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Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Some people may remember my last attempt of creating a setting, but the whole thing kept heading into directions I didn't want to end up. So I think it's time to go back all the way to square one and start with a new blank slate, this time hopefully heeding all those pieces of advice I've gathered since. This time I also try not to bother too much with custom classes, spellcasting systems and the like, and instead stick to the Pathfinder core rules as much as possible.
- Base Concept
- Tribes, Clans, and Villages
- Classes and Equipment
- Gods, Spirits, and Demons
- Tribes of the Barbarian Lands - Wood Elves, Humans, and Kaas
- Kaas racial features
- Gnomes
- Bestiary
- Magic Basics and Blood Magic
- Vandren (human tribe)
- Spell Tattoos
- History - Overview
The Base Concept
With steampunk, magitech, and renaissance settings being all the rage these days, I go entirely into the opposite direction. Lands of the Barbarian Kings is a wilderness setting following the Points of Light concept. In a way, old pulp stories are a major inspiration, but without the pulp. That is there will be lots of ruins in the deserts and jungles to explore, with voodoo cults, eldritch abominations, snake people, barbarians, shamans, and giant lizards. Oh, and volcanoes! I love volcanoes! :smallbiggrin: However, I want to avoid loincloth and greatsword characters who rescue nude women chained to the tops of pyramids and such. Or think of Dark Sun with a more healthier environment and without some of the wonkier things. I've never read Robert Howard, but I think the people who were inspired by him, where those who also inspired me with this setting.
The Lands of the Barbarian Kings are the eastern coastal region of a large continent, ranging from subarctic environments in the north (think Iceland or Finland) to subtropic in the south (think India and Thailand). The region also includes many larger and smaller islands near the coast (like Indonesia). And they are, of course, inhabited by barbarians. While there are some nomadic tribes, most clans are centered on a primary town build around the keep of the chieftain. Actual cities with real walls are extremely rare and famous throughout the whole world. Many settlements are in fact build around the ruins of even older civilizations, and most keeps and castles have changed hands many times in the past.
Unlike most similar settings, the Lands of the Barbarian Kings are not just the home to human barbarians. There are also wild elves, lizardfolk, and some reinterpretation of orcs, each roughly equally common in the region. The role of Player Characters is intended to be clan warriors who keep the areas near their settlements safe from monsters and raiders, or set out to find solutions for more serious threats that endanger the clan. Typical adventure work, one might say, but the PCs are not outsiders who exist outside social norms, but rather members of their communities, like the other 30 or so percent who also know how to fight. Like warriors in a viking village. And as they rise in level, they become members of the warrior elite and eventually possibly the champions of their clan or even lesser chieftains.
Working with the Pathfinder rules, this setting will be for 1st to 10th level characters, instead of going all the way to 20th (or beyond). In my experience campaigns very rarely reach 10th levels, and this setting is not intended for fast level advancement, so I won't bother with something like E6 rules or such. That said, most magic is capped at 5th level, there are just too few people around who know 6th level magic to make scrolls and items replicating those spells easily available.
Inspirations
Conan, the Barbarian
Princess Mononoke
The 13th Warrior
Seven Samurai
Shadow of the Colossus
Dragon Age
Warcraft 3 (Orcs and Night Elves)
An art gallery of images that capture the style of the setting.
Tribes, Clans, and Villages
The concept of tribes is notoriously complicated, and almost everyone who uses the term tends to mean something different. Many antropologists even favor not using the term at all, since it only causes confusion.
But since this is a fantasy world about tribal societies and people expect the term to show up, I will make my own difinition that should come pretty close to what most people associate with it and that I will consistently use everywhere here.
Race: The most basic separation of people is race (in the sense of species). Though it's very obvious and actually the cause for most major differences between people, it doesn't have a very strong meaning for the people of the Lands of the Barbarian Kings. What race a person is is usually not very important. Members of a friendly clan of a different race are much more wellcome and tolerated than members of a hostile clan of the same race. The exception are lizardfolk, who being non-mamalian, stand out significantly from all the other races.
Tribe: I use the term tribe pretty much the same way as ethnic group. Mythology withstanding, the most basic, and most practical way to define an ethnic group is by language. The people of a tribe all speak the same first language, but also have similar names and customs. Loyalty to the tribe is rather weak. There is some kind of kinship among the people of a tribe, but it has very few actual meaning in everyday life. The tribe may be the first place to look for allies and trade partners, but there are no tribal leaders or any form of formal alegiance to the tribe. Tribes usually range from 100,000 to 1,000,000 individuals.
Clans: Clans are one of the most important forms of organization in the Lands of the Barbarian Kings. Members of a clan all trace their lineage back to one shared ancestor who originally founded the clan. However in practice, association with the clan plays a much greater role than blood relationship. Most clans actually believe that they were founded by a mighty warrior in the distant past, who left his old clan with his family and his followers, which might already have been easily 100 people or more. In some cases, the founder is believed to have been a spirit or dragon, or other type of magical being, who adopted a group of humanoids. Marrying into a clan or being adopted into one is usually treated just the same as being born into it, and for legal cases is just the same. The leader of a clan is called a chieftain and the most powerful among them are the legendary Barbarian Kings. Clans usually range from a few thousand individuals to several tens of thousands.
Villages: The village is primary form of settlement in the Lands of the Barbarian Kings. The people living in a village are usually all from the same clan. Others are visitors or guests, but people who become permanent members of a village have to be adopted into the clan. The warriors of a village are lead by a sub-chief, but government of the village usually lies in the hand of the village elders. Villages usually consist of a few hundred people.
In addition to villages, there are also many towns. Towns are usually located around the keeps of clan chiefs and are more open to strangers than villages. Towns frequently allow foreigners to live among the clanspeople and run shops or workshops.
Families Generally, a family is understood as all people under the authority of a patriarch or matriarch, which includes slaves and servants. Usually all members of a family live in a single household (which might actually be a large farm with several buildings), but in some cases some members of the family live in a different place while still being part of the household (such as hunters or charcoal makers). In most tribes, the patriarch or matriarch is the sole legal representative of the family and all complaints against family members have to be made to the head of the family. Land, livestock, and buildings are always owned by the family. Personal belongings are usually limited to what a person can carry (like clothes, weapons, tools, or toys).
Families can be as small as 6 or 8 people, but sometimes even include several dozens of persons.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
The Crunch (Classes and Equipment)
An important part in creating a world is to decide what kinds of warriors and spellcasters inhabit the world, and what types of weapons and armor they use. Like so often, less is more
The following is based on the Pathfinder SRD.
Character Classes
Barbarian: The most obvious class. Like fighters, barbarians are among the elite warriors of most races. They are usually the strongest and toughest warriors of their clans. Barbarians usually spend more time outside the villages than other characters (except rangers) and often found their own groups that are somewhat seperate from the other warriors. Though they are usually not shamans, they often call to the spirits to lend them strength and courage and sometimes even seem to become possessed in battle.
Fighter: Most veteran warriors are fighters. Most of them are trained as fighters from a young age and as nothing else. While most warriors are also hunters or sentries, fighters are full time soldiers.
Fighters do not gain proficiency with heavy armor or tower shields at 1st level.
Oracle: I think oracles are the perfect class to represent shamans. With more spells and skill points, and a lower Fortitude save, they are more spellcasters than warriors. I also like the idea of having arcane and divine magic not being very different, and as a divine sorcerer, the oracle does just that. Oracles are the primary wise men and women of their villages. As shamans, it is their role to communicate between the villagers and the local spirits, and they also serve as healers and diviners. Apprentice oracles often set out with groups of warriors, when it's expected that their quest will lead them to encounter spirits, which is usually the case.
Oracles can have access to the Flame, Heavens, Nature, Stone, Waves, and Wind mysteries.
Ranger: Rangers are the first line of defense that every village has. Many of them spend more time outside the village than in it and are on the lookout for signs of dangerous beasts or intruders. When other sentries notice something suspicous, they usually inform the rangers, who will investigate and possibly organize a hunt in the case of threats to the village. It's not uncommon for other warriors to have spend some time with the rangers and learned some of their skills.
Since magic is the exclusive domain of oracles and sorcerers, all rangers have the Skirmisher archetype and no access to spells.
Rogue: Rogues are less frequent in the Lands of the Barbarian Kings than in other settings, but still relatively common. Most rogues are not actual warriors, or multiclass characters who expend their abilities with skill in stealth. Many rogues are trappers or spies, or a found among brigands preying on the few major roads.
Rogues are not proficient in the hand crossbow and rapier. Since magic is exclusive to oracles and sorcerers, rogues can not take the Minor Magic and Major Magic Rogue Talents.
