NUELOW at Christmas: Day Nineteen

HE KNOWS WHO'S BAD OR GOOD... 

BECAUSE SOME OF THEM ARE TRYING TO KILL HIM! 

The world's leading assassin, Madam Satan, is hired to kill Santa Claus. Confronting St. Nick awakens memories of Christmases long gone, and, in turn, brings a long-dormant part of her soul back to life. She turns from predator to protector... but will she be able to save Santa and the very heart of Christmas itself from the 12 killers that were brought in by the client to replace her?

NOT SINCE DIE HARD HAVE YOU SEEN 

A MORE ACTION-PACKED CHRISTMAS MOVIE!

COMING ONLY TO THEATERS DECEMBER 25, 2024...

NUELOW at Christmas: Day Eighteen

Dozens of centuries ago, a red dragon who is known as Brigid fell in love with the human winter festivals that eventually became Christmas. She continues her love affair with Christmas, and she has taken to spending some of her time creating magic candles that she secretly places in places where people of good cheer and kindness gather. Humans, when they notice them, have taken to referring to these mysterious magic items as candles of peace.

 

Brigid also uses the candles herself, placing them all over the part of her lair that is visible to humans. She sometimes invites heroes (such as the player characters) and disadvantaged children to spend all of Christmas Eve waiting up for Santa with her... and there's a 1d6 chance that he shows up slightly before dawn to visit with his biggest and oldest fan and those she think are worthy of getting gifts from him.

The rest of this post is presented under the Open Game License, and it presents rules for candles of peace for use in the d20 System and D&D compatible games.

Candle of Peace
Candles of Peace are found in churches and shrines to good-aligned deities. No one knows how they are created or by whom. They just seem to appear in dark corners  bundles of 2d4+4, on random festival days for the deity a given shrine, church, or temple is devoted to. If subjected to detect magic, candles of peace radiate faint auras of divine magic, but nothing more specific can be determined. Roll 1d6 to determine what color the candles are: 1-2 red; 3-4 white; 5-6 green.
   When lit, a candle of peace provides a +2 bonus to Will saves to resist fear effects, and a +2 bonus to Fortitude saves to resist disease, venoms, and poisons (magical and non-magical) within a 10-foot radius and sight of the candle's flame. Each candle can burn a total of 48 hours before completely expended. It can be lit and extinguished any number of times during that period. (Each time it is lit, the GM can assume that a minimum of 1/4 of an hour  of burn time is spent.)
   A candle of peace cannot be wet or submerged in water to work. It can be used to ignite flammable materials and substances. It can be extinguished by any means that would extinguish a normal candle.
   Up to four candles of peace can be lit at the same time and their benefits will stack, for a maximum bonus of +8. They cannot be more than 4 inches apart for the bonuses to stack. The radius of the effect never expands beyond the 10-foot radius.



Best Holiday wishes from your friends at NUELOW Games! Here's Mike Oldfield's fabulous version of "Silent Night" to help set the mood!

NUELOW at Christmas: Day Seventeen

THE DRAGON WHO LOVES CHRISTMAS

When she walks among humans, she calls herself "Brigid" in honor of a goddess she once knew. Her real name is too long and complicated for lesser beings to pronounce, so she doesn't even bother to tell them.

Brigid is one of the oldest living beings on Earth. Brigid is an ancient dragon.... an ancient red dragon. Unlike most of her kind, she not retreated to the elemental planes with the Titans and other ancient races who were driven from Earth by the Atlanteans. Instead, she has spent tens of thousands of years observing humanity as it developed from cave-dwelling scavengers to masters of the Earth and becoming capable of destruction on a level that not even red dragons can conceive of in their darkest imaginings.

Brigid first became interested in humanity when she noticed they had "tamed" fire and made it just another one of their tools. Over the millennia, she traveled among them in human form--dragons are all capable of taking whatever shape they like, but few bother to perfect the skill to the degree that Brigid has--and she has been worshipped as a goddess of fire and light (and sometimes destruction) by many cultures that have emerged and faded.

 

  

 
 

But out all the inventions and achievements she has witnessed grown out of human imagination and community were the celebrations of Saturnalia and Yule; she loved the chaotic way humans in that part of the world celebrated life and brought light to the darkest of seasons. She also enjoyed getting gifts and getting roaringly drunk and treating lucky crowds to amazing displays of fire magic.

As Christianity gained dominance and the ancient festivals merged into a celebration of the faith's central figure, Brigid's love of the festivities surrounded it only grew greater. The songs, the decorations, the setting aside of differences and coming together in peace--if only for brief moments. And by the time what we consider "modern day" had arrived, Brigid loved that Christmas was EVERYWHERE thanks to all the various human inventions' who needs magic when you have broadcast networks and Muzak in malls?!

