Santicore 2017: d100 Alchemical Accidents

Secret Santicore 2017 is finally available thanks to the diligent stewardship of Steve Sigety and layout savior David Sugars. Tons of folks came together to produce these beautiful 90 pages of cool game shit. My own contribution was a d100 table of Alchemical Accidents:

While attempting to mix the desired concoction, there is an explosion, and…

1. When the dust settles, all that remains are two gallons of milk in plastic jugs.
2. One of the vials is unbroken, and it contains a potion of Suzie. The imbiber instantly transforms into an 8 year old girl with red pig tails, and freckles all over her face. She is the protagonist of a popular series of children’s books, and will want to go on adventures, and learn simple lessons. The transformation lasts until it is undone by some magic.
3. A puppy, which speaks like an 18^th century aristocrat appears.
4. A bucket’s worth of refined napalm pools on the floor.
5. The metaphysical concept of the number six has been made physically manifest. It must be protected at all costs. If it is destroyed, math will cease to function throughout the cosmos.
6. A single jar is is not shattered, and contains Fetish Juice. Anyone who consumes it will gain an intense, kinky desire.
7. Seeds blow out in all direction, at least a few of which will land outside. Within a year, the seeds will grow into thriving apple-on-a-cob plants.
8. A rift is torn open in space time, leading to the most boring possible version of the character’s reality.
9. There’s a puddle of green glowing goo on the ground. Touching it causes a person to mutate to resemble whatever other animal they were most recently in contact with.
10. There’s a puddle of green glowing goo on the ground. It doesn’t do anything, it’s just kinda gross.
11. Along with the smoke and shrapnel, there are bones in the explosion, enough for a full skeleton. It’s not clear where they came from, though study may reveal that they are exact clones of the alchemist’s own bones.
12. When the smoke clears, a naked clone of the alchemist is all that remains of the lab.
13. When the smoke clears, an evil naked clone of the alchemist is all that remains of the lab. The clone also has wings and laser eyes and twice as many hit points as the alchemist has.
14. When the smoke clears, all that remains of the lab is a clone of the alchemist that is such a profoundly good creature, that it cannot abide allowing the alchemist (who is necessarily evil by comparison) to live.
15. A single decanter remains intact, filled with a Potion of Shoe Location. When consumed, the imbiber will gain a sixth sense, enabling them to locate any shoews nearby.
16. The explosion is caused when sheets of paper begin to appear, one after the other, inside a sealed jar. Eventually the jar bursts, sending glass and pages everywhere. There is typing on the pages, and if they are gathered up and placed in the correct order, they form a really shitty novel.
17. All that is left is a lizard. A sort of iguana looking thing, with organic jet engines instead of feet, allowing it to fly or hover, as it wills.
18. There’s a beaker on the floor, filled with a Potion of Wanting a Haircut. Consuming it will cause a person to want to go get their hair cut.
19. A fleshy tarp covers the whole space of the laboratory. It shudders with pleasure when touched.
20. The explosion gradually settles into a cloud of fetid gas, large enough to fill the room. This cloud can never be dispersed, though it could be moved by a sufficiently powerful aircurrent.
21. All that remains is a cup, with a potion of Creative Dance in it. When consumed, the imbiber will be flooded with ideas for interesting new dances.
22. A wildly gesticulating hand flops about in the aftermath. If the hand is given a writing implement, it will immediately begin writing gibberish, and never stop so long as it is not restrained from continuing. There may or may not be hidden meaning in this gibberish.
23. A mysterious concoction has appeared, in a little jar labelled “Drink Me.” If it is consumed, and the imbiber has a dick, then their dick falls off. If the imbiber does not have a dick, then they grow a dick.
24. The Alchemist has invented American Cheese. Thanks a fucking lot, Alchemy bro. That’s something the world really needed.
25. A potion of Speed Reading has been created, allowing the imbiber to read at three times their normal rate.
26. From every jar and beaker, a cactus begins to grow, and it just wont…stop…growing…
27. A black monolith appears, harbenger both of growth, and of violence. Every creature present will be awakened to a new level of existence, and filled with an intense desire to use their newfound enlightenment to dominate those around them.
28. The alchemist has accidentally created a star, roughly the size of a marble. The heat from a star even this small is so intense that everthing in its viscinity burns.
29. The ghost of a woman who never lived is created. She is a crossing guard, and will attempt to let people know when it is safe to walk, and when it is not.
30. PARTY EXPLOSION! Confetti and streamers burst outwards from the failed concoction. Banners affix themselves to the walls, hats appear on heads, and dance music begins to pound as if from nowhere. It’s a celebration! Everyone must party. Not partying is impossible.
31. One of the vials is unbroken, and within is a potion of affection for the color green. Consuming it will make you mildly predisposed to like things that have a green color. Ironically, the potion itself is red.
