Hashmalum
2016-08-07, 06:21 PM
So I haven't played 3.5E for a while, but recently I became obsessed with Binder for some reason, and I came up with a bunch of new vestiges. I'll post 3 to start with, and then I'll post more as I finish them if there's any interest. Most of my vestiges are NPCs from well-known adventures from past editions of D&D, although there are also some from the Ars Goetia and some warped versions of real world mythological figures. Besides critique of my work, I'd also appreciate it if anyone has a list of other peoples' homebrewed vestiges that are generally considered good, both in flavor and mechanics.
Cimeries, the Questing Marquis
Once a paladin, then an undead treasure hunter, Cimeries lends his summoner his prowess at the arts of rhetoric, combat and treasure hunting.
Vestige Level: 6th
Binding DC: DC 25
Special Requirement: Yes
Legend: Cimeries was once a mighty paladin, whose heroic deeds eventually earned him the title of marquis. His battles against the undead in particular were legendary, and as a result he acquired an archenemy: a notorious necromancer. Eventually, his archenemy defeated him, but rather than kill him, he decided on a novel form of torture instead: the necromancer stole Cimeries' soul and hid it in a golden circlet, rendering him undead and unable to rest in peace until the circlet was recovered. However, the circlet was cursed to teleport away whenever Cimeries came close to it.
Stripped of his paladin abilities and shunned as a creature of the night, Cimeries had no purpose in existence except to undo and avenge the wrong that was done to him. He devoted his unlife to hunting down the circlet, and became very good at tracking it down. Eventually, he somehow cornered it, and it vanished into the only place it had to go: nowhere. Cimeries followed it, becoming a vestige.
Special Requirement: Cimeries empathizes with those who have had something precious to them stolen. In order to bind Cimeries, you must have had something precious to you stolen away (not destroyed) by another and never returned. A kidnapped loved one counts, but something abstract like "my sense of safety" does not; it must be something that can be taken back. Furthermore, Cimeries hates Acererak, Kas, Sakatha, and Tenebrous and will not answer your call if you are bound to those vestiges, nor will they answer your call if you are bound to Cimeries.
Manifestation: A black horse rides into Cimeries' seal. On its back is a figure clad head-to-toe in full plate mail and carrying a shield; the shield bears a heraldic crest and the symbol of a Lawful Good religion. The mail-clad figure dismounts and bows to his summoner; he then raises his visor, revealing the face of a skull wearing a golden circlet. The skull-faced figure then speaks, in a bold yet courteous manner, greeting the binder, introducing himself, and requesting that the binder do likewise.
Sign: The skin on your head pales, shrinks, and becomes taut, making your skull prominent. You can still be recognized as yourself, but appear cadaverously ill.
Influence: You become obsessive about finding hidden treasure. If you overcome an opponent or encounter a trap, you must search that opponent and/or location at least once.
Granted Abilities: Cimeries grants you his combat prowess, ability to find things, increased ability to persuade others, and knowledge of nobility.
Art of Rhetoric: You may reroll a failed Diplomacy check. You may only use this ability once per 5 rounds.
Cimeries' Skill: You gain the base attack bonus of a fighter of your character level, potentially giving you more iterative attacks.
Cimeries' Strength: You gain a +6 enhancement bonus to Strength and one temporary hit point per effective binder level.
Forever Searching: You gain a +12 competence bonus to Search checks; furthermore, you receive an automatic Search check for finding hidden doors when coming within 5 feet of them, like an elf. If you already have this ability, you gain an additional +1 to Search checks to find hidden doors.
Marquis' Knowledge: You gain a +12 competence bonus to Knowledge (nobility and royalty) and may make Knowledge (nobility and royalty) skill checks untrained.
Treasure Quest: You gain the benefit of find the path, except that it tells you how to get to the locale where a specific object known to you can be found. This ability is useless with regards to finding the object within the locale; other abilities, such as locate object or Andromalius' locate item ability, will be needed for that. You may only use this ability once per hour.
