A piece on mushrooms by my dear friend Alex, who does not have a home of his own.
You've Found a Mushroom!
A nature or intelligence test will identify the mushroom. Upon failure, a second, easier, test may be made after eating the mushroom.
Roll a D20. On a roll of 1 the mushrooms were poisonous. Roll on the poisonous mushroom table and everyone who ate them suffers the same effect.
On a roll of 2-9 the mushrooms were inedible but not poisonous. Either rotten or slimy or bitter tasting or too insubstantial to provide a meal.
On a roll of 10-19 you've found some edible mushrooms! Hurrah! Roll again on the edible mushroom table to discover what delicious morsels you've found.
On a roll of 20 you've found magical mushrooms. Roll on the magic mushroom table and apply the effect to each character who ate the mushrooms, although some mushrooms will have different effect on different players.
Poisonous Mushroom table: D10
1 Deathcap: Tall white stem with frilled “skirt” and flat scaled cap. Pleasant taste. Make a poison save or die of a heart attack. Otherwise become violently ill for 4d12 hours. A violently ill character is considered completely incapacitated and will die without having their basic needs cared for.
2 Destroying Angel: Tall white stem with the same frilled “skirt” as a Deathcap, but with a brown scaled top. Disgusting, bitter taste. Make a poison save. If successful vomit away your last meal. Otherwise fall violently ill for 2d12 hours and make a poison save every hour for the first d6 hours of the fever. A failure on any one of these saves means your liver is destroyed beyond recovery and the character loses 1d4 points of constitution every day until they die or are cured via a magical spell that could regrow a limb.
3 Web cap: Brown and phallic. Delicious taste, firm peppery flesh. Make a poison save. If If successful vomit away your last meal. Otherwise make become violently ill for d12 hours and make two further saving throws, one for each kidney. A character with only one kidney cannot drink alcohol and all poisons have their effect doubled. A character with no kidneys cannot eat until they are cured via a magical spell that could regrow a limb.
4 Panther Cap: Dark brown with white spots. Good taste, earthy with a slightly bitter after-taste. Make a poison save or fall violently ill for 2d12 hours and take 1d4 poison damage every hour of the sickness. Causes minor hallucinations even to those who save successfully that last 2d6 hours, making any attempt to accurately see perceive the world difficult.
5 Fly Agaric: Bright red with white spots. Bitter, unpleasant taste. Make a poison save or suffer intense delirium that makes any actions unpredictable. A character might not recognise their friends, or may see them as monsters or long lost loved ones. They might communicate with gods or devils and be given a sense of purpose or have their world-view remade. On a successful safe, only minor hallucinations occur. Effects last 2d6 hours, then progress to the lighter stage for another 2d6 hours, or disappear as appropriate.
6 False Morel: Dark brown brainy mushroom. Good meaty flesh and strong earthy taste. Edible if cooked, otherwise become violently ill for 2d12 hours, save for half the time.
7 Fool’s funnel: White trumpet like funnel. Slimy, with no taste. Make a poison save or become and incredibly sweaty for 2d12 hours. A sweaty character has a 1-10 chance to drop an item they are carrying without gloves whenever they use it (e.g. swinging a weapon). A character overly covered, such as wearing armor, will become too hot and risk fainting if they perform strenuous exercise.
8 Devil’s boulette: Puffy red and grey boulette, blushes orange when cut. Firm texture but bitter taste. Become violently ill for 2d4 hours. The save is easier if it was cooked.
9 Yellow Stainer: White with light yellow blushes. A little bland and a little mealy. Make a poison save or suffer diarrhoea for 2d6 hours. Every time you roll a 1 on any dice you have 10 seconds before you shit yourself.
10 Jack ‘O Lantern: Dark orange cluster, slightly photo luminescent. Unpleasant bitter taste and insubstantial. Make a poison save or feel vaguely unwell for 2d6 hours.
Edible Mushrooms: D20
1 Field Mushroom: Small, mushroomy. Good, mushroomy taste.
2 The Prince: Stubby with a wide cap. Tastes excellent, hints of almond.
3 Blushing Wood Mushroom: Small white and brown, but damage causes deep red “bruises”. Good, delicate taste.
4 The Blusher: Dark brown with white spots. Good taste, earthy with a slightly bitter aftertaste.
5 Honey Fungus: Yellow orange clusters. Good taste, but requires large numbers to be a substantial meal.
6 Wood Ears: Purple fruiting body is gelatinous and ear shaped, undulating, affixed to dead wood. Tastes good but needs cooking to be edible.
7 Bay Bolette: small brown bulb, stains green blue when cut. Good, excellent when dried.
8 Penny Bun: Small brown bolette. Excellent, either dry and add to stews for strong earthy flavour, or fry with butter and garlic and serve with toast or fresh white bread.
9 Shaggy Ink Caps: Long flaking cylinders or finger, purple around base. Excellent when young, particularly in creamy sauces.
10 Horn of Plenty: Dark black or grey trumpet. Excellent, easily dried.
11 Beefsteak Fungus: Bracket fungus with red flesh with white “veins” resembling a cut of meat. Good but a little sour.
12 Hedgehog fungus: White and convex with spines rather than gills on the underside. Excellent, sweet and nutty with a crunchy texture.
