Purple Hack Patch Notes

_If you want to see every single change, you can check out the GitHub commit history. Here’s a summary of the major recent changes. You can access the full Purple Hack ruleset _here_._

2026.03.23: Monster Harvesting

More XP! In a nutshell, you can harvest monster parts off monsters you kill and haul them home for XP like any other treasure. The more dangerous the monster, the more valuable their parts.

2026.01.04: New Way to Gain XP

There are now two new ways to gain XP:

  • Carousing: Spend money carousing in exchange for XP at a 1d.=1XP rate. Complications may arise!

  • Philanthropy: Spend money engaging in philanthropy in exchange for XP at a 2d.=1XP rate. Not as risky as carousing.

2025.12.27: Dolmenwood

Just for the curious, I’ll add a (D) after each entry that’s from or heavily inspired by _Dolmenwood._

Characters

  • Changed to a d6 Ability Check system (instead of d20). Roll a d6, add your ability score modifier and any other situational modifiers, beat a 4. Easy. (D)

  • Added Feats of Exploration for new ways to gain XP.

  • Added a Knight fighting style for the warrior class (D)

  • Added a Breggle (goatfolk) race for if you ever meet one and then have a character die and then want to make one. ‘Til then, they’re locked 😉 (D)

  • Updated Dwarf and Elf racial bonuses

  • Added a provision to allow you to reroll truly garbage characters.

  • Specialist mage ability has been broadened to allow for one additional spell slot each spell rank, irrespective of spell school.

  • It’s not new, but it’s worth noting the Upgrading Armour and Weapons section - it’s a good way to spend some of your hard-earned cash, and it’s pretty underutilized.

Feats

  • New warrior feat: Battle Rage (D)

  • New mage feats: Arcane Antipathy, Detect Magic (D)

  • New unrestricted feats: Animal Companion, Undead Slayer (D)

  • Characters with the Anointed feat now pull spells from the holy spell list instead of the regular arcane spell list. (D)

  • Updated Defender and Whirlwind to reflect combat changes

  • Removed Concentration mage feat ‘cause it kinda sucked

  • Combined Stillcasting and Spell Silence mage feats into a new Metamagic feat to replace the old Metamagic feat ‘cause it kinda sucked

  • Updated and simplified Fieldcraft and Lockpicking feats to align with Skill system

Skills

  • Converted to a d6 skill system. Roll a d6, and if you hit your Skill Target you succeed. Skills are either general (where everyone starts with a Skill Target of 6), or specialized (where you can’t even attempt without having taken the skill). Each time you take a Skill, it lowers the Skill Target of that skill by 1. Skills can be taken multiple times to allow a cumulative lowering of the Skill Target. For example, someone could take the Stealth skill twice to have a Skill Target of 4. Or make a grizzled wilderness survivalist and start with an old character to take three skills and do Survival x3 for a Survival Skill Target of 3 right out of the gate. You get the idea. (D)

Combat

  • Removed stances at the beginning of a round in favor of a clear list of options each phase. (This, besides the d6 Ability & Skill system, is the most significant change and the one that’ll take the most getting used to. I’ll have cheat sheets, don’t worry.)

  • Clarified how splash weapons work (D)

  • Added a “defensive movement” phase after melee, to allow for a strike and then move

Exploration

Magic

  • The number of spells slots each caster has at each level has been slightly adjusted. (D)

  • Spell levels are now called spell Ranks to avoid confusion with character levels. Thanks, Dolmenwood. (And also duh why hasn’t anyone else thought of that before?!) (D)

  • Additional clarification added around binding and researching new spells, and the time requirement was lowered.

  • Clarified that it usually takes two hands to cast any given spell, unless the caster has the Dextrous feat.

Spells

  • Multiple arcane spells were updated or replaced. The spells replaced are replaced with (I think) more interesting options, and updated spells are either rebalanced or made clearer. Full details below. (D)
  • You can see the current arcane spell list here.

  • Added information on Holy Magic for Anointed characters. The holy spell list info is here.

  • Added info about Praying at Shrines (note that second paragraph!). (D)

Rank 1

  • New evocation spell: Crystal Resonance (D)

  • New illusion spell: Ventriloquism (D)

  • Bless renamed to Arcane Ward (to distinguish it from the classic holy spell) and its bonus is rebalanced down to +1.
  • Light renamed to Firelight, and flare ability added (D)
  • Magic Missile replaced with Ioun Shard cause it’s cooler (D)
  • The Turn Undead spell has significant changes in how it works (D)

  • Detect Magic has additional functionality

  • Shocking Grasp has been buffed and renamed to Shocking Strike, and is now a Rank 2 spell
  • Change Self is now a Rank 2 spell

Rank 2

  • New transmutation spell: Arcane Cypher (D)

  • New divination spell: Mind Crystal (D)

  • Removed Acid Arrow, Augury, Bolster & Fool’s Gold

  • Updated Knock, Mirror Image, Guide, Phantasmal Force, and Web

  • Increased duration for Mind Shield and Protection from Poison

  • Detect Invisible replaced with Perceive the Invisible for pedantic flavor reasons (D)

Rank 3

  • New divination spell: Crystal Vision (D)

  • New transmutation spell: Darkvision (D)

  • New evocation spell: Serpent Glyph (D)

  • Removed Blink, Dig, and ESP

  • Updated Dispel Magic, Disguise, Haste, Hold Person, Spectral Force, and Water Breathing

  • Renamed Negative Plane Protection to Protection from Undead ‘cause that’s what it does

Rank 4

  • New evocation spell: Sending (D)

  • New transmutation spell: Fabricate (D)

  • Removed Ice Storm, Stone to Flesh, Thunderclap

  • Updated Confusion

  • Replaced Polymorph Self with Polymorph (which allows polymorphing others)

  • Replaced Domination with Dominate (D)

  • Upgraded Strength and renamed it to Enhance

Rank 5

  • New conjuration spells: Air Sphere, Conjure Elemental (D)

  • New transmutation spell: Passwall (D)

  • Removed Limited Wish, Shape Earth

  • Updated Elemental Wall and moved it to Rank 4

  • Upgraded Fly

  • Updated Contact Other Plane and renamed it Oracle

Rank 6

  • New conjuration spell: Dweomerfire (D)

  • New transmutation spells: Move Terrain, Petrification (D)

  • Remove Control Water, Shape Change, Wish

  • Updated Control Weather, Disintegrate, Invisible Stalker, and Project Image

  • Updated Earthquake and renamed it to Earthquake Wave

Other Stuff

  • Google Sheets character sheet has been updated to match. Make a copy here.

  • Did a thorough edit of the whole thing, making minor tweaks and adjustments here and there, besides style fixes. Github says I changed 589 lines in that commit, so I don’t feel like recapping it. See it for yourself if you’re dying of curiosity that much.

  • Just a final note: I know this is a lot of changes at once, but I’m hoping it’s not overwhelming and that in practice it’ll feel more trickled out at the table as things come up. As always, if something just isn’t working, I’m perfectly happy to revisit and change it until it does.

  • Coming Soon: Carousing & Philanthropy as ways to spend money in exchange for more XP.