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Hershel's Holiday Handbook: Winter Lights, Seasons' Sprites - A DMs Guild Charity Booklet $4.95
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Hershel\'s Holiday Handbook: Winter Lights, Seasons\' Sprites - A DMs Guild Charity Booklet
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Hershel's Holiday Handbook: Winter Lights, Seasons' Sprites - A DMs Guild Charity Booklet
Publisher: Dungeon Masters Guild
by Curse o. S. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 01/20/2020 08:18:46

Hershel’s Holiday Handbook: Winter Lights, Seasons’ Sprites

This truly is a wonderful collection of creators coming together in the festive spirit to spread cheer, raise money for a good cause showcasing their talent and imagination!

Much like dogs, these spells and more are not just for Christmas! They may come with holiday cheer, but magic can last throughout the year!

“This book is a collection of the work of twenty-seven TTRPG writers who came together under the banner of the time of giving and joy to help bring some life and light to your table. And best of all, all the money we make from this project is donated directly to ExtraLife to help children’s hospitals across the globe.”

“So, what exactly do you get in this here book? Well, lemme tell you – fourteen spell reskins, forty-five new spells, some new class mechanics for the Battle Master, and four new magic items. So, we got plenty of goodies for you!”

Spell Reskins and Variants

This collection of 14 reskins have name changes and aesthetic changes to give them some holiday cheer and hilarity. I’ll pick a few that catch my eye to give you a few shakes of this gift box without taking the wrapping off:

Macy’s Parade of Floating Apparitions (Spirit Guardians) “...If you are good or neutral, their spectral form appears as a honey loving pants-less bear or a square sponge. If you are evil, they appear as a lasagne loving cat.”

What can I say? I absolutely love Spirit Guardians, and the idea of changing the ghostly apparitions to Macy’s Parade floats brings me so much joy! I’m all for more personal flavourful elements to spells that create an image or apparition! The use of Pooh Bear and Garfield for good and evil is glorious, as is the image of these balloon Guardians floating around the caster.

Grandma’s Christmas Sweater (Armor of Agyths) “A protective magical sweater surrounds you, manifesting as a yarn-made piece of...If a creature hits you with a melee attack while you are wearing the sweater, the creature must succeed on a Wisdom saving throw or say “I’m sorry” out loud to the target.”

You can’t beat a Christmas jumper (sorry, sweater. My English is showing), and if you do you must apologise! The apology save is absolutely ridiculous in the best way, and has such potential for hilarity as some Humbug Bear gruffly apologises after stabbing the Wizard with a rusty carving knife. This also made me wonder if the jumper was knitted by Aunt Agyths...

Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire (Scorching Ray) “You create three burning hot chestnuts and hurl them at targets within range...”

A fun seasonal reskin that evokes memories of tasty treated and burnt fingers.

Phantasmal Krampus (Phantasmal Killer) “You tap into the nightmares of a creature you can see within range and create an illusory manifestation of a half-goat, half-demon monstrosity, visible only to that creature...”

You just have to give it up for terrifying your enemies with horrific visions of Krampus. It’s an industry secret that creature’s nightmares when targeted by Phantasmal Killer are always of Krampus anyway.

These are a novel and amusing approach to existing spell to being more merry to your magic. You could have fun with these in a Holiday game and not tell the players about the changes until the cast the spells and see them marvel at the differences, as with the changes to spells in Curse of Strahd.

New Spells

This is huge collection of 45 new spells! To paraphrase the supplement; much like dogs, these spells are not just for Christmas! They may come with holiday cheer, but magic can last throughout the year!

As with the Reskins and Variants, I’ll pull out a bunch to talk about and then give a bit of an overview.

Missile Toe Cantrip “You fire a small, toe-shaped object out of your toe toward a creature in range...”

It’s impossible not to make this spell. It writes itself. Essentially, it’s a way for a Wizard to cast a shorter-range Fire Bolt doing piercing damage, but without the need for a verbal component, which is actually unique among the offensive Cantrips in the Wizard’s repertoire.

Fruit Cake of Bludgeoning 1st-level conjuration “Like most creatures, the weave is not a fan of fruit cakes. Seasoned spell casters can use their great powers to open up the weave so it can forcefully expel these rock hard, unwanted cakes to bludgeon whatever creature stands between you and your holiday quest...”

What’s more festive than bludgeoning your enemies to death with portal-activated magic fruitcake bazooka!?

Giblet Buster 1st–level necromancy (ritual) “This spell infuses a roasted turkey with necrotic energy creating an undead servant. Touch a roasted turkey and the spell raises as an undead creature known as a Giblet Buster. The Giblet Buster resembles a thanksgiving turkey walking upright.” (stats provided in the appendix)

For every Necromancer who wants to be the unlife of the party or the player who has watched too much Erazerhead.

