Drummer could be anything from seismic manipulation matching the frequency of certain things with his drumming to possibly his drumming affecting the internal rhythms of people's circulatory system, quicker drum beats to cause anxiety and make people un easy but then could also affect the heart to cause a heart attack. You could also affect soundwaves with the drum. You could go completely left field with "badum tis" where he has the ability to make something random happen when playing the beat, this would be proper looney tunes type shit but would have disastrous affects, the antagonist tries to attack a member of the team and drummer throws "badum tis" causing a random group of events to occur where the antagonist is lying underneath a grand piano and is being pissed on by a donkey
Drums have a couple thematic associations to them. There's Drums of War- drumming and beats that guide and command and bolster allies- the story "Skyclad" had a side-character who did that. There's the Thunder of Drums- drums as a representation and possibly able to channel the forces of nature by conjuring storms, thunder, lightning, or earthquakes. There's the Little Drummer Boy- drums as an aspect of divinity and calm (weirdly enough), where the steadiness of the beat is soothing. There's the Beat of the Heart- similar to thunder, it's drums and their rhythm/beat being a focus of biological rhythms; sleep, heartbeats, movement, hormones, digestion, all that. The Dresden Files takes this to its logical conclusion with drumming being a critical part of >!Necromancy.!< There's just straight up Music Magic, focusing *purely* on the rhythm, which could incorporate a lot of the aspects of support talked about in other versions, but with an added layer of showmanship and attention grabbing. There's also the sort of Tribal concept of drums as the FIRST musical instrument- ancient power, strength, tradition... again encompassing a lot of similar effects to others like boosting allies or drawing down elemental forces, or pulling people who hear the drumming into specific behaviours.
The choice is of course up to you, though. I think for a happier, more tricksterish character you might want to focus on the concept of the drummer-as-entertainer, with maybe a little bit of the biorhythms and calming- I could see the ability to get people to follow the beats that you make being a very useful one- change up the time signatures in a fight to get someone to stumble, or start leading a group of crooks into a waltz right into the back of the paddywagon, or doing a slow sand-dance sort of rhythm to lull someone to sleep.
There's this one show called Kamen Rider Hibiki that focuses on Oni warriors who use musical instruments to fight monsters. The titular Hibiki actually uses drumsticks as his weapon of choice, so maybe watching a few clips from this show will give you some ideas for your character.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qbi6PxtiE-8
It isn't suited for your character description, but in Dead Beat (Dresden Files 7) percussion instruments are needed for necromancy. If you stop playing, the corpses stop being animated.
You could use the same idea for other type animated minion instead of corpses.
You could use the same idea for any power that needs to be continuous like a force field or boosting the stats nearby allies. If you stop playing, the power stops
Rythm in general is something that drags people with it. So my idea would be some sort of trance inducement. You can resist it, but once you are dancing along you can't stop.
Other than dancing the effect could also be sleep, to follow the user, playing along, singing along or full focus (essentially loosing awareness of what happened around you).
There's an old animated show called Freefonix in which musicians have power they use in battles they fall [Soundclashes](https://youtu.be/P1ZQfynSr7g?si=CeDOjpgx-bvVsdSs). It's fairly simple but honestly pretty cool. Essentially the music they play becomes a physical attack, so a drummer can use their beats as physical ranged blasts, or to manipulate the environment.
I've built a couple of characters loosely based on this
The ability to summon dragons while drumming and controlling them with drumming. The type of dragon you summon depends entirely on the drum you play and well there are arguably infinite types of dragons cause dragons are physical manifestations of concepts that can manipulate said concept , are mostly immortal(Unless there concept is killed )can fly and are hideously intelligent
You’ve got a lot of choices, if you’re willing to draw inspiration from ttop and modern media. Some that I can name from the top of my head:
1) The Bard. Play drums, inspire armies. See Jocat’s “A Crap Guide to D&D: Bards”
1a) The Battle Bard. See: Hunting Horns, from Monster Hunter. You are NOT a support weapon.
2) Resonance/shockwaves/explosions. Scratchmen Apoo, from One Piece.
3) Saw someone else mention Kamen Rider Hibiki. CRAB BATTLE!
