Dungeon Masterchef - A Cooking Subsystem

As my campaign world slips ever-closer to its inevitable end, a very mundane question has arisen.

What the fuck do we eat?

With the precipitous decline of the human population as a consequence of a third of all plants dying and all water being fucking poison and, you know, all the demons and undead stalking the land, a fundamental pillar of the standard D&D game has been shattered - the humble home base.

No longer is there a convenient village within walking distance of the dungeon entrance where you can flip open your equipment list and buy some rations and ropes on the cheap. Because everybody's fucking dead.

And so my players huddle in a cave just inside of Dwimmermount, hoping that they'll be able to obtain the azoth they need to maybe stop the apocalypse, their supply of iron rations slowly dwindling, hoping that the various dungeon creatures here will be edible enough to stave off starvation.

A perfect time to become a DUNGEON CHEF!!!

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Cooking Spreadsheet here

Includes:
- Rules Summary
- Deliciousness table
- Dinner Perks table
- Known Recipes
- Known Ingredients
- Exotic Ingredient Side Effects

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The world's smallest taco

Hors d'Oeuvres

The key concepts in tl;dr:

You can eat food to heal.

Take a break. Minor HP recovery during the day.
Long rest. Major HP recovery overnight.

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You can eat food for buffs.

Dinner Perks. A delicious dinner grants you a boost until your next long rest!
Exotic Ingredients. Monster flesh and other weird stuff can grant strange powers and mutations!

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There are two types of food.

Iron Rations. Basic bitch adventurer food. No use-by date. Calorie-dense but unappetising and you'd never eat this if something else was available. Dry nuts, chewy meats, hard cheese and stale biscuits. The Huel of the D&D culinary world.

Proper Meals. Now we're talking! Fresh ingredients cooked into a hot meal, from fortifying and hearty stews to tender brisket and leafy greens! A good chef can concoct a delicious meal from even the lowliest of ingredients, filling adventurers with good health and good cheer!

Stackable wheat crisps topped with soft cheese and chorizo

A Quick Bite

Eat food to heal during the adventuring day!

Taking a break takes a ten minute Exploration Turn and involves eating food, adjusting your bags, hyping yourself up, and treating minor wounds.

Iron Rations
Heal 1d6 HP.

Proper Meals

Heal 1d6 HP by default, but get improved healing up the dice chain based on how many unique Ingredients the meal has and how Delicious it is.

Dice chain:

0 > 1d2 > 1d4 > 1d6 > 1d8 > 1d10 > 1d12 > 1d12+1 > 1d12+2 > etc

The primary means of improving the meal's Die Size is to add more ingredients:
+1 Die Size per unique ingredient.

The secondary means of improving the meal's Die Size is to improve its Deliciousness.
Up to +3 Die Size based on Deliciousness (see Get Cooking below)

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Food takes the place of standard Healing Potions in my game.
Cheap mid-delve healing at the risk of a Random Encounter.
Iron Rations are perfect for this because you don't need to cook them. Bringing a lunchbox of cooked food in the dungeon is even better though!

Crumbed chicken with salt-tossed sweet potato strips

The Main Meal

Eat food to regain HP rapidly overnight, and get a boost the whole next day!

A Long Rest is a night of peaceful sleep.

Overnight Healing

As per my house rules:

Importantly, if you have food and shelter you upgrade from Vagrant to Comfortable conditions.

Tents and food are important on wilderness trips - tents are easy shelter, rations are easy food.

Iron Rations
Easy but uninspiring. With shelter, upgrades you to Comfortable conditions as above.

Proper Meals
A sufficiently delicious meal unlocks an additional Dinner Perk!

These range from further improving overnight healing rates to temporarily boosting an ability score.
Dinner Perks last until your next Long Rest, so you get them for the whole next day.

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This has already led to players getting back to their base camp and cooking up a nice meal for all their friends, which I really dig.

Naturally it's also led to one player becoming obsessed with harvesting meat from dead creatures to taste their exotic flavours. Just as planned...

I was going to illustrate with amusingly nicely arranged oven food, but I was legit proud of this salmon with balsamic glaze on quinoa salad.

Get Cooking!

Now that you know the benefits, you'll want to know how to cook!

Ready Steady

Cooking a meal requires fire and half an hour.

In a dungeon, cooking doubles the chance of random encounters
Enterprising gourmands might use this to their advantage.

Servings

Each Ingredient is a standard ration. You make as many servings as standard rations you put in.
Iron Rations can be used to bulk out a meal - an extra serving per Iron Ration - at the cost of flavour.

Don't Ask How the Sausage is Made
If you're a player, this is all you need to tell me:

1. What Ingredients are you using?

2. Do you apply any modifiers?

3. Tell me the final deliciousness and we'll see what happens!

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Here's the backend.

Recipes
A unique combination of ingredients is a Recipe. If you're the first to make it, name it!
Each recipe has a Base Deliciousness (2d8). Some dishes take more work to make them tasty.
Each recipe has a Dinner Perk (see d100 Perks table). You'll get the same perk each time you make this recipe.

Deliciousness
Anyone can make a tasty meal with a well-stocked kitchen and a bit of effort.
Those without the proper equipment will just have to do their best.

Take the Base Deliciousness and apply these modifiers:

Then look up the result on this table:

The more delicious the better!

Dinner Perks
The big gimmick, Dinner Perks.
Have a tasty or delicious meal for dinner and you get a Dinner Perk.
Eat a truly superb meal for dinner and you get an upgraded version of the perk!

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The big one for chefs is the bonus per time you've cooked the meal before. The more you cook, the better you get! 
The good part is that we've got one person who's bang into this cooking system now and they're doing most of the cooking... but the downside is when they're not there everyone's like "fuck we don't have our chef!"

Halflings are naturally better cooks. Obviously that's why they have so have so many elevenses and second breakfasts.

Yes, there's a 1/100 chance of taking minimal damage from fire because you ate something yummy for dinner last night. It'd be amazing if that's the recipe that involves a lot of risky exotic ingredients!

