Mechanics for Magic-Users of the Order of the Green Hand

Much of this post will build on my previous post on the Order of the Green Hand. I'll try not to repeat too much, and I'll put a bit more history into this post than my previous posts.

The Order of the Green Hand was originally founded by a Sorcerer (think Carcosan Sorcerer, but with the ability to cast any spell as a ritual; we'll get to Sorcerers later in this series) who discovered the Ritual of the Green Hand and numerous low-level Magic-Users from the various Magical Academies who were disillusioned with the zero-sum culture, constant infighting and politics of the Academies. The Order, then, is based on the idea of cooperation and mutual aid. All of the Magical Academies found this idea dangerous both because it shook up their comfortable world and because they recognized that Magic-Users cooperating together, and with Sorcerers, would be much more powerful and effective than the Academies, divided as they were by petty squabbles. They hunted down as many of the early members of the Order as they could, coordinating their attacks on a single night of purging, known as the Night of Green and Red. Most members were killed, but some escaped; most that escaped lost their spell books and were only able, at a later date, to copy the spells they had memorized (and not used during their escape) onto new spell books. A very few members of the Order were able to abscond with a few higher level spells; to this day, the Order's spell books are skewed towards many low-level spells and few high level spells.

The Magical Academies continued to hunt the Order, citing the Order's connection to sorcery to the authorities and expending considerable political capital to convince them to ban the Order and eventually founding an order of Purgators to stamp the Order out of existence. The Order eventually found safe havens, however, in the good graces of kings, lords and city-states which did not have Magical Academies within their territory and desired reliable access to court mages, advice and magically capable agents. Eventually, the Order became established enough that the Academies no longer challenge it openly outside of their own cities (which the Order still has not been allowed to establish a presence in) and the Purgators have dwindled in number and their ranks are now filled with more Assassins than Paladins. The Order, as it has gained power, forged an alliance with the Assassin's Guild to combat the Purgators, who violate the Assassin's strict insistence on their own monopoly on assassination.

As described in my original post, members of the Order have access to many shared resources at the Order's many dormitories. One of these resources is the dormitory spell books. Whenever a member of the Order discovers or obtains a new spell, it is copied into the dormitory's two spell books. Every month the dormitories send one of their spell books on to the next dormitory in a set rotation and once the new spell book arrives any spells that one book has but the other does not are copied into the book that does not have them. In this way, the number of spells available to a member of the order is constantly, if slowly, growing. Mechanically, every month there are (1d6-4) new spells of (3d6-9)th level. (No new spells if either roll goes below 1.)

Despite the enmity between the Order and the Academies, the methodology of their practice of spell-casting is basically the same; after all, the founding Magic-Users of the Order all came from the Academies. The relative inexperience of the founding members was balanced out by their practice of mutual aid as well as the desperation of the early days of the Order, so members of the Order today are able to cast spells just as well as alumni of one of the Academies, save that they don't specialize in certain spells like the Academies do. Like graduates of an Academy, members of the Order must check against their Intelligence scores whenever attempting to learn a new spell; failure means that the spell may not be learned at the member's current level, but a new attempt may be made each level until the spell is successfully learned.

In the methodology of magic outside of casting spells, however, the Order owes much to the Sorcerers within its ranks. Ready help and teaching from Sorcerers enable Magic-Users of the Order to cast rituals of one half their caster level. In addition, members of the Order may copy spells they have not mastered into their spell books and may cast them as rituals, something alumni of the Academies are not able to do. In addition, members of the Order benefit from Sorcerous training in the crafting of magic items; mechanically, they craft them as if they are one level higher than they actually are and as if the laboratory they use is one increment more valuable than it actually is.

Higher-level members of the Order often take administrative positions within the Order, helping to run a dormitory, manufacturing magic items and protecting and advancing the Order through diplomatic and political means. At least one of these members will always be on duty in each dormitory to give help and advice to any members that need it, though they will be most knowledgable about magic and local politics and generally ignorant about other subjects. (If a PC is a member of the Order, when the PC established a stronghold, it will be, or will at least include, a dormitory.)

