Fantasy[Genres]
FantasyA mage flinging lightning and death spells faces off against an ancient dragon whose fiery breath has seared whole armies. A knight bedecked in bright armor rides forth with the sunrise and the kingdom's acclaim, sworn to a worthy quest that might last years. A party of travelers, swords sheathed and bows unstrung, enters a firelit inn just before the evening rain hits, drawn by the smell of roast beast and delicate notes from a song performed by an elven bard. A band of explorers descends into a sprawling, buried ruin left behind by vanished forerunners, eager to find treasure and magic.
The fantasy genre is an exploration of worlds where magic exists side by side with untamed forests and expansive mountain ranges that are home to elves, dwarves, and other mythical creatures. The mostly preindustrial societies dotted across the landscape often feature newer, human societies, while much older humanoid species (and monsters of every sort) are everywhere else, save those that are long vanished, leaving behind their mysterious ruins to lure the curious.
Which means you can expect your character to embark on quests, confront supernatural threats, and grapple with themes of destiny, power, and good versus evil. And you'll do so wielding magic, enchanted tools and weapons, and extraordinary special abilities of your own.
Many fantasy subgenres exist, including fusions with other genres. There are numerous subgenres: dungeon fantasy, fairy tales, mythological, swords & sorcery, and epic fantasy.
A major distinguishing factor between these subgenres is the character types available for each. For instance, in a dungeon fantasy, you might play as a Paladin, Mage, Bard, or several others. In a swords & sorcery game, your options include Witch, Axe Fighter, Knife Fighter, and similar kinds of warriors. In an epic fantasy game, you might play a Noble Warrior, Burglar, Wizard, Swashbuckler, and similar.
These skills are appropriate for dungeon fantasy, swords & sorcery, and epic fantasy games. When you have the option to choose skills, choose from the following.
| Animal care | Athletics | Attacking † | Crafting |
| Deception | Defending † | Disarming traps | Disguise |
| Escaping | Farming | Gathering information | Gymnastics |
| Healing | History | Initiative | Intimidation |
| Lockpicking | Magic lore | Mining | Navigation |
| Outdoor survival | Perception | Performance | Persuasion |
| Pickpocketing | Psychic lore | Recognizing motive | Religious lore |
| Riding | Scribing | Stealth | Tracking |
| Woodcutting |
† Some of these skills are tier restricted, meaning there’s a minimum tier requirement before you can become trained or specialized in them.
At tier 3, your fantasy character gains a mid-tier genre ability from those described below, and at tier 6 you gain a high-tier genre ability. In addition, at tier 6, you can replace one of your mid-tier genre abilities with a different mid-tier ability.
However, the following stipulations apply:
Each day you can pick a different magical effect and cast it as a spell. Choose a low-power or medium-power manifest cypher. You can cast that spell as an action, costing 3 Intellect for a low-power cypher or 5 Intellect for a medium-power cypher. This spell does not count oward your cypher limit. Unlike when using a cypher, you do not lose this spell after casting it.
As part of making a ten-hour recovery, you can change which cypher you've taken as a spell.
At tier 6, you can use this ability to choose a low-, mid-, or advanced-power cypher as a spell. You can cast an advanced-power cypher spell as an action, costing 7 Intellect.
10 minutes to prepare a cypher as a spell; Action to cast a cypher as a spell.
You can bear one additional cypher at a time. You can gain this ability multiple times.
Each time you do, you can bear one additional cypher at a time.
If you are attacked by surprise, whether by a creature, a device, or simply an environmental hazard (such as a tree falling on you), you move an immediate distance before the attack occurs. If moving prevents the attack, you are safe. If the attack can still potentially affect you—if the attacking creature can move to keep pace, if the attack fills an area too big to escape, and so on— your defense against it is eased.
Even if in full view of up to three creatures, your successful stealth task allows you to slip away from them and hide from view in a nearby shadow, behind a tree or furnishing, or in the next room as your action.
Effort: Attempt to slip away from one additional target looking directly at you (attempt a separate stealth task against each).
Your mind resists injury from one mental attack, psychic trauma, or similar effect, reducing its wound severity by one step (major to moderate, moderate to minor, minor to none).
You and every creature you designate within immediate range gains protection against one kind of energy damage (such as fire, electricity, or cold). The creatures reduce the severity of wounds from that energy by one step (major to moderate, moderate to minor, minor to none). This protection lasts for a creature until they use a one-hour or longer recovery; one individual ending the cypher doesn't affect the duration for other creatures.
An NPC’s elemental protection lasts until you use a one-hour or longer recovery.