Every Christmas, Brigid assumes the human form she considers her most perfect and dresses it in quirky Christmas outfits. She visits churches and community centers around the world; she crashes corporate and political Christmas parties; she approaches both the financial and cultural elite, as well as the poorest and most rejected members of societies, asking to help them celebrate Christmas.
If treated with a minimum of hospitality and good cheer, she is a good guest that brings much entertainment to the party. If she is treated warmly and generously, the generosity is returned. The party's hosts receive a charm that will bring good luck to them and their direct descendants for 100 years so long as they are kind and generous while guests who are nice to her receive charms that grant them good luck for the next year.

 

 

If those who are impoverished or on the fringes of human societies accept her offer to spend Christmas with them, they find themselves whisked away to a wondrous palace that reflects Yule and Christmas in all its forms. They are guests at a spectacular feast and leave with gifts both useful and desired, as well as money to get back on their feet and magically cured of whatever addictions of ailments they may have been suffering from.

On the other hand, if Brigid is rebuffed or treated rudely, she makes sure those who lack proper Christmas spirit have their Holiday Seasons ruined by unexplained fires. How severe those fires are depends on how badly Brigid is treated. If she is physically attacked, she will reveal her true from and lay waste to a swath of the land, killing dozens if not hundreds of people... but leaving those who violated the Spirit of Christmas alive and fully aware of what they unleashed.

NUELOW at Christmas: Day SixteenBessie Love and the Magical Mistletoe

It's the time of year when the Spirits of Christmas move across the land, randomly bestowing icons of the holidays with supernatural blessings. Among the things they empower is the mistletoe that hangs in the doorways of frisky young people.

 
During the Christmas Season of 1925, Bessie Love (silent movie star who secretly fought against supernatural evil as a costumed mystery woman), noticed that enchanted mistletoe was showing up at the parties she was attending. Even in her own house, the mistletoe that hung over the doorway to her sitting room suddenly became enchanted on Christmas Eve. 

The magic seemed to vary in strength and appeared harmless--perhaps even helpful in some cases--so it was a fairly low priority for her to track its origins. Instead, she collected the enchanted sprigs when possible and preserved them in her collection of magical artifacts. She noted they tended to regain their enchantment every Christmas Eve, even after they'd long since dried out.

Eventually, when she joined forces with Santa's Helpers to save Kris Kringle himself from certain doom in 1933, she discovered the true origin and nature of the enchanted mistletoe, even if she never did find out exactly what their full range of effects could be.

MAGICAL MISTLETOE
The Spirits of Christmas enchant random mistletoe sprigs in doorways to bestow various blessings from December 21 through January 5.

IS THE MISTLETOE MAGICAL?
Roll 1d6 to determine the nature of the mistletoe hung in the doorway.

1. Not magical, but still pretty (and a pretty good excuse for smooching).
2. Vampires may not cross through the doorway in which the mistletoe hangs, they cannot touch it, and anyone on the other side is immune to their mind-effecting powers.
3. Everyone who passes through the doorway in which the mistletoe hangs are instantly filled with a sense of comfort and joy. They receive a +4 bonus to all Charisma checks and Charisma-based skill checks that are done in acts of love and friendship or to defuse tense situations.

4. Unfaithful lovers feel compelled to confess their betrayal while under the mistletoe (Will save DC24 to resist).
5. Faithful lovers who kiss under the mistletoe gain the spell-like abilities of comprehend languages, discern lie and detect illusion as if they were 20th-level spellcasters.

6. Faithful lovers gain a +4 bonus to all saving skill checks, saving throws, and attack rolls made when fighting together or defending each other for 24 hours after kissing beneath the mistletoe.

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The text in this post is presented under the Open Game License and may be reproduced in accordance with its terms. Copyright Steve Miller 2017, 2024. (If you found this material useful and/or entertaining, please support our efforts by buying one of our products at DriveThruRPG.)

Also, for the record, both images of Bessie Love in this post are as fictitious as her career as a superhero. They were made using a specifically "trained" model at OpenArt.ai.

NUELOW at Christmas: Day Fifteen

There exists among us people who are touched by the Spirits of Christmas at birth. As children, they seem extra kind and extra cheerful (especially around the Holidays). When they turn 16, the Spirits visit the individual and offer them a chance to become a Santa's Helper.

A pair of Santa's Helpers

 

SANTA'S HELPER 
(d20 System rules, presented under the Open Game License. Copyright 2024 by Steve Miller)
During character creation, the player declares that his character chose to become a Santa's Helper. (This can also be rolled randomly if the GM prefers; the character is a Santa's Helper on a roll of 001 on percentile dice.)
  In addition to all standard class abilities and bonus feats, a Santa's Helper gains the following abilities for two days out of the year, December 24 and 25.
  Joy of Fellowship: The character and his closest allies (other PCs for example) gain a +1 bonus to all saving throws, attack rolls, and skill checks.
  Spellcasting: The character may cast a number of spells from the following list a number of times per day equal to his Wisdom + Charisma bonus. He casts the spell by making a gesture (such as twitching his nose or winking, with no other components required): Animal Friendship, Detect Thoughts, Disguise Self, Fabricate, Knock, Nondetection, Passwall, Telekinesis.
   Bonus Feat: The character adds Naughty or Nice to the selection of available bonus feats. The ability gained from this feat is available all year long.