Each dormitory possesses a modest library and laboratory, serviceable but nothing like the libraries of the Academies. Tables for determining the their value, as well as the mechanical benefits of staff of the dormitory, will be forthcoming.

Finally, it should be noted that Sorcery, that is, the casting of rituals by those without the capability to memorize spells, and especially the casting of rituals which cannot be memorized as spells, has never lost its stigma. The continued presence of Sorcerers within the Order is a secret, even if it is suspected by many. Low-level Magic-Users in the Order are not told of the presence of Sorcerers within the Order and Sorcerers of all levels are aided in passing as Magic-Users. Once a Magic-User has reached fourth level (also the level where one no longer must surrender magic items to the Order, and when the hands turn green), the Magic-User is told of the membership of Sorcerers and introduced to the dormitory's book of sorcery, which contains all the rituals the Order possesses (mechanically, three kinds of rituals will be in the book of sorcery: rituals for which the Order does not have the spell, since rituals may be cast from spells, but spells cannot be cast from rituals as the ritual "write-up" contains less information than the spells do; rituals that may not be cast as spells at all, such as Carcosan rituals; and, finally, the ritual write-ups for all the spells that the Order has, including all the information necessary to rebuild actual spells, as back-up).

When first given this information – the membership of Sorcerers, the reality of Cthuloid beings, the possession of horrible Carcosan rituals by the Order – the Magic-User must roll at or under Wisdom or go catatonic (and unplayable) for d100 days; this same risk is repeated the first time the Magic-User attempts to study a Carcosan ritual (so it is in the PC's best interest to study one at the first opportunity so that this risk doesn't have to be run when time is of the essence).

… and Sometimes They Go Really Well!

Last night I enjoyed myself greatly running a session of my Skype campaign; it was the kind of game that makes this kind worth playing.

We started slowly, and two hours late (we ended up playing two hours later than planned as well). The party consisted of:

Gunt Vor, Dwarf Warrior (Level 3, I think)
Velmont Pirok, Dwarf Warrior (Level 1, I think)
Sorvana, Magic-User (Level 3)
Firgon, Warrior (Level 1)
Shavasta, Scoundrel (Level 3, I think)

The party went back to an area of the dungeon with irregularly cut, cyclopean stonework where they had discovered two ray guns on a previous expedition. They found their way into a large throne room with rows of statues down both sides and a yellow skeleton on the throne, pointing to the floor in front of it (thank you, Dungeon Alphabet).

Examining the floor, the players found a loose stone and were able to lift it out of the floor with a crowbar and some effort. The stone had been covering a lever, which the players promptly pulled. Blue lights came on near the tops of all the walls… and the 18 statues in the room animated and attacked the party!

This is a combat that I had been concerned about the party encountering when I first laid it out, but I had decided that, first of all, the players had to activate the encounter themselves and that I would stand by the Old School dogma of allowing "unbalanced" encounters that the party should run away from, as heavy-handed as it felt. I did decide that the batteries for these statues wer low so that they would attack every other round, but it turns out that I needn't have worried.

First off, both Gunt and Velmont took advantage of the "Unstoppable" house rule we use, which is fairly common in the OSR. It states that if a Warrior/Fighter kills an enemy in melee then that warrior gets an extra attack that round. Gunt and Velmont both dropped multiple statues in a few rounds.

Secondly, though, I hadn't taken into consideration the unpredictable effects of using Arduin's Class-based Special Ability charts during character generation. Velmont's player had rolled a 77 or 78, the result of which reads: "Roll d6 - Add this number as a bonus with any one weapon type." Velmont's player had proceeded to roll a 6 on his d6 roll and added it to any time he uses axes. This bonus (to both to-hit and damage rolls, I ruled), along with the Unstoppable class ability, meant that most of the statues fell to Velmont's axes.

One of the most fun things I've learned from another member of the OSR is to ask "please describe the [thing your character just killed]'s horrible death." (I learned this from Tavis Allison at SoCal Minicon.) Velmont's player actually started declining to answer the question with more than one word; I asked him if he was sure he didn't want to describe Velmont rocking out in combat, but, once again, I needn't have worried about him losing his spotlight. After it had been established that there were only a few statues left, Velmont started singing "We will Rock You" as he smashed the last of the statues to bits. As the last statue crumbled at his feet, Velmont assumed this stance and belted out "We Are the Champions."

