Shadow Swords in the Land of Three Empires

The Shadow Sword is a new class to DARK•HERITAGE m20.  Rather than add it to the document, it's going to be only semi-official here on the blog.  My intention for this class isn't really that it be "core" but that it be an extremely rare ability that few have.

Shimut the Flesheater, a member of the loosely defined "Heresiarchy of the Twelve" is said to be the sorcerer who invented the concept of the Shadow Sword.  As with literary character Beorn the skin-changer from The Hobbit, Shadow Swords are "under no enchantment but [their] own."  Able to access a small amount of magic--or The Shadow, as it is sometimes colloquially called--Shadow Swords can do basically one thing.  Other than that, their abilities are exceptional, but not supernatural.

Shadow Swords are more common among the Northlander race, although even there it is rare.  Very few others have learned to harness the Shadow in the manner in which Shadow Swords do.  Northlander Shadow Swords usually belong to one of the many strange Death Cults from the Cannibal Island and elsewhere which produce mystical assassins, of which the Shadow Sword is the most prominent variety

Some hamazin kemling revanchist cells among the Cherskii Mafia have also learned the procedure from some unknown vector, and as the Cherskii Mafia has lost its original focus, the knowledge has slowly seeped out to a few others.  Mostly still limited to assassins and other purveyors of "black ops", most people in the Land of Three Empires still have no idea what a Shadow Sword is or what he can do, and those who know the skills of a Shadow Sword are very discrete, handing down their knowledge rarely and carefully to hand-picked apprentices only.

The most iconic ability of Shadow Swords is the ability to manifest a weapon of pure Shadow at will.  Despite the name I've used to represent the class, this weapon can actually be any weapon that the character desires (although curved sabers seem to be among the most popular).  This includes missile weapons, even--although not any complicated mechanical weapon, such as a firearm.  Any melee weapon, any thrown weapon, and any missile weapon other than firearms can be manifested as desired by the character, summoned at a moment's notice, and then "banished" again back into the Shadow as desired.

This weapon is usually a cool, matte black in appearance, and often seems to seep or exude darkness almost like smoke.  Nobody but the Shadow Sword himself can use this weapon (i.e., he can't hand it to anyone else, and nobody else can pick it up if it's thrown, for instance--usually if it's thrown, the Shadow Sword would immediately disperse it and resummon it back into his hand again as soon as it has done its damage.)

Because a Shadow Sword is always armed, even if he appears not to be, those with this ability have naturally gravitated towards "black ops" type professions and assassination, to which this ability is remarkably well suited, but this is a trend not an obligation to those who belong to this class, naturally.

Shadow Blade: Gains combat bonus advantages to attack and damage, but only when using a shadow sword; a blade of pure shadow substance that can be summoned at a moment's notice. Also, any unarmored character with this ability can add ½ his character level (rounded down) to AC, and can, instead of attacking, deflect missed missile attacks, including bullets, back at anyone shooting at him (rolls as if making a missile attack himself, can only apply to missed shots; hits still do damage as normal to the Shadow Sword character and cannot be deflected.) If the character doesn't move or take any other action, he can use his shadow blade to “fight defensively") by adding +4 to his AC against missile attacks. Missed attacks when “fighting defensively” can be deflected.

Shadow Swords also can cloak themselves in Shadow, which makes them difficult to spot.  They gain a class bonus of +3 to Subterfuge.  (I know, I know; Subterfuge is also used for a number of other actions besides literally sneaking around, including bluffing, creating a forgery or disguise, lying, etc.  That's OK.)

Some designers' notes, briefly: The class started off being, basically, a Jedi from my Star Wars game.  I decided to ditch the Force powers in favor of making him sneakier (as well as looking less obviously like a Jedi), so it ends up feeling, in many respects, more like a hybrid of the Assassin prestige class and the the Soulknife, rendered in the much more simplistic m20 ruleset.  I long ago had the concept of an Advanced Class version of the Soulknife as part of my d20 Modern version of the setting, although it was an esoteric option that wasn't always easy to find.  As I said earlier, I've often been back and forth on the fence about whether or not I think it fits my conception of the setting.  Currently, I'm leaning much more towards making the setting a kind of swashbuckling noir setting rather than the somewhat darker version of the setting which is more Lovecraftian horror in sword & sorcery drag.  The class fits better in the former tone than in the latter, and I think my drift in that direction has been a long time coming and is probably permanent, so it fits as I see the setting now, and probably will do so for good.

