Since 2025 is apparently the year of the beta, I've decided to go ahead and post something from an unpublished google doc from ~2019. I was a few months into an administrative assistant job with a lot of seasonal variation in workload and had just gotten jazzed up about Tolkien and OSR writing from reading Rise Up Comus, The One Ring 1st edition and Adventures in Middle Earth, so I was able to get a lot of writing done on the clock.
Piggybacking off of Josh's Wilderlands posts, I hatched a grand scheme to write a boxed campaign with a megadungeon, a small hexcrawl, and a bespoke ruleset in a kind of "The Hobbit meets Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay," "what if you replaced Smaug with Chernobog" thing called "Orcmont". I wrote a bunch of stuff for it before realizing that A) I'd bitten off way more than I could chew, and B) I was adding very little original material to my sources. Bits and pieces are still pretty good (although you'd certainly hope so, since the google doc is over 100 pages long), and a lot of the work that I've done since has owed a creative debt to Orcmont.
Maybe I'll revive it in some form one day, who knows! While these rules are mostly me clambering onto the shoulders of giants, there are a few minor innovations and ideas that I like:
- The sigil rules are pretty fun. You can make a ward or magic item by casting a spell as a sigil, but you can only ever have one at a time. For example, Josh had the great idea of letting the caster choose who the victim of a Charm Person is charmed by, so it can be a love spell. Using the sigil rules, you can also make a love potion.
- Making Blessing work like Glinda the Good's kiss is pretty cute.
- I combined Josh's Animate Object and Command spells, which feels resonant to me. They are both in a sense Words of Command.
- The table of non-magical counterspells for lifting curses is neat.
- While unnecessarily clunky in implementation, this marks my first attempt to combine the Light spell with a Turn Undead effect. To be honest, I think they should be the same thing in any setting where the cleric isn't warding vampires off with a cross. Everybody's always trying to rework or drop the cleric because "adventuring priest" is a fairly specific archetype, and the best way to do that in my opinion is to just hand their tool set to the wizard. Gandalf holds a demon at bay and Ged banishes shadows with magelight: why not do the same in your game?
- Wizards should also be able to turn into animals.
- While my Speaking spell is lifted almost word-for-word from Josh's Give Voice, I do think that I wrote a nice line expanding on how to give the target of the spell a thematically appropriate personality.
MAGIC
Casting a spell generates a balance token. Wizards can cast a number of spells per level per adventure before they begin generating balance tokens.
The GM can cash in a balance token at any time to give you some kind of misfortune. The misfortune might involve an automatic critical failure at an inopportune time, an encounter, or some other unfortunate circumstance suggested by the fictional situation.
Some spells may be maintained with concentration. You may only maintain one spell with concentration at a time, and cannot cast any other spells while you have one maintained. If you suffer any damage, you must make a Willpower saving throw to continue maintaining the spell.
When a character casts a spell, the player may elect to cast using an incantation. In that case, the player does not use table talk to describe how they cast the spell or what the target is. Instead, the caster’s player must speak an incantation.
An incantation is:
· A poem
· At least 4 lines long
· Rhyming
The GM must interpret the target or effects of the spell based on the incantation spoken. If an incantation is used, the spell is considered empowered. An empowered spell might do more damage, affect more people, or last longer. It might be given caveats, conditions, or lingering durations based on the GM’s interpretation of the incantation spoken.
By spending a turn to carve his rune, a wizard may cast a spell using a sigil. Sigils are visible to all and are obviously magical, but only other wizards may interpret them. It takes a turn to decipher a sigil. Sigils are distinctive enough that they can be associated with the wizard who inscribed them – once you have seen a particular wizard’s sigil, you would recognize their work if you saw it again.
A wizard may only ever have one active sigil at any given time. Inscribing a new sigil causes any previously inscribed sigils to vanish.
It is possible to combine a sigil with an incantation.
Magic Spells
Roll d6, d6
I.
Abjuration
Bewitch
Binding
Blessing
Calling
Charm of Air
II.
Charm of Earth
Charm of Fire
Charm of Water
Circle of Protection
Command
Conceal
III.
Curse
Divination: Chanting
Divination: Scrying
Divination: Patterning
Evoke Fear
Far Hand
IV.
