Critic Class
(Note: I designed this class for Scott
Alexander's Dungeons and Discourse system, which probably violates a
number of intellectual property claims. I don't know where that
leaves me. Please see
http://slatestarcodex.com/2013/02/22/dungeons-and-discourse-third-edition-the-dialectic-continues/
for the complete system. It should be noted that I wrote this as
though it were 4th ed. D&D and you had to choose only one power
per level. Re-reading the Dungeons and Discourse rules, I now suspect
you are supposed to get ALL of the spells per level, excepting
Empiricists. So it is likely highly unbalanced.)
A Critic takes classes in literary
theory and criticism. The Critic class draws its power mainly from
Bullshytte, interdisciplinary study, and Poiesis. Critics gain
book-related bonuses and almost entirely attack in response to
opponents' spells.
Level One
CLOSE READING
Type: targeted, mental, metamagic
Cost: W
Timing: Cast during opponent's turn,
then lose next turn.
Defence: R(S) > your Bullshytte
(your choice)
Spell: Carefully examine the language
of your opponent's argument to better understand how it works. Cast
on an opponent's Debate attack. If successful, attack does 50% damage
against opponent. Whether or not your opponent makes the saving
throw, attack only does 50% damage. Lose following turn.
Level Two
FEAT: EDUCATED IMAGINATION
Type: self, fregian
Spell: You are incredibly well-read.
You may have one more open book than
you would otherwise have. You are able to use type:literary books.
For 4 - half your level (rounded down) W, you can also open any of
the following books even if you do not meet their requirements:
/Being and Nothingness/ by Sartre, /Nichomachean Ethics/ by
Aristotle, /The Origin of the Species/ by Darwin, /The Prince/ by
Machiavelli, /The Psychopathology of Everyday Life/ by Freud, /The
Republic/ by Plato, /The Second Sex/ by de Beauvoir, /Tao Te Ching/
by Tzu, and of the books listed in this document. Add 1/2 your level
(rounded down) to your Erudition.
Level Three
FEAT: RHETORICAL FLOURISH
Type: self, metamagic
Spell: You use your knowledge of
language to improve the clarity and persuasiveness of your arguments.
Add your Poiesis or your Precision to
your Rationality or your Phronesis scores for any spell or saving
roll. Add your Poiesis score or your Precision score to your Rhetoric
skill.
FEAT: OBFUSCATION
Type: self, metamagic
Spell: You use your knowledge of jargon
to obscure your argument and confuse your opponents.
Add your Poiesis to your Bullshytte
scores for any spell or saving roll OR for 1W use your Bullshytte
instead of Rationality or your Phronesis (this spell supercedes all
opponent spells and effects). Add your Poesis skill to your Sophistry
skill.
KATHARSIS
Type: self
Timing: Whenever you deal physical
damage against an opponent > 4
Cost: W
Spell: Gain +2 HP. If you are Greek,
recoup the Will cost.
DECONSTRUCT (Critic)
Type: dualist, metamagic, postmodern
Cost: W
Timing: cast during an opponent's turn,
then lose your next turn (once you are Level 7 Critic, you no longer
lose your next turn)
Defense: R(S) > your Critic level +
2
Spell: Explain how the subtext of an
opponent's argument covertly challenges and undermines itself.
Cast on an opponent's Debate attack.
That attack now damages the creature who made it instead of the
target.
Level Four
LESSER INTERDISCIPLINARY CONVERSATION
Prerequisite: FEAT: EDUCATED
IMAGINATION
Type: self
Spell: Your wide reading has given you
an edge in interdisciplinary work.
Earn Metaphysician, Apologist, Utopian,
or Ethicist Levels up to Level Three at 3/4 what you would otherwise
pay (but no less than what a specialist would pay).
MARXIST INTERPRETATION
Type: targeted, communist OR leftist
Prerequisite: Level 1 Utopian
Cost: W
Timing: Use when you make a successful
saving throw against a Debate attack or a Spell
Spell: You analyze your opponent's
recent claims according to Marx's critique of capitalism.