You may have seen "weather effects" in the 21-30 result and wondered what those are.
Fog, rain, high wind: Half overland speed, double chance of getting lost off-road.
Extreme heat: 1 Con damage per four hours of travel.
Sheer cold: 1d6 Con damage per four hours of travel unless wearing cold weather gear.
Four hours of travel lines up with the time between encounter rolls.
These feel a little boring so if someone has better weather mechanics out there I'd love to see them!
The apocalypse might go six-dimensional weather soon with Raining Blood and Lacerated Sky and shit on there so it'll get more interesting soon I promise!

I actually ate this bad boy - legitimately delicious cooked, like a bacon sausage.

Experimental Dishes

Exotic Ingredients are those from strange sources.
Living plants, mutant beasts, the flesh of sentient beings.
There are even rumours, some say, of a Fifth Meat...

Monster Mash
Exotic Ingredients have weird and wonderful effects, unique per creature.
When you eat an exotic ingredient, roll 1d10 on the respective table (See: Exotic Side Effects) and see what happens...

I want Fugu!
Some creatures can be prepared properly to reduce the risk or get some extra bonus - like boiling Green Slime to make it edible or grinding up dried Fire Beetle glands to make Beetle Spice.
Such things are noted in the Ingredients section.


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This is straight from the Monster Menu-All, obviously.
Eat monsters to get weird powers.

Black mole best mole

Local Produce

Last but not least - hunting and gathering!

Now that fresh food grants boons and healing, it's beneficial to go hunting for fresh food even if you've got iron rations to spare!

Foraging
When you spend the day foraging, roll Bushcraft with a modifier based on terrain.

On success, gain 1d4 Standard Rations of the following type:

These are broad categories of Ingredient, but you can choose exactly what it is you found if you like. 

Common forage could include nettles, dandelion leaves and berries.
Special forage might be plump mushrooms or wild onions.
Small game includes hare, grouse, duck and other small animals.

Fishing
When you spend the day fishing, roll Bushcraft with a bonus equal to your Sailing score.
On success, gain 1d4+Sailing score Standard Rations of fish.

Butchering
Every ten minutes spent butchering a creature yields 1d6 Standard Rations.
Maximum butchering rolls are based on the size of the creature.

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Terrain table directly from LotFP.
I was going to do a Foraging table but it's so season- and biome-dependent that it didn't seem worth it, especially since I've got no experience of foraging myself! I figure if a player is into it they'll be able to do a better job of saying what they found than I ever could!

LotFP has a thing where you reduce your overland speed if you're hunting... but in practice people only bother hunting for food if they're waiting for their friends to heal up so they tend to come back to base camp anyway.

Fishing gives some ROI on Sailing score - mostly because I feel guilty about that skill being so very niche. People tend to put "Sailing" as one of their skills if they roll a fisherman Failed Career so this works for me.

Butchering takes some time if you want to use the whole beast, so you're best lugging corpses out of the dungeon and butchering them at the camp.

Battered goujons with tomato reduction schmear

Sauces

Last but not least, the chefs who inspired me.

This subsystem owes most of itself to the Unified Food Theory post by Dan (aka Dandyman on Discord) over at Throne of Salt. Drawing together a multitude of food-related posts into one place is what made this happen!
Primary amongst these is the Eating Good in the Dungeonhood post at Occultesque which has the more-ingredients-mean-more-healing bit.

The other big hitter is the Monster Menu-All  over at Coins and Scrolls. Of course it's Interesting to eat monsters! They're monsters!

Class: The Extras

I'm putting this up here because I occasionally need to search my own rules at the table, it's almost exactly identical to the original by Joseph Manola which you can find at Against the Wicked City

>>>HERE<<<

Alright so, the Extras character class.

Main gimmick - instead of being a single character, you're a gang of unnamed background characters whose collective efforts more or less add up to that of a "real" player character.
Very silly, very meta, lots of fun!

The Extras

Be this if
You want to be a bunch of super meta slapstick background characters.

Being the Extras
Some people are born to be Someone. Singular people, people whose stories will survive long after their deaths. Whether they’re good, evil, or somewhere in between, tales will be told of their trials and tribulations. Their triumphs, their tragedies, their rises from obscurity and their falls from grace.
They loom large in the history of the world. Heroes! Villains! Legends!

But this is not you.

You’re the other guys.

Alignment
Collectively, you detect as Neutral.

All for One
Your mob of nameless Extras act mysteriously like a single character in many ways.
They have a single HP pool. They have a single action per round. They can carry as much as one man.
They also consume rations and ammunition like they were one person. Very strange.

One for All
In other ways they are very different.
They take up four times as much room as a single character. They count as ten men when doing menial labour like digging and rowing.
They also count as ten men when buying equipment – you have to buy ten swords or armours or whatever to get the mechanical benefit of just one. Bulk equipment like this only counts as a single piece of equipment for encumbrance and breakage though…
If you’ve got less than ten of a thing, each takes encumbrance and the Extras can benefit from the item only once per scene, like the magic sword guy takes a swing as the camera pans past.

Named Characters
At level 1, give one of the Extras a name. This is your mob’s leader who gets a few lines!
Once per scene, they get an extra action independent of the rest. Essentially you get two actions that round. Afterwards they get absorbed back into the general mob.
Each level you get another Named Character with the same ability, albeit you can only use the extra action ability of Named Characters once per round.

Death of a Mob
At 0HP, your Named Characters look around and realise they’re the only ones left, all the other Extras are dead! The Leader survives as a half-health Fighter one level below the Extras’ level, and the other Named Characters are simple 0-level mooks with 1d6 HP.
If they make it back to civilisation, they can gather more people and turn back into the Extras! If any of them die before then though, the survivors sorrowfully remain ordinary characters forever more.

Gameplay Stuff

HP	Stun	Doom	Blast	Law	Chaos
1d12 – min. 8	14	16	15	14	14

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As I say, this is all pretty much direct from the original Against the Wicked City Extras class and all of the reasoning there is intact.

There only minor differences:

The Magic for the Masses rules applies to anything the Extras have less than a full ten of. So if they've got ten swords and one axe, they can attack with swords as much as they want but only attack with an axe once per scene.

For Death of a Mob only one Named Character becomes a Fighter when the Extras hit 0HP, the others become 0-level minions.

