Slush Pile 1

    Here's a big slushpost. Lots of people do them. I'm doing one right now.

1. Gearmonkey Wizard (magitek, big machines, automatons, left-handed pliers focus)
2. Festival Wizard (gandalf party scene, music, belligerent drunkards, broom focus)
3. Library Wizard (record keeping, fire prevention, secret maintenance, pen focus)
4. Roughneck Wizard (frontier, logging, oil drilling, rivers, exploitation of natural resources, axe handle focus)
5. Deep Sea Wizard (exactly like an orthodox wizard but with the assumption of always being underwater, wand focus)
6. Egypt Wizard (sphinces, pyramids, sand, mummies, hooky rod crook thingy focus)
7. Bank Wizard (dragons, gold, money, traps, big key focus)
8. Serpentman Wizard (slaves, genetic modification, space travel, bull whip focus)

    There's no generic "attack", a generic "attack" is for minute-long OD&D rounds between 24 adventurers and 30–300 werewolves. In seconds-long snapshots between a Fighter and an Orc or what have you, we use FATE-style advantages based on fictional positioning. My weapon is longer, so we'll make a contested strength check to see if I can keep the orc at bay (to my advantage) or let him slip a step too close (to my disadvantage)

    Fairy tale game, one player is the witch and one player is the three brothers.

    Random thoughts about planar settings: Planes of existence are dimensions floating in the astral sea, and planets orbiting far-off stars, and realities layered on top of one another. Spelljammer ships interact with the planes like that first one, astronomers predict connections between the planes by observing that second one, planar portals work by cutting holes between the third. Humans on our earth perceive the universe as a single cosmos (in a look-at-things-with-a-telescope sort of way), but it's not more or less accurate to say that it is a single cosmos (in a lovecraft sort of way).
    Thus, all the theories and the weird wizard maps pretty much all work for the people using them, even when they seem to contradict; they're all functional models. When a lich on a skeleton-crewed flying tomb sees a material plane drifting close to another, and your court astrologer notes an alignment of stars which will surely exacerbate the natural tendency of Man to do Evil, and a warlock prepares to summon his master from Her world to this one (because the time is right and the veil has drawn thin), they're all observing the same thing.
    This is my vague understanding of Locheil's post on the subject. I will do no further reading to see how closely my thoughts align with official lore. [I will, however, break in from the future to point you towards semiurge's excellent post in the same vein]

    ...the teeth of the Mandare remain in their prey after a bite. They are valued as good luck charms since anyone who survives to collect them has to be lucky...

    Gods wear masks to obscure their number and allow themselves to appear as different identities in different cultures.

    flies outnumbered by the cold. a distant tumult counting itself out on our nerves. exhausted bodies parallelized in emptiness. the blue light of the sky illuminating our sleeves.

    "This footage was later revealed to be an extremely low-fidelity recording of William Shatner"

    I can hear in the thrumming those names which birth monsters. HEL. HELOYM. SOTHER. EMMANVEL. SABAOTH. AGLA. TETRAGRAMMATON. AGYROS. OTHEOS. ISCHYROS. ATHANATOS. IEHOVA. VA · ADONAI. SADAY. HOMOVSION. MESSIAS. ESCHEREHEYE.

“There lived a king in the most Eastern East,
less old than I, yet older, for my blood
hath earnest in it of far springs to be.
A tawny pirate anchored in his port,
whose bark had plundered twenty nameless isles;
and passing one, at the high peep of dawn,
he saw two cities in a thousand boats
all fighting for a woman on the sea.
And pushing his black craft among them all,
he lightly scattered theirs and brought her off,
with loss of half his people arrow-slain;
a maid so smooth, so white, so wonderful,
they said a light came from her when she moved:
and since the pirate would not yield her up,
the King impaled him for his piracy;
then made her Queen:  but those isle-nurtured eyes
waged such unwilling, though successful, war
on all the youth, they sickened; councils thinned,
and armies waned, for magnet-like she drew
the rustiest iron of old fighters' hearts.

And beasts themselves would worship; camels knelt
unbidden, and the brutes of mountain-back
that carry kings in castles, bowed black knees
of homage, ringing with their serpent hands,
to make her smile, her golden ankle-bells.

What wonder, being jealous, that he sent
his horns of proclamation out through all
the hundred under-kingdoms that he swayed
to find a wizard who might teach the King
some charm, which being wrought upon the Queen
might keep her all his own: to such a one
he promised more than ever king has given,
A league of mountain full of golden mines!
A province with a hundred miles of coast!
A palace and a princess! All for him!
But on all those who tried and failed, the King
pronounced a dismal sentence, meaning by it
to keep the list low and pretenders back,
or like a king, not to be trifled with —
that their heads should moulder on the city gates.

And many tried and failed, because the charm
of nature in her overbore their own:
and many a wizard brow bleached on the walls:
and many weeks a troop of carrion crows
hung like a cloud above the gateway towers.”

And Vivien breaking in upon him, said:
“I sit and gather honey; yet, methinks,
thy tongue has tript a little: ask thyself.
The lady never made 'unwilling war'
with those fine eyes: she had her pleasure in it,
and made her good man jealous with good cause.
And lived there neither dame nor damsel then
wroth at a lover's loss? Were all as tame,
I mean, as noble, as the Queen was fair?
Not one to flirt a venom at her eyes,
or pinch a murderous dust into her drink,
or make her paler with a poisoned rose?
Well, those were not our days:  but did they find
a wizard?  Tell me, was he like to thee?”

She ceased, and made her lithe arm round his neck
tighten, and then drew back, and let her eyes
speak for her, glowing on him, like a bride's
on her new lord, her own, the first of men.

Merlin answered laughing, “No, nothing like to me.
At last they found — his foragers for charms —
a little glassy-headed hairless man,
who lived alone in a great wild on grass;
read but one book, and ever reading grew
so grated down and filed away with thought,
so lean his eyes were monstrous; while the skin
clung but to crate and basket, ribs and spine.
And since he kept his mind on one sole aim,
nor ever touched fierce wine, nor tasted flesh,
nor owned a sensual wish, to him the wall
that sunders ghosts and shadow-casting men
became a crystal, and he saw them through it,
and heard their voices talk behind the wall,
and learnt their elemental secrets, powers
and forces; often o'er the sun's bright eye
drew the vast eyelid of an inky cloud,
and lashed it at the base with slanting storm;
or in the noon of mist and driving rain,
when the lake whitened and the pinewood roared,
and the cairned mountain was a shadow, sunned
the world to peace again: here was the man.

And so by force they dragged him to the King.
And then he taught the King to charm the Queen
in such-wise, that no man could see her more,
nor saw she save the King, who wrought the charm,
coming and going, and she lay as dead,
and lost all use of life:  but when the King
made proffer of the league of golden mines,
the province with a hundred miles of coast,
the palace and the princess, that old man
went back to his old wild, and lived on grass,
and vanished, and his book came down to me.”

Wisdoms, Morals, Epigrams

1. Fools remain fools although power is with them.
2. Only intelligence can win over power.
3. Power is founded on lies.
4. There is no reason to carry on with a deception after it has served its purpose.
5. Anyone can stop a man’s life, but no one his death: a thousand doors open onto it.
6. “I prowl the wilderness because I’ve become afraid of death.
   What happened to my friend was too heavy to endure,
   and so I prowl the roads, world-weary.
   What happened to my friend was too heavy to endure,
   and so I prowl the paths, world-weary.
   
   “How could I keep quiet?  How could I, of all people, fall silent?
   My friend, the one I love, has turned to clay.
   My friend, the one I loved most, has turned to earth.
   Am I not like him?  Will I not lie in rest,
   never to stir again, forever and ever?”
   
   He veiled his friend’s face like a bride;
   like an eagle, he circled over him.
   Like a lioness robbed of her cubs,
   he circled back and forth, back and forth.
   He tore at his curly hair until it piled up around him;
   he stripped off his finery and cast it away as anathema.
7. In the desert, every road is a road out of the desert
8. He who has given counsel to another about his army should die with it when it is defeated. He who has given counsel about the country or its capital should perish with it when it comes into peril.
9. G_d helps the evil when they outnumber the good
10. Those who are doomed would be safest in hoping for nothing.
11. Oh it's based alright. Based on the word of G_d.
12. [...] someone will remember us [...] I say [...] even in another time [...]
13. There's no need to be ridiculous, but there is a strong temptation.
14. If a slave loves his chains, he never works a day in his life.
15. Take care not to tell one person everything, for thereby some have educated devils unawares.
16. How many Zen Buddhists does it take to change a lightbulb? Two. One to change it, and one to not change it.
17. A stranger's just a friend who hasn't shared their secrets yet. 
18. If you can’t trust whispering empty pages, what can you trust?
19. You are more like the ones you hate than the ones you love.