Sorcerer: Not as common as oracles, sorcerers are the second spellcasting class in the Lands of the Barbarian kings. While oracles usually have strong connections with spirits and act as mediators between spirits and mortals, sorcerers are generally independent and their own masters. Some make their homes at the edges of villages, but others live alone in the wilderness just as often. Though sorcerers often deal with spirits, their interaction is completely restricted to simple deals. Each side gets what they want and then they part ways, there is no desire for any lasting bonds or just general goodwill.
Sorcerers generally have the Fey or Elements bloodline. Those who learn dark magic from demons switch to the Abyssal bloodline and lose their former bond to nature and the elements.
Commoner & Expert: The majority of people are commoners, with craftsmen and other specialists often being experts. They are usually considered noncombatants and only engange in fighting to defend themselves.
Warrior:Warriors make up the bulk of all people with combat training. They are the guards of the villages and the sentries who patrol the surrounding area for any possible threats. Warriors usually stay close to the village and are almost never send to deal with monsters or to travel to other villages, those tasks are the domain of barbarians, fighters, and rangers. In some clans, almost all adult men are warriors, but in other it's only as much as 30% of the adults, with men and women in almost equal numbers.
Warriors are not proficient with heavy armor and martial weapons. Most carry spears and wear light armor, with many learning to use bows with a feat.
(Druids:) I do like to keep druids out of the game, but they would certainly fit the setting very well. A shapeshifting prestige class for oracles would be quite neat, I guess.
Alignment
While I don't think alignment is inherently flawed and it does enhance some kinds of campaigns, I think it's not a good idea for all games. Since I want moral ambiguity a major aspect of the Lands of the Barbarian Kings, the setting won't use any alignment. Alignment works well in settings, in which there are forces of Good and Evil at work, but for this setting, I want there only to be spirits and demons, who don't care for mortal notions of right or wrong. Players are supposed to see NPCs not as allies and enemies, but more as people who are useful, or standing in the way. For now. Making deals with the devil and chosing lesser evils is expected of the PCs, as is turning against former allies when the situation changes.
In practice, this works as if all mortal creatures have Neutral alignment. Outsiders and fey have the (demon) and (spirit) subtypes, and spells like detect chaos or protection from evil become detect demons or protection from spirits, but otherwise work exactly the same way.
Equipment
The equipment of most warriors consists of spears and bows, as well as nonmetalic armor.
All simple weapons are available, except for crossbows. In exchange shortbows (but not composite shortbows) are treated as simple weapons.
Martial weapons are restricted to light and medium swords (straight and curved) and axes, halberd, glaive, greatclub, scyth, and bows.
Available exotic weapons are bolas, boomerang, falchata, net, and shuriken.
Armor is restricted to light and medium armor. Shields are limited to light wooden shield and heavy wooden shield.
Spells
I think to really fit the campaigns, some changes have to be made to the spell lists.
- Spells that detect, protect against, or are targeted at specific alignments instead target creatures with the (demon) and (spirit) subtypes. In all other regards, all other creatures are treated as having Neutral alignment.
- No spells or items that create extradminesional spaces.
- No spells that interact with the ethereal plane.
- No spells with the [force] descriptor.
- (Conjuration (healing) spells change to necromancy.)
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Interesting. Sad to see the E6 setting go but something is better than nothing at all.
A note on Rangers, there is an alternative to the Skirmisher Archetype that will take away spellcasting: Trapper. I think Rangers should have a choice between the two, honestly. Also remind people that they can pick up multiple Archetypes, as long as they don't change the same class features, as otherwise you may get people freaking out about being locked into an Archetype and not want to play Rangers.
As for equipment and weapons, you may want to have a look at Ultimate Combat for Primitive Arms and Armor, as it provides some handy rules for non-iron and steel weaponry, as well as new weapons that are appropriate for a Bronze Age or earlier setting, which seems likely in this setting. It also has some handy guidelines for what material works with available armors, so it's something to consider. There's also a couple feats that key off primitive arms and armor that aren't all "Let's screw the players over!" in execution.
Them's my 2 coppers. Take as you will.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
The idea is pretty much the same with my last setting attempt. But everything I had so far was already connected to other things, to the point that I couldn't get it all untangled again and keep the parts that I want and get rid of those where I drifted off.
You just can't create a civilization, remove half of it's traits, and continue from there. You always keep turning back to what you had alrady done. :smallbiggrin:
This is an attempt to start with a clean slate and this time re-using only those things I really want.
The Ultimate books didn't sound very good, and I would like to limit rules creep as much as possible. And there will already be quite a bit of homebrew crunch. But I might give the equipment section a closer look, those should easily be adaptable while ignoring the rest.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
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Originally Posted by
Yora
The Ultimate books didn't sound very good, and I would like to limit rules creep as much as possible. And there will already be quite a bit of homebrew crunch. But I might give the equipment section a closer look, those should easily be adaptable while ignoring the rest.
I haven't read Ultimate Magic, I just picked up Trapper from the SRD when I was looking at archetypes and whether Skirmisher still allowed the choice of other archetypes. As for taking from splat books what you want and ignore the rest, fine by me. Some bits are less well written than others.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Yora
The Ultimate books didn't sound very good, and I would like to limit rules creep as much as possible. And there will already be quite a bit of homebrew crunch. But I might give the equipment section a closer look, those should easily be adaptable while ignoring the rest.
Ultimate Combat gives melee nice things, if you're willing to give a feat to Improved Unarmed Strike. Chargers can now ignore difficult terrain, if in dragon style. You can now deflect melee attacks if you have a hand free, while in crane style. You can switch between any style feats you have as a swift action.
Plus, it's in the process of being put on the SRD.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Gods, spirits, and demons
This part is basically a rewrite of a similar section I did for the Ancient Lands setting. People who knew the old setting might not find anything really new here, but I hope this is a more condensed and coherent version of the subject.
The Planes
The Lands of the Barbarian Kings have a rather simple cosmology. There are only four planes, the Mortal Realm, the Spiritworld, the Realm of Shadows, and the Void, a single outer plane.
The Mortal Realm: The Mortal Realm is the material plane of the setting. It basically follows all the standard assumptions of such planes.
The Spiritworld: The Spiritworld is a mirror of the Mortal Realm and the place where the spirits of all things live. Almost everything that exists in the world of mortals also exists in the world of spirits, though it may not all look exactly the same. Humanoids and animals are an exception, as their spirits exist within their own bodies in the Mortal Realm. Buildings, roads, and manufactured objects also have no direct equivalent, and the wood, stone, or metal they are made of still are in their original state as trees or mountains in the spiritworld.
The Spiritworld is highly hostile to humanoids, as the forces of nature exist in much purer and more powerful forms. Storms are much more violent and during summer, the midday sun can burn skin and ignite paper when standing out in the open for too long. Unprepared mortals usually freeze to death in the nights or drown in the rushing rivers, if they are not eaten by wild beasts first.
The Shadowrealm: The Shadowrealm is pretty much a mystery to everyone. Like the Spiritworld, it mirrors the landscape of the Mortal Realm, but everything seems to be made out of shadows, and there are barely any creatures in the entire plane. Some spells allow to travel great distances in a short time by passing through the Shadowrealm, but otherwise there seems to be almost nothing of interest there. To nobodies suprise, there are countless stories of ghosts, spectres, and more horrible things wandering the shadows and preying on lost travelers.
The Void: Outside the closely interconected realms of mortals, spirits, and shadow lies an infinite expanse of nothingness. The Void is the astral plane, far realm, and outer plane of the Lands of the Barbarian Kings. Though pretty much empty of anything, the void if full of countless demiplanes, many the domains of demon lords, but a much larger number unclaimed islands of reality in a sea of nothingness. A few of these domains are rather hospitable to humanoids, but almost every imaginable form of environment can be found somewhere in the demiplanes of the Void.
Spirits
Spirits are found pretty much everywhere and their intelligence and power ranges from almost godlike beings to as small and insignificant as ants. As spirits have some control over the environment and can influence the growth of plants and the behavior of animals, they play a very major role in the daily life of the humanoid people. Almost anything you do could potentially anger a spirit and draw its wrath, but having the spirits watching out for you can bring enormous benefits and advantages. Dealing with the spirits is one of the primary roles of oracles. They are learned in the taboos and offerings, that keep the villages on the spirits good sides, and are responsible for ensuring the spirits protection and blessings of the fields and herds. Religion in the Lands of the Barbarian Kings most often revolves around maintaning a good relationship with the local spirits. While in many places the spirits are feared and given offerings to distract them from harming people, it's not uncommon that powerful spirts are revered as guardians and protectors and consulted for guidance and other blessings.
Most spirts lack any physical form and only inhabit the tree, hill, or meadow they belong to. Others have permanent physical forms and are not bound to any locations, and a few can even switch between physical and imaterial form as they desire. The most powerful of such spirits are called demigods. Demigods are similar to nymphs or treants, but much more powerful and often have the ability to command any spirit or animal within their domains, which can be dozens of miles across.
