Chaos

Always a popular path, even if it's only in an NPC. If you need help with botches let me know. I haven't made any for this particular set of rules as I generally make things up on the fly when playing, but I have a couple of different d100 outcomes of botches that could give you ideas. Or, if they're popular enough, I'll write a new set of 100 just for this.

There are things that are forbidden, or that are so powerful as to have instilled and inspired fear from those that use such powers. One of the greatest and yet, most terrifying powers out there is Chaos. You channel energies from the Primal Chaos into your world, willing it to do what you desire. With this blessing comes the curse of madness, and the inevitability of an early death before you lose all sanity, but during the intervening years, amazing things may happen.

WARNING: This path has the potential to destroy those who use it. Unlike Shadow, this power comes with a madness that eats at you and slowly devours your sanity. With Chaos there is no rhyme or reason, there is no desire or will, there is only inevitable change.

Primary Stats: Wisdom (Affect Probability, Enhancement and Healing) Charisma (Madness and Damage), Constitution

Bonus to Skill Checks: Bluff, Concentration, Decipher Script, Intimidate, Knowledge (Arcana, Religion, the Planes), Perception

Basic Abilities

Opening this talent tree grants you the following powers and abilities.

Derangements: Tapping into the Primal Chaos – that eternal force of constant change that drives all things – requires a great deal of time and patience, and while the power it grants is great indeed, it comes at a price, and that price is madness. The power and the madness are inseparable. When taking this talent path, you also take a derangement of some kind. It could be megalomania, paranoia, depression, a fugue state, multiple personalities, or any other number of things. However, you are mad in some way and must embrace or fight the madness to control your power and not let it overtake you. Your madness will color your world in any number of ways. Discuss options with the GM to see what might be best for your character.

Affect Probability: The core ability of Chaos is the power to make that which is improbable a reality. You take a small amount of the primal chaos and channel it into the real world, willing it to do what you desire. It takes a great deal of mental fortitude and not a little bit of math knowledge to be a walking statistic machine, but it can be quite rewarding. The main use for this power is to enhance your allies, boosting their abilities in small ways to make them stronger, faster, better for short times. You can also change the world around you in small ways as well. You could make it more likely that people have gold or the item you need, or that a particular inn will serve an ale you particularly like. The changes are small but can be cumulative and useful. You can choose to use this power to do whatever you like, however, the greater the change you effect, the more chaos must be drawn into the world, and should you mess up you could wind up worse than dead. If you botch, it will only affect you, and nothing else around you (with the possible exception of those people who are now wearing your entrails after you exploded to death).

Chaotic Arcana: Chaos can be used to mimic the effect of magic. Much like destructus and basic arcana from the Mage branch, you can cast various spells such as fireballs, lighting bolts, ice lances, and the like. This is easy and will never incur a botch as it is a primary part of your abilities. However, being Chaos, it’s an equal opportunity power and you can also heal as in the Light or Monk branches. The energy is directed as you desire, changing from one to the other, or both at once, but the effects at this level are minor though effective.

Mastery: Mastery is a measure of your overall power and ability in a given talent branch. Each rank raises your ability a bit higher, and grants you greater power and access to more abilities further down the line. You must purchase each rank in order. Each rank is explained in detail below.

Rank 1: Your powers are slightly enhanced, reducing the energy you need to summon and direct the chaos. You need to draw slightly less chaos to do the same things, making the power slightly safer. In addition, the effects produced by your abilities are slightly empowered. For example a simple fireball might now have an explosive effect when it crashes against a foe, dealing more damage to him and perhaps a few people near him. The enhancements you grant are slightly more powerful and last slightly longer. 10 points.

Rank 2: Your powers are slightly enhanced, reducing the energy you need to summon and direct the chaos. You need to draw slightly less chaos to do the same things, making the power slightly safer. The effects produced by your abilities are slightly empowered. The enhancements you grant are slightly more powerful and last slightly longer. Your derangement becomes slightly more potent and has a greater effect over you and the world as you view it. However, this grants you the ability chaos controlled. You have a small collection of things you do that have the same effect every time, such as casting a fireball, that now requires almost nothing on your part, and is simply an effect you have. You can have up to Wisdom modifier spells like this. 20 points.

Rank 3: Your powers are enhanced, reducing the energy you need to summon and direct the chaos. You need to draw less chaos to do the same things, making the power safer. In addition, the effects produced by your abilities are empowered. The enhancements you grant are more powerful and last longer. In addition, you can now enhance your entire group with one burst, giving each member a different minor effect, or one powerful effect for everyone. You gain a +2 to Wisdom or Charisma. 30 points.