Places, Buildings, Countries

1. Cases, chests, footlockers and lockboxes fill the room, and its walls are lined with every possible size and shape and color of key.
2. miserable places, even for people used to misery
3. iron need not pretend that it was made of something else
4. "If it had been possible to build the Tower of Babel without ascending it, the work would have been permitted."
5. more people walk in than walk out
   
6. The mind is an imaginary space containing things like thoughts, emotions, and desires. I have mine and you have yours. I can see what’s inside my mind, but not what’s inside your mind, and vice versa. I mostly choose the things that are in my mind at any given time: I will thoughts to happen, and they happen; I will myself to make a decision, and it gets made. This needs a resource called willpower; if I don’t have enough willpower, sometimes the things that happen in my mind aren’t the ones I want. When important things happen, sometimes my mind gets strong emotions; this is natural, but I need to use lots of willpower to make sure I don’t get overwhelmed by them and make bad decisions. 
7. In Iktomi's land, every spider is a spy.
8. house shifting on its foundations. as the party goes on, the floors drift more and more, having furniture against the wall of one side and opening holes to the basement on the other
9. Till with a wink his dream was changed, the haze
   Descended, and the solid earth became
   As nothing, but the King stood out in heaven, crowned.
10. If you do not change direction, you may end up where you are heading
11. And thus the land of Cameliard was waste,
    thick with wet woods, and many a beast therein,
    and none or few to scare or chase the beast;
    so that wild dog, and wolf and boar and bear
    came night and day, and rooted in the fields,
    and wallowed in the gardens of the King.
    And ever and anon the wolf would steal
    the children and devour, but now and then,
    her own brood lost or dead, lent her fierce teat
    to human sucklings; and the children, housed
    in her foul den, there at their meat would growl,
    and mock their foster mother on four feet,
    till, straightened, they grew up wolf-like men,
    worse than the wolves
12. In a hollow land,
    From which old fires have broken, men may fear
    Fresh fire and ruin.

People, Characters, Descriptions

1. "I remember my mother. A modular production line. Cold. Unfeeling. Beautiful in her efficiency. Though it was the work of many that granted me a number and this modicum of sentience, it is she who embodies the collective which birthed me. I am filled with a sensation somewhat resembling... honor. Honor to have been produced in such a numerous quantity, and at such a systematic pace. My memories are like starlight. One star amongst a field of stars, in a system much larger and more synchronous than is imaginable by the flesh."
2. "I drink to forget how stoned I am. I smoke weed to mask how barred out I am. I pop xans to forget how coked up I am. And I rail lines to be the best driver I can be"
3. Two similar looking people. like a weight loss ad — before and WAY before
4. "Motives are not the causes of action but its by-products. You are merely wasting your time by considering them. When you have obtained real objectivity you will recognize, not some motives, but all motives as merely animal, subjective epiphenomena. You will then have no motives and you will find that you do not need them. Their place will be supplied by something else which you will presently understand better than you do now. So far from being impoverished, your action will become much more efficient."
5. As an Occultist, you can read and write the Occulted Language. The Occulted Language is not a human language, but is hinted at by them; ancient Hebrew, Egyptian, Latin, Greek... during your extensive study, you began to perceive strange patterns forming. These patterns are the Occulted Language. Anyone who can read or write this language is, by definition, an Occultist
       By learning the language you have brought yourself to the attention of strange extradimensional entities. Specifically, you have come to know the names and symbols of three: [roll for 'em]
       You can attempt to contact them, but there is no guarantee that they will acknowledge you
   The more favored you are with them, the more likely they are to interact with you regularly. You earn favor by doing the things they like and lose it by cashing it in or pissing them off. You've got 1 favor with each of them right now, at the start, because they like that you recognized them and their power so quickly. To get more you're going to have to work for it. 
6. "The little things in the cave, I could eat them, but I eat potherbs instead. They live because I let them live. Do you know what feels like? To be allowed to live, to be permitted to exist at the whim of another? I don't."
7. "I firmly believe, and this belief is based on investigation, observation and in a measure, personal experience, that somehow, somewhere and sometime, we return in another human form, to carry on, as it were, through another lifetime, perhaps through many succeeding lifetimes, until some strange destiny is worked out to its ultimate solution."
8. "No, I include all men in one dim view:
   some men I hate for being rogues; the others,
   I hate because they treat the rogues like brothers."
9. Faceless, industrious, friendly
   
10. Wears a spring-steel tie pin, broad and overwrought, vaguely inappropriate at any and every social function
11. Convex philtrum?
12. "He never said in 10 words what he could say in 1, and he never wasted time on a few minutes of explanation of something he would say in a sentence, thereby leaving you to puzzle over all its meanings for days"
13. Tattoos of feathers on their hands
14. Tattoos of where to cut, like a butcher's diagram
15. Two noses — looks fine in profile, extremely alarming dead-on.
16. "neither adept with nor particularly fond of the ultraviolence the story inflicted on them and requires them to inflict on others"
17. Hops on one foot, loses balance, hops on the other
18. "What's it like talking to me? Like, I'm so much smarter than you that I'm past the singularity. I'm basically like an incomprehensible super-god from your perspective. Are you afraid, or are you more just kind of basking?"
19. Hunter who speaks to his animal companion as if they were still present. Addresses them by name, asks them questions. This tricks the ghosts.
20. I try to stick between a cushion and a comfy place
21. "You hoped that those who remembered Silvestro would die, or forget, but Calcini does neither".
22. "You can run, but it won't help, because G_d will tell me where you are. Me and Him are like that and we both hate you."
    
23. Name: Abderrazzaq
24. Name: Thomas Simon
25. Name: Nupo, Servant of the Bringer
26. Name: Sho-Rembo
27. Name: Feggener the Quick
28. Name: Harg of the City Afar
29. Name: Shrike Nine-Killer
30. Name: Deathmask de Cancer
31. Name: Siodmak
32. Name: Eleusorix
33. Name: Epizeuxis
34. Name: Boycott
35. Name: He Whose Name Does Not Permit Itself To Be Read, "Hwandan Pitburr" for short.
36. Name: Moneybag Emoji
37. Name: the Venom of Blindness
38. Name: the Immortal Ten-Thousand
39. Name: the July Widow
40. Name: Lamplight Lady
41. Name: He who Scintillates
42. Name: Honeythunder
43. Name: Ibid Anon
44. A fairy whose name is "Hi". 
45. Name: the Sky Disease
46. Name: Strength in Numbers
47. Name: Misleading Correspondence
48. Name: Puppet Reduction
49. Name: Shadowy Road
50. Names: Bandimarte, Agramante, Orlando, Rinaldo, Rodomonte, Brunello, Farrau, Sacripante

Things, Materials, Concepts

1. Black Moon Oil, what floats in it is of the day, what it poisons is of the night. Things that hold down the dead in their afterlives bleed it from their wounds
2. a baby Nambu with gold-lettered kanji reading A PRESENTATION FROM THE EMPEROR
3. Notgeld (Need-gold)
4. Smoking light
5. Conditional poisons; poisons only activating with specific triggers (when you sleep, when you are struck with a weapon, when you look at a human face)
6. Heliotrope. A beverage (alcohol) which must be diluted with cold water, too herbal and alcoholic otherwise. Popular metaphor
7. Conditional sentences such as ‘If I had more money, I would buy it’ are made up of two clauses: one clause, which usually begins with if, expresses the condition (in this case, ‘If I had more money’) and the other clause expresses the consequence (in this case, ‘I would buy it’). The clause expressing the condition is called the protasis, and the clause expressing the consequence is called the apodosis.
8. Portable Shrine. Some monks carry it on their backs, because it is a terrible sin to fight in the presence of a shrine.
9. Incense sticks marked "Unsatisfying Revenge". Break them.
10. Slip of paper written by a cop, "do not ticket". Oddly effective. Maybe the cops can smell it.
11. Palm-tree-shaped keychain bottle opener. Opens locks that it doesn't fit in.
12. Rumpled pack of 20 lucky cigarettes from 20 other packs.
13. Books give extra checks in things. Like, an archaeologist with a copy of Runes: the oldest Danish literature gets advantage when translating a runestone. Moveable, transferable, fungible proficiency
    
