The Fleshforge Legacy (Community World Building Project)

[Arathnos]

I guess that is something to decide. I am more inclined to say that the specially prepared meats, which must be from the finest cuts, advances the Taint, but my such a minuscule amount that unless it is eaten everyday, or very nearly every day, it is insignificant. One who eats it once or twice a week might have a subtle, but detectable, change in their appearance. One who eats every other day may, in addition to slight physical mutation, begin to demonstrate a change in personality, making them more aggressive and hot-tempered.

I like the idea of a scaling template. I think there could also be the possibility for a prestige class bent on mastering the Taint. Similar to the Heir of Siberys class from Eberron, maybe their is a Tainted Master, or Tainted disciple, something along those lines. Entry requirements would include a certain level of Taint and would be only for those truly embracing the corruption within themselves. It could also be adding too much though. Maybe just the template is best?

Idea! In Star Wars d20, dark side corruption is compared to wisdom, maybe we can do something similar?

[Ponderthought]

I guess that is something to decide. I am more inclined to say that the specially prepared meats, which must be from the finest cuts, advances the Taint, but my such a minuscule amount that unless it is eaten everyday, or very nearly every day, it is insignificant. One who eats it once or twice a week might have a subtle, but detectable, change in their appearance. One who eats every other day may, in addition to slight physical mutation, begin to demonstrate a change in personality, making them more aggressive and hot-tempered.

I like the idea of a scaling template. I think there could also be the possibility for a prestige class bent on mastering the Taint. Similar to the Heir of Siberys class from Eberron, maybe their is a Tainted Master, or Tainted disciple, something along those lines. Entry requirements would include a certain level of Taint and would be only for those truly embracing the corruption within themselves. It could also be adding too much though. Maybe just the template is best?

Idea! In Star Wars d20, dark side corruption is compared to wisdom, maybe we can do something similar?

hey I have some of those in my big book of horrible things to do to pcs (Heroes of Horror)

[DracoDei]

Again, DracoDei has already expressed disinterest, but I think that with tweaking, much more so than this if necessary, this concept fits perfectly in the setting. Even if it is only in a form vaguely reminiscent of the city built around the Tarrasque. So, any one else have any feedback?]

Actually I meant that the bit about using troll for manufacturing was quite good. Just anything other than the THREE areas I mentioned was boring to me personally (but other people must like it, since I have never yet seen a campaign-book without a fairly in-depth timeline).

[Ponderthought]

Had some ideas for new monsters. Im not really good at balancing monster stats, so its just fluff.

Star Whale: Rare works of living art, Star Whales are massive creatures that swim the endless depths of the sea. They have many long pseudopods extending from their jaws and the front halves of their body. Their pseudopods and their fins are edged with naturally occurring bioluminescence, and their calls are hauntingly beautiful. Star Whales live for centuries, and the oldest may reach a millennium of existence. They rarely communicate with those outside their species, but have been known to occasionally rescue shipwrecked sailors. To see a star whale surface is a rare and wondrous occasion, and considered a sign of good fortune.

Living Fortress: This ancient fortress appears to be a rather normal building, until it rises on giant crablike legs and walks to where it is needed. The fortress above is actually carved from a massive creatures carapace, allowing fortifications to simply be moved to where they are needed. The creature itself subsists on plant matter, but do to its size, must remain dormant most of the time to conserve its energy.

[Admiral Squish]

I like star whale. Actually, that really helps me settle on the flavor for the Sea. The East is all about bigger and badder. The west focuses on the artful subtle tweaking. The Sea will simply be artful. Beauty and awe are their goals, and star whales shall be among their crowning achievements.

Ancient fortress: Could totally see that. Sorta like a seige crab, but on steroids. But should it be arthropod-based? Perhaps it should be a living plant? Or just a massive beetle that simply has a cavernous castle interior. Is the castle like a growth on it's back, or carved OUT of the shell?

[Ponderthought]

I actually imagined the fortress on its back was carved out of an enormous knob of carapace and bone that the creatures grow naturally. And I just based it on arthropods cause I think crabs are neat, but the role could be filled by any number of huge creatures.