Cast on the opponent on whose spell you
made the successful save, but only if that opponent is non-Communist.
Do damage equal to their Wealth level + your Bullshytte.
SUMMON: PREHISTORIC STORYTELLER
Type: summon, materialist or dualist,
literary darwinist
Prerequisite: Level 1 Empiricist or
Metaphysician
Cost: W
Timing: When you make a successful
saving throw against a Debate attack or a Spell
Spell: You analyze your opponent's
recent claims for what they reveal about the evolution of human
narrative tastes.
Summon a Dire Normal Human. Does not
work if the attacking opponent has a Critic Level equal to or higher
than your own.
ORIENTALISM
Type: targeted, postcolonial, dualist
Prerequisite: Asian, Level 1 Utopian or
Ethicist
Cost: W
Timing: When you make a successful
saving throw against a Debate attack or a Spell
Spell: You explain how your opponent's
attack reinforces colonial power structures and others postcolonial
populations.
Cast against the attacking opponent,
but only if that opponent is Anglo-American or Continental. Does 20
dualist damage.
AFFECTIVE FALLACY
Type: targeted, formalist
Cost: W
Timing: When you make a successful
saving throw against a Debate attack or a Spell
Spell: You show that your opponent's
debate attack depended on a certain emotional response on your part.
Cast on the attacking opponent. Does
dualist damage equal to your Bullshytte.
Level Five
SUMMON: VOICES OF THE DEAD
Type: summon, materialist or dualist,
new historicist, non-combat
Prerequisite: Level 1 Utopian
Cost: 2W
Timing: 2
Spell: Examine historical texts to
conjure the voices of the dead.
Summon a Spectre of a spirit from any
time in the past. This Spectre cannot move, attack, or take damage,
but it can speak. It will answer questions about the history,
culture, religion, politics, etc. of the time period and place in
which it lived.
MIMESIS
Type: targeted
Cost: 3W
Timing: When an opponent makes a
successful attack against you, then lose your next turn
Defence: B(S) > 6
Spell: Learn from your opponent's
successful attack. Whatever damage is done to you (before armour,
etc.) + your Poiesis score is done to your opponent. Lose your next
turn.
HERESY OF PARAPHRASE
Type: self, formalist
Prerequisite: 2 Level Apologist
Cost: 3W
Duration: 6 rounds
Spell: Show that your opponent's
attempts to paraphrase the contents of their books is unavoidably
flawed.
For the next 6 rounds, no effects from
books apply to you and you are immune to all spells that opponents
gain through books.
DREAM INTERPRETATION
Type: targeted, psychological
Prerequisite: 2 Level Empiricist or
Metaphysician
Cost: 2W
Timing: 1
Duration: Until the target sleeps next
Spell: Interpret dream content in order
to better understand the dreamer's psychology and thereby improve
mental health.
Cast on a friendly target who has just
awoken from sleep. Provides a +4 bonus to mental defence. Target is
immune to type:psychological attacks. Gain +1 Influence over the
target.
MULVEY'S MALE GAZE DEFLECTION
Type: summon, feminist
Prerequisite: 2 Level Ethicist or
Utopian, female
Cost: 2W
Timing: Whenever a male opponent
attacks you, then lose following turn
Spell: Attack only does 50% damage;
100% of what damage would have been done is rebounded on the opponent
in dualist damage; lose following turn
Level Six
DISTANT READING
Type: area, digital humanities,
statistical
Prerequisite: 1 Level Logicist or
Empiricist
Cost: 3W
Timing: Cast whenever an opponent
attacks you, then lose following turn
Defence: R(S) > your Rationality
Spell: Rather than carefully examine
the language of your opponent's argument to better understand how it
works, you use statistical methods to examine all of your opponents'
claims.
Cast on an opponent's Debate attack.
Attack works like Close Reading, but if successful does damage to all
opponents in area (regardless of distance).