Effort: Reduce the wound severity by another step.
You gain 4 points to one Pool of your choice.
You gain a level 3 follower.
Your successful attack against a creature that was previously unaware of your presence deals +3 damage.
Your melee attacks inflict +2 damage. This ability lasts until you use a ten-minute or longer recovery.
With a successful Intellect attack, you tear apart the defenses of a creature within long range. Any magic-based defenses they have (such as a warding spell) are negated. If the creature has no magical defenses, its Armor is reduced by 2. If it has no magic-based defenses or Armor, its defense tasks are hindered. This lasts until you use a ten-minute or longer recovery.
Your attacks ignore 2 points of your opponent's Armor.
If you spend one action aiming, in the next round you can make a precise ranged attack; you have an asset on the attack roll and it inflicts +4 damage.
Action attack; you have an asset on the attack roll and it inflicts +4 damage.
Having an action plan in place before facing a challenge improves the odds of success, even if that plan is eventually changed or discarded once it's put into play. If you and your allies spend at least ten minutes going over a plan of action and you try to enact the plan before you use a ten-hour recovery, your GM provides a useful piece of information about the situation, either immediately if you've missed something or as it comes up sometime during the execution of the plan.
The plan of action must be something concrete and executable in order to gain this benefit.
Ten minutes to activate.
You can take one more minor wound than normal.
When you roll to persuade or influence someone and your roll is less than a 9, treat the roll as a 9. (This means you don't get a GM Intrusion if you roll a 1.) Your increased influence persists until your next ten-minute or longer recovery.
Effort: Increase the minimum number rolled for this ability by 3.
At tier 3, the minimum number rolled for this ability increases to 12.
If you successfully attack a creature that was previously unaware of your presence, you deal +6 damage. (If you also have From the Shadows, add the extra damage from both abilities).
You cause a pulse of force to explode out from a point you choose within long range. The pulse extends up to short range in all directions, dealing 5 damage to everything in the area (make separate attack rolls against each). Even if you fail the attack roll against a creature in the area, it still takes 1 damage.
If one ally can see and easily understand you, you can instruct that ally to take an action. If the ally chooses to take that exact action, they can do so as an additional action immediately. Doing so doesn't interfere with the ally taking a normal action on their turn.
You become invisible. This effect ends if you do something to reveal your presence or position—attacking, using an ability, moving a large object, and so on—or you use a ten-minute or longer recovery. An invisible character's attack is eased by two steps. Attacks on an invisible character are hindered by four steps or are nearly impossible if the attacker has no idea where they might be.
An NPC's invisibility lasts until you use a ten-minute or longer recovery.
Effort: Use this ability on a creature you touch invisible instead of yourself, lasting until they use a ten-minute or longer recovery.
You jump up to 4 feet (1 m) into the air and make a melee attack against a foe on the way up or down. If you hit, you inflict damage and can attempt a difficulty 4 Might roll to inflict an additional 4 damage and knock them prone.
Effort: Add 2 feet to the jump height and +2 damage to the attack (whether or not you knock the target prone).
You create a tunnel through space that allows transportation to a location within long range. You must be able to see this location or know that it exists (such as beyond a closed door or an open space underground beneath you). This hole in reality is large enough to accommodate you and creatures of your size or smaller. Anything moving into the hole immediately emerges from the other side. The hole remains open until you use a ten-minute or longer recovery.
Durations that persist until you take a recovery end immediately, not when the benefits of the recovery are gained after ten minutes, an hour, and so on.
You can always end one of your abilities with an ongoing effect as an extra action on your turn, at no cost.
You transform your body to become someone else. You can change any physical characteristic you wish, including coloration, height, weight, gender, and distinguishing markings. You can also change the appearance of whatever you are wearing or carrying. Your stats, as well as the stats of your items, do not change. You remain in this form for up to a day or until you use an action to resume your normal appearance.
If using this ability as a disguise that comes under direct scrutiny or challenge, your disguise task is eased by three steps.
You can take one more moderate wound than normal.
You immediately end one ongoing magical effect (such as an effect created by a character ability, cypher, or magical device) within immediate range if you succeed on an Intellect attack against it. If you target a cypher or magical device and succeed on your Intellect attack, it doesn't function until you use a ten-minute or longer recovery.
Effort: Use this ability as an enabler, allowing you to use it in response to an attack when it isn't your turn.
Action (enabler if used defensively).
You stand in one place and attack up to five foes, each as an extra action on your turn. All of the attacks have to be the same sort of attack (melee or ranged attacks). Make a separate attack roll for each foe.
