Ancient Lands - Sword & Sorcery Campaign Setting, Take 3

[Yora]

Ancient Lands - A Players' Introduction
So, here we are going into the culture and geography of the Ancient Lands, but in a way that still lets me do this by simply filling out a number of preexisting questions, one last time.

These questions are from the Pathfinder Gamemastery Guide in the chapter on worldbuilding, and I think they are actually quite useful both to set the parameters of the setting to the creator, as well as explaining all the basics to the players, who don't know anything about it yet.

What's the PCs base of opperations?
While the player characters can be from any background and occupation that exists in the Ancient Lands, the default assumption around which the settins is designed, is that the PCs are either all or at least partially members of the warrior class of one of the countless small clans that inhabit the region. PCs can also be apprentices of the village shaman or a witch serving the chief of the clan, but it is these circles of chiefs and their trusted followers in which most of the interactions between player characters and NPCs is assumed to be taking place.
As such, the PCs are usually not wandering adventurers, but have a home base which can be either in the court of the chief itself, or their private homes both in the center or at the edge of the village they are from. More specialized alternatives would be the shrines of shamanistic circles, ranger camps, or even the hidden stronghold of a cult, but generally it is expected that PCs are members of some kind of greater organizations that both support and backs them, and in which they can rise in influence and station.

Do I look different from everybody else?
As it will so often be the case with these question, the answer is both yes and no.
Yes, in that the PCs are expected to stand out from the ordinary rabble of farmers and craftsmen. Even as 1st level characters they are part of an elite that is occupied with warfare and protecting the clan from all kinds of threats from the outside and also betrayal from the inside. Their occupation is a highly dangerous, but also highly rewarding one, and just by belonging to this group within the society provides them with a certain amount of prestige and respect. Warriors immediately are recognizable as such, which clearly sets them apart from the commoners and farmers. Within their own clans, most people will even know them by name and know their rank and status among the clanspeople.
But they are also very similar to a great number of other people, in that they are usually ordinary warriors, hunters, and apprentices, which are found in every clan and of which every clan has several dozens, if not even more. At 1st level, PCs have an elevated station and are given special respect, but they have to share it with lots of other people just like them. As they advance in level and distinguish themselves through their deeds, they are going to rise above their fellow peers, becoming people of special reknown and joining the ranks of the most capable and trusted followers of their chief. And eventually might even rise to become chief themselves.

How do I make a living?
As warriors and shamans who protect their fellow clansmen from all kinds of deadly dangers, the PCs are primarily supported by their clan and have both food and payment provided by their chief. Some PCs might come from a wealthy family that owns a large farm, which can support them as well. As they rise in station and gain wealth from loot they have taken and rewards they have been granted, PCs may even decide to build their own farm or homestead, where servants work for them to provide them with a steady income. (See the Downtime system in Ultimate Campaign/the SRD.)
As long as they are in good standing with the chief and serve him well as warriors and advisors, player character will not have to worry about food, lodging, and maintaining their equipment. While they may not become particularly rich, there are relatively few expenses that need to be payed in the tribal society of the Ancient Lands.

Have I been doing this long?
For warriors in the Ancient Lands, training is usually very informal and often begins at an early age, when parents and older siblings teach them the use of spears and bows. Those who show talent and promise often make it to the ranks of the full warriors of the clan when they become adults. Others gain apprenticeship with a shaman or a witch, who teaches them in the basics of magic and the traditions of the craft. In any way, it is assumed that player characters in the Ancient Lands are fully trained in the basics of their occupations and have reached full status as adults who perform their role in the protection and support of the village and the clan. Games might also start with characters who are already veterans who have seen many years of combat and are hardened by experience. But it is generally assumed that PCs have already proven themselves in the eyes of their fellow clanspeople, but have not yet attained an outstanding reputation.

Are we at war or at peace?
In most situations the answer is most likely to be a bit of both. Unlike a campaign is specifically centered around a major conflict, long and open war is a relatively rare event and most of the time that passes is dominated by relative stability.
However, at the same time both raids and skirmishes, as well as attacks by wild monsters are a common occurance. While times my be stable, they are far from safe, and there is always some trouble brewing somewhere that keeps the warriors and protectors of the clan vigilant and on their toes.

What am I doing with these other guys?
Most player characters are asumed to be some kind of warriors serving under the chief of their clan. This applies to fighters and barbarians, but also to many rangers and rogues. Such characters tend to be companions, often of a similar age and experience, who have proven themselves to work well together and are assigned to deal with any problems threatening the clan as a team. However, often a task requires the assistance of specialists, such as shamans, witches, trackers, or even thieves. These are good opportunities to bring adepts and shamans into the group, as well as rogues and rangers who are not really members of the warrior class.

How are lives affected by magic?
Both a lot and not much at all. In the Ancient Lands, magic is everywhere and all the time, but it usually tends to be rather minor and subtle. Spells cast by shamans and adepts are a relatively rare things that common people rarely get to see themselves, if at all, and magic items are fabled treasures possessed only by kings, chiefs, and the most outstanding warriors. But at the same time, shamans and witches are serving their villages all around the year with minor forms of magic. Shamans keep the peace and the good relations with the spirits of the land surrounding the villages, and they investigate strange and supernatural occourances and see to it that they don't endanger the people of the clan. Witches often make amulets from substances that, while not magical itself, can help ward of harmful spirits and protect against spells and curses. Runes of warding and protection are found everywhere, as are prayers and blessings which might or might not keep the spirits beneign towards the people who use them.

How are lives affected by religion?
Religion playes a major role in the Ancient Lands, but very often it takes place in the background and is of a rather practical nature. The Spiritworld overlapps with the material world and spirits are found everywhere. Spirits have power over nature and as such can greatly help and harm the people whose life depend on it. If the spirits are benevolent, even poor farming land might allow the people to keep themselves fed and they would be spared by diseases and disasters. But if the spirits are angered, they also have the power to destroy every clan or kingdom, no matter how large and mighty, by punishing the people with plague and famine, or even floods, earthquakes, and volcanoes. As a results, people tend to be aware of the spirits at all time. While the shamans do their best to maintain good relationships between the spirits and the people, it is often hard or simply impossible to tell apart neccessary ritual from mere superstition. But the presence of spirits is everywhere and people usually tend to be on the cautious side and obey to rules and traditions, even if the spirits might not actually care much about them.

Who or what is going to try to kill me??
While there are countless dangers in the Ancient Lands, the two primary threats to and opponents of warriors are wild monsters and the warriors of other clans. Monsters are usually the more immediate threat, as they simply attack on sight and have few concerns other than defending their territory and getting fed. Warriors of other clans and raiders pose a more difficult to handle and anticipate, but equally dangerous threat. The motives of other people can be very varied and are often hidden by deception, and no attack is more danerous than the one you do not expect. While in former generations, the people of the Ancient Lands often fought for farmland and other natural resources out of a basic need of survival, wars and conflict of the present day are more often about influence and wealth. While raiding and pillaging is still a major aspect of war as it has always been, motives are often more complicated, often involving the elemination of rivals, the subjugation of smaller clans, and controlling the highly profitable trade with goods from distant lands.

Where can I sell this loot?
While silver and gold are highly values in the Ancient Lands and used for trade with all kinds of goods, there is not actually a lot of wealth gained for most warriors by the claiming of ancient treasures. And at the same time, there is not much that one would need to buy. Warriors are usually supported by their families or their chief, and magic weapons and armor rarely make it into the inventories of merchants. Instead, the really valuable resources in the lands of the clans are Goods and Influence. It is rare to buy a house with coin or hire servants who are paid a monthly wage. Instead it depends a lot more on status, influence, and favors as well as being in possession that other people would trade for. The Downtime system from Ultimate Combat introduces the resources of Goods, Influence, Labor, and Magic, which are indicators for both the amounts of favors you can rely on and wealth that comes in other forms than coins. In the Ancient Lands, these are very good indicators to measure both the wealth and station that PCs gain throughout their adventures and asignments. The reward for destroying a group of bandits might come in a small box filled with silver coins, but also in other valuable goods that the badits have stolen (increasing the PCs score of Goods or possibly Magic) and gratitude they gain from the locals and recognition by their chief (increasing their scores of Influence and Labor). PCs can then use these resources to expand their homes and find followers to serve them by working the fields or raising horses, or whatever the PCs descide to spend their wealth on.

[Yora]

Ancient Lands - General Knowledge

Who's in charge?
The people in power are almost all chiefs, kings, and powerful shamans. The chiefs are the leaders of their clans and most of the time can rely entirely on the loyalty and support of their warriors and clanspeople. Groups of neighboring villages are often led by a sub-chief, who is a member of the old highborn families and takes care of most of the chiefs responsibilities in his name. Some chiefs have becomes especially powerful and have gained the loyalty of other vassal chiefs, and as such can call themselves kings. But in a powerful kingdom, even the vassal chiefs may possesses greater actual power and influence than the free chiefs of smaller clans. In all clans and villages, the shamans almost always wield considerable power as well and few chiefs can afford to make descisions that are in direct opposition to the will of their shamans.

Who has the biggest army?
Every clan has its own warriors, who are often the elite and among the more wealther member of their villages. Since they are needed to guard and protect the villages, large armies are rare and usually often assemble for short amounts of time, before the warriors have to return home. Kings can call on the support of their vassal chiefs and as such can amass much larger armies than individual clans would be able to.

