Sunday, December 31, 2017

Monthly Challenge: Curses! [AD&D, Hackmaster]

Another entry from Dragonsfoot's monthly challenges, The Curse of the All-Seeing Eye.

A curse often laid by gynosphinxes on those who provide them with false information, the Curse of the All-Seeing Eye is sometimes useful, but often, insidiously, drives its recipient mad. This curse may also be cast as a spell; 5th level for wizards and druids, 4th level for Clerics and illusionists. Touch range and conditionally permanent, it allows a save to resist if laid by a mortal... not so if laid by a furious gynosphinx.

The character is cursed with the ability to see invisible creatures... however, they also suffer from delusions, which are indistinguishable (for them) from an invisible creature. Upon gaining the curse, roll 1d6; the character will see that many hallucinatory invisible creatures within three hours. Each day, they will also see 1d6 hallucinatory creatures. Every time they see a truly invisible creatures, however, add 1d4; they will see that many more hallucinations within the next 24 hours (in addition to the 1d6 each day). Each month the character suffers this curse, they must roll under their Wisdom on 3d6 or lose 1 point of Wisdom as their sanity degrades; Wisdom lost in this way recovers only with the application of Restoration (in Hackmaster, there is no way for a 20th level or lower character to cure this injury).

The curse can be broken in numerous ways. A standard remove curse is only effective 50% of the time. Any Gynosphinx (not just the one who laid it), however, can remove the curse at will... they will frequently demand several thousand gold worth of gems or jewelery, or some riddle they cannot solve (but do not regard as an evasion or otherwise unsolvable... they'll not free you because they cannot guess what is in your pocket!)

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