Finding
Healing
Illusion
Instill Hate
Lightning Bolt
Magelight
V.
Magic Missile
Mending
Misdirection
Naming
Poison
Reveal
VI.
Sending
Shapechange
Sleep
Speaking
Turning of the Seasons
Wonderwork
I.
1. Abjuration
The wizard’s spell reminds an undead or dark spirit of its true nature. The target undead must flee to their resting place and once there will bury itself in its grave, lie down on its bier, or otherwise put itself to rest as if truly dead. The spell may affect a number of undead equal to the wizard’s level, and may be maintained by concentration. Undead with more HD than the caster has levels receive a saving throw.
Empowered: target a larger number of undead, target a single powerful undead without granting a saving throw, or force the affected undead to remain in their graves until some condition is met.
Sigil: the abjuration will activate when an undead creature attempts to pass it.
2. Ensorcell
The wizard casts his spell over the mind of another, whose opinion of a designated subject (usually, though not necessarily the wizard) grows more positive – hostile creatures become neutral, neutral creatures become friendly, and friendly creatures become infatuated. Friendly creatures will be open to serving the wizard if provided with some basic incentive, and infatuated creatures will do so with no reward. Situations that cast strong doubt over the wizard’s intentions allow the bewitched creature a saving throw to end the effect. When the spell is over, the enchanted person will become aware that they were bewitched. The spell is maintained by concentration.
Empowered: the bewitchment is more potent, and the target’s attitude towards the subject improves by two stages. A previously friendly creature’s infatuation is so powerful and self-reinforcing that it becomes permanent until the wizard dismisses it or it is dispelled, and the spell does not need to be maintained with concentration.
Sigil: if the sigil is baked into a loaf of bread or inscribed on a cup, whoever eats the bread or drinks from the cup suffers the spell’s effect.
3. Binding
The wizard calls on thorns, stones, or unseen hands to restrain a number of foes equal to his level. Until the targets can pass a Strength saving throw, they cannot move from their current space.
Empowered: the wizard might affect a wider area or cause the thorns to attack using a grapple maneuver at his attack bonus.
Sigil: the charm activates on some specified condition, such as when a named enemy passes beneath it.
4. Blessing
The wizard places their blessing over a target. The blessing imparts a bonus equal to the wizard’s level to one particular type of roll, such as:
· Attack rolls
· Defense rolls
· Saving throws
· One type of ability check
· Reaction rolls
Wizards and other magical beings can see blessings and determine their relative strength. With a Perception roll, a wizard can tell who laid the blessing, making their bestowal an act of trust. This spell is maintained with concentration.
Empowered: the blessing’s bonus and duration are determined by the incantation, such as a blessing of safety for as long as the subject remains on a certain road. The blessing will stay with the target until the wizard dismisses it or the condition or duration is met. It is not maintained with concentration.
Sigil: the blessing is sealed with a kiss, a hand to the forehead, or by tracing the wizard’s rune over head and heart – the sigil is invisible but detectable by spellcasters and magical beings. Such a blessing will activate only once at need, but does not need to be maintained with concentration.
5. Calling
The wizard calls on a being whose name they know, who must then come to them. Alternatively, the wizard can impart a charm to another person (usually a simple rhyme that includes the wizard's name) that when spoken or sung alerts the wizard to the caller's need and location
6. Charm of Air
The wizard calls on the winds in small but significant ways. The wizard might:
Blow out candles or torches
Predict what the weather will be in the next day
Power a small sailboat
Divert an afternoon rain
Raise a fog
While gusts of air or the light magewind necessary to power a small boat may be employed relatively freely, interfering with the weather always has consequences - use of the Charm of Air to divert or create weather always generates a balance token.
Empowered: an empowered Charm of Air might blow a door off its hinges, power a large sailing vessel, conjure a fog filled with shapes and illusions, or whistle up a storm
Sigil: the charm activates on some specified condition, such as when a named enemy passes beneath it.
II.