Desayeus, the God Who Was Banned
Desayeus was once a god who defied a cosmic ban and paid the ultimate price. Those who bind him gain his defiance, his weapons of light, and the ability to strengthen and protect souls.
Vestige Level: 6th
Binding DC: 26
Special Requirement: Yes
Legend: There exist commandments handed down since time immemorial of uncertain origin that even gods fear to disobey. One such commandment is the Ban of the Unborn: a decree that in order to protect the free will of mortals, no god may influence the ultimate source of mortal souls. Desayeus was a god who did not fear the Ban of the Unborn, which he considered to be a mere myth. When Desayeus tried to take the protection of unborn souls as part of his portfolio, he was struck down, stripped of divinity, and imprisoned for all time by a group of other gods who feared that Desayeus' folly would bring down the wrath of the Ban of the Unborn upon all the gods.
After an age-long imprisonment, there came to be a growing plague of soulless births on the material plane, caused by the dragon Ashardalon taking up residence in the Bastion of Souls. An artifact belonging to Desayeus was necessary to solving the problem, but Desayeus refused to give it up. So a group of mortal adventures breached Desayeus' prison and struck him down, taking the artifact by force. Desayeus fought to his last breath, but when he finally perished, his remains were nowhere to be found. Some say that the Ban of Unborn was responsible for his final fate, ultimately banning him from the cosmos and dooming him to existence as a vestige.
Special Requirement: Desayeus hates Ashardalon and will not answer your call if your are bound to him at the time of his summoning. Likewise, Ashardalon cannot be bound if you are already binding Desayeus.
Manifestation: A faint white light begins to glow in Desayeus' seal. As the light becomes stronger, it begins to take form: a huge, classically handsome male whose body is strangely covered with small, seemingly randomly-attached wings with rainbow-colored feathers. Binder scholars believe that these wings are the remains of his lillend faithful, who followed him first into exile and then into death. Desayeus' head is lowered and he lays, slumping, on the ground in a position of exhaustion and despair. When at last he raises his head and opens his eyes to regard his summoner, he speaks in a pleasing voice with a weary tone, asking why he has been summoned.
Sign: Your entire body emits a faint, pale glow. This isn't enough to see in darkness to an appreciable degree (although it does make you visible in the dark). Worn clothing blocks the glow of the covered parts of the body, but unless you are bundled up from head to toe, Desayeus' sign will be visible whenever you are in dim light or darkness.
Influence: Under Desayeus' influence, you ignore others' attempts to tell you not to do things. Also, you must express skepticism of legendary or mythical commandments, warnings, and dangers.
Granted Abilities: Desayeus lends you his stubbornness, the properties of his weapon, and abilities related to his former portfolio.
Brilliant Energy: As a free action, you may bestow or remove the brilliant energy special ability to any weapon you wield, including natural weapons. If the weapon leaves your hands, the property fades in one round.
Font of Souls: By touch, you may bestow a positive level upon a living creature or construct. This positive level either cancels out the target's most recently gained negative level, or grants a +1 bonus to attack rolls, saving throws, ability checks, and skill checks as well as 5 temporary hit points and a +1 bonus to character level for purposes of abilities used by the target. (The positive level from this effect does not last long enough to bestow additional spell slots.) This effect lasts 1 minute per effective binder level and does not stack with itself, although the temporary hit points from this ability stack with other sources of temporary hit points. If the target would gain a negative level while under this effect, the positive level effect is canceled instead.
Guardian of Souls: You may bestow an effect equal to the spell death ward to a living creature by touch.
Headstrong: You are immune to compulsions. Moreover, against anyone who uses a compulsion effect on you, you gain a bonus to attack rolls, damage, and saving throws of +1 per 4 effective binder levels for 1 minute.
Keraptis, the Living Spell
A powerful evil wizard once created a copy of himself as a living spell in his search for immortality. Now, that copy has become a vestige with the power to grant arcane spellcasting and infect other spellcasters.