Rank 4: Your powers are greatly enhanced, greatly reducing the energy you need to summon and direct the chaos. You need to draw much less chaos to do the same things, making the power a great deal safer. In addition, the effects produced by your abilities are greatly empowered. The enhancements you grant are more powerful and last longer. Your derangement becomes more potent and has a great effect over you and the world as you view it. You become greatly intimidating, even when you are not trying to and you may have physical changes based on the number of times you’ve botched or given in to your madness. You gain the ability joker’s delight. This ability allows you to frighten people and even damage them simply by being yourself and letting your madness, and the chaos, flow around you. 40 points.  

Rank 5: Your powers are greatly enhanced, greatly reducing the energy you need to summon and direct the chaos. You need to draw much less chaos to do the same things, making the power a great deal safer. In addition, the effects produced by your abilities are greatly empowered. The enhancements you grant are more powerful and last longer. Your derangement becomes more potent and has a great effect over you and the world as you view it. At this point it is unlikely that your derangement will grow any worse, and you may even begin to adjust to it or start to remedy it in small ways, but it will never ever leave you. You gain truth, or something like it. This ability makes you a very likeable fellow, despite your madness and intimidating manner, and allows you a great lying ability, to the point that, on occasion, you can make a lie reality. You gain a +3 to Wisdom or Charisma. 50 points.

Jaunt: You can teleport short distances. Requires Mastery Rank 1 and 10 points.

Dual Cast: Many spells require you to channel energy through your hands, guiding the magic. You now have the ability to cast two separate spells from each hand, or use your hands together to cast the same spell making it a bigger spell with different and more powerful effects. This kind of spell casting requires a great deal of energy and can drain you very quickly. Requires Mastery Rank 1 and 15 points.

Archmage: You have chosen your path, whatever it may be, or perhaps perfected several different paths of magic. Regardless, you have learned and practiced arcane secrets and rituals throughout your life, always searching for greater knowledge, better control, and more power. You may never stop practicing, you might never achieve your complete goal, but you have become one of the most powerful mages in the world, and other planes. All of your powers are magnified to a great extent, your power usage is reduced to almost 0 for nearly all your spells and you can do wondrous and amazing things. Requires Mastery Rank 5 and 50 points.

Explosive Branch

10 points.

Opening this branch of Chaos grants the following abilities.

Flames of Chaos: Fire and explosions are your specialty, and you do both with great enthusiasm and with great style and flair. You point at something and it simply explodes in a fiery blast. You control fire in amazing and brilliant ways, and are not limited by normal fire. You can use any fire from any branch, though, unless you have taken the branch that fire comes from, you will have only minor ability with the flame you use.

Explosive Branch Abilities

Dragon’s Breath: The source of fire on many worlds is now yours to wield. With a great roar you unleash a plume of the most potent fire known, reducing your foes to ash and leaving the field ablaze. Requires Mastery Rank 1 and 10 points.

Cinder Shield: Taking ash and flame from fallen foes, you create a super-heated shield around you, blocking most incoming melee attacks and even deflecting bits of magic directed at you. Requires Master Rank 1 and 10 points.

Flambé: With a snap of your fingers, your enemy ignites and is wreathed in chaotic fire. Life is good. Requires Mastery Rank 1 and 10 points.

Ghost Pepper Spray: A fine mist shoots out, covering your foes. Almost instantly, they begin to cry out as is sears their flesh. Requires Mastery Rank 1 and 15 points.

Fatal Combination: With a gesture and a nod your opponent finds their stomach suddenly filled with several Mentos and 2 liters of Diet Coke. It seems to make them unhappy as they vomit foam, or simply explode in a very messy way. Requires Mastery Rank 1 and 15 points.

Human Bomb: With a gesture you attach a small piece of burning Chaos to an enemy, who shortly explodes in a magnificent blaze, setting others near him on fire and, occasionally, spreading the effect. Requires Mastery Rank 2 and 15 points.

Flaming Shrapnel: When someone affected by your human bomb explodes, whether or not they die, they explode with bits of bone and metal shrapnel that is also burning, dealing more damage and enhancing the chance that others will become human bombs. Requires Human Bomb and 20 points.

Luminous Burst: A brilliant mote of light appears in the middle of your enemies, where it begins to expand into a brilliant blue dome, incinerating all it touches. Requires Mastery Rank 2 and 30 points.

Ifrit Guardian: Using a still burning corpse you summon a small piece of living flame, an ifrit, that will use its amazing powers to fight next to you and protect you for a short time before it burns out and must return to its plane of origin. The power, size, and ability of the ifrit is based on your level of Mastery. Requires Mastery Rank 3 and 20 points.

Bang!: With a simple gesture, as though firing a weapon, your foe explodes with fire and falls back with a massive hole in their chest as though you really did shoot them. Requires Mastery Rank 3 and 25 points.