Who has the most money and power?
Most wealth and power is controlled by a relatively small number of old families that are known as the highborn class. They have the largest homes, farms, and herds, and also can afford the best weapons and armor, which give them a very strong position in the politics of the clan. In fact, many of the poorer people of the clan work for the highborn on their farms, or live on land owned by the highborn families in exchange for part of the food they grow. Almost all chiefs come from highborn families and more often than not they are also by far the richest people of the clan.

Who maintains law and order?
Except for the few large cities, there is no town watch in most settlements that maintains public peace. Instead, some of the warriors who do not have to work on their own farms patrol the villages and towns to defend them against attackers more than to catch thieves and put an end to illegal trade. How much these guards interfere with criminal activities and fights in public varies greatly between places. Offenses and other grievances are brought before the chief or his marshal, who will deal with the problems according to the traditions of the clan or the village.

How hard do poor people have it?
Since there are few large cities and most people grow their own food on their small farms, there are not a large number of overly poor people and most of them are scraping by reasonably well, even if deprived of most luxuries and amneties. In the large cities, where clan and family relationships are not of much relevance, many people who fall on hard times end up as beggars or have to make a living as unskilled laborers, taking whatever jobs become available.
However, for those who have no clan to back them at all, live is particularly harsh. People who have been cast out of their clans are trusted nowhere and neither are their descendants. Outcast sometimes can take refuge in larger towns and cities, where they might have a chance to work themselves up to become recognized as freemen, but most of them have to live in small camps with others of their kinds or completely cast off fro civilization as hermits. Since many outcasts are people of particularly bad character, life for those who have to live among or under them usually have a very harsh lot in life.

How do people travel, and how easy is it?
One of the most effective way to transport goods overland is by ox cart, but these animals are not very common among most people and were almost unheard of before mercenary clans from the west brought them to the Ancient Lands from the Great Plains. The more common beasts of burdens are donkeys and mules, with horses usually being too expensive for most people to own and keep. Everyone else has to travel by foot.
For journeys of longer distances and to transport large amounts of goods, the main means of transportation is by ship, both on the many great rivers than run from the mountains and highlands in the west into the inner sea, and also along the coast and to the nearby islands. There are not a great number of roads and only two major highways that are used by traders comming from the Great Plains west of the Ancient Lands.

What are the best-known landmarks?
Almost every village has some kind of common hall, that is both a tavern and a meeting hall for the villagers, and the best point for travelers to find a place for the night.
In towns and larger villages, the heart of the settlement is usually the mansion of the local subchief or chief, or sometimes the chiefs keep or even castle. This is the seat of the government and also the place where many of the settlements warriors can be found for most of the day. Some villages and towns have a separate warriors hall close by the chiefs mansion, where warriors spend much of their free time training and exchanging news and stories. Towns also have a central market square where farmers from the surrounding villages come to sell their goods and aquire harder to get tools and materials that they can't make on their own. Next to the market there are often a couple of inns and taverns catering mostly to traveling merchants.
In addition, every village and town has a main shrine, where the head shaman is residing and overseeing all the settlements business with the local spirits.

Why is everybody celebrating?
Hollidays and festivals are mostly based around the passing of the seasons. Life in the villages and on the farms changes drastically throughout different times of the year, and these periodic changes are often the time for large festivals. In most places, the primary festivals are at midsummer, harvest, mid-winter, and the beginning of spring, but many villages also observe numerous rites related directly to the local spirits that watch over the settlement.

What do people do for a good time?
People in the villages are usually not rich and live rather simple lives with the basic neccessities. The heart of any leisure activities is often the common hall or tavern where people mingle after the days work and engage in all kinds of games and contests of skills. Singing and music is also a common pastime, but usually takes place in completely informal settings, with few bards or minstrels gaining any particular notoriety or fame.

How weird does it get around here?
While the spiritworld touches every point of the material worlds and spirits are everywhere, they rare interact directly with mortals in highly visible or dramatic ways. Usually the influence of the spirits is very subtle, affecting the weather and the growth of plants, often being invisible to direct observation and only becomming evident over longer periods of time or to the knowing eyes of the shamans. Many people never directly set sight on a spirit or rare monstrous animals throughout all their life, other than seeing the faint lights of wisps near the edges of forrest.
However, once one leaves the relative securite of the villages, things are soon becomming very different and alien. Deep in the forest and hills are numerous creatures that usually avoid the proximity of humanoid settlements, many of which possess strange or even magical powers, and can display many dangerous suprises even for experienced warriors and adventurers.

[Yora]

Ancient Lands - Specialized Knowledge

How did the world come to be?
People in the Ancient Lands are very well aware that nothing in the world is permanent. Even though life does not change much and most people live very similar lives to their ancestors, longer lived people like elves and gnomes can make their homes in the branches or under the roots of massive trees that did not even exist when they were young, and floods, earthquakes, and volcanoes can change the landscape in many different ways. Myths and legends tell of times before humanoid races walked the lands and the ruins of ancient naga and shie civilization can still be found in many places. But there were even earlier times in which the world was even more alien and hostile, and the knowledge that everything that currently is part of humanoid will one day also disappear as lands fall under the sea and new islands rise up. While few people know many details, it is generally part of common knowledge that the world has not always existed and will end again at some point in the distant future. Most local cults are based on the assumption that the world is impermanent but that there are also other worlds that exist alongside their own and also before it and will come into existance in the future.
Only a few sorcerers and shamans who delved into the knowledge of the Great Ancients know that there is an infinite number of universes that spontaneously form from the Void until they dissolve and vanish again after some millions or billions of years. A universe is basically a bubble of reality in which the formless chaos of the Void takes shape and over the eons develops its unique laws of nature. There is no real difference between demons and spirits. The spirits of the spiritworld are merely demons born from the energies of nature instead of the energies of the Void and the Great Ancients are being from the early ages of the universe, when the differences between the material world and the Void where not yet as great.

What is the nature of the gods?
The gods are not substentially different from the common spirit that inhabit the Spiritworld and can be found anywhere. The gods could be called the greatest of the spirits, being the spirits of very large areas and more abstract concepts, like the Sun, the Ocean, Darkness, or Healing. Because they exist at such vast scales, the Gods do not directly interact with individual mortals or might not even be actually aware of them.
The Gods are the object of worship in more spiritual and philosophically minded cults. In everyday life, the spirits of the forests, hills, and rivers surrounding a village play a much greater role, as they react directly to the activities of mortals and may even communicate with them through shamans or in person.

What is the source of magic?
The most important thing to understand about magic is that magical energy is identical to natural life energy that is found in every person, animal, and plant. It is a universal force that allows creatures and objects to change and affect their environment. The casting of spells is merely a use of this energy in ways that are not availale to most beings. There is nothing substentially different from bending a brench with ones hands or a wood shape spell. Most people use their life force to move the muscles in their arms, while adepts and shamans can focus the same energy dirctly at the wood itself.
One important limitation of magic is that it can not change the rules of reality and nature, only utilize them in unusual ways. Also, the effects of magic are not permanent and when a spell ends the normal rules of nature apply again. Magic can move stones to form a wall or cause wood to burn. But once the spells end gravity will affect the stones normally and the wall might collapse if the stones are arranged in an unstable way. And a fire started by magic might even continue to burn like any other fire, or be extinguished in the same ways.

What happens when you die?
The soul of a creature is simply the life energy that animates it. When the body dies and no longer draws energy from food, light, and warmth, the energy present in the body starts to slowly fade away and mix with the energies of the ground and surrounding plants. The energy does not cease to exist, but without a body to focus it into the shape of a soul, it simply dissolves within a matter of days or a few weeks.
There are some powerful magical rituals that can return life to a dead creature by restoring the body and replacing the energy that has been lost to the fading soul. The longer a body has been dead, the harder it is to rebuild the soul until it eventually becomes impossible. Many people also have their doubts if the soul would even be the same one as the original soul; a question similar to whether the flame of a candle that has been blown out and lit again is the same flame. To some there is no difference, but to many it is an unsettling idea.
When a person dies, most funeral rites attempt to channel the energies that escape from the dead body to join and mix with the enrgies of a particular place or spirit. Often, the storage for these energies is a shrine or tomb in the center of a village or the home of a family, so that this energy will be part of any new children that are born in the nearby houses.

What cycles or events define the calendar?
The main cycles by which time is measured are the passing of the seaons and the phases of the moons. The times of seeding and harvest are the most important in almost all cultures, with winter and summer being times or relative leisure where few work needs to be done. Summer is often a time for constructions but also for war, while the months of winter rarely see anyone leaving their villages and travelling to other places.

What do you see when look at the sky?
During the day, the sky is an ordinary blue or covered in clouds, and only the almost permanent presence of winds from the sea being noteworthy of any kind. Modarate wind is almost everpresent except inside forests. In plains, mountains, and near the coast, there is a always 25% chance of severe wind (-2 to ranged attacks), and on the open sea and along the coasts, there is an additional 10% chance of strong wind (-4 penalty).
During the night, when the weather is clear, the sky is dominated by the two main moons. The largest moon is about three fingers wide in diameter at arms length, while the second largest is about one finger wide. Two additional moons are much smaller and can sometimes be mistaken for very bright stars on hazy days or when they are high up in the sky. On clear evenings and mornings, they are easily recognized as small moons.
The moons all have very different orbits and phases and there are few people who can precisely predict the paths of the moon some weeks in advance. The third largest moon is the fastest one and can travel over the sky in just a few hours, on rare occasions even rising once in the morning and once in the evening on the same day. The smallest moon is much slower than the others, but travels across the sky in an opposite direction to the other three.
In addition, polar lights are not an uncommon occourance in the Ancient Lands, often being visible relatively far to the south, but generally not being very bright and more of a slight green haze among the stars.