C is for Cannibal Island

For to the east and north lies a large body of land called Cannibal Island.  It isn't far from the mainland, although it is far from any "civilized" location recognized by citizens of the land of the Three Empires.  Qizmiri sailors exploring the northland have occasionally stumbled across it, as well as curious and foolhardy explorers from Baal Hamazi.  Because it is buffered from the land of the Three Empires by other locations that are collectively known as the "Forbidden Lands", however, little traffic goes to the island.  It is known as a rumor and a byword amongst travelers and those who like strange tales, as well as in esoteric circles where forbidden, heretical and illegal knowledge is sought.  And, perhaps surprisingly, there are more inhabitants of the Cannibal Island who come to the land of the Three Empires than vice-versa.

Cyclopean architecture on Cannibal Island

At about a quarter milion square miles, Cannibal Island is a significant landform, almost the size of Madagascar.  Much of it is covered in tropical jungles, but it also has significant areas of high elevation that are cool and foggy.  Cities, ziggurats, temples and villages dot the area, and it boasts a significant population of decentralized yet architecturally and technologically fairly advanced people of unknown original extraction.  Yet these people are cursed, in ways both overt and subtle.

People from the Cannibal Island are visually very easy to spot.  Of course, few in the land of the Three Empires know what they look like, so they are instead considered to be merely albinos, or non-hamazi hellkin, or simply pale-skinned people of some other race when they are seen.  Many of them are careful to avoid showing their faces, and thus their features are not obvious even when one has been met.  Their skin-tone is a chalky pale gray or almost white, a most unnatural color for most humans.  There is no trace of pink or flesh-coloring, as one would expect in a true albino.  Hair can be either silvery white or jet black; only turning something else artificially, or perhaps going iron gray with age.  Their eyes are also extremely pale--beyond the lightest gray eyes normally seen amongst the balshatoi or other northerner races, verging on completely colorless.  The pigmented cells of the iris look like finely etched silver lines on a white background against the whites of the eyes--again, not a feature associated at all with true albinos.  Many Islanders also feature dark tattoos on their face, giving them stylized skull-like visages.  Those who leave the Cannibal Island are often assassins for hire, or cultists making pilgrimages to the strange and fell spirits whom they worship.

As the name of the island suggests, the inhabitants of Cannibal Island are, in fact, cannibals.  Normally they raid each other for "long pork" since they have few visitors and few outsiders live within easy striking distance of their island, but some of them do indeed travel farther afield in search of their ghoulish repast.  There are even rumors of an entire pirate ship crewed by Cannibal Island natives, who's search for treasure to loot is less important to them in search of captives to add to their larder.

Feral cannibal

As a matter of fact, the corrupted and fell environment of the Forbidden Lands has caused the inhabitants of the Cannibal Island to become cursed, and their cannibalism is a direct result of that curse.  If an Islanders does not indulge in an anthropophagic repast, over time his body will become corrupt, his mind will wither, and he will devolve into a savage beast.  Twisting painfully, his body will become emaciated, yet hard and strong as iron, his teeth will grow and develop points, his eyes will become sunken and sharp.  His mind and behavior will become feral and uncontrollable.

In d20 game terms, this curse can be treated as a magically induced disease (similar to Mummy rot) with a save DC of 15.  Every month that human flesh is not consumed (incubation period 1 month), the targeted character's Intelligence drops by 1 if they cannot make the saving throw.  If the targeted creature's intelligence drops to 0, the character becomes a ghoul.  It is impossible to treat this malady except magically--restoration or lesser restoration can restore lost ability points.  To eliminate the curse completely, the curse must first be broken with break enchantment or remove curse (requiring a DC 20 caster level check for either spell), after which a caster level check is no longer necessary to cast healing spells on the victim, and the disease can be magically cured as any normal disease.

Keep in mind that in the DARK•HERITAGE campaign setting, however, which does not have "regular" spellcasting classes, access to these spells is much more limited than in D&D, and may not be available at all.  For this reason, inhabitants of the Cannibal Island who come to other lands or regions almost always turn to the hunting and eating of other people.  It is not necessary that a new victim be hunted each month--a person can provide enough meat for several months assuming that the meat can be properly preserved somehow.  They either prefer rural areas where missing victims are unlikely to be missed for some time, or seedy urban areas where missing victims are, again, unlikely to be missed due to the activities of criminal gangs, or other reasons that would cause the poor, destitute or disenfranchized to be unmissed and unwanted.  There is a thriving albeit small population of cannibals living in the slums of Porto Liure, for example, and they even operate semi-openly in Sarabasca.