Witches

Edge: Arcane Background (Witch)

Requirements: Wild Card, Novice, Smarts d6+, Witchcraft d6 +

Arcane Skill: Witchcraft (Smarts)

Power Points: 10

Starting Powers: 2

Backlash: A witch who rolls a 1 on her Witchcraft die (regardless of her Wild Die) is automatically Shaken.

Available Powers: Beast friend, blast, bolt, boost / lower Trait, charm, deflection, detect/ conceal arcana, disguise, dispel, divination, elemental manipulation, entangle, fear, fly, healing, invisibility, light/obscure, puppet, slumber, succor, zombie.

Special Rules:

• Affirmative Action: A warlock (male witch) who rolls a critical failure (a 1 on both his Witchcraft and Wild Die) suffers a Wound instead.

• Ingredients: A witch can use certain items, called Ingredients, to assist her in casting her spells.She begins play with a number of Ingredients equal to half her Smarts die.

Way back when the Reckoning was just getting underway, a gal named Mina Devlin uncovered a few arcane secrets that man was not meant to know (at least, as far as she was concerned). After Devlin’s husband died, leaving her a controlling stake in one of the biggest rail lines of the 19th Century, she didn’t have much use for folks of the masculine persuasion. She turned her newfound knowledge to increasing her personal power, and soon became a witch—just like the ones that got burned at the stake back in Salem. After many years, it turned out history really does repeat itself, and Devlin and most of her coven were soon given the same treatment. Some of Devlin’s daughters, however, escaped with copies of their mother’s spell book. Mina’s grimoire—along with her special talents—was passed down through the years. Back around the middle of the 20th century, her great- and-then-some - grand daughter Annabelle Lee Devlin (all Devlin women keep their mother’s name), assumed control of Pentacorp in the 1960s, as well as the grimoire.

“How to Serve Your Man”

Annabelle was a bit of a radical supporter of the growing women’s rights movement at the time. In a misguided effort to help empower her fellow women, she almost literally took a page from Edmond Hoyle, father of the Old West’s cardslinger spellcasters known as hucksters, and encoded her “recipes” into a cookbook. Pandemonium Press, a subsidiary of Black River Industries, published the book. Annabelle laughed all the way to the printing presses— especially when she thought of all the oblivious men who would buy her book as a Christmas gift for their spouses. It took a little while for most folks to really figure the book out, but when they did, the government watchdogs found their hands full, dealing with a widespread epidemic of curses, conjurings, and cauldrons. The law did the best it could to round up every copy of Annabelle’s encoded grimoire and was fairly successful on the whole. Hundreds of thousands of copies were destroyed by the Agency and the Rangers with the cooperation of their counterpart organizations abroad.

The Rangers brought Annabelle up on charges, but thanks to a huge bank account and the lawyers it can buy, she managed to sell the courts on the idea that she had no idea the recipes were actually magical spells. Her lawyers spun her as an innocent woman who simply didn’t know any better—a fact that appealed to a number of less-educated male jury members. The case against her even used the words “magical spells” probably helped as well, as most folks still tried to deny the existence of anything too overtly supernatural. In the end, she was stopped from publishing any further “Devlin family recipes,” but walked out of court with little more than a dainty slap on the wrist.

Succession Plan

Fast forward about one hundred and twenty years. Sybil Rose Devlin was the last of the Devlins and wasn’t getting any younger. Worse, she had an almost pathological hatred for men, wrongly blaming the governmental persecution of her ancestors on a corrupt patriarchy rather than her family’s own trespasses against both the law and morality. While she could prolong her life for a while, even her strongest magics couldn’t make her immortal. When she died, her family would end. However, she couldn’t bear the thought of touching a man, much less taking the steps necessary to actually conceive a child. A subsidiary of Pentacorp, Genetech, had perfected a method for not only cloning an adult human, but preserving it indefinitely and educating it as well. Unfortunately for Sybil, nearly every country had banned the practice decades before she took over the family business.

As the Devlins had always butted heads with the Agency and Rangers, Pentacorp and its holdings were always being subjected to searches, inspections, and just about every other form of governmental attention. To be fair, this was largely due to the fact the Devlins had more than a passing predilection for dabbling in the dark arts, muscling out their competitors by any and every means, and tossing caution (and consumer safety) to the wind. And finding an illegal cloning facility was just the sort of thing to make a government inspector’s day complete.

Reprint of a Classic

In early 2082, just before she set her clones to brewing, Sybil dug up Annabelle’s old “cookbook” and had it reprinted through a shell company. Her agents then filtered copies into the market through flea markets, yard sales, and used book stores. In no time, the Agency and Rangers had a brand new outbreak of witches to contend with, distracting them quite nicely from Pentacorp’s genetic shenanigans. Sybil set up dozens of secret facilities across both the USA and CSA, each holding a “daughter” of hers. That way, even once the governments got a handle on the cauldron she’d set boiling, they’d be unlikely to find all of her “children.” When the time came, trusted Pentacorp minions would activate one to step in and take over the reins of the Devlin business.

