The Elemancer

An alternate Immolator playbook for Dungeon World

“Too long a sacrifice can make a stone of the heart.”

W.B. Yeats
 The Elemancer
Introduction
As an elemancer, you’ve grafted your
soul with the essence of an elemental
substance, giving yourself abnormal
abilities to summon and magically
manipulate that substance within the
mortal world. You sacrificed some of your
soul to achieve this new state, and you
carry a reminder of the humanity you’ve
lost. That reminder is sometimes the only
thing keeping you from drifting fully into
the elemental plane.
Among the world’s small population of
elemancers there are numerous orders,
each devoted to a substance they’ve found
the secrets to taming. What drew you to
yours? And more importantly, what will it
drive you to become?
Role and Inspiration
A party’s Elemancer is an offensive
magical force, with the potential to change
the dynamics of an environment by
introducing their element to it or simply
bending what’s present to their will.
Elemancers who push creative interactions
of their moves – chaining them together
through success and failure – will find the
class most rewarding.
The predominant theme for players to
explore centers around the sacrifices
elemancers must make in order to
command their element’s segment of
reality. GMs should prod players to explore
the gravity of these sacrifices.
Beyond the original Immolator playbook,
the Elemancer is inspired by elemental
specialties from classic Final Fantasy
games and benders from Avatar and Korra.
The Elemancer was compiled by Mike Martens, as an alternate and expansion to The Immolator
playbook by Sage LaTorra and Adam Koebel with design by Stefan Grambart – part of Dungeon
World.
Special thanks to The Gauntlet community and Aaron DeRosa for design feedback.
Change Notes
Most moves have been modified to allow
for the use of varied elemental orders
beyond the original Immolator/Fire type.
Fighting Fire with Fire has been removed,
balanced by the expanded potential to pair
The Bends and Flesh Made Soul over Zuko
Style and Hand Crafted.
Indestructible Hunger expands to A Life
Less Ordinary and My Soul-Called Life,
with emphasis on the playbook’s theme of
sacrificing one’s humanity for elemental
control.
Moth to the Flame, Enkindler, Firebrand,
and Sick Burn have been removed in favor
of moves where the character manipulates
their element rather than other characters,
with some care to provide narrative
focused moves as well as mechanical ones.
Race traits become Anatomical traits,
tying the Elemancer in more closely to
their new identity rather than heredity.
(Race becomes part of look options.)
 NAME LEVEL XP
Solomon, Omen, Elda, Agasha, Herald, Khalwa, Yajna, Auka, Kalil, Obet, Ohverdus

LOOK ARMOR ALIGNMENT

Choose one for each, or write your own:
Evil
RACE: Human, elf, salamander
Sacrifice an unwilling victim to your
THE ELEMANCER
EYES: Vacant, probing, elemental HIT POINTS element.
Max (4 + Constitution) Current
BODY: Strange brands, ritual scars, perfect skin Chaotic
Spread a dangerous new idea.
HAIR: Styled hair, wild hair, your order’s cowl

CLOTHES: Elaborate robes, salvaged garb,

DAMAGE Neutral
an athletic uniform Exchange a sacrifice, freely given, for
a service rendered.
Assign these scores to your stats: 16 (+2), 15 (+1), 13 (+1), 11 (+0), 9 (+0), 8 (-1)

Strength Dexterity Constitution

Weak -1 Shaky -1 Sick -1

STR DEX CON

BONDS

You lost a memory of

Intelligence Wisdom Charisma that they still have. Reconstruct your
experience of it.
Stunned -1 Confused -1 Scarred -1
INT WIS CHA You feel doesn’t
appreciate the power of your element.
Demonstrate its superiority for them.

seems interested in the

ways of the elemancers. Proselytize.
STARTING MOVES
You and shared a
painful experience. Face it or sacrifice it.
Elemental Order The Bends
You mastered your element as a When you command your element,
member of an order of elemancers. roll+WIS. On a 10+ it does as you
Choose one. command, taking the shape and
movement you desire for as long as it
Immolator - Fire can be sustained in your surroundings.
On a 7-9 the effect is short-lived,
Drowned - Water (liquid/steam) lasting only a moment.