Subtract a meter, add two axes and a beard and you've got what happened last night.

Exploring this throne room, now that the statues were vanquished, they found that the large cyclopean stones that made up the walls all had court scenes depicted in reliefs. Looking at them carefully, they found six figures that stood out from the rest; three figures held coils of rope while the other three bent over and held lanterns to the rope.

There is a secret door here, and the way to open it is to bring a light source near the depictions of rope three times. It's a difficult secret door, and they weren't able to figure it out, but they ended up finding another way to the treasures behind this door, though they haven't taken it yet.

Pulling back the tapestry behind the throne, the party found a much less concealed secret door, made of some kind of silvery metal, without locks or hinges, but which they couldn't open. I allowed Gunt to use his laser-gun to cut out a section of the door; reaching through it, he found a wheel on the other side fo the door, which he turned. After turning it enough, the door opened and they found what looked to be a long-abandoned, dusty bedroom. Looking around and investigating the desk and rotting bed, they still failed to find the treasure hidden in a hole in the wall behind the desk.

The room they were in has three other doors, all with wheels to unseal them. Taking one, they found themselves in an abandoned alchemist's lab. The cyclopean stones in the walls, floor and ceiling were constantly changing shape and size and shifting among each other. They found a workbench covered in broken glassware (Sorvanna was disappointed, as I'd just discussed the usefulness of libraries and laboratories for Magic-Users with her at the beginning of the session) and a cabinet. Investigating the contents of the cabinet, they found three spheres of glass that seem to contain some kind of smoke (when a sphere is broken, it will release the "Outfire Fog," which puts out all fires it comes in contact with) and a bag with powdered roots necessary for the Carcosan ritual "Chaining the Formless Aspect."  If the party encounters a sorcerer, the sorcerer will likely want the contents of the bag.

Moving on, the party discovered an old prison, with many of the inmates' skeletons left in their cells. The skeletons were mostly human, but some had longer, thinner, more fragile bones, bones they didn't recognize and skulls not built with jawbones (mind-flayer skeletons- yeah, the guys who ran this prison were that tough).

Connected to the prison was a chamber with a lever on the wall and a red square outlined in the middle of the room with a large pile of powdery dust in the middle. This was a summary execution chamber. Shevasta's player decided to have her experiment by having Sorvana command her Unseen Servant to pull the lever while Shevasta stood in the circle. Failing her save, Shevasta disintegrated into dust. The party, saddened by this turn of events, decided to leave the dungeon. As they headed towards the exit, however, they met a Spawn of Shub-Niggurath, an three-eyed, toothy worm-like thing that they were able to kill after a less one-sided battle than the fight with the statues had been.

This spawn had 6 HD which means that the party qualified for a roll on the Puppet-Master Machination Tables to see whether a dragon has noticed the party or not. They only had a 10% chance to be noticed, but they "made" their throw, being noticed by a dragon which I'll now have to generate. This dragon, I found out after rolling further on the tables, has decided to get rid of the party by sending some of its minions to rub them out. We'll see what happens; the minions will have 4 HD, so if the party kills them it will increase their chance to be noticed by other dragons as well!

All in all a great session. The loss of Shevasta was severely tempered by the fact that, well, no one, including her player, really liked her (for good reason). Her replacement character, to my glee, will be the first character in my campaign to be a member of the Order of the Green Hand, as I mentioned in my last post. Along with figuring out what will be ambushing the party next session, I need to figure out which spells the Order has. It's going to be interesting to see Magic Users of very different backgrounds interact; Flynn's new character will have access to many, many spells, as a perk of being a member of the Order, while Sorvana, the other Magic User, as the apprentice to an independent master, has access to comparitively few spells; this is complicated by the fact that members of the Order are not allowed to share their magical knowledge without express permission, and such permission is rarely granted.