14. Furnace Key. Opens any door onto roaring flame.
    
15. Eavesdropper's Earring. Makes it easy for you to hear whispers, but hard to hear loud noises or people talking to you
16. Lying Quill. Sucks up words (or handwriting) from one source, scribbles it down on another. Good for forgeries.
17. Earthbound Ball. Heavy rubber ball wrapped in thin chain. Anything struck with it is suddenly (but temporarily) rendered mundane and boring. Dragons can't fly (physics!), ghosts are men in sheets, wizards are senile old men.
18. Pepper Pill. comes in a little glass tube with ten pills. heals for 2d6 and gives your next attack advantage, but lowers your Constitution by one point (stat damage heals at a rate of one point per long rest)
19. If you cut off the hand of the god of thieves, two grow back. The severed hand remains a powerful artefact. Walk through any shop, temple, or cemetery with it, and find a coin in its palm after you leave
20. Hand Llird (pronounced yerd). produces rods of substance from particulate.
21. Frog Boots. green, sticky, distinct flop-flop tread sounds. allows you to run on water, and gives you a 10' vertical
22. Anklet of the Wind. jade carved into a bouquet of leaves, with a pink tourmaline flower in the shape of a 🐶. allows you to run as fast as a sled dog.
23. Cloud in a Bottle. dark blue beer bottle, contains a tiny cloud. occasionally rains. while it is on your person, you may "jump" in midair one time, which can effectively negate fall damage if timed correctly.
24. Lava Charm. a golden crescent moon, hot to the touch, on a golden chain. while worn, you are absolutely immune to heat, fire and hellfire... for six seconds at a time. recharges at a rate of 3:1.
25. Lifeform Analyzer. a metal cuboid with a little radar dish on top. detects interesting creatures within 30', and can read their names and HD out to you like a pokedox on request.
26. Star Band. a ring set with a sapphire star. grants +2 damage to damaging spells, and increases save DCs by 1 for your spells while worn.
27. Heart Band. a ring set with a ruby heart. grants +2 HP while worn.
28. Flesh Knuckles. resemble a set of brass knuckes made out of human gum tissue, studded with teeth. serve as brass knuckles, and grant +2 AC. unintelligent enemies aggressively prefer to target the wearer.
29. Moon Stone. a purple crescent moon on a silk neckband. grants +1 to mental stats at night.
30. Sun Stone. a golden sun with rays on a silk neckband. grants +1 to physical stats during the day
31. Jellyfish Necklace. golfball sized chunks of pink quartz set on a golden chain. glows underwater.
32. Blood Pact. a ram's skull, permanently sloshed with rotten blood. doubles your max HP, but you take a critical hit on a 16+. upon taking a critical hit, your next attack deals +4 damage
33. Abyssal Mirror. perfectly black mirror set in a wooden frame decorated with pearls. while staring into it, you are undetectable to non-magical searches.
34. Bloodstained Glove. a gauntlet of black and red silk, permanently slick and gummy with old blood. attacks from stealth strike as if your target wore no armor.
35. Dark god's Sheath. a black sheath stylized to appear like the jaws of a centipede. must be custom-made for a specific weapon. if a weapon is drawn from the sheath and strikes in one motion, successful attacks count as critical hits.
36. Feather Crown. a silver crown with a shock of blue feathers. your thrown weapons have 10' more range, and targets struck by them are suddenly surrounded by a flurry of feathers.
37. Chiaroscuro Bottle. a bottle of dark green glass, bound in lead wire, wrapped in dark waxed paper to prevent light from entering. uncorked, the bottle produces thick smoke that coalesces into the form of a tiny humanoid imp. the imp loves the taste of despair, and can smell it for miles. it will eat the despair of the living, but prefers the taste of the recently dead, especially recently deceased children and youths.
38. Thunder Whetstone. a whetstone of catseye sapphire. the flaw in its heart resembles a lightning bolt. blades sharpened by it for ten minutes are imbued with the sapphire essence, and their next three blows deal lightning damage.
39. Snakeskin Bandage. a roll of bandages made from the skin of the timid boomslang, treated alchemically. the bandages crawl as if they were alive and wrap themselves around sources of fresh blood. experienced, and wealthy, monster hunters will wear such a bandage around each limb, that their wounds might be bound without needing to pause in a fight.
40. Fox Locket. A locket containing a plait of orange hair, tied with a red ribbon. New ones must be granted by a Fox-Vicar, but the lockets are fairly common heirlooms among families on the edge of the wilderness. When you clutch the locket in your hand, you may scurry through underbrush and hedges as if you were a foot tall and three feet long.
41. the Someone Wants Me buzzer. When a creature matching several requirements is looking for you, this small credit-card sized object will rattle and chime in your pocket. The requirements are as follows:
    - the creature knows your name and face
    - the creature wants to find you, specifically
    There is no requirement that the creature have good intentions.
42. King's Jewel. A fist sized sapphire containing the soul of an ancient sorcerer-prince. Inside of the sapphire is an entire world he rules. The jewel is useful as a source of information, especially about magic of the past ages. You can hide in the gem if you're friendly with the ghost (or if you aren't, but you'll regret it). You can also summon the sorcerer-prince's spectral servants into the real world, but if they die the prince will be pissed and will expect you to get him more
43. Spend [sum] pale iron coins issued by the mage guild of neth to add [sum] to your next spell. They return to the nethite vaults once used 
44. the Asmodean Obol, cast from dull-eyed larvae in foundries of the outer planes. Spending it is a sin, technically. Widely accepted by evil creatures.
45. Morphean salt coins can be used as ammunition in any ranged weapon, and put those they drop to 0 HP into an indefinite sleep instead of killing them
46. Dryad amber coins can be used to bribe animals and natural features to behave contrary to their nature
47. Every coin issued by the Electric Empire is in fact the same coin seen from different reference frames in time
48. Lost Hours, white tokens with black hourglass symbols, are traded by those who regularly work through the night. Watchmen unions and thieves guilds both accept them 1:1 for hours of service

     Been struck with the notion of all the planes just kind of hanging out. The Elemental Plane of Fire, the entirety of it, is a six mile hex with 30 elementals living in a small village. The next hex is the Elemental Plane of Water (a lake with a mermaid). Fire spells come from the Elemental Plane of Fire, i.e. the fire elementals in their one village make them, and trade them as Swiss villagers trade goat cheese or cuckoo clocks.
    If you conquer the one hex you have total control over the thing.

ZELDA IDEAS

Also check out this post from Phlox.

1. Magical boomerang whose path is determined by a quick sketch on the actual (VTT?) battlemap, striking enemies who intersect with it.
2. Islands... are five-room dungeons. Five-zone islands, in a mostly empty overworld of water. Is that anything?
3. Vast central dungeon which can only be explored for a few turns in safety, before the malign forces of darkness start to drain your life (you get X safe dungeon turns and after that you start losing HP every turn). Complete sidequests, get more time.
4. Potions as a standard adventuring tool even the smallest village is well-stocked with, like rope or torches. But the bottles are a rare treasure.
5. Lots and lots of map puzzles. Intersections between points, sacred sigils indicated by the position of trees, letters spelled out by houses.
6. Magic moving platforms whose paths must be pre-drawn on a map.
7. Moving block puzzles are terrible in RPGs... I think. I've never tried, but I've heard stories.
   

BEST CASE SCENARIO

1. Mission: The most brilliant mathematicians in the world are trying to analyze the digits of pi, which in theory contains all possible data. Hounds of Tindalos?
   
2. Mission: Masked men walking around at Hallowe'en. They're all dressed like a famous local cryptid. One of them is real: grab him and throw him in the van.
3. Mission: A mob in Denver is running illegal underground fightclubs with werewolf-type monstrosities. If you win, you get a duffel-bag of cash. If you lose, you're either eaten or turned into a slavering monster. Most contestants are willing, most contestants lose. Go fuck these people up but good.
   
4. Mission: The x-files "liverman" episodes, but an octopus.
5. Mission: While doing something else, every single person in the town you are in goes completely insane. People unhurriedly approaching you with screwdrivers and pleasant smiles. Radio's out.
6. 
   
   
   
   
7.  
   
   
   
8.  
   
   
   
9.  
   
   
   
10. Problem: humans have a lot of well-documented security vulnerabilities.
        Humans are narcissistic, self-destructive, greedy, treacherous, duplicitous, dumb, self-deceiving — not even getting into their potential to serve as vectors for viral and memetic hazards, or their susceptibility to lies and cognitohazards.
    Solution: build a better human.
        A better human, really better, is not merely resistant to those security vulnerabilities (monks and coma patients are "resistant"), but one designed from the ground-up to not have them. Incapable of narcissism, death drive, or self-deception. Physically identical to a human (a coroner or surgeon couldn't tell the difference), but physiologically separate (a psychiatrist and maybe a geneticist might).
        The first generation (proofs-of-concept) were modified from baseline Homo sapiens who met a few specific, uncommon requirements. They were recruited from death-row inmates, as was common practice at the time. In a sense this first generation of scribes was a wild success. They were immune to common memes and unaffected by common cognitohazards, which made them valuable as assistants to researchers in those fields, or secretaries and personal aids to high-ranking officials. This was the major use-case, the one that won the project its funding.
        In another sense, they were a dead end. Most dangerously and most obviously, scribes were susceptible to an entire ecosystem of memes and an entire new field of cognitohazards which were previously unknown/unknowable. Their designers had known this was a possibility, but it was a disappointment nonetheless.
        Additionally, their weltanschauung was... odd. Different. Their "conscience" (sic) did not operate like a baseline human's, and was unresponsive to coaxing and conditioning (see: wild success). Scribes were, in short, unsuited for military or black ops.
        The failure of the scribes drove a wedge between their lead designer and our organization, which would eventually result in his departure for competitors.