Dealing with spirits is always dangerous. Most spirits don't have much experience with mortals and a poor understanding what things could harm humanoids and what would benefit them. Since they are often easily offended, encounters with spirits are highly unpredictable. Even a well meaning spirit who enjoys the company of mortals may accidentally harm or kill a person, so almost everyone tries to keep any encounters with spirits as short as possible, and get away quickly without angering the spirit.
Spirits all have the (spirit) subtype, which gives them resistance 10 against cold, electricity, and fire, and DR 5/cold iron or higher.
Gods
Though most people primarily worship the spirits of the land, there are some deities known to the people of the Lands of the Barbarian Kings. The gods are basically spirits, but their power by far exceeds that of any demigod. They are the spirits of the Sun, the Moon, and the Oceans, and many also include the spirits of the Earth, the Sky, and the Night among them. These spirits are so vast that they are impossible to directly be reached, even by the most powerful oracles. The gods can't be bothered to care for the fate of a single village or even an entire tribe and they offer no direct boons to any mortals.
However, worship of the gods does exist. Such cults are often much more philosophical than those who serve spirits, and don't hope for the direct intervention of the gods. While the gods don't speak to mortals (or even though lesser spirits), they worshippers believe that one can still experience the divine power by concentrating on the places where it is the most focused, as the sun, the moon, or the earth. Through this, they gain the ability to see the world more clearly and gain an understanding of the meaning of things.
Demons
Demons resemble spirits, but are at home in the Void. In many ways, demons are even more dangerous and unpredictable, but they also pose the additional threat of corruption. Since the void exists outside the other three planes, demons have no place in them and their mere presence taints and currupts everything near them. Not all demons are outright hostile to humans or even wish them any harm, but regardles of their intention, their presence and mere influence poses a danger to all creatures of the other realms.
Like spirits, true demons are usually imaterial beings without bodies or shapes, but many of the demiplanes of the Void are inhabited by lesser demons, many of which have originally be created from mortal creatures altered by thousands of years of demonic corruption.
True demons and lesser demons all have the (demon) subtype.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Witch and druid would be great for this. Why don't you like tier 1s?
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Swiftmongoose
Witch and druid would be great for this. Why don't you like tier 1s?
Yora already mentioned Druid earlier. Overly magicky for their taste in this particular setting. It's his/her choice what s/he wants to include and I could see druid and witch being a bit more of a specialized magical tradition. They're something of an evolution, as opposed to something a bit more spontaneous and natural occurring like the Oracle and Sorcerer are.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Cieyrin
Yora already mentioned Druid earlier. Overly magicky for their taste in this particular setting. It's his/her choice what s/he wants to include and I could see druid and witch being a bit more of a specialized magical tradition. They're something of an evolution, as opposed to something a bit more spontaneous and natural occurring like the Oracle and Sorcerer are.
Yora never mentioned anything about "magicky". She (I'll just go with gender based on avatar) just said that she likes to keep them out of the game (read: not setting), even though their flavor would fit the setting.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
You can refer to me as male here, no problem with that. :smallbiggrin:
Some ambiguity is nice, but this is one of the points where it gets impractical.
My actual reason is, that sorcerer and oracle are both spontaneous casters. I don't like spell slots, but I think it's too much effort to make a full conversion of druids and wizards to augmentable spell point spells.
With sorcerers and oracles, you can use all spells straight from the books and add spells from other books without any additional work, while still having fixed sets of known spells and the ability to chose your spells as you need them.
Witches are of course just perfect for such settings, but they don't seem to be that much different from fey bloodline sorcerers and most hexes don't appear to do anything that can't also be done with spells.
About druids I am just uncertain. Keeping all spellcasting spontaneous is one thing, but not having the by far most powerful out of the box class in the game is also nice. Maybe a Beast Mystery for oracles, that emulates wild shape could work well. The nature priest role should be filled quite well by Nature mystery oracles.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Tribes of the Barbarian Lands
I think I have it now figured out who is actually gonna live in the Lands of the Barbarian Kings. As mentioned earlier, in this setting a tribe is an ethnic group that usually shares a common language and many customs and traditions. I think the basic geography I had in mind for the Ancient Lands setting works just fine as it is, so I just keep using it.
Lands of the Barbarian Kings - Blank
Lands of the Barbarian Kings - Labled
The area is fairly big, and traveling all the way from the northern mountains to the southern jungles would likely be a journey of months. The area between the Main Coast, Southern Coast, and Islands will be the primary focus of the setting where most people live. The rest is even more of a frontier region and would be considered wilderness in most other settings.
As you can see, I have not yet come up with any names for the tribes.
Wood Elf Tribes
Northern Forest Elves: The elves living in the northern and eastern parts of the main forest near the coast are the largest elven tribe, and in fact one of the largest tribes in all of the Barbarian Lands. They could be called "Standard Wood Elves".
Island Elves: The elves of the islands are closely related to the eastern forest elves and only somewhat smaller in numbers. Because of their homeland, the Island Elves are known as great sailors and frequently visit the southern coasts of the mainland, but they are not very fond of mainlanders coming to their islands. The elves of the islands have one of the oldest histories and often make their homes around ancient monumental temples that predate their own civilization. Their society is very much dominated by priests and many of the clan chiefs are high level oracles of Nature or Waves.
Blond Elves:Living to the south of the Northern Forest Elves, the blond elves are easily recognizable by their unusual haircolors like blond and red, combined with a deep tanned skin darker than most wood elves. The blond elves have quite good realtionships with the humans that live in the same area, and there are also some blond elves who have made their homes on some of the islands closer to the mainland.
Western Forest Elves: The elves living in the Deep Forest region are not very closely related to the elves of the eastern forest and are a distinctively seperate people. They are relatively small in number and spread over a rather large area and elves of other tribes consider them more savage then the people inhabiting the coast and islands. The elves of the western forest have a reputation to be good with many kinds of darker magic, and there are always stories of them kidnapping lone travelers who make the mistake of traveling that deep into the wilderness for blood sacrifices.
Human Tribes
Blackhair Tribe: Though by far the largest human tribes in the Barbarian Lands, these black haired barbarians are rather new arrivals in the region. Originally from the wide open plains far to the west, in the heart of the continent, these clans have settled along the coastal lands of the Main Coast and Southern Coast regions. They are easily recognizable by their raven black hair and rather broad build, compared to other humans or elves. Though newcommers, the Blackhairs are not at all shy to demand a place among the powers of the region and have in fact become the probably most influential human group in all of the Barbarian Lands.
Islands Barbarians: One of the native human tribes in the Barbarian Lands, these clans have been living on the southern islands for thousands of years. Though having more than half the number of people of the blackhairs, they have never played any major roles in the politics of the other tribes. They are among the more savage people of the Barbarian Lands and mostly live in villages lead by a chief and a shaman, with few individuals who controll larger groups of warriors and no real kings. They usually don't get in trouble with the wood elves living on the northern islands, but constantly clash with neighboring tribes of lizardfolk and dark elves.
Ice Hunters: From what is known, the Ice Coast has always been home to a small population of humans that fight both the harsh weather and the giants and ogres from the mountains. They don't seem to be related to any of the other human people of the Barbarian Lands and look clearly different with their light brown hair and blue and grey eyes. Very few people ever have any wish to travel to the Ice Coast, but those who find themselves in that harsh lands all have to rely on the Ice Hunters to surive there.
Kaas Tribes
The kaas are one of the truly original races of the Lands of the Barbarian Kings. At least as original as you can get when it is most easily described as a blend of Shifters and Goliaths. Kaas are strong humanoids usually standing over 2 meters tall with short brown fur and long dark manes. Their faces have some passing resemblance to bears or big cats, but they are not directly related to either. As natives to the Northern Mountains region, kaas are well known as excelent climbers and very strong warriors.
Inner Plains Tribe: The largest tribe of the kaas makes its home on the plains between the Northern Mountains and the large main forest of the Barbarian Lands, but their clans are also found in the surrounding hills and forests.
Mountain Tribe: The mountain tribe are true mountain people. The are the largest and toughest among the kaas and the only real contenders for their mountain homes are giants and ogres. Though quite numberous, they are spread all over the mountain ranges and make their homes in inaccesible valeys and gorges, which makes them rather isolated from the other kaas tribes.
Outer Plains Tribe: These clans are much fewer in number than the other tribes, and live out in the wide open plains that are usually not considered part of the Lands of the Barbarian Kings. They are true nomads with no permanent settlements and only a few ancient temples which the clans regularly visit on their travels.
