Reasonable Cruelty

For this challenge I'm going to revisit a selection of monster abilities that often scare GMs away, and can feel like unfair relics from the era of killer GMs.

These include:

• Equipment Destruction
• Maiming limbs
• Finishing-off downed PCs
• Instant Death
• Level-drain (with a twist where ITO/Bastionland has no levels)
• Petrification
• Mind Control

And the final twist, none of the above effects will grant a Save to avoid them. There might be another way, but not from rolling well. 

The only way this will work is ultra-clear information for the players. They need to know that the scorpion's sting is instantly fatal FOR REAL THIS IS NOT FLUFF. If that touches you, you die. 

We can only give them information, let's see what they do with it!

Reasonably Cruel Monsters

Gun-Runt

STR 6, DEX 9, CHA 3, 1hp

Muck Gun (d6, leaves splat of muck as well as damage)

• Hides under its tortoise-like shell as an instant reaction if anybody gets close, or if threatened from afar. The shell is utterly unbreakable by anything short of a bomb, and forms a tight seal to the ground.
• Surrenders pitifully if they are unable to retract into their shell. They weep and cry but will turn hostile at the first opportunity.
• Live only to serve the Green Beast, and would happily die for him. 

Notes: These things are annoying, but not much trouble on their own. They exist to accompany the more interesting monsters and make them even more annoying. 

Sticky-Runt 

STR 9, DEX 6, CHA 3, 2hp

Claws (d6)

• Resembles a Gun-Runt, but has a mass of tangled fur and tendrils in place of its shell.
• Anything touching its shell is grabbed by a waxy adhesive, only released by a Runt's saliva.
• Their saliva also melts through any material, which they gleefully use to destroy captured items. 

Note: Equipment destruction

Collector Beetle

STR 10, DEX 10, CHA 3, 5hp

Jaws (d8) Shell (Armour 2)

• On an attack roll of 7+ the Beetle tears a limb from the target. It favours arms, especially those carrying impressive weapons. 
• Torn limbs are attached to the Beetle's hide, animating to grant an extra attack as appropriate.
• If the Beetle is killed then limbs can be reattached, but require a skilled surgeon. 

Note: Maiming limbs

White Vulture

STR 12, DEX 15, CHA 3, 3hp

Rend (d8)

• Has no appetite for combat, but watches on and swoops down onto any helpless victims.
• Before feasting the Vulture spends a whole turn displaying, turning blood red and ruffling its feathers.
• On the next turn the feast is gruesome and quick. The Vulture is back in the air before the last drops hit the ground. 

Note: Downed opponents

Crushing Spirit

STR 10, DEX 15, CHA 13, 6hp

Crush (d10), part-bone part-shadow (ignore normal attacks, takes d4 to d12 damage from light depending on intensity)

• Its touch is unavoidable, freezing the victim in the place. On their next turn the spirit crushes the victim to dust, extracting their soul.
• Even lamplight repels the spirit.
• It's always plotting a way to plunge a victim into darkness. They don't much care who the specific victim is, but they must feed. 

Note: Instant death

Bloody Tearer

STR 7, DEX 6, CHA 5, 10hp

Black Gauntlet (d8, melee or ranged), Bloody Armour (Armour 2)

• Bears trophies from infinite wars on impossible worlds, now a reluctant killer for hire.
• They warn that each death now carries a greater cost.
• If the Tearer causes or takes Melee Critical Damage, a red orb emerges and drains the life from any combatants. They all reroll their Ability Scores on 3d6, keeping any that are lower than their current score. 

Note: "Level drain"

Cloud Rider

STR 15, DEX 18, CHA 10, 11hp

Wind Blast (d6 Blast)

• Extremely fast, lives to spread terror. 
• Their body is fleshy, but always masked by cloud.
• Instead of moving, the Rider can fill a room-sized area with glowing petrification gas. There's enough time to flee the area, but anybody that stays and breathes even a little of the gas becomes permanently petrified.

Note: Petrification

The Green Beast

STR 16, DEX 7, CHA 18, 10hp

Smash (d10 or d6 Blast), Stony Body (Armour 2)

• Wants to amass more servants and punish those who rejected him.
• Uses material bribes before resorting to his mind control. 
• Anybody killed by the Beast, or one of his sworn servants, finds themselves on the threshold of death, faced by his true form, soft and verdant. The Beast offers life in return for an hour of service. If they agree, the victim returns to life but is under the Beast's control for the next hour.

