About Estra by ZinEstra
Spell Descriptions:
Daze: Estra dazes one humanoid creature within 35 feet, causing it to lose its next turn (Will DC 14 negates). Once a creature is dazed by this spell, it is immune to it for 1 minute. Ghoul Touch: One humanoid touched by Estra is paralyzed for 1d6+2 rounds. All creatures vulnerable to poison within 10 feet of the paralyzed creature are sickened. Fortitude DC 16 negates for both. Grave Words: Estra can cause a touched corpse to begin babbling for 1 round. There is a 10% chance the corpse’s ramblings are useful in some way (determined by the GM). Once a corpse has been targeted by this spell, it is immune to it forever. Guidance: Estra can give a touched target a +1 competence bonus on any attack roll, saving throw, or skill check in the next minute. Invisibility Alarm: Estra wards a 20-foot-radius area within 35 feet. If an invisible creature enters this ward, an alarm sounds or Estra receives a silent notification. The ward lasts 8 hours. Light: An object Estra touches sheds light for 40 minutes. She can’t have more than one copy of this spell active at a time. Message: Estra can whisper messages to a target for 40 minutes as long as it is within 140 feet and isn’t obstructed, and the target can respond each time Estra sends a whisper. Nearby creatures might be able to overhear the messages (Perception DC 25). Mindlink: Estra can communicate large amounts of information to a touched creature, as if she’d spent 10 minutes in discussion. She and her target do not need to share a language. Remove Fear: Estra selects two creatures within 35 feet of herself and within 30 feet of each other. Estra suppresses all current fear effects on those creatures for 10 minutes. During that time, the creatures gain a +4 morale bonus against fear effects. Resist Energy: For 40 minutes, a target Estra touches gains resistance 10 to her choice of acid, cold, electricity, fre, or sonic damage. Shield Estra gains a +4 shield bonus to AC for 1 minute and becomes immune to magic missile. Spiritual Weapon: Estra creates a floating longsword of pure force anywhere within 140 feet that lasts for 4 rounds. It attacks on its own each round with a +7 bonus, dealing 1d8+1 points of force damage. Combat Gear Estra has the following combat gear. Combat Gear Descriptions:
Potion of Lesser Restoration: This potion heals 1d4 points of ability damage to any ability score or eliminates most magical effects reducing ability scores. The imbiber is no longer fatigued, and if exhausted, she is fatigued instead. Scroll of Faerie Fire: All creatures in a 5-foot-radius burst within 440 feet are outlined in a pale glow that sheds light like a candle. Outlined creatures take a –20 penalty on Stealth checks and do not benefit from concealment granted by darkness, blur, invisibility, or similar effects for 1 minute. Scroll of Ghostbane Dirge: Estra causes one incorporeal creature within 30 feet to become semi-physical for 3 rounds (Will DC 13 negates). While affected, the creature takes half damage from nonmagical attacks and full damage from magical, supernatural and spell-like effects. Scroll of Scare: Estra causes one living creature (with 6 or fewer Hit Dice) within 130 feet to become frightened for 3 rounds. If the creature succeeds at a DC 13 Will save, it is instead shaken for 1 round. Wand of Cure Light Wounds: A touched creature regains 1d8+1 hp Background:
Estra never wanted to commune with spirits: she only wished for others to believe she did, and profit from that belief.
Born the daughter of a poor miner in Isger, Estra fell in with a small gang of faux spiritualists who needed a convincing actress to play the role of their spirit-channeling medium. The group engaged in fraudulent seances targeting grieving mourners, who paid dearly for confirmation of the smooth passing of their loved ones into the hereafter. Within darkened chambers and ramshackle theaters, Estra and her confederates spent nearly 10 years bilking the grief-stricken. Estra proved a talented actress, falling into convincing trances to channel the dead and dispense the carefully gathered information her associates had gleaned on their targets. Sessions typically culminated with the full-form “manifestation” of a bereaved subject’s lost relative: actually a confederate dressed in luminous robes and clumsy disguises. The arrival of a handsome knight named Honaire changed all that. Stationed in Elidir, Honaire had left behind an ailing mother, and in his absence she had passed. Honaire sought some comfort in his loss, and turned toward the seances of Estra’s troupe for assurance that his mother rested in peace. Relieved of his grief by the assurances of the spirit-seer, the young knight became smitten with Estra’s quick wit and streetwise charm. Estra, for her part, found the knight’s combination of physical strength and gentle courtesy enchanting, even as his strict code of honor made her regret her own life of lies. When at last she confessed the truth—that she’d never contacted Honaire’s mother at all—she expected him to fly into a rage. Instead, he thanked her for her courage and proposed marriage. Accepting his proposal, Estra left behind the life of a charlatan, and the two spent several happy decades together. Yet this life, too, came to an abrupt end when rumors of a rising alliance of goblin tribes reached the capital. Seeing her husband’s frustration at the government’s slow response, Estra urged him to volunteer to investigate, with no way of knowing that the goblin assemblies were the precursor to the deadly Goblinblood Wars. There in the dark expanse of the Chitterwood, Honaire and his unit were unexpectedly ambushed by a horde of maniacal goblins and their green dragon ally. Though he fought bravely and saved the lives of many comrades in their retreat, Honaire was bathed in the dragon’s toxic breath. Wracked by guilt and loss, Estra turned to her old means of supporting herself, training several new associates in the tricks of the faux spiritualist trade. Yet during the group’s first performance, Estra’s fake trance became something more. A wispy, greenish vapor coalesced from her mouth, eyes, and nostrils. To the wonderment of those assembled, a spectral figure emerged through the curtain of ectoplasmic mists. The ghostly apparition was not a confederate but rather the very real specter of her fallen husband. Comforted and shamed, the burgeoning spiritualist pledged again to never allow deceit to rule her life. Though age stoops her body, Estra has learned to strengthen her spiritual bond with Honaire so that his ectoplasmic form might walk the world again. She uses her strange powers to provide comfort and consolation—for real this time—to those who’ve lost loved ones to the ceaseless violence of the world. Yet all the while, doubt plagues her. She wonders if her phantom husband’s presence is the result of the depth of their love, some god’s attempt to shepherd her toward righteousness, or a manifestation of her own guilty conscience. |