You harden your allies' dedication and capabilities with an inspiring speech that lasts at least a minute. All allies within immediate range (including yourself) Add +1 Edge to one stat (chosen by each individual). This lasts until they use a one-hour or longer recovery; one individual ending the ability doesn't affect the duration for other allies.
sOne minute to complete.
In some fantasy games, one might encounter elves, orcs, and similar species. Maybe a player character could even be a member of such a species. The GM may decide to handle them with narrative description (and maybe advice on how to adapt the type and focus you already have) rather than introduce additional mechanics. For example, if you're a dwarf, that might not change your stats or skills—though it may have interesting roleplaying challenges and benefits.
However, the GM might decide to offer species choices that do grant mechanical benefits. In this case, choosing Dwarf as your species would change your stats. If the GM decides that species with mechanical benefits are appropriate for their game, they may give you the choice to gain one described in this chapter and/or a species they've created to suit their setting.
Species offer a one-time package of characteristics for your character, much like a descriptor. If the GM uses species, they become the fourth element in the sentence “I am an adjective species noun who verbs.” For instance, your sentence might be “I am a Jovial Dwarf Barbarian who Never Says Die” or “I am a Charming Human Cleric who Blazes With Fire.”
Generally speaking, player characters—regardless of their species—can’t see in complete darkness. The GM will let you know if they’re handling things differently for their game.
| Dragonfolk |
| Dwarf |
| Elf |
| Gnome |
| Halfling |
| Hellborn |
| Human |
| Orc |
Scaled and descended from dragons, you share a kinship with some of the mightiest creatures that ever winged their way across the world. You might have been born of dragonfolk parents, willingly transformed in a magical ceremony, or chosen by a dragon to be their agent or champion—or you might have no idea why you are the way you are. Some claim you have a great destiny, but whether you believe that is up to you.
You gain the following characteristics:
Work with your GM if you want your dragonfolk character to have a breath weapon. You can easily adapt one of your type or focus abilities, such as Blast, Shroud of Flame, Lightning Hand, or something similar, so the effect is produced from your breath instead of as presented in the ability description.
You're a stocky, broad-shouldered, bearded native of the mountains and hills. You're also as stubborn as the stone in which the dwarves carve their homes under the mountains. Tradition, honor, pride in smithcraft and warcraft, and a keen appreciation of the wealth buried under the roots of the world are all part of your heritage. Those who wish you ill should be wary of your temper. When dwarves are wronged, they never forget.
You gain the following characteristics:
You haunt the woodlands and deep, natural realms, as your people have for millennia. You are the arrow in the night, the shadow in the glade, and the laughter on the wind. As an elf, you are slender, quick, graceful, and long lived. You manage the sorrows of living much longer than most others with song, wine, and an appreciation for the deep beauties of growing things, especially trees, which can live even longer than you do.
You gain the following characteristics:
Half-elves gain either the Elf species characteristics or the Human species characteristics, whichever you decide when creating your half-elf character.
You are curious and love discovering ways to turn found things into art, tools, or weapons. You might be a sculptor, smith, artist, chef, storyteller, or inventor. Alchemy, magic, and engineering fascinate you.
Other beings may see you as a strange mix of a nature-loving elf and a craft-obsessed dwarf, but you and your kind are unique people with a passion for life, exploration, and creation.
You gain the following characteristics:
Three feet (1 m) tall and proud of every inch, you are fond of the comforts of home but itching for a little adventure now and then. Small and quick, you have a way of getting along with everyone. You might have been raised in a halfling village, a mixed community where humans and the small folk work and eat side by side as friends, or a less welcoming environment where your people get things done using deception and criminal activity. You and humans have a lot in common—you're just more compact and efficient about it.
You gain the following characteristics:
Part human and part something from another dimension, you might be the orphan of a supernatural dalliance, the result of a magical ritual gone wrong, a scion of a long-established bloodline, or just someone who spiritually “ingested” the demon that tried to possess you. Some of your kind have horns, tails, and pointed teeth. Others are more subtle or more obvious in their differences—a shadow of a knife edge in their face and a touch that withers normal plants, a little too much fire in their eyes and a scent of ash in the air, a forked tongue, goatlike legs, or the inability to cast a shadow. Work with the GM on your particular hellborn appearance.
You gain the following characteristics:
Work with your GM if you want your hellborn character to have an inherently magical ability related to your alternate-dimensional heritage. You can easily adapt one of your type or focus abilities, such as Seeds of Fury, Sacred Smite, Tribulation, or something similar, so the effect is something you personally manifest instead of as presented in the ability description.