-- The Extras in Play

We've had a few Extras characters in the game since they got introduced a while back, the first as a silly test gimmick in February last year and the first "proper" use by a visitor from Australia in October.

As they're such a silly character class, they've seen quite a few wacky interactions with the rest of the rules.

Two things that stand out most:
- "Death" at 0HP means they're much more vulnerable than other classes.
- Failed Career and Retroactive Backstory work real silly and great.

Death and Dismemberment:

The way my death rules work is that once you reach 0HP, you start getting hit for real. Instead of glancing blows and near-misses, the attacks start to draw blood and bruises.

The idea is that HP is all luck and skill that shields you from real harm, "hit protection" if you will.

But since the Extras split into a Fighter and a bunch of 0-level mooks when they reach 0 HP, they don't have that extra layer of protection. They've got a big 1d12 hit die, but once their health is gone that's it!
No minigame of sitting around holding in your guts hoping for help, at 0HP your Extras are gone (for now) and you're suddenly in control of several individuals.

The other side of this coin is that, on reaching 0HP, a higher-level Extras character suddenly goes from having one action per round to having many. Between your main Named Character, now a Fighter, and all their minion friends, there's a good chance that you can go nova on whatever "killed" you.

Even better, the damage that took you to 0HP doesn't carry over. The Extras can take a ton of damage, plummet to 0HP in one hit, and still survive as a Fighter and their minions!

Backstory:

At level 1, characters in my game roll a Failed Career.

With the Extras, it means that you've suddenly got a whole mob of ex-shepherds or ex-farmers or whatever. A proper mob!

And since an ordinary character starts with a repurposed weapon, the Extras start with enough of them for everyone to use.

An army of background shepherds all wielding shepherd's crooks and rooting around corpses for swords is the best.

The other gimmick is Retroactive Backstory.

For your regular character class, this is so that we the players learn more about a character's past as they level up.

For the Extras, the new backstory is for the new Named Character! This is great because it adds up to an Extras character being made up of a bunch of people with a shallow backstory, rather than a single person with a deeper backstory. Fitting!

Robin, Jr

Finally, an anecdote.

Due to wacky campaign shenanigans, we had a situation where one character (POWERLAD, superhero, only ever spelt in all caps) had "given birth" to a bunch of giant spider babies.
The demon spider mother is now dead and POWERLAD wasn't much interested in raising a brood of spiders, so they were adopted by another character (Sir Robyn, raccoon-appreciating lawyer wizard).

This was all very silly and the sort of thing a long-running campaign throws up organically.
We ended up with a rapidly growing horde of teenage spider-kids, born of a demon spider and an anime character, adopted by a lawyer.

This was all well and good until Sir Robyn's player decided to retire the character for a while, sending him off to research some time travel spells that could help reverse the apocalypse.
"Hey actually could I play as the Spiders?"
A perfect opportunity to play as the Extras!

And so it went for a while. Their leader, Robyn Jr or "RJ", is a weaboo spider who collects POWERLAD manga and has a shitty replica katana. Every level we met another individual shitty teen spiderkid with their own little backstory, and the little gang of spiders continued to grow!

All that ended when a bunch of giant mites devoured most of the spiderkids, leaving RJ and three of his siblings alive.
Only RJ survived...

Which means that suddenly my allegedly gritty low-magic game now has a giant weeb spider Fighter with a katana, who just so happens to be the quasi-biological son of one PC and the adopted son of another.
And it's all because of the Extras and a bunch of ridiculous emergent gameplay.

I love it!

So I Helped Make Secret Munticore

This is a review of a product that will blow your mind.
It is Secret Munticore.
Back in 2016, since Santicore just never happened, a bunch of us Mongrels decided to do our our shitty version of it.
What followed was a bunch of horrible requests, followed by a bunch of replies that were actually pretty good!? At least... some were.
The good David Black said he'd put it all into a pdf for us... and that never happened. So after some grousing in the group I just went at it with scissors and paper and a marker pen, scanned it in, and scooped all the trash into one purchasable trash heap.

I will deal with each nugget of geniousness in order.


Apps by Oli Palmer
A whole list of pretend fantasy smartphone apps to assist your players with their lives.
Do they not have smartphones?
They do now!
Why do they have smartphones?
Post-apocalyptic something something!

Basement Referee by Nick LS Whelan
A terrifying "monster" encounter where YOU THE REFEREE are the monster.
A referee who lives in a basement and makes things terrible for everyone around them.
Gives true ultimate power to whoever defeats it.

Bears by Gregory Blair
Greggy-boy's first foray into the making-things-for-other-people santicore-style melting pot.
He put a heap of effort into this as a result. God knows why.
Anyway, you've got a big TWELVE new bear-based monsters for horrifying your players with.
I decided to try and doodle all the bears which is why I ended up illustrating more. Poor bears.

This bear is made of herpes

Beers by James Young
I don't know who this James Young guy is but he fucking nailed this one. 26 beer ingredients, each with flavour imparted and in-game effects!?
Holy shit this guy is amazing.
And he did all the interior art!? What an animal!


Bordello, Orc by Evey Lockhart
A short but juicy (the wrong sort of juice) table for spicing up the inevitable whore-fights in your D&D games.
My players end up in Orcish whorehouses at least twice a session so this is going to be massively useful.

Christmas Party by Tore Nielsen
Nobody asked Tore to do this, and he did it anyway.
An encounter table of things that could happen at a mongrel christmas party.
We got animated tinsel.
We got a diabetic.
We got whoever Waylon Jennings is.
We got the best party, basically.

Elderly Lady by Tore Neilsen
Tore's "real" entry involves the goings-on behind the closed doors of the elderly lady in 4a.
She's up to all sorts, let me tell you.
Can easily be reskinned to a space opera setting if you replace the elderly lady with an elderly alien sitting on a space chair watching space telly.

The thousand yard stare of those who've seen too much

Familial Complications by Jarrett Crader
In the most personally-affecting entry in the Munticore rankings this year, Jarrett delves too deep into his own soul and experiences to portray a dire portrait of a family edging close to ruin behind a fantasy veneer.
Liminal spaces are crossed, boundaries are transgressed, and your sister is inseminated by your grandad's evil twin.
A harrowing journey into the id, where the question of self is constantly brought into question.
Plus discover whether you win D&D.