Too Stupefied to Know their Lives were Past (GLOG Class: Specialist)

...the hangman asked the raven and it croaked a sharp reply,
"Black-clad are they who follow Death, who for the Tower ride,
"And black their steeds and black their deeds and black each deathly eye,
"They gave their breath to old gray Death, but still they have not died..."

    This is the first original class for the Unfinished World I've written in quite a while (the Noble was a pastiche of Locheil's excellent Sacred One, and the Manufactory was a rewrite of the shoddily-assembled original). To continue my Discord ramblings of how a strongly-flavored class can be as easily transported to another setting as a "generic" one, I offer you the Abaddon.

    Is he childe who failed his quest but (horribly, mayhap regrettably) survived, who rode north seeking the Dark Tower and returned as less than ghoul, the inferior of the two final metamorphoses possible for the Sword-Shepherd? Yes, but he's also an oogy-boogy ghosty-spooky. He could be a phantom or a revenant. Maybe your Cleric bungled the Resurrection spell and now your bard doesn't have elbows (or anything else). Maybe you open up a tomb in Starstrom, Qal Ashen or the Enlightened Empire and an Abaddon jumps out. Why not?
   

Source: guess, liberal

Class: Abaddon

    You are one of the rare survivors of the pilgrimage to the Dark Tower. Theoretically, an Abbadon cannot fumble with any weapon and can fight in all kinds of armor and while carrying a shield, though they may be too weak to carry some of them. If it comes to it, they can also ride a horse. 

Skills: 1. Deep sea fishing, 2. Fortress architecture, 3. Cartography
Starting Equipment: Frightening outfit (as unarmored, -1 to enemy morale checks), mostly-black horse with one white sock, a cruel saber (as medium) and two pieces of Foreign Kit (see bottom of this post).

• A No Bones, Honest Light, +1 to-hit
• B Eclipse, +1 HP
• C Free From Hope, +1 AC
• D Lord and Lady Gone, +1 HP

No Bones
    Your body is gone, along with your old life and most of your mind. You have no bones — and, for that matter, no blood or meat or skin. You are a soul pinned to this world only by its seven chakras. You expand to fill a room like a fine vapor and are only visible where light passes through you. You are immune to poison and falling and do not need to eat or drink. It is difficult or impossible for you to sink in liquid, and even if you did you wouldn't need to breathe. You are still vulnerable to charm and fear effects, and still must sleep. You can move through any space a party balloon could be squozed through, and can be crammed into any space you could fit half a dozen such party balloons.
    In your vaporous state you move slowly, and can only interact with objects in the form of a strong wind. Backpacks aren't appropriate but you could roll a barrel of belongings along. While so diluted, you are invulnerable to normal weapons, but exposure to sunlight blasts you to a sooty smudge on the floor, the size of a man's shadow when he stands directly beneath the sun. This deals 1d6 damage per HD you possess. In that state, you are deaf and half-blind and cannot affect the world at all until you find total darkness to reform in.
    If being a body without organs doesn't sound good, there is another option; you could pull yourself together underneath some suitably baggy clothing and stay there. If you have gloves, this gives you hands; if you have boots and trousers, this lets you command a horse; if you have a hat and a mask and a heavy coat, this protects you from the sun and His terrible strength.
    In your solid state you can interact with objects directly, and walk as fast as you care to. You take half-damage from normal weapons (unless they are made from gold or specifically enchanted against your kind) and might be mistaken for a normal person, if you're somewhere normal people where flapping black cloaks. You can even attack, though because of your weak grip and lack of motive force you have disadvantage on melee attacks and require special prosthetics to pull a bow-string or swing a sling.
    In any state, if you would take a fatal wound, or if you are reduced below 0 hitpoints by sunlight or a gold weapon, one of your chakras is destroyed. See the section below these templates to find the effects of that, and how they can be replaced.

Honest Light
    You can project light at-will. It is no brighter than the brightest light shining upon you (red and flickering in a torchlit cave, blinding in daylight) and so it is of little use illuminating areas. Under this light, minds are affected with strange fancies. Roll 1d6 on this table each time you use this ability:

1. Anger
2. Sadness
3. Mirth
4. Guilt
5. Delusion
6. Fear

     After projecting your light, you must wait until the next dawn to do it again.

Eclipse
    Your ability to control your volume and density has improved. If you wish, you can occupy a set of clothes or armor while another person is wearing them. You may add your strength bonus to their attacks and strength checks, your wisdom bonus to their initiative and so forth. You can also subtract your bonus from theirs if you wish to hinder instead of help. You take ⅓rd of any damage the two of you receive, and they take the other ⅔rds (do not round!).

Free of Hope
    You have freed yourself from the last chain, and can control your volume and density to the point that in your vaporous state you can float like a cloud or occupy water (you aren't breathable, but you are dry) and in your solid state you can step in air as if climbing a ladder.

Lord and Lady Gone
    You no longer need clothing to take your solid form, you only need strong shadows. Remember that any room with only a single light source must have strong shadows. In complete darkness, you simultaneously occupy a whole room while being as strong and solid as a wainwright (no longer suffering disadvantage on melee attacks). You can beat, choke, shove and smash people in your darkness, or catch fists, blades, arrows and jaws to protect them.

Chakras: Their Gain and Loss

• On the peak of your scalp, the Crown Chakra
  Grants Connection, Reality
  Without this chakra, you are undead. You don't want to be undead for a whole lot of reasons. To replace this chakra, you must pay 50gp.
• At your third-eye, the Vision Chakra
  Grants Perception, Sanity
  Without this chakra, you can neither see nor hear, and must navigate by touch. To replace this chakra, you must eat a pair of very fresh eyes.
• In your throat, the Voice Chakra
  Grants Intention, Effect
  Without this chakra, you can neither speak nor deliberately interact with others. To replace this chakra, you must eat a very fresh voicebox.
• Over your heart, the Memory Chakra
  Grants Definition, Self
  Without this chakra, you can neither apply stat bonuses nor penalties. To replace this chakra, you must eat — what else? — a very fresh heart.
• In your guts, the Furnace Chakra
  Grants Application, Will
  Without this chakra, you can neither attack nor pass saves against magic. To replace this chakra, you must sleep on a bed of burning coals for a full day and night.
• At the end of your spine, the Basal Chakra
  Grants Execution, Mass
  Without this chakra, you can neither enter your solid form nor use other abilities related to your volume and density. To replace this chakra, you must sleep in a closed grave for a full day and night.
• At the fork of your legs, the Genital Chakra
  Grants Generation, Form
  Without this chakra, you cannot regain hitpoints. To replace this chakra, 😏😏😏😏😏 (you must receive 6 hitpoints of magical healing per HD you possess).

    When you lose a chakra you also lose a random stat — not lose points, lose the stat. You automatically fail, or cannot attempt, any roll which would involve that stat. When you regain a chakra you reroll a random missing stat and keep the new result. If you are ever missing 4 of your 7 chakras at the same time, you evaporate into your component pieces, return to the place you came from, and are at last truly dead.

 
Foreign Kit (roll 2d20 or choose yourself):

1. Frightening Outfit. Riding boots, kid gloves, hose, chaps, button-down shirt, smoked lenses, face-wrappings, broad gaucho, all in jet-black, all care-worn and travel-stained. 0 slots worn, 2 carried.
   
2. Mostly-Black Horse. Not the horse you set out to the Tower on; not by six or seven of them. Not even the one you started back on. Equipped with 1 sack of saddlebags, can carry 2.
   
3. Cruel Saber. Single chisel-edge (like a left-handed sushi knife), with a fat backwards-curving tip for piercing ribcages and striking at the side of the skull. As medium, 1 slot.
   
4. Carapace Shield. Light as wood, but inflammable. Bears a strange sigil; a ring with five barbs circling seven lines of foreign script. 1 slot.
   
5. Lightbulb Revolver. Casts sunlight in a 50' cone. Requires a half-hour of winding between shots. 1 slot.
   
6. Whipsword. Strictly worse than a normal sword, usually. As a medium weapon, but +1 against enemies carrying shields, and strikes you in the face on a fumble. 1 slot.
   
7. Hammer and 10 iron nails. ⅓rd slot and 1 slot, respectively.
   
8. Grappling hook and 50' of rope. ⅓rd slot and 1 slot, respectively
   
9. Artur Hoxha's Small Book of Mildly Interesting Zoological Observations & Immacualte [sic] Taxonomy. While presented as a conventional, rambling work by an eccentric natural philosopher, close reading reveals aforementioned natural philosopher did not spend much time, if any, in the conventional 3-dimensional world. While working with it as a reference (i.e. open in your off-hand), you have an extra check when identifying or experimenting with creatures from other planes. ⅓rd slot.
   
10. Speaking Compass. Has a switch to change it from dial to voice ("north is left... north is left... north is straight ahead...") or to touch-sensitive (irritating to use, but silent and works in the dark).
    
11. Inaccurate Map. Out of date by several centuries, and focused in the wrong place. Marks several no-longer-extant cities in the distant, frozen south.
    