What constitutes cutting-edge technology?
The most advanced and highly prized weapons and armors are those made from steel. While many elves and some lizardfolk cities forge their own steel, gnomes are clearly the masters of these arts. Gnome forges produce both common equipment in much larger numbers than those found in other lands, and also can create blades of much higher quality that have no rival anywhere else. Humans and kaas mostly make equipment from bronze and the material is used by most elves and lizardfolk as well.
The other most important technology is shipbuilding, which is dominated by elven clans that life along the coast of the inner sea and on its islands. Ships are the most important way to transport goods over large distances and most goods that human caravans bring from the west are soon loaded onto ships once they reach the major rivers leading to the sea, from which they are transported to the rest of the Ancient Lands. Elven ships are often larger or faster than those of other people, with humans being relatively new to sailing and lizardfolk relying mostly on small boats.

Where do monsters come from?
There is no real difference between most monsters and particularly rare and dangerous animals. While a wolf would never be called a monster, a sabre lion or giant crocodile might very well be regarded similar to a worg or a wyvern.
The most common supernatural creatures are native to the spiritworld and are collectively known as spirits. Many of these spirits are actually mortal beings that are not that different from other animals or humanoids, but being at home in the spiritwold they possess many strange magical powers. The more powerful spirits are manifestations of the life force of nature itself, that takes form in a material shell, with nymphs, treants, and spriggans being among the most well known kinds. These beings are basically immortal and while their physical bodies can be destroyed, they will eventually manifest again in a new body, unless the area from which they spring is drastically altered in some way. The only way to really kill the nymph of a lake is to drain the lake and fill it in, after which the "identity" of the area would no longer be that of a lake. But even then, the plants and rocks of the area might simply bring forth a different type of spirit that represents it. Deep underground lightless caves and lakes have remained the same since the earliest days of the world and many of their spirits have persisted throughout the eons. These spirits are known as the Ancients and are the most alien and horrifying creatures native to the world, as they are from a time when the world itself was a very different place than it is today, where humanoids and animals of today could not exist.
A third type of monsters that most people only hear from in rumors, are demons. Demons are very similar to spirits, but they are not manifestations of the life energies of the spiritworld, but arise from the raw chaotic energies of the void. These demons are even weirder than the Ancients, but they rarely interact with the physical world or the spiritworld unless contacted by sorcerers who have discovered ways to see beyonf the borders of this world.

Which is strongest: magic, gods, or nature?
In the end, magic is a product of nature, and gods and spirits are manifestations of these magical energies. While spirits and gods are powerful, they too are bound by the laws of nature in the same way as mortals are, and often in even more intricate ways. The primary force and source of everything else in the world is nature itself and no mortal or spirit, regardless of the magic they wield, can ever really defy it's laws. The world has always been changing and will continue to do so until its very end, and both spirits and mortals have to accept its supremacy and make their lives in the best way they can and try to addept as things are changing. But they can never be stopped.

If I drop this off the balciny, what happens?
The laws of physics are not unusual or different from what most people would expect in any meaningful ways. This applies both in the material world and in the spiritworld, and only outside the university in the Void are all rules cast off. The world of the Ancient Lands is one of very strong natural forces, with strong winds being always present in virtually all places, and some minor earthquakes and volcanoes being common to most regions. In the spiritworld, these natural forces are a lot stronger than in the material world though, and much more than hungry monsters, they are the main dangers that mortals are facing in this realm, with visitors being as likely to be struck by lighnting or falling trees during a storm, as thery are to freeze to death during the night or succumb to the heat of the midday sun.

[Yora]

The Downtime and Kingdom Building rules are now in the SRD at d20pfsrd.com.

Both system will be incorporated in the Ancient Lands setting, but they remain purely optional and if the GM uses them it is even up to the individual players if they character is using the options or not. As the systems are designed, they can be added to a running game at any time with no need to plan or prepare for it in advance.
The Kingdom rules are really only of relevance to groups which are actually in charge of a domain and have any of the Leadership Roles. However, it also includes the mass combat system, which is useful for anyone leading groups of people into battle and it becomes impractical to roll dice for every indivudual combatant. Even if it's just a ten villagers with spears and another ten with bows laying an ambush for 25 goblins, while the PCs are trying to sneak into the unguarded goblin camp and find the goblin shaman, it's a simple system to see if the villagers can kill all the goblins, flee before all goblins are dead, or fail in their attack. This could determine how much time the PCs have before the goblin warriors return and how many they would be dealing with. (The Mass Combat system is not in the SRD yet, as of now.)

The Downtime system is playing a larger role, as PCs can use it right from the start. Instead of creating a business that provides with a small but steady income of silver pieces, it's primary purpose in the Ancient Lands is to build a home base and personal stronghold, which the PCs can use expand their prestige and influence, and gain power and status within their clan. Not every warriors has to strive to claim the position of chief, but any one who would do so would be required to have an estate that shows his wealth and power, and followers to back him up. The machanics for this are described below.

Gaining and Using Capital
In the Ancient Lands, player characters do not have as much use for gold and silver as they do in other games. Once you have weapons and armor of masterwork quality, an expensive warhorse, and a well stacked stash of potions and scrolls, there are not a lot more things that money can buy. PCs can go on quests to claim magic weapons and armor and find wondrous items in the loot they take from their defeated enemies, but these things won't be found in stores to be bought with small chests of gold. As a result, characters won't have much use for even more silver pieces if all the can spend it on is extravagant entertainment.
Instead, many PCs will probably want to improve their rank and status within their clan or other type of community they are living in. Doing so is very hard to do by just going on quests for the people who rank above you and doing favors that increase your reputation with the common people. It also requires putting your wealth to use and gaining the favor of other powerful people. Doing so is done by using Capital.

In the basic meaning of the word, capital is the amount of wealth, physical goods, and immaterial goods that you possess and can put to work for you. This can be boxes full of silver that you have in your vault, but also land and other natural resources you control, debts other people have to you, and prommises of assistance that other people have given to you. Even the knowledge of a rich vein of silver that nobody has claimed yet is a form of capital. You could share this knowledge with someone else in exchange for money, or build a mine that provides you with silver ore, and so on.
Since capital can be hard to track, the Downtime system from Ultimate Campaign introduces four resources in addition to money.
Goods: Goods are the most basic and simple form of capital. Goods are all kinds of objects that have a value for someone other than silver pieces. This can include building material, metal ores, grain, spices, cloth, and so on. For ease of use, the exact nature of Goods is not tracked individually and instead it is assumed that you can barter the goods you have for other goods you need without problem at a 1 to 1 rate. If you just got a shipment of grain worth 4 points of Goods and you need 3 points of Goods as building material for a shrine, you don't need to sell the grain and buy the building materials, it simply us assumed that the person providing the building material accepts your grain in exchange or you find a trader who does the exchange for you.
Influence: Influence is an immaterial form of capital and represents favors that the local people in power are owing you. As with goods, the exact nature of these depts and favors does not need to be tracked individually. In some situations it might be appropriate to have the player characters visit a specific NPC and make their request in person rather than simply substracting the Influence point from their capital count. But instead of having to bicker and argue with the NPC and making Dimplomacy or even Intimidate checks to convince him, the favor will be granted and the characters Influence count reduced.
Labor: Labor is similar to Influence, but represents favors and goodwill with the common people who may not have any popitical power but still can express their gratitude and repay their debts through service. If you want to build any constructions, you need laborers to do the work. You could simply hire those people, but it may be a lot cheaper to simply call in those depts that the local craftsmen and commoners are owing you. (For simplicity, workers for construction are always counted in Labor points. If you need to hire laborers, you can simply "buy" the Labor points that you need with silver pieces.)
Magic: Magic capital is very similar to good and merely a more specialized form. Magic can take the form of rare herbs, minerals, the horns and claws of rare beasts, poisonous plants, special containers for alchemical substances, and so on.
Silver Pieces (sp): Money in the form of cash that you own is a type of capital as well. You can use your silver to buy both mundane and magical goods, hire laborers, and bribe or compensate people in power for favors you are asking. But a coin as an object has no use in itself until you give it away to get something else.

Gaining Capital
There are a number of ways to increase your Capital count.
Buying Capital: The easiest and fasted way to get the Capital you need for any specific project is by spending money. You can always buy goods you need and hire people for the neccessary work, but that often is quite expensive. Goods 200 sp, Influence 300 sp, Labor 200 sp, Magic 1,000 sp.
Earning Capital: A slower, but more effective way to gain Capital is to work for it. You can cut trees, mine ores, help other local leaders with minor tasks, and so on. You can also have your followers do this work for you, if you have any. You could send a group of woodcutters to cut wood or a group of warriors to patrol the area for bandits, gaining you the goodwill of the locals. Gaining Capital this way is slower and while it still requires spending some of your resources, (paying your woodcutters and warriors for the day) the cost is only half as much. Goods 100 sp, Influence 150 sp, Labor 100 sp, Magic 500 sp.
Loot: If the Downtime system is used in a campaign, the loot taken from many defeated enemies could come in the form of Goods and Magic. The lair of bandits might not only hold some boxes with silver and other valuables, but also crates with cloth or sacks of grain the bandits have stolen. While not usually useful to player characters, these could also be claimed and added as points of Goods. The horns and claws taken from a slain dragon could be added as points of Magic. (One point of Goods would be worth 200 sp of treasure, one point of Magic worth 1,000 sp of treasure.)
Rewards:In a similar way, every time the PCs are doing something that benefits other people in a significant way as well, they could earn points of Influence and Labor. Labor would be most appropriate when the PCs made life a lot safer for the common people, while any quest taken on behalf of a powerful leader should also gain some points of Influence in addition to a payment of silver and magic items. (In situations when it would be relevant, one point of Influence would be worth 300 sp of treasure, and one point of Labir worth 200 sp of treasure.)
Converting Capital: While any types of Goods are considered equal and can be changed to any form that is needed, characters can also trade one type of capital for another, but this comes at significant expenses. 3 points of any resource can be exchanged into 1 point of either Goods, Labor, or Influence. It is assumed that you get someones favor by giving him Goods, or get access to his goods by using Influence you have with others for his benefit. In special situations, the exchange rate may even be 2 points spend for 1 point gained. Trading other forms of Capital to gain magic is more expensive and it takes 5 points of either Goods, Influence, or Labor to gain 1 point of Magic.