All in all a very fun session, especially because I'm beginning to see how the party's actions are going to influence how the world treats them from here on out.

Player Map of the Mews of Methas

The mapper in the Skype campaign I run sent me this after tonight's session. It's the map of all of my megadungeon that they've explored. It makes me very happy to see just how big my megadungeon is; I've never taped my pieces together like this before. ^__^

Two other important bits from tonight's game:

• I've run enough sessions since I added Carcosan influences to my game to be able to say that Carcosa definitely improves it.
• One of my players started a new character tonight. To my delight, Flynn decided to have his Magic-User be a member of the Order of the Green Hand.

Guilds, Class Warfare and Alien Settings

Some quick thoughts as a follow-up to my recent post on guilds:

– I've been thinking more about the difference between hirelings and henchmen. Hirelings, despite the fact that they have been presented as having guilds, are not compatible with guilds because they only represent Labor, not Capital. Hirelings are wage-slaves, dependent upon a wage and usually unskilled, with no prospects for advancement.

– This leads to class warfare in well-run games. Things like Telecanter's Five Fingers and Joesky's unhappy hirelings table. This can be fun, especially when the dice tell you to have a hireling stab a PC or push them into lava, but players often have just as much a sense of humor about this sort of thing as employers do about their employees striking. Depending on what kind of game you want to run, you may want to offer another, less anachronistic and troublesome option, or you may want to totally replace hirelings with henchmen, especially when it comes to institutions. (That is, having a henchman could be a "thing" that people recognize, that allows legal inheritance, lets the henchman speak for the PC, etc., while hirelings could still happen, but would just be hired in an ad hoc way and wouldn't be anything special.)

– Dovetailing with this line of thinking, I assume that most readers are interested in ways to make their game settings seem "different" to their players. Things that make players feel like they are in a different world add to immersion and the escape that is a part of roleplaying. Guilds are something that is very foreign to most people raised in the West, so instituting some guilds that the PCs encounter would be very easy ways to communicate "this isn't the 21st century dressed up like a ren fair."

– A guild that would have a lot of contact with PCs would be a guild for adventurers. The guild would be a supplier of henchmen, who would basically be apprentices, but would have regulations against using hirelings, among other things. The guild would both jar the players from their assumptions and provide the benefits and restrictions that are what guilds are about. Adventurers guilds can be customized according to alignment, whether they are optional, whether the guild will be OK with adventurers opting out and whether the guild is particularly active in hatching and executing schemes or if it just takes care of the basics and doesn't involve itself in the plot.

– I should write up an adventurer's guild.

Guilds

A while ago, Sully brought up the idea of using guilds in RPGs, and way back in January, Telecanter also did some thinking on guilds (the comments are especially worth reading for ideas). Including guilds in most FRPG settings is a good idea, as guilds were very common in the pre-Capitalist Europe that serves as the basis for most fantasy roleplaying. The problem is that guilds have mostly faded away in the last two or three hundred years of Capitalism, so most people aren't really sure how they work. As Sully says in his post, it's not unusual for the only guild players ever come in contact with to be the Thieves Guild, which has roots in Lankhmar, rather than medieval London or Paris.

Dove-tail this with my own real-life interest in a third-way economic system called Distributism which advocates a return to a guild system. I mention this not to turn this blog into a political soapbox, but to explain how I came upon this article. The article is worth a read, but I'll break down the main characteristics of guilds according to the article here so those who don't want to won't have to:

• The goal of the guild is to maintain the livelihood of its members, so that guild members who work hard will be guaranteed to be able to make a living at their trade. 
• Guilds receive charters from the State that gives them the legal authority to regulate their trade.
• Anyone can join a guild, but they have to go through a process before they become members of the guild. This keeps the ranks of the guild from swelling to the point where there is too much supply.
• No one who isn't a member of a guild may legally practice the guild's trade.
• Rules are put in place that keep competition from driving hard-working guild members out of business. In practice, this means that certain forms of competition are not allowed. (Like doctors not being allowed to advertise, from the example in the article.)
• Rules are also put in place to maintain the quality of the trade. From reading books on the Middle Ages when I was in middle school, I remember that wine guilds would ban watering down wine, for example.

