You are a member of a teeming horde — one small part of a sprawling organism. Just as you are part of the swarm, the swarm is part of a larger ecosystem, a never-ending cycle of life, death, rot, and rebirth. You have spent your life in the slow churn of that ecosystem, in the dark places of the city where the messy parts of existence are on display. There is little squeamishness among the Golgari, no fear of death or taboo about the dead, just a fierce affirmation of the Great Wheel and all it entails.
Bashers are the enforcers of the Swarm, plain and simple. Perhaps in some other life you drove the workers at a rotfarm, spurring them on with threats of physical harm or worse. Maybe you were a guard for someone who needed protecting, a collector for a Golgari merchant or a paid combatant on the pit fighting circuits. Or are you someone who just knows how to back a person down with cold silence and a grim stare? Whatever the case, your reputation preceeds you. If someone needs something done and they don't mind how much blood gets spilt in the process a Basher is usually who they'll turn to.
"I swear, there are drudges out there whose blood runs warmer than that woman's. Don't ever get confused when she fixes on you and then ends whatever she's got to say to you with 'my friend'. She's not your friend, never will be - not by any stretch of imagination. What she's actually thinking about is how much pressure she'll need to apply to one of your knees before it pops just so."
- Skill Proficiencies: Intimidation and a choice of either Athletics, Insight or Stealth
- Tool Proficiencies: One type of gaming set
- Languages: Choose one of Elvish, Giant, Kraul, Goblin, or Abyssal
- Equipment: A Golgari insignia, one type of gaming set, a crowbar, a set of manacles, a hammer, three small knives, a set of dark-colored common clothes with a hood, and a belt pouch containing 10 gp worth of mixed coins.
Sometime in the past, some infamous role, event or action has been irrevocably associated with you. It is the basis of your brutal reputation and the means by which that aspect of your nature can be utilised to sway and intimidate people.
What is it you did or were part of? Was it an isolated incident or have you reinforced it with repeated actions and behaviours in the times since? How much of it is truth and how much of it is Undercity legend? Do you revel in the infamy or are you attempting to see it firmly buried in your past? Are there those still planning vengeance or harm against you because of what you did?
Based on past deeds, you can exert leverage over one or more Golgari who are below you in the guild's hierarchy and demand their assistance as needs warrant. You might need a message carried across a neighbourhood, or transport or information. You might need people to clean up a blood mess you've had a part in creating. Witnesses to certain indiscretions - committed by you or your associates - might be convinced to simply look the other way or keep walking.
The DM decides if your demands are reasonable and if there are people available - or willing - to fulfill them. Should the use of this feature require an Intimidation check you gain advantage on the roll. At the DM's discretion as your status in the guild improves, you may gain influence over more people, including ones in greater positions of power.
Reputation is a capricious beast of course. Fail to live up to it with expected action or rely too much on the fading memories of past deeds and you run the risk of seeing your prized infamy diluted to the point where it becomes worthless. But heavy reliance on or the repeated overuse of it is likely to draw the wrong sort of attention from people of influence further up the Golgari hierarchy, with potentially hazardous consequence.
Spell List
For you, the spells on the Golgari Guild Spells table are added to the spell list of your spellcasting class. (If you are a multiclass character with multiple spell lists, these spells are added to all of them.)
| Spell Level | Spells |
|---|---|
| Cantrip | dancing lights, spare the dying |
| 1st | entangle, ray of sickness |
| 2nd | protection from poison, ray of enfeeblement, spider climb |
| 3rd | animate dead, plant growth |
| 4th | giant insect, grasping vine |
| 5th | cloudkill, insect plague |
Golgari magic is often accompanied by a sickly green glow and a rotting stench.
