Friday, April 16, 2010

B/X Witch Hunter


This new character class is based on the Stephan Michael Sechi fantasy RPG supplement, The Compleat Adventurer. See this previous post for more info.


WITCH HUNTER

Level.....Title.....Experience Points.....Hit Dice
1.....Zealot.....0.....1D6
2.....Fanatic.....1800.....2D6
3.....Denouncer.....3600.....3D6
4.....Crusader.....7200.....4D6
5.....Inquisitor.....15,000.....5D6
6.....Witch Finder.....30,000.....6D6
7.....Exorcist.....60,000.....7D6
8.....Grand Inquisitor.....120,000.....8D6
9.....Witch Hunter General.....240,000.....9D6
10.....10th level W.H.G......360,000.....9D6+2*
11.....11th level W.H.G......480,000.....9D6+4*
12.....12th level W.H.G......600,000.....9D6+6*
13.....13th level W.H.G......720,000.....9D6+8*
14.....14th level W.H.G......840,000.....9D6+10*

*Constitution bonuses no longer apply.


Witch Hunters are individuals that combine tracking skill with a knowledge of mysticism and ritual magic. All are avid students of arcane lore, and have trained themselves to track down spell casters, undead, and the supernatural.

The Prime Requisite of witch hunters is Wisdom; a witch hunter with a 13-15 in Wisdom gains an additional 5% bonus to earned experience points, and a witch hunter with a 16 or better gains a 10% bonus. A character must have a minimum Charisma of 9 to be a witch hunter.

RESTRICTIONS: Witch Hunters use six-sided dice (d6) to determine their hit points. Because of their need to travel with speed, they wear no armor heavier than chain mail, though they may carry shields. They may use any type of weapon. They may achieve a maximum of 36th level of experience. Witch hunters use the same attack table as fighters of the same level and use the same saving throw table as clerics. They may use any magic item not restricted to a specific class.

SPECIAL ABILITIES: Like clerics, witch hunters can be especially helpful when fighting undead. They may turn undead as a cleric of half their own level (for example, a 8th level witch hunter may turn undead like a 4th level cleric). In addition, they receive a +1 bonus to hit any kind of undead, demon, or devil.

Witch hunters have the ability to track and read tracks (determining the number and type of prey) equal to 50% + 5% per level of experience (maximum of 95%). This chance of tracking decreases by 5% for every day that has passed since the tracks were made, and decreases an additional 5% for every hour of rain or snow fall since the tracks were made.

Witch hunters have the ability to find traps as a thief of the same level, and may set snares with the same chance of success.

At 7th level the witch hunter gains the ability to read magic (as the spell) at will, though attempting to cast a spell from a scroll always carries a 10% chance of failure. Prior to 7th level, the witch hunter may attempt to decipher magical writings (thus knowing what is written, though not being able to cast any written spells); however, the chance of success is only 50%.

Finally a witch hunter gains the ability to cast the following spells as he or she rises in experience. Each spell may only be cast once per day, and always as a caster of half the witch hunter's level (so a 10th level witch hunter would cast spells as a 5th level spell caster):

1st Level - Detect Magic
3rd Level - Detect Evil
5th Level - Locate Object
7th Level - Dispel Magic
9th Level - Remove Curse
11th Level - Dispel Evil
13th Level - Commune
15th Level - Holy Word**

**see B/X Companion or Labyrinth Lord for information on this spell.

Witch hunters may never cast reversed spells.

4 comments:

  1. On breaks from college my hometown friends and I would play Sechi's Arcanum game, the middle product between the Compleats and Talislanta. As I recall the system was pretty much house-ruled D&D with spell points, damage subtraction armor, schools of magic, and most of the other usual improvements. Most all the Compleat character classes were there, in a sword'n'sorcery world stuffed with all the lost continents. Good stuff.

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  2. This is excellent! :)

    I'm thinking about how to add this to our Weird West game...

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  3. Instead of the +1 to "outsiders" (+1 bonus to hit any kind of undead, demon, or devil) I would give them a bonus to hit any type of arcane spell caster, such as wizard, witch or other "magic user".

    Good stuff. I'll have to try this guy out in my games.

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  4. Thanks for the kind comments.

    @ Tim: My idea here is that there is no inherent bonus for fighting spell casters as they are simply humans that use magic like any other weapon or tool...the interpretation of what is "evil" or "a witch" or "diabolic" is left up to the individual WH...depending on how righteous and un-remitting you want to play him (alignment-wise) the WH may or may not persecute clerics and magic-users. BUT the hunter ONLY gets a bonus against REAL monsters (undead, devils, and demons).
    : )

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