    Over the centuries, many organizations and many masters have claimed to be the true incarnations and successors of this semi-legendary order. It's possible they were all lying. Indeed, it's possible that the secretive Shadows never existed at all outside of fable and nightmare. Nobody has ever proved that they've seen one.

Skills: 1. Agriculture 2. Theater costuming 3. Gambling games
Starting Equipment: Matte black bodysuit with big red silk sash (as unarmored, +1 to sneaking), two sais (light), grapnel and 50' of rope, bundle of lockpicks, calligraphy set.
  • A Pass Without Trace, +2 skill
  • B Spreading Night
  • C Razor Edge Between Light and Death, +2 skill
  • D Shadow Step
Pass Without Trace
    Your mastery of the Shadow-Arts lets you move silently and without a trace. Leave as many footprints in snow or loam as you would on a marble floor, and make as much noise passing through gravel or water as you would walking on that marble floor in silk slippers.
Spreading Night
    Shadows you can see lie in any direction you wish, including towards lightsources. If you focus on a shadow for a moment it becomes inky-black with a stark edge, and this lasts for several minutes.
Razor Edge Between Light and Death
    Spend one chi per HD to instantly and silently slay any mortal creature occupying your darkness. When their bodies are found, they have no visible wounds.
Shadow Step
    Between the blinks of any observers, move up to 60' from one stark shadow to another. In a totally dark environment you cannot be seen with darkvision or located by sound, though you may act as if you were present.

3 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Yes. This is it. Pluck content from the very gaping maw of 5e and bring it to us for succour and delight!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. First note: Blogspot has broken in such a way that prevents me from replying to comments from the URL I am brought to when I click on a comment from the dashboard.
      Second note: Yeah, the 5e monks have great names but jank mechanics, I hope these classes are a little more aligned with GLOG sensibilities. Expect the barbarians shortly.

      Thank you for your comment.

      Delete