Notes: Mind control

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This post was originally sent as a reward to all Patreon supporters, and is released freely on this site the week after its original publication.

If you want to support my blog, podcasts, and video content then head over to my Patreon. 

Defence

This Bastionland Editorial was originally sent as a reward to all Patreon supporters, and is released freely on this site a week after its original publication.

If you want to support my blog, podcasts, and video content then head over to my Patreon.

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ITO and EB have three types of defence. Pretty bloated system, right?

I wanted to talk briefly about how to use them both alone and in combination with each other.

Hit Protection (HP)
A guaranteed buffer of "safe" damage that can be taken before getting wounded. Easy to recover once the fight is over. It's the most abstract of the defences, but usually represents a general sense of skill and stamina. 

Strength (STR)
Raw physical endurance. Both the mass to soak up hits and the vigour to keep on fighting when wounded. More debilitating and difficult to recover, losing STR is always painful in comparison to losing HP. 

Armour (A)
Anything that lessens the effect of an attack against you and give a chance to shrug it off altogether. 

Now things get more interesting when you use them together. What does that look like?

For these examples, assume that the defences not mentioned are unremarkable. 

High HP, High STR: If you want to make something tough, this is probably the safest way to go. They're going to stick around, but gradually get worn down. I'd use this for most typical scary monsters that you want to pose a real threat and not be easily taken down. 

High HP, High A: I've seen discussions around whether something fast and small should use Armour to represent their ability to dodge. In general, I'd save that sort of thing for another category, but I can see the temptation to put them here. Instead, I'd use this category for the skilled, armoured opponent that frustrates the characters until they can land one decisive blow on them.

High STR, High A: The classic big monster profile here. In general terms, before considering actual armour-like protection, I give +1 armour to big stuff, and +2 to REALLY BIG stuff (maintaining the maximum of 3). Just be aware that this profile is vulnerable to a lucky one-shot if the players roll high and you roll badly. 

High HP, Low STR: THIS is the fast, small monster profile. They can duck and dodge safely until you land that blow which will likely take them straight down to instant death at STR 0. 

Low HP, High STR: Just a dumb brute. Good for your orc-likes. 

Low HP, High A: I've used this for both untrained-armoured-grunts and automaton-like monsters. It's interesting in that it can feel a little more like the classic D&D combat with lots of swinging and missing, with one or two decisive blows. It has a use, but I wouldn't make this the standard. 

Low STR, High A: I like this for skeletons and the like. Fragile enemies that can be shattered with a good hit but are surprisingly difficult to land a good blow on.

High Everything: Use with caution! I mean, you can use it, but just make sure it's something that you're prepared to have stick around for a long time. In particular, make sure it has interesting things to do while it's out there surviving for so long. 

Born to Play, Doomed to Die

When a rule is born into one of my games it cries out as it draws first breath, and I look down with contempt. 

I do love the pathetic little thing, and I can't help but think of all the deeds it might accomplish, all the fun we could have together. 

Then I stop myself, lean to its ear, and whisper.

Tell me why I should let you live.

Going back to Into the Odd after Electric Bastionland has pushed me face-first into examining my rules. After so long explaining the changes in EB, I'm catapulted backwards to the ITO rules page, examining it with old eyes. Like Merlin living life in reverse, I can't unsee the future of this game. 

At least I thought Electric Bastionland was the future.

Into the Odd wouldn't sit back and retire. I kept hearing people talk about it, making hacks, choosing to play it over the new gigantic hardback. Just a scrappy underdog? No, people were actually explaining why they preferred this old game. They even preferred WIL to CHA!

That's not to say I haven't enjoyed the process of exhuming it and sending it to the tailor to be swaddled in finery. The plan was always for ITO to stick around as a smaller, quieter relative to EB, but I hadn't fully expected it to survive.

So approaching this project from a necromantic angle, the plan soon became to do a Remaster rather than a revision. Paying tribute to the original and presenting it in as authentic a revivification as possible, rather than trying to fix anything about it. A shimmering ghost representing their ideal form, rather than a monstrous marvel of forbidden engineering.

