The Impaled

The Prophet Luther was believed to be truly bound with God. When he spoke his golden voice would boom out with righteous vigour, telling of the paradise that awaited all who would lay aside their blasphemous ways and follow the good Lord.

He grew exasperated, tired of all the Sin that he was confronted with everywhere he went. When he one night awoke to find one of his own flock masturbating over a woodcut of the Virgin Mary, he nearly gave up hope.

As he oversaw the lashing of the degenerate, he was said to have experienced a Vision. The Lord spoke to him and detailed a ceremony he could perform that would exalt he and the pure of his followers to a state of divinity, granting them the ability to purge the Sin from the world.

Luther took his followers that he knew to be honest and god-fearing to a mountaintop and performed the act to the rising sun. Upon completion, there was nothing but silence. The assembled looked around carefully, unsure of what to expect, when suddenly several spears of blood erupted from the sky and pierced downwards at the group. The sanguine cruor bolts nailed them all to the earth via their skulls, their cries of pain scorching the morning sky. Just as suddenly as they had arrived the bolts collapsed and funnelled into the brains of their targets, and leaving the victims gaping upon the barren ground.

When they arose, they found the knowledge in them that they could consume the sins of the world in a most literal sense. It didn’t take long for most of them to feel the desire to turn the power to their own needs, consuming the favourable traits of humanity. The Prophet Luther tried desperately to keep them under control, urging them to use this power to do God’s work, but instead found himself torn to pieces by his flock and devoured.

The Impaled, as they’ve come to be known, split up and now roam the land. They can be identified by the red scar upon their forehead, the mark from the heavens, and of course by the monstrosities some of them have become; some look like badly formed patchwork dolls, a horrible collaboration of glorious attributes.

Consume

The Impaled cease to naturally evolve or develop. Instead they must consume the attributes of others if they wish to progress or improve in life.

When faced with a fallen foe, the Impaled can devour the body in its entirety. While they chomp away at the flesh, they focus their desire on the part they want to incorporate into their own body. After the enemy is completely destroyed, the Impaled feel a torrent of energy surge through their own body; they writhe in pleasure as their mortal shell rebuilds itself to use the new body part. This could be better muscles to lend greater strength, better hands to increase their locking picking abilities, even better looks.

The Mechanics

They gain a new ability, Consume. This can be used once per day on one target (target must either be dead or at least unable to resist). The player picks the desired skill/ability/trait of the target then roll a Save vs Poison. A failure leads to a roll on the This isn’t what I ordered! table below. It takes a number of rounds equal to the target’s HD to Consume successfully – if the character is interrupted, assume a failed Saving throw and roll on the table anyway.

An Impaled character can no longer gain experience.

Should the Impaled wish to do so, they can also consume animal parts; perhaps they wish for the teeth of a tiger, the ability to turn their neck around like an owl or what have you. It’s your call on this one, really.

This Isn’t What I Ordered!

1. While eating you begin to cough violently and feel yourself choking on the foe. Take 1d4 damage, can’t eat properly for 1d4 days while you recover. You are also unable to attempt Consume again on this foe.
2. You think its worked, but in fact you’ve managed to corrupt yourself. The target ability/skill/feature suffers the reverse of what you hoped to achieve; if for example you were consuming a Stealth increase skill of 3 over your existing 2, your Stealth is now at 1.
3. The Consume fails, and your left physically affected in some way related. For example perhaps you were trying to consume the strength of a foe – now your limbs are covered in severe scarring and burn marks.
4. The character explodes in a pillar of blood, piercing the heavens above. The torrent of blood carries on for a good few minutes as every part of the body is pulverised and ejected into the atmosphere. Time to roll a new character.
5. Something goes terribly wrong. While you feel the pleasurable change in your body, it carries on longer than it should. You realise with horror that which you have consumed is being added to your body, not replacing. Furthermore, the newly added appendage or skill is useless. [The Consume has had no statistical effect, but the character now has for example a useless extra arm or similar hanging off their body. Adjust their Charisma value with a suitable modifier to reflect this.]
6. As you swallow the last morsel, you start convulsing. You abdomen begins to bulge, your bones break and reset into new positions, your skin rips and tears over your flesh as your muscles reshape. Your last thoughts amidst the maelstrom of pain are of terror as you feel your consciousness blasted away into oblivion as that which you sought to consume instead takes over you. [Treat as character death, as the character has now become the target. The target is now alive again, though its memory will be hazy for a few rounds]

Introducing the Impaled into your Game

The spears of blood from the heavens could happen at any point. A magic-user could be trying to recreate the process, one of your players may have picked up a cursed item, or perhaps they encounter an Impaled and decide to consume the monster to gain its powers.

When I was writing this, I envisaged the Impaled getting more fucked as time goes by, creatures that are incapable of progressing. The chances are that your players would relish this. As a result, it could be interesting to tuck away a middle finger in the form of only allowing a certain number of Consume's before the mind of the character becomes a garbled mess, or have the Save vs. Poison value increase with each Consume to increase the chances of becoming a monstrosity.

For other strange or unusual classes we've created, check here. Please let us know if you decide to use them or a variation of them in your sessions, feedback gives us a warm fuzzy glow.