With that in mind, several Patrons are detailed below and can be included in your legendarium at the Narrator's discretion. Each Patron listing has three elements: Obligation, Visitation, and several potential Benefits.
A Patron's Obligation is an agreement between the player characters and the Patron. In return for the Patron's support, the player character will agree to abide by certain restrictions or engage in specific activities on a regular basis, as detailed below. Violating this Obligation can result in a loss of Benefits (detailed below) or even being abandoned by the Patron to which the player character is sworn.
A Patron's Visitation describes how often a player character is expected to consult or visit with their Patron and for what length of time. A player character that fails to meet the requirements of their Visitation may lose access to the Benefits granted by their Patron until such time as they pay the Patron a visit. In addition, player characters may be required to make amends for their over-long absence before being eligible to receive Benefits from their Patron.
A Patron's Benefit lists one or more positive effects the player character can receive from their Patron in return for meeting the requirements of their Obligation and Visitation. A character can only receive the effects of one Benefit at a time, but may change the Benefit they receive (if their Patron offers multiple Benefits) each time they meet the requirements of their Visitation.
Unless otherwise stated, a player character cannot have more than one Patron at the same time. Narrators are encouraged to develop new patrons that are appropriate to their own legendariums.
Armchair Scholar
Not everyone is interested in going on adventures. Some are more comfortable simply reading about them and chronicling the strange and fantastic affairs of the world. These Armchair Scholars will sometimes offer aid to adventurers and heroes who are willing to brave the forgotten and abandoned places of the world and face unknown dangers in hopes that these reckless souls will come back with stories and artifacts lost to time. In return for their bravery, Armchair Scholars will help these intrepid heroes by providing a comfortable place to relax and deeper insights into what is discovered.
Obligation: In return for their patronage, the Armchair Scholars expect the player characters to bring to them any items of historic significance for the Scholar to examine, including and especially Heirlooms. However, the Scholar will expect the occasional donation to their collection in the form of an Heirloom or other historically significant item. In addition, the player characters must promise not to destroy any Heirlooms they recover.
Visitation: Once per season the Armchair Scholar expects a visit in which the player character will bring the Scholar at least one Heirloom that they have not seen before. Alternatively, the player characters can bring a previously undiscovered item of historic significance or a map to an undiscovered location.
Benefit: As long as the player characters meet the requirements of their Obligation and Visitation, they receive Advantage on all Lore checks to identify the unique properties of any Heirlooms they discover. Characters who do not normally have the Lore ability are considered to have a Lore of 2 when identifying the unique properties or history of Heirlooms, but do not receive Advantage on these checks. In addition, when visiting the Armchair Scholar, the Scholar will translate any documents or texts brought to them and has a 1-5 in 1d6 chance of deciphering the history of any Heirlooms they are brought. Finally, if the player characters are searching for a specific Heirloom there is a 1 in 1d6 chance the Armchair Historian will be able to provide some lead or clue to that item's potential location.
Curious Rover
The Curious Rover is a small, friendly animal of remarkable intelligence - most often a Rover (as described in The Hero's Companion, page 11), that has taken a liking to the player characters. Though it does not travel with the characters, in return for simple affection and regular table scraps, a Curious Rover provides temporary companionship whenever the player characters visit their furry friend and may even provide insight to the true nature of anyone traveling with them if the characters bring a strange around the next time they visit the Curious Rover.
Obligation: Each time the player characters visit the Curious Rover they are expected to spend a few hours relaxing with the adorable little dog. This includes such simple joys as playing fetch or giving it simple belly rubs. In addition, the player character is expected to provide the Curious Rover with a few choice morsels to eat. Earning a Curious Rover as a Patron is often done accidentally by a simple act of kindness to a seemingly innocent animal.
Visitation: The player character is expected to visit the Curious Rover once per season, bringing some kind of snack or treat with them each time. If the player character fails to do so, they must make a successful Weal-based Attribute Saving Throw or the Curious Rover loses interest in them and they lose the patronage. If more than a year passes between visits, the patronage is lost automatically.
Benefit: After spending an evening in Visitation with the Curious Rover, the memories of the simple pleasures of animal companionship can help stave off the darkness when the world seems dangerous. The next time the player character fails a Bearing-based Saving Throw to Relax Around the Campfire, they may choose to ignore that failure and gain the benefits as if the Saving Throw had been successful. After this is done once, they cannot gain this benefit again until their next Visitation. In addition, if the player characters have someone with them who is under a malicious enchantment or who secretly wishes them ill, the Curious Rover automatically detects the ill intent and tends to growl and bristle at the villain's presence.
Patriotic Noble
The Patriotic Noble is a lord or lady ruling over a small parcel of land (typically a keep and the surrounding land under that keep's protection) who is dedicated to defending their realm. They typically believe ardently in the goodness and virtue of the people they are sworn to protect and the prosperity of the land. Player characters that earn the patronage of a Patriotic Noble can expect much in the way of aid, but are expected to come when that ruler calls for aid, which usually comes when the land is in a time of great need.