Of course there were genuine problems. Wordings could be improved, and I was never fully happy with the included Arcana, so they all got some attention. I knew I wanted to put some extra content in there, so brand new Arcana were added to the heap, the Oddpendium got beefed up slightly, and the Iron Coral exploded into rampant growth, now a fully blown dungeon worthy of your expedition. 

Then I looked to Electric Bastionland, its neon lights always tempting me. I could add in the Scars table but... then I'd have to change the advancement rules and... NO, show some respect! I throw my EB book out of the window and I hear paving slabs shattering. 

But I do indulge a little. Rules that have fought hard for their place are granted access. Deprived is my golden child, ushered fawningly to the table. They're so well behaved, always there when you need them but never in the way. Bulky comes with them. Sure, they're not quite as well-groomed, and sometimes I even forget their birthday, but we've got room for one more.

Wait. Do we have enough room at the table? 

We do, but isn't it always nice to be able to stretch your legs? I sharpen my axe.

I see some misshapen figures tucked on the far corner. They look comfortable, but I've been watching them for a while.

Swap any two Ability Scores after rolling gets it first. I suspect they knew this was coming, as I never really spoke to them for long after they arrived.

Make a WIL Save to bend an Arcanum to your will gets the second chop. Where their sibling was forgettable, they were rowdy and disruptive, and not in the good way. I had to re-engineer my bone magnet because of them.

Two in, two out.

I put my axe away. Now we can play. 

400 Types of Pathetic Jerk

Anybody that runs enough games will start to notice recurring themes and patterns. It's even worse when you have twelve years of blogposts to look back on.

It's been almost ten years since I wrote this, but it reminded me that my NPCs far too often fall into one of three categories.

• Pathetic losers
• Detestable jerks
• Both of the above

So why fight it? Let's embrace it. 

The bridge between those two archetypes is often an Insecurity. This is something that eats away at them. Maybe they overcompensate and do everything they can to prove themselves, maybe they withdraw into self-defeatism, or maybe they lash out against anybody else that tries to thrive in this area. 

Those truly memorable Jerks usually have some sort of Leverage that they can weaponise in defence of their insecurity. 

Let's put that into a Spark Table.

Roll 2d20 and combine.

d20	Insecurity	Leverage
1	Rhetoric	Family Connections
2	Physical Strength	Natural Talent
3	Professional Skill	Technology
4	Wealth	Good Education
5	Appearance	Unnatural Ability
6	Peer Respect	Personal Wealth
7	Artistic Talent	Celebrity
8	Authenticity	Protective Siblings
9	Morality	Cosmic Blessing
10	Humbleness	Raw Confidence
11	Place in Community	Hired Muscle
12	Drinking Capacity	Press Contacts
13	Popularity	Wealthy Benefactor
14	Book Smarts	Employees
15	Personal Struggle	Animal Magnetism
16	Worldliness	Hidden Oddity
17	Groundedness	Secrets
18	Politeness	Society Connections
19	Modernity	Martial Ability
20	Faith	Crime Connections

Examples

4+3: Wealth / Technology

Wealth is a common insecurity. It can be reflected by somebody flaunting their money around, but in this case let's take a different angle and say that this is the opposite. Somebody that comes from money, but is insecure about the benefits that it has granted them, so they're doing everything to show how they had to fight for every penny they've earned. 

Their leverage is technology, so let's say they're a factory owner. This ultra-modern factory basically runs itself, but the NPC claims to have built it by hand. Of course, it was passed down from a parent, but they'll take issue with anybody that points that out. 

The inherited-billionaire that claims to be self-made is pretty archetypal, but I think it resonates really strongly in creating a character you can hate. 

19+1: Modernity / Family Connections

Another way to read the insecurity is to have the jerk focus it outward, deflecting their own shortcomings outward onto others. So let's say this person just doesn't get modernity, and is sick of hearing about it. They want things to go back to how they were.

This ties into the Family Connections if we imagine an aristocrat type, fearful that the world is moving beyond the point where they can get a free ride on their family name. Yes, I can see them as a politician that's going to make sure that tradition is upheld and unfettered progress checked against our cultural values at every step, which just so coincidentally helps them cling onto their anachronistic life of luxury.

1+15: Rhetoric / Animal Magnetism

This one's easy. Somebody that people just seem to like, but if you disagree with them they just have to prove themselves to you by aggressively debating you until it's crystal clear that you were wrong. 

Perhaps she's a socialite that's so used to having people fawn over her, but we'll place her in a position where the players are going to have to get on her bad side.

