BLACKWATER GLOBE
Magical item
The Blackwater Globe, a palm-sized magical sphere of pure jet polished to a mirror shine, lets its wielder transform and control a single volume of water or water-based liquid, ranging in quantity from 50 gallons (a typical rain barrel) to 35,000 gallons (a 20-foot diameter sphere, abut 5000 cubic feet, or enough water to fill 50 feet of standard dungeon corridor. (The 50-gallon minimum quantity of water is required for the globe’s magic to function.)
Holding the black stone ball in hand, a user maintaining concentration (which permits movement but no other actions) who succeeds on an EASY INT roll can transform the target volume of water into an inky, semisolid black goo (“blackwater”) with the same mass and a rubbery surface membrane. The formed shape can be maintained (without additional rolls) as long as the concentration continues, but if the caster takes damage from combat or environmental factors or is otherwise disturbed, a CON roll success is necessary to maintain the blob’s form. The wielder suffers 1 hit point of magical damage at the end of the turn on each round the Globe is used to shape the blackwater, falling unconscious (but stable) at 0 HP as the goo returns to the form of normal water.
The blackwater is now under the control of the wielder of the Globe, who is able to animate the black substance in rudimentary fashion up to NEAR distance from wherever the water it was conjured from would otherwise come to rest.
Simple structures like ramparts can be formed from the blackwater, absorbing 1 hit point of damage per foot of thickness without being destroyed or allowing a breach; thus, a gelatinous, mostly opaque, hard-to-climb wall of jiggling blackwater 5 feet thick, 10 feet tall, and 100 feet long can be formed (within NEAR distance) along the shore of a body of water; this barrier can absorb harmlessly any conventional or magic missile that does 5 HP or less without letting it penetrate, while reducing the energy (and lethality) of any that do get through. (A circular barrier with reduced protection effects—one 3 feet thick and 10 feet high—around a circular space 30 feet (NEAR distance) across can be formed at the wielder’s option, as long as one edge remains close to the water’s origin.) Blackwater takes only half damage from bludgeoning, so it is resistant to forming breaches caused by such attacks.
The user of the Globe can can form a wobbly bridge 10 feet wide up to 500 feet across a river or lake (requiring DEX checks to bring cargo or a wagon across) or—in theory—an even more precarious footpath only 1 foot wide across nearly a mile of open water (requiring HARD DEX checks at intervals to cross faster than a crawl, assuming the form can be maintained for sufficient duration; such a thin, fragile, unstable structure would buckle if it were to take 2+ HP of damage anywhere a human-sized creature were located.)
A party of adventurers with a Globe wielder can float in the ocean on a boat-shaped raft of goo with waist-high gunwales 2 feet thick and a deck 30 feet wide, 2 feet thick, and over 60 feet long. The wielder can likewise form an encasing 30-foot spherical bubble of blackwater (NEAR distance across) with walls 2 feet thick with enough air inside to float and sustain them for longer than the wielder will hold out. Likewise a hemispherical dome 5 feet thick can be constructed onshore within NEAR range of the water’s resting location; it would be 30 feet across (NEAR distance) with a 20-foot diameter interior space and the ability to soak 5 HP of damage from incoming missile or magical attacks.
The Globe’s most wondrous feature is its ability to form “blackwater golems”; this misnomer is somewhat misleading, but the wielder can command the inky goo to attack a designated NEAR target with a combination of pseudopod attacks in a semi-autonomous manner. With the minimum quantity of water (50 gallons), a single “golem” is formed and under telepathic control of the Globe wielder, possessing +3 STR, able to relocate by flowing NEAR distance from its origin point, and striking out to NEAR distance as if it were CLOSE-range melee combat with up to two pseudopod attacks upon a single opponent each round at the end of the wielder’s turn; the “golem” is dispelled if it takes 6+ HP of damage on any single attack (with damaged by bludgeoning halved before the threshold is considered). The wielder can “conjure” ane additional “golem” for each point of INT bonus possessed, each with its own designated opponent or target, but the “golems must remain contiguous, connected by black tendrils, and within NEAR distance of one another; there must be sufficient water for the transformation (a barrelful, or about 50 gallons per “golem”), and if one of the vulnerable connecting tendrils is targeted and severed with enough damage, some or all of the “golems” may be dispelled (GM’s discretion).
Very complex structures cannot be constructed from the blackwater; likewise, stable structures more than about 30 feet straight up (NEAR distance on top) will not maintain cohesion, owing to gelatinous nature of the goo and its rubbery membrane of appreciable but finite strength. If the wielder’s concentration is lost or the wielder is knocked out or killed, the effects of the Globe are dispelled immediately, and the water returns to normal in a thunderous splash of deanimation.
Notes:
- Keep magic weird…
- See what else is on top of The Loot Pile.