Oddly enough both ideas came to me while watching an episode of doctor who.

[Admiral Squish]

That sounds like it could be pretty awesome to describe. A massive fortress of seamless ivory with gossamer windows green as emeralds.

That does replace my idea for the brickbone beetles. These beings are normally grown to harvest this bony, ivory-like substance for building blocks. Only the richest of the shapers have versions large enough to actually cave a castle out of.

Also, I was thinking about the fleshforges. Instead of bloated flesh-sacks, I was thinking more like large or huge-sized beetles, with abdomens that act as artificial wombs for the creations. They can be 'programmed' easily to create offspring of a general sort. The shapers use their magic while the creature develops to make the most stable changes. These bugs live within massive facilities, sometimes with a hundred or more. The east are the only ones who really perfected creating gargantuan or colossal, even colossal+ versions of the bugs for their megascale fleshforges.

[Admiral Squish]

Alright! I did some editing in the first posts, including a map I drew myself in paint. (REALLY hoping somebody can draw a better one, fast, to spare me the embarrassment of my 10-minute creation becoming the official map.) I also included the latest ideas about the races/nations, and most of the information from post #27.

[Eldan]

Well, my idea for the fleshforges came half from common descriptions of Neth and half from practical considerations: if these huge things were mobile and able to defend themselves, they would be the most powerful weapons around, instead of a factory that would have to be defended.

[Ponderthought]

Ill give it a look and see if I can draw you up a map if youd like.

[Admiral Squish]

Well, they ARE factories though. Your description didn't make me think 'weapon', either, though. Perhaps the factory-swarm is it's own weapon, with guard-bugs and things. Hell, perhaps formian queens were originally the fleshforges.

And yes, I would definitely like a map.

[Eldan]

So, lesser Illithids: how strong should they be?

Suggestions:

LA +0:
+2 Int, -2 Str, +2 bonus to all grapple checks (face tentacles), Mind Thrust 1/day as a psi-like ability

LA +1:
+2 Int, +2 Cha, -2 Str, Mind Thrust 1/day, +2 to grapple checks, 2 face tentacle (1d4 damage), darkvision, minor boni.

LA +2:
+4 Int, +2 Cha, Mind Thrust 1/day, 4 face tentacles, improved grab, darkvision, minor boni

[Ponderthought]

One map, coming up. Im only doing geographical features though..im pretty bad at little tiny trees.

[Admiral Squish]

Hmm... How about LA +0, but instead fo the grapple bonus and the mind thrust, we go with a sorta extract-lite? Like, if the opponent is helpless (or pinned, so you can still grapple them into it) you can deal 1d4 int damage to the target as a standard action, and you gain some fraction of their memories. The target reaches 0, they automatically die, and you gain full access to their brain's knowledge. Would probably have been designed as a way to rapidly educate fledgling illithids. Just feed them the brains of the old slaves and they get all the experience they need.

[Ponderthought]

Behold!

Spoiler

Show

Theres a quick and dirty version for you. Maybe I can put some more polish on it later.

[Admiral Squish]

Oooh, nice! I would like to see the crop ring on it, though. And if not lots of tiny trees, some sort of forest-resembling texture could be done?

[Ponderthought]

I was thinking of trying that, and maybe adding some sand dunes in the desert. Perhaps Ill even add some basic color.

Question: Is it crop rings or crop ring? Because looking at the scale, a single giant ring might be interrupted by various topographic features, while several smaller (yet still huge) rings might be more plausible.

[Admiral Squish]

It's several thousand smaller, concentric rings, each about 40-50 feet across. Low walls (5-8 ft. high) separate one from another, and the outer and innermost walls are much higher and thicker. The shapers took great care ensuring the crop rings would be free of outside influences and reduced the variables as much as possible. The eastern and western poles of the ring have half-mile wide empty spaces that allow the scytheboars to mate until the season begins again. The lizards and plowtusks similarly use this space, though the lizards use it about three months previous, and the plowtusks share it with the boars.