Vestige Level: 5th
Binding DC: DC 25
Special Requirement: Yes
Legend: Long ago in a distant land, a powerful wizard named Keraptis became obsessed with immortality. He took up residence in a dungeon beneath a smoldering volcano, where his experiments into the nature of life created many strange fungal monsters. However, none of these brought him the immortality that he sought. At one point in his search for immortality, he hit upon the radical concept of turning himself into a living spell and living on forever in the minds of others. His preliminary research was successful; he created a number of spell scrolls that contained living spells that contained partial copies of his personality and knowledge. However, even as he was on the verge of complete success, he became afraid of the idea of undergoing such a radical transformation and abandoned his research. The scrolls with the living spells were hidden away and forgotten.
Keraptis eventually heard rumors of a mysterious, shadowy plane of existence where immortality could be found, and turned all his efforts to penetrating this plane. He was successful in opening a planar portal, and stepped through it and out of all human knowledge. Meanwhile, the dungeon in which his servants lived gradually fell into disorder. Eventually, the hidden cache where the living spells were stored was breached, and the scrolls read by no less than four spellcasters. The result was disastrous, as there were suddenly four powerful wizards each of whom considered himself to be the real Keraptis. The four each quickly accumulated followers from among the dungeon's inhabitants, and began to war with each other.
This did not suit the wizard's remaining faithful servants, and an efreet organized a resistance against the impostors. The efreet correctly believed that the real Keraptis had to be summoned from another plane to put an end to his false copies. With the aid of some interloping adventurers, the summons was successful. A safety measure in the living spells caused them to be evicted from their host minds once the real Keraptis returned to the material plane, and the crisis was over. However, no god has prepared an afterlife for living spells, and so the evicted living spells drifted outside the cosmos and coalesced into a vestige.
Special Requirement: You must be literate in at least one language and have an Intelligence of 11 or better to host Keraptis; if you are not, it will not answer your call.
Manifestation: An ancient scroll appears in Keraptis' seal. The scroll is sealed with a pale wax seal bearing the imprint of an ancient bearded face (said to be that of Keraptis's original mortal body). The seal splits in a puff of white smoke, and the scroll opens, revealing an unreadable arcane-looking text; the letters of this text change shape and move even as they are read. Suddenly, the text rearranges itself into a message in a language that the binder knows, asking who it is that wishes to host the glory that is Keraptis, the Living Spell.
Sign: Random arcane glyphs appear beneath your skin on one location on your body of your choosing.
Influence: You become paranoid that others are impersonating you and scheming to replace you. This makes you strangely insecure in your own identity, which you must announce to everyone that you meet.
Granted Abilities: Keraptis grants you his spellcasting, the ability to scribe spells, the ability to infect others' minds via scribed spells, and concentration.
Concentration: You gain a +12 competence bonus to Concentration checks.
Infectious Personality: When you scribe a scroll or spell in a spellbook, you may choose to make it an infectious scroll or infectious scribed spell for no extra cost. An infectious scroll or spell causes any creature that reads and understands it to become infected with a fragment of your personality, becoming dominated as the spell dominate person if it fails a Will save.
You are aware whenever someone becomes infected, learning their name, race, occupation, and general location. You may only have one such infected victim at any one time; if an additional subject becomes infected while you already have an infected victim, you may choose whether to release the original and gain the new subject, or keep the original and release the new subject.
Like all vestige abilities, the effects of this one stop operating when you die or are no longer binding Keraptis; while any scribed scrolls and spells continue to exist, they lose their infectious property.
Keraptis' Spells: When you bind to Keraptis, you gain a number of prepared arcane spells and the ability to cast them as a wizard of your effective binder level. These spells are: magic missile (x3), fireball, dimension door (x2), spell resistance (x2), and wall of force. Note that only the ability to prepare and cast spells without arcane spellcaster class levels is a supernatural ability, not the spells themselves, which are subject to spell resistance, armor failure chance, Concentration checks to avoid being interrupted, etc. Your caster level is equal to your effective binder level.