[Zap Dynamic]

I haven't looked at Kingdom Building yet, but Downtime is a really great read! Thanks for pointing this out to me; I had thought about creating a 1 page mechanic for the same idea, but this is way cooler.

[Yora]

Variant Leadership Feat
With character levels ranging from 1st to about 8th level, the regular Leadership feat is not really practical in an Ancient Lands campaign. It becomes available at a too late point and players have few opportunities to gain a high Leadership Score and attract any meaningful amount of follower.
Effectively, characters get a +3 bonus to their leadership score to determine the number of followers, and a -3 penalty to determine the level of a cohort (already included in the table).
Also, the special modifiers are now defined in a clear way.

Leadership (AL variant)
You attract followers to your cause and a companion to join you on your adventures.
Prerequisite: Character level 5th.
Benefits: This feat enables you to attract a loyal cohort and a number of devoted subordinates who assist you. A cohort is generally an NPC with class levels, while followers are typically lower level NPCs. See Table: Leadership for what level of cohort and how many followers you can recruit.

{table=head]Leadership Score | Cohort Lvl. | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th
1 or lower | — | — | — | — | —
2 | — | — | — | — | —
3 | — | — | — | — | —
4 | — | — | — | — | —
5 | 1st | — | — | — | —
6 | 2nd | — | — | — | —
7 | 3rd | 5 | — | — | —
8 | 3rd | 6 | — | — | —
9 | 4th | 8 | — | — | —
10 | 5th | 10 | 1 | — | —
11 | 5th | 15 | 1 | — | —
12 | 6th | 20 | 2 | 1 | —
13 | 7th | 25 | 2 | 1 | —
14 | 7th | 30 | 3 | 1 | 1
15 or higher | 8th | 35 | 3 | 1 | 1[/table]

Leadership Modifiers: Several factors can affect your Leadership score, causing it to vary from the base score (character level + Cha modifier). Your reputation (from the point of view of the cohort or follower you are trying to attract) raises or lowers your Leadership score:

{table=head]Leader's Reputation | Modifier
Great Reknown | +2
Fairness and Generosity | +1
Aloof | –1
Cruelty |–2[/table]

Followers have additional priorities to cohorts. When you try to attract a follower, use the following modifiers.

{table=head]The Leader... | Modifier
Has a stronghold, base of operations, guildhouse, etc.* | +2
Moves around a lot | –1
Caused the death of other followers | –1[/table]
* See the Downtime system.

Leadership Score: Your base Leadership score equals your level plus your Charisma modifier. In order to take into account negative Charisma modifiers, this table allows for very low Leadership scores, but you must still be 5th level or higher in order to gain the Leadership feat. Outside factors can affect your Leadership score, as detailed above.
Cohort Level: You can attract a cohort of up to this level. Regardless of your Leadership score, you can only recruit a cohort who is two or more levels lower than yourself. The cohort should be equipped with gear appropriate for its level (see Creating NPCs). A cohort can be of any race or class. The cohort's allegiances my not be opposed to your own allegiances. (Cohorts always have allegiance to the character they follow.)
A cohort does not count as a party member when determining the party's XP. Instead, divide the cohort's level by your level. Multiply this result by the total XP awarded to you, then add that number of experience points to the cohort's total.
If a cohort gains enough XP to bring it to a level one lower than your level, the cohort does not gain the new level—its new XP total is 1 less than the amount needed to attain the next level.
Number of Followers by Level: You can lead up to the indicated number of characters of each level. Followers are similar to cohorts, except they're generally low-level NPCs. Because they're usually 5 or more levels behind you, they're rarely effective in combat.
Followers don't earn experience and thus don't gain levels. When you gain a new level, consult Table: Leadership to determine if you acquire more followers, some of whom may be higher level than the existing followers. You can also chose to upgrade some of your followers to a higher level and fill the vacated slots with new followers.

[Yora]

Brace yourself, fluff is comming.

As I mentioned before, designing game rules is a lot easier than the creative work of creating a setting. But now that the crunchy part is really pretty much wrapped out (everything that's left is really just doing a clean writeup, and that's as fun as it sounds), there is now no more avoiding it.
One of the most praised campaign setting documents is the Forgotten Realms Grey Box, and while there is probably a huge amount of nostalgia speaking, there are good arguments while that one is working so well. It keeps things simple and basic, describing the background and leaving the specific details to the GM. Also, I am going to throw in a couple of ideas that I have now, that are likely to change quite a bit as more things are added and the individual aspects become interconected with each other.

Comments and ideas are very much appreciated and welcome. The reason I am writing these things down in this thread is to get feedback on what people think about it. Even if it's just "I like this one" or "Could you give more details on that one", it will actually help me quite a lot. I know this is purely creative work and it's hard to tell someone that you don't like a certain thing and would leave it out, but don't be shy. This isn't colaborative worldbuilding or crowdsourcing, but not every idea I have is neccessarily a good one. If you think that I should take another look at some things because it looks odd to you, it could very well be that I missed something important myself or wrote down nonsense that I didn't really think through. Just speak even, even if it's just to let me know people are reading this.

The geography is not yet 100% fixed, but for a very long time I had something in mind that looks pretty much like this:

Spoiler

Show

This is an old and unfinished map, and you have to ignore the markers for cities, but it should provide a general idea about the geography of all of it. The size of the map covers about an area like the eastern half of China, Korea, Japan, and the southern parts of Siberia. The sea in the north is regularly frozen, while the forest in the south are similar to India or Bangladesh. There are also some island groups in the large gulf, which are not yet added on the map.

Factions and Organizations I

The Temple of the Sun
The Temple of the Sun is one of the major and most important centers of power in the Ancient Lands. In the late centuries of the Age of Spirits, when the power of the naga and shie had already been declining for a long time, lizardfolk slaves rebelled against their naga masters, led by a group of shamans who had secretly created a cult dedicated to the power of the Sun. Despite all odds, the revolting slaves overwhelmed their naga overlords and took control over one of the largest cities in the jungles of the south. Their victory was attributed to the assistance of the Deity of the Sun, and it has ever since been considered the actual supreme ruler of the lizardfolk that inhabit the city and the surrounding jungles to this day. The government and the military of the Kingdom are lead by a king, who is chosen and appointed by the high priests of the Temple of the Sun, according to the will that their deity reveals to them. The lizardfolk kingdom is probably the single most powerful realm in the Ancient Lands, but the continuing presence of naga citadels to the east, and the large numbers of dark elf tribes to the west has kept them from expanding their control beyond their current borders.

Harbor City of Elven Sorcerers
This city of 16,000 elves is one of the major centers of civilization in the Ancient Lands. While the realm of the Sorcerer Queen is relatively small, her domain is exceptionally rich and her soldiers one of the major military powers in the region. Most of the city is located at the base of a steep cliff, with the mansions of the sorcerers and highborn families sitting on a large outcropping that rises high above the sea and the rest of the city, while being protected to the north by the cliffs.
Despite its wealth and power, the city is most well known as one of the few places where sorcerers are not only openly tollerated, but actually have a high status in society and constitute a major portion of the rulling class. While most people have a certain amount of distrust for sorcerers, only few of them have more detailed knowledge about the exact nature of their magical research into the powers of the Void, and the corrupting effects these energies have on the material world of mortals. However, the great profits tha can be made by trading in the cities port are too tempting for most merchants to let their predjudices get in the way and most common people treat the realm with a certain amount of respect and tollerance. Behind the scenes, the sorcerers are involved in numerous conflicts with the adepts and shamans from the surrounding lands, who have a much more critical view about their dealing with demons and use of fel magic.

The Warrior Order
From the countless mercenary companies and barbarian clans that came from the human lands west of the great plains to pledge their services to the elven kings, one managed to rise high above the others, becomming one of the major powers in the Ancient Lands in their own right. The leaders of the order are silent about their origins, but some elves remember the army fighting in battles almost three centuries ago. But it has only been in the last 80 years that the power of the mercenary company has started to rival that of the larger clans and kingdoms.
The leader of the order is the Lord General (human Fighter 11), a tall warrior and great tactician who is more commonly recognized by his armor than his face, which people have often described as entirely unexceptional. Numbering some 30,000 warriors, their ranks also includes about twice the number of freemen servants and slaves. The order itself is more of an ideology, with idividual companies resembling small clans that are almost entirely self reliant and seek out employment on their own. Sometimes companies of the clan are even fighting on both sides of a battle, but they will refuse any order that has them attacking other members of the order. When work for mercenaries is scarce, the Lord General often compensates for it by extending the area of his own influence into the lands surrounding his main stronghold, providing plunder and an occupation for his warriors.
While shamans are allowed in the Order, their ideology stresses reliance on ones own power, particularly martial strength. Service to a strong master is deemed honorable, as long as one does not hide behind his power for protection.

