SAKER'S SUMMON HACK

(UPDATE: Angus Warman has automated this table in Javascript!!)
   

Summon forth randomly generated grotesque monstrosities from other planes! Watch as they wreak havoc upon the mortal sphere- wait, what's that one doing to your character? Ooh that wasn't pretty. Hope you didn't eat spaghetti recently!

 

(-This is a hack of the Summon spell from the Lamentations of the Flame Princess Core Book, including some random table bits from the Random Esoteric Creature Generator, with some new bits added.

-A very important thing for me when doing this project is giving proper attribution to the sources of the ideas that I have borrowed. At the end of this post you can find an overview of changes made, my reasoning for said changes, and my attempts to give credit where it is due.)

PROCESS

1. Determine amount of Hit Dice.

2. The Summoner tests their INT stat to limit the abstractness of the Entity. If the caster fails, there is a chance for an Abstract Form, or a WORLD-SHATTERING DISASTER.

3. Determine form. Roll 1d20 for the (type), and if the Summoner succeeded on their stat test, roll 1d12 for the (material). If the caster failed, roll 1d20 for the (material).

4. Determine Appendages: roll d6: (1-2: None 3-5: One 6: One and roll again.) To generate an appendage, roll 2d20. The leftmost one determines the (adjective), the rightmost one determines the (noun).

5. Determine Powers: roll d6: (1-3: no powers. 4-5: one power. 6: one power and roll again.) For each power, roll 2d6. The leftmost die determines which section of the table, the rightmost die determines which result from that section.

6. The Summoner faces the Entity in a domination battle (d20 + Caster Level vs d20 + Entity HD) to determine whether they control it, how long it lasts in this world, and what other horrific consequences may occur.

Default stats: AC 12, 1 attack for 1d6 damage, move 120’ (ground).

FORMULAIC SUMMONING

-If you sacrifice creatures during the Summoning, or create a magic circle for the Summoning, you gain 1 formula point for each HD of the sacrificed creatures, or for each 500sp spent on making the circle.

-You can spend 1 formula point to change your INT tests or domination rolls by 1. You can spend 3 formula points to reroll any result on any of the Entity generation tables. You can spend 5 formula points to try to summon a specific Entity if you know their planar Signature.

PLANAR SIGNATURE

Sometimes you can learn the Planar Signature of a specific summonable Entity, in which case you record the characteristics of the Entity on your character sheet, and you can choose to summon that specific Entity by using 5 formula points. If you succeed on your initial INT roll to limit the abstractness of the Entity, then that specific Entity will emerge.

FORMS

(Roll two dice simultaneously for Form and Material. If you succeeded your INT test, Roll 1d20 for the Form, and 1d12 for the Material. If you failed your INT test, roll 2d20: the leftmost one is the Form and the rightmost one is the Material.)

IT IS A… (Form)

1. Mirror of Caster: has the powers and abilities of the Caster.

2. Canine: if it charges, +2 to hit and CON save vs knockdown.

3. Crab: 2 attacks base, +2 AC.

4. Eyeball: Always sees attacks coming, advantage on saves, no back arc and no sneak attacks.

5. Frog: Leaps, as its attack, can land on someone for DEX save vs knockdown and 2d6.

6. Insectoid: Can climb on vertical surfaces.

7. Polyhedral: Roll d20 to see how many sides it has, if any die rolls that number, gains a power.

8. Snake: Immune to knockdown, has infravision.

9. Squid: Roll for exactly 1 appendage, then copy it 6 times.

10. Humanoid: no powers or abilities to speak of.

11. Whirlwind: Can pick up an opponent on an attack if they fail a STR save.

12. Pillar: Tall, can reach high places.

13. Maw: Can swallow whole on natural 20.

14. Machine: Produces a miniscule copy of itself each round.

15. Brain: Attacks psionically, targets WIS instead of AC.

16. Puddle: Takes half damage, can squeeze through cracks.

17. Cloud: Immune to normal damage.

18. Mushroom: emits spores on death that grow tiny parasitic versions of itself.

19. Amorphous Mass: Can shape itself into basic forms at will.

20. Beautiful Member of Gender According to Caster’s Sexual Preference:

MADE OF… (Material)

1. Cytoplasm: If it rolls a 20 on an attack, instead it makes an exact copy of itself.

2. Blood: Takes half damage, heals for the damage it deals to living creatures.

3. Brains: Has a guaranteed extra power.

4. Crystal: +4 AC, vulnerable to shattering.

5. Excrement: Disgusting, all within melee range hit at -2, disadvantage for grapplers.

6. Leeches: every point of damage it deals is instead a leech attached to target, deals 1hp/turn.

7. Fungus: Spore cloud, Wis save versus hallucinations.

8. Entrails: Can absorb dead bodies it moves over to heal 1d6 per body.

9. Slime: Regenerates 1d6/round.

10. Seaweed: Immune to fire.

11. Smoke: Immune to regular damage. Attacks by suffocating.

12. Swarm of Smaller Versions of Itself.

13. Absence:                                                                                                                                    .