Gather the Lads 1st-level conjuration (ritual) “Casting time: 13 days Components: S,M (1 Peg Leg, 1 Pint of Milk, 1 Pot, 1 Pan, 1 Bowl, 1 Doorknob, 1 Spoon, 1 Pair of Binoculars, 1 Sausage, 1 Chunk of Wood from a Doorframe, 1 Leg of Lamb, 1 Candle, 1 Cup of Yogurt, and 13,000 Gold pieces, which the spell consumes) Duration: 13 Years For the next thirteen years, the caster is imbued with the power of one of the Yule Lads, forgotten beasts of holiday terror rivalled only by the gods of chaos themselves. At the start of the Yule, the power of one of the thirteen Yule Lads shall imbue the caster...If 3 rolls of 1 are made within the space of 1 year, the Yule Lads are no longer happy with your actions. Your soul is ripped asunder and split between the 13 Yule Lads, to be forever used as fuel for their infernal powers.”

This spell combines many of my great loves; obscure Icelandic folklore, unwieldy casting times, duration and components, D100 tables, spells that take up so much space there’s no way they would fit on one scroll and the possibility of soul disembowelment!

Gift of Giving “You attempt to compel generosity from a creature within range. Target creature must make a WIS save against your spell save DC or be compelled to gift you any one nonmagical item in their hand worth less than 100gp...”

Because nothing is more festive and useful all year than compelled magical theft!

Flying Reindeer Harness “A shimmering harness manifests on a deer of your choice that you can see within range. A flying speed is added to the deer’s stat block (see Monster Manual), it grows until it is Large, it can speak the Common tongue, and it obeys your commands for the next 24 hours. During this time, you can use the deer as a mount without the need for saddle, barding, or other equipment...”

Most definitely useful all year round, but may lead to the party setting up a side business as seer poachers because once they’ve seen this, they will never want to be a than a few feet from a deer!

There are so many ridiculous and wonderful spells to enjoy that will definitely bring festive joy to holiday games, but many have uses all year round!

New Class Options

Festivus Battle Master Maneuvers

Airing of Grievances – reduce temporary hit points by stating your disappointment.

Festivus Feats of Strength – ridiculous wrestling fun

New Weapon: Festivus Pole “By choosing either of these maneuvers, you gain proficiency with an unadorned aluminium pole. It is plain looking, unencumbered by decorations, and relatively inexpensive. Very high strength-to-weight ratio.”

Loving the Festivus flavour and silliness. Confession time: I never watched Seinfeld growing up. I attempted to watch it recently, but I really couldn’t get into it...

New Magic Items

Merry Mulled Wine – A wonderfully warming potion

Warming Wine – A more common slightly less wonderful warming potion.

Spy Elf (Elf on the Shelf & Arcane Eye) – A teleporting magic spy camera.

Bag of Cheer (Bag of Beans) – A particularly festively dangerous Bag of Beans.

To Whom We Wish Thanks “Many thanks to all of the authors and designers who put the time into helping to create this project. It has been a ton of fun to work on. ‘Tis the season to be jolly – so one might say – and I can say that we have all be very jolly in making this project and helping to raise the money that we are for ExtraLife. You can go to their website at https://www.extra-life.org/ and do your part to help support children’s hospitals. Imagination and creativity were born from the minds of children, and without them, this world would be a darker and more dismal place. “

This truly is a wonderful collection of creators coming together in the festive spirit to spread cheer, raise money for a good cause showcasing their talent and imagination!

Credits: Organizer, Management, Editing and Layout: Cameron Day (@daylightpub1066) Written By: KingSwede, Elise Cretel (@DNDElise), Chelsea Chapeliere, Kai Linder (@Paradoliak), Morgan Bates, Marco Michelutto (@marcomiki), Krish (@vistara_setting), Judith Neugebauer (@Writer_JuNe), The Tartan Dungeon Master (@TartanDM), Melissa Doucette (@MellieDM), Matt Standfast, Matthias Gildemyn, Matthew Whitby (@WhitbyWrites), Arthur Rouise (@pub_medieval), Noah Simpson (@Noah20243425), Stuart Broz (@zorbtrauts), Derek Gray (@RockymtnR), Drew Dawes (@DrewDwarves), James Welch (@tatoskok), Jamieson Mulash (@SuperJamoose), Griffin Fredette (@drthreeshoes), Bridie Dutton (@secretcatshop), Joe Sullivan (@JoeSullivanDM), RCG Harlow (@athenaltena), Evan Perlman (@StoriesColossal), Christopher M. Cevasco, Stephen Cinquegrano II, Chris Hopper (@chrishopper2), Rachel Savicki (@RWritesThings)



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