Musical Magical (OSR Secret Jackalope 2020)

Spell rituals

An ancient spellbook has been uncovered, containing these secret rites. 

The Forest Witch by Stu Harrington

You Spin Me Round

Cover a spinning top with the ashes from a burned wheel, write the words PRITTU VANAM on your palm, and then spin the top upon it. So long as you keep it spun, all who can clearly see its spin are forced to pirouette.

Take Me to Church

Select a shrine or temple and take the branch from a tree near it (if there are none anywhere nearby, a handful of grass may still work). Then, obtain an eyelash from a true believer. When you need to return there, hold the branch aloft and entreat the god to return you to safety. The branch will burn in holy light, and you will be brought there in only a minute by a similar divine glow.

Kill V Maim

Weave grass from your hometown into a small pad, and mix together dirt from a robbed grave, spittle from a panicking goat, and the crushed body of an insect that has killed a human into ink. With this ink, write out your name and the letters E V N X T I N on the pad, and place it under your clothes. For the next week, if you are wounded by blows while bearing this pad, your foe will be struck down on the spot.

Megitsune

Craft a fine mask of clay or another brittle material (clay is simply the most easily reached choice I know of). The mask should depict your own face in a visage of deepest sorrow, and be inscribed along the rim with IV NATAS MIM RETO KALIN. Shattering this mask against your face summons the pure maiden Megitsune, a fox spirit in the form of a young girl who is kind and knows the deepest regret of everyone whose eyes she meets. She will use this knowledge to achieve her (and your) ends, but is not all knowing.

Crying Spirit by Leon Ropeter

Absolute Territory

This spell can be cast with a skirt or cloak. Create a patch woven with an eyelash that has not been wished upon, and dyed with wine that has been shared. Sew the patch to the inside of the garment while describing the most beautiful sights you have seen. When you flip up the inside to reveal the patch, it will start to shine brightly and everyone within five meters as well as anyone who approaches to that close will be enthralled for up to a minute by what they see.

Wonderland

Mix together rust shavings, a stranger's blood, the wings of a butterfly, and spoiled milk in a pot of oil. Say the magic words YARUNE TOLSS REWEK and anoint it upon yourself or another. Until the sun sets, this oil will permeate the outer clothing and badly sting the skin of any fairie who touches it. There are other recipes to ward against other spirits and supernatural monsters, but all I know of them is that the incantation is the same.

Untouched

Take the bone which has never touched human skin from a large beast (a dog or larger). The spell may only work if thick gloves are worn by the caster when handling this bone. The bone must be painted or dyed black and you must incant NATARES. As soon as this is said, the bone will appear to all as whatever object they most desire at that moment, until it melts away into ink at sunset. Some may react unusually to this sight.

Magic wand of peace by Victor Duarte

I Can't Fix You

Forge a bell from bronze that was once a sword. I believe the sword must have seen battle, but cannot be sure. Carve the words NORU SIVIM somewhere on it. If it is rung over a wounded foe while they sleep, the magic words will burn a hole in the bell and the wounds they bear will become cursed to never heal by any natural or medicinal means.

Wandering

Make a candle using the fat of a lost sheep for the tallow and cotton from a field you have never seen before as the wick. Burn it while chanting the words TUMUN SHAMA VIDEH until you have a handful of molten wax. Throw this wax upon someone and they will seem to disappear, while they are forced to wander through the halls of an empty palace full of stairs and balconies, trapped until they say the words "I'm free!"

Summoning by Olivier Hennart

Mr. Blue Sky

Make a circle with a three-pointed star holding at each point amethyst, quartz, and hematite respectively. Meditating in the center of this circle for an hour under uninterrupted sunlight shall summon Mr. Blue, a small fae man with skin fittingly the color of a clear summer sky, who will stay to aid you until the sun reaches the same spot in the sky the next day. His gaze can quell unbound power; raging fire, torrential flow, or frenzying elementals for example.