1. Charm of Earth
The wizard calls upon the powers of earth and stone in small but significant ways. The wizard might:
Lift, push, or pull about 10 pounds of stone or wood
Shape a piece of unworked stone or wood as if with invisible craftsman’s tools
Cause a patch of ground to grow soft and muddy
Quickly bury an object about the size of a man
Raise a small hill
Dig a trench
Empowered: an empowered Charm of Earth might create a navigable tunnel, raise a stone or earth wall, or briefly animate a statue
Sigil: the charm activates on some specified condition, such as when a named enemy passes beneath it.
2. Charm of Fire
The wizard calls upon the powers of fire in small but significant ways. The wizard might:
Start a fire as if he had flint and tinder
Cause a torch to flare up and blind its wielder
Cause a fire to shoot sparks or produce a huge amount of smoke
Extinguish a torch or bonfire
Create images in flames or smoke
Enchanted fires may burn in any number of colors or produce colored smoke. Fire, even when woven of magic, must still obey its basic nature: a wizard cannot start a fire on nothing. It must have a fuel source to burn.
Empowered: an empowered Charm of Earth might cause a bonfire to flare up and blind everyone in the immediate area, cause a fire to explode like a firework, extinguish a house fire, or enchant a fire to burn for an unnaturally long time
Sigil: the charm activates on some specified condition, such as when a named enemy passes beneath it.
3. Charm of Water
The wizard calls upon the powers of water in small but significant ways. The wizard might:
Raise something that’s sunken but visible
Dry something that’s wet
Shape water into waves or images such as horses, warriors, etc.
Grant Advantage or Disadvantage to tests related to swimming or sailing
Cause the nearby water level to raise or lower by about a foot
Empowered: an empowered Charm of Water might part a lake, capsize a ship, or cause a river to flood.
Sigil: the charm activates on some specified condition, such as when a named enemy passes beneath it.
4. Circle of Protection
As preparation for casting this spell, the wizard spends a turn tracing out a protective circle, which can encompass a number of creatures equal to the wizard’s level. Once the circle is drawn, the wizard may activate it by speaking a word of forbiddance and names a type of creature. All creatures who share this category – whether a specific name, gender, kind (goblin, elf), or feature (“born of woman,” “servant of the Master of Orcmont”) – may not pass the circle’s ring. By waiting to speak the activating word until the desired target has entered the circle, it is possible to trap a creature within it. The circle’s power is dispelled if it’s line if broken by a physical object.
5. Command
The wizard speaks a single word of command. If the target is a living being, they must try and obey the command until they complete it. Each turn, the target may attempt a Willpower saving throw. If successful, the target shakes off the command.
If the target is an object it will obey the command, appearing if necessary to be wielded by an invisible hand. A creature holding the commanded object may make a Strength saving throw to prevent it from acting for a turn if they wish.
Empowered: commands of more than a single word may be issued, although the whole command must consist of a single task.
Sigil: the Command activates when read (living creatures), or when the object is touched (objects)
6. Conceal
The wizard hides a person, object, or location from mortal eyes. No one will be able to find the subject of the enchantment unless they know it to be there (or in the case of an enchanted person, they take some action to reveal themselves, such as making a melee attack). If someone knows that the subject of the enchantment is there, they can find it by searching, but have Disadvantage on Perception rolls to locate it. Clues can make a concealed thing easier to find: a concealed thing can still make noise, be bumped into, has a smell, and so on. This spell is maintained with concentration.
Empowered: conditions and durations may be specified, in which case the spell is not maintained with concentration. The wizard may designate a number of people who can always see and find the subject.
Sigil: the contents of a hiding place marked with a sigil are protected by the spell of Concealment.
III.
1. Curse
The wizard’s ire manifests in a dreadful curse – use the table below to find out which one.
1. Animals hate you. Dogs will snarl and bark as you pass and attack if you get too close. Birds will harass you. No horse will bear you.
2. You are stalked by a nightmare. You have a 50% chance to regain no Body or Spirit from sleep.
3. Food turns to ash in your mouth. You still need to eat, but it gives you no comfort and cannot use it to recover your Spirits.
4. You are cursed with misfortune. All Saving Throws are made with Disadvantage.
5. Your tools rust and break easily. On an attack roll of 20-18, your weapon gains a notch. When making an ability check using a tool or piece of equipment, on a roll of 20-18 the tool breaks.
