Gregorius21778: Curse of the Gleaming Icosahedron is a role playing game supplement published by Kai Pütz a.k.a Gregorius21778 for use with Lamentations of the Flame Princess. As such, it is covered by the Open Game License and some parts are considered to be Open Game Content as a result.
This is a 10-page PDF that is available from DriveThruRPG as a Pay What You Want supplement. One page is the front cover, about half a page is front matter, one page is ads and one the Open Game License. The PDF comes in two versions, one of which is a printer-friendly version lacking the page backgrounds.
The introductory paragraphs explain that this, like The Blood-Drenched Room and The Tale of Harrot, the Headless Horseman, is only available in October. This title introduces a curse that changes the character who dabbles in something that they really shouldn’t have.
A Gift not Meant for Them explains that it starts with the discovery of a tin that can only be opened with magic. Inside it is a small green gem, an icosahedron. Or d20. The icosahedron has a gift for one who has the heritage of or who has pledged their soul to, essentially, a cosmic abomination. Which will not be the character who opens it.
If the icosahedron is only briefly examined and the tin then closed, nothing bad happens. If, however – and this is highly likely – the character examines it too closely or removes it from its tin, bad things happen. From this point, they are affected by a curse. A roll of 19 on a d20 is now considered to be a natural 20. A natural 20, meanwhile, triggers a roll on a d20 table of metamorphoses.
Metamorphosis of Body and Fate is the chart. Rolls of 1 mean that the 18 is treated as 20, and this continues every time, and rolls of 20 mean that now rolls of 1 also trigger a metamorphosis, and this increases as well. So, eventually, it is possible for every number to trigger a change. Each change turns part of the body into something tentacular over several hours.
The Conclusion of the Metamorphosis explains that once all results of the d20 have been changed, the metamorphosis is complete and, every time a level is gained, the PC must make a save or be taken over by an alien mind and become an NPC. Successfully saving three times means they PC will remain a PC. Although a rather bizarre-looking one.
Fighting the Metamorphosis has ways of fighting the changes. Notably, some methods will cancel the change, but have unfortunate side effects; cancelling the change on the head leaves the character with no head.
The Tentacled Icosahedron is a new creature, one that will burst from the character’s corpse should they die during the changes.
There is also a chart of all d20s for the player to note how they have been affected.
Gregorius21778: Curse of the Gleaming Icosahedron in Review
The PDF lacks bookmarks, which are not essential but would have been appreciated. Navigation could be better. The text maintains a two-column format and a number of minor errors were noticed. There are a couple of pieces of tentacle-related black and white stock art, as well as the icosahedron on the cover. Presentation is okay.
This is, unsurprisingly, a rather not-nice thing to happen to a character. There are ways of combatting it, but this requires use of magic, and using it intelligently as well. It also demonstrates that it isn’t always a good idea to examine everything that looks as if it might be valuable, and sometimes things are sealed for a reason. Curiosity might not kill the cat, but it could turn it into a tentacled abomination. The effects will not be suited for every group or every campaign, but it should be fine with campaigns that have weirder aspects, and have a theme of dabbling in stuff Not Meant to Know. Gregorius21778: Curse of the Gleaming Icosahedron is an interesting and unpleasant curse and it can be found by clicking here.
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