[5e] Introducing Friends and Strangers to Mystara...

[critter3of4]

...by someone with spotty knowledge of Mystara.

Most of our group has played / DMed exclusively in Forgotten Realms and I'd like to entice them with a little knowledge. This is all part of my diabolical scheme to get them to let me DM a campaign in Mystara. Karameikos to be exact.

I'm trying to get an overview of the world in a way that's easy for me to communicate. I decided to use 5e's Core Assumptions (DMG page 9) as a common starting point between me and the rest of the group. These Core Assumptions in the DMG match well with Mystara. The only major difference I can see are Immortals vs. Gods.

Side note: I'll be using material / PDFs found at Pandius.com to expand upon these ideas, such as "The Newbie's Guide to Mystara." I haven't gotten to that point yet.

If I missed anything, if you have a different idea that would work here, hell, if you just want to say "looks fine to me." I'd like to hear it.

Thanks!

Boilerplate Mystara (Karameikos)

1. Gods Oversee the World

Hoo boy, here goes...

(A) The world's creator is unknown:

From the second post in this old thread...
http://www.thepiazza.org.uk/bb/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=5937&view=next


Officially, noone knows who/when/how Mystara or the multiverse was created. The Multi-verse has been in existance since before the oldest living immortal (and presumably, though now specifically stated, even before the current Old Ones).

Each race/culture/region has their own creation myth... naturally tending towards the Immortal patron(s) they most revere creating the world, or the race/culture/people or both.

(B) Immortals

Immortals are the closest things to gods, but they are creations of Mystara. They did not create the World. Immortals are an appendage that has grown from Mystara.

(C) The Divine: Domains and Immortals

Divine classes are not necessarily bound to Immortals for their powers but are dependent on the clerical domains (PHB 59). An Immortal may epitomize a domain, e.g. Halav for the War Domain, and thus be worshipped as one of its embodiments.

There are probably more domains than what's mentioned in the PHB and DMG, but I'm not concerned with that right now.

2. Much of the World is Untamed

Yep, that sums up Karameikos.

Other areas will not have this "points of light" motif, but I'm not too concerned with that right now.

3. The World is Ancient

Yep.

Karameikos, a temperate region, was once near the North Pole. Advanced technology and magic don't mix too well.

4. Conflict Shapes the World History

Yep

5. The World is Magical

Yep

IIRC, There's no Fey Realm in Mystara as written. ETA If you've DMed / played in 5e Mystara before, how was this handled?

[Ace Jackson]

Well, as far as immortals go, the way I'd try to describe them to the uninitiated might be to introduce them as MCU asgardians+, That is to say, while not truly divine, they are immensely powerful, and can bestow great power/information/generally be a great help to those who suit them and their purposes, (I.E. Clerics, though not necessarily with the usually assumed exclusivity). Domains and spheres, unless you're planning to drop the sphere concept entirely, at least for the beginning, might get squirrelly, that will take some thought. Most everything looks fine, and I'd not worry to much about the fey realms, Mystara has planes, and a great many of them, so you can probably just drop it in without issue, though if you wanted to get really creative, the Halfling/Hin have the blackflame forges from the Nightmare Dimension, you could give another race a set of artifacts/affinity to a "dream dimension."

Also worth noting, drivethruRPG has most of the old gazetteers series.

http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/16974/GAZ1-The-Grand-Duchy-of-Karameikos-Basic?it=1

Hope it goes well for you, I'm hoping to do the same when I can.

[LibraryOgre]

You might also try perusing the Cyclopedia Mystara (http://wiki.mystara.net/)...

[critter3of4]

You might also try perusing the Cyclopedia Mystara (http://wiki.mystara.net/)...

Free stuff is always welcomed. Thanks! :-)


Well, as far as immortals go, the way I'd try to describe them to the uninitiated might be to introduce them as MCU asgardians+, That is to say, while not truly divine, they are immensely powerful, and can bestow great power/information/generally be a great help to those who suit them and their purposes, (I.E. Clerics, though not necessarily with the usually assumed exclusivity). Domains and spheres, unless you're planning to drop the sphere concept entirely, at least for the beginning, might get squirrelly, that will take some thought.

My "divine by domain" idea is fairly cosmetic. It should be able to allow a player to create a cleric who does not want to pick an immortal as a patron. Then, that player can pick an Immortal later if he / she wants to.

Also, I like domains in that a concept can become divine. I just think it's kinda cool.


Most everything looks fine, and I'd not worry to much about the fey realms, Mystara has planes, and a great many of them, so you can probably just drop it in without issue, though if you wanted to get really creative, the Halfling/Hin have the blackflame forges from the Nightmare Dimension, you could give another race a set of artifacts/affinity to a "dream dimension."

Right now, I'm trying to get the basics down for Mystara. It's good to know that the fey realms are optional.




Also worth noting, drivethruRPG has most of the old gazetteers series.

http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/16974/GAZ1-The-Grand-Duchy-of-Karameikos-Basic?it=1

Hope it goes well for you, I'm hoping to do the same when I can.