32. A single decanter remains, with a bit of fluid inside of it. This is a potion of Temporarily Forgetting Your Own Name. The effects of this potion are entirely predictable.
33. A milky white goo has congealed into a crater in the ground. It is a tincture of racism. If consumed in any amount, randomly determine a race for the dumbass who consumed mysterious white goo to hate.
34. The mind-altering smoke is laced with tacheon particles. At some point in the past of everyone who inhales it, they will make a different decision during some pivotal moment in their life. This new choice in their past is still consistent with their character at the time, but it changes their present circumstance in some significant way. The referee may designate anyone they desire to identify this different choice. If the inhaler objects that it’s not something they ever would have done, the table must vote on whether or not it is consistent with their character. Majority rules.
35. There’s one beaker left, containing a potion of Speak to Mosquitos, duration 2 hours. Mosquitos are macabre, edgelord little shits.
36. The alchemist has accidentally discovered chocolate chip cookies. Bake sales will never be the same.
37. A spray of liquid paper splatters all across the room.
38. As the orange dust settles, it coats everything in the room with a strange kind of greasy powder, that tastes vaguely of cheese. The flavor is wholely unnatural, yet addictively compelling, and fills the consumer with an intense desire for something called “mountain dew,” whatever that is.
39. Only a single vat remains, now filled with a dull grey liquid. If gold is dipped into this vat, it will be transformed into lead.
40. In the center of the room is a massive heap of slimy, shower-drain hair.
41. A radioactive isotope has been created. It glows with a faint green light, and is quietly poisoning everyone in the room.
42. All that’s left is a 6 inch cube of an unbreakable, unmalleable, unmeltable, completely unknown metal.
43. A Potion of Melodrama has been created. Whomever consumes it will become suddenly melodramatic about every little thing that happens to them. There is no cure.
44. Tiny flecks of something too small to hurt pelt everyone in the room. Once it’s safe for people to open their eyes, they will discover they are surrounded by piles of clipped toe and fingernails.
45. The air grows cold, and the lights grow dim. Wherever you are, a long winter night has begun. Pray you do not die.
46. The room is splattered with a thick coat of the big mac’s secret sauce.
47. The explosion has birthed a potion leech. A creature which sustains itself by sucking potions and other magical effects out of people’s bodies.
48. A noise hole is opened to the future. Only sound passes through it. The other end of the hole is in the basement of a house in Miluakee, on April 7^th, 1974. Nobody is down there for most of the day, but at 3pm a man comes down to start a load of laundery, and at around 4, a woman comes down to move it into the dryer. Time on the other end of the sound hole loops each day.
49. Fart in a jar.
50. A mysterious concoction appears. It is a Potion of Annoying Laughter, which permanently alters the laugh of whoever consumes it. Anytime they are amused, they emit one of the most unpleasant, inhuman sounds that could ever be called a ‘laugh.’
51. It’s not just a normal alchemical failure explosion. It’s a really big alchemical failure explosion. All that’s left is a crater, with a 500’ radius. Mysteriously, no warm blooded creatures are harmed by the explosion. It just passes over them like a hot breeze.
52. The alchemical explosion expands outwards in slow motion. It is intensely hot and dangerous, but will take over 2 years to complete.
53. A massive portal to the south pole of the planet is torn open. The tear in space gets larger and larger, until it’s over 100’ long, with cold wind blasting through it. This dramatically changes the weather patterns in the local area, gradually causing a cataclysmic shift in the environment.
54. A 6’ high pile of human noses fills the room. Periodically, one of them sniffs loudly, as though trying to identify a smell.
55. Someone’s skin has appeared on the laboratory floor. There’s no seams, no tears, no blood, and absolutely nothing inside the skin. Somewhere in the world, someone’s skin has just disappeared, leaving them a screaming heap of exposed muscles and organs.
56. A mysterious voice whispers “thank you…” and fades away. It’s a completely sincere sentiment, and there’s no indication of what anyone has done to deserve being thanked.
57. All oxygent in the room vanishes, creating a vaccuum until some doors or windows are opened.
58. A small bit of ice. If this ice comes into contact with any water, it will rearrange the atomic structure of that water, freezing it instantly into ice.
59. An all-consuming moss has been created. Gods have mercy on you for what you’ve done.
60. There is an unbroken flask, containing a Potion of Static Shock. Whoever consumes it will generate a charge on their body, causing them to receive a static shock anytime they touch anything metal. The effect lasts for two weeks.
61. There’s one beaker left, containing a potion of Knowing Pi. The effect lasts for 10 minutes, and during this time the imbier knows every single digit of pi. Of course, they can only communicate so much of what they know in the 10 minutes they have before their knowledge fades.
62. The 9^th Roman Legion marches out of the smoke. It takes awhile for the whole group of them to emerge, and they won’t seem to notice they’ve been snatched out of the past until every one of them has arrived.