Created as part of the OSR Discord server Secret Jackalope 2020! The prompt for an ancient spellbook full of spells named after songs comes courtesy of Stefan "The Moth," who blogs at Verbum Ex Nihilo. This prompt caught me somewhat off guard, but I took it as an opportunity to start writing spell rituals which will be a component of my next RPG project. Ultimately, it all kind of worked out just right.

On the nature of things: what they are and why

Stone is the basic form of existence. It is hardy, colorless, and heavy, generally unmoving when left to its own devices. Color is what turns stone into other things, granting it growth, motion, reaction and other things, often at the cost of its immutability. The four colors infused purely into stone cause it to become either natural fire (orange), ice which melts into water (green), lightning (indigo), or oil (yellow). The art of sorcery is generally the manipulation of these colors, not necessarily the elements themselves, and often the more purely distilled the color is the harder it becomes to truly control. Lightning is an exception here, as its indigo power is rarely ever diluted and so there is much knowledge on manipulating it in that purest form.

Material studies by Torsten Gunst

Dread illusionists, the arcane deceivers, manipulate the image without touching the material at its core, controlling the color without the 'stone' as it were. This power is profane and can only lead to ruin.

Where color determines the properties of a substance, spirit is the form of it. Most materials have no spirit, and can thus be reshaped freely without losing their properties (it has been discovered that almost everything does in fact have a spirit, though it is usually quite rudimentary. The spirit of crystal, for instance, may be that it persists only in hexagonal patterns, an extremely simple spiritual form). Plants have slightly more defined spirits, and animals even moreso. Most animal species share a spirit with their kin, including humans, though the soul has a strong tendency to impact the spiritual form.

A soul is simply a more advanced, particular extension of the spirit, which is so developed only in humans and other thinking beings. Because of the unique and advanced ways it can develope, generally no two souls are alike, and this can have an impact upon the prospective spirits, often turning a human spirit into that person's spirit, a subtle but important distinction for those who practice shifting arts. It may be noted that animals cannot be cursed, and this is a simple product of their having no soul; a curse is a wound upon the soul, as much as any cut or bruise upon the flesh. Minor curses can be healed with mild bed rest, as they are shallow cuts and scrapes on the soul. Deeper, more powerful curses require careful, lengthy processes of healing. The holy powers of saints utilize this process, pulling spiritual energy into their soul and tearing away bits of it in order to grant that energy to their allies, and more experienced saints can even learn to utilize these rends in their soul offensively, attacking the souls or even the flesh of enemies.

The summoning sisters by Antoine Collignon

Much study has been done with regards to silver and the functions of undeath. It is clear that the undead are similar to the living afflicted with a curse, as can be seen with vampires, who were long considered undead despite often suffering no death between humanity and monstrousness. It is now consensus that undead are given malformed souls that eat away their spirit, granting something that is almost life but often far more finite. On the other hand, many cases of immortality are reached through undeath, perhaps with souls that are reinforced using parts of the spirit, malforming the body but keeping the mind alive indefinitely? Regardless this is perverse and unnatural, and no further writing should be done upon the subject.

Similar to undead, artificial souls are created when a golem is animated. Imprinting the holy word upon a tool forms a unique embossing of the creator's soul upon the spirit of the tool, which must have originally been crafted with intent. Naturally occurring objects can be used as tools physically, but they have no spirit for it and reject the artificial soul. Because of this, some claim that golemology is a darker, more unnatural art than necromancy, and will one day destroy us all! This is preposterous, golems are quite useful and docile, and have never destroyed anyone when used properly. It is possible that a fusion of necromantic and golemary arts could yield a living golem, capable of creating more of its kind... but this strays too far from the known and established.

Household Golems by Ben Wanat

Of course these findings are irrefutably true and thoroughly proven through rigorous testing. Any wishing to dispute or disprove this work may find their way best to a tavern, where they shall engage in discourse with any drink of their choosing.

Magic user classes

Magic users may select an object in their possession as a magic focus. With a focus in contact, all magical techniques take one round to perform unless otherwise noted. If the focus is lost or destroyed, a new one can be assigned through a week long, arduous but not challenging process. Without a focus, magical techniques can be performed outside of combat with a ritual that takes one minute to complete.