Forest Tribe: In many ways hardly even considered a tribe, some clans make their homes in the northern parts of the Deep Forest region Though few in number, the location of their villages actually makes them some of the kaas clans that have to most contact with people from the central and southern lands.
Gnome and Dark Elf clans follow later.
Please share your impressions.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
I succesfully set up a Barbaripedia, since I have done that before and had the unused webspace lying around.
Not much to see there yet, but when I have something set fixed, it will be included there. Things I want your oppinions on will be posted here and transfered when finalized.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Good initial details on the local tribes, though I'd like to see mechanics on the Kaas and Lizardmen. Are they standard PF Lizardmen or will Poisondusk, Blackscale and other variants be making appearances?
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Lizardfolk will be standard lizardfolk, but I have to take a closer look how I want to handle LA with them, since it's pathfinder.
Stats for Kaas and Gnomes will be up later tonight (it's night here).
Poison dusk and blackscale are really just normal lizardfolk with small or large size, and would be easy to do, but I'm unsure if I want such tiny ones and ogre-sized lizardfolk.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
To replace the druid, you could use a Shape-shifting Ranger class with access to ranger spells and perhaps Druid BAB (3/4), proficiencies, and restrictions on metal. You could houserule out any spells you didn't want, and have something similar to a druid without powerful spells or overpowered class abilities.
Also keep in mind if there is any one thing (feat, class feature, spell), you can suggest for a DM to not allow it in this setting.
I am eagerly anticipating the gnomes. I love gnomes!
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
My gnomes are hardcore! :smallbiggrin:
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Might I suggest something? It seems to me that the Summoner could work quite well in a low magic setting. You can re-fluff them as almost anything, and their Summons makes quite a lot of sense as a Spirit. Just an idea.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Summoner is a Cha-caster?!
Oh yeah, this is definately getting used. :smallbiggrin:
Love the concept since that little girl in Jade Empire. I once considered implementing binders, but coming up with a big batch of fey vestiges seemed like a lot of work.
Thanks a lot for mentioning it.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Yora
Summoner is a Cha-caster?!
Oh yeah, this is definately getting used. :smallbiggrin:
Love the concept since that little girl in Jade Empire. I once considered implementing binders, but coming up with a big batch of fey vestiges seemed like a lot of work.
Thanks a lot for mentioning it.
No problem. I just enjoy watching a cool project coming together, and I'm glad my simple suggestion was of use.
Now write some more so I can use this to run a campaign. :smalltongue:
EDIT: Oh yes, another suggestion. Seeing as how you are making a clear divide between martial and spellcasting classes, you may wish to give them different Experience Progressions, such as making martial characters medium and spellcasters slow, in order to make up for the imbalance in power.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Yora
Summoner is a Cha-caster?!
Oh yeah, this is definately getting used. :smallbiggrin:
Love the concept since that little girl in Jade Empire. I once considered implementing binders, but coming up with a big batch of fey vestiges seemed like a lot of work.
Thanks a lot for mentioning it.
There's only one fey vestige I can think of off-hand, Desharis, whose associated with civilization, anyways, so Summoner is probably the better bet, anyways. Fun class, too, if you include Archetypes like Synthesist and Master Summoner. The rest aren't that good, though (Broodmaster, I'm looking at you in disappointment :smallfrown:).
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
I think most archetypes are actually very disappointing. Skirmisher is pretty cool, since I wanted rangers to lose spells anyway.
Master Summoner sounds like spamming the battlefield with creatures, which I imagine could slow down the game significantly, but Synthesist sounds fun.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Yora
My gnomes are hardcore! :smallbiggrin:
-snip-
Isn't that picture in the 4e MM2? 4e has good artwork. The half-orcs look good, and in the 4e Dark Sun Creature Compendium (or whatever it's called) there's the braxats, which have way better artwork in that and 4e Dark Sun Campaign Setting than in the 3.5 MM2. Although the picture you use for the kaas is also 4e, and that and the artwork for the human race entry isn't so good IMO.
And can I make the kaas? I'm thinking they actually have some shifter traits, minus shifting and plus powerful build, although not straight shifter plus that, just similar. I sorta want to make the gnomes too.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Unfortunately, no.
I've been developing them for quite some time already, and they are one of the things that I like best so far.
Kaas - racial features
The Kaas are a race of tall humanoids who have lived in the northern regions of the Barbarian Lands since ancient times. Standing about 7 feet tall and at almost twice the weight of average humans, they are the largest and most powerful of the humanoid races, rivaled only by a few lizardfolk clans in the jungles far to the south.
In addition to their size, kaas stand out from other races by their more animal-like features, as short brown fur that coveres their entire bodies, and faces that have some resemblance to bears or lions, and almost all kaas sport thick dark manes. They don't have any claws and though loking ferocious, their long teeth don't make for effective weapons. Instead they favor punches and kicks when fighting unarmed, which often hit with bone crushing force.
Though kaas mature early compared to most other humanoid races, they can live to become quite older to humans and often reach 80 years or more before old age finally claims them. Given the strength of their limbs and hands and the mountainous regions of their homelands, kaas are excelent climbers. They rarely slip or lose their hold and can cling to small cracks in the rock with a single hand until they find somewhere to place their feet and continue climbing.
- +2 Strength, +2 Constitution, -2 Intelligence.
- Medium: Kaas are Medium creatures and have no bonuses or penalties due to their size.
- Normal Speed: Kaas have a base speed of 30 feet.
- Low-Light Vision: Kaas can see twice as far as humans in conditions of dim light.
- Fearless: Kaas receive a +2 racial bonus on all saving throws against fear.
- Intimidating: Kaas receive a +2 racial bonus on Intimidate skill checks due to their fearsome nature.
- Sure-Footed: Kaas receive a +2 racial bonus on Acrobatics and Climb skill checks.
More details about their culture and society follow later, but will likely be something central asian themed (without horses).
There's actually a lot of inspirations for them, which all seem different interpretations of the same basic theme. Goliaths and Shifters are two, but there are also the Orcs from Warcraft and the webcomic Dominic Deegan, Ferai from the PS2 game Primal, and Cathar from the Knights of the Old Republic setting.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
I would see better move the COS bonus to DEX, since they are excellent climbers and got a bonus to acrobatics.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Climb is Streangth based. And giving them a Dex boost would mean a second bonus to Acrobatic checks. However, while good at jumping and balancing, I don't see them as quick and agile. The bonus to Acrobatics gives them a bonus at the things they are actually good at, but a Dex-bonus would improve that even more and also add bonuses to many things they are not supposed to be good at.
I think it's just fine that way, except that Str and Con with an Int penalty are really really nice to have for melee warriors.
Having made myself more familiar with the Summoner class, I am now uncertain if the would really fit that well. Apparently the class plays like having a magical warrior creature at your side all the time and letting it do all the fighting for you, making it effectively an additional party member. And having a spirit or demon live side by side with humanoid people would be a bit problematic, since PCs are supposed to be vey well integrated into their clans. I think summoners might contradict one important aspect I had planned for the setting.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
I didn't think about it, and I was imagining them more agile than strong. :)
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
More goliath than shifter in this regard. :smallbiggrin:
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Yora
I think it's just fine that way, except that Str and Con with an Int penalty are really really nice to have for melee warriors.
And that's the only thing they really got going for them, besides Low-Light Vision. I mean, compare them to the PF Half-Giant, who get Powerful Build and a Psi-like ability, as well as a bonus feat. The Kaas feel...kinda on the weak side. Let's have a look at the Half-Orc, who is the Warrior Race Guy of the PF races. Choose a stat boost, darkvision, orc ferocity, intimidate bonus, free weapon proficiencies. Closer but I think the Kaas are still a bit lacking. They need something unique to them to make 'em stand out. When you said a mix of Goliath and Shifter, I expected Powerful Build or Shifting to come over and they got neither. If you want 'em to be more in tune stat wise, you could shift Con to Wis and they'd be more shifter that way in their naturally being in-tune with the world. Especially since, other than potentially humans, there isn't a +Wis race in the campaign, so having a choice is always a good idea.
Quote:
Having made myself more familiar with the Summoner class, I am now uncertain if the would really fit that well. Apparently the class plays like having a magical warrior creature at your side all the time and letting it do all the fighting for you, making it effectively an additional party member. And having a spirit or demon live side by side with humanoid people would be a bit problematic, since PCs are supposed to be vey well integrated into their clans. I think summoners might contradict one important aspect I had planned for the setting.
The Eidolon is about as extensive as animal companions are, though more flexible in their strength. Without it, a Summoner is like an underpowered Bard. As for fitting in, my personal view is to have the Eidolon and his summons be calling ancestors back to the present for a short time to aid their descendants, with his Eidolon being the strongest spirit in his repertoire and personal guardian. Where the Oracles commune with the spirits, Summoners call them forth and bind them to do tasks for them. Perhaps they aren't part of every tribe and a profession that is viewed in conflict to the core beliefs.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Cieyrin
I expected Powerful Build or Shifting to come over and they got neither.
