What are the full effects and how long do they last? Short time? Permanent? You figure out the details. In my games there's none of this "sample it by tasting" crap. You gotta take a swig and find out the effects as the story unfolds, for better or for worse (unless you have some magical way of knowing, of course). For potions with multiple uses, I'll have the "swig" not count against the number of remaining uses, while the effect plays out. If it's a one-time-use thing (permanent or not), I'll encourage the full top-off by saying something like, "you are feeling something, but you'll have to finish it off", or something to that effect. For cautious Johnny-Be-Safe type players, they either have to experiment on someone or something else, or take it to a sage or an alchemist and pay a ton of money to know exactly what they are dealing with.
To me, potions are one of those things that has to play out at the table, as they always are circumstantial given the situation and the user, so be prepared to house it on the fly. Remember: Play the way we used to in the old days and have fun with it! It's only a game!
4 comments:
I can see myself using some of these for sure. Very old school in flavour (in a good way). I was looking at an old solo recently, can't even remember which one, but a combination of lucky finds took my first level character to the equivalent of fifth level (by dT&T rules) within the space of half a dozen paragraphs. Needless to say he went on to conquer everything in sight until a wrong turning (probably at an intersection) obliterated him instantly without even the option of a saving roll. Sometimes you just have to laugh and accept your fate.
Thanks! I'm gonna keep them coming. I do a lot of solo work, so I figure since I need my own random charts, I might as well put them out for others to enjoy. I see most of these as being an occasional roll too...if you did it for everything, it certainly would give an insane setting that might lose the reality thread.
The old school flavor you are seeing there is the only way I know how to roll due to my age, and the fact that I never moved past the original systems, so yep...it's built in. I've done a few newer games with others, but even the OSR stuff doesn't really feel like the games from the past that I'm still wired for...and that's not a bad thing, but it IS an actual thing that I've felt.
Like your adventure where you went from weenie to superhero in a few paragraphs, I think we were willing to move the barometer more dramatically back then. I suppose they call that "gonzo" now, but the observation I have on that is that that usually implies just plain over-the-top goofiness many times, as opposed to less safe and middle ground. Lotta fun no matter how you look at it!
Fun potion list!
Thanks so much! More to come!
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