Curses

Careless rogues plundering a tomb, drunken heroes insulting a powerful wizard, and foolhardy adventurers who pick up ancient swords all might suffer from curses. These magic afflictions can have a wide variety of effects, from a simple penalty to certain checks to transforming the victim into a toad. Some even cause the afflicted to slowly rot away, leaving nothing behind but dust. Unlike other afflictions, most curses cannot be cured through a number of successful saving throws. Curses can be cured through magic, however, usually via spells such as remove curse and break enchantment. While some curses cause a progressive deterioration, others inflict a static penalty from the moment they are contracted, neither fading over time nor growing worse. In addition, there are a number of magic items that act like curses. See Chapter 15 for a description of these cursed items.

The following samples present just some of the possibilities when creating curses.

Baleful Polymorph Spell
Type curse, spell; Save Fortitude DC 17 negates, Will DC 17
partial
Effect transforms target into a lizard; see baleful polymorph
description

Bestow Curse Trap
Type curse, spell, trap; Save Will DC 14
Effect –6 penalty to Strength

Curse of the Ages
Type curse; Save Will DC 17
Frequency 1/day
Effect age 1 year

Mummy Rot
Type curse, disease, injury; Save Fortitude DC 16
Onset 1 minute; Frequency 1/day
Effect 1d6 Con damage and 1d6 Cha damage; Cure mummy
rot can only be cured by successfully casting both remove
curse and remove disease within 1 minute of each other.

Unluck
Type curse; Save Will DC 20 negates, no save to avoid effects
Frequency 1/hour
Effect target must reroll any roll decided by the GM and take
the worse result

Werewolf Lycanthropy
Type curse, injury; Save Fortitude DC 15 negates, Will DC 15 to
avoid effects
Onset the next full moon; Frequency on the night of every full
moon or whenever the target is injured
Effect target transforms into a wolf under the GM’s control
until the next morning