More un-Classes for Ouroboros

This is a continuation of my post on fiction-first classes here. Check that our for replacements to the "base classes" assumed by most OSR games. In this post, I cover some societies in Ouroboros that could replace your barbarian, warlock, bard, paladin, or monk. Enjoy!

Another day in paradise

Ironclads

A tradition older, some say, than Ouroboros itself. The Ironclads preach the gospel of might. The strength is all.

Initiate

Joining: Present the trophies of 10 foes (or 1 monster) you slew to a master Ironclad.

Benefits: Minimum damage rolls seem to wound you but deal no actual damage.

Restriction: You must not show affection, or emotion, under any circumstances. If you do, minimum damage rolls will deal double damage to you until the next day.

Adept

Joining: Present the trophies of 30 foes (or 3 monsters) you slew to a master Ironclad.

Benefits: When your attack kills an enemy you may make another, and another, attacking as long as enemies are adjacent and the first hit kills them.

Restriction: You must never flee from a fight. If you do, you will be branded (literally) a coward and kicked out of the Ironclads.

Master

Joining: Present the trophies of 50 foes (or 5 monsters) you slew to a conclave of masters.

Benefits: Once per day, you become immune to all damage for d4 rounds, after which all damage taken during this time is inflicted on you at once (this counts as one "hit").

Restriction: When you are insulted, you must respond with deadly force. If you let it slide, you will be declared a dishonor to the Ironclads and the masters will come to collect your skull and turn it into a flagon for their ale.

blessed be the biceps

Mantic Apostates

Those who abandon the Mantic School are hunted by the Mantic Demon. Most die, their souls stolen away, but some make a deal instead...

Initiate

Joining: Make a pact with the Mantic Demon, in exchange for your immortal soul.

Benefits: You are given a familiar. You may conjure your familiar to work magic on the order of trickery or deceipt.  This works once per day before you must make a 1 HD blood sacrifice or roll on the Marks table. Each subsequent summoning demands double the blood sacrifice.

Restriction: You must make blood sacrifice to your familiar every week. If you don't, it will not answer your summons.

Adept

Joining: Feed the soul of an adept from the Mantic school to the Demon.

Benefits: You may conjure your familiar to work magic on the order of protection or prophecy. This works once per day before you must make a 2 HD blood sacrifice or roll on the Marks table.

Restriction: You must sacrifice an elf's soul to the Mantic Demon every week. If you don't, it collects half your soul, cutting all your mental stats in half until you do (and even then they all come back reduced by 1).

Master

Joining: Feed the soul of a master from the Mantic school to the Demon.

Benefits: You may conjure your familiar to work magic on the order of inflicting curses. This works once per day before you must make a 4 HD blood sacrifice or roll on the Marks table.

Restriction: Every night, you must sacrifice someone to the Mantic Demon. If you don't, it comes to collect your soul.

*Marks Table*

Visible marks are recognized by all as evidence of your apostasy. Most will shun you, members of the Mantic School proper will seek to bring about your ruin.

1. Your face becomes a mask of blood, dripping like a curdled veil and trailing behind you, elegant and horrible. If you re-roll this, the veil spreads across your whole body, swamping your clothing in crimson.
2. Your legs fuse and the skin peels away, revealing a single mucosal foot like that of a giant slug. The silvery trail you leave behind sprouts myriad exotic plants which die off in seconds. If you re-roll this, your eyes shoot out on viscous stalks and soft antennae grow like a mustache.
3. Your skin turns translucent, revealing your organs and veins and bones, like you're some kind of cave fish. Direct sunlight deals d6 damage per round, but in total darkness you recover 1 HP per round. If you re-roll this, you burst into flames in sunlight for 2d6 damage per round, but in total darkness you recover d6 HP per round.
4. Your voice dies away into a rasping whisper, everyone nearby can hear it pounding in their skull, as if your mouth were pressed against their eardrums. If you re-roll this, you can telepathically communicate with someone at any distance, but give them and yourself a random insanity.
5. You no longer gain sustenance from food and water - your body demands the crimson feast. Every day you must drink 1 HD of blood or suffer the effects of starvation as normal. If you re-roll this, you need 4 HD of blood per day.
6. Any attempt to magically heal you results in horrific pain, no HP restoration, and a random mutation. If you re-roll this, magical healing lights you on fire for d6 damage.
7. Your teeth fall out over the course of the day and are replaced with row upon row of glass needles. If you re-roll this, you gain a d6 damage bite attack.
8. You no longer have a shadow or reflection. If you re-roll this, you now have two shadows, and two reflections. They are intelligent, malicious, and beyond your control.
9. Mantic dice rolled in your presence automatically result in calamity, no matter the result. If you re-roll this, calling upon your familiar always results in a roll on the Marks table.
10. When you call upon your familiar, the dead nearby are awakened, even those long-buried. If you re-roll this, these undead attack you with malign intelligence and hungry strategy.
11. The familiar of a rival apostate is called down upon you, you have interfered in someone's schemes and will now pay the price. If you re-roll this, this enemy familiar will appear every time you roll a Mark, in addition to whatever is rolled on the table.
12. You and those nearby are transported to another Ouroboros. If you re-roll this, the Ouroboros is highly malignant and unfriendly to you and yours.
13. Your blood, when ingested, confers all of your Marks onto this unfortunate soul. If you re-roll this, this happens whenever your blood touches someone else.
14. Gain a random insanity from the Gauche Madness table. If you re-roll this, gain another.
15. You contract virulent leprosy, depriving you of feeling and flesh, spreading rapidly to those you touch or sneeze on. If you re-roll this, you lose a random body part to the contagion.
16. Gain a random insanity from the Urbane Fervors table. If you re-roll this, gain another.
17. You are pregnant, regardless of gender or sex. What the child is, you are not sure, you know only that its sire is the Mantic Demon itself. If you re-roll this, the child is born.
18. Gain a random insanity from the Eldritch Lunacy table. If you re-roll this, gain another.
19. Your familiar roosts inside you from now on, emerging in a shower of gore when summoned that deals you d6 damage. If you re-roll this, it moves its infernal nest to somewhere more vital, 2d6 damage instead.
20. The Mantic Demon comes to collect your soul.