Wait.
*reads stats fully*
You left out Powerful Build!?
Anyway, can I still make the gnomes?
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
I think there is some merrit to the concept, but it would be such a special power, that I think it should be restricted to only a tiny handful of NPCs. And in that case the spirit would be the one hogging the spotlight, which makes having a specialized character class rather unneccessary.
A spirit doesn't need a mortal to guide it, and humanoids shouldn't be able to hold a spirit on a leash. Oracles don't command the spirits, they merely make humble suggestions and ask for favors.
I think this might become more clear when I flesh out oracles and spirits more.
Since I'm doing an inside out approach, you have to get to specific places and people pretty early once the frame is set, and for that you need names.
So what I'm doing now is the most nerdiest thing that people ever did, and come up with fictional language. :smallbiggrin:
However, since I only need names, all I really need are phonologies. For that, my first step is to come up with the alphabet for each race. Using roman letters for ease of use, but when c and y only appear in elven names, I think this should have a pretty nice effect of creating consistency and complex cultures. As the basis, I use the sounds of Japanese, as they all also appear in my native German and include really no sounds that would be unusual to almost any language (except that dreadful R). Native english speakers would probably still pronounce everything different from what I intended, but the rest of the world should be able to read it.
For personal names, I'm going to start with a big load of finnish and japanese names, that don't sound particularly finnish or japanese.
Any suggestions regarding this subject?
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Yora
I think there is some merrit to the concept, but it would be such a special power, that I think it should be restricted to only a tiny handful of NPCs. And in that case the spirit would be the one hogging the spotlight, which makes having a specialized character class rather unneccessary.
I still say the get Powerful Build.
So can I make the gnomes?
And I just thought of something!
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Swiftmongoose
I still say the get Powerful Build.
Yora was talking about Summoners, not the Kaas, at least as far as I can tell...
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Indeed. I see what you meant about the kaas, but I'm also the kind of person who thinks 3.5e half-elves are okay. :smallbiggrin:
I think races as they are in PF are bloated enough. There's such a huge amount of minor bonuses and extras, that in my oppinion don't make much of a difference.
Since I'm a bit of a control fream with minor OCD, I am hesitant to hand away the fleshing out of an intire race which I already have plans for.
But you certainly can write one of the gnomish tribes. With lots of open space and isolated people, adding new tribes shouldn't be a problem at all. Let me just wrap up the racial traits I've so far for them, and you're free to go to start with your idea of barbarian gnomes.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
With dwarves who are all the same on one side, and 3 feet tall comic relief characters on the other, I want to approach the small people somewhat differently. As D&D gnomes are about halfway between dwarves and halflings, and even have some elven touches, gnomes are the starting point for this race and where it gets the name from.
Gnomes
Gnomes are short humanoids roughly resembling humans in stature, but standing only about 3 1/2 feet tall. They have round faces with large noses and skin of an earthen tan, which maes them clearly distinguishable from human children. Almost all gnomes have dark brown hair with males growing short beards. Eyes are usually green or brown, with some occasional cases of dark grey.
Despite their small stature, gnomes are among the longest living races of the Barbarian Lands and can live for well over 200 years.
Most gnome villages are located in forests, and often found in landscapes dominated by rugged hills. Villages can often be hard to spot, as most of their buildings are burried. Stables, barns, and many workshops are usually located at the surface with easy access to the fields and herds (mostly sheep and goats), while most living quarters and storerroms are located in the extensive basements. Most villages have underground tunnels that connect the various homes without any need to go outside during night or winter at all. Often there are also large community halls underground, so that in winter only hunters and herders are the only people who ever set a foot outside during winter.
Well aware that all other races are physically much more powerful than them, gnomes usually avoid direct confrontation. When in a tight situation, they will often feign to let themselves be bullied into service by others, with no intention to complying with any such commands once they are out of sight. Quite often gnome villages will just hand over anything that raiders demand and then follow them quitly to attack them when they are asleep and take back their things. Given that people rarely consider gnomes as dangerous, they can get away with it suprisingly often. Most gnomes will not show any false bravado, but rather retreat and then strike back when they have the advantage.
In combat, gnomes fight dirty. Not in a charming or an adorable way, but in a seriously deadly one. They won't survive any fair fight, but they are not going to let others push them around. They will pull every dirty trick that would be to their advantage.
- +2 Constitution, +2 Wisdom, -2 Strength
- Small: Gnomes are Small creatures and gain a +1 size bonus to their AC, a +1 size bonus on attack rolls, a –1 penalty to their Combat Maneuver Bonus (CMB) and Combat Maneuver Defense (CMD), and a +4 size bonus on Stealth checks.
- Slow Speed: Gnomes have a base speed of 20 feet.
- Low-Light Vision: Gnomes can see twice as far as humans in conditions of dim light.
- Defensive Training: Gnomes get a +4 dodge bonus to AC against monsters of the giant subtype.
- Hardy: Gnomes receive a +2 racial bonus on saving throws against poison, spells, and spell-like abilities.
- Keen Senses: Gnomes receive a +2 racial bonus on Perception skill checks.
- Obsessive: Gnomes receive a +2 racial bonus on a Craft or Profession skill of their choice.
*Gnomes lose their magical traits, but gain dwarven resistances instead. Since there are no exotic gnomish weapons in the setting, Weapon Familiarity does not apply.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
The way it stands currently, you're completely missing any Int or Wis based class options in this setting. This just seems jarring, as every other base stat has a class that they could be considered a primary stat for.
With the way it's built right now, Int is only useful for skill points, limited bonuses, and Combat Expertise, so aside from fighters getting 13 int for CE and skill monkeys getting a +1 or +2 bonus for extra skill points, there's nothing that can use it. In the (rare, since this setting seems to be low magic) case that an Int based magic item drops, the knowledge monkey is the only one that could make any use of it at all, and that use is very, very small.
Wisdom is in a little better position as it provides a bonus to will saves, making a Wis bonus of use to classes with low will saves.
This is especially worrying to Elves and Dwarves if you hope to include them in your setting, as the mental score classes they're most suited for from a game play standpoint are completely unavailable.
The Wis direction can be taken care of by rebuilding Oracles with Wis in mind instead of Cha since they're supposed to be the "wise men" of their respective villages or by working druids into the setting since you're on the fence about them.
Int is a bit trickier. I understand why you don't want to add Wizards, but why not Alchemists or Witches? Alchemists could be fluffed as witch doctors, taking natural chemicals from the world and working them into magic-like effects, whereas witches gain power from a patron, such as a spirit or a demon. (Clarity edit: The similarities in niche are there between them and sorcerers, but the flavor is quite a bit different in play.)
Edit: I actually looked back through and saw Kaas, and noticed that they break one of the suggestions put forth that races have one physical ability bonus and one mental ability bonus. This could make them the best tanks and mediocre at best with pretty much everything else.
('nother Edit: As an aside, Bride of Lucifer is my wallpaper and has been for several months. kudos on the awesome avatar.)
((and yes, I love edits. I hate double posting. >.>))
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
While true, these issues actually don't bother me much.
With this setting I have an idea for a world first and the RPG system with which it is played is only of secondary concern. I picked pathfinder because I'm familiar with d20 and pathfinder is both free and popular.
That elves have a racial bonus to Intelligence, and there is no class that gets a huge boost from high intelligence is not a problem in my eyes. My idea is not to provide a background where people can let their character builds roam free, but to develop a multi-faceted fantasy world.
I can see how people like to play the game by coming up with interesting character builds and squuezing any tiny bonus out that can help them in combat, but that's just not how we play the campaigns that I run. This setting is going to be relatively independent of any RPG-system, I just look at what kinds of characters and magic I want to have in the world and then search for options in the pathfinder game to represent these things.
I played half-elf barbarian/sorcerers in 3.0. If the mechanics of the game favor certain builds simply doesn't interest me when comming up with character concepts.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
I was just pointing out discrepancies. Good luck with it all. :)
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Yora
Since I'm doing an inside out approach, you have to get to specific places and people pretty early once the frame is set, and for that you need names.
So what I'm doing now is the most nerdiest thing that people ever did, and come up with fictional language. :smallbiggrin:
[...]
Any suggestions regarding this subject?
About Kaas' language, if you imagine them as snarling and growling when they speak, you can use it for their names. An extensive use of "R", "WL" and similar sounds could be a good approach.
For other races/tribes, you can choose some unique flavour for each of them (like coastal tribes using words that sound similar to the sound of the sea).