6. You are cursed to speak in rhymes. Everything you say in-character must rhyme.
7. You grow supernaturally old for the duration of the curse. Reaction rolls and ability checks are made with Disadvantage. NPCs will not recognize you.
8. You grow mirthless and lethargic. You do not laugh or smile, and are unable to perform any Undertakings during Fellowship phases. You cannot perform or benefit from any songs, and any action requiring a turn or more of continuous concentration requires a Willpower check to perform.
9. Your civilization is taken from you, and you must live as a dumb beast. You cannot speak, and cannot use tools or weapons. All actions must be performed directly, with the body.
10. You are Doomed. This means that at a crucial moment in the future you will automatically suffer a critical failure when making a test.
Wizards and other magical beings can see curses and determine their relative strength. With a Perception roll, a wizard can tell what sort of curse it is.
Empowered: the wizard may choose which curse effect to apply.
Counter-Spells: While a wizard can lift another wizard’s curse, extraordinary mortal action can do so as well. The following are some folk practices for lifting curses. The default option is that these methods work. However, GMs wishing to introduce an element of superstition might assign a percentage chance that a given remedy will be effective, such as 50%.
1. Raise an animal from infancy with love and kindness. The animal is still subject to the effects of the curse until it reaches maturity. Rescuing an animal at great personal cost will also lift the curse in 1d6 days, as news of your action spreads.
2. Burning a thick smoke of aromatic herbs about you for a full night while you sleep will confuse the nightmare, preventing it from settling on you. If it cannot reach you for three nights, it will depart.
3. If you ever fall unstable but do not die, the experience reinvigorates your senses and the curse is lifted.
4. A magnificent stroke of luck, such as rolling a critical success in a truly desperate situation, will reverse your fortunes.
5. Melt down all of your worldly wealth and pour the metal into a lake. This will cause the bad luck to flee from you.
6. This curse has no cure – it is best to try and make amends with the wizard that you offended.
7. An act of true generosity by someone who is unaware of your condition will restore you to your proper age.
8. If you can ever be made to laugh or cry, your curse will be lifted. It is not usually possible for people to do this on purpose: the king’s jester could not make you laugh with his best jokes, but if the king were to slip and fall into the pudding in front of his whole court, you might laugh.
9. If someone were to take care of you with patience and kindness for an entire year, the curse would be lifted.
10. No one, neither man, nor elf, nor dwarf, can escape their doom when it is upon them.
2. Divination: Chanting
The spell of Chanting recites the memories of the Pattern of Ages. The wizard may ask the GM any question about history and receive an answer.
Empowered: the wizard may ask a follow-up question.
3. Divination: Scrying
The wizard glimpses far away scenes and spies out the condition of a specified person, place, or thing. Such a vision confers sight only - it might reveal conspirators gathered together in a single room, but not what they are saying. The wizard might discover that the treasure he seeks is buried beneath a flat rock on the bank of a river, but without clear landmarks may not be able to tell which river.
Empowered: the wizard may ask a follow-up question. This question may provide information beyond the visual, if only briefly.
4. Divination: Patterning
The spell of Patterning searches the memories of the Pattern of Ages and reveals recurring elements through textual analysis. By looking at what comes before, the wizard guesses to what comes after. The wizard may ask the GM, “If X happens, what will happen?” and receive an answer.
Empowered: the wizard may ask a follow-up question.
5. Evoke Fear
From
6. Far Hand
The wizard moves objects without touching them. This spell can lift an object within line of sight and move it as if the wizard were holding it. Objects being held by another creature receive a saving throw against this spell. The spell can only lift objects about as heavy and large as the wizard could life one-handed. The spell is maintained with concentration.
Empowered: the wizard may lift larger and heavier objects.
IV.
1. Finding
The wizard
2. Healing
The wizard puts forth his power to heal. This spell applies one of the following effects; apply the first relevant effect in this list:
If cast on a creature with 0 Body who is not yet dead, the target restores 1 Body and is considered stable.
If cast on a creature who is stable but unconscious, the target becomes conscious.
If cast on a creature who is poisoned, the target is cured of the poison.
If cast on a creature who is suffering from a disease, the target is cured of the disease.