O, how they have fallen!

Dead Poets' Society

Subversive and distrusted (perhaps with just cause), this society tells the stories of the other Ouroboroses.

Initiate

Joining: Learn a story from another Ouroboros and deliver it to an adept in the form of a poem.

Benefits: Once per day, when you deliver a poem about a great deed you have witnessed, you make the deed manifest again (so if you compose verse about the fighter getting a crit, she will crit again on her next attack).

Restriction: You must never allow visiting denizens of another Ouroboros to come to harm before you get a story out of them. If you do, you will be forced to rejoin the society.

Adept

Joining: Recover a written record from another Ouroboros and deliver it to a master in the form of a poem.

Benefits: Once per day, when you deliver a poem you can implant a suggestion in it that the target audience will unknowingly follow.

Restriction: You must maintain correspondence with an adept of the society from another Ouroboros, and always answer their calls for aid. If you don't, you will be kicked out of the society across all Ouroboroses.

Master

Joining: Go into another Ouroboros, perform a great deed there, and compose a poem about it for judgement by the masters.

Benefits: Once per day, when you deliver a poem that tells the story of another Ouroboros, the events of this story manifest in our world.

Restriction: Every week, you must journey into another Ouroboros and exchange stories and verses with the Dead Poets' Society there. If you miss a week, you will be stripped of rank and busted back down to adept.

dead poets, dead audience

Knights of the Botfly

These are not the famous castrati legions of the Dominatrix Botfly: but they are her biggest fans.

Initiate

Joining: Help the castrati or the blind masons stem the tide of a violent incursion from another Ouroboros.

Benefits: You have +2 to hit and damage against any being from another Ouroboros.

Restriction: You must always assist the forces of the city when an incursion occurs and you are at hand. If you refuse to do this, a tribunal of masters will be held to either expel or admonish you.

Adept

Joining: Fight alongside one of Dominatrix Botfly's expeditions into another Ouroboros.

Benefits: Once per day, you may declare someone an "enemy of the city" and whenever you hit them you roll double damage dice. You may not use this ability again until your foe has been dispatched.

Restriction: You must slay any being that has come from another Ouroboros. If you knowingly look the other way, you will be expelled from the order immediately.

Master

Joining: Lead a crusade into another Ouroboros yourself.

Benefits: You are encased permanently in a giant botfly, giving you AC as plate and allowing you to fly at half your normal speed.

Restriction: Every day, you must feed your giant botfly armor a citizen of this Ouroboros. If you feed it someone from another Ouroboros or fail to feed it anything, it will abandon you, ripping away half your HP with it. You will be excommunicated from the order.

abandon all hope

Pankratonii

An ancient order of wrestlers and unarmed fighters sworn to defend the city's poor from injustice.

Initiate

Joining: Give all your possessions and silver to the poor.

Benefits: When you hit an enemy with a melee attack, you may choose to disarm them instead of dealing damage. Your unarmed attacks gain +1 to hit.

Restriction: You must never attack a foe who cannot harm you. If you do, you will be expelled from the Pankratonii.

Adept

Joining: Take a vow of poverty, never again to own property or silver save your clothes and your staff.

Benefits: When you hit an enemy with a melee attack, you may choose to throw them 10 feet and knock them to the ground instead of dealing damage. Your unarmed attacks gain +1 to hit.

Restriction: You must always protect the poor from harm. If you fail to do this, you must defeat another adept in trial by combat or be expelled from the Pankratonii.

Master

Joining: Remove your eyes, defeat a Pankratoni master in combat, and don their blindfold.

Benefits: You suffer no penalties from blindness, and can effectively sense anything within 10 feet of you. When you hit an enemy with a melee attack, you may choose to grapple them, keeping them from taking any action while you hold them. During the hold, you may move but take no other actions. Your unarmed attacks gain +2 to hit.

Restriction: You must never wield a weapon. If you do this, you must face a master in single combat, and will be expelled from the Pankratonii either way.

a master of the order