[Class] Trapped Demiurge

This concept and class was super experimental, and in all honesty, not really that good. However the concept of a powerful but also limited God or divine spirit being able to be a player character has always been a concept I wanted to experiment with. And here it is.

Trapped Demiurge

N/A

N/A

You are a creator being; left over since the beginning of the world. You're not THE demiurge, you are a tiny fractal part of the original creator. You are many places below the supreme being(s) in the celestial hierarchy. Most demiurges like yourself went into a long sleep after the world was made, absorbing your being into inanimate and ancient objects and places. Once within, they were trapped inside the objects that housed their spirit, but could alter reality as they saw fit.

Some Demiruges stayed around, perhaps to rule the created world. Some of them may have become the greater demons- corrupted by greed and power. Others may have become haughty ancient spirits of magic, only accessible to mortals and immortals by many long decades of study and introspection and spiritual purity. You are one of the ones who went to sleep and only woke up recently. Perhaps you lived within a stone roadside temple, accepting many small sacrifices and not becoming arrogant but instead satisfied and slothful, your prison being destroyed or somehow having you essence transferred into a new medium. Or perhaps the object you were originally housed in

As a Demiurge, you are a spirit. You cannot be harmed by physical attacks, nor can you interact with physical objects. You have localized (and limited) omnipresence and omniscience. You do not have a body, or the approximation of one in spirit form- beyond the body of the object you inhabit. You are more of a general presence that exists within an area around your object. You can only communicate through a medium, such as tea leaves or a spirit board, or through the whining voice of a white whistling dog; specially trained for spirits to speak through. Most Demiurges don't speak at all, and instead focus their abilities on helping those they've come across.

Just because you are an immortal and ancient being, doesn't mean you don't have feelings. You are like the Gods of the world, in which case you feel emotions and desires even more strongly then normal people. Your dedication and emotion is much greater then a normal persons capacity for it, simply put, and even a minor act of kindness you receive are returned as massive displays of affection and unconditional love. Most Demiurges are awoken when their object receives this kind of care; the ancient ceremonial blade is sharpened and polished, or an old painted carriage is redone and has its wheels realigned and ready to ride again. You instantly align to the persons who treated you so kindly, hence why you help them.

Mechanics

You don't have stats. Ignore whatever stats you rolled at character creation- this class may be used to offer an out to players who roll terrible starting stats where rerolls aren't allowed. Instead, roll 2d6 to determine your starting Rend, then roll 1d4 to determine your object class. Finally, subtract your object class roll from your Rend and the result number is your starting Potence- This ensures those with a poor object class and high rend will have a high amount of potence and vice-versa. If you get the unlikely result of 0 or a negative number, just set your potence to 1.

Object Class Table- 1d4

[1] Small, simplistic objects. Urn, bag, small statuette, handful of marbles, a single painting. You lack most useful forms of both inherent animation and function. You are not a weapon and do not gain any particular bonus to attacking.

[2] Small to medium sized objects of slight complexity. A skull with mandible, a cloak, a dagger, a chessboard. If your form is a weapon then you can attack at 1d4 by using a Lesser animation action.

[3] Medium sized objects of moderate complexity. Sword, a wheeled toy or rocking horse, a cabinet. Weapon can deal 1 damage on a trivial animation action or 1d6 on a Lesser animation action.

[4] Large objects and/or medium objects of high complexity. Grandfather clock, carriage, crossbow, chest with combination lock. Deal do 1d8 damage on a Lesser animation action if you're a weapon.

You don't have AC or health. Whatever object you have is your only source of stable being in this world. If it is destroyed, you are broken apart and scattered to the aether until mended once more. Every 1d6 years you spend broken apart you lose a Demiurge level, as your memories and magic fades over time. You can also be temporarily banished by a Cleric turning you or Magic User using binding and Abjuration spells- despite being above both of them in the celestial hierarchy, their crass methods can still be effective. Whenever you are forced to avoid being banished, you must roll over your Rend on a d20 roll. You also use this method for all non-specific saving throws.

Rend is your negative emotional state as well as the negative and vile magic and thoughts of others you've soaked up like a sponge. Whenever someone you are protecting and caring for dies, you cease to exist for 1d4 exploration turns by the mental anguish and gain a permanent point of Rend. You can also gain Rend by being vandalized, mocked, or otherwise mistreated as an object. You can also remove a point of Rend whenever a person you care for gains a level up or conquers a great personal obstacle.