[EdroGrimshell]

Off topic from what's being discussed but still relavent to the project, what are you going to do for base classes? 11 standard plus those from other sourcebooks? Homebrew? d20 Modern style?

If you need something for a class that follows the path of the shapers I've been working on a class called the geneforger, although it's not done just yet.

[Admiral Squish]

A geneforger would be an awesome addition. As for what other classes, I wasn't intending to limit the classes available for the setting. Was thinking we'd probably have a few homebrew classes in here.

[EdroGrimshell]

A geneforger would be an awesome addition. As for what other classes, I wasn't intending to limit the classes available for the setting. Was thinking we'd probably have a few homebrew classes in here.

I'll try to finish it ASAP, may take a while.

[Admiral Squish]

Alright, looking forward to it.

SO! I was thinking that perhaps the racial stats for the base races would be modded a little. Like, elves with climb speeds, dwarves with +int...

And then there are the monsters to design!

[Ponderthought]

Indeed there are Admiral!

In fact I had several ideas at the bar the other night. Seeing as my last set involved relatively benign creatures, i figured we needed a few that would haunt our nightmares.

Deathshaped: No one knows what form this creature originally inhabited, but its a moot point. This creature has been shaped, tweaked and modified so many times its very flesh has been imbued with magical residue, causing it to rise as a dreaded Deathshaped after it expired. The Deathshaped are horrors to behold, rotting masses of muscle, bone and skin in a configuration that could never even approach anything natural.
Mechanical Notes: Im thinking this would perhaps be a template, possibly with a constant fear effect due to the unrelenting horror of its appearance.


(Dammit all, this is gonna need a name change, somebodies already used Tall Man as a name)
Tall Man: Tall Men have appeared quite recently, within the last few decades or so. They generally take the form of very tall, thin humans, hence the name. Divination magic, however, has uncovered their minds arent even remotely similar, and are in fact, more alien than many diviners can bear or even make sense of. What makes the Tall Men dangerous is their voracious appetites for despair. Typically, a Tall Man enters a human settlement as a traveler, its magical abilities ensuring that it stays firmly unnoticed. Most villagers cannot remember the that the Tall Man even exists, let alone what it looks like.. Then the creature slowly begins abducting the young of the village, spiriting them away in the night to some desolate, forgotten place and imprisoning them there. Typically the creatures take care to keep the children fed and healthy, but miserable. Then it feeds on the despair of both the grieving parents and the imprisoned children. When it is satiated, the creature abandons the children to die of exposure or starvation. Very rarely, it takes a child with it to transform, through some unknown and horrible process, into a new Tall Man.
Mechanical Notes: Thinking the Tall Men will be poor melee combatants, but have powerful spell-like (or psionic) abilities focusing on controlling and misdirecting its foes.

Body stealer: This creature generally appears as a relatively innocuous animal, like a housecat or a small bird, with one slightly humanoid addition to its body, such as a pair of human hands on a dog. Their origins are a mystery, but their goals become clear through study: A body stealer collects parts from humanoids,as if It wants to be one. Bod Stealers have been encountered throughout all stages of their transformation, from simple animals with human mouths or hands, to creatures who have almost completed the shift to humanoid, with only a few pieces missing, such as a dwarf with dog ears, or a human with a snake tongue. What makes the creatures disturbing is the idea that after theyve collected all the pieces they need, they may be completely indistinguishable from regular humanoids.
Mechanical notes: I have no idea how this would work, but it creeps me right the hell out.

Ah, I had more, but Im suddenly drawing a blank.

Have we considered the place of undead in this setting?

[Admiral Squish]

I was thinking undead proper, zombies, skeletons, and the like, were viewed as sort of 'second hand'. Like used cars, but worse. They were cheap to maintain, but they couldn't act independently, they decayed quickly, and, worst of all, couldn't reproduce.

As for 'natural' undead, in a world where the entire ecosystem is controlled, would probably be regarded the same way we regard uncontrolled elements, such as wolves or jackals.

