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Easy. His body becomes a lifeless husk as the mystical power tears his soul free of his body to be helplessly caught in the power forever, or perhaps simply consumed to fuel a new magical event. As a bonus you can have an evil spirit inhabit his body and become the party's archenemy.
If the player complains that a fraction of the power shouldn't have been strong enough to do that, remind him that 9/10ths is a fraction too.
Enjoy!
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A few possibilities come to mind at first glance.
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Wish Granted, however, the fraction is 99/100 and he ascends to godhood as the incarnation of primal chaos. He gains the Chaos, Magic, Luck, and Madness domains. His Favored Weapon is a horseshoe. His holy colors are whatever his priests happen to roll around in that morning. His holy symbol is a hand that, no matter how closely inspected, can never be confirmed as to whether it is an approving thumbs-up or a rude extended middle finger. His sobriquets are "What the hell just happened?!", "He who cannot be shamed/tamed/lamed/maimed/samed." And "The blessed divine wind of spring that smells of Kami flatulence." (Tian-Xia)
Grant the alchemist some cool general abilities (+2 DC for all spell effects, bombs deal +1d6 damage of a random type, mutagen bonuses all increase by +2, etc.) but also inflict him with a wasting affliction that gradually tears apart his being and discorporates it into the same primal magic essence that now ravages the world. A mortal isn't meant to hold such power for so long, but the wish made a temporary exception.
I *really* like this one. I was thinking something very similar -- power inhabits his body and both makes him stronger and slowly kills him. Maybe 1 permanent CON a week (or a month, depending on the time frame of your campaign) so that it's constantly a race against time to see whether the alchemist makes it to the end of the campaign...
...and as they get to higher levels, he can prolong his life a bit with belts, wishes, and other attribute enhancements, but nothing lasts forever, and he's going to die right about when the campaign finale is playing out.Very dramatic!
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From now on each of his alchemical creations is capable of changing geography, creating new monsters, granting people strange magical powers, causing local barmaids to grow a second head, turning inanimate objects into animate objects, etc. The level and power of the effects isn't diminished at all, only the area of effect, which is for him a very tiny fraction of what it was then the cataclysmic wave swept through.
The problem is, the effect is always completely random. He might be able to control who is affected, since it would be the target of whatever alchemical item he uses -- but he'll never know what the effect will be until it's used. he can't create a new item and then analyze it to see what the effect will be, it won't be known until it actually manifests.
This likely makes the character entirely useless except as an object lesson to players who make stupidly dangerous wishes just to see what will happen.
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Grant the alchemist some cool general abilities (+2 DC for all spell effects, bombs deal +1d6 damage of a random type, mutagen bonuses all increase by +2, etc.) but also inflict him with a wasting affliction that gradually tears apart his being and discorporates it into the same primal magic essence that now ravages the world. A mortal isn't meant to hold such power for so long, but the wish made a temporary exception. I *really* like this one. I was thinking something very similar -- power inhabits his body and both makes him stronger and slowly kills him. Maybe 1 permanent CON a week (or a month, depending on the time frame of your campaign) so that it's constantly a race against time to see whether the alchemist makes it to the end of the campaign...
...and as they get to higher levels, he can prolong his life a bit with belts, wishes, and other attribute enhancements, but nothing lasts forever, and he's going to die right about when the campaign finale is playing out.Very dramatic!
This can be a great way to keep the PCs focused and moving toward campaign goals, too. If one of the major goals involves a possible "cure" for the alchemist's conditions, he'll probably become one of the more vocal advocates for driving the plot and following up on any leads the GM plants.
I think the ideal timing for the Constitution loss (or any other feature) would involve the alchemist falling to somewhere around 6-8 Constitution, which is scary but not an instant death sentence. If the PCs wander around and don't focus, there's still room for the alchemist to fall yet lower while still allowing the PCs a little wiggle room to explore the occasional diversion.