Jarrett Bum by David Black
David Black shows us exactly what's been hidden from view for too long.
There are many strange things up there, but in true D&D style we use the oracular power of dice to discover what was truly there all along.
The capacity for a single random roll to change the fiction in such a massive way is something to be celebrated.

Mongrel Carouse by Reece Carter
Given the prompt of "a carousing table with meth on it", Reece crafts gold.
Iconoclasm. STIs. No less than seven results that involve smoking something weird.
An easy addition to any carousing table, maybe to roll on if someone rolls a mishap they've already had?

Mutant Pet Table by Richie Cyngler
Boy, we've had the Esoteric Creature Generator and the LotFP Summon spell and the Guests in Red and Pleasant Land, but they all quail before the mighty Roll-All-the-Dice mutant pet table.
Does YOUR random mutant/demon tables have such wonders as the Hard-Face Fake SLime Dominator that devours goodwill or the Mysoginist Gnome which is so foul it defies even description?
That is the sort of shit you're getting from this crazy table. If anything, this is the thing that's worth the price of admission.

I don't think anyone's having a good time in this book

Unicorns by Christian Kessler
Delving deep into the ancient layers of mythology, Christian reinvents unicorns for the modern age.
Also many of the results may be useful for manticores.
We've got some crazy shit in here, like a rad motorbike unicorn mutation and a unicorn whose blasted-off skin makes you invisible but ALSO forces you to hunt down and kill the rest of its still living body.
Grim shit.
Also a unicorn with a dick for a horn, obviously.

What are we doing?! by Ben L
Given possibly the most difficult prompt because Evey couldn't get her shit together to ask a proper request, Ben L still manages to put on a good show.
This would be a sick way of starting off a new campaign. "You all got fucked up and ended up.. roll dice!" and now you've just got to deal with the consequences.
Go wild!

this is all performance art

So there you have it! A thorough review of the worst best the OSR has to offer.
You can buy it here.
My mum bought 5 copies and has stopped talking to me.

Dungeons and Druggies

You guys wanna get fucked up?

Having my campaign area's capital as an exaggerated fantastical other-London means that London's furtive yet pervasive drug culture gets blown up into a whole RANGE of fantasy drugs!

Good times for all! Unless you get addicted and it ruins your life of course, but that's by the by.

Mind-Altering Substances table here.

The silly names for real drugs were initially placeholders, but I kept them because I think they're a little bit endearing and give some plausible deniability if the drug doesn't work quite how the player was imagining.
"Oh no, our characters aren't taking ecstasy! This is a fantasy drug called Unmandy!"
Do feel free to change the names in your own game.

Mind-Altering Substances: Gygaxian Democracy Edition table here.
If you make up more drugs for your game, definitely add them in.

The basic mechanics are meant to be simple enough to bolt onto any game. 

Drugwise, the upsides are meant to be useful enough to make getting high on a dungeon crawl a tempting proposition, and the downsides bad enough to make drug addiction a big deal for your characters.
You may notice some Fallout influence, and that some Narcosan drugs feature on the Rare Drugs part of the table. I'll be adding more over time, I'm sure!

Here's how it works.

Summary

1. Take a drug and get its Upsides and Downsides for the Duration.
2. If you're already on something and you take something else, also roll for Drug Miscibility
3. At the end of a day in which you took drugs, check for Tolerance
4. If you have a Tolerance to a drug and haven't taken it in the last 7 days, check for Withdrawal

Basics

Take a dose of a drug, and you're saddled with Upsides and Downsides for the drug's Duration.

Extra doses stack.

Sick. Smash a couple doses of Alterket and you're taking -2 damage per die from all sources and won't pass out from Pain, but you've got -2 AC, move 2 encumbrance levels slower, and the DM keeps track of your HP in secret.
Good for when you're about to run into a room of unfriendly looking cultists with 1d4 damage daggers. Bad for running away from the demon they just summoned.

Mixing Drugs

Mixing your drugs is a gamble at the best of times.

Any time you're on something and take something else, roll 1d6 on the Miscibility table for each category of drug currently in your system.
So if you're on a depressant and then take another depressant, roll once on the Depressant table.
If you're on a depressant and then take a stimulant, roll once on the Depressant table AND once on the Stimulant table.

For the DM - decide now whether you can be bothered to track what mixes with what. I probably won't bother (you never can be sure about the purity), but it might be cool to do it on a per-combination or even per-character basis.
Everyone knows that Notcoke goes great with a couple of pints of lager... right? Or so you think until your mate passes out on his bar stall and cracks his head on the way down.

Tolerance / Addiction

The main downside to drugs is, famously, addiction.
The true tragedy of drugs to the end user is, in fact, tolerance.

This mechanic is meant to model both at once.

Well I mean, the real tragedy is dying of an overdose, but I figure if you're a heroic player character who can eat a few sword thrusts to the face you're heroic enough to snort a line as long as your arm.

Take drugs and there's a chance you'll build up points of Tolerance.

At the end of each day, Save vs Poison per drug you took that day with the following modifiers:

• +/- Tolerance modifier (see table)
• +/- Wis modifier
• +1 for each Tolerance point you already have with the drug.
• -1 for each dose of the drug taken that day

Success, and you're fine. No change.
Failure, and you gain a Tolerance point with the drug.

Each point of Tolerance builds up Tolerance Effects.
Generally the Tolerance Effect is the opposite of what the drug does, or a downside that the drug will make irrelevant.
So not only do you have to take more of the stuff to get the same effect, you've also got to take a bit of it to take the edge off and act sorta-normally.

Damn. Your Alterket habit is catching up with you and you've gained an Alterket Tolerance point. You take +1 damage per die from all sources and take double penalties from Pain.
Good thing taking a dose of Alterket will equalise the first effect and nullify the other...

Kicking the Habit

So you're addicted to something and don't want to be addicted any more.
Or even worse, your stash ran out a couple of days ago and you're still stuck in this stupid dungeon!
What to do?
Whatever happens, it's going to suck.

The easiest thing to do is shift your addiction onto some other substance, hopefully something that it's easier for you to obtain and/or control.
The hardest thing to do is go cold turkey.