A note about places' names: if you don't want to create an entire new language (or bits of it) like Tolkien did for the Lord of the Rings, you can use an approach simlar to George Martin's Song of fire and ice, naming places in "common language" (King's Landing, the Wall, etc) :smallsmile:
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
I once did a list of common words that appear in place names. When you take a closer look, people all over the world and througout all of history have not been very creative with naming places. A couple of words for geographical features, and a few adjectives, and you're ready to come up with Greefields, Whitefords, and Fairviews in any language you have. :smallbiggrin:
Though I don't think I still have that file.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Barbarian Kings - Bestiary
I post this here because it's something I think I have pretty much finalized by now:
I have noticed that many of my favorite fantasy games actually have only a quite small number of monsters in them, way short of two or more Monster Manuals or bestiaries. And thinking of my native europe, there have never really been that many large predators. Wolves, bears, and boars, wolverines in some parts, and if you really have to possibly badgers. But that's it, everything else is about the size of a mans arm. So I decided to go for a more limited monster list for the Barbrian Kings setting, and to my suprise, it's actually pretty limited.
Humanoids
Even when going just with the pure necessities, this is still quite a long list.
Spoiler
Show
- Elves
- Gnomes
- Humans
- Kaas
- "Kobolds" (I don't have yet a name for these Fox-monkey-goblins)
- Lizardfolk
- Giants
- Ogre
- Harpy (think "savage raptorans")
- Merfolk
- Lagura (your common primitive "fish-people")
- Sahuagin
Beasts
This category primarily consists of the fictional wildlife.
Spoiler
Show
- Ankheg
- Basilisk
- Dragonhawk (giant lizard-bird)
- Frost Worm
- Griffon
- Hippogriff
- Owlbear
- Purple Worm
- Remorhaz
- Sea Serpent
- Worg
- Wyvern
- The ultimate giant beetle hive (Resistance is futile!)
- Assassin Vine
- Yellow Musk Creeper
- Shambling Mound
There will also be plenty of ordinary animals native to Eurasia, and giant vermin and giant reptiles.
Spirits
This category is all creatures from the spiritworld. They all have the (spirit) subtype and DR/cold iron and cold, electricity, and fire resistance 10.
Spoiler
Show
- Awakened Celestial Dire Animals
- Dragons (black, bronze, copper, green, red, silver, white, up to "ancient" category)
- Drider (CR +2 template)
- Elementals (including ice, lava, mud, and smoke)
- Forest Giant (large forest humanoids)
- Genies (Djinn, Efreet, Marid, Shaitan)
- Kitsune ("were-fox sorcerers")
- Lamia
- Minotaur
- Naga (snake people)
- Nymph (cast spells as oracles and are for all natural features, not just lakes)
- Oni
- Planetouched (aasimar and elementals)
- Rakshasa
- Shee (Human-like immortals)
- Treant
- Winter Wolf
- Wisp (tiny incorporeal flying light)
- Wood Troll (plant hobgoblins)
Demons
This category is all creatures from the Void.
Spoiler
Show
True Demons are completely incorporeal and immortal. Ranked from highest to lowest:
- Pride Demon (superiority, hybris)
- Dominance Demon (control, enslavement)
- Sloth Demon (curruption, apathy)
- Desire Demon (excitement, amuesement)
- Vanity Demon (entitelment, luxury)
- Hunger Demon (greed, envy)
- Rage Demon (destruction, wrath)
Lesser demons are creations of true demons or originally mortal creatures altered by the Void. (CR 1 - 12)
- Babau
- Barghest
- Dretch
- Erinyes
- Hamatula
- Hellcat
- Hell Hound
- Hezrou
- Howler
- Imp
- Petitioner (The fate of demon cultists)
- Succubus
- Tiefling
Undead
All the types of undead.
Spoiler
Show
- Abomination (corpse possesed by true demon, similar to lich)
- Ghost
- Ghoul (humanoid who died from Taint)
- Lich (given the levels of NPCs, very rare!)
- Shadow
- Skeleton
- Wight (corpse possessed by weak demon)
- Wraith
- Zombie
While I took plenty from other peoples ideas, it wasn't af if those hadn't done the same. :smallamused:
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Yora
About druids I am just uncertain. Keeping all spellcasting spontaneous is one thing, but not having the by far most powerful out of the box class in the game is also nice. Maybe a Beast Mystery for oracles, that emulates wild shape could work well. The nature priest role should be filled quite well by Nature mystery oracles.
Maybe algamate the more supernatural type rangers(Beast Master, Spirit Ranger, Shapeshifter) and animal shamans into a new druid class with bard style progression?
Edit;
Actually looking closer at it, adopting the animal shaman stuff into the oracles curses as a type of bestial bond with an animal spirit could be an easy way around this... could also use the spirit bond from the Spirit ranger for one of the mysteries...
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
If you don't want Summoner's to be capable of summoning a special spirit from level 1, you could pretty easily turn them into a prestige class for Sorcerors. Off the top of my head, Eidolon's begin with 4 or 5 hit dice, and they progress at a 1 hit die, 2 hit die, per level scheme, and the Summoner progresses casting. Toss in a few of the class features like life link, and its good.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
My reason is, for both druids and summoners, that I don't really see that the setting actually needs those classes. There are currently no roles in my concpet, that would be filled much better by these clases than by oracles and sorcerers. At this point, including these classes would be including them for their own sake. Something I really want to avoid, because when you start with it, there's a huge amount of other things, that could be made to fit. And my experience is that just adding everything you think would be cool to a setting, is one of the primary reasons that make you lose focus on those aspects you really want to concentrate on.
My personal approach, as opposed to lots of D&D settings and I believe Golarion as well, is a minimalistic one. Put only into the setting what you really need and do that well. Trying to create all inclusive settings has never worked out well for me.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
You could add Dryads to the Spirits, I think they fit well in the setting.
Are you thinking to add foreign presence in you setting?
Something like an outpost from another continent, colonists, a trading post, pirate, or a village of a shipwreck survivors?
The islands on the east could be a good spot to add this.
This could also help you justify the introduction of "uncommon" features: classes, materials, items...
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Quote:
Originally Posted by
B!shop
This could also help you justify the introduction of "uncommon" features: classes, materials, items...
No, that's the point. I don't want to have anything in the setting for that I would have to find a justification. If I add any mechanics to the setting, it's because the world as envisioned requires such a mechanic.
For example, you have a cavemen campaign, and you could hypothetically add gunpowder weapons. You could come up with some logical explaination why there are guns in the stone age, but would you want to do that? Usually not.
I could also find reasons why to have clockwork golems, or airships, or teleportation networks. But I don't want them, they are just not neccessary for what I have in mind and would only distract from the things I want the setting to be about.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
I can understand what you are saying Yora, but I think a little context would help. Are you creating this world for your own use, or do you plan to have other DM's running campaigns in this world. FOr personal use, players should have to justify anything out of the ordinary, and you should have final say. If other people will use it, DM's will want more customization options so that every party isn't just Sorcerer, Oracle, Ranger, Barbarian. Even if they have customization options, classes as they are in PF still tend to rely on similar class features and mechanics unless you seriously support archetypes. Plus, many high-powered gamers will be disappointed by their options (just to put that out there).
Putting this on the forums as you have seems to indicate that you want other people running your setting, so I believe most of the posters (including myself) have been running under that assumption.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
I think Yora is on the right track here. It's much easier as a DM to allow other things players want to use rather than having to tell a player that they cannot use something that they expected to be included in the setting. Also: I believe it was mentioned up front that the setting was supposed to fall largely in the tier 4 area, another thing I think is smart, because it's often easier to up the power of NPC's than it is to lower their power while keeping all the flavour in tact (at least in my experience).
Edit: Hideous post from phone; I'll try to remember to clean it up later.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
I want to some day compile all the details about the setting into one big document to turn it into a campaign setting book that is free for everyone who wants to use it. And from many replies I've got so far, there are quite some people who would love to see what I make of it.
But primarily, this should be the setting to run my own campaigns here. If others want to run a game in a world like mine, they are certainly wellcome. But this is not supposed to be something that appeals to an audience as large as possible.
I see the point that many people will favor settings that are open to all the option the rules system offers. But personally, I believe this is a mistake. the result of this is, that every system becomes very generic. It's different places and different people, but at the core, the vast majority of d20 settings seem to be just another d20 setting. Which doesn't have to be bad. I like Star Wars and absolutely love the "Knights of the Old Republic Setting", which the same universe, but with very different people and places. But I also absolutely hate the "New Jedi Order" setting, which is also the same universe with it's own characters and places.
But in my oppinion, this is usually too short sighted. Do I want to make another Pathifinder setting, or do I want a completely new and unique fantasy universe that can be the setting for an rpg campaign? I chose the later one and now just need a rules system to run that campaign with. Let's assume Pathfinder as a default, because I know the rules and it's popular. But every other system that can represent warriors, shamans, and witches would work as well.