14. Dream-Matter: Immune to physical. Attacks put target to sleep (WIS save), all sleeping creatures within 50 ft are puppets to its will. Cannot die until all within 100ft are awake.

15. Irradiated Matter: Each round within 50 ft, CON save vs Radiation Poisoning. Weapons that strike it have a 1 in 6 chance of being irradiated.

16. Hate: Attacks fill the target with senseless murder-rage for 1 round/damage taken (WIS save). Can only be damaged by those with true peace in their heart.

17. Lightning: Damaged only by nonmetal. Auto hits and deals an extra 1d6 to targets in physical contact with metal or water. If in a lightning storm, triple its HD and damage.

18. Shadow: Damaged only by things that are also a light source (fire magic, glowing sword, etc.). If in darkness, double its HD and damage. Can hide very convincingly in other shadows.

19. Pure Light: Damaged only if it is in an area of darkness or in a shadow. Blinds all those who try to look at it. Attacks against it are at disadvantage.

20. WORLD-SHATTERING DISASTER (see LotFP player core book pg 140 or make your own)

APPENDAGES

(Roll 2d20 for each appendage. The leftmost die is the Adjective, the rightmost die is the Noun. Each appendage gives an extra attack.)

WITH… (Adjective)

1. Adhesive: Sticks to its target.

2. Beautiful: Unnerving to look at, +1 AC.

3. Blurred: Don’t know what it is till it’s hit you.

4. Crawling: Confuses on hit.

5. Chiming: Deafens on hit.

6. Dead: Spoils all perishable goods on target.

7. Floating: On hit, CON save or start floating away.

8. Glowing: Irradiates on hit.

9. Gushing: On hit, target’s skin becomes translucent/slimy and can only breathe water.

10. Humming: Calms on hit.

11. Stony: Knocks down on hit.

12. Immaterial: Don’t know what it is till it’s hit you, but has disadvantage to hit.

13. Malformed: Has disadvantage to hit.

14. Necrotic: Rots flesh on contact, damage doesn’t heal naturally.

15. Prehensile: Can be used to grab and hold things.

16. Pungent: Enemies in melee get -1 to hit.

17. Reflective: Blinds enemies on hit.

18. Smoking: Scalds on hit for +1d6 damage.

19. Throbbing: Enrages on hit.

20. Transparent: Don’t know what it is till it hits you.

…(Nouns)

1. Antenna: ultra-senses, attack does no damage.

2. Branches: +1 AC due to tough bark.

3. Eggs/Seeds: damage taken has a 1/6 chance of dropping an egg or seed that will hatch into a tiny version of the Entity in a few rounds.

4. Eyes: attack is psychic and targets WIS stat instead of AC.

5. Face: disturbing, -2 to all rolls from one opponent. No attacks though.

6. Genitals: let your imagination go nuts.

7. Horn: if it charges, +1d6 damage.

8. Legs: +30 move.

9. Lumps: At half HP, a new appendage bursts forth.

10. Quills: Shoots 1d3 quills at -3 to hit, 1d6 damage each.

11. Oil: 1-2 Flammable 3-4 Acidic 5-6 Regenerative

12. Ovipositor: On hit, CON save vs Implanting a tiny egg version of itself.

13. Proboscis: On crit, latches on.

14. Sores: Doesn’t contribute an attack, damage taken has a 2/6 chance of popping them, AoE 1d6 acid.

15. Spinal Chord: +1 AC due to exoskeleton.

16. Stinger: Fort 4 save, 1-2 Sleep Poison 3-4 Paralyze Poison 5-6 Hallucinogen

17. Suction Pods: Can suck to target.

18. Tentacles: Can try to grapple.

19. Teeth: On crit, latches on.

20. Wings: Can fly.

POWERS

(Roll 2d6 for each Power. The leftmost die determines which section of the table, the rightmost die determines the entry in that section. Each section can act as its own mini 1d6 table.)