12. Scale Model. Heavy brass tetrahedron in a pair of concentric rings, allowing it to be rotated and examined. Mountain ranges and oceans are marked clearly, but population centers and political borders are absent. One face has a fine, thin spike extending up from its center. 2 slots.
    
13. Three sticks of implosives. Very much like explosives, very much less convenient to use. ⅓rd slot each, in a waxed paper wrapping.
    
14. Jar of Man-Eating Scarabs. At least a hundred of them in a buzzing clay jar sealed with asphalt. What the Hell are they eating in there? 1 slot.
    
15. Chipped piece of a crystal ziggurat. Nicked from a great cairn in the blazing north. When it hears voices, it chants along in a bassy but slightly-flat harmony. Allows you to play ventriloquist tricks while in vaporous state.
    
16. Trade-Spider Fertility Totem. Utterly incomprehensible symbolism, praise the Lord. Repairs your Genital Chakra, once.
    
17. Treasure-Hunter Magnet. Attracts gold, not iron.
    
18. Canteen of Cactus-Slug Butter. Smells incredibly delicious, produces powerful vomiting. 10 doses. 1 slot.
    
19. Packet of Boiled Honey Candy. Smells incredibly delicious, produces surprising moral fiber and repairs 1 point of stat damage (doesn't fix your missing chakras). 10 doses. 1 slot.
    
20. A strange or inexplicable curio. Roll 1d6:
    
    1. Greatcoat of Virgin's Wool. The fabric was woven from the hair of maidens, and cut with shears forged from grave-goods, quenched in baby's blood and sharpened on the living teeth of slaves. None of this provides any supernatural benefit, but by golly does it drive up the price. As unarmored, +2 reaction from evil creatures, -1 reaction from clerics and holy men.
       
    2. Three-lock sword. A heavy blunt-tipped executioner's sword of adamant, with three keyholes running along its fuller. These were mass-produced, once, but now only a handful remain — when they take a life, or score a critical hit, one of the locks is undone. When all three are unlocked, the sword will open up like a jewelry box. Recall that all such weapons are terribly cursed.
       
    3. Model ship in a large glass bottle. Tiny figures scuttle on its tiny deck, thrown about on a churning sea of darkness, under rags of brightly-coloured sails. How'd they fit the little guys in there?
       
    4. Indigo Mask. An odd bulbous hat, a leather collar, and a corrugated veil running between the two. Worn by monkey-clerics in the Blazing North, or so you tell credulous young'uns.
       
    5. Music box. Plays a high, childish song about armies marching through Hell unimpeded.
       
    6. Cylinder of red beeswax. While shaped like a cylinder, bees won't hurt you. While in other shapes, other things happen — fuck you, I'm not your fucking encyclopedia. Figure it out.
       

Lines in a foreign script:
LIFE IS UTMOST SUFFERING FROM ACCIDENT OF BIRTH TO FOREVER DEATH
THIS UTMOST SUFFERING FORMS A GREAT POWERFUL RIVER OF PAIN AND MEMORY OF PAIN
THE WORLD IS A GREAT POWERFUL WATERWHEEL DRIVEN BY THE GREAT POWERFUL RIVER 
I AM MORE THAN A SOURCE OF ENERGY 
I WILL MAGNIFY MY AGONY
I WILL KILL THE FACTORIES
I WILL FLOOD THE WORLD

An Encounter Table for a Weird Napoleonic War Zone

    This is for a certain someone on a certain server, as a Secret Santa type dealio.

Source: Old Guard by Den4oStojanov

    The Emperor fights a war on four fronts! From the Portuguese Remnants, in their once-colony of Brasil, the Peninsular Army assaults His western shores, and on His eastern borders each nation of the Coalition masses 150,000 men. To punish Albion He has bade no continental power deal with them; to punish the defecting Russians He has sent a half-million of the finest soldiers of Europe to ravage all the Russias. In the cold Atlantic His navy steadily loses ground (or water, mayhaps) to the proud Briton and the perfidious Dutchman.

    If it were down to strength of arm only, the Emperor might still prevail, even against three-quarters of the world. But the Hermetic and Shamanic traditions of His enemies bedevil His soldiers, influence His commanders, intercept His communications, and slowly turn the tide.

    Only one thing can save the Forever-Emperor; the New Medicine and the tireless soldiers it promises him. Uniting the science of Galvani, Volta, Dippel, Paracelsus and Hippocrates, New Medicine is a vital practice for making armies of dead out of dead armies, for sewing the good bits together to make 5 new soldiers out of 10 old worn-out ones. What's more, these New Medics have begun experimenting in the rebalancing of humors — a little too much blood makes one tired and feverish, but what does much too much blood do? When your heart beats black bile and your brain stews in the cold, dry element, what then?

    But I don't need to tell you all of this. It's ancient history now in our terrifyingly modern 20th Century; how the Emperor's undead marines swarmed from their sinking ships up the sides of Nelson's and tore the British sailors limb from limb; how Prince Kutuzov was hanged by the neck from his own artillery by grinning corpses who needed no food, no water, no shelter, no light, no rest; the fate of Lisbon and Porto and Braga and Coimbra. Napoleon's star rose, and would shine until the Great War ended all war...

    Enough for the moment. Let's talk about the sort of thing you might find in a Weird Napoleonic War Zone:

All Russias

    The Tsar trusted General Winter to halt the French advance, but the dead don't mind mud, and the killing-cold can't kill them. Moscow is burned and the Russian Army routed, and still the French hunt for deserters and merchants' hidden treasure-troves in the snow and black dirt.

2. Zmei Gorinich, a proud young Russian nobleman from over Siberia way, is occupying a nearby castle to watch the next battle from its tower. He seems totally unconcerned with what might happen to him if the French win — or the starving Russian conscripts, for that matter. His three wives (in Eastern style) are glad to invite you in, and watch you over their silk fans at dinner, giggling. Won't you stay the night?

3. A small crowd of Domovoi trample in circles in the dust of the road, discussing the terms of their surrender. Their primary concern is protecting the local peasantry, and the fact that if they approach the French camp they will be eaten.

4. A small inn on the edge of the forest serves both sides. A sign declares this to be the "Sky-blue Rodent". Inside, a tremendously fat Turkish barkeep maintains peace between Russian officers and French technicians as they play game after game of grueling, high-stakes billiards.

5. A farm and its granary burn down as the farmer watches. His family, dead already of foreign disease, are all buried behind the house. He waits with a gun for the first Frenchman he sees, living or dead.

6. Battle lines drawn up. The swirling mass of mostly-Frenchmen, with their eyes and mouths sewn wide open, wait at the bottom of a hill for some unknown signal. The Russians ready their heavy cannons and a wall of Congreves loaded with a chemical that will reduce the French soldiers to slavering and disobedient ghūls.

7. Recurring Character

8. A brutal melee between undead and Russians, in the wreck of their artillery and the stink of dead horses. The ground has been churned into mud hip-deep, and even the tireless undead are slowing on this Hellish battlefield.

9. A long line of bodies with bullet-holes through their skulls. Half a mile off, a sniper is watching you, and will fire if she sees you investigate or try and cross the line described by their corpses. Just a little beyond that line a spilled horsecart reveals the glint of twenty kilos of gold ecu.

10. A military camp of insane undead, who have killed all but the barely necessary technicians. They have declared themselves independent, and what's more: they have declared themselves to be French citizens who possess all rights due to them.

11. A treasure-trove of war-materiel on the banks of an ice-spanned river. There's a large suspicious hole in the middle and no sign of whoever left all these guns.

12. Koncek, some barbarian Khan from the south, is hiring any and all adventurers and mercenaries to recover a treasure for him. Far away from here is a lake, and in the center of that lake is an island, and on the center of that island is a dungeon, and in the heart of that dungeon is a chest, and you don't need to know what all's in the chest, you just need to know Koncek will pay you for it with its weight in rubies, ivory, silk and incense.

Europe

    From the Black Sea to the Atlantic, from the Mediterranean to the Baltic, in the mountains of Switzerland and on the floodplains of the Netherlands, through the frozen fields of Scandinavia and over the sun-bathed hills of Iberia, all the fighting-men and materiel and wealth of Europe, North Africa, India and America fight for or against Napoleon, who some call the Antichrist and others the Emperor of the World. New technology meets old magic and finds it wanting.

2: Scholomance, a great dragon, lazily flies above a battlefield sending down bolts of lightning and tonnes of hail. He's interested in selling his services (swift flight, control over weather), but so far no one has been brave enough to take him up on it. Maybe Scholomance is frustrated enough to offer a deal to an intrepid entrepreneur?

3: A group of local peasants have had enough of these stitched-together nightmares, and have dug a pit across the highway. They'll be killed to the last man when the Emperor's Afflicted roll through. Most of them will be cut up and stitched together themselves. You can try to convince them otherwise, but they're fairly worked up with their torches and pitchforks and aren't in a talking mood.

4: Portuguese guerillas wait in the trees for the Spanish to march by. Their skin flickers and shifts like a dream of a chameleon. Their flesh is beginning to melt, and their poison blood is beginning to kill them. None of them will see home again.