Fate intervened before her plan for passing the torch could play out in the form of the Last War. While some of the hidden labs were destroyed in the fighting, scores remained undiscovered. Generators, often powered by longlasting alternative sources, kept the facilities functioning for long after the fighting died down—and the clones alive in a state of suspended animation. Even the most advanced systems wear out over time. As the facilities run down, often one of the clones is awakened and released.

Playing a Witch

To play a witch, your gal pal needs to take the Arcane Background (Witch) Edge, as well as putting points into Witchcraft. For her trouble, she also gets a ratty copy of How to Serve Your Man, which she’ll need if she plans to learn more spells. If she ever loses her grimoire, it’s considered Rare, but only runs $1 unless she buys it from someone who knows its real worth.

And for those of you wondering, some men do take up the mantel of the witch. Be warned, though, that the powers that be seem to favor the fairer sex when channeling these magics.

Ingredients

A witch can use items and components known as “Ingredients” to help cast her spells. A wide range of items can be used as Ingredients. Since How to Serve Your Man was disguised as a cookbook, many, but not all, of these are food items. They run the gamut from common baking mixes to exotic spices and herbs to more esoteric things like the eye of a newt or a cat’s whisker. Anytime she casts a spell, she can opt to expend Ingredients. Each Ingredient she uses reduces the cost of the Power by one power point. A witch can completely pay for the Power’s cost assuming she has enough Ingredients on hand. Once a witch uses an Ingredient in a spell, it is consumed completely. At the time Annabelle wrote How to Serve Your Man, most of these were fairly easy to come by. Now things are a little tougher. A witch can make a Notice roll to search an area the Marshal decides is suitable for Ingredients. On a success, she finds one, while with a raise she scares up two.

Only a witch can scrounge for Ingredients. An attempt generally takes about an hour, and while she’s doing that, she can’t scavenge for other items. Any bonuses she has to Notice or to scavenge salvageable items apply to this roll, however. There’s a limit to how many Ingredients a witch can manage at any one time. She cannot have more Ingredients than her Smarts die type. If she tries to hoard more than that, the magical nature of the items gets stewed together and spoils the entire batch of Ingredients, making them unusable. Otherwise, Ingredients have a virtually unlimited shelf life. A witch starts play with a number of Ingredients equal to half her Smarts die.

Affirmative Action

A witch who rolls a 1 on her Witchcraft skill die, regardless of Wild Die, is Shaken. It is possible to suffer backlash and still succeed at casting because of the Wild Die. If your witch is male, usually referred to as a warlock or “Sloppy Joe” by less-polite (or at least braver) wasters, there’s a little extra spice in the recipe for him, though. While witches in the wastelands as a whole don’t particularly love or hate men, Annabelle Devlin herself would’ve been happy if the whole lot of them shriveled up and died. In fact, she made sure that more than a few did just that! Being the man-hater she was, Annabelle encoded quite a few traps for any men that might try to make use of her magic. If your witch is a warlock, he suffers a Wound anytime he is unlucky enough to get a 1 on both his Witchcraft and Wild dice.

Learning New Spells

Your witch’s lifeblood, so to speak, is her “cookbook,” How to Serve Your Man. If she wants any new powers, Pentacorp Pentacorp’s origins stretch all the way back to the 19th century and the Great Rail Wars. Mina Devlin, one of the last six Rail Barons, took over the reins of her late husband’s company, the Black River Railroad. When Hellstromme’s Wasatch Rails won the war—and the much-coveted government contracts— most of the other competitors folded. Mina’s company, however, proved surprisingly resilient, eventually transforming into Black River Industries shortly after

World War II.

Over the next hundred years or so, her heirs diversified their holdings into far more than simple transportation. Hexaco

Oil Company and Thayer Pharmaceuticals were the first additions to the Devlins’ portfolios. The financial and securities firm Black Investment Group provided the family with considerable fiscal flexibility. The final major acquisition was Genetech, a bioengineering conglomerate that virtually cornered the market on agricultural research early on. The Devlins joined all five companies together under a single blanket entity, the multinational corporation known as Pentacorp. The combined political clout of the diverse holdings allowed Pentacorp to score several legislative victories in both the USA and CSA congresses and by the time the Last War began, Pentacorp rivaled Hellstromme Industries in the scope of its international influence. she must decode them from the text.

In other words, if she doesn’t have the book in her possession, she can’t take the New Power Edge. She still knows her favorite recipes, however. If her copy is destroyed, she has to find a replacement, which should be the subject of an adventure in and of itself.

New Edges

Witches have a few Edges all to themselves.