The Twelve Failed Careers of Oddmas

Did you enjoy all of the weird stuff and silly references in Electric Bastionland's Failed Careers?

Feeling festive?

The Twelve Failed Careers of Oddmas is now on sale!

(also on DrivethruRPG but Itch takes a smaller cut)

Twelve more Failed Careers for your seasonal Electric Bastionland game, focusing on the council-endorsed winter conglomerated-festival of Oddmas. A 30 page PDF. 

Featuring (in reverse order):

12: Drumbelleer

11: Primal Piper

10: Lady/Lad-a-Loopin

9: Layman Duncer

8: Malady Milker

7: Sworn Swimmer

6: Goose Allayer

5: Gold Ring Grappler

4: Coalie Bird

3: Fancy Poulterer

2: Turtle Devotee

and

1: Apprentice to a Paired Tree

Framing Weirdness

Bastionland has a lot of weird stuff. The closest thing to an introductory adventure has, among other things:

• Dirt and worm worshipping teenagers
• A hedgehog judge with other animals as servants
• Slugs piloting mechanical bodies
• A lonely whalebone mech

That's quite a lot of strangeness to throw at your players in game one, not even factoring in that the characters themselves might be a bunch of pretty weird individuals.

Some groups will lap this up, it can help some groups to consider how they present the weird elements. Remember that, at large, Bastionland is deliberately designed to be somewhat more mundane than a typical fantasy setting.

That is to say that for most residents of Bastionland, life doesn't look all that different to life today. Most people live in the city, they have a job they applied for, they buy food from the shops, they listen to their music collection and indulge in hobbies with their friends at the weekend.

This might seem like I'm stating the obvious, but in a more medieval-style world none of the above would be taken for granted by an average person. 

So I wanted to present a few tools for framing the weirder elements of your Bastionland if you're finding it a touch too much to take neat.

Dilution Reveals Flavour

Going hard on the whisky analogy here. Fancy drinkers will tell you to put a few drops of water into your whisky, even more if it's cask strength, which lets the flavour open up. Think of weirdness like your alcohol content here. It's got a lot of flavour, but too much and you only get the burn, or in this case weirdness-overload. 

Yes, you can make your entire Borough head to tail bonkers, but it might be tough to stomach. Sometimes reining it back in is the right way to go. 

I'm aware of the hypocrisy here, as I'm normally more of a "Go big! Subtlety is overrated" sort of GM, but it's really about reading your group. I'd still advise things like big, impactful consequences for actions, and strongly defined, memorable characters, but for your setting as a whole it's sometimes nice to have...

A Solid Foundation

Cities are already weird and confusing. Don't be afraid to just let Bastion be a city. Yeah, you can turn it up to 11, but it's a familiar song. 

If your campaign centres around an alien world where gravity is tidal and everybody is telepathic then you're on uncertain ground from day one. Rely on Bastionland's solid foundation of something that the players can relate to. Even if you don't want to go for the city route, Deep Country should hold elements that are familiar to anybody that's spent time in rural areas.

For this reason I wouldn't really advise a game set entirely in the Underground. For me it works as a new level of weirdness that you descend into, before returning to that solid foundation in Bastion or Deep Country. 

Weird Empathy

Incomprehensible alien intelligence can make for appealing antagonists, but I like to make even the weirdest characters relatable. Give them a good, strong drive or emotion that we can all sympathise with. To use the example of ABYSS in the Prison of the Worm Queen, he's lonely. The actions he takes are hopefully different to how we would react to loneliness, but the core is the same.

I don't go into too much detail in the actual document, but when I've run the game I do everything I can to make the players feel that loneliness. It might feel strange, like this is the "boss monster" right? If you make the players empathise too much won't they just refuse to fight it? Well, yeah. That happens quite often, and in my eyes it can lead to much more interesting situations than a fight.

Cloak of Mundanity

A common trick with modern-weird and alternate-history settings. Keep the surface level of everything relatively normal. Push the Mockeries and Aliens far into the background. Leave the machines in the Underground. Bastion is big and messy, but mostly has familiar elements.

It's definitely not how I'd run the game, especially for one-shots, but if you're still getting to grips with your idea of Bastionland, and your players are perhaps less exposed to weird fiction and fantasy it can be a good way to ease them into a longer campaign where they gradually discover the strange elements of the setting one by one. 

