[Archetype] Necromancer

You straddle the barrier of the living and the dead. This is bad.

Abilities: 18 16 14 12 10 8

Skills: Arcana, History, Religion

Languages: Ethnic, Ancient

Alignment: Evil

Tell (pick 1): milky eyes, red eyes, black eyes, withered frame, pallid skin, moist skin, stench of corruption, stench of brimstone, hot to the touch, cannot touch holy symbols

Origin (pick 1): innocent dabbling, born to occultists, sacrificed as a child, spurned by hell, deal with the devil

Motive (pick 1): power over the living, to return someone from the dead as they were in life, immortality, an ordered society, to rid myself of this spirit, human welfare via the secrets of the knowing dead, to judge the world, to be revenged upon X, to fulfill a vow to a dead king

You get Skinbottle, Control, Mutter, and one more.

Skinbottle

A spirit lives inside you. It is your interface with the dead. Without it, you have no power.

The spirit begins hungry and uncontrollable. It hungers after (pick two): human flesh, suffering (its own), suffering (another's), terror, humiliation (its own), humiliation (another's), ever more of X.

While the spirit is hungry, you must seek to satisfy it. If you dally or fail, the spirit torments you per the DC 10 result of the Control power.

When you satisfy its hunger, scratch a rune of propitiation. You cannot command the spirit without such a rune. When you command the spirit, erase a rune.

Control

When you command your spirit to perform a task, check Wisdom:

DC 18: it does what you want and returns in time

DC 10: the spirit goes too far or takes too long or draws attention to you

Miss: it works against you and/or refuses to return; death of the host will force it to return unto thee

Mutter

Open your mouth to the spirit when you seek guidance from it. It speaks through you. Check Wisdom.

DC 18: it tells you what you want to know

DC 10: its knowledge is vague or confusing

Miss: it is angered at being disturbed; it speaks lies or dooms or curses

Coven

1d6 apprentices, loyal, ignorant, and fanatical, flock to you.

Call Up

Command your spirit to call up someone from the dead. You see its appearance, and you speak its words. Treat it as muttering.

Come Forth

Command your spirit to call up the dead around you. If there are dead here, up to 1d6 arise as minions of your level under your control.

Torment

Command your spirit to enter another. For PCs, they will only be tormented by the spirit if they allow themselves to be. If they do so, they gain XP = minion of their level.

Reanimator

Send your spirit into a corpse. You must touch the corpse. It reanimates under your control as it was in life. But it's gross now.

Necrolocation

Place your hand on the ground and inquire of your spirit concerning the bodies buried here. It always knows. Treat it as hitting DC 18 on Mutter.

[Archetype] The Priest

You can baptize, forgive sins, bless things, and say mass. You may be elevated to the office of bishop. If you are also a monk, you are called a hieromonk. You are to be celibate and may not marry.

Best stat: Charisma
Skills: Diplomacy, Religion
Languages: Latin, Ancestral
Motive: temporal power, gain merit before God, an easy living, reform the church, nurture the diocese

Becoming a Priest

If you are not already a priest and wish to become one, you must convince your bishop that you are worthy. Tell the DM to give you a new Skill Challenge: Deaconate. If you are successful, the bishop will ordain you as a deacon. Your only privilege is teaching. Tell the DM to create another Skill Challenge for you: Priesthood. If you are successful, your time as a deacon convinces the bishop to ordain you as a priest.

Flaw: Abuse of Power

Tell the DM that you gain Flaw: Abuse of Power.

Baptize 

When you baptize someone, gain XP = a minion of your level. Check Charisma.

DC 18: target becomes a faithful convert, calls and considers you "Father." Tell the DM to make a new entry on his Development List: Guidance: [convert's name] comes to [priest's name] asking for guidance concerning a sensitive matter.

DC 10: the target still holds on to major beliefs or practices of the old ways. Tell the DM to create a new Skill Challenge for you: Sanctification: [convert's name]'s [the convert's problem(s)].

Miss: the convert is Christian only in name. Tell the DM to create a new threat: Apostasy: [convert's name].

Note: when you baptize a child, the the provisions above apply to the child's parents or guardians.

Bless

When you bless something (a person, place, or thing) over someone's objection or at their request, check Charisma:

DC 18: it comes to good, and God is considered to be the cause of it. Tell the DM to make a new Development: Reward of Successful Blessing.

DC 10: meh.

Miss: it comes to ruin, and you (and maybe your God) are to blame.  Tell the DM to make a new Development: Blame for Failed Blessing.

Confession

When a PC comes to you for confession, follow this script, or it doesn't work. "(+)" means the person speaking must cross himself. If you do not follow the script precisely, there is no XP or forgiveness.

Penitent: 

• (+) 
• [After making the sign of the cross, the penitent shares some passage of scripture.] 
• Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It has been [time] since my last confession.

Priest: Speak, my child.

Penitent: [honestly recite the number and kind of your transgressions.]

