Record Of Davokar is built for the administration of my Symbaroum campaign. If you have wandered onto this page and are a fan of the setting, feel free to borrow any ideas you find. There are no spoilers to the campaign source books here.
This selection of house rules are intended to smooth out the glaringly broken aspects of the game while keeping with the overall theme of the setting and keeping as close to the original rules as possible. The goal is not perfect game balance; instead these house rules are intended to be easy to remember while fixing the most broken aspects of the game. Ultimately, we are going to embrace the chaos and accept certain abilities and powers are going to wipe the floor with players and NPCs alike.
The counterpoint to this will be the DM won’t be pulling any punches. If the players start relying too heavily on the most broken aspects of the game, the DM will both introduce new powers that counter the player’s abilities, and use those same abilities against the players.
Players are encouraged to not think like a Computer RPG, where they play within a walled garden of predetermined outcomes. Instead players should actively come up with creative and possibly game breaking ideas (preferably while in character). You are superheroes with capabilities far beyond that of normal people. But like superheroes, there are super-villains who can match or even exceeds your powers. To quote Dark Souls: "Prepare to Die".
I have created a complete quick reference of house rules combined with the rules as written (Just select "House Rules" from the dropdown). This is a merge of my own house rules and the house rules found on symbaroum.fr Players should use the rules quick reference here as the primary reference when creating their characters.
The Campaign will pick up half way though Book 4 of Throne of Thrones. The previous adventure party is missing and presumed dead. The game world will continue from the point the previous campaign went on hiatus. World altering decisions made by the previous party stay in effect and won't be retconned.
New Characters will start with 180 XP using the 5, 7, 9, 10, 10, 11, 13, 15 attribute distribution. Players must spend at least 150 XP before the first session.
Characters may start with any non-magical equipment they wish. Players can select one set of armor and two weapons with non-magical Qualities (See Rules Quick Reference). Along with any five Alchemy substances.
The party is assumed to have had a lot of resources at this point, but not necessarily a lot of cash on hand. Owning their own longboat, tavern, or similar major purchase is within the realm of possibility if the player desires.
Each character must have a backstory and their motivations for why they wish to venture into Davokar. Because players are expected to play in character as much as possible, this motivation may be the driving point of your backstory. No matter your motivation; the DM will tie it into the campaign. Here are a few examples that might inspire you:
The game beings in Thistle Hold, the party has been hired by Ordo Magica to travel deep into Davokar to find the missing expedition lead by the leader of the Ordo's Thistle Hold chapter: Kullinan Furio.
The player's party has just returned from Karvosi, having dealt with a massive spider infestation that had infiltrated the tunnels beneath the seat of the Barbarian Tribes' power. Having missed the initial rush of adventurers seeking the Throne of Thorns, the party is more than eager to get involved.
A complete recap of the story so far will be presented at the first session.
At the start of each game session, every player receives two Fortuna coins. Rolling a critical hit (natural 1) grants one additional Fortuna coin, while a critical miss (natural 20) results in the loss of one coin. Critical hits and misses are always considered successes or failures, respectively, but have no other in-game effects.
All Fortuna coins reset at the end of the game session. Unspent coins are lost and do not convert to gold, experience points, or any other game benefit.
At the start of combat, each player rolls a [Quick<-DM Quick] check. Every player who succeeds acts before the DM, every player who fails moves after the DM. This determines the turn order for the entire scene. "DM Quick" is the average Quick bonus of the enemies the players face.
Tracking initiative is a massive chore for the DM. It slows down combat and players are easily missed.
When a player’s total Corruption (temporary plus permanent) reaches their Corruption Threshold, they must roll a Resolute check. If they fail, 1d4 temporary Corruption transforms into permanent Corruption, and they gain a stigma. If they succeed, no transformation occurs, but they must roll again upon gaining additional Corruption. When permanent Corruption equals the Corruption Threshold, the character gains the Dark Blood and Bestial traits.
This makes Corruption Threshold less of a hard wall. Players now might be more willing to risk pushing past it. While still offering penalties that match the theme of the game.
Concentration is handled in a confusion fashion in Symbaroum. This is further confounded with other RPG systems that have "Concentration" with slightly different rules. Rules as written, Concentration is just the roll you make to maintain the spell when the mystic takes damage. With many spells dropping the "concentration" requirement at higher levels, but still having a failure condition.