Druid

Grow useful plants whenever needed, eschewing metal items.

• Stat bonus: +1 ration per inventory slot per level
• Starting items: cudgel, druidic passphrase, pouch of common seeds from your homeland
• Skill: cook, survivalist, or builder

Level 1: bramble, naturalist

Level 2: vine, botanium

Level 3: heartfruit

Level 4: arbory, wither

• Bramble: throw down a handful of bush seeds and cause them to grow immediately. They require a decent amount of dirt and form a sturdy but not fully rigid barrier. Fruit bushes can provide 1 ration, but plants created with these magics produce no seeds.
• Naturalist: none of these powers can be used while you knowingly touch metal, or until the next new moon after. You and your companions (not including vehicles) are impossible to track through natural terrain by any normal means.
• Vine: cast vine seeds which grow up to ten meters instantly, across any solid surface. Can be used to climb walls, destroy weak structures, or immobilize an enemy until they succeed a strength test or are freed.
• Botanium: one per day, you can put any magical plant under your control with a touch. This lasts one hour, and they can remember what happened but may be understanding.
• Heartfruit: call upon the providence of nature to grow a plant which can bear healing fruit. It grows after a month of care, from then on producing a new fruit one week after harvesting. The fruit has dark red juices and tastes salty, fully restoring vigor or healing one wound.
• Arbory: once per day plant a tree seed, causing it to grow swiftly and irresistibly up to twenty meters. Requires plenty of soil, and fruit trees can provide 1d6 rations.
• Wither: once per day, you can cause any normal plant to wither up and die with a touch. Deals a wound to plant creatures.

Witch

Gain the forms of animals and their natural talents, forgoing metal items.

• Stat bonus: +1 stealth in wilderness per level
• Starting items: broomstick, journal, stone axe
• Skill: butcher, cook, or politician

Level 1: wild shape, blessing

Level 2: mode of the swift, natural aspect

Level 3: cast of sky

Level 4: dominant will, beastly form

• Wild shape: become an animal at will, gaining its physical attributes but becoming unable to use normal items, techniques, or magic. You can take the form of any animal you have been turned into by magic, as well as an antelope or wolf. If you knowingly touch metal, these abilities are lost until the next full moon.
• Blessing: perform a ritual to gain the forms of wild animals by putting your hand over their eyes for ten seconds. Only works on nonmagical animals, no larger than twice your size or smaller than half, and grants you their form whether by friendship or force.
• Mode of the swift: gain the forms of a fox and cobra.
• Natural aspect: partially transform, gaining one conspicuous attribute from the animal form while still being able to use your normal equipment and abilities.
• Cast of sky: gain the form of an owl or similar sized bird (at GM discretion).
• Dominant will: with a touch, impell your will upon a nonmagical beast once per day, forcing it to obey a single word command along with pointing. Cannot be used on a beast again if your command caused harm.
• Beastly form: gain the forms of a shark and tiger.

Summoner

Call upon alien entities and unleash them.

• Stat bonus: +1 skill slot every two levels
• Starting items: whip, ritual mask, chalk
• Skill: navigator, linguist, or tailor

Level 1: summon entity

Level 2: alien contact

Level 3: alien mind, twin passages

Level 4: stable conduit

• Summon entity: once per day you can conjure an alien presence into your realm, to act for six rounds plus your will bonus (or sixty seconds +10 per will bonus). Every level, the summoner can call upon an entity one additional time per day and gain access to a new entity, generated by the GM or rolled from a list the GM has prepared. If you find a summon scroll, you can discern the nature of the entities, and permanently learn to summon one.
• Alien contact: once per summon, you may roll a magic check to give your entity a one-word command that it must obey, along with necessary gestures. For example, you command it to 'kill' and point at a creature.
• Alien mind: once per day, make a magic check to give your entity a single complex order that it must try its best to carry out. For example: you command it to lift a portcullis and prevent non-allies from passing by.
• Twin passages: up to two entities can be summoned simultaneously.
• Stable conduit: once per day, summon an entity for one hour plus one minute per will bonus.