--

As a little extra, the nymph and oni as they appear in the Ancient Lands, and the spriggan, a new creature.

Spoiler

Show

The nymph and the spriggan use the special abilities of kami, a new outsider type from Bestiary 3 and The Jade Regent. In fact, the stats of the spriggan are basically those of an advanced kodama kami. The oni is reduced from CR 8 to CR 5, so you can use small gangs of them before the PCs reach 9th level.

Nymph
Nymph - CR 8
XP 4,800
Medium outsider (spirit)
Init +5; Senses darkvision 60 ft., low-light vision; Perception +14
Aura blinding beauty (30 ft., DC 21)
DEFENSE
AC 23, touch 23, flat-footed 17 (+7 deflection, +5 Dex, +1 dodge)
hp 76 (8d10+32); fast healing 5
Fort +13, Ref +18, Will +16
DR 10/cold iron; Immune mind-affecting effects, petrification, polymorph; Resist cold 10, electricity 10, fire 10; SR 18
OFFENSE
Speed 30 ft., swim 20 ft.
Melee mwk cold iron dagger +14 (1d4/19–20)
Special Attacks stunning glance
Spell-Like Abilities (CL 8th; concentration +15)
3/day — "shift to spiritworld"
Spells Known (CL 7th; concentration +10); SP/day 56
4th — bestow curse (DC 17)
3rd — dispel magic, stunning blast (DC 16), water breathing
2nd — lightning arcs (DC 15), resist energy, restoration, toughen skin, wood shape
1st — charm (DC 14), entangling vines (DC 14), faerie fire, fog cloud, heal, summon spirit
STATISTICS
Str 10, Dex 21, Con 18, Int 16, Wis 17, Cha 25
Base Atk +8; CMB +13; CMD 31
Feats Agile Maneuvers, Combat Casting, Dodge, Weapon Finesse
Skills Diplomacy +18, Escape Artist +16, Handle Animal +15, Heal +11, Knowledge (nature) +14, Perception +14, Sense Motive +14, Stealth +16, Swim +19
Languages Common, Sylvan, telepathy 100 ft.
SQ merge with ward, unearthly grace, ward (tree, lake, isle, or mountain), wild empathy +21
Gear masterwork cold iron dagger
ECOLOGY
Environment any natural
Organization solitary
Treasure standard
SPECIAL ABILITIES
Blinding Beauty (Su) This ability affects all humanoids within 30 feet of a nymph. Those who look directly at a nymph must succeed on a DC 21 Fortitude save or be blinded permanently. A nymph can suppress or resume this ability as a free action. The save DC is Charisma-based.
Merge with Ward (Su) As a standard action, a nymph can merge her body and mind with her ward. When merged, the nymph can observe the surrounding region with her senses as if she were using her own body. She has no control over her ward, nor can she communicate or otherwise take any action other than to emerge from her ward as a standard action. A nymph must be adjacent to her ward to merge with or emerge from it. If her ward is a tree, the nymph can emerge sitting on it. If its ward is a location, the nymph may emerge at any point within that location.
Spells A nymph casts spells as a 7th-level shaman.
Stunning Glance (Su) As a standard action, a nymph can stun a creature within 30 feet with a look. The target must succeed on a DC 21 Fortitude save or be stunned for 2d4 rounds. The save DC is Charisma-based.
Unearthly Grace (Su) A nymph adds her Charisma modifier as a racial bonus on all her saving throws, and as a deflection bonus to her Armor Class.
Ward (Su) A nymph has a specific ward—a tree, a lake, a mountain, an island, or another natural feature or location similar to these. Several of a nymph's abilities function only when she is either merged with her ward or within 120 feet of it. If a ward is destroyed while a nymph is merged with it, the nymph dies (no save). If a ward is destroyed while a nymph is not merged with it, the nymph loses her merge with ward ability and her fast healing, and becomes permanently sickened.
Wild Empathy (Su) This works like the ranger’s wild empathy class feature, except the nymph has a +6 racial bonus on the check. The nymph’s effective ranger level is equal to her HD for determining her total modifier to the check.

Oni
Oni - CR 5
XP 1,800
Giant kuwa oni
Large outsider (shapechanger, spirit)
Init +2; Senses darkvision 60 ft., low-light vision; Perception +10
DEFENSE
AC 20, touch 11, flat-footed 18 (+5 armor, +2 Dex, +4 natural, -1 size)
hp 42 (5d10+15); regeneration 5 (acid or fire)
Fort +9, Ref +3, Will +6; +4 vs. enchantment
DR 5/cold iron or magic; Resist cold 5, electricity 5, fire 5; SR 15
OFFENSE
Speed 30 ft. (40 ft. without armor)
Melee mwk greatclub +11 (2d8+9)
Ranged composite longbow +6 (2d6+4/×3)
Spell-Like Abilities (CL 5th; concentration +8)
3/day — darkness, fly
1/day — charm (DC 16), sleep (DC 14), invisibility (self only)
STATISTICS
Str 22, Dex 15, Con 20, Int 12, Wis 15, Cha 17
Base Atk +5; CMB +12; CMD 24
Feats Cleave, Combat Reflexes, Power Attack
Skills Bluff +11, Disguise +7, Intimidate +11 (+15 vs. medium creatures), Knowledge (arcana) +9, Perception +10, Sense Motive +10, Spellcraft +3, Stealth +1, Use Magic Device +11
Languages ???
SQ change shape (medium or large humanoid; transformation)
Gear masterwork greatclub, composite longbow [+4 Str], scale armor
ECOLOGY
Environment any
Organization solitary or gang (1 plus 3–10 trolls)
Treasure standard

Spriggan
Spriggan - CR 6
XP 2,400
Medium outsider (spirit)
Init +3; Senses darkvision 60 ft. low-light vision; Perception +14
DEFENSE
AC 18, touch 14, flat-footed 14 (+3 Dex, +1 Dodge, +4 natural)
hp 60 (8d10+16); fast healing 3
Fort +6, Ref +9, Will +9
DR 10/cold iron; Immune mind-affecting effects, petrification, polymorph; Resist cold 10, electricity 10, fire 10; SR 18
OFFENSE
Speed 30 ft.
Melee 2 claws +10 (1d4+2)
Special Attacks distracting gaze, sneak attack +2d6
Spell-Like Abilities (CL 8th; concentration +10)
At will — speak with nature (trees only)
3/day — charm (DC 16), entangling vines (DC 16), "shift to spiritworld" (self plus 50 lbs. of objects only)
STATISTICS
Str 15, Dex 17, Con 14, Int 13, Wis 16, Cha 15
Base Atk +8; CMB +10; CMD 23
Feats Dodge, Great Fortitude, Nimble Moves, Power Attack
Skills Climb +13, Escape Artist +14, Knowledge (nature) +10, Knowledge (spirits) +6, Perception +14, Sense Motive +14, Stealth +14, Survival +14
Languages ???, speak with nature, telepathy 100 ft.
SQ merge with ward, ward (wild trees)
ECOLOGY
Environment any forest (Spiritworld)
Organization solitary, pair, or group (3–5)
Treasure standard
SPECIAL ABILITIES
Distracting Gaze (Su) Staggered for 1d4 rounds, 30 feet, Will DC 16 negates. This is a mind-affecting effect that requires the spriggan to be visible to those it wishes to affect. The save DC is Charisma-based.

A spriggan is a tall and gracefully build humanoid spirit that seems to be made entirely from branches and vines, with leaves covering much of its body. Their only facial feature is a pair of bright green or amber eyes. Spriggans are among the most powerful spirits that take physical shape and rank only behind nymphs in power. They don't like visitors in their parts of the forest and become highly agressive if anyone tries to approach their trees.

[Yora]

New PC Classes: Adept and Shaman

I think I never posted the new spellcasting classes, even though I had them pretty much finished and written up for quite some time. So here they are.

Adept
Role: The adept can fulfill a variety of different roles depending upon the spell choices he makes. Regardless of their choices, all adepts are masters of magic and capable of helping their allies against any danger.
Hit Die: d6.

{table=head]Level | BAB | Fort | Ref | Will | Special | SP/Day | Spells Known | Max. Spell Level
1st | +0 | +0 | +0 | +2 | Bonus feat | 2 | 3 | 1st
2nd | +1 | +0 | +0 | +3 | — | 6 | 5 | 1st
3rd | +1 | +1 | +1 | +3 | — | 11 | 7 | 2nd
4th | +2 | +1 | +1 | +4 | — | 17 | 9 | 2nd
5th | +2 | +1 | +1 | +4 | Bonus feat | 25 | 11 | 3rd
6th | +3 | +2 | +2 | +5 | — | 35 | 13 | 3rd
7th | +3 | +2 | +2 | +5 | — | 46 | 15 | 4th
8th | +4 | +2 | +2 | +6 | — | 58 | 17 | 4th
9th | +4 | +3 | +3 | +6 | — | 72 | 19 | 4th
10th | +5 | +3 | +3 | +7 | Bonus feat | 88 | 21 | 4th[/table]

Class Skills
The adept’s class skills are Craft (Int), Fly (Dex), Heal (Wis), Intimidate (Cha), Knowledge (arcana) (Int), Knowledge (nature) (Int), Knowledge (spirits) (Int), Profession (Wis), Spellcraft (Int), and Use Magic Device (Cha).
Skill Ranks per Level: 4 + Int modifier.