ENIGMATICALLY SIGNIFY
Type: target, psychological,
laplanchian
Prerequisite: 1 Level Empiricist or 2
Level Metaphysician
Cost: 2W
Timing: 1
Defence: Their Theory of Mind score >
your remaining Will (prior to the cost's deduction)
Spell: Your untranslated desires become
a part of your opponent's unconscious. Gain +1 Influence over your
opponent and do 10 mental damage.
INTENTIONAL FALLACY
Type: targeted, metamagic
Cost: 2W
Timing: Whenever an opponent makes a
saving throw, then lose your next turn
Spell: Point out that your opponent
needs to address the argument itself, not what the author of the
argument is presumed to have meant.
Cast on an opponent's saving throw.
Subtract 3 from the saving throw.
EXEGESIS
Type: targeted, theist, metamagic
Prerequisite: 2 Level Apologist
Timing: Whenever an opponent attacks
you with an Apologist or eastern Spell, then lose following turn
Cost: 3W
Defence: R(S) + the spell's level >
6
Spell: You use your literary analytical
savvy to out-interpret your opponent's sacred text.
Cast against on an opponent's Apologist
or eastern spell that affects you. If successful, any damage that
would have been done on you is instead done on them. Lose following
turn.
PERFORM GENDER
Type: self, feminist, lgtbq, postmodern
Prerequisite: 2 Level Utopian or
Ethicist
Cost: 2W
Duration: 2 turns
Spell: You use your knowledge of gender
performativity to take control of your own gender. From the duration
of this spell, you can decide whether you count as male or female for
any given spell or effect
Level Seven
SIMULACRUM AND SIMULATION
Type: targeted, postmodern, dualist or
idealist
Cost: 3W
Timing: 1
Duration: 4
Defence: Poiesis(S) > 6
Spell: In the current age, simulacra
have become the reality.
Cast on a simulation (clockwork,
p-zombie, illusion, etc.). When it would be beneficial, you and your
allies may treat the target as real, doing mental damage and so
forth. Your opponents do not get this advantage.
FEAT: COMPARATIVE LITERATURE
Type: self, fregian, postcolonial,
non-combat
Spell: You have decided that
multilingualism is necessary for a complete understanding of
literature. You may speak, understand, read, or write any language,
even those you have never encountered before. This does not allow you
to speak to non-sentient animals nor inanimate objects, nor does it
ensure the other party will listen to you or care what you have to
say. You may not use Fear: Comparative Literature to learn
programming languages or private languages.
ANXIETY OF INFLUENCE
Type: targeted, psychological
Prerequisite: 1 Level of Empiricist or
Metaphysican
Cost: 3W
Timing: Immediately after another
player makes a debate attack or spell against you (whether successful
or not)
Spell: Cast on the opponent who
attacked you. Immediately gain +1 Influence over them. If you get +2
Influence over them, whether or not you have majority, they become
Afraid (saving throw Poiesis(S) > your Poiesis).
SUMMON: LAUGHING MEDUSA
Type: targeted, feminist
Prerequisite: female
Cost: (7 - your Poiesis skill)W
Timing: Immediately after another
player makes a saving throw against one of your Debate attacks, then
lose following turn
Spell: Summon a Gorgon
Level Eight
GREATER INTERDISCIPLINARY CONVERSATION
Prerequisite: FEAT: EDUCATED
IMAGINATION
Type: self
Spell: Your wide reading has given you
even further proficiency in interdisciplinary work.
Earn Metaphysician, Apologist, Utopian,
or Ethicist Levels up to Level Seven at 3/4 what you would otherwise
pay (but no less than what a specialist would pay).
BECOME HARAWAY'S CYBORG
Type: self, feminist, materialist
Prerequisite: 2 Level Metaphysician,
Empiricist, or Utopian, or 1 Level in each
Spell: You have entirely blurred the
distinction between human and machine. When it is convenient to you,
you may defend against mental damage with your physical defence and
you may defend against physical damage with your mental defence.
Dualist damage does 150% its regular damage. If you are female, +4 to
your Precision.