Illusionist

Conjure illusions which can be manipulated in many ways.

• Stat bonus: +1 speed per level to maintain distance
• Starting items: fine clothes, copper mirror, whip
• Skill: writer, engineer, or painter

Level 1: minor illusion, duplicate

Level 2: shroud, quasitangible

Level 3: lifesize

Level 4: dualize, unreality

• Minor illusion: create an illusion of a common handheld object that you are familiar with. When someone first sees an illusion and each time they see it do the impossible, they make a will save to see through it. By focusing, you can see through illusions you know of as if they were transparent. You can maintain one illusion at a time, and it disappears if your concentration breaks.
• Duplicate: make an illusory copy of a particular object you have with you, or have had time to examine outside of combat.
• Shroud: by touching a target, you may cover it with an illusion of similar size. For example, you could disguise a sword as a broom, or make a bag of gold appear as an apple.
• Quasitangible: your illusions are solid and tangible to anyone who does not know their true nature. You always know that your illusions are false.
• Lifesize: create illusions up to the size of a person.
• Dualize: you can maintain two illusions at once, but only so long as you do nothing else.
• Unreality: if you can imagine it, you can create it, up to the size of a house. Your illusions can break the laws of physics without allowing a new save from viewers, unless it fails to affect the environment in ways it should. For example, if you make a figure of lightning walk through dry grass without burning it, a new save would be allowed.

Necromancer

Resurrect and control undead as minions or tools.

• Stat bonus: -1 vigor, +1 magic per level
• Starting items: shovel, dagger, coffin
• Skill: apothecary, surgeon, or historian

Level 1: corpus

Level 2: spiritus, vitae

Level 3: quietus

Level 4: animus

• Corpus: resurrect a dead person as a wight, so long as they have been dead for less than one week. It will retain any class techniques and physical abilities from life, not including magic. If you raise a wight while you still have one, the old one will crumble into dust.
• Spiritus: give life to the bones of a person who has been dead for less than a week, raising them as a skeleton with normal skeleton attributes, totally loyal to you. Command up to one skeleton at level 2, three at level 3, and five at level 4 without them going wild and attacking everything.
• Vitae: touch an undead creature and drain vital essence from it, lowering its vigor and raising yours by 2d6. If you roll higher than its current total, you completely absorb it.
• Quietus: touch any dead flesh and preserve it from all natural forms of decay. This does not require a thinking being or even a complete body, but only one continuous piece of animal flesh can be preserved at a time. This cannot be used again on the same flesh.
• Animus: within any container crafted of bone, you can hold a dead person's soul. Only thinking creatures have a soul, and it must be captured within one hour of death. The soul contains all their memories, personality, and magical aptitude, but can do nothing aside from speaking when captured. You can place a soul within your wight, which will grant it all of the soul's traits and no longer count as your captured soul, but will also make it no longer obedient, and the soul cannot be re-captured when the wight dies.

Sorcerer

Redirect elemental forces.

• Stat bonus: +1 speed per level when retreating
• Starting items: arming sword, robes, alchemical battery (one charge)
• Skill: alchemist, brawler, or politician

Level 1: channel, elemental channels

Level 2: warp, infuse

Level 3: twin channel

Level 4: redirect, transmogrify

• Channel: when in contact with a visible amount of water, oil, fire, or lightning, you can channel it into a 10 meter line. While channeling, you take no damage from ice, fire, or lightning for the round.
• Elemental channels: each day, you have a number of channels equal to your sorcerer level. Channeling water or oil deals 1d6 damage and soaks everything along the line. Channeling ice, fire, or lightning deals 2d6 damage, fire can ignite the target, and lightning can paralyze them.
• Warp: alter your elemental blasts to take different shapes. New forms can be created at GM discretion, and any number can be combined, but each additional warp consumes one additional channel.*
• Infuse: absorb up to a person-sized amount of any element into your body, to be channeled at a later time. Requires at least a cup of water or oil, a torch worth of flame, or any electrical charge greater than a static shock. Only one infusion can be held at a time.
• Twin channel: when touching enough of more than one element, both can be channeled at once and aimed at separate targets, consuming three channels.
• Redirect: if struck by elemental attacks, you can negate one and channel it in the next round without spending any channels, but losing your infusion if you have one. If a sorcerer targets you and also has this ability, the one who rolls higher damage or spends the most channels wins.
• Transmogrify: when touching two elements at once, you can expend two channels to convert them both into any other element and channel that. Infusions can be expended for this, but not gained.

