Drugs

Drugs offer short-term benefits with harmful side effects and long-term consequences. These short-term benefits, such as euphoria, draw many to drugs, but addiction keeps users hooked long after their first dose. A character can voluntarily fail their initial save against a drug, but for each dose they consume, they must attempt a saving throw against addiction, a disease that represents cravings and withdrawal. Addiction is unique to each drug, so a character can be affected by multiple instances of addiction at once.

Certain drugs alter how addiction works for that drug, adding the virulent trait to the addiction, limiting the maximum stage a character can reach, or adding additional stages beyond those listed in the base affliction.

ADDICTION

Disease, Level Varies

Track the maximum stage you reach with each drug’s addiction. This maximum stage is separate from your current addiction stage for the drug. The maximum stage can’t be reduced, even if you fully remove the disease. When you take the drug, two things happen: you attempt a saving throw against addiction, and you suppress the effects of addiction for 1 day. Failing a save against addiction caused by taking the drug causes you to go to 1 stage higher than the maximum stage you had previously reached (2 stages higher on a critical failure). If you’re currently suffering from addiction when you attempt a save from taking the drug, you can’t improve your stage; if you succeed at the save, the stage remains the same as it was.

When you attempt your save against addiction each week, the stage you are currently at can’t get worse—it can only stay the same or improve. The conditions from addiction can’t be removed while you are affected by the addiction, and suppressing addiction by taking the drug only avoids the effects—it doesn’t remove the disease.

Saving Throw Fortitude (DC equals that of the drug); Onset 1 day; Stage 1 fatigued (1 week); Stage 2 fatigued and sickened 1 (1 week); Stage 3 fatigued, drained 1, and sickened 1 (1 week); Stage 4 fatigued, drained 2, sickened 2, and stupefied 2 (1 week)

Alcohol

ITEM 0

Traits: alchemical, consumable, drug, ingested, poison

Price 1 cp or more

Usage held in 1 hand; Bulk L

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Alcohol is a common substance available in stunning variety. The Price of a dose of alcohol depends on the specific beverage. You can’t recover from the sickened condition from alcohol while affected.

If you fail a saving throw against alcohol other than initial saves, the affliction’s stage doesn’t increase; the only way to increase the stage of alcohol’s affliction is to consume more alcohol.

Saving Throw DC 12 Fortitude; Onset 10 minutes; Stage 1 +1 item bonus to saving throws against fear effects (10 minutes); Stage 2 flat-footed, +1 item bonus to saving throws against fear effects (10 minutes); Stage 3 clumsy 1, flat-footed, stupefied 2 (10 minutes); Stage 4 clumsy 2 and sickened 2 (10 minutes);

Stage 5 clumsy 2, sickened 2, and stupefied 2 (10 minutes);

Stage 6 unconscious (8 hours); Stage 7 death

Bloodeye Coffee

ITEM 0

Traits: alchemical, consumable, drug, ingested, poison

Price 5 sp

Usage held in 1 hand; Bulk L

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A strong blend including several spices common in the Padishah Empire of Kelesh, bloodeye coffee is a favorite morning drink across the Inner Sea region. The maximum addiction stage of bloodeye coffee never progresses beyond stage 1.

Saving Throw DC 14 Fortitude; Onset 10 minutes; Maximum Duration 8 hours; Stage 1 +1 item bonus to AC and saves to which you are taking penalties caused by the fatigued condition (10 minutes); Stage 2 stupefied 1 (1 hour); Stage 3 can’t recover from fatigued (1 day, after which the drug ends)

Flayleaf

ITEM 0

Traits: alchemical, consumable, drug, ingested, inhaled, poison

Price 1 gp

Usage held in 1 hand; Bulk L

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The flayleaf plant is relatively common, though the mildly euphoric effects of smoking its dried leaves increase when it’s sourced from plants specifically grown to produce such effects.

Saving Throw DC 12 Fortitude; Onset 10 minutes; Maximum Duration 4 hours; Stage 1 +1 item bonus to saving throws against mental effects (1 hour); Stage 2 fatigued and +1 item bonus to saving throws against mental effects (1 hour); Stage 3 fatigued and stupefied 1 (1 hour); Stage 4 fatigued, frightened 2, stupefied 2 (1 hour)

Blood Sap

ITEM 1

Traits: alchemical, consumable, drug, ingested, poison

Price 4 gp

Usage held in 1 hand; Bulk L

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This potent drug is distilled from a certain tropical vine into a deep-red syrup that, over time, stains the user’s lips and teeth a vivid shade of red.

Saving Throw DC 16 Fortitude; Onset 10 minutes; Maximum Duration 3 hours; Stage 1 drained 1, +1 item bonus to weapon and unarmed attack rolls, Acrobatics checks, and Athletics checks (10 minutes); Stage 2 slowed 1 (1 hour)

Refined Pesh

ITEM 1

Traits: alchemical, consumable, drug, ingested, inhaled, poison

Price 2 gp

Usage held in 1 hand; Bulk L

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When eaten or smoked, pesh gives users a sense of well-being, sometimes with hallucinations, aggression, and exhaustion.