We are going to consolidate and clarify the rules as follows:
We need to scale back the power of some ongoing effects, also this helps with consistency across the many types of mystical powers whose description isn’t clear.
The Professions listed in the Advanced Players Guide have a set a skill requirements before the player can be considered part of that profession. This will generally be ignored by the DM. If the player would like to use any of the Profession specific abilities or Mystic powers, the player is free to take skills and claim being part of the profession without regard to the requirements so long as the character roughly conforms to the spirit of the profession.
This game system shines as being a classless RPG system. The professions work against that paradigm. If a player really wants to take Pyromancer exclusive powers but has not learned two arbitrary rituals, so be it.
All mystical traditions (Such as Wizardry, Witchcraft, etc) are an Incremental Ability. You do not buy the tradition directly with Experience. Instead, you advance the level of your Mystical Tradition ability by learning mystical powers of that tradition. When a character learns two Novice level powers of a tradition, they get the Novice level tradition for that power automatically. The same applies with two powers at the Adept and Master levels, the character receives those traditions at the respective level automatically.
Characters may choose to not gain Permanent Corruption from learning their first two Novice level powers or rituals.
For Example: At Character Creation, Ruby takes Curse and Lay On Hands at Novice level. Ruby may automatically receives Witchcraft at Novice level because both of these mystical powers are part of the Witchcraft tradition. Because this is at character creation, Ruby does not gain Permanent Corruption for these powers. Later Ruby upgrades both of these powers to the Adept Level. Because Ruby now has two Witchcraft powers at the Adept level, she gets Adept level Witchcraft for free.
Troll Singing, Symbolism, and Staff Magic have been added to a select group of Core Rulebook powers, and have new powers created for them to assist in making Incremental Mystical Traditions more viable for these groups as their spell selection is very short.
The Incremental Ritualist rule replaces the standard Ritualist ability, allowing players to learn rituals at a cost of 10 experience points each. Provided the character finds a source of knowledge to learn the ritual.
The Mystical Tradition system as written is a bit backwards. If a player does not want to gain large amounts of permanent corruption, they must buy in with XP to a particular tradition. However the big benefit of most of these traditions is not taking up permanent corruption. When a player is spending 20 or 30 XP on a skill, it needs to do something exciting. What happens in the base rules is it just unlocks being able to do something exciting in the future.
Players may use their Alchemy skill as an action during a scene, rather than once per adventure, representing an alchemist rummaging through their bag looking for a forgotten elixir. These potions expire at the end of the scene. Alchemists are not required to track ingredients, similar to how archers do not track ammunition. Permanent potions can still be crafted with one Alchemy roll per day wholly dedicated to gathering ingredients and brewing. See the Rules Quick Reference for a complete description.
Some potions are so rare they can only be crafted through dedicated crafting and cannot be retrieved ad-hoc during a scene. Those have been noted in their rules description in the compendium.
The Transforming Draught includes Night Perception, Swift, and Amphibious effects.
This turns Alchemy into a skill that is always applicable during a scene; and thus justifying its XP cost. Players can now build an entire character around the "Alchemist" archetype opening a fourth play style beyond "Fighter", "Rogue", and "Mystic".
Multiple poison applications extend the duration rather than applying the effect twice. If a new poison’s damage value is higher, use the new value.
Poison generally rolls against Strong to resist being poisoned. However there are some forms of poison that attack against a character's other attributes.
Mystical abilities, alchemical substances, or magic items do not cause ongoing fire damage. Instead, fire damage negates 2 points of armor when calculating damage, provided that fire is the sole damage type. When combined with other damage types, such as Flaming Quality or Elemental Essence applied to a weapon, the armor negation does not apply. In this case it is just bonus damage.
Acid damages armor (Natural or Manufactured) rather than hit points. Once the armor is destroyed, acid has no further effect. Items damaged by acid must be repaired before the wearer can benefit from the armor again.
Creatures damaged by Lightning have a second chance to fail their next [Resolute] check.
Creatures damaged by cold have a second chance to fail their next [Quick] check. This includes [Defense] checks and Initiative rolls.
Elemental damage types should be unique and meaningful. Further, micromanaging damage over time detracts from the flow of the game.