Scribe Spell: You gain the benefit of the Scribe Scroll feat with regard to Keraptis' spells, or any other spells that you happen to know. You may also scribe Kerpatis' spells in a spellbook as if you were a wizard with class level equal to your effective binder level.
Cimeries, the Questing Marquis
Once a paladin, then an undead treasure hunter, Cimeries lends his summoner his prowess at the arts of rhetoric, combat and treasure hunting.
Vestige Level: 6th
Binding DC: DC 25
Special Requirement: Yes
Legend: Cimeries was once a mighty paladin, whose heroic deeds eventually earned him the title of marquis. His battles against the undead in particular were legendary, and as a result he acquired an archenemy: a notorious necromancer. Eventually, his archenemy defeated him, but rather than kill him, he decided on a novel form of torture instead: the necromancer stole Cimeries' soul and hid it in a golden circlet, rendering him undead and unable to rest in peace until the circlet was recovered. However, the circlet was cursed to teleport away whenever Cimeries came close to it.
Stripped of his paladin abilities and shunned as a creature of the night, Cimeries had no purpose in existence except to undo and avenge the wrong that was done to him. He devoted his unlife to hunting down the circlet, and became very good at tracking it down. Eventually, he somehow cornered it, and it vanished into the only place it had to go: nowhere. Cimeries followed it, becoming a vestige.
Special Requirement: Cimeries empathizes with those who have had something precious to them stolen. In order to bind Cimeries, you must have had something precious to you stolen away (not destroyed) by another and never returned. A kidnapped loved one counts, but something abstract like "my sense of safety" does not; it must be something that can be taken back. Furthermore, Cimeries hates Acererak, Kas, Sakatha, and Tenebrous and will not answer your call if you are bound to those vestiges, nor will they answer your call if you are bound to Cimeries.
Manifestation: A black horse rides into Cimeries' seal. On its back is a figure clad head-to-toe in full plate mail and carrying a shield; the shield bears a heraldic crest and the symbol of a Lawful Good religion. The mail-clad figure dismounts and bows to his summoner; he then raises his visor, revealing the face of a skull wearing a golden circlet. The skull-faced figure then speaks, in a bold yet courteous manner, greeting the binder, introducing himself, and requesting that the binder do likewise.
Sign: The skin on your head pales, shrinks, and becomes taut, making your skull prominent. You can still be recognized as yourself, but appear cadaverously ill.
Influence: You become obsessive about finding hidden treasure. If you overcome an opponent or encounter a trap, you must search that opponent and/or location at least once.
Granted Abilities: Cimeries grants you his combat prowess, ability to find things, increased ability to persuade others, and knowledge of nobility.
Art of Rhetoric: You may reroll a failed Diplomacy check. You may only use this ability once per 5 rounds.
Cimeries' Skill: You gain the base attack bonus of a fighter of your character level, potentially giving you more iterative attacks.
Cimeries' Strength: You gain a +6 enhancement bonus to Strength and one temporary hit point per effective binder level.
Forever Searching: You gain a +12 competence bonus to Search checks; furthermore, you receive an automatic Search check for finding hidden doors when coming within 5 feet of them, like an elf. If you already have this ability, you gain an additional +1 to Search checks to find hidden doors.
Marquis' Knowledge: You gain a +12 competence bonus to Knowledge (nobility and royalty) and may make Knowledge (nobility and royalty) skill checks untrained.
Treasure Quest: You gain the benefit of find the path, except that it tells you how to get to the locale where a specific object known to you can be found. This ability is useless with regards to finding the object within the locale; other abilities, such as locate object or Andromalius' locate item ability, will be needed for that. You may only use this ability once per hour.
Desayeus, the God Who Was Banned
Desayeus was once a god who defied a cosmic ban and paid the ultimate price. Those who bind him gain his defiance, his weapons of light, and the ability to strengthen and protect souls.