Suggested Characteristics
Members of the Golgari Swarm are unmistakably products of the undercity, ill at ease amid the comforts of civilization. They bring about the same discomfort in others by reminding them of death’s inevitable approach.
| d8 | Personality Trait |
|---|---|
| 1 | Remember, I could kill you in your sleep. Or put centipedes in your bedroll. |
| 2 | I like to remind people of their inevitable demise. |
| 3 | Sometimes I give voice to the whispers of the rot, which I hear but no one else does. |
| 4 | I do my best to discourage anyone from approaching or talking to me. |
| 5 | I have accepted my death. Hence, I don’t fear it. |
| 6 | Like roots growing through stone, I am relentless and determined in my action. |
| 7 | I put my knowledge of anatomy to use by narrating the injuries my enemies suffer in grisly detail. |
| 8 | Like a wild animal, I lash out viciously when I’m provoked — and I’m easily provoked. |
| d6 | Ideal |
|---|---|
| 1 | Guild. My guild is all that really matters. (Any) |
| 2 | Stoicism. All of us are part of the cyclical march of nature, which will continue with or without us. (Neutral) |
| 3 | Nature. The natural world is more important than the edifices of the city and civilization. (Neutral) |
| 4 | Interdependence. We are all part of nature’s web. (Lawful) |
| 5 | Ambition. The time of Golgari ascendance is at hand, and I intend to have a prominent place in the new world order. (Evil) |
| 6 | Live and Let Live. Meddling in the affairs of other guilds is a great way to get squashed like a bug. (Neutral) |
| d6 | Bond |
|---|---|
| 1 | I cherish the finger of a family member who was petrified by a medusa. |
| 2 | I have an identical twin who is as different from me as any person could be. |
| 3 | I want to lead one faction of the guild to a new position of dominance. |
| 4 | I love spending time in the moss-covered building where I took part in my first reclamation mission. |
| 5 | I found something in the sewer that must never come to light. |
| 6 | I am forever grateful to the reclaimer who found me floating facedown in the sewer, moments from death. |
| d6 | Flaw |
|---|---|
| 1 | Death comes for us all, so you can’t expect me to take care of someone who can’t fight it off. |
| 2 | I assume that anyone outside the Golgari looks down on me. |
| 3 | I feel a need for revenge against those who enjoy the privilege of living above ground. |
| 4 | I don’t bother to couch my opinions in flattering words. |
| 5 | I can’t help but pocket any trinket or coin I come across, no matter how worthless. |
| 6 | I’m convinced that I’m better and stronger than members of other guilds, isolated as they are from the realities of life and death. |
Contacts
To the extent that the Golgari Swarm acts like a single organism, you are connected to every other member in some way or another. Convinced that the rest of the world is out to get you, you find it easy to form close bonds with your guild mates, and harder to make meaningful connections with others.
Roll twice on the Golgari Contacts table (for an ally and a rival) and once on the Non-Golgari Contacts table.
| d8 | Contact |
|---|---|
| 1 | One of my parents is an elite assassin, a member of the Ochran. |
| 2 | I learned combat from a kraul. |
| 3 | I know a medusa who is stationed in the guildhall. |
| 4 | I had a torrid romance with a spore druid responsible for a large rot farm. |
| 5 | There’s a troll in a remote area of the undercity who seems to find me interesting — and who knows more than you’d think. |
| 6 | An elf lich is determined to see me become a lich someday, too. |
| 7 | A medusa decided it would be more fun to recruit me into the guild than to kill me. |
| 8 | I know a findbroker who can locate just about anything, for the right price. |
| d10 | Non-contact |
|---|---|
| 1 | An Azorius arrester I literally pulled out of the gutter will do anything for me. |
| 2 | Someone joined the Gruul in a battle against the Boros once, and the sergeant of that Boros squad would love to prove that it was me. |
| 3 | I had a romance with a Dimir agent whom I still feed secrets to. |
| 4 | Roll an additional Golgari contact; you can decide if the contact is an ally or a rival. |
| 5 | I joined the Gruul in a battle against the Boros once, and the chief of that small clan thanks me for turning the tide. |
| 6 | An Izzet scientist resents that I sold a scrapped invention I found in the sewer. |
| 7 | My undercity explorations led me into an Orzhov vault, and a spirit thinks I stole something valuable. |
| 8 | I found a baby beast and sold it to a Rakdos wrangler who remains grateful to me. |
| 9 | A Selesnya druid and I share an interest in the same garden, and we have enjoyable arguments there. |
| 10 | I regularly pick up refuse from beneath a Simic laboratory, and sometimes I talk to the researcher who dumps it there. |
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