Devlin Blood (Background Edge)

Requirements: Novice, Arcane

Background (Witch), Witchcraft d8+, Female

Your witch is one of Sybil Rose’s clones. Witchcraft is in her blood, her very DNA. She’s a conduit for supernatural powers of a witchy variety, and like all Devlin women she’s more than a little easy on the eyes. Your character is automatically Attractive. She can also spend an Ingredient to make her spells harder to resist. Each Ingredient spent this way gives the target a –1 penalty to resist the spell. Alternately, she can give a damaging spell AP 1 for each Ingredient expended. Your character can’t spend more Ingredients than half of her Smarts die type on a single spell this way. The computer banks responsible for educating your hero while she was in suspended animation weren’t updated once the Last War began. As a result, she has virtually no knowledge of what’s changed in the world since the first bombs began falling. Your character has the Clueless Hindrance with regards to anything that occurred after the beginning of the hostilities.Thanks to the techniques used byGenetech, she’s not an exact duplicateof either Sybil or the other clones, but she does share an uncanny resemblance to them. Given the Devlin family tendencies, this could cause problems for her if one of her sisters has been raising Hell in the wrong places. For obvious reasons, this Edge can only be selected at character creation.

Familiar

Requirements: Novice, Arcane

Background (Witch), Witchcraft d10+

Your witch has summoned an animal familiar. The type of critter she’s acquired depends on her rank when she first takes this Edge. The Available Familiars table (below) tells you what type of animal your enchantress can choose at that time.

Available Familiars

Rank Animal Type

Novice Owl, cat, snake, frog

Seasoned Dog, wolf, stag (deer), mule

Veteran Cougar, riding horse

Heroic Bear, bull, shark

Legendary Brain buzzard, devil bat, dog o’ war

Your witch and her familiar acquire the Loyal Hindrance with regards to each other. The familiar isn’t a slave though, and can refuse to follow your hero’s orders—particularly those which may cause it harm. Unless ordered to follow otherwise, a familiar acts in accordance with its nature. For example, a cat may stop to chase a mouse or take a brief nap and will most likely hide during combat.

A familiar is a Wild Card with respect to wounds and having a Wild Die, but it receives no Bennies. However, your witch can spend her own Bennies on behalf of her familiar. The familiar can understand your character’s speech and vice-versa. Any eavesdropper just hears the witch speaking in her normal voice, while the creature makes noises appropriate for its species. The bond between the familiar and its mistress makes it more resistant to beast friend. Each Rank of your witch adds to the familiar’s Size when calculating how many Power Points are needed to control it.

A witch can dismiss her familiar to summon another if she chooses. The process takes two weeks from the time the original familiar is dismissed until the new one arrives.

This Edge can be taken more than once, although not to gain additional familiars. Each additional time you choose it, you may pick one of the powers below. Each

power may be taken only once, and you can only take this Edge once per Rank (Taking during character creation does not prevent your character from taking it during Novice Rank).

• Your witch can transfer wounds and Fatigue to and from her familiar as a free action.

• Your witch can increase one attribute of her choice which is lower than that of the familiar by one die type, to a maximum of d12.

• Your witch can use the familiar’s senses as if they were her own. This requires concentration and the maximum range for this ability is your witch’s Smarts x 100 yards.

• The familiar can use your witch’s Combat Edges as its own.

• Any spells your witch casts on herself also affect her familiar. For example, if she casts armor on herself, both she and her familiar gain +2 Armor (+4 on a raise) for the duration of the spell.

• The familiar has 5 Power Points which your hero can use as if they were her own. The Power Points recharge at the same rate as the witch’s own (1 per hour).

Witch Powers

Jump to the Savage Arcane Powers List

Charm

Rank: Novice

Power Points: 4

Range: Self

Duration: 1 minute (1/minute)

Charm makes the caster more appealing and attractive to others. It grants a witch a bonus of +1 Charisma. The power also allows her to use Persuasion to initiate a Test of Will opposed by her target’s Smarts. With a raise, the Charisma bonus is increased to +2. Additionally, the witch can use her Persuasion to initiate a Test of Will against either a single target or everyone within a Large Burst Template. This is a double-edged sword though, as it applies to friend and foe alike.

Trappings

Witch spells often involve incantations of some sort and sometimes hand gestures. However, it’s usually easy for a witch to hide her casting from a casual observer by making a simple Stealth roll. Only if someone has a reason to watch for monkey business of the magical sort does he get to make a Notice roll to oppose the witch’s Stealth. Spells with subtle effects, like charm or boost/lower Trait, have no visual effects beyond the witch’s casting chant or gestures. Combat spells, on the other hand, are usually quite flashy. Blast, called “ball o’ doom” by most witches, creates an explosion of glowing, green energy. A witch casting a bolt energizes small objects, ranging from marbles and ball bearings all the way to skulls, with arcane power. Flight may produce powerful winds that lift the witch aloft or it may even empower a broomstick for her to ride.

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