*some possible warps: a bend in the line, allowing it to hit around corners. A single-target projectile that can hit up to 30 meters, but only one target. A wide burst that hits everyone in melee.

These are the core magic classes for my game. It's possible more will be added, but they'll more likely be put in my 'advanced magic' folder which may or may not ever see use.
Some magic plants to start you out: http://wordsforyellow.blogspot.com/2019/09/magic-plants.html
General animal stats: http://wordsforyellow.blogspot.com/2019/09/stats-for-some-common-animals.html
Summon entities: http://wordsforyellow.blogspot.com/2018/09/aberrant-summon-generator.html
Undead attributes and worldbuilding: http://wordsforyellow.blogspot.com/2019/09/undead-stats-and-attributes.html
Elemental generator: http://wordsforyellow.blogspot.com/2019/04/elementals-generator.html

Dark Magic

Dark magic is a destructive force that draws power from the oldest and greatest of emotions; fear. A dark mage cats their spells from a mirror, which holds the fear and turns it into dark power. The simplest spell is to release all the power within the mirror at once, in a burst of destruction. It is similar to an explosion, but for the lack of concussive force or fire; the black burst simply obliterates anything it touches. With practice, the mage usually learns precision and control, enabling them to mete out energy and utilize it more efficiently, perhaps focusing the release into a narrow beam with longer range or multiple projectiles.

To gather their power, a mage must gaze into their mirror and focus on what frightens them. This perverse form of meditation will never seek to overcome or learn to live with these fears, for if they do so then power will be lost. Instead, mages simply fixate upon their fears and paranoia, warping their minds and twisting their souls over time.

There is no upper limit to how much fear a mirror can hold, but the more it is given, the harder it will be to control. Like filling a wineskin, it can stretch but will start to leak, and when you pierce it the contents may come gushing out when a more controlled stream might have been preferred. Mirrors will also leak when left idle for too long with power inside, becoming tarnished and shadowed. It is for this reason that most dedicated mages will keep a polishing kit along with them, as it takes much more focus to use every iota of darkness each day than it does to simply clean the mirror regularly. Some say that when a mirror is completely consumed by this darkness, it changes into a new metal, a black silver that has special properties. There isn't much evidence behind this however, and the mages themselves are unwilling to confirm or deny these rumors.

Most dark mages either come from or were trained at the white palace. Built of polished sandstone, it lies near the edge of the northern desert. The entire building is white, so that no dark magic can be hidden there; despite their many powers, no dark mage can create light. They are paranoid, distrustful, and violent people overall, and there are plenty of stories involving an unlucky traveler or villager being slaughtered for any small slight or even nothing at all.

The order of Light’s Shadow comprises the largest organized group of mages, though organized seems a stretch. They control the white palace, using it as a meeting center as well as a place for training new mage apprentices. They currently work with the kingdom of Orisria, centered in the jungles to the south of the desert. This is how they have access to the fine silver used to make their arcane tools, though the specific power structure of the order is quite hard to pin down due to frequent backstabbing and mysterious deaths.

Seppam the gnoll is a dark mage from the deeper deserts, near the famous volcano of the sands, who uses a mirror of obsidian. Some say her mirror can hold more power than others and never tarnish, but she is not part of the order, and refuses to share her secrets.

Sir Markim is a knight errant who is rumored to be a dark mage, though he does not carry any mirror openly, or keep a polishing kit. He’s even known for using a spell that creates a sword of darkness, but mages look down on personal combat as brutish and needlessly hazardous, while most warriors see mages as weak and paranoid, so it’s unlikely that someone would put the two together.