   Drawback: A Santa's Helper is expected to be kind and helpful to all but the most naughty and outright evil beings. If he or she is mean or violent toward an innocent, friendly, or harmless target, he or she instantly loses his mystical status and all benefits that come with it..

   Special: If Santa requires assistance in delivering gifts to good children, or if there's a particular threat that is stopping him from visiting an area that requires the sort of skills and attention that only a player character can bring to bear, he or she is asked to spring into action. (Hopefully, the other party members will go along to help the Helper!) 

NUELOW at Christmas: Day Fourteen

The text in today's post is released under the Open Game License and may be reproduced in accordance with it. Copyright 2024 by Steve Miller.

MAGICAL CHRISTMAS COOKIES

A powerful person (rich, well-connected, a sorcerer, sorcerer-related, or just with access to magic), or perhaps even Santa himself, has gifted the player characters with a tin of magical Christmas cookies. Each type of cookie has a different effect (described on a piece of parchment in the tin), and it lasts for 8 hours or until another cookie from the tin is eaten. Each type of cookie is separated from the others by a thin sheet of paper.

    Danish Vanilla Wreaths (8 in the tin): +4 bonus to Bluff and Diplomacy skill checks. Ability to understand all Scandinavian languages.

    Gingerbread Santas (8 in the tin): +4 bonus to Move Silently and Hide skill checks. Ability to fall from up to 10 ft. and suffer no damage.

    Russian Tea Cakes (8 in the tin): +4 bonus to Gather Information and Intimidate skill checks. Ability to understand Russian.

    Shortbread Cookie (8 in the tin): +1 to all saving throws.

    Sugar Cookie Jesus (8 in the tin): Heal 1d6+1 hit points with a touch, up to a number of times equal to Wisdom+Charisma bonuses.

    White Christmas Chocolate Chip (8 in the tin): -2 damage from all elemental sources.

Although the cookies are the main attraction, but tin itself is also mildly magical. It keeps any food items placed within it fresh and edible without a need for refrigeration. The food items will still spoil at their normal rate.

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NUELOW at Christmas: Day Thirteen

Sometimes, Santa needs a little help making his rounds on Christmas Eve. Sometimes, it gets so bad that even his regular staff of Helpers can't provide enough support. During these times, Noelle Candy, one of Santa's Helper's who specializes in Helper Recruitment & Training, reaches out to suitable candidates to serve as temporary workers to get the job done.

Noelle Candy, Santa's Recruitment Specialist

In 2023, she reached out to several... well... beings on the Naughty List that she knew wanted to made amends for past dark deeds. They performed so well that she's invited them back for this year. So, if Santa can't make it to your house, one of these special hires will.

Marvin the Zombie Master, an Undead Necromancer Who's Changed

 

Garry Loop, a Werewolf Who Got Bit by the Christmas Spirit

The Grim Reaper, Trying to Rehabilitate his Reputation

Jason Vorhees, Hoping to Kill Some Naughty Kids

Roll 1d6 against the tables to see how present delivery goes on Christmas Eve.

WHO BRINGS PRESENTS TO THE PC's HOME?

1. Santa, the Big Man Himself

2. Noelle Candy

3. Marvin the Zombie Master

4. Garry Loop the Werewolf

5. The Grim Reaper

6. Jason Vorhees

WHAT HAPPENS IF THE PCs CONFRONTS THE GIFT-BRINGER PEACEFULLY?

1-2. He or she wishes them a 'Merry Christmas', asks where the milk and cookies are.

3. He or she flees without leaving presents.

4. He or she gives the PCs a one-shot blessing, giving them a +4 bonus to a single die roll.

5-6. He or she grants them a benefit specific to the Gift-Giver until next January 6.

       Santa: Grants a +2 bonus to skill checks involving being stealthy.

       Noelle: Grants a +2 bonus to skill checks involving eliciting loyalty.

       Marvin: Grants a +2 bonus to damage dealt to undead foes.

       Garry: Grants a +2 bonus to damage dealt to lycanthropes.

       The Grim Reaper: Grants a +2 bonus to resist illness and infections.

       Jason Vorhees: Grants a +2 bonus to attacks and damage rolls.

WHAT HAPPENS IF THE PCs CONFRONTS THE GIFT-BRINGER 

WITH HOSTILITY?

1-2. He or she tries to flee without leaving presents. If pursued, he or she 

       fights back.

3-4. He or she drops all the gifts and flees. 1d4 hours later, 20 armed elves 

        show up to retrieve the gifts, fighting the PCs if necessary. The initial

        gift-giver will fight back if pursued.

5.     He or she will fight to the death if necessary. 1d4 hours later, 20 armed

        elves arrive to avenge the Helper.

6.     He or she tries to reason with the PC and resolve the confrontation

        peacefully. If that fails, he or she will fight to the death if forced to.