Class Features
The following are class features of the adept.
Weapon and Armor Proficiency: Adepts a are proficient with all simple weapons. They are not proficient with any type of armor or shield. Armor does not, however, interfere with the manifestation of spells.
Spell Points/Day: An adept’s ability to cast spells is limited by the spell points he has available. His base daily allotment of spell points is given on Table: The Adept. In addition, he receives bonus spell points per day if he has a high Intelligence score (see Table: Ability Modifiers and Bonus Spell Points). His race may also provide bonus spell points per day, as may certain feats and items.
Spells Known: An adept begins play knowing three spells of your choice. Each time he achieves a new level, he unlocks the knowledge of new spells.
Choose the spells known from the creation, elements, entropy, and spirit spell lists. An adept can cast any spell that has a spell point cost equal to or lower than his caster level.
The number of times an adept can cast spells in a day is limited only by his daily spell points.
An adept simply knows his spells; they are ingrained in his mind. He does not need to prepare them, though he must get a good night’s sleep each day to regain all his spent spell points.
The Difficulty Class for saving throws against adept spells is 10 + the spell’s level + the adept’s Intelligence modifier.
Maximum Spell Level Known: An adept begins play with the ability to learn 1st-level spells. As he attains higher levels, an adept may gain the ability to master more complex spells.
To learn or cast a spell, an adept must have an Intelligence score of at least 10 + the spell’s level.
Bonus Feats: An adept gains a bonus feat at 1st level, 5th level, and 10th level. This feat must be a metamagic feat, the Expanded Arcana feat, or the Magic Talent feat.
These bonus feats are in addition to the feats that a character of any class gains every other level. An adept is not limited to any of the feats listed here when choosing these other feats.

Shaman
Role: Shamans typically use their spells and revelations to further their understanding of their mystery and to protect their community, be it through fighting mighty battles or tending to the poor and sick.
Hit Dice: d8.

{table=head]Level | BAB | Fort | Ref | Will | Special | SP/Day | Spells Known | Max. Spell Level
1st | +0 | +0 | +0 | +2 | Mystery, revelation | 2 | 3 | 1st
2nd | +1 | +0 | +0 | +3 | — | 6 | 5 | 1st
3rd | +2 | +1 | +1 | +3 | Revelation | 11 | 7 | 2nd
4th | +3 | +1 | +1 | +4 | — | 17 | 9 | 2nd
5th | +3 | +1 | +1 | +4 | — | 25 | 11 | 3rd
6th | +4 | +2 | +2 | +5 | — | 35 | 13 | 3rd
7th | +5 | +2 | +2 | +5 | Revalation | 46 | 15 | 4th
8th | +6/+1 | +2 | +2 | +6 | — | 58 | 17 | 4th
9th | +6/+1 | +3 | +3 | +6 | — | 72 | 19 | 4th
10th | +7/+2 | +3 | +3 | +7 | — | 88 | 21 | 4th[/table]

Class Skills
The shaman’s class skills are Craft (Int), Diplomacy (Cha), Heal (Wis), Knowledge (history) (Int), Knowledge (spirits) (Int), Knowledge (religion) (Int), Profession (Wis), Sense Motive (Wis), and Spellcraft (Int). In addition, shamans receive additional class skills depending upon their shaman mystery.
Skill Ranks per Level: 4 + Int modifier.

Class Features
The following are the class features of the oracle.
Weapon and Armor Proficiency: Shamans are proficient with all simple weapons, light armor, and shields.
Power Points/Day: A shaman’s ability to cast spells is limited by the spell points he has available. His base daily allotment of spell points is given on Table: The Shaman. In addition, he receives bonus spell points per day if he has a high Wisdom score (see Table: Ability Modifiers and Bonus Spell Points). His race may also provide bonus spell points per day, as may certain feats and items.
Spells Known: A shaman begins play knowing three spells of your choice. Each time he achieves a new level, he unlocks the knowledge of new spells.
Choose the spells known from the creation, elements, entropy, and spirit spell lists. A shaman can cast any spell that has a spell point cost equal to or lower than his caster level.
The number of times a shaman can cast spells in a day is limited only by his daily spell points.
A shaman simply knows his spells; they are ingrained in his mind. He does not need to prepare them, though he must get a good night’s sleep each day to regain all his spent spell points.
The Difficulty Class for saving throws against shaman spells is 10 + the spell’s level + the shaman’s Wisdom modifier.
Maximum Spell Level Known: A shaman begins play with the ability to learn 1st-level spells. As he attains higher levels, a shaman may gain the ability to master more complex spells.
To learn or cast a spell, a shaman must have a Wisdom score of at least 10 + the spell’s level.
Mystery: Each shaman draws upon a divine force of nature to grant him powers and spells. This mystery also grants additional class skills and other special abilities. This mystery can represent a devotion to one ideal, prayers to deities that support the concept, or a natural calling to champion a cause. For example, a shaman with the waves mystery might have been born at sea and found a natural calling to worship the spirits of the oceans, rivers, and lakes, be they benign or malevolent. Regardless of its source, the mystery manifests in a number of ways as the shaman gains levels. A shaman must pick one mystery upon taking his first level of shaman. Once made, this choice cannot be changed.
Revelation: At 1st level, 3rd level, and 7th level, a shaman uncovers a new secret about his mystery that grants him powers and abilities. The shaman must select a revelation from the list of revelations available to his mystery. If a revelation is chosen at a later level, the shaman gains all of the abilities and bonuses granted by that revelation based on his current level. Unless otherwise noted, activating the power of a revelation is a standard action.

The mysteries available to shamans are the same as for oracles, except that a shaman does not get any additional spells known. Shamans still get the addtional class skills and can take any revelations for which they qualify.
The available mysteries are Flame (fire, sun), Heavens (moon), Life, Nature, Stone (earth), Waves (water, oceans, rivers, lakes), Wind (air, sky), and Darkness (not yet written up).

Bonus Spell Points by Caster Level
{table=head]Ability Score | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | 5th | 6th | 7th | 8th | 9th | 10th
10-11 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0
12-13 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 5
14-15 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10
16-17 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 6 | 7 | 9 | 10 | 12 | 13 | 15
18-19 | 2 | 4 | 6 | 8 | 10 | 12 | 14 | 16 | 18 | 20
20-21 | 2 | 5 | 7 | 10 | 12 | 15 | 17 | 20 | 22 | 25
22-23 | 3 | 6 | 9 | 12 | 15 | 18 | 21 | 24 | 27 | 30
24-25 | 3 | 7 | 10 | 14 | 17 | 21 | 24 | 28 | 31 | 35[/table]

[Grinner]

Comments and ideas are very much appreciated and welcome. The reason I am writing these things down in this thread is to get feedback on what people think about it. Even if it's just "I like this one" or "Could you give more details on that one", it will actually help me quite a lot. I know this is purely creative work and it's hard to tell someone that you don't like a certain thing and would leave it out, but don't be shy. This isn't colaborative worldbuilding or crowdsourcing, but not every idea I have is neccessarily a good one. If you think that I should take another look at some things because it looks odd to you, it could very well be that I missed something important myself or wrote down nonsense that I didn't really think through. Just speak even, even if it's just to let me know people are reading this.

Okay.

First, where did you get the idea for Ghost Paint? It's really cool.

Second, what program did you use to make that map?

Third, in the Harbor City of Elven Sorcerers section, you misspelled the word "tolerated". Additionally, that name seems a bit underwhelming. Perhaps there's a historical figure the city could be named after?

[Yora]

Like most people, I am rather bad at naming things.
I usually use placeholder descriptions and push the naming out until I am completely sure I will actually be using the location or organization.

The idea for ghost paint was a combination of images of drow from the Eberron setting and a type of psionic magic item, but also inspired by a tradition from Thailand or Malaysia, where people would have magic symbols tattooed on their bodies, which then would be charged with protective powers by a shaman for one year.

I think I did the map with GIMP, using a plugin called "HexMapper" or something like that. If you have GIMP, just search for "GIMP hex map plugin" and you should find it.

[Yora]

I am sorry, but more feats...

New Feats
I've come to the descision that metamgaic feats for adepts and shamans just work the same as for oracles and sorcerers, with the only difference that a metamagic spell costs them 2 additional power points instead of every additional level for a spell slot. Casting time is a full round action, but there is nothing like psionic focus.

Blood Magic
You can expand your spell point total at the expense of your health and gain access to the Blood Magic school of spells.
Prerequisite: Caster level 1st, Con 13.
Benefit: You can recover 2 spell points by taking 1 point of ability burn damage to each of your three physical ability scores: Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution. You can recover additional spell points for a proportional cost to Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution. These recovered points are added to your spell point reserve as if you had gained them by resting overnight. Ability burn recovers like ability damage through natural healing, but can never be restored through magical means.
You also gain access to the Blood Magic school. If you can learn new spells on the level at which you take this feat, you can immediately pick blood magic spells as your new known spells.
Special: Only living creatures can use this feat.

Expanded Arcana
Your research has revealed new spells.
Prerequisites: Caster level 1st, see Special.
Benefit: Add one spell from your class's spell list to your list of spells known. This is in addition to the number of spells normally gained at each new level in your class. You may instead add two spells from your class's spell list to your list of spells known, but both of these spells must be at least one level lower than the highest level spell you can cast in that class. Once made, these choices cannot be changed.
Special: You can only take this feat if you possess levels in a class whose spellcasting relies on a limited list of spells known, such as the bard, oracle, and sorcerer.
You can gain Expanded Arcana multiple times.
This feat is from the Advanced Players Guide, but important enough to list it here.