Vestige Level: 6th
Binding DC: 26
Special Requirement: Yes
Legend: There exist commandments handed down since time immemorial of uncertain origin that even gods fear to disobey. One such commandment is the Ban of the Unborn: a decree that in order to protect the free will of mortals, no god may influence the ultimate source of mortal souls. Desayeus was a god who did not fear the Ban of the Unborn, which he considered to be a mere myth. When Desayeus tried to take the protection of unborn souls as part of his portfolio, he was struck down, stripped of divinity, and imprisoned for all time by a group of other gods who feared that Desayeus' folly would bring down the wrath of the Ban of the Unborn upon all the gods.
After an age-long imprisonment, there came to be a growing plague of soulless births on the material plane, caused by the dragon Ashardalon taking up residence in the Bastion of Souls. An artifact belonging to Desayeus was necessary to solving the problem, but Desayeus refused to give it up. So a group of mortal adventures breached Desayeus' prison and struck him down, taking the artifact by force. Desayeus fought to his last breath, but when he finally perished, his remains were nowhere to be found. Some say that the Ban of Unborn was responsible for his final fate, ultimately banning him from the cosmos and dooming him to existence as a vestige.
Special Requirement: Desayeus hates Ashardalon and will not answer your call if your are bound to him at the time of his summoning. Likewise, Ashardalon cannot be bound if you are already binding Desayeus.
Manifestation: A faint white light begins to glow in Desayeus' seal. As the light becomes stronger, it begins to take form: a huge, classically handsome male whose body is strangely covered with small, seemingly randomly-attached wings with rainbow-colored feathers. Binder scholars believe that these wings are the remains of his lillend faithful, who followed him first into exile and then into death. Desayeus' head is lowered and he lays, slumping, on the ground in a position of exhaustion and despair. When at last he raises his head and opens his eyes to regard his summoner, he speaks in a pleasing voice with a weary tone, asking why he has been summoned.
Sign: Your entire body emits a faint, pale glow. This isn't enough to see in darkness to an appreciable degree (although it does make you visible in the dark). Worn clothing blocks the glow of the covered parts of the body, but unless you are bundled up from head to toe, Desayeus' sign will be visible whenever you are in dim light or darkness.
Influence: Under Desayeus' influence, you ignore others' attempts to tell you not to do things. Also, you must express skepticism of legendary or mythical commandments, warnings, and dangers.
Granted Abilities: Desayeus lends you his stubbornness, the properties of his weapon, and abilities related to his former portfolio.
Brilliant Energy: As a free action, you may bestow or remove the brilliant energy special ability to any weapon you wield, including natural weapons. If the weapon leaves your hands, the property fades in one round.
Font of Souls: By touch, you may bestow a positive level upon a living creature or construct. This positive level either cancels out the target's most recently gained negative level, or grants a +1 bonus to attack rolls, saving throws, ability checks, and skill checks as well as 5 temporary hit points and a +1 bonus to character level for purposes of abilities used by the target. (The positive level from this effect does not last long enough to bestow additional spell slots.) This effect lasts 1 minute per effective binder level and does not stack with itself, although the temporary hit points from this ability stack with other sources of temporary hit points. If the target would gain a negative level while under this effect, the positive level effect is canceled instead.
Guardian of Souls: You may bestow an effect equal to the spell death ward to a living creature by touch.
Headstrong: You are immune to compulsions. Moreover, against anyone who uses a compulsion effect on you, you gain a bonus to attack rolls, damage, and saving throws of +1 per 4 effective binder levels for 1 minute.
Keraptis, the Living Spell
A powerful evil wizard once created a copy of himself as a living spell in his search for immortality. Now, that copy has become a vestige with the power to grant arcane spellcasting and infect other spellcasters.