If you have Tolerance points in a drug, you've got to take it at least once a week or risk going into withdrawals.
If you haven't taken it in the last 7 days, Save vs Poison with the following modifiers:

• +/- Wis modifier
• -1 for each point of Tolerance you have with the drug
• +1 for each point of Tolerance you have towards other drugs

Success, and you can remove a Tolerance point for the drug.
Failure, and you double the Tolerance Effects until you take the drug again.
If you get this result again, triple the Tolerance Effects until you take the drug again, and so on.

A bad Example to children

Jack is the party Fighter. He knows the next room is dangerous - full of ratmen at least. Ratmen like to set ambushes and to grapple you and bite you.

Luckily Jack's brought some Notcoke with him! Keeps you alert for ambushes and bumps up your melee skills. He carefully unpicks the little paper wrap, pretends to sneeze, and takes a couple of bumps off of the end of his dagger while he "blows his nose".
BOOM. It kicks in! He's PUMPED! +2 to Search and +2 to melee!

2 doses of Notcoke - Upside is +1 to Search and +1 to melee per dose.

The only downside is he's got to Save or do something risky and impulsive - he saves successfully, but they were planning to charge into the room anyway!
He boots down the door, sees the Ratmen dropping from their ambush position on the ceiling, and charges into GLORIOUS BATTLE!

2 doses of Notcoke - Downside is Save vs Paralyze or do something risky and impulsive with a -1 penalty to the save per dose.

That evening, Jack's regaling the people at the local tavern with his exploits. His teammates look at him with wide-eyed awe. "I can't believe you saw the ratman that jumped out behind me!" says the Wizard. "You were amazing, Jack!" says the Elf he's got a crush on.
He gets to bed and peels off his ratblood-soaked armour.
He has to check for Tolerance. He's got average Wisdom and Notcoke has a +0 Tolerance modifier, so he's just rolling a Save vs Poison at -2.

Shit, he failed.

Jack gains 1 Notcoke Tolerance point.

Check for Tolerance:
+0 for Notcoke's Tolerance modifier. +0 for average Wis. +0 for having no Tolerance to it. -2 for doses taken today.

The next day he wakes up feeling groggy. Weird. -1 to Search. -1 to melee. 

Entering the dungeon the next day, he feels like he's not up to his usual dungeonbashing standards. 

On the sly, he does a fat line of Notcoke to keep his head in the game. 4 doses means he's up to +3 Search and +3 melee! -4 to his Save vs recklessness of course, so he's charging in more often than before, but why hold back when you're this good?

Over the next few weeks he'll begin relying on it more and more to get him through the adventuring day, and need to take more and more of it to get to his normal baseline.

1 Notcoke Tolerance point. Effect: -1 to Search and -1 to melee per Tolerance point.
4 doses of Notcoke - Upside is +1 to Search and +1 to melee per dose.

4 doses of Notcoke - Downside is Save vs Paralyze or do something risky and impulsive with a -1 penalty to the save per dose.

- A few weeks later -

Jack's been smashing Notcoke every time he goes into a dungeon. He's not even bothering to hide it any more.
He's got 5 Notcoke Tolerance points at this point, meaning he starts the day at -5 to Search and -5 to Melee.
The rest of his party is worried about him, but the few times he's taken their suggestion of delving without taking it he's been a fucking liability.

5 Notcoke Tolerance points. Effect: -1 to Search and -1 to melee per Tolerance point.

Finally he's caught stealing drug money from the party coffers and enough's enough.
"No delving until you get clean" says the hot Elf. He'll do it for her.

After a week of feeling fucking terrible, it's time to check for Withdrawal.

He's got 5 Notcoke Tolerance, average Wisdom, and no other addictions. That's -5 to his save.
He rolls a Save vs Poison at -5. Against the odds, it's a success! He feels marginally less shit!
The next day he's got 4 Notcoke Tolerance! That's -4 to Search and -4 to melee.
If all goes well, he'll have kicked this in a month.

Check for Withdrawal: +0 for average Wisdom. -5 for 5 Notcoke Tolerance points. +0 for other addictions.
4 Notcoke Tolerance points. Effect: -1 to Search and -1 to melee per Tolerance point.

Another horrible week goes by. It's time to check for Withdrawal again.
Same again with a -4. This is getting easier!
Or so it seems.
He rolls a Save vs Poison at -4 and... fails. God fucking damn it, he needs some Notcoke.
All Tolerance effects are doubled - now he's at -8 to Search and -8 to melee.

Check for Withdrawal: +0 for average Wisdom. -4 for 4 Notcoke Tolerance points. +0 for other addictions.

Withdrawal - double Tolerance effects until you take the drug again.

4 Notcoke Tolerance points. Effect + Withdrawal: -2 to Search and -2 to melee per Tolerance point.

He's never felt this bad! 

And he knows, he knows, that if he just took one little bump it'd be enough to set him back up to -4 for everything. He'll still bad, but not this bad. Just one little bump to get him level, then he'll be back on the wagon.

Fuck it. While the rest of the party is out, he rifles through their stuff to find where they hid the last of his stash... and finds it.

Just a little bit left, but it's enough. A single dose, and he's no longer affected by Withdrawal! Phew! Even though he knows this could give him another Tolerance point and set him back a week, it was worth it.
Unfortunately he's still got a negative Search skill so he doesn't even notice when the Elf comes in early and sees the party's stuff scattered all over the floor as he snorts a little line.
She gasps, tears in her eyes, and he starts at the sound!
He fails his save against doing something impulsive! He approaches to kiss her! And she easily wrestles his -3 melee penalty arse out of the room and tells him never to come back.

1 dose of Notcoke - Upside is +1 to Search and +1 to melee per dose.
1 dose of Notcoke - Downside is Save vs Paralyze or do something risky and impulsive with a -1 penalty to the save per dose.
Withdrawal reset
4 Notcoke Tolerance points. Effect: -1 to Search and -1 to melee per Tolerance point.

Now Jack's on the street, no job and no money and a ruthless Notcoke addiction.
At the end of the day he'll be checking to see if that single dose gave him another Tolerance point, but until then he's got to find some way to scrounge money and survive.
Add him to the encounter table boys, he's an NPC now.
Requiem for a Dungeoncrawler.