Priest: 

• [Give counsel to the penitent, exhorting him to trust in God and pursue holiness.]
• [Assign penance. Verily, only if uncomfortable or inconvenient may it grant XP.]
• I absolve you of your sins in the name of the Father (+) and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

That done, if the penitent then performs the penance, the penitent gains XP = a minion of the priest's level.

For goodness' sake, only one confession per extended rest.

Note that the priest himself receives no XP for this, only the penitent. You may want to leverage your power to forgive sins.

Guidance

When a PC comes to you for sincere guidance and you give it, they gain a +2 token usable post hoc on any check only if they follow through on your guidance.

When an NPC does the same, treat it the same as giving them a blessing (see above).

Mass

When you conduct mass, you literally turn bread into divine flesh and wine into divine blood. Anyone who goes into battle on the same day he has partaken in a mass you have said (including you) checks Wisdom vs DC 10. On a hit, all his damage types are also radiant.

Bishopric

If you wish to become a bishop, you must convince your own bishop that you're worthy. Tell your DM to create a new Skill Challenge for you: Bishop [priest's name]. If you are successful, the bishop sends for Rome to recommend you, and you will be ordained when word comes back, with all the privileges and responsibilities that entails.

[Archetype] The Sage

Let's face it: you're probably the only one in this town who can read.

Best Stat: Intelligence

Name: Josephus, Simon, Sophia, Lucas, Thomas, Philo, Tacitus, Junia

Motive: complete an account, assuage doubts, find something lost to history, defend a system of thought, prove something they say you're crazy for believing, solve a mystery, resolve a contradiction

Languages: Latin, your ancestral tongue, and three more (select all three categories once or multiple languages in same category): dead language, foreign language, secret language.

You have a library. At first, it's only three books. Write down what they are and what they're about. "I don't know what what they are or what they're about" is fine.

When you consult your library on a subject, add +1 to your Int check for each relevant book in your library:

• Crit: you find just what you need
• Hit: you find part of what you need, but it's (GM's choice):

1. vague
2. partial
3. riddled with lacunae
4. apparently contradictory
5. obviously a later addition
6. overwritten by other text (will take time and/or special instruments to make out original text)

• Miss: you'll need another work to get anything good, and you've got an idea where you might find one

When you relax undisturbed (as part of an extended rest—no research!) "in your library," you gain temp HP for your next combat encounter equal to your Int Mod plus level.

When someone comes to you for a serious answer about what they consider to be a matter of grave concern, you get XP = a minion of your level if you blow them off or tell them some convincing nonsense, which they will, of course, believe. They'll be ticked off at you—now or later.

When you encounter a text in a language you don't know, check Int:

• Crit: with enough time, you can make out the meaning, and, with another such text, to learn the language passably enough.
• Hit: you can make out words here and there. With another text to work off of, you should be able to make out the meaning.
• Miss: gibberish! You need a comparative text to even make out a decent passage.

When you're searching somewhere in particular for a certain piece of knowledge, say why you think it would be here and check Int:

• Crit: you find it.
• Hit: you find a marker, clue, or piece of the puzzle.
• Miss: DM decides if you find something troubling or a dead end.

When you study something intensively, check Int:

• Crit: it's clear and complete and what you what you want to hear
• Hit: GM decides if the info is confusing and symbolic or if it is clear but partial
• Miss: GM decides if info is clear but troubling or just, after all that study, a waste of time

[Archetype] The Healer

Note: This is my first stab at homebrewing a class. Actually, this is a reconstruction of what a class in 4e means. It separates the combat role from the fluff and other elements of character. The "class" then is separate from the combat role. (See my first role post, Brutal.) The role is the fighty fight stuff. You mash together the two and get, say, a Brutal Healer. Also, note that there are no encounter or daily powers here. Everything's fictionally triggered. There aren't dissociated mechanics either.

You're The Healer. When you come into a town, it's only a matter of time: the people will swarm you: my son is mute; my brother is a leper; my sister won't stop bleeding. They always hear about you eventually, and then they're banging on the door at all hours, dragging invalids into your path—they know you can heal them, but it's rarely so simple.

Best stat: Wisdom

Skills: Diplomacy, Healing, Insight
Languages: Latin, Ancestral


Choose a motive: atoning for past sins, desperate to gain merit before God, fulfilling a vow, pursuing a vision.

Create or choose a name: Raphael, Anastasi(a/us), Asclepi(a/us), Medic(a/us), Salv(a/us), Cura, Curatio, San(a/us)

When you lay hands upon someone and pray earnestly for their healing, roll.

• Critical: immediate healing; all who see it fear.
• Hit: the DM chooses either (a) immediate healing leading to envy and hatred (b) a test of faith: there will be immediate healing if something bizarre, uncomfortable, or inconvenient is done—the DM will tell you who must do it and what must be done. 
• Miss: sin is preventing the healing. The DM will tell you whose sin it is, and he knows what it is, but he won't tell you that. When the sin is dealt with, pray again, and the healing will be immediate. 

As long as you touch someone, he will not taste death. 

As long as you touch a corpse, it will not see decay.