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

Declassifying Ouroboros

The idea of normal D&D classes could easily be applied to Ouroboros - just run LotFP or B/X or whatever your system of choice is, steal some tables from Last Gasp Grimoire (plug), and you're probably good to go!

That being said, I had a more esoteric idea for how this could work. Instead of picking a class and sinking levels into it with XP won through combat and plunder, just join a society and move up through the ranks to unlock new powers. It's a little bit based on the "Special Abilities & Permissions" section of the Blades in the Dark rulebook.

So here are the base classes (cleric, fighter, thief, wizard) replaced by the society you could join to gain their abilities.

The Cult of Ishtar

Initiate

Joining: Liberate someone from an unhappy marriage.
Benefits: You get 1 favor die (d6), which is depleted for the day on a 1-3. If it is not depleted, next time it depletes on a 1-4, and so on. Rolling a depleted die still works, but you must roll on the Divine Punishment table. When you kiss a wound, you may roll a favor die to heal the damage and close the wound.
Restriction: You must renounce your gender and wear only the pearls and robes of the courtesan. If you do, you will be slathered in honey, filled with wine, and excommunicated.

Adept

Joining: Shelter one who has been done violence by their lover.
Benefits: You get a 2nd favor die. When you kindly ask someone to do something, you may roll a favor die to magically compel them to do it. This compulsion lasts until the task is complete.
Restriction: You must never turn down a request to aid true loves course. If you do, you will be forced to re-enter the cult as an initiate.

Master

Joining: Smite a powerful person who has abused their lovers.
Benefits: You get a 3rd favor die. When you or an ally is attacked, before the roll is made, you may roll a favor die to force the attack to miss. Alternately, when an ally makes an attack, before the roll is made, you may roll a favor die to force their attack to hit or to add it to their damage.
Restriction: You must never wield weapons. If you do, Ishtar's flaming sword will pierce your heart in the dead of some soon-to-come night and your soul will never be taken to her boudoir.

*Divine Punishment Table*

Effects, unless otherwise stated, last d6 hours. Rolling a 6 means it's d6 days, and then weeks, then months, and so on.

1. The target suffers stigmata and begins to exsanguinate, suffering d4 damage every round for d4 rounds. The blood pouring from their wounds is of the sweetest votive wine, and would make a great offering to Ishtar.
2. The target's eyes swell and slit like snakes', all seems painfully bright to them and they feel the urge to slither away into somewhere dark and damp. They take -2 to hit / AC in direct light, but they can see in the dark.
3. A crown of spiraling goat horns push from the target's head and their breasts grow massive (if they didn't have breasts, they do now!). Their constant lactations, if collected into a wine bottle, heal d4 HP.
4. The target grows delicate, graceful wings like that of a moth. They are vestigial, but beautiful in an ethereal sort of way.
5. in patches, you can see tiny shapes squirming just beneath the surface. When attacked from behind they take double damage, and the tiny bastard spawn of Ishtar will spill forth.
6. Their eyes, nose, mouth, and other orifices constantly ooze honey of richest amber. It attracts clouds of stinging, biting insects that fortunately die shortly after their first taste of Ishtar's sweet nectar.
7. Twisting horns and jagged fangs burst from the target's joints, dealing d6 damage and forcing them to move at half speed, lest they take another d6 damage.
8. White lilies sprout wherever the target's blood lands, if ground and ingested they grant +2 to physical checks for an hour, but after a week the madness sets in, and after another the change comes over them.
9. Ishtar boils your blood for a few moments, causing you to vomit up caustic sanguine blobs and dealing you d6 damage.
10. Angelic organs and prehensile things burst from the target's mouth, fronding the air, the only noises they can make are of the most beautiful music, even their screams for pain are choral and harmonious.
11. The target's saliva transmutes into a powerful aphrodisiac which they're at danger of swallowing to the point of overdose.
12. The target's tongue is replaced by a black adder, malicious and intelligent, though wishing no harm upon the target themselves. It will depart back to Ishtar once allowed to lethally envenom someone.
13. Ishtar finds the target's form wanting and reshapes it. Re-roll all physical stats. The target finds themselves now androgynous and beautiful.
14. The target's eyes turn into valuable exotic red gems, their skin to soft and pliant marble. They can still see and feel just fine, and don't get any fancy powers or a boosted AC.
15. The target's skin becomes glistening and night-black, their hair falls out and their nails pop off, their teeth sharpen into small fangs, they take on an overall Giegeresque appearance.
16. The target falls into writhing ecstasy, unable to act or speak in any coherent fashion.
17. Ishtar's glory manifests in the target, forcing everyone who can see within 30 feet to save or be overcome by ecstatic melancholy, falling into an orgiastic frenzy as they are overcome by hallucinations of beckoning genderless figures.
18. The target begins fading from reality. Every day they must save or advance down this track: Real --> Insubstantial --> Invisible --> Gone. The only way to end the march towards vanishing is to fall in love.
19. Ishtar finds your devotion wanting. Prove yourself forever beyond all question, right now, or have your pitiful body returned to the primordial squirming flesh-mass it was always meant to be.
20. The next time they sleep, the target must save or go to Ishtar's boudoir in their dreams and never return.

A priestess of the Lover of Lovers

Blackheart's Fencing Club

Initiate

Joining: Defeat an initiate of the club in a formal duel, proctored by an adept.

Benefits: Choose a signature sword and design a trick for it that you can perform instead of attacking. Also, you get +1 to hit with your signature sword.