Tips for Cooking Up Drugs

So you're a DM and want to add more drugs to the the game.

Here are some tips!

• In general, modifiers for upsides, downsides and tolerance are +/-1. This is so people can take several doses in order to improve the effects, and so that tolerance effects build up fairly slowly.
• If it's something that you don't think is that dangerous (like Otherpot), feel free to make the upside negate any amount of Tolerance Effect. In the case of Otherpot it only takes one dose to negate all the Tolerance Effect you've accrued.
• If you want the addiction to be harder hitting (like Notcoke), make the Tolerance the exact opposite of the Upside without negating any of the Downside.
• If you want to make an addict act a bit weird all the time even when they're on it (like Unmandy), have a Tolerance Effect that can't be negated by taking the drug. With Unmandy, you're on a -1 to reaction rolls per Tolerance point but you can still read intentions from facial expressions. You're still useful in the party's negotiations unless you're speaking directly to people.
• Don't go overboard with the Tolerance modifier. Maximum of +4 for extremely addictive and -4 for non-addictive.
  Psychological addiction is like 80% of addiction, man. Hell, I once met someone who was addicted to nangs of all things.

The Lair of the Holly Spirit

Dungeon PDF here

The local group of evil cultists have been hard at work for the past year preparing for the culmination of their plan to SUMMON SATAN!
Unfortunately their leader was dyslexic and fucked up the final ritual.
Now their mountain lair is full of CHRISTMAS FEAR! Prepare to meet your doom in… THE LAIR OF THE HOLLY SPIRIT!

This was the dungeon I ran for Christmas last year and it was quite well received!

The session began with a bunch of generic black-robed cultists fleeing down the mountain past the PCs.

If stopped, one of the cultists will inform them that their Satan summoning ritual went wrong because it turns out the cult leader's dyslexic!

The best part was that the players somehow didn't work out the dumb Satan-Santa dyslexia joke until right at the end, up until then they'd been hunting the "Ice Satan" and his christmas themed minions.

Download the pdf here

Monsters

- Christmas Gremlins

- Evil Snowmen

- The Toy Soldier

- The Nutcracker

- The Snugglebear

- Santa

Christmas Gremlins

HD 1, AC unarmoured, 1 snowball attack dealing 1 damage, morale 7

Snowballs auto-hit and deal a single embarrassing point of damage.

Ineffective in close combat, but their friends can throw snowballs into combat with perfect accuracy.

Evil Snowmen

HD 2, AC leather, 2 attacks dealing 1d6  + freeze, morale 10

On hit, save vs Paralyze or be frozen in a block of ice until you break free with a successful wrestle (Ice gets +0 to wrestle), every round you’re trapped you take another 1d6 damage.

Snowmen are immune to fire.

The Toy Soldier

HD 4, AC plate, one gun attack dealing 1d8 + gun benefits OR bayonet dealing 1d8, morale 12

Gun attack pierces 5 points of armour and deals exploding damage (ie. If they roll 8 for damage, roll 

again and add to total. Keep going until they don’t roll an 8). Gun takes a round to reload.

The Nutcracker

HD 4, AC chain, grapples to CRACK NUTS, morale 12

Doubles wrestle bonus (ie  total of +8 bonus to wrestle). CRACK NUTS deals 2d8 damage to men or 1d4 damage to women.

The Snugglebear

HD 4, AC leather, one snuggly attack dealing 1d6 damage + snuggle, morale 12.

Takes only 1 damage from smashy weapons. On hit, forces you to snuggle it – jump on and just give it big hugs. Save vs paralyze on subsequent turns to stop snuggling, but you can’t attack the bear on the turn you stop snuggling because it’s so warm and lovely and you love it.

Santa

HD 6, AC leather, multiple attack options, morale 12.

Santa can attack twice a round with his choice of the following attacks:

- SACK WHACK – 2d8 damage from overhead sack smack

- HO HO HO – blasts all nearby away from him! Those blasted into walls take 1d6 damage.

- HELLVES – Summon 1d4 Christmas Gremlins to his side!

Additionally, Santa is surrounded by CHRISTMAS MAGIC BULLSHIT

Every time a character attacks Santa (no matter whether they hit or miss) roll 1d6 –

1. Mistletoe Mayhem! Random character has mistletoe appear above their head, Save vs Magic or smooch random person nearby. Obviously both miss their next go due to smooching.

2. Christmas Cheer! Random character is doused with magic eggnog and is fucking trashed. Save vs Booze (aka vs Poison) or -4 to all actions and AC for the next ten minutes.

3. Ice to Meet You! Terrain in a 20’ radius around Santa is suddenly slippery as fuck. Characters who want to move through it must save vs Paralyze or fall on their arse. Santa is immune of course.

4. Elf on the Shelf! Random character has a Christmas Gremlin appear on their head and start attacking their mates with snowballs while giggling joyfully.

5. Family Argument! Random character attacks their closest ally, who also attacks them back. Save vs Magic to avoid this if either player brings up a legitimate grievance they or their character has against the other.

6. In a Single Night! Santa teleports behind a random character and attacks them with his SACK WHACK.

The person who strikes the KILLING BLOW against Santa, as in classic Tim Allen documentary The Santa Clause, becomes the new Santa!

They gain the following abilities during the winter months:

- Immunity to cold weather, half damage from cold attacks

- Heart beats in time to “Jingle Bells”

- Unerring aim with snowballs, dealing 1 damage

- Children will always tell you the truth

- Detect Naughty or Nice at will

- Ability to ascend/descend small vertical shafts instantly

- If killed, killer slowly becomes Santa Claus

But also the following penalties during the winter months:

- Must return to grotto in the Frozen North for the entirety of December

- Massive weight gain no matter what you do

- Hair turns white

- Cannot lie, cheat or steal.

- Craving for sugar, brandy and milk

 

 

THE DUNGEON

1. Out the front of the grotto are 2d10 Christmas Gremlins! They’re in two teams having a snowball fight and it’s obviously a great time. They keep throwing really impressive trick shots to hit each other behind the snow barricades. They’re pretty friendly.