Humans are among the youngest species, and perhaps that's why—when considered as a whole— they're more given to explore, conquer, and expand their communities, even if that means taking from other species or other humans. Individually, Humans couldn't be more diverse. Which means you could be under 5 feet (150 cm) tall and barely 100 pounds (45 kg), or well over 6 feet (180 cm) tall and weigh in at 250 pounds (113 kg); have blue eyes or brown, black, green, or some other variation; have no hair, flowing golden locks, amazing dreads, a mohawk, or some other rakish cut; be all about your faith, exploring ancient places, keeping evil at bay, enriching yourself, or some other disposition; and so on.
What's definitely true is that you are not afraid to strive for what you want and believe in.
In a game where everyone’s human, using the Human species option may not make sense. Your GM might grant you the option to choose Human as a species only if other species are also part of the game.
You gain the following characteristics:
If you choose Human as your species, your character sentence “I am an adjective species noun who verbs” gains another element: your second descriptor. For example, your sentence might be “I am a Brash and Rugged Human Fighter who Masters Weaponry.”
Other species are sometimes prejudiced against orcs, viewing them as misbegotten creatures destined to serve as fodder for more powerful evil overlords. Perhaps that's true of some; however, you know orcs are a proud (if aggressive) people with a sense of honor. Though they can be deadly enemies, especially to humans and elves, they have been known to ally with others against a larger threat.
Whatever your particular upbringing, you've ventured out into the wider world looking for new opportunities. How much your heritage affects your outlook is up to you—it might color everything, or it might only come up when someone flinches from your visage.
You gain the following characteristics:
Half-orcs gain either the Orc species characteristics or the Human species characteristics, whichever you decide when creating your half-orc character.
| Level | Name | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Goblin | 4 | Elemental, fire | 4 | Ghost | 6 | ChimeraI |
| 1 | Shadow | 4 | Elemental, water | 4 | Ghoul | 6 | Elemental, thorn |
| 2 | Guard | 4 | Elf | 4 | Giant snake | 6 | Golem |
| 2 | Morlock | 4 | Ghost | 4 | Hollow knight | 6 | Hag |
| 2 | Orc | 4 | Ghoul | 4 | Minotour | 6 | Jotunn, fire |
| 2 | Skeleton | 4 | Giant snake | 4 | Ogre | 6 | Jotunn, frost |
| 2 | Wraith | 4 | Hollow knight | 4 | Paladin | 6 | Manticore |
| 3 | Bard | 4 | Minotour | 4 | Shadow elf | 6 | Puppet tree |
| 3 | Berserker | 4 | Ogre | 4 | Thief | 6 | Troll |
| 3 | Crime boss | 4 | Paladin | 4 | Werewolf | 6 | Vampire |
| 3 | Deinonychus | 4 | Shadow elf | 5 | Basilisk | 6 | Wyvern |
| 3 | Faerie | 4 | Thief | 5 | Cambion | 7 | Corrupt mage |
| 3 | Giant rat | 4 | Werewolf | 5 | Demon | 7 | Cyclops |
| 3 | Giant spider | 5 | Basilisk | 5 | Elemental, earth | 7 | Djinni |
| 3 | Halfling | 5 | Cambion | 5 | Fallen angel | 7 | Dragon |
| 3 | Harpy | 5 | Demon | 5 | Gorgon | 7 | Evil priest |
| 3 | Merfolk | 5 | Elemental, earth | 5 | Mi-go | 7 | Giant |
| 3 | Sapient tree | 5 | Fallen angel | 5 | Necromancer | 7 | Hydra |
| 3 | Thug | 5 | Gorgon | 5 | Occultist | 7 | Noble knight |
| 3 | Thug | 5 | Mi-go | 5 | Prince(ss) of summer | 7 | Sphinx |
| 3 | Transitional vampire | 5 | Necromancer | 5 | Satyr | 7 | Statue, animate |
| 3 | Zombie | 5 | Occultist | 5 | Soul Eater | 7 | Tyrannosaurus rex |
| 4 | Deep one | 5 | Prince(ss) of summer | 5 | Wendigo | 7 | Worm that walks |
| 4 | Devil | 5 | Satyr | 5 | Witch | 8 | Lich |
| 4 | Druid | 5 | Soul Eater | 6 | Blackguard | 8 | Wizard, mighty |
| 4 | Dwarf | 5 | Wendigo | 6 | Assassin | 9 | Demigod |
| 4 | Elemental, air | 5 | Witch | 6 | Blackguard | 9 | Demon Lord |
| 10 | Kaiju |