Vestige Level: 5th
Binding DC: DC 25
Special Requirement: Yes
Legend: Long ago in a distant land, a powerful wizard named Keraptis became obsessed with immortality. He took up residence in a dungeon beneath a smoldering volcano, where his experiments into the nature of life created many strange fungal monsters. However, none of these brought him the immortality that he sought. At one point in his search for immortality, he hit upon the radical concept of turning himself into a living spell and living on forever in the minds of others. His preliminary research was successful; he created a number of spell scrolls that contained living spells that contained partial copies of his personality and knowledge. However, even as he was on the verge of complete success, he became afraid of the idea of undergoing such a radical transformation and abandoned his research. The scrolls with the living spells were hidden away and forgotten.
Keraptis eventually heard rumors of a mysterious, shadowy plane of existence where immortality could be found, and turned all his efforts to penetrating this plane. He was successful in opening a planar portal, and stepped through it and out of all human knowledge. Meanwhile, the dungeon in which his servants lived gradually fell into disorder. Eventually, the hidden cache where the living spells were stored was breached, and the scrolls read by no less than four spellcasters. The result was disastrous, as there were suddenly four powerful wizards each of whom considered himself to be the real Keraptis. The four each quickly accumulated followers from among the dungeon's inhabitants, and began to war with each other.
This did not suit the wizard's remaining faithful servants, and an efreet organized a resistance against the impostors. The efreet correctly believed that the real Keraptis had to be summoned from another plane to put an end to his false copies. With the aid of some interloping adventurers, the summons was successful. A safety measure in the living spells caused them to be evicted from their host minds once the real Keraptis returned to the material plane, and the crisis was over. However, no god has prepared an afterlife for living spells, and so the evicted living spells drifted outside the cosmos and coalesced into a vestige.
Special Requirement: You must be literate in at least one language and have an Intelligence of 11 or better to host Keraptis; if you are not, it will not answer your call.
Manifestation: An ancient scroll appears in Keraptis' seal. The scroll is sealed with a pale wax seal bearing the imprint of an ancient bearded face (said to be that of Keraptis's original mortal body). The seal splits in a puff of white smoke, and the scroll opens, revealing an unreadable arcane-looking text; the letters of this text change shape and move even as they are read. Suddenly, the text rearranges itself into a message in a language that the binder knows, asking who it is that wishes to host the glory that is Keraptis, the Living Spell.
Sign: Random arcane glyphs appear beneath your skin on one location on your body of your choosing.
Influence: You become paranoid that others are impersonating you and scheming to replace you. This makes you strangely insecure in your own identity, which you must announce to everyone that you meet.
Granted Abilities: Keraptis grants you his spellcasting, the ability to scribe spells, the ability to infect others' minds via scribed spells, and concentration.
Concentration: You gain a +12 competence bonus to Concentration checks.
Infectious Personality: When you scribe a scroll or spell in a spellbook, you may choose to make it an infectious scroll or infectious scribed spell for no extra cost. An infectious scroll or spell causes any creature that reads and understands it to become infected with a fragment of your personality, becoming dominated as the spell dominate person if it fails a Will save.
You are aware whenever someone becomes infected, learning their name, race, occupation, and general location. You may only have one such infected victim at any one time; if an additional subject becomes infected while you already have an infected victim, you may choose whether to release the original and gain the new subject, or keep the original and release the new subject.
Like all vestige abilities, the effects of this one stop operating when you die or are no longer binding Keraptis; while any scribed scrolls and spells continue to exist, they lose their infectious property.
Keraptis' Spells: When you bind to Keraptis, you gain a number of prepared arcane spells and the ability to cast them as a wizard of your effective binder level. These spells are: magic missile (x3), fireball, dimension door (x2), spell resistance (x2), and wall of force. Note that only the ability to prepare and cast spells without arcane spellcaster class levels is a supernatural ability, not the spells themselves, which are subject to spell resistance, armor failure chance, Concentration checks to avoid being interrupted, etc. Your caster level is equal to your effective binder level.
Scribe Spell: You gain the benefit of the Scribe Scroll feat with regard to Keraptis' spells, or any other spells that you happen to know. You may also scribe Kerpatis' spells in a spellbook as if you were a wizard with class level equal to your effective binder level.