I downloaded B10 Night's Dark Terror from DrivethruRPG. I think that's what inspired this whole crazy idea in the first place :-)

[BWR]

1. B. The Immortals are gods. The term was chosen because the Greek gods are often referred to as immortals and for some reason they didn't want to use the word 'god' for Mystara. Some modules and adventures set (or retrofitted into) Mystara use the term 'god'
They can ascend, they are worshipped and grant powers to followers. That's basically all a D&D god is. Immortals may not have created the world and most may have originated on Mystara at some point, but not all (Alphaks, for one). There are other worlds with, presumably, their own Immortals. The Old Ones might have created worlds, but they're mysterious and even the wisest of Immortals knows little other than that they (probably) exist and are scarily powerful. Some of the Immortals are so old, on the order of millions of years, they don't remember their past.

C. The books are a bit quiet on the subject of whether divine characters need to worship an Immortal. If clerics in modules are mentioned without a patron it's mostly because whatever patron isn't important. Personally, I generally require them to have a patron, but I don't think it matters much, certainly not like in FR.

2.
Partially. There is some wilderness, but it's bounded by more settled lands, there's lots of old Traldar stuff in Karameikos, some of it driven away from the big population centers by the Thyatian invaders. when you look at the map, there's really not a lot of wilderness in the Known World, and lots of the wilderness is more like 'sparesly populated' rather than 'always overrun by monsters'.

3.
Yup. Millions of years, possibly billions, though most important history is only about 6000 years old. Basically from the crash of the FSS Beagle and the development of the Blackmoor culture.

4.
Business as usual for D&D worlds, innit?

5.
Yup. Especially Glantri and Alphatia. 25% of Alphatians are casters and they use magic for everything. Glantri has a giant magical school that is the single greatest center of magical learning in the world (probably). Alfheim was created and sustained by magic. As pointed out, there are tons of other worlds out there, not to mention different dimensions (dimensions are the next step up from 'multiverse'') - you can easily invent something fey-like to work.
What you might look into is the faedorne, who are basically fey and live on floating isles in the sky that look like stars from below. I haven't handled it in my games because I run old Mystara modules and they don't bring it up.

[critter3of4]

1.B

Ah yes, the 80's DnD scare really mucked things up.

C

I'd like to keep my "divine by domain" idea since it doesn't require knowledge of the setting. This will allow new players to play a divine who might be discouraged b/c of ignorance of Mystara.

Then again, I might drop the idea and just allow PCs to pick a divine class w/o picking a patron. That seems weird to me though.

2

You're right, I like the fact that running into a band of goblins or a band of traveling merchants are both justifiable by the setting.

[Khedrac]

1 C

In the early Gazetteers (well Gaz1: The Kingdom of Karameikos) the clerics of the kingdom are divided into several churches (the main two are the church of Karameikos and the church of Traldara). These churches worship collective groups of immortals, but they are not detailed beyond the basic listing (which is probably not complete), but in BECM D&D the choice of patron did not alter the cleric's spells.
In 3.5 terms the church would have a number of domains (probably all the domains offered by the relevant immortals).

Other Gazetteers mix things up as they usually avoided religion (it matters in Karameikos because of the two churches in semi-friendly rivalry), and when they don't avoid it, it's because it is different to the standard rules: shaman for the Atruaghin Clans and spirits for the Ethengar Khanate etc).

If you are setting the campaign in Karameikos I would explain the two main churches to the players and ask them which their character would like to be in (or neither).

[Yora]

There seem to be two very different kinds of Immortals. Mentzers Known World Immortals apparently were very different from Heards Mystara Immortals.

[Khedrac]

There seem to be two very different kinds of Immortals. Mentzers Known World Immortals apparently were very different from Heards Mystara Immortals.

Oh the Immortals rules got completely re-written for Wrath of the Immortals from the gold Immortals Rules box. One of the most important changes (if you are not going to play with immortal PCs) was the removal of number caps by rank for each sphere.
So far as I recall neither rules set really covers worship (I do recall something about there being some advantages to having worshippers in one's home plane in the Gold box rules - probably because one can potentially use them as agents).

Just to confuse the "immortals = gods" position, the author of module IM3: The Best of Intentions forgot this and had a bunch of junior immortals pretending to be gods and the senior immortals being concerned that the gods might come back and be upset when they found out. I have never run or played at Immortal level, but it's fairly easy to swap the gods for more senior immortals - perhaps ones who no-one else knows which immortals they are?
(One of the points that WotI makes nicely with its useful catalog of known immortals, is that the same immortal can be worshipped under different names by different groups - which makes it much harder to cut them off from worship when one does not know all of their pseudonyms.)

[Khoram]

Well, as far as immortals go, the way I'd try to describe them to the uninitiated might be to introduce them as MCU asgardians+, That is to say, while not truly divine, they are immensely powerful, and can bestow great power/information/generally be a great help to those who suit them and their purposes

I'm setting up a Known World/Mystara 5E campaign and I'm going to handle the Immortals similarly. That is, they will be like the Ainu/Vala/Maia in Lord of the Rings cosmology - powerful ("angelic") beings that the Creator god uses to help oversee the world. Much like Galadriel was a student/follower of Melian and derived much of her knowledge of magic from her. I don't intend the campaign will get much beyond mid teen levels if that high so I won't have to worry about anyone trying to "ascend". Even if they did I would just handle it like in Greek Mythology when the Olympians allowed a mortal or demi-god to "ascend".