You can run a Lord of the Rings campaign playing with the 3.5e rules. You can run a Ghost in the Shell campaign playing with the Star Wars Saga rules. You can play a Mass Effect campaign playing with GURPS. But none of these fictional universes were made to include all the classes and special abilities that these rules systems offer. This is what I am doing here. And it's been done before. For example the Midnight setting is a setting for 3.5e, but it also has no problem in proclaiming, "there are no spellcasting classes except channeler, and rangers get replaced bil Wilders". And it's a really really great setting, not despite, but because it does some things drastically different, by completely changing how magic works. If some day someone releases a new RPG that would work much better for this world, I would probably switch.
If at some point some groups decide they want to play in this setting, but also want to include druids, they can be included just like that, nothing is stopping them. But the setting as I write it is the default state.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Note: I've compiled a lit of about 300 finnish, baltic, hungarian, japanese, and maori names and grouped them according to races. I think this should get me a rather nice consistency in NPC names without using names that are easily recognized by most people. It's amazing how to regions from opposite sides of the earth have so very similar names. ^^
Basic Magic and Blood Magic
To understand what magic can do and what it can't, it is helpful to understand what magic is supposed to be and how it is supposed to work. Limiting spellcasters to Charisma-based spontaneous casters makes it a lot easier to come up with a consistent system.
The basis for magic in the Lands of the Barbarian Kings is quite similar to asian concepts of chi, but also draws from elements of european and african magic. A very good compariosn would also be the Force from Star Wars.
The basic assumption of magic is, that all physical and chemical processes are based on energy. Or in this case, life energy. Animals have a very strong concentration of energy, which allows them to move, and rocks have very low concentrations, so they seem to do nothing. But life energy is present in everything in nature. Fire is a release of energy, as is punching someone in the face. Normally, creatures can effect life energy only indirectly. An example would be to use the hands to move stones, the stones create sparks, the sparks ignite leaves, and so on. Affecting the energy directly without physically handling object is magic.
The first step in learning magic is to feel the energy within and outside oneself. Most warriors or athletes have learned this ability to a limited degree to put all their inner reserves of energy into a jump or a punch. But they are still limited to the energy that is part of their own body. Through meditation, oracles and sorcerers learn expend their sixth sense to a much greater scale. Spellcaster also learn to manipulate the energies within things, which can have dramatic effects of the things themselves: Turning air into fire, shaping solid rock, clouding the minds of people, or make plants grow at highly accelerated spead. But to manipulate the energy in an object, a spellcaster has to give it a "push" in the form of a wave or blast of his own personal life energy. Because of this, spellcasters can only cast a certain number of spells per day, once that ammount is passed, they just can't expell more energies from their own forms. However, all spellcasters learn do draw miniscule amounts of energy from their environment while they sleep, not only bringing their personal energy level back to their normal state, but also storing huge amounts of excess energy, which is their primary fuel for their spells. The amounts of life energy required for a spell is rather low though, so even several dozens of exhausted sorcerers resting at the same place wouldn't put a noticeable strain on the nearby plants and wildlife, just as their breathing doesn't deprive the environment of air.
A healing spell is a strong infusion of almost pure life energy into a body, with just a minor alteration that turns the raw energy into highly accelerated healing. There is no Positive Energy plane or something like that.
Corruption, negative energy, and Taint
In this setting, Taint and negative energy are very closely intertwined. Basically, negative energy is the same thing as positive energy, but has been corrupted and twisted. A primary source of this corruption is demonic taint. All demons, regardless of their intentions, have a corrupting influence on the natural world. Wherever demons or demonic artifacts are, they immediately start to corrupt everything near them, which is called the Taint. In high concentrations, taint causes everything to die or mutate. When the taint is very high, even the bodies of the dead continue to suck up negative energy and become zombies and skeletons. Even more unfortunate ones don't exactly die and immediately turn into ghouls. Highly tainted souls can not merge with the pure life force of the environment, and unable to die become wraiths. The tainting influence of demons is rather low though, and it takes moths or years of immediate demonic presence to taint a place to the point where it creates undead.
In this system, positive and negative energy are not opposing forces or one the opposite of the other. For gameplay purposes, they continue to work exactly as usually.
Blood Magic
In what is generally understood as traditional magic, spellcasters gather a pool of excess energy which they use to power their spells. However, this is not the original way that mortal spellcasters first discovered magic. As natural energy is what makes animals and humanoids alive, they possess one of the greatest concentrations of energy in everything that exist. And nowhere in the body is the life force so highly concentrated and pure as in the blood. The loss of blood can drain the strongest warriors and beasts of their energy within seconds and will kill them within a few minutes. The energy in the blood is what eneables the warrior and the athlete to push themselves beyond their ordinary limits. From pushing even way farther beyond, the first humanoids discovered the basic principles of magic before spellcasters learned to gather and storne excess energy to fuel their spells.
Since then, blood magic has become very uncommon and pretty much forgotten in many places. Using the energy of ones own blood or the blood of others is not particularly evil and contrary to popular oppinion in no way linked to taint. However, it is extremely painful and draining for all participants, and in many cases highly gruesome and bloody. Only in a small number of relatively isolated villages is blood magic openly accepted and in many places it's even outlawed under severe penalties. Today, almost all blood mages can cast spells in the traditional way and even do so most of the time. However, many find the ability to draw on additional sources of spell energy highly useful.
I have not yet decided how to integrate blood magic into the rules, but currently I am thinking of a feat that allows spontaneous application of metamagic feats at the expense of Constitution damage instead of higher spell slots and increased casting time. And there will also be a couple of secret blood spells that can only be cast by blood mages.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
I like a lot your idea of blood magic.
It may have influenced the traditions of the tribes (all, some or just one).
Maybe there's still the custom of animal sacrifice for blessing, celebrations or divination spells (like in the roman empire), a custom which most of the tribes forgot the origin.
For the mechanics I agree with you, replaceing level increase o spellcasting time with blood is a good idea. Maybe the blood type or its origin can change the effect of the spell enhancement.
You can also decide that metamagic feats effects are blood magic only, and casters who want to use them need to know blood magic.
Also if you want, I'd like to help in the development of the fluff details for the setting: locations, tribes, and whatever you could use.
Of course you decide what to use and what to discard, after all it is your world.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
I think limiting metamagic to Blood is a bit extreme, personally. Much like Overchannel, I'd probably reinstitute Ability Burn so Oracles aren't just healing the damage afterward so they can meta more. Bringing Overchannel over would also be pretty damn neat.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Of course, ability burn is a given. Also appropriate, as there's nothing with the body, the blood mage is simply draining its life force. It's not like poison or regular exhaution or something like that.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
With the basic framework pretty much set, I now start to get into making rough sketches for the people that inhabit the setting, so when it gets to the details of specific places and people, there will be a good consistency in their cultures.
On another note, I am using "historic time" instead of "fantasy time". From the Neolithic, when there was first something that could be regarded as civilization, to the present day, it has been just 10,000 years. Giving an approximate Bronze Age level to the Barbarian Lands, this shrinks down to under 7,000 years. Before that, we're talking about cavemen. Since short timeframes could get a bit silly with extremely long living people, live expectations are quite shorter than in D&D/PF. Elves can hypothetically live 300 years in rare cases and gnomes over 200, but all other races are more along what we have in the modern world. If they don't die from plague or get eaten by a bear. Which happens a lot.
The Vandren
The Vandren are the tribe I've earlier reffered to as Blackhairs. They are the largest human tribe and one of the native people of the region I want to start with.
History
The Vandren are a wild collection of human clans whose original homelands lie in the southern parts of the Great Plains that lie beyond the western borders of the Barbarian Lands. 600 years ago elven explorers discovered a human town near the gap between the Border Mountains and the southern jungles (see the maps here), whose people were on very good terms with the plains traveling merchants, and the town soon became a major trade hub for rare goods between the Barbarian Lands and the Great Plains. Very early elven merchants started to hire human mercenaries to guard the caravans with good back to the coastal regions where the elven lands are mostly located. As the humans faught well alongside elven warriors, some elven lords employed entire human units in their armies and with service in elven pay became highly regarded with the mercenaries, entire clans migrated to the Inner Sea to pledge allegiance to elven warlords. The greatest migration occured 400 to 300 years ago, when a large number of clans traveled through the large valley that seperates the southern jungles from the rest of the Barbarian Lands to found new homes in the Southern Coast region, that was sparesely inhabited at that time, even in compairison with the rest of the Barbarian Lands. Though originating mostly from three human tribes in the Great Plains, there was a high frequency of clans merging and splitting up during the migrations, and they are now collectively known as the Vandren, regardless of their tribal affiliation in the plains. Another group of humans had migrated into the Barbarian Lands a few centuries earlier and settled in the Northlands, but they are a completely different people.