The best example from Western Capitalist society today probably is the practice of medicine, with the various boards that certify doctors standing in the place of guilds, but basically filling the same function. I'll assume that if you want more information on non-gaming guilds, though, that you'll read the article, so I'll stop explaining here.

So how do we apply this to gaming? The obvious answer seems to be that guilds prevent PCs from running roughshod over other characters. That'll mean that, at least in a relatively settled or civilized area, like a city or town, characters don't get to just set up shop and run a business while they rest for a week between dungeon expeditions. Instead, if they want to engage in a trade, they'll have to join a guild and go through the apprenticeship process. The article I've cited says that guild membership has to be free to anyone who can pass muster, but if you want to make your setting more frustrating and corrupt your PCs may have to have connections or buy their way into an apprenticeship. I don't particularly like this, since it makes guilds frustrating to players, and I like guilds, but it's a possibility and so I mention it.

Another possibility is to have guilds employ the adventurers. Maybe they need the PCs to investigate a member who is suspected of breaking some guild rules. Maybe someone is practicing their trade outside of the guild but hasn't been shut down by the authorities yet and the guild wants the PCs to find out why. Maybe the guild is required by it's charter to do its own enforcement, so the PCs are hired to enforce compliance with guild rules. Maybe the guild has heard about some opportunity for trade or some location of raw materials for its trade and wants the PCs to investigate for them. Having guilds as patrons in this way, I think, adds flavor and makes guilds an integral part of the setting in the players' minds.

Another possibility is having the PCs be part of an adventurers' guild. Telecanter has already kind of started this with his Five Fingers, where hirelings have rules that protect themselves from wanton PCs, but also have to hold up their end of the five protections as well. This isn't exactly a guild, though, since there's a kind of management/labor split in the relationship, but it's close. If hirelings were apprentice adventurers and the PCs and their hirelings were part of the same guild, then we'd have a true guild situation. Another possibility is that each class gets its own guild, much like my Order of the Green Hand.

Twenty Questions, Part 2: Magic User Guilds

[I've decided to take out the "with Jeff Rients" part of this series title. I'm not sure if it was leading people here expecting something totally different and whether that was totally fair of me or not. Sorry if that bothered anyone. No one contacted me about this, but it's just been bothering me.]

So, Jeff's ninth question is: "Is there a magic guild my MU belongs to or that I can join in order to get more spells?"

Answer 1: Yes! It's called the Order of the Green Hand. You can have access to any spells that the other members have, as all newly discovered spells are copied into guild-owned spell books so other guild members can copy them. There are also some other serious perks, but be aware that membership is also costly.

Answer 2: No! Magic is a rare thing and wizards are Dying Earth style selfish, scheming connivers who won't give you a lick of help unless there's some benefit for them, and even then will be scheming to figure out some way to get out of helping you. The way they see it, magical ability is a zero-sum game, so if you're learning more, that must be bad for them unless they're learning more as well. If they learn more while you don't, they must be winning. Your best bet for finding new spells is adventuring in unexplored areas. Sorry, buddy, but dungeons are more accommodating than your fellow magic users.

Answer 3: No, but your first level magic user is almost certainly an apprentice to a higher-level magic user. Your magic user can get spells, advice and magical assistance from this master wizard, but only for as long as your magic user is acting like an apprentice. That means sharing any spells your MU finds, taking quests assigned by the master and possibly turning over at least some of the magic items that your MU finds. That's not all bad, especially since quests to find lost magic and treasure are kind of what this game is about, but eventually your MU will want to strike out on his own and make his way by himself, after which help from your master will be infrequent at best, though he might also give your MU a large and useful gift as a parting present. Oh, and I, as the ref, totally reserve the right to kill your MU's master once you're good and emotionally attached to him; it'll make you want to go after whatever NPC killed him.

Answer 4: No, but that's no biggie for your magic user. He was educated at a magic-user school, where the text was the Book of First Level Spells. When he's ready, any magic-user school library will be happy to sell him the Book of Second Level Spells, the Book of Third Level Spells and so on, at a hefty price, of course.