Frostbitten - Ice/snow
Earthbound - Rock/stone
Ironvein - Metal
Corrosive – Acid/toxin
Elemental Brand
When you conjure your element in the
form of a weapon, roll+CON. On a 10+
choose two of the listed tags; on a 7-9
choose one. You may treat your INT as
your STR or DEX in regards to making
attacks with this weapon. The weapon
always begins with tags of touch,
dangerous, and the nature of your
element. It gets 3 uses: Each attack with
the weapon consumes one use.
Flesh Made Soul
Phase into existence up to a chest’s
worth of your element in a raw
form. You can do what you like with
the substance, but its strange purity
is rarely trusted in barter. Take an
ongoing -1 CON penalty (including -1hp) ANATOMY
until you can rest.
Choose one anatomical trait.
Takes One to Know One
When you gaze intensely into Hound
someone’s eyes, you can see any recent When your element is nearby, you can
interactions of significance they’ve locate it via a peculiar tic.
had with your element … even if these
are things they’d prefer to keep hidden.
Cocoon
When you Make Camp and rest
engulfed in your element, regain all

E
your HP.
• close
• thrown (near) Hide
• +1 damage When you take damage from your
• remove the dangerous tag element, take +1 forward.
 COIN ADVANCED MOVES
When you gain a level from 2-10, you may choose from these moves.
Written in the Essence
STARTING GEAR When you stare into a source of your
Max Load (9+STR) Current element, looking for answers, roll+WIS.
On a hit, the GM will tell you something
new and interesting about the situation.
You carry no weapon and refuse armor
On a 10+, the GM will give you good
beyond the element bound to your soul.
detail. On a 7-9, the GM will give you an
impression. If you already know all there
You begin with: is to know, the GM will tell you that.
A Symbol of past sacrifice, describe it:
Soul Slayer
Adventuring Gear (5 uses, 1 weight) Add the following tags to your options
1 Healing Potion for Elemental Brand: messy, forceful,
reach, far
Choose two:
Dungeon Rations (5 uses, 1 weight)
Soul Piercer
Add +1 piercing to your tag options for
1 Healing Potion (0 weight) Elemental Brand.
Bag of Books (5 uses, 2 weight)
10 Coins Advanced Biology
Take an additional Anatomical trait.
Straight from the Source
When you focus deep on the element
inside you, you may treat a missed
roll as a 7-9 or a 7-9 result as a 10+.
This may be a roll you or another
character has made. Tell the GM what
you’ve sacrificed in reaching this far:
an emotion, a memory, or some innate
piece of your being. You may not use
this move again until you’ve used
Complete the Sacrifice.
Complete the Sacrifice
You gain this move whenever you’ve
used Straight from the Source.
Replenish the source of your power by
sacrificing a victory: Treat any roll of
10+ as a miss, and then regain Straight
from the Source.
When you gain a level from 6-10, you may choose from these moves.
Life is Hell
Whenever you summon your element
with any move, you can pull it from the
demonic plane. This black, twisted form
of the substance ignores armor as it
affects the soul directly. Soulless entities
cannot be harmed by this form of your
element.
Force Majeure
When you open a channel to the
elemental plane and call a storm, tell
the GM what you’re sacrificing and
roll+WIS. The sky opens up and your
element pours out in force within an area
the size of a small village. Everyone and
everything in the area takes damage as
appropriate. On a 10+, you can cease the
storm with little effort. On a 7-9, you
can’t close the channel as sharply as you
hoped and the effect spreads longer or
further. On a miss, something cruel,
intelligent, and hungry comes with the
storm.
Split Personality
You discover a rare-but-risky way to
join a second elemancer order. Tell the
GM what significant aspect of yourself
THE ELEMANCER
you’ve sacrificed, and you’ll command
a second element and take on a second
symbol of loss.
Gone to A Better Plane
When you meditate on the elemental
plane, your soul may pass entirely
to it, leaving your body lifeless for a
short time. If you seek guidance from
your element, roll +INT. On a hit, your
element will leaves its mark (e.g. a patch
of frost, a tongue of fire) on something
you should pursue in the mortal plane.
On a 7-9, the mark will likely be noticed
by others before you return.
A Life Less Ordinary
When you take your last breath for
the first time, don’t. After a few hours,
you revive in a purer elemental form
with 1d6 HP. Your skin takes on the
appearance and feel of your element.
Food and drink no longer affect you:
Magic and rest are your only ways to
recover HP.
The Shortest Distance
You may move through an
accumulation of your element to
another accumulation within about
20 meters, so long as both portals are
large enough for you to pass. When you
approach your source, roll +CON. On
a 10+, you may pass and return with
ease. On a 7-9, you may not return the
same way and the elemental plane takes
something from you.
My Soul-Called Life
Requires: A Life Less Ordinary
If you have revived into your altered
form, you may transform into a pure
elemental, able to morph your shape
without constraint and gaining +2
damage. Roll+CON. On a 10+, gain 3 hold
as an elemental. On a 7-9, gain 1 hold.
On a miss, gain 1 hold as a mortal body
disconnected from your element with -2
damage. Any move or substantial action
spends 1 hold. Once all hold is spent, you
revert to your hybrid form.
...For My Next Acolyte
When you convert an NPC to your
order, roll +INT. On a 10+, your souls are
fused through the elemental plane and
may inhabit each other’s bodies at will.
On a 7-9, the conversion goes normally,
vesting them with elemental control.
E
On a miss, their soul and body are lost,
transformed into an insentient pillar of
your element.