Restriction: You must never refuse a duel, and must duel at least once a week. If you fail to uphold either of these commitments, you will be banned from entering the club.

Adept

Joining: Defeat an adept of the club in a formal duel, proctored by a master.

Benefits: Once per combat, you may parry a blow that would hit you, ignoring all damage. Design a new trick, and get another +1 to hit with your signature sword.

Restriction: You must only fight with your signature sword. If you use another weapon, you will be kicked out of the club, forced to win your way back in.

Master

Joining: Defeat a master of the club in a formal duel, proctored by a gathering of the other masters.

Benefits: Attacks with your signature sword ignore AC provided by armor. Design a final trick, and what the hell, get +2 to hit with your signature sword.

Restriction: You must never wear armor. If you do, the other masters will hunt you down and kill you without honor.

A club member

The Hand

Initiate

Joining: Steal a treasure worth 200 silver and gift it to an adept.

Power: Once per day, when you are restrained (physically or socially) and you could feasibly escape, you do. You get +1 to hit from hiding.

Restriction: You must fence everything with the Hand, and hand over half the take to the Hand. If fail to uphold this commitment, you'll be kicked out of the Hand and blacklisted by every fence in the city.

Adept

Joining: Steal a treasure worth 1000 silver and gift it to a master.

Power: When an attack misses you, you may redirect the attack to another target, forcing them to roll a new attack. You get +1 to hit from hiding.

Restriction: You must never pay for anything. If you do, the other adepts will attempt to steal everything you own and hold dear.

Master

Joining: Steal a treasure from the Queen's palace and gift it to the Hand's coffers.

Power: Once per day, you may leave a scene and later declare yourself to have been disguised in the background all along. You get +1 to hit from hiding.

Restriction: You must never honor a deal. If you do, the other masters will attempt to steal your life.

Light fingers

The Mantic School

Initiate

Joining: Bring an artifact or spell grimoire recovered from another Ouroboros to an adept for verification.

Power: You get 1 mantic die (d6), which you roll to cast a spell. On 1-3 the spell still casts but the die is depleted for the day. If it is not depleted, next time it depletes on 1-4, and so on. You may push a depleted die to cast the spell anyways, but you must roll on the calamity table. You are taught 3 random spells by your new adept-teacher.

Restriction: You must spend every night studying your spells. If you fail to do this, you won't be able to cast the next day.

Adept

Joining: Bring back an unknown creature from another Ouroboros for study by the masters.

Power: You get a 2nd mantic die. You are taught 3 more random spells by your new master-teacher.

Restriction: You must take on an apprentice selected for you by the masters and teach them 3 spells. If you neglect your duties or death befalls your pupil, you will be forced to re-join the school as an initiate.

Master

Joining: Bring lore about the Mantic Demon and how one might defeat it to the masters.

Power: You get a 3rd mantic die. You develop your own signature spell, which you can cast once per day without rolling a mantic die.

Restriction: You must never push a depleted mantic die. If you do, the old Mantic Demon will come for your soul in the night, it can be fled from or driven away but never truly defeated until it claims you.

*Calamity Table*

1. Arcane flames wreathe you, scorching your flesh and dealing you d6 damage. You will heal somewhat, but will always bear the marks of witchfire.
2. You age 5 years an hour. At age 100, you die and are reborn as an infant out of your corpse. The cycle begins again.
3. You gain a random insanity from the Gauche Madness table (a post yet to come).
4. The spell takes form, it holds nothing but hate for you and is possessed of a terrible intelligence, defeat it if you'd ever like to cast it again.
5. Your face becomes a spiral of whirling shattered crystal, you are unable to speak  but may still cast spells.
6. Strange fungus blooms from your back and sporulates aggressively, affecting everyone within 30 feet. This happens every time you cast this spell now.
7. A tiny version of the Mantic Demon in one of its many guises claws its way up your throat, dealing d6 damage on the way out before scampering off to scheme and sow mischief.
8. You gain a random insanity from the Urbane Fervors table (a post yet to come).
9. Caustic green mist pours from your mouth with the words of the spell, choking you and everyone within 30 feet who fails a save into painful unconsciousness. While knocked out, they dream dark and prophetic dreams.
10. You gain a random insanity from the Eldritch Lunacy table (a post yet to come).
11. Your skin begins to shine reflectively, your joints crackle when you move. You have become somewhat crystalline, with no obvious downside.
12. You wretch violently, borne to the ground by the force of the heaving, what comes forth are wet tendrils with no apparent other end, curling and twisting in the air.
13. You swell and swell, witchfire pouring from your mouth and eyes and nose, dealing 2d6 damage to everyone within 30 feet as you explode, before reconstituting all wrong (re-roll physical stats with 2d6).
14. You gain a random insanity from the Gauche Madness table.
15. You gain a random insanity from the Urbane Fervors table.
16. You gain a random insanity from the Eldritch Lunacy table.
17. Everyone within 30 feet, including you, suffers a spontaneous infestation of tiny crawling things just beneath their skin. This happens every time you cast the spell now.
18. Your blood is slowly and insidiously replaced by infectious worms. They do no harm to you, their glorious host, but any time your blood contacts someone else's skin they will be rapidly devoured from within and turned into a parasitic monstrosity.
19. You are suddenly encysted in a cocoon of silver and crystal, lapsing into a delirious and delightful slumber, unlike any since you were a child. If no one penetrates the chrysalis within the hour, the thing they find inside will no longer be you.
20. The Mantic Demon comes for you in the night.

Master of the Mantic School