Of course, what happens if the alchemist dies from this affliction? Does he become a major campaign foe (some primal magic elemental?) that hounds the surviving PCs and/or signs on with an existing campaign villain? Does his demise accelerate the world's fall into chaos (even more primal magic rolls)? Sometimes a foreseen PC death can be a really powerful storytelling device, and this could be one that illustrates just how precariously the world is hanging on following the aforementioned cataclysm.
Whatever you choose, I hope it balances advantages and disadvantages in a way that makes it feel worthwhile that the player invoked wish magic. It might be tempting to pull a "gotcha" moment and slap the PC with an embarassing death, but the player has handed you a golden storytelling opportunity; it would be a shame to teach the group that taking unique risks is never rewarded.
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I was about to suggest something similar to John Compton.
The arcane power begins integrating into his soul, slowly transforming him into an elemental of raw arcane power with his mortal coil slowing the process. Each day, the power begins degrading his mind and his body, causing glowing fissures to appear on his flesh. When the power finally shatters his body, he will become reborn as a wandering beacon of primal magic, changing reality around him with each step and leaving behind a trail of transformed creatures and landscape -- a smaller but barely sentient version of the magical cataclysm.
With each loss of Constitution, the power grows more powerful as the mortal coil is less capable of containing the energy in his soul. At first, it's merely a +1 caster level to his extracts. Then he starts emitting an aura that causes primal magic events whenever a spell is cast. The aura grows larger the more Constitution he loses. However, with each event, he can make a Will save in an attempt to control the raw power, suppressing it, influencing it, or perhaps leaving some areas near him exempt of this power.
The party learns that this transformation is inevitable. Unless the taint is removed from his soul, a feat requiring mythic power, eventually he will become a magic elemental. However, hope exists. If the alchemist somehow manages to control the power rather than the power controlling him, he may become something akin to a genie of primal magic. This requires an insanely strong will. The party may have to appeal to a god to assist. Perhaps the god of magic may see the alchemist as a potential new herald? Maybe another god wants to use him as a tool to end the cataclysm. Perhaps an evil god and his cult wants the alchemist to make it worse...
I wish I had a fraction of all this power bound to my soul.
The Cataclysm is sentient, and the Alchemists now becomes its Familiar.
If anything else, it ensures that he becomes/remains of a chaotic alignment, as it would effect his soul thus. As for corrupting, make it so harmful lawful spells and effects do twice as much harm.
Hey!
So, background first: magical cataclysm sweeps through the setting during the course of the campaign. It causes sweeping changes to geography, creates new monsters, grants people strange magical powers, causes a local barmaid to grow a second head, turns inanimate objects into animate objects at random. Essentially, a wave of wild magic sweeps the world and changes a lot of stuff.
The scenario: The party alchemist got a wish from the Deck of Many Things and observes this terrifying event. He then speaks his wish.
"This is the kind of power that could change anything... I wish I had a fraction of all this power bound to my soul."
The Objective: he intentionally wished this worded in this way just to see what would happen. Best answer wins +1 internets.
The key word there is = Fraction. How much of a Fraction, 1%, 98%, 50%, 10%, etc... So what all he say does not matter, you as DM, get to decide how much.
I also liked, John Comptons, ideas.
I think Cyrads idea is pretty close to how I'd run it, though I think it might be fun to write up a table of effects and each day you randomly could roll to have them effect the character, adding more over time as well to help the 'random' feeling of the magic.
There's this magic elemental, if it fits.
I'd make him a living Rod of Wonder. WIS mod times per day (minimum 1), the Alch may use a standard action to roll for a random effect. In addition to whatever the Rod of Wonder result is, for the effect's duration (or 1 minute, whichever is shorter), roll a random drawback effect from the cursed items section of the CRB (page 537-538). Making a custom list of effects encouraged.
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Well, you mentioned wild magic. I think it's only fair to turn him into a wild mage, right? Or at least a wild alchemist.
So chaotic options:
- Everytime he uses an extract, bomb or mutagen something random happens. You could use the rod of wonder table for this, or make a custom list of effects with a 100 or even 1000 options. (You might want to stick to 100 for your own sanity.) You could make multiple lists for different purposes.
- He can roll twice whenever he uses a rod of wonder and take the best result.
