Sorcery Bonus Die: Part 1

 

A couple weeks ago I made a post titled Sorcery! in which I described rules I made for freeform casting based upon my limited knowledge of Warhammers magic system. In that post I described consequences for quadruple, quintuple and sextuple matches for a sorcery roll, even though as it stands, the maximum number of dice a sorcerer could get is three (barring exploding dice from a star pool made after rolling doubles).

So I have been going through the Old School Essentials magic users spell list and adding examples of ways for a sorcerer to obtain bonus dice for specific spells. When coming up with bonus objects, I used a few guiding principles:

1. Symbolism > Cost
2. Carrying, acquiring and using the objects should alienate the sorcerer from the general public
3. 1 die objects should be treated like gear that the caster can accumulate, carry and become known for
4. 2 die objects should be consumed/destroyed when used, and should require money or connections to acquire
5. 3 die objects should be consumed/destroyed when used, and should require adventure to acquire 

Here's how they work.

• Bonus dice can be rolled by themselves or with any number of sorcery dice the sorcerer has. 
• If any sorcery roll results in one or more 6's, assume they were rolled on a bonus die, preventing the sorcerer from losing one of their dice. If the sorcerer rolls more 6's than they roll bonus die, the sorcerer loses the difference from their dice pool.
• Spells have ways to get 1, 2 or 3 bonus dice. These bonuses stack, so long as the sorcerer can reasonably perform all of them in the time it takes to cast the spell.

With that out of the way, I present you with the first half (-ish) of the magic user spells and the requirements for their sorcery dice. Shouts out to The Geologist Primer and The Herbalist Primer by  Anna Urbanek for inspiration for some of the following entries.