When an ability or mystical power indicates it is a chain effect, the next target must be the next closest enemy to the previous target.
When an ability or power indicates it targets "within sight" or "all allies", the range is limited to two movement actions away.
Abilities that ignore armor instead have the quality "Armor Piercing". Armor piercing ignores manufactured armors (i.e. Armor a character wears) and the Armored trait. Mystical Powers that ignore armor continue to function as normal.
Abilities can be used every turn without limit. Mystical Powers require a resolute check and incur temporary corruption. Mystical powers also don't deal as much damage nor benefit from die stacking like abilities do. This way the abilities are extremely effective against creature wearing armor, but have reduced effect against most monsters.
The Rules Quick Reference has a more up-to-date version of new and changed abilities than what is listed here. There are some house rules imported from Symbaroum.fr that I have not outlined here for the sake of brevity. Additional changes are not so much "house rules" but reworded descriptions to add clarity.
The Medicus ability is limited to once per patient per scene, rather than once per day.
Bend Will has no effect on Abominations and Undead. and cannot force a target to harm an ally or act against their moral code. Cultured beings have varied ethical guidelines, which the caster must consider. For example, a thief may steal, but a mother would not harm her child.
Attempting to force a moral violation causes the mystic a second chance to fail all subsequent Resolute checks to maintain control. If control is lost, Bend Will cannot be used on that target for the remainder of the scene. The victim recalls events as a surreal dream.
Bend Will is now more akin to the "Jedi Mind Trick" than the classic “Dominate” D&D spell. Players may use Confusion if they wish to have a power that forces enemies to attack each other.
Maltransformation has no effect on Abominations and Undead. The Resolute check to break the transformation is adjusted by the target’s total Corruption. If a transformed target takes hit point damage, the mystic has a second chance to fail all subsequent [Resolute] checks to maintain the transformation. Once a target breaks free, the target has a second chance to succeed against subsequent Maltransformation attempts for the scene.
It doesn’t match the theme of the game as Abominations/Undead are already transmuted creatures by magic. Also Abominations/Undead are intended to be major enemies and they lose their fear factor when the player can turn them into a sheep and beat on it with impunity. Thus, the more corrupted a target is, the less susceptible they are to mind and body altering effects.
The mystic cannot exclude friendly abominations and undead from the spell effect. At Adept the spell heals 1d4 HP initially (1d6 at Master) on the first round the spell is cast. While the aura is active, all subsequent healing (from magical or mundane sources) heals an additional 1d4 at Adept and 1d6 at Master.
The healing/damage effect of the aura is too powerful. This transforms the spell from being a “kill everything in the room” spell to “Assist the party do what they do best” spell.
At Novice, objects thrown or used to block do not automatically break and can be reused. The mystic can throw objects in any direction, including off ledges, or pull unattended objects toward themselves with a successful Accurate check to catch them. At Adept, the mystic can propel themselves one movement with a successful Quick check to land safely.
Mind throw rules as written is fairly useless and uninteresting. This clarifies it as more of a situationally powerful telekinesis spell.
These rituals protect against mystical powers with ongoing effects, such as Unnoticeable or Transformation, requiring a Resolute check each turn within the area to maintain the effect. Rituals with ongoing effects are exempt unless specified.
Characters (and NPCs) need a way to reliably ward an area against magic beyond just eavesdropping.
Characters with Strangler can create Choking Spores and Spore Bombs as if they have the Alchemy skill.
Heroic Hymn grants a second chance to succeed instead of a +1 bonus.
Novice Loremaster may use Cunning instead of Resolute when weaving mystical powers, though not as a basis for the corruption threshold.
Created to allow characters to make Accurate their prime Ability, instead of their Dump stat.
Toss silver into the air to distract your enemies; or at master level outright bribe them.
Created for characters that want to throw grenades and other alchemical substances.
Push your enemies away from you. Created to help protect squishy mystics from getting mobbed.
Hello Silence Spell my old friend. I've come to play with you again. Because mystic power is softly creeping, your whole party is sleeping.
Protect yourself because the creatures mostly come out at night... mostly.
See the Rules Quick Reference for a complete list of all new boons and burdens. Many have been created to help facilitate more "Origin" stories for characters.