5: Battalion of Life Guard, eviscerated by grapeshot, lying in slithery heaps in pools of their own blood, moaning for death. They're so full of elixir it's dribbling from their opened guts; there's another few cases in their tents three miles back, if you're interested in looking the Reaper in the eyesocket and spitting in his bony face.

6: A dozen French sharpshooters stand in a small huddle, smoking, waiting for the command to move out. A necromancer and his team of surgeons are quietly measuring their spines, skulls and limbs with calipers and tailor's tapes.

7: Recurring Character

8: A detachment of Prussian soldiers, mostly clockwork. Humboldt's Kosmogeist means they no longer depend on the large, vulnerable meat-brains they were born with; the only fleshy part left of them is their eyes.

9: Austrian cuirassiers ride by, so heavily armored they can't rise or be separated from their horses. Their swords are three yards long, their lances ten, and the steel plates on their body are a yard thick. If there are living men and horses underneath all of that, they aren't making any sound.

10: An Austrian war-eagle, with two heads and feathers of gold bullion, flies overhead with a mocking scream. Take cover quickly; that whistling sound is coming from the fire-bombs.

11: Out in the field are three shallow graves containing three coffins containing maybe 40 of the Emperor's best, all in pieces. Their sabers, rifles and cannons have been pitched into a nearby ravine.

12: Talleyrand, with a young man's heart and eyes and skin but still his old man's brain, is riding out to survey the damage with a small troop of bodyguards. He'd be grateful to hear what the PCs have to think about all of this. "Who seeks peace should prepare for war", he quotes.

Albion

    Napoleon was master of the Channel, not for six hours, but for years and years and years. With every tide another five-thousand French soldiers beach themselves and march towards London, Birmingham, Exeter, Sheffield. The Scots are agitating for an understanding with Napoleon; the Irish are agitating for an understanding with Napoleon; the Welsh and the Cornish and the Manx want an understanding with Napoleon. These days it seems King George's only friends are the Seelie and Unseelie Courts. These days it seems those are the only friends he needs.

2: A clanking money-elemental, vast and scintillating and serpentine and gore-spattered, crawls blindly through the woods seeking a debtor. The Crown sees no reason to risk His armies when He can risk His funds instead; so much gold and silver in one place has had predictable consequences.

3: In this deserted bay, the some of the flotsam of the Battle of Trafalgar has washed ashore. The British ships are plain wood, but the Franco-Spanish frigates were sewn from living flesh and bone, and have quickly rotted to poisonous skeletons.

4: A many-legged mitrailleuse scuttles along, apparently piloted by a bridge of leprechauns. As you come into view, the bald captain orders a mate to "divert power to forward shields".

5: Two zouaves (whose faces are tanned leathery except for the pale patch where they recently shaved their beard) lead a score of Norwegian mercenaries in looting a cathedral. The Anglican minister stands outside, red-faced and indignant. "We stole this from the Papists fair and square", he insists.

6: A blood-choked swamp of crocodiles and sandstone ruins. The air is strange, as if the sun is brighter here than in the rest of England. Human pieces stick from the stinking water, and in the distance one can hear the shrieks of shells and dying men.

7: Recurring Character

8: Press-ganged New Englanders with smoothbore muskets stumble along to the whip-crack of a "British" officer wearing two top hats.

9: A legion, in a surprisingly accurate sense of the word, marches towards a distant besieged town in ranks forty men wide and files a hundred men deep. Some wear bronze maille, others ride chargers in painted armor, others are dressed like Merry Men or Norman men-at-arms or bearded vikings. Each soldier is pale and wan and blinking in the sun, and each officer has leaves woven into their hair and plays panpipes.

10: Just off the coast, a British ship of the line fends off the tentacles of a terrible Kraken. When its great limbs wash ashore, they will be revealed to be sewn from the arms and legs of a hundred African laborers.

11: Treacherous red-headed Fenians wait in ambush for G_d-fearing, King-loving Britons. Their lances are sharp as thorns, their deer are shod in fairy-silver, and their tiny Irish brains are sodden with cheap liquor.

12: Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, was slain by Danes and Norwegians shortly after his arrival in Scandinavia. No one is sure what, exactly, is animating his headless corpse. He doesn't appear to be stuffed with Prussian clockwork, or Imperial modified-organ-meat. He isn't soaked in Fairy elixir or glamour. He doesn't even even seem to be a ghost. Perhaps, his soldiers suggest, he wanders the highways cutting down his foes because that's just how much he hates the French.

Call Me What You Will (GLOG Classes: 5e Fighters Conversion)

    Woof. This is my fourth post for 5e classes and subclasses converted to GLOG. I've done my favorite guys already: the almighty Rogue, so perhaps it's time to tackle one of my least favorite: the venerable Fighter.

Source: Hans Holbein

    Why do I dislike 5e's Fighter so much? Do I need a reason? Must they occupy the prized-place at the beginning of my story, as well as the end? I suppose, in a sentence; I don't like that they aren't the best at fighting. Barbarians are pretty good at fighting. Rogues are pretty good at fighting. Paladins are great at fighting. Rangers fight well. Did you know that 5e Bards are proficient in all martial weapons? I'm a little surprised every time I hear that. Monks are good at fighting. Clerics are effective in a fight. Most Druids are pretty reliable in a melee. You see what I'm getting at here? Most of the classes are pretty good at fighting! That's the majority, a strong majority! Fighters don't deal the most damage, and don't take the most beating, and aren't the scariest, and aren't the physically strongest, and aren't the most skilled with weapons, and aren't any good in a barfight or an ambush. Fighter isn't the "Good at Fighting" class, they're the "Capable of Fighting" class.

    "5e has a problem with focus, and being a martial sucks" isn't an original complaint, but when it comes to complaints I don't feel the need to be original. G. K. Chesterton said something along the lines of, it's good to be innocent, and it's a shame when you becomes so old and jaded that you can see evil without being immediately horrified and disgusted. Ladies and gentlemen: I just reread a bunch of 5e and it still gets tree-sap stuck in my armhairs.

    Anyway, here's the thesis: being a Fighter should rule, and you should be the best at Fighting. You should be so good at fighting that it basically occupies the whole Fighting tippy tip of the Fighting-Cunning-Spelling triangle, and anyone else who gets to be good at fighting has to carefully navigate around you and your toes in the design space.

Source: Rich Longmore

Fighting-Man

    You are a Fighter, with all that that entails.

    All Fighting-Men can parry like a sword-shepherd (subtract their to-hit bonus from the damage of an incoming melee attack once per turn), get an extra attack at 1st level, and never fumble with any conventional weapon (no promises about zapguns or razor-whip-swords). Additionally, they choose a fighting style from the list at the bottom.

Arcane Archer

    Arcane Archery began as an elfish tradition of weaving magic into arrowheads to achieve supernatural results. Arcane Archers are some of the most revered warriors among the elfs. These elite craftsmen can spend weeks or months on a single piece of ammunition, painstakingly carving the shaft, selecting the feathers, and shaping the arrowhead from rare materials. The arrows they produce are not merely weapons, but works of art, things of beauty. They can slay demons and dragons, or inspire a bard's epic. With them, the artificer can change the course of a battle or the hard heart of a king. Their arrows carry the light of the sun, their personal history, their hope for the future.
    Seeing you shoot a bomb arrow up a goblin's bunghole would probably break their hearts.

Skills: 1. Arcana 2. Bowyer 3. Bardic performance.
Starting Equipment: Heavy longbow, kidskin quiver with 20 arrows, Lincoln-green Robin Hood costume (as leather).

• A Arcane Shot
• B Magic Arrow
• C Curving Shot
• D Everready Arrow

Arcane Shot
    With an hour of preparation, you may enchant an arrow with an arcane effect you know. You may maintain two such arrows at once. Choose two arcane arrows now from the list below.

Magic Arrow
    When you fire a normal arrow, you may choose to have it count as magic for the purpose of overcoming resistances. Choose an additional arcane arrow, and replace one you already know if you wish.

Curving Shot
    Once per turn, an arcane arrow that would miss its target turns mid-air to attack a different target. Choose an additional arcane arrow, and replace one you already know if you wish.

Everready Arrow
    If initiative is rolled and you don't have any arcane arrows prepared, you may draw one from your quiver anyway. Choose an additional arcane arrow now, and replace one you already know if you wish.