At the referee's option, certain spells may not be in the general corpus of knowledge, having been lost or just never getting into general circulation; these can be found through adventuring in unexplored areas and can give a magic user great power, as they can be the only ones who can cast the spell. They may contribute the spell to the magic user community, gaining prestige, undying thanks, honorary doctorates, favors and perks, or they may keep it for themselves, gaining a reputation as a magic user who practices spells inscrutable to even other magic users.

As another option, different schools of magic could be rivals with each other, each having different spells in their Book of First Level Spells, which they guard jealously from each other. In order to buy a book of spells from a school's book store, one must have graduated from that school. Selling copies of your spell books to other schools would be one of the highest acts of betrayal to your school, while stealing a copy of another school's spellbooks and turning it over to your school would be a coup that would earn you all sorts of accolades.

Answer 5: No. Why would you need a guild when you can go to the library to look this stuff up? Spells are not exactly common knowledge, but they are common enough that access to them is free. You still need expensive ink to copy them, though, and the library books aren't written/printed in magic ink/gold/giant squid ink/whatever; they just have the information you need to copy it down, so it's no use stealing them.

These five answers aren't all mutually exclusive, and could be combine with each other in various ways. For example, your setting could combine Answers 1, 2 and 3 by having the default Machiavellian magic using culture of Answer 2, but have an upstart Order of the Green Hand (Answer 1) that, firstly, greatly benefits the high-level magic users who run the guild and, secondly, is introducing a new spirit of cooperation into the magic-user culture. If an MU PC's player decides not to join the Order, the MU can be an apprentice to another magic-user (Answer 3), but the master-apprentice relationship is one fraught with both sides seeking advantage over the other and trying to help the other just enough so that the other side doesn't terminate the relationship.

Another possibility could be mixing Answers 4 and 5. Roll randomly on the first three spell levels ten times each. These spells are public knowledge and can be found in the library. For each school of magic, roll a few more times (depending on how big your spell lists are) on each spell level list and those spells are the ones that each particular school has and teaches in addition to the common knowledge spells. Once you get above third level spells, they aren't public knowledge anymore, so if your MU didn't go to school and just studied magic on his own in the library, or was an apprentice, then he's going to have to figure out some way to get his hands on fourth level and higher spells…

What's also interesting to me is how these answers, or any combination of them, immediately sets the tone for how much magic saturates your setting. Low-magic or low-magic-saturation settings have answers like 2 and 3, while high-magic-saturation settings have answers like Answer 5.

So, how do you handle this in your own campaign? What other possibile answers are there to this question? Can you think of a magic user guild that has less costs and benefits than the Order of the Green Hand, but still isn't just handing the MU PC some magical advantages without making them pay for them? Or should MUs really just be given a break and not be asked to pay much for the benefits of guild membership?

Assassin's Guild

So, the Order of the Green Hand needs an assassin's guild to go with it, no? Taking a cue from Zak, I'm presenting this guild as all rules, with any "fluff" I think has to be included in brackets. This assassin's guild doesn't have any official name, but goes by a few unofficial names, including "the Group," "the Gang," "the Workmen," and, most commonly, "the Monopoly."

Guild Law:

• Guilded assassins may not kill other guilded assassins, on pain of death.
• Guilded assassins may take apprentices, who are not considered guilded, but who may kill under their master's supervision. [Apprentices are the way enemy Guild members get rid of each other.]
• Apprentice assassins may only gain guild membership by replacing a retiring guilded assassin, killing a guilded assassin and taking his place or by co-founding a Guild franchise in a new location.
• So long as it is expedient to do so, guilded assassins have the responsibility to kill any non-guild murderer they become aware of in an area claimed by the Guild. The cornerstone of the Guild is its violent insistence that it have a monopoly on killing. [This leads to clashes with the Thieves Guild, who like to keep everything, including hits, in-house instead of sub-contracting with a specialist guild.]
• Guild assassins may take any job they choose, but must complete any job they accept. If they fail, they must try again until they succeed.