Inverted Monsters

A simple concept. Sum up some classic D&D monsters in three bullet points, invert those points, then make them into their own monster.

As always, if your idea can't be summed up in three bullet points then maybe it's too complicated for an RPG monster.

Art from artbreeder.

Beholder

• Lots of eyes
• Floats and shoots beams
• Hates everything

Becomes

• Eyeless and Blind
• Grounded melee fighter
• Loves everything

Adorer (Inverse Beholder)
STR 15, 8hp, Stony Body (Armour 2), d8 Trample.

• Sniffs out signs of life and is drawn towards them. Has infinite love for all other beings, so much so that it can hardly contain its overlapping emotions.
• If it encounters any beings in conflict for any reason it lashes out as a punishment, hoping it will stop the conflict.
• If it in inadvertently kills another being it does everything in its power to isolate itself permanently.

Rust Monster

• Mostly harmless critter
• Eats metal
• Dumb scavenger

Becomes

• Physically dangerous
• Produces metal
• Ultra smart predator

Steel Demon (Inverse Rust Monster)
DEX 18, 9hp. Two d6 Claws.

• Senses any movement of metal objects within a mile.
• Spits out a hail of metal discs (d6 blast) or a single spike (d10, target pinned in place on Critical Damage). 
• Harasses prey with hit and run tactics from vantage points.

Gelatinous Cube

• Absorbs and dissolves anything
• Weird geometric shape
• Amorphous

Becomes

• Can create anything
• Pleasing natural shape
• Rock solid form

Calciferous Mound (Inverse Gelatinous Cube)
STR 15, Armour 3, Immobile. 

• Hums a hauntingly beautiful song to attract visitors. 
• Can create any stony handheld-sized object from its shadowy innards, but only if it is fed something it wants.
• It longs for knowledge, the more secretive the better.

Purple Worm

• Huge creature
• Burrows around
• Poison sting

Becomes

• Small creature
• Flies
• Healing Touch

Viridian Moth (Inverse Purple Worm)
STR 1, 4hp.

• Begins as a bright green, stinking grub with acidic spit that will eat away at practically anything. This lasts for three days and it is insatiable. 
• When it enters its cocoon form it emits an unpleasant, ultra high-pitched whistle every few minutes. This lasts for one day. 
• When it emerges as a beautiful green moth it can shed spores that heal any ailments and can even regrow limbs with enough exposure. It remembers everything about how it was treated in its earlier phases, and only helps those that have previously helped it. 

Bulette

• A shark, but in land 
• Armoured shell
• Eats people

Becomes

• A bull, but in water
• Soft body
• Delicious to eat

Sharling (Inverse Bulette)
STR 16, 5hp, Big Soft Body (Armour 1), d10 Gore. 

• Patrols its territorial waters and rushes anybody that it sees as a threat. 
• If you can catch one its fatty meat is a delicacy (£2k for a full carcass).
• Anybody that eats some of its meat is Deprived each day they do not eat some more. The addiction wears off after a week of not eating any meat at all. 

Mind Flayer

• Ultra smart psychic
• Eats brains
• Physically weak

Becomes

• Stupid and devoid of empathy
• Absorbs muscle
• Physically strong

Force Leech (Inverse Mind Flayer)

5hp. d8 Sledgehammer.

• Wants to assert physical strength over others and has no concept of empathy
• When it causes STR damage it gains that many "Muscle Points" (MP)
• Can spend MP in place of HP or to add to Damage rolls, to the maximum of their die type

Wrecked on the Goragath

Hot on the slithering tail of the worm queen, here's a brand new Electric Bastionland adventure for you to try out. This time you're cast against the hull of an unearthly vessel that's anchored in Bastion's waters. Inside you'll find an inept mechanical brain losing their grip on the environment they were built to control, rebellious semi-organic workers, and strange interlopers personifying elements as broad as "Rigging", "Salt" or "Krill". 

This is is more of a straight up dungeon that exists in isolation from the rest of the world, and as ever is presented in broad strokes. It's designed to be something you can mostly pick up and run without prep, as long as you're comfortable filling in some of the fine detail yourself.

Oh, and because I had a two-page spread free I went ahead and included the Electric Bastionland rules right in there.

DOWNLOAD WRECKED ON THE GORAGATH

Have fun!