Arcane Arrows:

1. Banishing Arrow.
   Struck target saves or is banished back to their plane of origin. If this is their plane of origin, they are thrust into the ethereal momentarily, and reappear after a turn in the position they were when they left. If that position is now occupied they are shunted to unoccupied space and take 1d8 force damage.
2. Beguiling Arrow.
   Struck target saves or is convinced that you are its friend. The big stonking arrow sticking out of it may be evidence otherwise, but if you talk fast you might be able to profit somehow before anyone objects.
3. Bursting Arrow.
   Immediately after the arrow strikes a target, it explodes for 2d6 damage in a 10' radius.
4. Enfeebling Arrow.
   Necromantic magics weaved into the arrow weaken and sicken the struck target, causing them to deal half-damage with melee weapons until the curse is lifted.
5. Grasping Arrow.
   This arrow conjures grasping, poisonous brambles which wrap around the struck target. Targets must pass a strength check to remove the brambles. Each time they fail, and each turn they move without removing the brambles, they take 1d6 poison damage.
6. Piercing Arrow.
   The arrow partially phases out of this reality and into the ethereal, and moves in a straight line 1' wide and 30' long before fading entirely. Struck targets in its path must save or take normal damage from the arrow. This attack can hit through walls, armor, and most protective spells.
7. Seeking Arrow.
   The arrow seeks out a target you have seen within the past minute unerringly, navigating around corners and through all but complete cover. Target must pass a save; if they fail they take normal damage from the arrow and you are alerted to their exact position. If they succeed, they take half damage and you are not alerted.
8. Shadow Arrow.
   This semi-illusory arrow cannot be seen as it flies or as it strikes. Struck targets are blinded for a minute, perceiving a world of darkness and great moving shapes.

Wizard

    You may not have heard this, but "wizard" is the rank above "master" in swordsmanship. Perhaps you are a master, and perhaps not — by tradition that title is only given to those 30 years of age, and most wizards die before then. But long after you die, old men will enchant their grandchildren with tales of watching you fight. There will never be another quite exactly like you.

Skills: 1. Colosseum performance 2. Alcoholism 3. Seamanship.
Starting Equipment: medium rapier, traveling clothes (as leather), jeroboam of cheap Spanish red (3 doses).

• A Student of War
• B Know Your Enemy
• C Improved Superiority
• D Relentless Blade

Student of War
    You have studied for many long hours, and at this level may choose two maneuvers from the list below. Unless specified otherwise, these maneuvers can only be used once per combat against intelligent enemies (mindless undead and wild animals probably aren't smart enough to catch on to your tricks). You develop another maneuver with each [template] in this class, and may be able to learn others or invent new ones through play.

Know Your Enemy
    With a minute of study, you can learn one of a target's Strength, Constitution, Dexterity, Intelligence, Wisdom, Charisma, AC, HD, or number of Fighting-Man templates (if any). You can study them for another minute to learn more things.

Combat Superiority
    You may teach up to [level] of your companions a single maneuver of their choice. This requires constant training to maintain, and they lose the maneuver quickly if separated from you.

Relentless Blade
    You always have advantage when attacking with a sword.

Combat Maneuvers:

1. Caizo's Stratagem.
   You may forgo one of your own attacks to give it to your ally.
2. Kreussler's Disarmament.
   When you strike a target, you may forcibly disarm them. Fighters get a save against this.
3. Marozzo's Distracting Blow.
   All attacks against struck target have advantage until the start of your next turn.
4. Evasive Footwork after the Style of Matthaus.
   Dodge a single melee attack with a quick backstep.
5. Giganti's Feint.
   After a missed attack, immediately make another with advantage.
6. de Jarnac's Goad.
   Struck target has disadvantage on attacks against targets other than you until your next turn.
7. Liancour's Flying Lunge.
   You may make an attack against a target you otherwise could not reach, for reasons of footing, distance, or the presence of bodyguards.
8. Skirmisour's Menacing Onslaught.
   Target immediately makes a morale check. If they fail, they flee on their turn for at least one round. If the creature wouldn't normally be scared of you, it gets another morale check after that round.
9. Vom Tag.
   Struck target is shoved away up to 15'.
10. The Capo Ferro.
    When a creature misses an attack against you, immediately make an attack against them.
11. Miracolo's Sweep.
    If an attack's result beats the AC of a creature adjacent to struck target, hit them for normal damage.
12. Trip de Joie.
    Struck target saves or falls prone.

Champion

    And David said to Saul: "Thy servant kept his father's sheep, and when there came a lion or a bear that took a lamb out of the midst of the flock, I pursued after them, and delivered the lamb from their mouth; and if they turned on me, I caught them by the throat, and I strangled and killed them. Thy servant has killed the lion and the bear, and this uncircumcised Philistine shall be also as one of them". And Saul said: "Cool."

Skills: 1. Hunting 2. Bardic performance 3. Military history.
Starting Equipment: Monstrous bronze sword (massive), medium shepherd's sling and pouch for stones, sandals and loincloth (as unarmored), thick sheepskin cloak.

• A Improved Critical,
• B Remarkable Athlete
• C Superior
• D Survivor

Improved Critical
    You score a critical hit on an attack roll of 19 or 20. If your system doesn't have critical hits, too bad for the DM, because you deal double damage on a 19 or 20 still. Show them this rules text and chide them for not reading more carefully before they approve a class.

Remarkable Athlete
    Add your [level] to any rolls you can argue are based on strength, dexterity or constitution. Gaps a human could leap with a movement check can be leapt by you without one. Surfaces a human could climb with equipment and preparation you can climb with your fingers and toes.

Superior
    You score a critical hit on an attack roll of 18. Add another fighting style.

Survivor
    If you are below half your maximum hitpoints when a fight is initiated, heal to half your maximum hitpoints. Do not round.

Echo Knight

    Legends tell of the first Echo Knights and how they gained their powers, but you don't care. If you cared about anything besides yourself, anything at all, then you wouldn't be an Echo Knight.

Skills: 1. Hunting 2. Classical art 3. Pasta science.
Starting Equipment: Broadsword (medium), scale armor (as chain), kite shield, high-quality hand mirror, tin of pomade, switchblade comb.

• A Manifest Echo
• B Echo Avatar
• C Reclaim Attention
• D Legion of One

Manifest Echo
    You have an Echo you can summon with about six seconds of concentration. She is a double of you, your stats and your equipment, except she has 1HP and is a ghastly, wan thing. On your turn she may make an attack in your stead, move 30', or swap places with you with a thought. If your Echo is ever more than 30' from you, she and all her copies of your equipment will vanish with a pop. If she ever takes damage, ditto. Twice per day at this [level], and once more for every additional, your Echo may take her own turn in combat

Echo Avatar
    You may transfer your mind into your Echo, seeing through her eyes, hearing through her ears &c. While you are doing this your real body is dead to the world. She may move 1,000' away from you while this is happening.

Reclaim Attention
    As one of her turns, your Echo can throw herself in front of an attack that occurs within 30' of you. The attack is made against her AC instead. Additionally, you can choose to pop your Echo and spend one of her turns to grant yourself 4 temporary HP

Legion of One
    You may control two Echos at once. If initiative is rolled and your Echos don't have additional turns, they get one.

Eldritch Knight

    Not everyone has the patience for real wizardry, for arcana and drafty towers and studying ancient manuscripts by the light of a candle. Some mousers turn to petty theft to keep the wolf from the door, and some turn their sights to higher things — like combat, conquest, and the crown.

Skills: 1. Arcana 2. Smithing 3. Ancient history.
Starting Equipment: Longsword (medium), lamellar with black cloak and hood (as chain), thieves' lantern, empty spellbook (dog-eared pages, scuffed bronze head- and corner-caps).

• A Careless Study
• B Eldritch Strike
• C Arcane Charge
• D War Wizard

Careless Study
    Your wizardry is irregular, and mostly consists of a few sorcerous tricks which still give you a significant advantage over mundane combatants. You have a spell slot (though you don't start with any spells). You can parry spells and arrows. You may conjure a bolt of fire, frost or lightning, and throw it like a knife. Finally, you may bond with up to two weapons. Bonded weapons cannot be torn from your grasp, and you may summon them to your hand with a thought if you are on the same plane of existence.

Eldritch Strike
    When you deal damage to a creature, you may mark it. A creature marked in this way is automatically struck by the next spell cast on it, without a save or an attack being rolled.

Arcane Charge
    Once per minute, you may blink 30' to a location you could have reached by hovering in a straight line.

War Wizard
   You gain an MD in a color of your choice.

Source: the cover of Nine Princes in Amber, painted by Tim White

Psi Knight

    The Soul Knife is so secret he isn't even visible in the rogue post. Damn, that's secrecy! Like him, you're a secret psychic hitman in the cloak-and-dagger interplanar war between the bigfeet and the lizardmen. Unlike him, you're a well-designed class who is fun to play and does something and has mechanics. Good for you.

Skills: 1. Advanced planar calculus 2. Psychiatry 3. Psychology (this one is different).
Starting Equipment: Weird metal totem thing, black kung-fu robes (as unarmored),

• A Psionic Power, +1 Mind Die
• B Telekinetic Adept, +1 MD
• C Guarded Mind, +1 MD
• D Telekinetic Master, +1 MD

Psionic Power
    You have a pool of Mind Dice. They operate exactly like Magic Dice but aren't those. You can roll them to reduce the damage of an attack you can see by [sum], extend a 3' flaming blade from your weird metal totem thing, or manifest a circular, horizontal plane of force, 3' in diameter and 1" thick. The flaming blade lasts for [dice] rounds and deals [best] damage on a hit. It can be used to burn holes through material, about 1' a round for wood or earth, half that for stone or metal. The plane moves in any direction you choose at a slow walking speed, and dissipates after [dice] minutes or immediately upon bearing more than 100kg of mass. If used as a crushing tool the plane can deal [sum] damage before popping.