Magic Training
You are trained in the basics of magic.
Prerequisite: Knowledge (arcana) 1 rank.
Benefit: You have received a basic initiation in magic, conferring upon you the designation of a spellcaster. As a spellcaster, you gain a reserve of 2 spell points and can take item creation feats and use scrolls and wands. (Your effective caster level is 0.) You do not, however, gain the ability to cast spells simply by virtue of having this feat.

Powerful Summons
Your summoned spirits and demons have more abilities.
Prerequsite: Caster level 1st.
Benefit: When you summon a spirit or a demon, you can give it one additional special ability from any menu that the creature currently has an ability from.

Summon Familiar
You call a small animal to you, with which you form a magical bond.
Prerequisites: Caster level 1st, Knowledge (arcana) 1 rank.
Benefit: You gain the ability to summon a familiar with an effective wizard level equal to your adept or shaman class level.

--

New Spell
I am not entirely sure if this should be a 4th level spell (available to 7th level adepts and shamans), or be replaced by a special spell-like abilitiy for all outsiders with the plane shift SLA.

Spirit Gateway
School creation
Level 4
Components V, S
Casting Time 1 standard action
Range personal
Target you, plus up to seven willing creatures joining hands
Duration instantaneous
Saving Throw Will negates
Spell Resistance yes
Spell Points 7

You move yourself and other creatures from the material world to the Spiritworld, or the other way round. As many as eight creatures can be affected by the spell at the same time. Due to the shifting nature of the Spiritworld, the spell does not always transport the targets of the spell to exactly the corresponding location in the other world. The chance to arrive directly on target is 70%. Otherwise the targets appear 6d10x100 feet in a random direction from their destination. Spirit gateway transports creatures instantaneously and then ends. The creatures need to find other means if they are to travel back (including casting spirit gateway again).
Augment For every additional spell point spent, the chance to arrive at the right destination increases by 5% (for a maximum of 95%).

[Yora]

Spell Lists

These are the spell lists organized by school. The Spell Focus and Greater Spell Focus feats apply to all spells of a school.

Spoiler

Show

Creation Spell List

1st Level Creation Spells
Beast Sight: Gain low-light vision, darkvision, or blindsight.
Entangling Vines: Vegetation entangles everyone in the area.
Faerie Fire: Outlines invisible creatures.
Grease: Makes surface or item slippery.
Heal: Heals hit point damage.
Jump: +10 enhancement bonus to Acrobatics checks to jump.
Light: Object sheds light like a torch.
Speak with Nature: Allows you to communicate with animals, plants, and rocks.
Summon Spirit: Summons a spirit for fight for you.

2nd Level Creation Spells
Alter Self: Assume form of a Small or Medium humanoid.
Resist Energy: Grants energy resistance 10 against one type of energy damage.
Restoration: Heals the effects of diseases and poisons.
Spirit of Fury: +1 morale bonus to attack and damage rolls.
Spirit of Warding: +1 bonus to AC and saving throws.
Strength of the Beast: +4 bonus to Strength, Dexterity, or Constitution.
Thicken Skin: Grants natural armor bonus.
Web: Creates a web of sticky strands.
Wood Shape: Reshapes dead or living wood into a desired form.

3rd Level Creation Spells
Beast Shape: You take the form and some of the powers of an animal.
Remove Affliction: Removes disease or poison.
Water Breathing: Subjects can breath underwater.

4th Level Creation Spells
Spirit Gateway: You and up to seven additional creature travel to the Spiritworld.

Elements Spell List

1st Level Elements Spells
Blast of Water: Bull Rush enemies with a blast of water.
Featherfall: Slows descent and reduces falling damage.
Fog Cloud: Creates a thick cloud of fog that grants concealment.
Ray of Cold: Ray deals 1d6 or more points of cold damage.
Ray of Electricity: Ray deals 1d6 or more points of electricity damage.
Ray of Fire: Ray deals 1d6 or more points of cold damage.

2nd Level Elements Spells
Cone of Cold: Cone deals 3d6 or more points of cold damage.
Cone of Flames: Cone deals 3d6 or more points of fire damage.
Control Air: You have control over wind speed and direction.
Earth Walk: Allows you to climb on stone walls with ease.
Gust of Wind: A strong wind knocks down and blows away small creatures and objects.
Lightning Arcs: Deals 3d6 or more points of electricity damage to a group of enemies.

3rd Level Elements Spells
Fireball: Deals 5d6 points of fire damage within 20-ft. spread.
Lightning Bolt: Deals 5d6 points of electricity damage in 120-ft. line.
Stone Shape: Reshapes stone and earth into a desired form.
Wall of Fire: Creates a wall of fire that deals 2d6 points of damage to nearby creatures.
Wind Wall: Wall of wind deflects missiles and blocks surrounding wind conditions.

4th Level Elements Spells
Fly: Fly through the air for 1 minute/level.

Entropy Spell List

1st Level Entropy Spells
Fear: Causes targets to become frightened for 1d4 rounds.
Sleep: Makes creatures fall asleep.

2nd Level Entropy Spells
Cloak of Shadows: Shadows grant you concealment.
Darkness: Creates a region of magical darkness.
Vulnerability to Energy: Doubles damage from energy attacks.
Weakness: Target takes –4 on attack rolls, or –2 if he makes the save.

3rd Level Entropy Spells
Hold: Holds target paralyzed, allows a save every round to escape.
Vulnerability to Weapons: Double damage from weapons.

4th Level Entropy Spells
Bestow curse: Bestows several penalties to target.

Spirit Spell List

1st Level Spirit Spells
Detect Magic: Detect magic auras from spells and items.
Charm: Makes a creature your friend.
Daze: Target loses next action.
Illusory Image: Creates a simple illusion.
Magic Weapon: Gives a magical enhancement bonus to weapon.
Remove Fear: Grants new saving throw against fear effects and +4 bonus on saves against further fear effects.

2nd Level Spirit Spells
Invisibility: Makes you or another creature invisible.
Read Thoughts: Allows you to read surface thoughts.
Suggestion: Implants hypnotic command in a creature.

3rd Level Spirit Spells
Dispel Magic: Dispels magic effects.
Stunning Blast: Stuns targets in 20-ft. cone.

4th Level Spirit Spells
Dominate: Controls the mind of one creature.
Ethereal Form: Target becomes incorporeal for 1 round/level.

Blood Spell List

2nd Level Blood Spells
Rend Flesh: Foe takes 2d6 damage.
Share Pain: Subject takes some of your damage.
Share Life Energy: Target heals 2d10 points of damage, you take half the amount as damage.

3rd Level Blood Spells
Drain Life Energy: You heal up to 50 points of damage, target takes equal amount of damage.

4th Level Blood Spells
Control Body: Takes control of corpse or living creatures body.

Fel Spell List

1st Level Fel Spells
Summon Demon: Summons a demon to fight for you.

2nd Level Fel Spells
Animate Corpses: Temporarily animates nearby corpses as skeletons and zombies.

Creation, Elements, and Spirit spells are looking great, but Entropy and Blood magic are still quite empty, and there barely is anything for Fel magic. Any ideas?

For fel magic, I think a good theme might be, that there is an infinite amount of energy in the Void and you could cast fel spells all day without ever running out of power, but it's an unnatural energy that corrupts everything it comes in contact with, including the spellcaster who casts the spells. Maybe I make a feat that lets a Fel magic caster take Taint damage, instead of paying spell points. But there should also be four or five more spells that do things that can only be done with fel magic. And I'm not so sure what that could be.

[Yora]

With great pride do I present to you a first version of

The Ancient Lands Player Character Reference Guide

Probably still full of errors, still missing the flavor text for the races, and the sections on Honor and Taint, but this is pretty much it.
The reference guide is intended to include everything you need to create PC and NPCs if you are familiar with Pathfinder. Meterial from pretty much any other book can also be used, but the options presented in the guide should cover about everything you would need for a moderatly optimized campaign.

[Yora]

Just a small idea that's been in my head these last days. Instead of making the river that separates the temperate forest in the north from the subtropical jungle in the south just run through a big valley, I think I am going to turn it into a huge canyon. Since it's the best way to get from the sea east of the Ancient Lands to the plains in the west, there could be all kinds of old ruins left in the area, and of course there would be lots of bandits and raiders to attack the caravans passing through. It also happens to be the area where I wanted to do something with "wild elves".
Still just a rough idea, but I think this could be something really cool.

[Grinner]

Just a small idea that's been in my head these last days. Instead of making the river that separates the temperate forest in the north from the subtropical jungle in the south just run through a big valley, I think I am going to turn it into a huge canyon. Since it's the best way to get from the sea east of the Ancient Lands to the plains in the west, there could be all kinds of old ruins left in the area, and of course there would be lots of bandits and raiders to attack the caravans passing through. It also happens to be the area where I wanted to do something with "wild elves".
Still just a rough idea, but I think this could be something really cool.

I think there were Native American tribes that built their homes into the sides of cliffs...I can't remember their names, but I'm pretty sure they used adobe in the construction of their homes...

Edit: Pueblo! That's it! They were called the Pueblo.

Relevant Wikipedia articles:

• Ancient Pueblo Peoples
• Ancient dwellings of the Pueblo peoples

[Yora]

Havn't really been updating in a while, but I think sharing the current state of the major settlements might be interesting. Some people who have been following me for a while may recognize some of the ideas here.