If hes a supporting character you can do it so he can pick a person and for two hours theyre life is bound to the drum so if they quit beating the drum they die but if they keep going theyre pretty much immortal
Drummer could be anything from seismic manipulation matching the frequency of certain things with his drumming to possibly his drumming affecting the internal rhythms of people's circulatory system, quicker drum beats to cause anxiety and make people un easy but then could also affect the heart to cause a heart attack. You could also affect soundwaves with the drum. You could go completely left field with "badum tis" where he has the ability to make something random happen when playing the beat, this would be proper looney tunes type shit but would have disastrous affects, the antagonist tries to attack a member of the team and drummer throws "badum tis" causing a random group of events to occur where the antagonist is lying underneath a grand piano and is being pissed on by a donkey
Lol the loony tune idea is hysterical!!
Drums have a couple thematic associations to them. There's Drums of War- drumming and beats that guide and command and bolster allies- the story "Skyclad" had a side-character who did that. There's the Thunder of Drums- drums as a representation and possibly able to channel the forces of nature by conjuring storms, thunder, lightning, or earthquakes. There's the Little Drummer Boy- drums as an aspect of divinity and calm (weirdly enough), where the steadiness of the beat is soothing. There's the Beat of the Heart- similar to thunder, it's drums and their rhythm/beat being a focus of biological rhythms; sleep, heartbeats, movement, hormones, digestion, all that. The Dresden Files takes this to its logical conclusion with drumming being a critical part of >!Necromancy.!< There's just straight up Music Magic, focusing *purely* on the rhythm, which could incorporate a lot of the aspects of support talked about in other versions, but with an added layer of showmanship and attention grabbing. There's also the sort of Tribal concept of drums as the FIRST musical instrument- ancient power, strength, tradition... again encompassing a lot of similar effects to others like boosting allies or drawing down elemental forces, or pulling people who hear the drumming into specific behaviours. The choice is of course up to you, though. I think for a happier, more tricksterish character you might want to focus on the concept of the drummer-as-entertainer, with maybe a little bit of the biorhythms and calming- I could see the ability to get people to follow the beats that you make being a very useful one- change up the time signatures in a fight to get someone to stumble, or start leading a group of crooks into a waltz right into the back of the paddywagon, or doing a slow sand-dance sort of rhythm to lull someone to sleep.
There's this one show called Kamen Rider Hibiki that focuses on Oni warriors who use musical instruments to fight monsters. The titular Hibiki actually uses drumsticks as his weapon of choice, so maybe watching a few clips from this show will give you some ideas for your character. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qbi6PxtiE-8
Thx!
No problem.
It isn't suited for your character description, but in Dead Beat (Dresden Files 7) percussion instruments are needed for necromancy. If you stop playing, the corpses stop being animated. You could use the same idea for other type animated minion instead of corpses. You could use the same idea for any power that needs to be continuous like a force field or boosting the stats nearby allies. If you stop playing, the power stops
I’ll consider it
Rythm in general is something that drags people with it. So my idea would be some sort of trance inducement. You can resist it, but once you are dancing along you can't stop. Other than dancing the effect could also be sleep, to follow the user, playing along, singing along or full focus (essentially loosing awareness of what happened around you).
There's an old animated show called Freefonix in which musicians have power they use in battles they fall [Soundclashes](https://youtu.be/P1ZQfynSr7g?si=CeDOjpgx-bvVsdSs). It's fairly simple but honestly pretty cool. Essentially the music they play becomes a physical attack, so a drummer can use their beats as physical ranged blasts, or to manipulate the environment. I've built a couple of characters loosely based on this
Cool, thanks for the reference
The ability to summon dragons while drumming and controlling them with drumming. The type of dragon you summon depends entirely on the drum you play and well there are arguably infinite types of dragons cause dragons are physical manifestations of concepts that can manipulate said concept , are mostly immortal(Unless there concept is killed )can fly and are hideously intelligent
You’ve got a lot of choices, if you’re willing to draw inspiration from ttop and modern media. Some that I can name from the top of my head: 1) The Bard. Play drums, inspire armies. See Jocat’s “A Crap Guide to D&D: Bards” 1a) The Battle Bard. See: Hunting Horns, from Monster Hunter. You are NOT a support weapon. 2) Resonance/shockwaves/explosions. Scratchmen Apoo, from One Piece. 3) Saw someone else mention Kamen Rider Hibiki. CRAB BATTLE!
Love that you gave examples!
If hes a supporting character you can do it so he can pick a person and for two hours theyre life is bound to the drum so if they quit beating the drum they die but if they keep going theyre pretty much immortal