13 The Deceiver: Sometimes pink, brown, yellow or orange with wide cap deeply depressed in centre. Mediochre, only really worth eating if desperate.
14 Saffron Milk Cap: Carrot orange tufts that can exude a harmless white substance. Good, will add orange colour to dishes.
15 Chicken of the Woods: Knobbly, sulphurous yellow bracket fungus. Mushroomy, purportedly tastes of chicken to some. Best eaten when young.
16 Giant Puffball: Large white ball that can grow to the size of a bull’s head. Excellent taste, can be sliced and fried like a steak.
17 Oyster Mushroom: Brown bracket fungus with white gills. Mushroomy.
18 Dryad’s Saddle: Large plates of brown scaled flesh. Smells strongly of watermelon, but the taste is lost when cooked.
19 Scarlet Elf Cup: Small, fragile funnel with bright scarlet inside. Mild, only worth eating if discovered in large quantities.
20 Truffles: Black warty globes, found underground. Excellent, nutty, intense flavour. Considered a delicacy and can be sold for d20 gold pieces.
Magical Mushrooms: D10
1 Phycobilin Mushroom: Small and brown with thin stalks. Not literally magic, just causes intense but pleasant hallucinations for d6 hours. Roll a D20, on a roll of 1 the character has a bad trip and the hallucinations are not pleasant. Any divine character, such as a paladin or cleric, has a 1 in 100 chance of being contacted by their God during this trip and are given useful information or are tasked with a specific quest to perform.
2 Exploding Puffball: Appears identical to the giant puffball except when first cut it explodes dealing 2d6 damage to everyone within ten feet, save for half damage for all characters except the one who cut into it. Puffballs have a 8 in 10 chance to explode when damaged by other puffballs, causing a chain reaction. Surviving puffballs have a 1 in 10 chance of exploding when touched or moved.
3 Mirror Fungus: Appears like a random edible mushroom. When eaten, non-sentient fungus doppelgangers of all characters who ate the fungus grow underground, hatching in d20 hours. The naked doppelgangers will attempt to hunt and kill their progenitors, with whom they share identical physical stats. The corpses of anyone they kill will sprout more mirror fungi in about a month.
4 Doctor’s Friend: Salmon pink trumpet. When eaten fresh it cures all non-magically caused ailments and diseases. Can be dried, but has a 1-10 chance of becoming poisonous causing the consumer to become ill, suffering from fever and taking 1d6 poison damage every hour for 2d12 hours, however after the fever subsides the diseases will still be cured.
5 Lucky Charm Bolette: Fat little bolette with a red stem, flesh blushes indigo when cut. Perfectly edible, if bitter, but the spores it produces cover everyone who touched it when fresh, lying on the skin and conferring a blessing. The next time a spored character rolls a 1 on a d20 before washing, they re-roll the dice and use the new result.
6 Beadle’s Beetle: Black little mushrooms with a hard, crunchy cup. Causes mild hallucinations and confers the ability to talk to animals, plants (including mushrooms), insects and other natural flora and fauna, lasting an hour. Can be dried but the hallucinations become extremely vivid and disorientating and the effect lasts 1D4 hours.
7 Jorkvander Chanterelle: Intensely blue, slimy trumpet. Droll a d4 with 1=Strength, 2-=constitution 3=dexterity 4=all three. Increase the corresponding stat(s) by 2 for the next 2d12 hours. Ineffective when dried and multiple portions have no further effect.
8 Golden Jack: Dull, slimy yellow cap with a pale stalk. The next bowel movement the character performs will be solid gold. Golden poos are of varying quality and size, so roll 2d6. The first dice dictates the quality of the gold, and the second is the amount. Times one by the other to determine the GP equivalent.
9 Devil’s Eyeball: Deep red, slightly photo luminescent globes. To the eyes of the consumer, all magical and otherworldly beings are surrounded by an aura of flames. The aura corresponds to the origin and nature of the being. The specific colours the auras correspond with are much discussed by scholars, but generally red flames correspond to creatures of the pit, and blue to those of heaven with green indicating fae origins. Purple flecks in the aura indicate chaotic and orange indicate orderly nature. Apparently the consumer’s own stance on good or evil alters the inner hue of the aura, closest to the body, with white being closest to one’s own alignment and black furthest away. The effect lasts an hour, and the mushrooms can be easily dried, becoming dark brown pills that will last a year.
10 Lich’s Orchid: A perfectly white funnel. Only ever found singularly, so only one character may consume the mushroom and must do so immediately or the effects are lost. The character instantly grows 1d6 years younger and gains one permanent magical ability. Roll a random first level spell, the character may now cast that spell once per day in addition to any other spells they might be able to cast.
The list of poisonous mushrooms comes from this article:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/gardening/gardeningpicturegalleries/10053769/10-poisonous-mushrooms-to-watch-out-for-in-Britain.html
And
http://www.wildfooduk.com/mushroom-guides/ was invaluable for the edible mushroom table.
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