Raform Zokuworm Biomass Gladiator

[Fragments from the Draft Archive: This post has been resurrected from my back catalog of draft posts left unfinished over the past few years. I'm dredging through them all, deleting most but pulling some out, polishing up whatever is there and publishing it. I'm hoping it's an exercise in clearing out the backlog of ideas my mind still might be slightly attached too - scrubbing out my psychic connector tube to the unrealrealms for fresh new torrents of multiversal plasma.]


The Raform Zokuworm Biomass Gladiator:


Across the spongy deserts of  Sargossa, civil war has raged for eons. The biomass lords, slathered across their wormthrones, direct their effluents of genetic mass at one another hoping to claim new strands of DNA to bolster their melting forms. The zokuworms suck genetic information from the lords to pump out malformed warriors, bred for bloodshed in the ceremonial pits pockmarking Sargossa's surface.

Two Zokuworms spawning a fresh batch of gladiators.

 [Originally planned for White Star (or B/X) the Raform Zokuworm Biomass Gladiator class will now be written for the Black Hack. A) Because it's quicker and B) The Black Hack is what I'm running at the moment.] 

The Raform Zokuworm Biomass Gladiator begins its life ejected from the zokuworm of its father biomass lord. Life begins in the holy fighting pits of Sargossa, in a ceremonial battle between the gladiators of two biomass lords. The opposing zokuworms will vomit combatants out at one another in accordance to an ancient and bloody ceremony of war. The victorious gladiators win a feast for their mother zokuworm - who slurp the remains of the defeated at battles end.

The zokuworm is the genetic factory of the biomass lords. The zokuworm drains the lord for genetic mass at his seat of power and prison, the wormthrone. The zokuworm churns out gladiators by draining the lord's genetic makeup. When the ceremonial battle is complete, the victorious biomass lord will have fresh and reinvigorated strands of genetic mass. The loser of the battle will have been drained, taking another step towards the inevitable fate of the weak biomass lord - to become nothing more than a rotting pink puddle atop a dead wormthrone.

The Zokuworm is the Gladiator's mother and the Biomass Lord its father and liege lord!

A young, malformed gladiator. 

The body of the Raform Zokuworm Biomass Gladiator unformed and unstable, pink oozing flesh constantly boils and bubbles. As such the vitality of its form is in constant flux, each level the following basic statistics of the gladiator will change (staying the same until the next level): 

Starting HP: Always d10+4.
Hp Per Level/Resting: Each level, roll a d4: 1 = d4, 2 = d6, 3 = d8, 4 = d10.
Weapons and Armour: Always any and all, but armour price is tripled due to customization required for flux like state of body.  Armour must be replaced every level.
Attack Damage: Each level, roll a d4: 1 = d4, 2 = d6, 3 = d8, 4 = d10. Unarmed/armed gladiators do they same amount of damage - if no weapon is available for use their bodies will create one.

Special features: 
Armor costs: Armour price is tripled due to customization required for flux like state of body.  Armour must be replaced every level.

Gifts of the Father (mutations): The genetic information of the father biomass lord will manifest themselves randomly over time in a gladiator. You will have to find your own random mutation tables. (I use this PDF, and this PDF. Thanks to Red Box Vancouver's Blog and The Weirdlands of Xhuul.).

• A gladiator receives 1 x cosmetic mutation at level 1. 
• A gladiator receives an additional 1 x cosmetic mutation and 1 x power mutation at level 4. 
• A gladiator receives an additional 1 x cosmetic mutation and 1 x power mutation at level 8. 
• A gladiator receives an additional 1 x cosmetic mutation and 1 x power mutation at level 10.

Shield of the Zokuworm: Any skerrick of mystical or arcane receptibility was bred out of the inhabitants of Sargossa many ages ago. Roll with Advantage when resisting magic of any type.

Language: Although not all Gladiators will have mouths there exists a Sargossan spoken language inherited by all Gladiators. This language is presumably not spoken in the vast majority of the multiverse. Gladiators can employ  minor emphatic communication between other natives of Sargossa. This ability may extend to other beings too.

The Test of the Annelid: At level 8 and above a Gladiator may attempt to defeat a flagging biomass lord, pitting themselves against the gladiators sent forth by the lord's zokuworm. Victory results in the gifting of an infant zokuworm and the ceremony of the wormthrone will be offered...

Leveling up: 
Roll to see if attributes increase. If any do increase, you may test that attribute an additional two times to possibly increase an attribute by a maximum of two points a level.

Raform Skills:

 [The following are probably the most "draft" aspect of the post. I had plans to flesh out the setting of Sargossa and to write up some rules/tables for "Sargossan Fields Crawling". This would probably be a campaign focusing on a party of gladiators eventually inheriting their own Zokuworm/ending the civil war/dying. These are more ideas for skills than anything else.] 

Each skill can be attempted once per day. Each Gladiator starts with all skills at d20. For a skill to be used successfully a 1 must be rolled on that skill's die. Each level a Gladiator may decrease 1 skill die by 1. For example, at level 2 the Gladiator can pick 1 skill's die to be reduced from d20 to d12.

Skill list:

Fleshmelding: healing of others at own detriment.
Fleshouflage: disguise via warping flesh. 
Fleshpulsifcation: temporary additional mutation. 
Geneticwarper: decrease others genetics. 
Fleshmune: Join with others.
Fleshsume: Eat others for health. 
Fleshearch: Save genetic information (lock in current HP/Damage Dice). 
   

A Sargossan biomass lord, being slowly drained by his wormthrone.