Flashfire Imp: You can summon and use fire imps to attack your foes. They are tiny bits of living flame, almost indistinguishable from actual bits of flame that instantly ignite whatever they touch and leap from foe to foe, giggling all the while. Requires Mastery Rank 3 and 25 points.

Target Locked: “Now, Scotty!” you shout into the device in your hand. A moment later, orange white beams of light shoot from the sky frying your foes.

Cool Guys Don’t Look: You put on your sunglasses and turn your back on your foes, whereupon they promptly explode violently. Requires Mastery Rank 4 and 30 points.

Explosive Plasma: You can now control the super-heated element known as plasma. It is hotter than even dragonflame, and while it is a bit difficult to control, it can have a devastating effect on most living things. However, in your hands it is also highly explosive, making it even more deadly, unpredictable and, let’s face it, fun. Requires Mastery Rank 5 and 50 points.

Helpful Branch

10 points.

Opening this branch of Chaos grants the following abilities.

Enhanced Probability: You are incredibly skilled at using your affect probability to aid your allies. You are so good, in fact, that you can grant them limited abilities for a short time, provided someone on your team has that ability. For example, you can grant your warrior destruction magic should someone have it, or allow a druid to dual wield two-handed weapons if your warrior has titan’s grip. The person gaining the power knows full well how to use it, but the effect is very short, lasting only a minute at best. In addition, you are also quite good at using Chaos to heal and can ease pain and grant respite from wounds with the best of them.

Hepful Branch Abilities

Resistant Energy: You aid your allies by granting them small resistances to certain things, allowing them to more easily fight a disease they might have, walk through fire, take damage better and more. This shield ability lasts a short time before fading but can be refreshed easily enough, or changed as needed. Requires Mastery Rank 1 and 15 points.

F.Aid Spray: A simple canister that you keep with you allows you to heal most minor wounds with a spritz. Requires Mastery Rank 1 and 15 points.

Chaotic Shell: Your allies shimmer with chaotic energy, granting them limited immunity from damage for a short time. Requires Mastery Rank 1 and 15 points.

Blood and Thunder: Your enemy seems to have become very ill. You literally scare the shit out of them and make them bleed out their ass. Requires Mastery Rank 2 and 15 points.

Reversal of Fortune: You can use your affect probability to turn an attack around on a foe. This can even be done a few moments after the damage has been dealt to you or your ally (meaning if someone takes damage on their turn you can undo that damage on yours if you want). Requires Mastery Rank 2 and 20 points.

Explosion of Health: You violently explode. You and all your allies heal your wounds, and all your enemies are blown to hell. Requires Mastery Rank 2 and 25 points.

Remove Corruption: You can remove most detrimental effects from allies whether it is a disease, curse, or other. Requires Mastery Rank 3 and 20 points. 

Chaotic Storm: Pitch black thunderheads roil over the battlefield. Lightning strikes down on your foes while a soothing rain washes away your ally’s wounds as though they were nothing more than mud. This is a very difficult bit of chaos to manage and cannot be used frequently without losing control of the chaos or flat out hurting yourself from fatigue. Requires Mastery Rank 3 and 35 points.

Accident Forgiveness: Everyone makes mistakes, but they shouldn’t have to pay for it forever. This ability allows you or an ally (regardless of if you’re near them or not) to re-roll a botched roll. They must take the second roll, however. This can also be used to stop an incoming attack, even if it has already been launched, regardless of source (meaning you can stop an ally from attacking someone or an enemy from attacking). This does not redirect the attack, it simply stops all damage. Once per day, you can use this to erase a botch. If you erase a botch you’ve made, you cannot use this ability for anything else the rest of the day. Requires Mastery Rank 3 and 40 points.

Anti-Life Equation: You’re so good an healing and helping, that you know how to be the opposite. It’s SO simple! Your enemies + 1 metric ton of necrotic energy = Dead Folks. Requires Mastery Rank 4 and 30 points.

Slumbering Death: While you cannot resurrect the dead you can place someone who has very recently died (within 3 minutes or less) or is about to die in a coma. This coma will allow them to remain unchanged or even to recover very slowly until something can be done to help them in a more beneficial manner. Requires Mastery Rank 4 and 30 points.

Sacred Penguin: You call upon the most sacred of all spirit beasts; TIMMY! The Penguin Exarch of Sur’Gol! With a wave of his flippers and a magnificent tap dance (with help from his friend, the tap dancing baby murlock), he eases your pain and refreshes your allies. This will recover all allies, remove their diseases and curses, and will even bring them back from death. This ability is dangerous to use, and once per day is the limit, unless you feel very very lucky. Requires Mastery Rank 5 and 50 points.

Maddening Branch

10 points.

Opening this branch of Chaos grants the following abilities.