Rend can also be removed through active release; to do so, you must use your abilities to do something that negatively impacts the party. For example, if one character is worrying and speaking aloud about the horrible goblins that live near this cave, the Demiurge may conjure those creatures as enemies, which act under the dungeon master's control and act exactly as they would, with all the danger and consequence of regular foes. The Demiurge then may remove Rend equal to the number of Potence used. It is for this reason items containing Demiurges are thought of as being equal parts blessed and cursed, and can sometimes lead to truly hopeless Demiurges into endless negative loops of despair- they find new friends, their rend causes them to create bad situations, their friends die, and they gain back even more Rend then before.

You don't cast spells- but you are infused with magical powers. Every ability you have costs potence to invoke. Each use costs 1 Potence, which only returns at the start of a new adventure. As you level up, you gain more Potence as well as more powerful abilities you can use.

Level	Animation	Conjuration	Transformation	Domination	Entrapment
1	Trivial	Trivial	X	X	X
2	Trivial	Trivial	X	X	X
3	Lesser	Trivial	X	Trivial	X
4	Lesser	Lesser	Trivial	Trivial	X
5	Lesser	Lesser	Trivial	Trivial	X
6	Major	Lesser	Lesser	Lesser	Trivial
7	Major	Major	Lesser	Lesser	Trivial
8	Grand	Major	Major	Major	Lesser
9	Grand	Grand	Major	Major	Lesser
10	Grand	Grand	Grand	Grand	Major

Abilities

Each type of ability can be used as many times per day as you wish, as long as you have enough Potence. Particularly powerful or complex use of your abilities may cost additional potence. The graph above shows the maximum power you can perform with your abilities of each type, which increase with level.

Animation lets you move your object; typically things are animated in accordance to how the object could normally move. Round objects roll, fabric slithers and glides, big things take steps, etc. Trivial actions are akin to a small nudge, where as Lesser would be a powerful shove or a controlled motion over several seconds. Major moves the object as though it was fully controlled; such as levitation as it was being carried or long-term motion via rolling on its wheels. Grand allows for breaking the rules and allowing true flight or human-like full body motion on the object.

Conjuration allows the Demiurge to conjure beings, objects, and elemental energies into being. Trivial conjurations can create match stick sized flames, creatures with less then 1 HD, or small basic objects like wooden cups and stakes. Grand conjurations can create fully realized people or monsters with several HD or levels, with preset motivations and magical abilities as well as create storms from nothing and create magical artifacts of a moderate power level. All creations made by a Demiurge are considered real for all purposes of spells and magic, sexual reproduction, and are all permanent. Unlike conjurations made by magic, these creations have minds of their own and while they can be steered based on their personality and memories given to them, they cannot be controlled further by the Demiurge without casting Domination powers on them.

Transformation allows the Demiurge to change their own form. Trivial changes include things like colors, shapes, textures, smells, and other small things that cannot deal damage or cause anything more then a distraction. Lesser Transformations could grant useful properties like enhanced durability or buoyancy, where as Major and Grand could change the physical form such as granting magic wings that grant flight to vehicle-bound demiurges, or even create a human body out of the object, which only comes undone upon the body's “death”, it's flesh turning back into the object of which the demiurge is bound forever within.

Domination grants the powers of mind control to the Demiurge. Trivial actions can only help steer people and control the moods of animals, where as Grand can totally change a person's entire mind or personality, or create wild fantasies that only that person can see. Using this power in tandem with Conjuration lets you control what you create fully- helping your friends or mentally controlling your enemies to keep them away. Most mind-controlling actions allow a saving throw to resist, but you can avoid it by paying an extra Potence if you are at least capable of a “Major” domination power.

Entrapment is the final power of the Demiurge. It is used to trap other spiritual beings, and eventually, living beings within objects or within yourself, in the same way you are. Trivial only works on small nature spirits, where as Lesser can trap ghosts, Major can trap even more powerful spirits like demons and even weak living creatures, with Grand being able to permanently trap even Gods and other Demiurges within objects, though such traps will always be temporarily for such powerful beings. Normally Demiurges cannot trap beings like this unless you somehow became more powerful then them, which would require methods outside of leveling to become even more potent.

At 10^th level, you become a Pantheurge and most broaden your horizons to the wider universe. You are no longer bound to your object and can travel where you wish as long as you have a medium- such as floating up to the sky to go with the clouds or sinking to the sea to travel with the ocean currents. But the pain and steady weight of this world's burdens tempt you to leave it. Technically you never stop leveling, but this is the most powerful kind of Demiurge you can control as a player.

Additionally, you gain the ability to directly transfer Rend into yourself by absorbing the corruption and death of a place or from a being; this causes your original containing object to rot and decay away even though you are no longer bound to it. It also becomes harder for you to get rid of Rend- now your concerns encompass entire villages and many cultures of people, not just your small group of adventuring pals. Every season roll a d20 against your Rend- If you ever roll under your Rend value, you leave the Earth to create your own fractal dimension.

You're the car, basically.