- His effective caster level becomes alchemist level -3 +1d6. He can never take the magical knack trait. This could work on bombs and mutagen too?
- The living rod of wonder idea is pretty good too. A RoW is 12000 gp, less than half of what you could get for a wish. So you can just give him the power of a rod of wonder without any limitations.
If you want to make a custom list of effects, just ask your players for ideas, or make a new thread named 101 random effects.
Also, please tell us more about this wave of wild magic. Sounds like a good plot for a campaign.
43/2 is also a fraction. Probably not one you want to use, though.
You could spin it so he continually grows in power as he levels, but eventually learns that due to crazy temporal shenanigans, he is actually the source of the cataclysm. You could pull from the Time mystery to foreshadow a bit.
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43/2 is also a fraction. Probably not one you want to use, though.
You could spin it so he continually grows in power as he levels, but eventually learns that due to crazy temporal shenanigans, he is actually the source of the cataclysm. You could pull from the Time mystery to foreshadow a bit.
NO! No temporal causality loops! Bad ZZTRaider! BAD!
NO! No temporal causality loops! Bad ZZTRaider! BAD!
Hey, I never said it was a good idea.
I think it's a cool idea, but almost certainly better suited to a novel than a campaign.
But my campaign has been likened to Dark Souls.
So with sufficient planning and finesse you can beat any enemy or trap even with the weakest character, and returning from the dead is automatic? :P
Lol. Most game mechanics ideas aren't going to be superfun. Make him reroll his stats every morning. Every d4 hours he morphs into a different race in the ARG and gains some random power. If he reaches into his backpack, he can roll on the random magic item table to pull out some random powerful item, etc. He has a chance to have an elixir of any spell on him at any one time. Etc.
He's really asked for a story power, and if I was the GM here, that's how I would run it. It's hard, but that's the fun. I would cause the same kind of things you originally envisioned happening around him all the time. Cause random events. Create a table for yourself - or better yet, try to craft them on the fly. Every time he tries to use it, try to give the player something like what they want, in a totally twisted way. He's in a horrible battle, everyone is going to lose. He tries to use the "random whacky" power to bring the roof down on his enemies. Instead, a herd of stampeding chairs from the next room trample the enemy, given the heroes a temporary respite/advantage. Etc.
(i.e., the thing that excited the player, try to give them that - don't run so far away from what it was, use what it was they liked)
He's an alchemist. He already has a fraction of that power, and can control it. So to add a bit of that wild power and bind it on... Add wild surges to his alchemical magics. And make sure their presence and effect are not under his control.
He's an alchemist. He already has a fraction of that power, and can control it. So to add a bit of that wild power and bind it on... Add wild surges to his alchemical magics. And make sure their presence and effect are not under his control.
This.
I wish I had a fraction of all this power bound to my soul.The Cataclysm is sentient, and the Alchemists now becomes its Familiar.
This is by far my favorite.
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I like the ideas that give him both a benefit and a detriment, that way you AND the player get things to have fun with.
As for possible wish corruption:
Since chaos is the power he's after, maybe you could write up a bunch of things that align with some dice (6, 8, 10, 20, 100 different things on the list). Then decide a few events that may trigger the dice roll and something happens or he must act a certain way for so many rounds due to the chaos coursing through him. Be sure that a decent portion of things are good for him though. All suck and no awesome make jack a depressed fellow.
Example:
1. You shake hands with the mayor. (Rolls 19 on d100). You are only capable of bleating like a goat for (rolls 4 on a d6) hours and its uncontrollable..... "BAAAAAAAAH!"
2. You pat the barmaid on the shoulder. (Rolls 42 on d100). She does not pass her will save. She is now charmed for (rolls 2 on d6) hours. She will not believe you did anything and it is considered to be under silent and still metamagic.
3. You pull your fish in from your dangling fishing line. (Rolls 76 on d100). The fish is now a tiny eggplant.
Just tossing stuff out.
He has nightmares of a deck of many things every night. Nothing else happens.
After all he never specified what power he was talking about. "this" might as well have been the deck.