Spell	Requirement	extra dice
Animate Dead	A Sword made from Jet	1
	Burning vulture feathers placed behind the ears	2
	A mixture of Vampire Dust and Phoenix Ashes, snorted	3
Anti-Magic Shell	The shell of an undead snapping turtle	1
	A bowl of burning black powder	2
	A belly full of Night Caps, found in craters	3
Charm Monster	A mask made from a human skull	1
	Wear perfume made from aged meat, bone meal and gold dust	2
	Eat the brain of a manticore	3
Charm Person	Fine, revealing clothing and expensive jewelry	1
	Body painted in the ashes of a book of love songs	2
	Consumption of a religious artifact	3
Clairvoyance	Eight glass eyes held between the fingers and thumbs	1
	A burning wreath made of laurel and a lions mane	2
	A tincture made of powdered lapis lazuli, Angelica Root, and Psyclops(1) adrenaline	3
Cloudkill	A hood made from cobra skin	1
	A bite from a deadly spider	2
	Burning incense made of nightshade, garlic oil and green dragon saliva	3
Confusion	An ivory cudgel full of mercury	1
	Foxglove wine fortified with powdered azurite	2
	Brain fluid of a psychic mallard dripped into the eyes	3
Conjure Elemental	The sound of a damp, pumice horn	1
	Dust being blown away by a large explosion	2
	An active earthquake, Tsunami, Firestorm or Hurricane	3
Contact Higher Plane	A platinum hypercube	1
	Bury a human heart in a box painted with stars	2
	Eat the tongue of a forgotten saint	3
Continual Darkness	A blindfold made of dried worm skin	1
	An eye blinded by an eclipse, dissolved in acid	2
	A black mare covered in moon dust	3
Continual Light	A pair of yooperlite rings worn on adjacent fingers	1
	Jellyfish paste painted on the skin	2
	A golden haired ram sacrificed at noon	3
Control Weather	An tin sheet and a silver watering can	1
	Mashed frog brains, spread on onion skins and eaten	2
	A krakens gladius, etched with the name of the caster and fired into the sky	3
Curse	An intricately carved stele, strapped to the back	1
	A piece of the target, burned with mint	2
	A unicorn horn, ground into powder and sprinkled over a snake pit	3
Darkness	The shadow cast by a nocturnal animal	1
	Moonshine infused with purslane petals	2
	The ire of a shadow	3
Death Spell	Tattoos drawn in ink infused with nightshade, graphite and poison frog slime	1
	Burning crude oil	2
	A mouthful of algae and hydra venom spit into mist	3
Detect Evil	A silk robe with gold trim and a collar of dove feathers	1
	A dose of Third Eye Drops(2)	2
	A lump of clay, wet with holy water, shaped like the target and consumed	3
Detect Invisible	A wool cloak covered in eyes	1
	A handful of chalk and pepper blown into the air	2
	Burning elephant fat	3
Detect Magic	A silver headband with hanging opal teardrops	1
	A drop of crows blood in each eye	2
	Burning incense made of ordeal bean extract and gnome hair	3
Dimension Door	An electrum crowbar adorned with hanging bells	1
	A key of braided mouse fur, eaten	2
	A drop of demon blood in the ear	3
Disintegrate	A brass crossbow that can be held in one hand	1
	An expensive egg filled with ash, smashed to pieces	2
	Mummy dust and plutonium powder cast into the air	3
Dispel Magic	A wand made from hippopotamus ivory	1
	True loves kiss	2
	Gargoyle teeth and rose water made into a paste and smeared on the target	3
ESP	A skull cap made of psychoplastic(3)	1
	Three doses of Hellflower Petals(4)	2
	Sentient spores dusted into the ears	3
Feeblemind	Wine drunk from a led goblet	1
	A burning black scroll enumerating the crises of the world	2
	A ghost, eaten	3
Fire Ball	A clay scepter set with rubies and jasper	1
	Powdered bat guano blown through a pipe made of salamander bone	2
	The eye of a red dragon crushed in the casters hand	3
Flesh to Stone	A grotesque mask made from fossilized wood, set with amber eyes	1
	A sack full of maggot pupa smashed with a large rock	2
	Powdered limestone, clay and royal skeleton bone, mixed with water and hurled at the target	3
Floating Disc	A rhinestoned weight belt	1
	A glass plate covered in stones, dropped on a hard surface	2
	A 1lb sack of pig feathers, torn open and scattered	3
Fly	A human femur, hollowed, and set with moldavite	1
	9 doves wearing quartz anklets, released	2
	Harpy gastroliths swallowed and then expelled	3
Geas	A wooden staff carved with images of tubers	1
	The bottled words of a demagogue, released	2
	A gods tongue, pierced with an iron nail and gifted to the target	3
Growth of Plants	A peat brick set with emeralds	1
	The thumb of a gardener, set with an emerald finger nail, and buried with the plants	2
	Unicorn hooves burned in manure	3
Hallucinatory Terrain	A burlap shirt braided with dried mushrooms	1
	Bottled fog, released into the area to be changed	2
	Burning hags hair	3
Haste	A whip of braided rabbit leather, and a raptors talon heel knot	1
	A weeks binge of Jolt Vapor(5)	2
	A dose of pegasus adrenaline injected into the spine	3
Hold Monster	Electrum manacles, one locked around the casters wrist	1
	Liquid bismuth, mixed with fumitory leaves, sprayed through a glass pipe	2
	Bottled time, smashed at a targets feet.	3
Hold Person	A vertebra with a sharp steel core	1
	A ball of ice, hurled at a target	2
	Crystalized ghoul saliva, smoked in a pipe made of bay tree wood	3
Hold Portal	A platinum doorstop	1
	A glass bell, crushed underfoot	2
	The toe bone of a vampire, buried under the threshold	3
Infravision	An opal monocle	1
	A handful of ash, rubbed over the eyes	2
	Werewolf blood, mixed with with milkweed latex	3
Invisibility	A thin, gossamer poncho threaded with silver and gold	1
	A glass effigy of the caster, shattered	2
	Pixie dust, mixed with a ground cats eye stone and sprinkled about	3
Invisibility 10' Radius	A staff of transparent aluminum, topped with 10' silver cords	1
	Ashes made from sheep skin, painted onto the caster	2
	The heart of an invisible stalker, eaten	3
Invisible Stalker	The name of an invisible stalker, tattooed onto the caster	1
	The bones of a hunter, crushed	2
	The eyes of a saber-toothed tiger, pierced by its fang	3
Knock	An electrum key	1
	A door in miniature, eaten by the caster	2
	The left hand of a hanged thief, nailed to the door and left to rot	3

1: A cyclops with psychic abilities

2, 4 and 5: Drugs from my campaign world. Maybe I'll make a post about them in the future

3: A purple resin found in the ground, pliable when psychic force applied, objects made of psychoplastic weigh half the normal amount