KNOWLEDGE-POWER CONVERSION
Type: area, postmodern, foucauldian
Prerequisite: 2 Level Utopian
Timing: 2
Duration: 10
Spell: Whenever you or an ally inflict
mental damage, you also inflict physical damage equal to 50% of the
mental damage. Platonic forms do not gain this advantage.
DEFEAT IDEOLOGY
Type: targeted, metamagic, postcolonial
Prerequisite: 2 Level Logicist or
Ethicist
Cost: 2W
Timing: Whenever a rightist,
capitalist, racist, absolutist, papal, or nazi spell is cast against
you or an ally
Defence: R(S) > 8
Spell: Functions like Deconstruct
(Critic), but does damage to the opponent's allies as well (if the
opponent who made the attack fails his or her saving throw, then all
Associated creatures must make saving throws; if the opponent who
made the attack succeeds at his or her saving throw, all Associated
creatures are safe).
Level Nine
BECOME SUPERREADER
Type: self, reader response
Spell: Immediately learn Heresy of
Paraphrase, even if you have no Apologist levels. If you already know
Heresy of Paraphrase, you may now cast it at 1W. You are now immune
to any type:philosophy of language attacks and effects that you
choose. You are now immune to all type:formalist attacks and effects.
BECOME PERFECT INSOMNIAC
Type: self, fregian
Spell: No longer lose your turn for
spells which normally require you to lose your turn. Immediately
learn Feat: Comparative Literature. If you already know Feat:
Comparative, Literature, immediately learn another skill of lower
level for which you have the necessary prerequisites. You are now
immune to any type:philosophy of language attacks and effects that
you choose. You no longer require sleep; instead, read a book for 1
hour to achieve the same effects. Postmodern attacks do 50% more
damage.
DEATH OF THE AUTHOR
Type: formalist, barthesian
Cost: 50% of your total HP, all of your
remaining Will (minimum 3W)
Timing: Whenever you are successfully
attacked with a Debate spell
Spell: Cast against attacking opponent;
does exactly the same damage to him or her as it costs to you with
dualist damage
++BOOKS++
(Note: these are still underdeveloped)
THE CYBORG MANIFESTO by Donna Haraway
Prerequisites: Level 2 Biology and
Level 2 Metaphysics, Bullshytte > 14, not Rightist
Types: postmodern, feminist
Spells: Become: Cyborg, even if you are
not Level 7
Effects:
- +2 techne
THE COLLECTED FICTIONS OF JORGE LUIS
BORGES
Prerequisites: Feat: Educated
Imagination, Rationality > 14, Bullshytte > 12
Types: literary
Effects:
- +4 Erudition
- Paradox Beasts will not attack you
MOBY DICK by Herman Melville
Prerequisites: Feat: Educated
Imagination, Phronesis > 12
Types: literary
Spells: Summon Whale (retool Summon
Laughing Medusa, but produce a whale instead)
Effects:
- Each time you attack the same target
in successive turns (successfully or otherwise), increase the damage
of your attack by n%, where n = (the number of times
you have attacked this target X 10).
SIMULACRA AND SIMULATION by JEAN
BAUDRILLARD
Prerequisites: Level 2 Critic and Level
2 Metaphysics, Bullshytte > 14, not Fideist
Types: postmodern, post-structuralist
Spells: Simulacra and Simulation
Effects
S/Z by Roland Barthes
Prerequisites: Level 2 Critic,
Bullshytte > 13 and Rationality > 13
Types: structuralist,
post-structuralist
Spells: Intentional Fallacy,
Deconstruction; at level seven, you can use "Death of the
Author"
++SUMMONS++
GORGON (5)
/Rather than literally turning its
victims to stone, this gorgon inflicts a psychological paralysis./
Type: feminist, postmodern
Terrain: land
Stats: 22/11/12/21/11 25/25/1
Spells: Inspire Ennui, Inspire Fear,
Smash, Debate
Special: Will never attack female
creatures
Copyright, insofar as I can possibly
claim it, 2013 to Christian H of http://thinkinggrounds.blogspot.com
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