Two spells players can use to tell the future and answer questions. The principles behind these spells can be used for other methods of divination such as tasseography, automatic writing or haruspicy.
The Flase Mirror, Rene Magritte
Nephomancy:
- The practice of divining the future through interpreting the formation of clouds.
The player character casts the spell, asks a question to the sky and lays back to stare at the clouds. A cloud - obvious to the spell-caster begins to form into a rorschachian representation of an answer. The DM thinks how to answer the player's question with an image. Upside-down, with their non-dominant hand, their eyes closed and without lifting pen from paper - the DM will attempt to draw this answer-image. The resultant 'drawing' is the shape of the divinatory cloud that forms above the spellcaster. The players must then interpret this cloud shape to find the answer to their question.
It takes 10 minutes for the cloud to form and can only be cast if the sky is visible to the caster. For each level of the caster above 1, the DM can return to the drawing to add a small detail or correct a line of their choice.
Molybdomancy:
- The practice of interpreting the future via the hardened metal shapes that form when molten lead is poured into water.
The player character mutters their question into a bubbling crucible of lead before pouring the molten metal into a bowl of water. The lead hardens into the shape of an answer for the character to interpret. With a timer, the DM has 30 seconds to scrunch, rip and shape a piece of paper into a form resembling the answer to the player's question. For each level above 1, the DM has an additional 10 seconds of sculpting time. The caster requires a crucible, heat-source, bar of lead and a bowl of water to cast the spell. The entire process takes 10 minutes.
Holy crap this rules!
ReplyDeleteHaruspicy (animal-cruelty free version): DM has to create a portrait out of cooked pasta, has as long as they want.
Automatic writing: Player writes down as much junk as they want, the DM then circles, crosses out or underlines a few bits of the text (need some way to make this less exploitable)
As a patch to automatic writing, the DM must finger-paint their annotations with their eyes closed, perhaps?
DeleteFor automatic writing, use an online random word generator. Starting with 15 random words at level 1, increasing by an additional 5 words every level thereafter. The DM then reads aloud the words most relevant in answering the player's question (in the order they were generated) for the players to parse.
DeleteMaking spaghetti seems a fairly time consuming approach. Maybe using pipe-cleaners instead would work? You'd probably need to impose a time limit of around 30 seconds for this to work.
DeleteAnd higher level spells could either add time or pipe-cleaners?