Saving Throw DC 12 Fortitude; Onset 1 minute; Maximum Duration 6 hours; Stage 1 stupefied 1 and a +2 item bonus to saves versus fear effects (1 minute); Stage 2 1 temporary Hit Point per level (first time you reach this stage only), +2 item bonus to saves versus fear effects, clumsy 1, and stupefied 1 (1 minute); Stage 3 clumsy 2 and stupefied 2 (1 hour)

Shiver

ITEM 3

Traits: alchemical, consumable, drug, ingested, poison

Price 10 gp

Usage held in 1 hand; Bulk L

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A compound produced from the hallucinogenic venom of certain spiders, shiver is common in black markets.

The addiction to shiver has the virulent trait.

Saving Throw DC 19 Fortitude; Maximum Duration 4 hours; Stage 1 whenever you become frightened, reduce that condition’s value by 1 (10 minutes); Stage 2 clumsy 2 (1 hour); Stage 3 asleep (1 hour)

Dreamtime Tea

ITEM 4

Traits: alchemical, consumable, drug, ingested, poison

Price 13 gp

Usage held in 1 hand; Bulk L

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This lemony tea blended from rare Vudrani herbs and flowers is widely circulated by occult circles looking to transcend the boundaries of reality. The saving throw for addiction to dreamtime tea is DC 19.

Saving Throw DC 21 Fortitude; Maximum Duration 30 minutes; Stage 1 stupefied 2 (1 minute); Stage 2 unconscious and can ask a question with the effects of augury except the flat check DC is 10 (10 minutes)

Zerk

ITEM 4

Traits: alchemical, consumable, drug, injury, poison

Price 20 gp

Usage held in 1 hand; Bulk L

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This bitter paste is used among some gladiatorial rings for its short-term benefits in a fight.

Saving Throw DC 20 Fortitude; Maximum Duration 1 hour; Stage 1 +2 item bonus to Perception rolls for initiative, and if you have an addiction to zerk, your melee weapon and unarmed attacks deal an extra 2 damage during the first round of a combat encounter (1 minute); Stage 2 drained 1 (1 hour)

Cytillesh

ITEM 5

Traits: uncommon, alchemical, consumable, drug, ingested, poison

Price 30 gp

Usage held in 1 hand; Bulk L

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Deros use cytillesh in a variety of ways, and some surface-dwellers seek out the fungus for their own use. Memories lost to cytillesh can be restored through modify memory. The save for addiction to cytillesh is DC 20, and the addiction has the virulent trait.

Saving Throw DC 15 Fortitude; Maximum Duration 8 hours;

DRUGS IN YOUR GAME

Drugs are socially complex, and including them in your game has the potential to make some of your players uncomfortable—particularly players who have struggled with substance abuse themselves or seen friends and family members go through that struggle. As with any potentially difficult subject matter, you should discuss the role drugs play in your game with your players and ensure that all the players at the table are comfortable with the material; if they aren’t, avoid the topic.

If you do include drugs in your game, consider the role they’ll play. In some campaigns, drugs might simply be an element of flavor and a tool characters use to reach their goals; in others, the side effects and risk of addiction might be a terrible price to pay. The rules assume something of a middle path, where drugs are addictive substances that may provide a short-term benefit but have consequences. To make drugs more accessible in your game, remove some of the more severe stages of addiction. To make them more dangerous, add the virulent trait to the addiction affliction, add more stages with increasingly severe effects, or increase the DC of the save against the addiction by 1 for every use of the drug, decreasing back to normal over time as they stop using the drug.

Stage 1 stupefied 1 (1 minute); Stage 2 lose all memories made in the previous hour (1 hour)

Elven Absinthe

ITEM 5

Traits: alchemical, consumable, drug, ingested, poison

Price 25 gp

Usage held in 1 hand; Bulk L

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Specialists in Kyonin prepare this emerald-green beverage.

Saving Throw DC 20 Fortitude; Onset 1 hour; Maximum Duration 1 day; Stage 1 +2 item bonus to Diplomacy and Performance checks (1 hour); Stage 2 drained 2 (1 hour); Stage 3 stupefied 4 (1 hour)

Scour

ITEM 8

Traits: uncommon, alchemical, consumable, drug, ingested, inhaled, poison

Price 80 gp

Usage held in 1 hand; Bulk L

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This gritty powder improves responsiveness but suppresses thoughts and leaves you weakened. The saving throw for addiction to scour is DC 30, and the addiction is virulent.

Saving Throw DC 25 Fortitude; Onset 1 hour; Maximum Duration 6 hours; Stage 1 stupefied 2 and +2 item bonus to Reflex saves and Dexterity-based skill checks (1 hour); Stage 2 fatigued (1 hour); Stage 3 drained 2 and fatigued (1 hour)