Lost Sepulchers of Venus: Witchery 101

Alright, laying out the basics of the Witch class and how magic works on Venus. Nothing too specific or detailed yet, just a rough sketch.

"Witch" is the most common term, but "wizard," "sorcerer," "necromancer," etc. all denote the same thing: someone who strikes a bargain with one of the Six Cloven Princes and thereby gains access to Powers Man Wasn't Meant to Have. Who are the Six Cloven Princes? Extradimensional horrors who live (sometimes, in some form) on Venus. Each is uniquely monstrous, in both appearance and personality; the only commonality is they all have cloven hooves of some sort. Basically, they're a cross between Lovecraft's Great Old Ones and Medieval depictions of Satan. Don't worry, each of them (and their unique servitor races) are going to get their own post.

In mechanical terms, the Witch replaces the Magic-user and the Cleric. Like the Cleric, they're not quite as capable in combat as the Fighting-man but aren't too shabby. They can use most weapons and some armour. Witch spells take the form of elaborate rituals for binding and controlling weird entities, sending their minds backwards and forwards in time, cursing items, shit like that. Nothing of immediate utility in combat, but which presents a lot of possibilities for clever players. Obviously, I'm filching liberally from Carcosa here, but another reference point is Call of Cthulhu, where most spells are for contacting/calling weird beings and doing other stuff that generally won't help you when you're right in the middle of the shit. Also like Carcosa, certain spells will require certain items, being in certain places at certain times, etc. As I've said before, I really like Carcosa's idea of rituals as adventure hooks: if you have a spell that requires you to be on the Frozen Plains of Amin-Zul on a full moon, you know there's a place called the Frozen Plains of Amin-Zul somewhere.

Witches will start with a couple spells, and to get more they have to perform tasks for their patron, which gives the DM more adventure hooks. They'll also probably get some sort of familiar that functions as the main way they communicate with their Prince, though most of the Princes expect their Witches to visit them in person at least once.

Obviously, Witches are never getting the better deal: the shit they have to do is not pleasant, and obviously your soul is effectively property of a hideous hellbeast the second you say "You've got a deal." Which, I guess leads us to the question of how Witches get to the position of making bargains with hideous hellbeasts in the first place. It's your usual culprits here: reading too much, spending too much time alone listening to weird music, falling in with other Witches because you want to get laid, etc.