2 Evil Snowmen are also here, but they look like normal snowmen unless they and/or the Christmas Gremlins are attacked.

2. 13 Reindeer are harnessed to a sleigh, facing a misty portal. Their leader has a red nose. The portal leads to a similar misty portal halfway up the mountain. This is the launch pad for the Santa’s reindeer team.

If one of the players flicks the reins and can recite the reindeer’s names in order for real without looking it up, the reindeer fly out of the misty portal and into the sky! Anyone in the sleigh itself can easily steer. The reindeer run out of magic in January.

3. The Workshop was once the kitchen and pantry for the Satanists. Now it contains 2d6 Christmas Gremlins who hate their jobs making shitty anachronistic branded toys from wood and plastic. The toys are worth 3000sp if sold to somebody who realises how incredible Thomas the Tank Engine and Meccano are to pre-modern society.

4. The Playroom was once the bedroom for the cultists. Now the Toy Soldier, the Nutcracker and the Snugglebear are in this room, but they look like set dressing. They will come to life if the Christmas Gremlins and/or Santa are attacked… or if someone searches the room.

The cultists stored various valuables in this room. Notable are a small silver goat statue worth 500 sp, a case of miscellaneous magical herbs which give a one-time +5 bonus to a casting of Summon, and a pack of Satanist pamphlets that mention the cult’s address in a nearby town.

5. The Grotto was where the summoning of Satan was supposed to take place. Too bad the dyslexic cult leader summoned Santa instead.

Above the door to the south, Mistletoe is on the ceiling. Anyone who enters the room must Save vs Magic or smooch their nearest ally.

Santa is in this room. He’s jolly, but does not take kindly to people interrupting his Christmas preparations! Santa will fuck you up if you come into this room. Also, if he’s attacked, a massive siren will sound and everyone else in the complex will come to defend Santa.

To the north, a Portal to the Christmas Dimension swirls inside a pentagram. Floating in a frozen shard of ice above it is the cult leader whose name is Tranquilix Vern (real name Herbert Schuster) who just wants to go home.

Inside Santa’s sack, if you defeat him, are the following things:

- A Terry’s Chocolate Orange. 20 charges. Each “charge” heals 1d6 HP, but temporarily costs a single point of Constitution. Lost points of Constitution come back after a good sleep.

- The Ice Shard Sword. A critical hit means the target is frozen in ice like they were hit by an Evil Snowman! Only works in the winter months (in-game and real life) otherwise the blade melts.

- Candy Cane Daggers. A paired set that taste deliciously minty. Killing someone with one dagger creates a Christmas Gremlin. Killing someone with both (ie. When you roll the same damage on both rolls when dual-wielding) creates a Christmas Gremlin under your control.

- Horrible Christmas Jumper so impossibly horrible that people blank it out of their minds. +3 to Stealth. On successful Stealth roll though, lights up with a loud fun jingle!

- 10 Mince Pies that count as rations for adults, but force a morale check in children.

- Santa’s Expanding Sack will expand to encompass anything you put in it.

THE DUNGEON OF IAXWW - Christmas Gimmick Dungeon of 2016

2016 has been a tough year. Celebrity deaths. Brexit. Trump.
So rather than stock my annual Christmas gimmick dungeon with Santa and elves and snowmen again, I decided to stock it with a bunch of dumb 2016 references.

This should give you some indication of the calibre of the material here.

Overview

Countries united!
GOD-EMPEROR TRUMP of the UNITED STATES has teamed up with the Goblin King NIGEL FARAGE to enact a great and terrible RITUAL that will enable Loegria to PHYSICALLY LEAVE Europea and PHYSICALLY UNITE with America, destroying everything in its way!

The DARK REFERENDUM requires that AT LEAST HALF OF THE POPULATION OF LOEGRIA agree to leave Europea! To ensure this happens, the God-Emperor and Goblin King are enacting the RITUAL OF MASS TELEDEPORTATION, a ritual that will teleport any non-white non-native non-human people STRAIGHT INTO THE SEA.

YOUR PARTY OF NOBLE HEROES has been summoned to this Christmassy gimmick dungeon by THE LAST OF THE CLINTON CLAN.
She was at least two million votes more powerful than Trump, but even she could not defeat him.
Now it is up to you.

(Naturally, replace Loegria with your campaign setting. And Europea with the continent it's on/near. And America you can just leave as is, right?)

  

Monster Stats

The Dead – 1HD AC12 ML12
Prince: Surrounded by purple rain, those nearby save vs Magic each round or weep.
Bowie: If you kill him – you are floating in a tin can far above the world. Escape back to Earth if you can sing like half the song.
Alan Rickman: Has 5 random potions on his person. If you kill him – speak in Alan Rickman voice and physically become one of his characters. Transformation happens in one round, and maintains for as long as you stay in character in real life.
Gene Wilder: If you kill him - become a big blue blueberry that can barely fit through doors. Lasts the rest of the session. If popped, you die.
Muhammed Ali: AC 18. Missed attacks mean he ducks, weaves, and punches you in the fucking jaw for 1d8 damage and blasts you backwards. If Ali takes you to 0HP, he bits your fucking ear off.
Ron Glass: Peaceful. Holds book covered in a layer of wool. Allows reader to speak with sheep.
Fidel Castro: Attack has 50% chance to be Good (attack heals 1d6 HP) or Evil (attack deals 1d6 damage)

Harambe – HD4 AC12 ML4
Automatically grapples and drags. Dragged creature becomes as helpless as a small child. Deals no damage.
Takes double damage from projectile weapons, triple from firearms.
If you kill him – Save vs Paralyze whenever somebody says the name Harambe or fall to the ground, distraught at what you did to that noble, perfect creature. Lasts until people finally stop posting Harambe memes on the internet.
Everyone else – While in the presence of Harambe’s killer – asking for Harambe’s Blessing gives you a +1 bonus to your next roll. Stops working when people finally stop posting Harambe memes on the internet.

Nigel Farage the Goblin King – HD3 AC12 ML12
Any time you are in the same room as Nigel Farage the Goblin King, you must punch him in his stupid smug grinning face (just fists, no weapons) unless you Save vs Magic-ally Punchable Face.
Nigel Farage has a big mug of Real British Ale. Every round he can take a massive swig of his Real British Ale to heal up to full health, but takes -1 to his AC. Stop him from doing this by either dragging him away from the tap (hard when you’re punching him in the face) or taking/adulterating his ale somehow (which sends him into a rage).