Delirium: You have given over to the madness that surrounds you and threatens you and let yourself become a part of it. You know terror on a primal level and have friends and allies in all sorts of different planes. Chaos moves through you and grants you great ability at a terrible cost. You become greatly more intimidating and can now share the madness of chaos with others, making them hear voices, see and feel other planes and realities around them, and generally wreaking havoc with their mind. You are also highly skilled at drawing things from the chaos to use on your foes, such as dropping a sledgehammer on their head, or twisting the laws of physics so that you and your friend don’t fall from the crumbling bridge while your foe’s stare on in awe as you walk easily back to safety. However, all of this comes at the cost of your sanity, which now drains as quickly as sands in an hourglass. Your time is limited, but your power is great.

Maddening Branch Abilities

Heavy Rain: Dark storm clouds gather over your foes. However, it never rains water, but various heavy objects, such as bowling balls, anvils, sledgehammers, and the like. Requires Mastery Rank 1 and 10 points.

Eyes of Chaos: You can penetrate seemingly random events and connect them up, showing a patter in the chaos. You are also much better at reading people and discerning truth from lies, sensing motives, and understanding human nature. Of course, all this is only so you can better destroy them with the madness at your hands, but it could come in handy in some sort of negotiation or to see if someone is intent on killing you while they appear to outwardly be nice and things of that nature, but really, how often is that going to come up? Requires Mastery Rank 1 and 15 points.

Cardiac Arrest: With a wink and a grin, you cause your enemy’s heart to skip a beat. Requires Mastery Rank 1 and 15 points.

I’m Crushing your Head!: You put your index finger and thumb close to your eye so it looks like you hold your enemy’s head in your fingers. When you bring them together, reality sees your point of view. Requires Mastery Rank 2 and 10 points.

And You’ve Got That Brain Thing: You send a shock to your foe’s brain, shorting it for a few moments. Requires Mastery Rank 2 and 15 points.

Rhino-douken!: You’ve been watching the monk and you think you’ve perfected their energy blast techniques. However, instead of a brilliant beam of light, you instead launch a rhino at your enemies. Seems to be just as effective though. Requires Mastery Rank 3 and 20 points.

Imaginary Friend: You have strayed so far from reality that your imaginary friend is now something that is very real. You gain control of a chaotic creature. This creature can look like whatever you desire, from a demon, to a child with black eyes, to a talking rutabaga with a ninja mask. They have abilities based on what they look like, as well as small bits of chaos magic. For example, if you have a dragon, it will be able to breathe fire at the least, and crunch on enemies with its great teeth and slash them with deadly claws. The creature can be large enough for you to ride, but will never be much larger, and can be as small as a sparrow. They have a reasonable, standard intelligence at least, and can be commanded as well. Each level adds new powers and abilities to the creature as well as intellect. The creature is a permanent companion.

Level 1

Requires Mastery Rank 3 and 15 points.

Level 2

Requires Mastery Rank 4 and 25 points.

Level 3

Requires Mastery Rank 5 and 40 points.

Classic Misdirection: You point behind your foe, trying desperately to warn them of the impending danger behind them, but they don’t believe you until they are mauled by that quite horrible thing. This allows you to summon a creature from the ether to attack a foe briefly, generally doing a great deal of damage and leaving them bleeding. However, you can also use this to place your imaginary friend behind the enemy if you like, instead. Requires Mastery Rank 3 and 25 points.

Weirding Way: YELLING ALWAYS HURTS PEOPLE AND YOU ARE THE CHAMPION OF THE YELLING! You can use your voice as a weapon, screaming out words that inflict various types of damage at your foes. Requires Mastery Rank 3 and 30 points.

Dreams Come True: You reach into your foe’s mind and draw out their most primal terror, making it a reality for a short time around them. Requires Mastery Rank 3 and 30 points.

Swarming Madness: You stand before your enemies, madness in your eyes and your terrible smile. You raise your hands and strange, horrifying noises fill the air. Soon after a wave of creatures from various planes of chaos wash over your enemies, tearing at their flesh and destroying their mind. This is a devastating attack and will leave you drained after. Using it more than once in a day is very dangerous and likely fatal or worse. Requires Mastery Rank 5 and 50 points.

To Infinity and Maybe a Bit Further if We Have the Time and Gas: You have achieved a strange nirvana of insanity, coming full circle and passing easily between madness and genius as one might go in and out of a door. You are connected to other worlds and can draw from the whispers you hear there to aid in your life. You might summon the Batman to help you reason out a strange puzzle, or have the USS Enterprise fire phasers on your foes. Madness is your greatest weakness and most powerful ally. You can listen carefully to the chaos and maybe even glean insight into your own problems and dilemmas. The whispers know everything; it’s only a matter of being able to properly hear them. All of your powers are greatly enhanced,you’re your madness spreads a great deal more efficiently and easily. Requires Mastery Rank 5 and 50 points.