Today, only a very small number of Vandren are vasals of elven lords with the vast majority being completely independend clans. There are several larger Vandren towns, most of them in locations that had been along important roads of earlier people, as indicated by the large ruins that have been incorporated into the current settlements. Mostly however, Vandren settlements are small farming villages, clustered together according to clan affiliation. In recent generations, a couple of chiefs have become quite powerful and earned the honor of being counted among the Barbarian Kings.
Physical Appearance
Vandren are of average height and built for humans, but the most distinguishable features that sets them apart from other human tribes is their straight raven black hair. Except for very dark brown, other hair colors are virtually unknown among Vandren. Eye colors are mostly brown or blue.
Culture
The majority of Vandren live in small village of a few dozens of families, that consists of a few hundred individuals in total. A family consists of all members of a household, regardless of their blood relationship to each other. The head of the family is the patriarch or matriarch, who is the sole owner of all the families land and animals and the legal representative of all members of the family. Usually, the position of patriarch or matriarch gets passed on to the eldest child of the former head of the family, but if none are eligible, the position is transfered to his or hers siblings or nephews and nieces. If no other preference is given by the passing head of the family, the position gets to the person who is related most closely to the last or any former heads of the family. Though many families are headed by matriarchs, younger sons are often prefered over their older sisters, particularly in families with strong warrior traditions.
More important for social status than gender is being part of the clans warriors or the general population. Though they are relatively few in number, women can become warriors and usually have a higher status than men who are not. Vandren warriors are known for their leather trousers, which are usually made from brown or sand colored leather. While the wearing of these trousers is not forbidden to non-warriors, most warriors would never allow to be seen without them. If they wear only a single piece of clothing, it will be these trousers, everything else is considered highly inappropriate.
Slaves
Like most people in the Barbarian Lands except most wood elves, the Vendren keep slaves, which make up over a third of their population. There are two types of slaves known in Vendren society. Serfs belong to the chief of the clan and often have their own houses or even entire farms, and support the keep or castle of the chief. Thralls are slaves that are kept by individual families, but there is usually no more than three to five of them per family. Like serfs, thralls nominally belong to the chief, but have been given to individual families as rewards or payment. As individual Vandren have very few personal belongings and are entirely dependent on the head of the family for food and shelter, life for most thralls is not very different than for freemen. Usually it is prefered that serfs volunteer to become thralls in smaller families, as these families can not afford to be bothering with troublesome slaves. Thralls that make too much trouble can be returned to the chief as serfs, where they will probably be assigned to the most unpleasant and dangerous tasks. Generally, the life of a thrall is very similar to that of a farmhand, except that the only way to leave the families service is to become a serf again, which most slaves prefer to avoid.
Thralls may not be killed or tortured, which is still considered a crime, even when done by their keepers. However, a family can claim only much smaller reperations for an attack on a thrall than for one against a freeman.
Slaves are not allowed to wear their hair long. Some family heads allow their thralls to wear their hair as long as to the shoulders, but every slave cought with longer hair will get his head shaved and may get a beating by their masters. However, it is not uncommon for freemen to have short hair, especially when they think that it is out of the question that anyone could mistake them for slaves, which applies mostly to veteran warriors.
Vandren Names
Vandren usually have only a single given name. Members of large and powerful families, such as those of sub-chiefs are also known by the name of their family, but smaller families usally carry no name. Outstanding individuals often carry epithets that refer to famous deeds or other distinguishing characteristics.
Female names: Anna, Anya, Eleka, Elena, Ella, Gema, Hanna, Iona, Katriona, Kora, Mara, Maren, Mari, Mira, Netta, Nora, Ronya, Sana, Tanya, Valdis, Vilte, Yana, Yanina, Yeneka.
Male names: Akiva, Anto, Aras, Digod, Donat, Elek, Halva, Haren, Kenan, Kinon, Kota, Linas, Meran, Nial, Niko, Pavo, Tama, Tarik, Tonis, Varik, Veiko, Yanis, Yuho.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
I like this entry, as I feel the context works. There would definitely be a reason why they left the plains, but it might also be good to leave it open so that a DM could make up what they wanted, and it would be a major quest. Also, I'd include some family or clan names, because otherwise naming might get silly.
Also, looking back at the Kaas, maybe you could give them Orcish Ferocity (refluffled to Kass Ferocity) Basically he can stay up an extra round if knocked below 0 hp as if disabled, which would fit their style from what I can tell, but wouldn't be a big boost. Also, you are aware that PF intentionally had their races with the +2 to two specific stats have one mental and one physical. Just checking that you want to break from the norm.
And it would be nice if you could let Sorc's cast from Wis and Oracles cast from Cha to allow more versatility in the spell casting classes, but I know you want it your way and that's fine.
Last thing: Since it is your setting, maybe have a note with some of the more out-there ideas of what you hope to accomplish. That would help the conversation focus on helping you achieve what you want instead of us throwing out what we feel should be in the setting.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Ferocity would work, but it seems to me like an almost useless ability. In my experience, characters very rarely fall under 1 hp and that window of 10 hp becomes really small very soon after the very first levels. I believe it's something that maybe gets written on the sheet at character creation, and gets instantly forgotten. If anyone even remembers to put it on the sheet.
The idea is a cool one, but in practive it seems like just additional irrelevant baggage.
Wisdom-Sorcerer is an idea I think I have to spend some thoughts on. Might really have its merrits. However, oracles already are Cha-based.
What kind of out-there aspects are you thinking about? I think I don't actually want any drastically unusual elements in the setting. The main idea is to have a prehistoric setting with a good consistency. Fantastic elements yes, but a world about ordinary people, not about epic heroes changing the fate of the world every two months. The starting point was "what if we have a generic fantasy world, but 4,000 years earlier in the timeline, when the forests were not all cleared yet, elves and dwarves were doing well, and dragons and giants were still really major players in regional events?" The second thing is that this setting should not be just the modern world with swords and magic. I want cultures that are internally consistent, but don't just coppy modern western values. Oracles as shamans and slaves are both important parts of that. Many fantasy settings have evil slavers who raze villages and send everyone to die in the mines, but that's not really how slavery works. The ordinary well meaning people who employ slaves to work on their farms without laughing manically from delight over the slaves suffering are something you usually never get.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Yora
Ferocity would work, but it seems to me like an almost useless ability. In my experience, characters very rarely fall under 1 hp and that window of 10 hp becomes really small very soon after the very first levels.
Changed in Pathfinder: now you don't die until you reach negative hp equal to your constitution score.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
By out there, I meant departing from the core rules, where the rule-makers try to be more inclusive rather than building based on the theme of the place.
I was mistaken about the Oracle. I was just thinking some casters (without book learning, which logically = Int) drew power from inner peace, and others from their force of personality, both divine and arcane. I just felt that having Wis and Cha based casters could help make more diversity, rather than i guess all casters being faces for the party (due to the fact that other classes would probably let Cha be a dump stat).
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
The Empyral Bloodline lets a sorcerer key off wisdom instead of Charisma.
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Re: [PF] Lands of the Barbarian Kings
Since I am again in the middle of a lot of work, only a short update this time:
Spell Tattoos
Spell tattoos come in two types, permanent tattoos and temporary paint runes.
Painted runes work exactly like potions, but can be activated with a mental command as a move action. This benefit is mitigated by the fact that once drawn, a rune can not be sold or given to other people. The target of the rune is always the wearer.
Permanent tattoos are a type of permanent magic items. They function exactly like worn items and take up item slots. A character with a spell tattoo can not suppress the tattoo to benefit from other items that would occupy the same item slot. Tattoos usually occupy the head, neck, torso, shoulders, and finger slots. A tattoo can not occupy the armor and eyes slots.
Tattoos can only be removed by magic that would destroy other magic items. Damaging the skin does not destroy the tattoo, and all tattoos are restored when a dead character is ressurrected, except when the body was severely enough destroy that it could not be raised with a raise dead spell (however the time limit of raise dead is not a factor in this case). Magic tattoos can be expanded and improved like other magic items with the same additional costs for adding abilities to existing magic items.
Magic tattoos can not be stolen or sundered, but can also not be sold or removed without destroying them. To calculate the price for creating tattoos, calculate the cost just as if for normal magic items and multiply the final value by .75.
Natural Attack Tattoos
Spellcasters with the natural weapon spell can create special tattoos on the hands and feet that turn them into natural weapons that deal damage as gauntlets do. Once such tattoos are created, they can be enhanced just like gauntlets.
Both hands and feet count as seperate natural weapons that must be enchanted seperately.