Obligation: Player characters that have the patronage of a Patriotic Noble are expected to come when called to aid the Noble's land in the quickest way possible. In addition, they may never knowingly act in a manner that would be detrimental to the land or its people. Finally in times of war and strife, the player characters may be called to aid and defend the land and its people that the Patriotic Noble rules.
Visitation: Regular visitation is not required in most instances. Instead, player characters are expected to come as fast as they are able if the Patriotic Noble calls for aid. Traditionally, patrons of the Patriotic Noble visit the ruler's court at least once per year.
Benefit: While in land ruled by the Patriotic Noble or when acting directly as the Noble's agent the player characters all benefit from the Hospitality ability as if they were a Knight (see page 37 of The Hero's Journey, Second Edition). Player characters can also expect lodging and food when visiting their patron's castle. Finally, once per year the Patriotic Noble will provide the player characters with a riding horse for their personal use.
Reclusive High Fey
The Fair Folk are endlessly fascinated by the Mortal Realm and its natives. Some of their kind take up residence in the hidden places of the world where they watch from afar. In rare cases they will recruit the aid of mortals to report to them on the strange and uncanny doings of those who live and die in return for the occassional and inconsistent blessings of the fey. The Reclusive High Fey's reasons for wanting this news can be as strange and varied as the fey themselves, and what they do with it is their secret.
Obligation: Those who receive the patronage of a Reclusive High Fey will be visited once every 1d6 months by their patron, often during a solitary or awkward moment, and expect a full report on the some affair or event the player characters have experienced in that time. If they knowingly lie to the Reclusive High Fey, their patron will immediately know and the patronage will be ended.
Visitation: Visitation occurs seemingly at random, as noted above. If a character lies to the Reclusive High Fey during their visitation, they are cursed and suffer Disadvantage on all Saving Throws against the special abilities of the fey and any spells that are fey in nature for a year and a day.
Benefit: Each time the player character reports their experiences to the Reclusive High Fey they will receive a strange blessing upon their fate. The player character makes a Weal-based Saving Throw. If that Saving Throw is successful, the character gains a single Myth Point.
Trouble-Making Wizard
Wizards are rare and dangerous, more often spoken of in legends and whispers than actually encountered. Most fade into a reclusive existence of strange study and solitude. On rare occasion a Wizard decides to wander, seeking out those who are (or may reluctantly become) agents of change and forces for good in the world. These chosen few find themselves under the unexpected patronage of these Trouble-Making Wizards, and their lives are more chaotic and eventful for it.
Obligation: The only obligation that patrons of a Trouble-Making Wizard must abide by is that they must be of a true and good heart and able to, however awkwardly, participate in whatever errands the Wizard sets out before them.
Visitation: Unlike most other patrons, the Trouble-Making Wizard choose a player character as a patron and will arrive unexpectedly every 2d6 weeks to draw them into some new trouble or adventure that will aid the goodly people of the world. Often the circumstances of this appearance will place the player characters in a circumstance beyond their control where there is little they can do but aid the Trouble-Making Wizard, unless they want to betray their conscience. The Narrator should devise the exact circumstances of their appearance.
Benefit: In return for their aid, the Trouble-Making Wizard will sometimes arrive to aid their patron in times of strife. Once per character level, the player character can inform the Narrator that they'd like the Trouble-Making Wizard to show up some time during that session of play to provide aid at a critical moment. When that moment comes, as determined by the Narrator, if the player character makes a successful Weal-based Attribute Saving Throw, then the Trouble-Making Wizard arrives on the scene to help that character. The Trouble-Making Wizard is always 7th level or higher and once they appear and aid the player character party, they cannot be called upon again until the character gains a level of experience.
Uncanny Woodland Hermit
Uncomfortably merry and often detached from the dangerous affairs of the world, the Uncanny Woodland Hermit lives in a secluded area of the world, untouched by civilization and the plights of peril that trouble the larger lands. The Uncanny Woodland Hermit is strangely magical and removed from the wide world, concerning themselves more with the affairs of their domain and those selected as patrons are often done so as a matter circumstance when unlikely travelers stumble upon their hidden forest domicile.
Obligation: Those who accept the Uncanny Woodland Hermit as a patron must agree to never needlessly destroy the natural environment. In addition when they encounter reckless destruction of the natural world they must take steps bring such terrible deeds to an end as quickly as possible without further damage to the wilderness.
Visitation: Though there is no obligation of regular Visitation to the Uncanny Woodland Hermit, any time the character is traveling through the Hermit's land, they are expected to stop by their cottage and share a song, a meal, and mutually merry company.
Benefit: When traveling through the domain ruled over by the Uncanny Woodland Hermit the player characters will never encounter a Natural Hazard (as described on page 86 of The Hero's Journey, Second Edition). In addition, whenever the player characters are crossing a Blighted Land they never suffer Disadvantage to resist the effects of that realm (see THJ2e, page 88).
The Hero's Journey, Second Edition and its supplements can be purchased on DriveThruRPG.com.