If cast on a creature with at least 1 Body, the target regains 1d6 Body.
If cast on a creature who bears a Wound, remove 1 Wound.
If cast on a creature that is suffering from a curse or enchantment, the enchantment is lifted.
Empowered: the wizard can choose which of these effects to impart, not just the first applicable one.
3. Illusion
The wizard weaves light and shadow to create illusions. The illusion can be of any object, creature, or scene that you wish, but it is merely an image, and has no weight or substance. Physically interacting with the illusion reveals that it is a fake. In this way illusions cannot cause harm directly.
Illusions can be made more believable if they are placed on a target to make it seem like a different, but similar, thing – for example making a stone appear like a gem, making an old man appear as a young one, or making a letter from your elderly aunt seem like a king’s proclamation. Assuming the object is the same basic shape, this sort of glamer is not broken by interacting with the object.
Both forms of this spell are maintained with concentration.
Empowered: illusions may be made more convincing – seeming to speak or smell, for example – and require a saving throw to disbelieve, or the wizard might cover a larger area than usual with his glamer.
Sigil: the illusion is cast when the sigil is activated.
4. Instill Hate
The wizard plants the seeds of hatred in a target’s heart, causing intense feelings of animosity towards a secondary person that the wizard specifies. Anyone so enchanted will seek to harm the subject of their hatred in the best way that they can. When the spell is over, the enchanted person will become aware that they were bewitched. The spell is maintained by concentration.
Empowered: The hatred will fester inside the target until the wizard dismisses it, it is dispelled, or the subject of the hatred is killed. It is not maintained with concentration.
Sigil: if the sigil is baked into a loaf of bread or inscribed on a cup, whoever eats the bread or drinks from the cup suffers the spell’s effect.
5. Lightning Bolt
With a flash, a clap of thunder, and a stench of gunpowder, the wizard conjures up a blast of magic. Deals a number of d6s worth of damage, up to twice the wizard’s level, distributed against opponents as the player sees fit. For example, if 2d6 were rolled the wizard could strike one opponent for 2d6 damage or two opponents for 1d6 damage each. The wizard then takes half of the total damage dealt.
6. Magelight
The wizard produces a small magical light, providing a candle’s worth of illumination. The light will obey the wizard’s verbal requests. Creatures that hate sunlight find magelight painful, and will fight at -2 Morale. The spell is maintained by concentration.
Empowered: the light could be made to blaze more brightly, force creatures that hate sunlight to make an immediate Morale check, to provide illumination only for the one who holds it, or to blind and bedevil a target.
Sigil: if placed on an immobile surface, the wizard’s mark can be used to create a magical lamp.
V.
1. Magic Missile
The wizard asks if there is something in his environment that’s flammable – some pinecone or acorn. If the GM rules that there isn’t, the wizard has the option of pulling something from his pack to set ablaze and throw.
The magic missile explodes on impact and spreads fire in a 5 ft. radius. All creatures in this area make a Skill saving throw to avoid the flames. If unsuccessful, a struck creature catches fire. Creatures that are on fire take 1d6 Body damage at the end of each of their turns. Burning creatures may spend their turn attempting to put themselves out – success is automatic with a source of water or loose earth, otherwise a Skill saving throw is in order.
Empowered: a missile weapon, such as an arrow, sling stone, or catapult stone, may be enchanted in this way.
2. Mending
The wizard repairs a broken mundane object, as long as enough pieces remain that it could be repaired manually. If there aren’t, then the object must be held together by magic and will only last for as long as the spell is maintained.
Empowered: a broken magical object may be repaired.
3. Misdirection
1 mile/level, wizard becomes aware of any intelligent being who comes within the radius and can choose to affect them. Enchanted persons automatically become lost and move in the direction that the wizard wants them to. Once someone has discovered that they are enchanted (for example, by realizing that they should have reached a certain landmark by now) they can begin making Willpower saves to throw off the spell.
4. Naming
Grants a byname to a character ("Wingfoot I name you"), an object (same rules) or an animal. An animal so Named will respond to that name for the rest of its life, and if spoken to by name will be unusually obedient. For the magic to work on a person, everyone at the table must agree that the name is a fitting one.
