At Gary Con VII last month, I ran a Stormbringer 1st edition game. I hadn't played Stormbringer in more than 20 years (except for a one-evening playtest before the convention). It was enjoyable to play it again, but playing Stormbringer reminded me why AD&D is my game of choice. I'm not a fan of Stormbringer's attack-then-parry-then-roll-armor mechanic. I'm not a fan of how long it took to make pre-generated Stormbringer characters.
But I like the idea of demon-summoning sorcerers as the primary source of magic in the game world. (No clerics!) I like the idea of bargaining with demons and elemental lords for favors. I like the idea of binding fiery elementals or angry demons into your longsword, then cutting down your enemies. And I like the idea that you might get betrayed by the demon you just made a pact with.
... so I made THE SORCERER. It's a class for use with AD&D that summons elementals & demons and tries to force them into servitude. It's a 24 page digest-size pdf, and includes the Sorcerer class description, guidelines for summoning & binding, stats for minor elementals, details on the six demon types (Destruction, Suffering, Creation, Insanity, Ideas, and Shifting), random demon generation guidelines, and some brief suggested house rules to make AD&D feel a little more like the Michael Moorcock inspirational material. THE SORCERER should also work just fine with Swords & Wizardry, B/X D&D, Original D&D, or any of the other usual suspects.
Ian Baggley illustrated the cover beautifully. Right now it has no interior art. I'll commission interior art later; the rectangles in the pdf are artwork placeholders. But first I need to playtest it.
I'm gonna be testing this soon but I'm trying to see if anyone else has tested it yet.
ReplyDeleteI'm gonna be testing this soon but I'm trying to see if anyone else has tested it yet.
ReplyDeleteI tested it a few weeks ago, in a party with some of the more specialized AD&D classes (a paladin and a druid) using one of the Gabor Lux modules (The House of Rogat Demazien). The sorcerer was 3rd level, and could summon earth and water elementals; he started with five bound elementals, and overall it was _really_ powerful. Not saying _too_ powerful, necessarily, but really powerful. Even with just 30 rounds of service total, those elementals were combat powerhouses, on top of the other things they were able to do.
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