Stolen By Bats: The Pentecost Ape!

Locheil made a few posts about Stolen by Bats, an in-progress GLOG hack based on the Fallen London/Sunless Sea/Sunless Skies games. The Fallen London games absolutely kick ass, so of course I'm getting in on that action with a Pentecost Ape class. Embrace the social-climber lifestyle and Return to Monke.

you're this guy, you have soul magic, and everybody hates you

Pentecost Ape

+1 Mirrors and +1 Hearts per template

Starting Equipment: Ancient artifact (which was created just last year), elaborate headdress that doesn’t fit, and see below

Skills: See below

You are an ape- but oh, what an ape you are! Your soul coruscates merrily, as though it had always belonged to you. It isn’t enough, though. You yearn for more.

To gain a template, you must acquire another soul. The process of extraction takes about an hour and is about as pleasant for the soon-to-be-soulless as you’d expect. When you get somebody’s soul, you learn some of their specialized knowledge and gain one skill they had (your choice).

A- Ape, Fairly Bartered Soul

B- Twice-Souled

C- Thrice-Souled

D- Four-Souled

Ape

You are, indeed, an ape. An unscrupulous talking ape with a human soul, but an ape nonetheless. You are exceptionally good at climbing, monkeying around, and otherwise committing acts suitable for an ape, but you cannot understand particularly advanced human logic. Ape logic has gotten you this far, after all. Furthermore, you are unwelcome in polite society. You know what you did.

Fairly Bartered Soul

You have a human’s soul granting you speech, slightly uplifted intellect, and a few handy pieces of their knowledge. Now, whose soul did you take, exactly?

1- A man of the cloth, who cast away his soul during a crisis of faith that turned out to be short-lived. If word got out that he’s soulless, he would be ruined. Not that you’d ever stoop to blackmail, of course. You have the Neath Christianity skill (quite different from surface-dwellers’ Christianity!), an effective command of fire-and-brimstone rhetoric, and 7d100 extra starting Echoes that you’ve already exacted from him.

2- A player of chess, in all its variations. You have slightly-outdated knowledge of the structure, cryptology, and activities of a well-placed network of spies that spans from Fallen London across the Unterzee, but you’re an ape who doesn’t care about politics, so whatever. You have a copper ring with a code-breaking wheel of letters inside and +1d4+1 Veils. You’re also quite skilled at actual chess.

3- A ‘blemmigan biological enthusiast’, obsessed with the propagation and perseverance of blemmigans- a sort of walking purple mushroom with razor-fangs. You have a blemmigan butler of your own, sworn to aid you; it has 2 HD, it’s as big as you are and far more intelligent, it’s witheringly sarcastic but ultimately devoted, and it cannot talk but its fronds are delicate enough to allow it to write. You also have the Blemmiganology skill, for all the good that does you.

4- A delightful adventuress, who came to your island to plunder your temples and steal your loot. Truly, it was a delight to con the fool out of her soul. Whenever you visit parts unknown or encounter an ancient artifact, 2-in-6 chance that you already know a little about it. You have the Academia skill.

5- A madman with seven scars and a red hunger gleaming in his eyes. The soul he foisted upon you is a rancid, stained thing, and the nightmares are best left unmentioned. When you lock eyes with somebody, they must Save or be paralyzed by terror. You have the Esotericism skill and some sort of dreadful candle.

6 - A shipwrecked zailor, last of their crew and out of hope. You have their good-luck charm (a white bat finely carved from ivory, admired by any other zailor) and expertise in zee-faring (unimpressive, considering their ship sank), as well as the skills of a (1d4) 1. doctor 2. engineer 3. gunner 4. cook. 

Twice-Souled

You’re getting better at this soul-extraction thing. From now on, if you get a soul from someone with a special ability of some sort, you gain that ability (subject, of course, to all the same limitations). Only one ability per soul. You are marginally less detestable by upright Londoners now.

Thrice-Souled

Three surrendered souls chatter within. Once a day, when you need an answer to an esoteric question, there’s a (# of templates)-in-6 chance one of your souls knows it. You may come and go as you please in Fallen London without suspicion, too.

Four-Souled

You are debonair, impeccably mannered, and the envy of all other apes you meet. Your accumulated charms are more than enough to overcome the little question of your humble origins; in fact, figures of high society fall over themselves to invite you as the guest of honor to their soirees. Once a day, you can talk your way out of any legal or social predicament.