5. Poison
The wizard
6. Reveal
The wizard names a single hidden thing, forcing the subject so named to reveal itself. Hidden creatures will make themselves known. Hidden doors will appear, though they will not open. Creatures who are hiding the truth will speak it. Hidden messages will become visible.
Empowered: all hidden things named in the wizard’s incantation will reveal themselves.
VI.
1. Sending
The wizard bends his thought towards a distant subject, who hears the wizard’s words in their mind. The message must be 25 words or less.
2. Shapechange
The wizard changes his skin, adopting the form of an animal. You maintain your Spirits and mental abilities while in animal form, but temporarily adopt the animal’s Body and physical abilities. You cannot cast other spells while in animal form.
If you remain in animal form for more than a day, reduce your Willpower by 1 and make a Willpower saving throw. On a failure, you cannot find your way back to human form for another day.
If you ever reach 0 Willpower while in animal form, your mind is lost and you will live out the rest of your days as a beast, unless disenchanted by another wizard.
Empowered: the wizard can transform a number of other creatures into animals equal to his level.
3. Sleep
The wizard puts 1d6 HD worth of creatures per level into a magical slumber (so a 3rd level wizard could enchant 3d6 HD worth of creatures). Sleeping creatures can be awakened with a sharp slap or if they take at least 1 point of damage. If not woken prematurely, sleeping creatures will wake up 1d6 rounds after the wizard loses concentration.
Empowered: Durations and conditions may be set. The spell is not maintained with concentration, and lasts until its duration or condition is fulfilled or it is dispelled. Sleeping creatures do not need to eat or drink and will not age.
Sigil: the spell is cast when the sigil is activated.
4. Speaking
The wizard awakens silent things and talks with them. This spell allows one thing the power of speech, even if it normally couldn’t talk. The wizard might converse with a corpse, a grove of trees, the stones of a castle, a sword, and so forth.
The thing will converse with the wizard, but it is not compelled to tell the truth or to be helpful – use a Reaction Roll as normal. Things have a deep awareness of what happens around them, but their understanding of events will be heavily colored by their unique perspectives. For example, sword might not know the name of a person it had killed, but it would remember the taste of their blood (the sweet taste of an enemy, the bitter taste of a friend, the foulness of undead flesh, etc.). Stones will have a different understanding of what “a long time ago” means than a human would.
If cast on an inanimate object, it speaks in the wizard’s language.
If cast on a corpse, it speaks in the language it knew in life.
Plants have their own secret language (although some exceptionally old trees may have been taught the language of the elves). As with other languages, test Perception the first time you talk to a plant to see if you speak the tongue of root and leaf.
Empowered: the Reaction Roll is made with advantage.
Sigil: the target is given a message to speak when the sigil is activated.
5. Turning of the Seasons
The wizard chooses a different season to visit upon his immediate area.
If Spring is chosen, the air becomes cool and a light rain begins to fall. Plants immediately bud and flower.
If Summer is chosen, the air becomes hot and the sun shines. Plants immediately put forth leaves and produce fruit.
If Autumn is chosen, the air becomes chilly, the skies grow grey, and an obscuring fog rolls in. Plants darken to their autumnal hues.
If Winter is chosen, the air becomes bitter cold and a heavy snow begins to fall. Plants become dormant.
The GM may adjudicate other effects on the environment or local creatures as thematically appropriate, for example bears falling asleep in winter.
The spell is maintained by concentration. The weather and plant life gradually return to their normal state over the course of a day after the spell ends – snow ceases to fall but melts naturally, dormant plants wake up and put forth leaves, and so on.
Empowered: more dramatic effects are possible, such as affecting a wider area or calling up more extreme weather - for example, a summer storm.
Sigil: by placing his rune on an immobile feature of the landscape, such as a tree or standing stone, the seasonal weather can be maintained until the sigil is erased.
6. Wonderwork
The wizard completes in an instant any task that a barehanded person could have completed in a number of hours equal to the wizard’s level.
Empowered: the wizard might accomplish tasks that require tools (sewing, chopping firewood), or complete two tasks at once.
Sigil: the wizard draws his rune and places it inside of some box or bag. When the container is opened, the spell is released and the wonderwork is performed.
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