Characters from any class may become an assassin's apprentice, but they also keep all of their class restrictions. Assassin is a Glantri-style prestige class that I'm working on, but Dyson also has a Glantri-style Dark Assassin you could use.

Order of the Green Hand

Telecanter was thinking about guilds a while back.  Here's a magic-user guild I thought up between classes a while back:

The Order of the Green Hand is a well-respected and powerful order of magic-users.  It runs dormitories in all cities and large towns and in most smaller towns. Each dormitory is equipped with a small library of spellbooks and components for copying spells.  Regular circuits from dormitory to dormitory are made by Order personnel carrying any new spells that have been brought to a dormitory.  In this way, each dormitory's library is constantly being updated with whatever spells are researched or discovered by Order members.  The Order makes a practice of approaching fledgling magic-users just as they start out (that is, during character generation), when the powerful benefits they offer seem the most tempting, but also when profits the Order can expect to receive are the greatest.

Benefits of membership in the Order of the Green Hand:

• A free Staff of Magic Missile, with the maximum number of charges. (I use LotFP:WFRP rules for a lot of magic, so that's 49 charges in my game.)
• Magical immunity from mind-control spells cast by other members of the Order. (I'm still working out the mechanics, but this will be based on the Majestic Wilderlands' Shield of Magic.)
• Members are issued green robes.
• The Order is widely respected and letters of introduction can be drafted for any member.
• Contact can be made with the Assassin's Guild, which is allied with the Order.
• Order members may be issued magic items the Order owns at the Order's discretion. (Usually done only when sent on Order business)
• Free room and board at any Order dormitory.
• Free access to dormitory libraries, which include most standard spells.
• Free materials to copy spells into spellbooks and onto scrolls.
• Free access to dormitory laboratories, but not to components.

The last four benefits become available to members only after they have paid their first dues to the Order.

Costs of membership in the Order of the Green Hand:

• Members must pay dues to the Order.  Dues are a percentage of the member's income equal to one divided by the character's level; at first level, members pay 1/1, or 100% of their income, at second level, members pay 1/2, or 50% of their income… at twentieth level, members pay 1/20 or 5% of their income, etc.
• Members must surrender all magic items they acquire to the Order. This requirement lasts only until a member reaches fourth level.  They must make an effort to have a magic item as part of their share whenever a party acquires one or more magic items.
• Members must accept quests from Order leadership. (Rare. Should only occur once every two levels.)
• Members remain members for the duration of their lives. Contracts will be taken out with the Assassin's Guild on any member who deserts or is expelled from the Order.
• Members must copy all new spells they research or discover into spellbooks at an Order Dormitory.  From there, copies will be brought to other dormitories and so the Order's library of spells will constantly grow.
• Members suspected of violating the terms of membership must accept magical surveillance attached to them to determine whether they are in fact violating the terms of membership.
• Members may not share magical knowledge with those outside the Order without the Order's explicit and specific permission.
• Members will slowly turn green. At second level, fingernails and toenails go green.  At fourth level, hands are green. At sixth level, torso and hair are green.  At eighth level, a member's whole body is green.  At tenth level, any clothes worn or tools held turn green as long as they are in contact with the member.  This effect is the result of using the Magic Shield mentioned above.

Players in my campaign, weirdly enough, tend to shy away from magic-users, sometimes complaining that they don't want to only have one spell a day or be so fragile at first level. I figured that a guild that gave them a wand of some sort would be pretty welcome, but I also figured that there would be a lot of costs to that kind of leg up at the beginning of a magic-user's career; fully charged magic staves are expensive and time-consuming! A guild that provided staves to new recruits would need a lot of income to pay for the higher-ranking Magic-Users that spent a good deal of their free time making those staves, hence the high membership fees and the requirement that members surrender all the magic items they find during their first three levels. It makes for a guild that really takes care of its members, but asks a whole lot from them as well. I think that guilds that are big parts of the PCs' lives should be pretty interesting.

Interestingly, the only PC the Order has approached so far was an elf, who, being chaotic, declined because her player felt that she was too interested in freedom to join. We'll see if any other players create magic-users anytime soon.