63. A tincture of Pleasant-Smelling Farts has been created. If consumed, a person never need worry again about the social awkwardness of releasing their poo-gas around other people.
64. A randomly determined 8^th level spell forces itself into the Alchemist’s brain. Unless the alchemist is already capable of casting 8^th level spells, this process is completely overwhelming, to the point of causing some damage to their brain. The spell must be cast immediately, or the more damage will be done. The playewr has no time to read the spell’s description, they must simply pick a target and go.
65. There’s a decanter embeded in the wall, filled with a strange glowing liquid. It is a potion of paraplegia. When consumed, it causes a person to temporarily lose all motor function beneath the neck.
66. A portal is created to the bottom of a nearby lake. Water pours through the portal until the lake is drained.
67. A pair of stone tablets have appeared, with Holy Commandments eleven through twenty inscribed on them.
68. A Tincture of Tolerance has been created. Nothing really bothers the one who consumes it. I mean, they may not like something, but they’re not going to make a fuss about it or anything.
69. A tear in the cosmic fabric appears, and a bloodshot eye looks through it. The eye presses itself up against the tear, and looks around the room with a hateful gaze.
70. An army of hopping legs is created, and they begin boopin’ and boppin’ all about the place.
71. There’s one beaker left amidst the shattered glass of the alchemical equipment. It contains a black liquid which, if consumed, proves to be a Potion of Emo Bullshit. The imbiber is uncontrollably compelled to act like a sad, upper middle class teenager from the mid 2000s. The curse lasts for about 5 years, or until strong magics are used to break it.
72. Amelia Airhart appears, torn away from the future and dropped, annoyed, into the destroyed alchemical lab.
73. All metal in the area instantly heats into a molten state.
74. A Potion of Ranting About Half-Baked Political Nonsense is created.
75. A strange, haunting music begins to play, growing gradually louder until people have to cover their ears. The music will never go away. It will continue to play here for all time.
76. Everyone impacted by the blast feels a surge of artistic inspiration. They are compelled to go out and create something.
77. A vial rolls out from the center of the blast, containing a Potion of Obsession with Dumb Jokes.
78. A powerful creature is summoned from the outer planes. Randomly determine whether it is an angel, a demon, a devil, or some otherworldly horror beyond human reckoning. In any event, it will not be happy to have been pulled from wherever it was before.
79. A conduit is opened for speaking directly to God. Turns out, though, God is kind of a loser nerd.
80. The sound of crying echoes from nowhere in particular.
81. A cup slides out from the smoke, containing a potion of Body Part Shrinkage. Randomly determine which body part shrinks when the potion is consumed.
82. A cup slides out from the smoke, containing a potion of Body Part Gigantism. Randomly determine which body part enlarges when the potion is consumed.
83. A geyser of beer erupts from the earth. It’s a pretty decent brew.
84. Instead of a “boom,” the explosion sounds like a sentence. A profound, cosmic truth, bellowed into our world. Something no one ever would have thought of. And yet, now that they’ve heard it, they wonder how they’ve lived so long without realizing its obvious truth.
85. A bitter, hateful voice worms its way into the heads of everyone in the room. It will criticize and question everything they say and do until it is somehow expelled.
86. A shark appears, flopping on the ground, suffocating and dying.
87. A fat little writer goblin named Nyc is born. He is terrible.
88. Suddenly, everyone in the room is wearing these really cool, matching leather vests. They’ve got studded eppaulets and everything.
89. A vial flies out of the explosion, and lands right in the alchemist’s hands. It contains a Potion of Alopecia. Drinking it will cause the imbiber’s body to become completely, and permanently, devoid of any hair.
90. A tiny war cry is squaked into the room, as an eight inch tall Klingon charges out of the smoke, Bat’leth swinging above his head.
91. Tongues begin growing out of the floor, walls, and ceiling, waggling about and trying to taste anything within reach.
92. An intense interest in an obscure, ancient sport begins radiating out from this spot. Anyone who comes within a mile will have heard of the sport, and be interested in learning the rules. People closer to the source, or who spend an extended period of time in the area, will become obsessed with playing the game, building a playing field, and eventually getting a league going.
93. The fingernails of everyone in the room begin to grow out of control.
94. A potion is created which, when consumed, causes the imbiber to lose control of their bowels.
95. A permanent door is created, which leads to some other part of the world within a few miles of here.
96. Everyone in the room is instantaneously teleported to a chamber deep underground. How far they have gone, and how deep they are, is unknown.
97. Tails grow outta errybody’s butts.
98. The alchemist suddenly finds they have a passion for styling people’s hair. It’s now much more interesting to them than Alchemy is.
99. A constant spray of lubricating gel starts spraying all around the room.
100. A creature that resembles OSR luminary Cecil Howe appears, except he sweats a lot, cannot stop farting, and nobody will ever ever want to kiss him.