THAT HAS THE POWER OF… (power)

1 PHYSICAL

            1 Acid for blood, 1d4 acid damage to those who damage it.

            2 Regenerating, 1d6hp/round, can regen lost limbs as a troll.

            3 Fast Reflexes, +1 to initiative.

            4 Catching projectiles, 1/round.

            5 Extremely tough skin, 1d3 damage resistance.

            6 Gigantic: +1d6 HD, +1 size category and an extra Appendage.

2 TRANSMUTATION

            1 Heating metal that it touches as per the spell.

            2 Turning rock to mud on touch and vice-versa.

            3 Turning metal to wood on touch and vice-versa.

            4 Stone-Shaping.

            5 Turning air to water in a 15’ cube, cube holds its shape.

            6 Mutating characters it touches.

3 MAGIC

            1 Devouring Magic, heals 1d6/spell level.

            2 Reflecting magic back on caster if it successfully saves.

            3 Projecting a 15’ radius Antimagic aura.

            4 Learning any spell cast in vicinity, has 1d3 HD level spell slots.

            5 Casting Command 1/round in an uncanny, civilized, genteel voice.

            6 Telekinesis.

4 ANIMATION/SUMMONING

            1 Animating 1 inanimate object/round.

            2 Causing its dead victims to rise as Dread Wraiths.

            3 Animating 1 dead corpse/round.

            4 Casting Summon once, with equal HD.

            5 Animating a nearby element into a 1d6HD elemental as an action.

            6 Reproducing by budding once/round. The buds remain until exterminated.

5 ENTROPIC

            1 Damage aura, all within 30’ take 1 damage/round.

            2 15’ aura of magical darkness.

            3 Rusting metal, rotting wood, deals 1d6 extra necrotic damage on touch.

            4 Those starting turn within 15’ must save or start screaming incoherently.

            5 Players cannot say (1d3) 1: adjectives 2: nouns 3: verbs.

            6 Artifice within 20’ begin to dissolve into their material components.

6 METAFUCKERY

            1 Illusory power. Roll twice: one is its actual power, one is the fake power.

            2 2-Dimensional.

            3 Producing 1d3 Mirror Images/round.

            4 Unstable proportions; size category is proportional to initiative rolled.

            5 Mimicing voices and sounds.

            6 Roll for 2 powers instead of one.

DOMINATION

-The Summoner makes an opposed d20 roll against the Entity to determine the Entity’s disposition and how many rounds or minutes it lasts in this world.

-The Summoner makes a d20 roll and adds their Level. Then the Entity makes a d20 roll and adds their HD.

-The difference between the two rolls and determines what happens…

Summoner wins by 20+: The Entity is bound to your service within this plane forever.

Summoner wins by 10-20: The Entity is bound to your service for 1d10 + HD days, after which it returns to the infinite-foetal-wellspring-of-cosmic-horror. You also learn its planar Signature.

Summoner wins by 6-10: The Entity is bound to your service for 1d10 + HD minutes, after which it returns to its nightmarescape-at-the-edges-of-universal-consciousness.You also learn its planar Signature.

Summoner wins by 1-5: The Entity is bound to your service for 1d10 + HD rounds, after which it returns to its horrific, churning homeworld.

Tied, 0: Roll again.

Entity wins by 1-5: The Entity is not under control, and will chaotically frolic within this realm for 1d10 + HD rounds. Roll for a Minor Consequence.

Entity wins by 6-10: The Entity is not under control and is extremely vexed. It lashes out in a blind rage at being ripped from its reality for 1d10 + HD rounds. Roll for a Major Consequence.

Entity wins by 10-20: Reality bends and minds buckle under an unseen malevolence. The Entity warps existence around itself for 1d10 + HD round. Roll for a Disaster.

Entity wins by 20+: The door between realities has been not opened but rent asunder, immediately roll for a WORLD-SHATTERING DISASTER (see LotFP player core book pg 140 or make your own).

MINOR CONSEQUENCES Entity is capricious, chaotic, and cryptic AND…

1.  The Entity imprints on the first being it sees (the Summoner) and will try to protect it from all harm. It does not understand the other PCs’ existence and thus views them as threats, and will murder them freely to keep the Summoner safe from harm.

2.  The Entity develops an attachment to the Summoner, viewing them as a favored pet. The other PCs are an annoyance and it will try to disperse them using whatever means it has. It will try to take the Summoner home with it, by force if necessary.

3.  The Entity develops a fascination with one or multiple of the Summoner(or the party as a whole)’s most impressive possessions. It will immediately try to steal and wear/use them if possible, and take them back home with it to its homeworld.

4.  Entity is voraciously hungry and will begin to consume all organic matter it sees. It will prioritize meat over plant matter and will go after the nearest food source (the Summoner)

5.  The Entity is a fanatical Entropy Partisan and despises artifice in any form. It will try to destroy any artificial item or construction it sees, especially PCs’ items and clothes.