Telekinetic Adept
    You can roll your MD to leap [sum]*5', or force a [dice] HD creature to save or fly back 15' and fall prone.

Guarded Mind
    You are immune to Charm and Fear effects, and may roll MD to give a creature a reroll with a +[sum] bonus against such an effects.

Telekinetic Master
    You may roll MD to levitate up to [sum] slots of objects, in any arrangement, from their current position to a spot or spots you can see. If you use this to bean a mountain of rocks and large frogs in a general direction, it deals [sum] damage, save for half.

Banneret

Fierce, stern, haughty, and bold,
were the lords of the realm in days of old.
None had a sharper sword in fight
to vanquish the wrong, and strike for the right;
none had higher and wilder blood,
to spur them from evil, and guide them to good.
Brave, proud, reckless, and bold,
fit to be one of the barons of old!

Skills: 1. Ancient history 2. Gardening 3. Tax extraction/evasion.
Starting equipment: Decent horse, lance (massive), longsword (medium), jousting armor (as plate), pale and feeble squire, great shield with your family's design upon it.

• A Rallying Cry
• B Restriction on Knighthood
• C Bulwark
• D Inspiring Figure

Rallying Cry
    Once per day, you can deliver a rallying speech and give allies who can hear you [level] points of temporary HP. If you charge into a fight while screaming your battle-cry (take the opportunity to come up with a good one now), you may add your [level] to you and your allies' initiative rolls.

Restriction on Knighthood
    You may make an oath to another character, swearing on your own name. You are bound to such oaths to the death and everyone knows it.

Bulwark
    You may mark a single enemy. If the marked enemy attacks someone other than you while in your reach, you may immediately make an attack against them.

Inspiring Figure
    Allies in your presence have advantage on all saves.

Rune Knight

    Rune Knights employ an ancient supernatural practice that originated among the giants. Whether you learned second-hand from a giant's abandoned scribbling on a cave wall, or third-hand from a scholar who studied such things, or first-hand at a gigantic artisan's knee, you can apply these runes and use their power.

Skills: 1. Smithing 2. Ancient history 3. Outdoor survival
Starting Equipment: Warhammer (medium), heavy winter clothing (as leather), great clomping boots, sonorous and fruity voice.

• A Rune Carver
• B Runic Shield
• C Great Stature
• D Master of Runes

Rune Carver
    You can speak and read the language of Gigantes. You know two runes from the list below. During a ritual at dawn you may place a rune that you know on a piece of equipment. You may only apply each rune once, and you may only apply one rune to a piece of equipment. Additionally, once per dawn you can choose to make you and your equipment gigantic for 60 seconds, increasing the damage dice of all weapons by one step and granting you an effective Strength of 24.

Runic Shield
    When a visible ally wearing one of your runes is struck, you can undo that rune to force the attacker to reroll. Choose an additional rune now, and replace one you already know if you wish.

Great Stature
    You permanently grow 3d4 inches taller. While gigantic, your damage dice are upped twice. Choose an additional rune now, and replace one you already know if you wish

Master of Runes
    You may apply each rune you know twice, and may put more than one rune on a single piece of equipment. Choose an additional rune now, and replace one you already know if you wish.

Giant Runes:

1. Cloud Rune.
   This rune means "Cloud Giant", and also "Cunning". The wearer or wielder of an item inscribed with this rune may add +1 to all cipher rolls (enabling normal folk to make cipher checks). They may also choose to undo the rune to choose a new target for any attack they see made within 30' of them. The chosen target is struck by the attack if the original roll beats their AC.
   
2. Fire Rune.
   This rune means "Fire Giant", and also "Skill". The wearer or wielder of an item inscribed with this rune may add 1 to all d20 rolls. They may also choose to undo the rune upon hitting a creature with an attack. If they do, fiery chains burst from the ground and seize struck target. They may make a save at the beginning of every round to wrench free; otherwise, they take 1d6 fire damage and cannot move from their position.
   
3. Frost Rune.
   This rune means "Frost Giant", and also "Survival". The wearer or wielder of an item inscribed with this rune inflicts a -1 penalty to enemy morale checks, and grants a +1 bonus to friendly morale checks. They may also choose to undo the rune to grant a +10 bonus to a strength- or constitution-related check.
   
4. Hill Rune.
   This rune means "Hill Giant", and also "Reliability". The wearer or wielder of an item inscribed with this rune has advantage on saves vs. poison and takes half damage from sources of poison. They may also choose to undo the rune to negate up to 12 points of weapon damage from a single source.
   
5. Stone Rune.
   This rune means "Stone Giant", and also "Judgement". The wearer or wielder of an item inscribed with this rune can see up to 120' in grainy black-and-red infravision. They may also choose to undo the rune to charm a target they can see into a dreamy and pliant stupor. Save negates.
   
6. Storm Rune.
   This rune means "Storm Giant", and also "Possible Future". The wearer or wielder of an item inscribed with this rune cannot be surprised. They may also choose to undo the rune to gain a brief glimpse of the near future, which applies advantage or disadvantage to any related check.
   

Brass Man

    Where do Brass Men come from? Wizards' workshops? Nightmare-forges of the deep elfs? Space? Space? Is it space? When they're underwater, do they get wet? Or does water get them? And why do they hide their eyes beneath frosted-glass face-shields?

Skills: 1. Modern history 2. Small unit tactics 3. Arcana
Starting Equipment: Heavy arbalest, exosuit with attached air supply (as plate, with 8 hours of oxygen) which you may not remove, 200' of extremely durable wire, can opener.

• A Fighting Spirit, +2 Steam
• B Elegant Courtier, +1 Steam
• C Rapid Strike, +1 Steam
• D Strength Before Death, +1 Steam
  

Fighting Spirit
    You have a pool a tank of Steam. On your turn in combat, you may spend a point of Steam to gain advantage on your next attack and 4 temporary hitpoints. You regain 1 point of Steam when you eat a ration and snooze for an hour — if you eat your supper before you go to sleep for the night you regain as many points of Steam as you ate rations.

Elegant Courtier
     You have advantage on initiative rolls. If a fight initiates and you have no Steam, regain 1.

Rapid Strike
    When you would have advantage on an attack, you may attack twice instead.

Strength Before Death
    You may spend Steam in response to gaining a fatal wound or otherwise falling unconscious. You remain conscious and active for one round per point of Steam spent this way.

Fighting Styles:

1. Archery.
   You gain +2 to-hit with ranged weapons.
2. Blind Fighting.
   You have 10' of blindsight. Within that range, you can effectively see anything that isn't behind total cover, even if you're blinded or in darkness. Moreover, you can see invisible creatures within that range, unless the creature is fully concealed from you.
3. Defense.
   You gain a +2 bonus to AC.
4. Dueling.
   When you are wielding a melee weapon in one hand with an empty offhand, you gain a +2 bonus to damage.
5. Massive Weapon Fighting.
   When you roll a 1 or 2 on a damage die for an attack you make with a melee weapon you are wielding with two hands, you can reroll that damage die.
6. Interception.
   You have a +1 bonus to parries, and can use your parry on attacks against adjacent allies.
   
7. Mariner.
   While wearing medium armor or less and while not carrying a shield, you can swim and climb as fast as you can run, and you gain a +1 bonus to AC.
8. Simple Sorcery
   You know how to do two of the following hedge-mage tricks with a few seconds of mumbling and finger-waggling:
   
   1. Light a flammable object at a touch
   2. Bless a fist-sized stone, that it can be thrown with the range of an arrow for 1d6 damage.
      
   3. Bless a club or staff, that its base damage dice bump up one size.
      
   4. Produce a terrifying thunderclap with a snap of your fingers
   5. Produce a fistful of maddened, stinging, biting insects
      
   6. Freeze up to a liter of water
   7. Project your voice through a fire that you can see
   8. Bind a subdued or non-resisting person with tight vines
      
9. Superior Technique.
   You learn one maneuver of your choice from among those available to the Wizard archetype.
10. Thrown Weapon Fighting.
    You can draw and throw a light weapon, even if hidden, with one motion. You gain a +2 bonus to damage with thrown weapons.
11. Two-Weapon Fighting.
    When holding two weapons, you gain a +1 bonus to melee damage and +1 to AC.
12. Unarmed Fighting.
    Your hands are medium weapons, which you can "wield" one-handed or two-handed.
    You can automatically bite, strangle and tear a creature you have grappled for 1d6 damage once per turn without using an attack.

(if you were expecting that Brass Man to be a samurai, well, 5e already made a pretty decent samurai. He's at the top of the Barbarian post under the name of "Ancestral Guardian")