God-Emperor Trump – HD 8, AC 17, ML 9
Trump takes half damage from women and does double damage against foreigners and minorities
Roll 1d8 twice every round for Trump’s attacks:

1.       Pussy Grab! Wrestle. 1d4 damage to men, 2d6 damage to women.
2.       Build a Wall! Creates a wall 30’ long and 20’ high in the location of his choice. Anybody of even vaguely South American descent in the room (player or character) loses half their cash.
3.       Glass Ceiling! A huge pane of glass drops from above. Deals 1d6 damage to women inside the room, but men pass harmlessly through it.
4.       Rigged Pole! Springs from the floor and smacks a random person nearby for 1d10 damage. Roll to hit, but change the result to anything you want. It’s rigged.
5.       Krav MAGA! Three attacks for 1d6 damage each aimed at whoever he chooses.
6.       Hell Toupee! Hairpiece LEAPS FROM HIS HEAD and begins strangling someone. 1d6 damage every round until you wrestle it off. If he rolls this again, jumps again.
7.       Charm White Male! Random white human male in room is Charmed and does whatever Trump wants. Save vs Magic in subsequent rounds to break free.
8.       Deport Minority! Random non-human in room is teleported to the dungeon entrance.

Dungeon Key

Entrance. The Resting Place of the Last of the Clinton Clan
It is snowing. A blonde woman in a pantsuit ages before your very eyes.
"I was two million votes more powerful... but not even I could defeat him... I have used the last of my strength to summon you here. Please, save 2016. Save us all."
She collapses into the snow. If searched, you find no emails.
Above the dungeon entrance, festive neon splutters and fizzes in the cold. The letters spell IAXWW. The foetid stench of a horrible year blows from the dungeon mouth.
We were forced to got through 2016. Now so are your characters.

Room 1. Hall of the Dead.
The Celebrity Dead of 2016 are here, stacked in neat alcoves amongst tinsel. Search the berths and you will find every celebrity who died this year.
Progressing means several animate and attack! Specifically the first five I made stats for - Prince, Bowie, Alan Rickman, Gene Wilder and Muhammed Ali.
They will generally say that they didn’t want things to turn out this way, but the dark energies unleashed by Brexit have caused them to hate the living.
Surprise! It's not over! When the five are defeated, Ron Glass and Fidel Castro appear! Ron Glass does not fight and offers a book bound in wool. Castro may attack depending on the group's opinion of him.

Room 2. Harambe.

Shallow water surrounding a central island. Narrow ledge around room could be traversed with some difficulty. On the island, a single bare-branched Christmas tree.
If someone climbs down to the water - Harambe the Gorilla runs around the island, grabs them, and begins dragging them through the water to the sound of screams!
If the ledge is traversed instead - the smallest character falls! No save! Harambe catches, cradles, drags through water to the sound of screams.
Harambe is peaceful and harmless, but scared. It's up to you to work out how to save whoever fell in.
Leaning against the christmas tree is the Gorilla Gun. Any who touch it must Save vs Magical Device or shoot the nearest gorilla they can see. It deals 1d10 damage and has 6 shots left.

Room 3. The Inevitable Slide
A slide shading from dark blue at the top to dark red at the bottom. Those who didn’t vote in the EU Referendum or the US election this year take 1d10 damage from the sandpaper roughness at the bottom of the slide.
It doesn't matter what you voted for, just that you voted.

Room 4. Lair of the Right.

God-Emperor Trump and Nigel Farage the Goblin King are here!!
Steep 20' cliff with stairs up on the west side. This is to make this room into a "6", but also so people can get knocked off the cliff.
Farage stands by a tap marked Real British Ale and is laughing gleefully. He and Trump are smooching while also gloating about their plan to cast Mass Teledeportation which will throw all non-white non-human non-native people in the land into the sea.
Ritual circle on the ground is a big gold pentagram filled with blood.
The chamber shudders, and somehow you know it’s Loegria beginning to drag itself away from the continent!
Trump and Farage will fight you if you try to stop the ritual, of course.
The main boss fight gimmick is that you can't attack Trump if you're punching Farage in the face, and Farage's punchable face keeps healing when he gulps down his ale.
Kill Farage quick, or find some way to avoid seeing his punchable face.
Trump gets Opportunity Attacks on people who are forced run past him to punch Farage, by the way.

Treasure in the final room!
- Gold pentagram is worth 5000sp, and counts as double that if used as a Thaumaturgic Circle for the purposes of the Summon spell.
- Farage Mug magically fills itself from whatever it was last filled from. If filled with ale, heals 1d6 HP if you drain the mug but gives you -1 AC for the rest of the day.
- Real British Ale tap sticking from wall has 1d10 pints of Real British Ale left in it. Heals drinker to full health but gives -1 AC penalty for the rest of the day.
- Trump Power Armour is tacky and poorly made but wrapped in gold leaf! Low quality plate armour. Worth 10000sp.
- Trump’s Toupee, when placed on a bald head, will protect its new owner. Jumps and wrestles like a headcrab. 1d6 damage per round until wrestled off, but any damage will kill it. Comes back to life when you offend at least 100 people with a single statement.
- Wall Button acts like Wall of Stone but eats 1000sp from user whenever it’s pressed. User can pass this cost onto a South American in line of sight if they wish, but it fails if they don’t have the cash.
- Sack containing 350 million gold marked with the letters “NHS”. Super heavy because of this. If you look inside, there's nothing there and the sack weighs as much as an empty sack. Basically you can carry it around easily if you're looking inside it the whole time.
- Frog Face Grimoire has a frog's face stretched out on the cover forming a horrible grimace. Contains the ritual "Dark Referendum".
Casting time: 2 months
At the completion of the ritual everyone in the country is given the choice to Leave or Remain. If at least 50% choose Leave, the entire country begins moving in the direction of caster's choice at a rate of a mile a day, leaving behind a big hole and smooshing any other landmasses in its way!
This spell can be delayed indefinitely by the leader of the country, so kill them asap if they're not on your side.