6.  Entity attempts to communicate in an uncanny genteel voice but it speaks in incomprehensible word salad, and can be easily offended into a murderous rampage if a PC says the wrong thing.

MAJOR CONSEQUENCES Entity is hostile, murderous, and insatiable AND…

1.  Summoner divides into two identical clones. They behave exactly the same, but one of them is filled by the Entity and it will burst forth to attack at the best opportunity. If the real Summoner dies, the Entity may cunningly usurp their place for the long term. (The Entity’s duration within this world does not start counting down until it reveals itself.)

2.  Entity and Summoner switch bodies, but nobody notices immediately, and the Entity has access to Summoner’s memories enough to perform a decent likeness of their personality.

3.  As the Entity gets pulled into this world, the caster gets pulled into the Entity’s world, and will remain there until the Entity returns.

4.  The Entity gains 1d6 HD, gains a new power, and proceeds to rampage against all living things (starting with the Summoner) until killed or its time expires.

5.  The Entity doubles its HD, gains d3 new powers, and proceeds to rampage against a randomly chosen living creature each round until killed or its time expires.

6.  1d10 additional Entities follow through after this one, generate each separately. They are all panicked and will lash out at random beings in the vicinity (including each other) until their time expires or all other creatures are dead.

DISASTERS Entity is malevolent, cunning, and deviously hostile AND…

1. “Get ‘em, boys!” 1d6+2 additional Entities follow through, generate each separately. They are a coordinated extraplanar death squad bent on the eradication of all non-summonable life, and will last in your world until killed.

2.  All humans and humanoids within 120’ swap bodies for the next 1d10 + Entity’s HD minutes. After the duration, they make a CON test to return to their original bodies.

3.  At end of the Entity’s turn each round, it casts Summon, using its HD as a modifier for rolls.

4.  The Entity brings some of its home plane with it. For each round that it is in this world, the surroundings change to become those of its homeworld, and they stay that way permanently.

5.  All creatures (including ambients, which will gather in swarms) within 120’ must make a WILL save or be puppet slaves to the Entity’s will until it leaves.

6.   All humanoids within 120’ have an identical clone appear next to them, that will try to fight them to the death. The loser disappears completely, winner is unquestionably the new person. The clone is a perfect physical copy that has exactly the opposite political and social views as the original character.

 

Changes and Credits

If I do not mention that a section was my own original content, the content of my playgroup, or was borrowed from the Random Esoteric Creature Generator, then it is part of the underlying structure of the spell from the Lamentations Core Book. 

-The step-by-step process remains largely the same, but I’ve tweaked the generation processes to encourage multiple dice being thrown simultaneously, which speeds things up.

-Instead of the original Form Table, we now have two tables, one for the Form the entity takes, and one for the Material the entity is made up of. The goal here was to try to develop a wider and more entertaining variety of outcomes for the entities. You will recognize many of the entries here from the Core Book, others are of my own devising.

-One of the issues my playgroup had with Summon is that entities very rarely showed up with appendages or powers. I’ve reworked the system that determines this. It’s less explosive, but adds interesting bits much more consistently.

-Each (adjective) and (noun) of an appendage now bring a small combat effect that you can feel free to ignore/make up, but this was so that busy DMs have an easy way to figure out what weird thing is going to happen to a player if they get poked. Quite a few of these table entries came from RECG and the Core Book, and filled in with my own bits.

-Powers are now a 2d6 36 entry table, made of 6 mini-tables that have been categorized so that DMs could use them to generate more specific powers. A lot of these powers have been borrowed from RECG, some were by me, and some of the most interesting ones were crowdsourced from my playgroup.

-The biggest change here is the consequences of a failed summon. The opposed domination roll is largely the same as the one in the Core Book, but I’ve expanded on the repercussions of failure. I’ve added Minor Consequences which result in the entity behaving in ways that aren’t overtly hostile, but will still cause significant problems to the players. You will recognize many of the Major Consequences and Disasters from the Core Book. What were known as Abstract Forms in the Core Book have been renamed to WORLD-SHATTERING DISASTERS, but those Core Book entries are goddamn masterpieces that I couldn’t find any ways to change.

-Formulaic Summoning was a way to reorganize the Thaumaturgic Circles and Sacrifices section in the Core Book. Planar Signatures are a way to give players the option to summon a specific entity again. These two are, in my opinion, the shaky areas of the project and most subject to change.
-Changes contributed by Angus Warman at http://meanderingbanter.blogspot.com/.