[Ponderthought]

In that case, im thinking vampires would make a great sort of villainous faction, disturbing the natural order of things, With vampire lords experimenting with infecting different creatures and gangs of lesser bloodsuckers roaming the more desolate areas like wolf packs, descending on settlements and robbing the inhabitants of everything, including their lives. Taken to it's logical extreme, they could be a real problem in the far northern territories, where they days are short and the nights long and bloody.

[Admiral Squish]

VAMPIRE NINJA DEATH SQUIRRELS!
I had player who told me a story about a vampire who was draining small woodland critters to make a strike force of tiny, climbing vampires. the barbarian shouted the above comment when he was pounced upon by aforementioned woodland creatures.

But yeah, packs of predatory vampire spawn and vampires proper would be epic. Undead don't need to worry about cold, either. Maybe a portion of the northern mountains has fallen under the control of these vampires already, and their influence is spreading through the sunless caverns. The dwarves have come up with ways to repel them, including shielded daylight lamps and simply sealing off the tunnels, but they're spreading faster than the dwarves appreciate.

[Ponderthought]

Oh, and any comment about the monsters i suggested? I dont want to seem like an attention whore, but feedback would be good for refining them into interesting creatures.

[Admiral Squish]

Sorry, I been a tad distracted.

Deathshaped:
Perhaps something based off peudonatural? Perhaps not even a proper 'undead', so much as a sort of relentless magical force that keeps this thing, which, by all rights, should be dead, alive. Like a parasite of living energy that refuses to let the flesh die.

Tall Man:Reminds of the slender man, somewhat. Very creepy. Is this undead? Is it like, a psionic parasite that simply feeds on despair? Perhaps it feeds on sorrow, but not in the usual 'be around sorrow' way, but a more... visceral way. It makes people as miserable as possible then eats them, consuming their sorrow with their flesh.

Body stealer: Well, a lot of the 'creepy as hell' factor here will depend on DMs. I'm thinking a base creature, then we include a number of things about what changes when they acquire specific parts. I'm not usre how to fluff it, though...

[Ponderthought]

The idea the Deathshaped arent truly undead jives pretty well with the concept. Perhaps the magical saturation from repeated shapings has achieved a limited form of sentience, and controls the creatures movements like a hand in a puppet, leading to strange, jerking movements that make it difficult to predict. Ill reade up on creating templates and see if i can come back with something more concrete for this.

And yes, the Tall Men (thin men, tower men, there's alot of naming potential here). I hadnt heard of the slender man until a few hours ago, but the feel of it brought back alot of different ideas and concepts i had from when i first started writing. They also got a good deal of the weird silent creatures from that one episode of Buffy. They feel like malicious fey or some sort of horribly alien psionic creature. Perhaps both, as Ive never heard of psionic fey, and it sounds cool. Undead dosent really seem to fit them though. As for their feeding habits, their open to any interpretation, I simply chose their modus operandi to make them slightly more horrifying.

Body Stealers come directly from this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TFvfFiQ2fjQ

Ive been itching to make a variation for a long time. I think the fluff could involve a shaper experiment gone horribly horribly wrong. I have no idea how the stating would go..perhaps scaling in power as they attained body parts? or perhaps gaining the abilities inherent in the part, like the cadaver golem from heroes of horror.

[Admiral Squish]

I'm not talking intelligence, I'm just talking the most BASIC of functions. It's not some thinking creature, I think the fact that this body simply refuses to die long after the creature's flesh should have given up should be plenty terrifying. No sentience, no thought or planning, it just lives, and it will do ANYTHING to keep it that way. The word FEED comes up in my mind over and over, but I'm not sure how to put it into a sentence to deliver the creepiness I'm getting.

Tall men, thin men, whatever, frikken' CREEPY. Some sort of malevolent, psionic fey. Perhaps it's modus operandi goes a step further, keeping them healthy and fed, but keeping them from getting exercise so they're very... tender.

Video creeped me the frak out.

I'll have to check out the cadaver golem, but I was thinking it would just start replacing it's inhuman features with human ones, and that it's stats would modify accordingly.