Major Settlements of the Ancient Lands

City of the Kaas Tribes: In the far northwest of the Ancient Lands lies the only major city inhabited by kaas. Located in the open sub-arctic plains and marshes, the settlement is situated among and on top of a group of hills, which make it a natural site for settlement. No single clan has full control over the city, which serves as a central market for the many clans and family groups that inhabit the plains, forests, and hills of this cold land.
The city itself consists of mostly of relatively small wooden houses as one can find in many villages and small towns, but his home to about 6,000 people at any time. Four of the major local clans have small keeps sitting atop the larger hills, which are surrounded by wooden pallisades.
(Think of something like a huge Mongol tent camp, but permanent.)

Northern Elven City: Several hundred miles to the east of the kaas city, located in the hills between the tall mountains to the north and the vast marshes to the south, lies a large fortress inhabited by one of the local elven clans. While far smaller and less powerful than the greater realms in the south, the ruler of the city is called a queen, as she is by far the single most powerful leader in all of the Northlands. The city sits protected by three taller peaks on every side and has an open view on the marshes below to the southeast. A paved road leads up a narrow valley to the fortress walls, which is very well defended and makes it incredibly difficult to assault the city by force. The city is home to about 6,500 elves.

Elven Trade City: In the very east of the Northlands lies the northernmost port city of the inner sea. It is located several dozen miles from the sea and sits on the shore of one of the countless large lakes of the region, which are connected by river both to each other and to the sea. No clan rules over the city and it is instead gverened by a council of rich and powerful merchants. The city itself consists of winding narrow streets flaned by tall and narrow houses that are often three stories or even more in height. It's a major center of trade for the region, but with the relatively sparse population of the surrounding area, it's still barely more than a large town. Only about half of the 5,500 inhabitants are elves, with gnomes, humans, and kaas making up the rest.
(This city could also be anywhere in the eastern Baltic Sea region, like Finnland, Latvia, or Poland.)

Sorcerer City: Several hundred miles south of the Trade City lies one of the richest and most powerful realms of the Ancient Lands. The Sorcerer City is located at the base of a tall cliff and home to about 15,000 people, most of them elves. A large flat platform above halfway up the cliffside is home to an additional 3,000 people, who make up the cities aristocracy. In addition to being one of the major centers of trade, the city is also well known for its sorcerers, who not only practice their magical studies in the open, but also wield significant power and influence in the cities politics.
Except for trading ships, the city is not particularly welcomming of strangers, and visitors are mostly confined to the harbor.

Elven Forest City: The next major city from the Sorcerer City lies about 200 miles to the west and to the south, inside the large forest that dominates most of the northern Ancient Lands. With a population of 9,500 people, it is still one of the larger cities of the Ancient Lands, but the houses are spread out over a relatively large area with lots of old and massive trees found throughout the whole settlement. While several clans share the government of the city, the main power lies with the druids, a group of powerful shamans who have no ties to any individual clans. The druids are very strong opponents of warlocks and anyone persuing sorcery, which puts them at permanent odds with the sorcerer city. The last war between the two powers has been well over a century ago, but their agents are still deeply engaged in the hidden conflict.

Gnome Forest City: Less than a weeks travel from the city of the elven druids, one of the Ancient Lands gnomes major settlements is located inside a massive cave that is open to the surface on the south side. The roof of the cave is supported by numerous large natural pillars, some several dozens or even over a hundred meters in diameter. Inside the cave, stone houses are build into the cave walls and cover the cave floor, with several large mansions and small castles among them.
The city is home to about 8,000 gnomes and a few other inhabitants, who are ruled by a queen, who is also the head shaman of the tribe.

Gnome Mountain City: Somewhere in the northern parts of the Ancient Lands (not quite yet sure where to put it) lies the largest known settlement of gnomes anywhere in the world. It is located underground inside a mountain and consists of about a dozen large caverns of various sizes, which have the homes and workshops carved into the cave walls. Below the city lies a huge network of mines, and the city is by far the greatest producer of iron and steel anywhere in the Ancient Lands. The gnomes sell both weapons and armor, as well as unfinished steel ingots to places all over the Ancient Lands, but their prices are steep and the amount of steel that is exported in any given period of time is closely regulated by the cities king and the ruling council.
At about 15,000 people, it is one of the largest cities in the Ancient Lands.

Crystal City: (Yes, this one is back.) Not far from where the great river, that devides the Ancient Lands in a northern and southern half, reaches the sea, a large city is located inside a series of caves that are open to the waters. The caves have been formed from massive sinkholes in the cliffs and most of them are open to the sky to let in air and light.
The city is located near the great river, which is the primary trade route between the Ancient Lands and the Western Realms, as well as on the coast of the inner sea, which sees most travel from the northern ports to the southern ports. As such, it's the most bussiest port with one of the most diverse populations. The 20,000 inhabitants of the city are highly mixed, consisting of 40% humans, 25% wood elves, 20% gnomes, 5% dark elves, and considerable minorities of lizardfolk, kaas, and even some nezumi and undines.
While the city is governed by a council, the real power resides in one of the cities deepest caverns. A large formation of rare crystals, that are virtually uncorruptable by taint, is the home to seven demons that have voluntarily trapped themselves inside the crystal to contain their corrupting effect on the material world and its creatures. Though alien in mind, these demons are not looking for destruction, but have instead come to develop an appreciation of the natural world and desire to preotect it from other demons who show no such constraint. The demons use their power and their knowledge to help train a large number of demon hunters, who seek out all demons who spread Taint in the material world, and anyone who assists them.

Human Hill City: The city is located on an ancient site that has been home to numerous settlements in the past, but the current inhabitants moved into the site just a century ago. Located in the center of a large formation of rocky hills, the city is a natural fortress that is easy to defend and soon became a popular resting point for caravans bringing goods from the Western Realms over the land route instead of using the river and sea. Eventually, the site and the old ruins that covered it, where claimed by a human chief who never had pledged himself and his clan to any specific elven lord, to create his own domain in what had long been considered a worthless wasteland. But with caravans passing through the area on regular basis, the natural fortress has become a location of great strategic importance. While the position of chief has always been changing hands on a pretty regular basis, leadership is firmly in the hand of a single clan, who has managed to keep any other human clans or eleven lords from taking it from them.

Dark Elven Port The southernmost of the major ports on the inner sea is located in the southern half of the Ancient Lands and inhabited primarily by dark elves. At 12,000 people, it's one of the largest cities of the Ancient Lands. Unlike most dark elves, who pride themselves greatly on their independence and self-reliance and generally avoid trade with outsiders, the ruling clans of the port city have been very open to adopt new ways to create weapons and armor and to efficiently govern a large city based primarily on trade.

Jungle City: More than two weeks of travel through the jungle, southwest of the Dark Elven Port, lies the ancient temple city of the dark elves, which has been one of the main cultural and religious centers of most dark elven tribes and clans for countless generations. Most of the cities larger buildings are ancient ruins that had been abandoned by their original inhabitants thousands of years ago, but everything that can be said for certain is that they were not build by naga. The city itself is more of a collection of relatively mundane villages build inside massive courtyards or ruined palaces and impresses mostly through sheer size than by any cultural achivements. Most of the cities 7,500 dark elves belong to a single tribe, which is ruled by a queen known to be a both ancient and very poweful shaman.

Sun Lizard City:Some distance east of the jungles inhabited primarily by dark elves, lies a large region that is the ancestral home of the lizardfolk. Near the center of the city lies an ancient naga city that is now ruled by a powerful lizardfolk king and a council of high priests of the Sun. The city was the site of one of the first rebellions against the naga by their lizardfolk slaves, and the victory was attributed primarily to the magical powers of the shamans who led the rebellion. To this very day, the lizardfolk consider the Sun to be the supreme ruler of their kingdom, whith the king being merely a regent appointed by the high priests. While the kingdom rules only over a fraction of the lizardfolk inhabiting the southern Ancient Lands, the Sun King is ususally considered to be the single most powerful ruler anywhere in the Ancient Lands and at 24,000 inhabitants, the city even dwarfs the Crystal City and the Sorcerer City in the northern Ancient Lands.

Naga City: While the power of the naga has greatly diminished since the end of the Age of Spirits 4,000 years ago, they still have significant control over large parts of the eastern sections of the great jungles in the Southern Ancient Lands. Not much is know about most of their remaining strongholds, as few are welcomming to any visitors. One of the cities is a notable excetption and frequently engages in trade with the humanoid tribes and kingdoms of the Ancient Lands. Few captains have ever sailed to this remote port and even though the naga pay very well, most traders prefer to stay in less dangerous waters. Outnumbered by their lizardfolk slaves more than ten to one, the city still boasts a large population of about 9,000 individuals.

--

I am quite happy with this arangement in general, but there is of course still need for much more detail. Any thoughts, ideas, or suggestions are very much wellcome as they might give me some inspirations on how to expand on them.

[Yora]

Themes and Worldviews
I had some canceled classes today and spend the time working out the details about the thematic focus of the setting some more. Some of this is old, other things are new.

View of the Cosmos
Very few people know anything about the Void and most havn't ever even heard that name, but it is a very common believe among all the humanoid peoples that the Material World of the Ancient Lands and the Spiritworld are not the only worlds and neither the first. Nobody really knows how this knowledge first came to be discovered, but it is most likely that it was told to the earliest shamans by ancient spirits. (The Great Ancients of the Underworld might even remember the earliest days of this world.) The number of worlds is considered infinite, and that does not just include other stars and planets. There are whole other universes out there and new ones come into existance as old ones disappear for all eternity. In practice, this is entirely hypothetical knowledge, since nobody has ever seen or made contact with any of these other worlds. But from this derives a very important fact that shapes the worldview of people in the Ancient Lands to a great degree. Not only did this world have a beginning, it will also have an end. How long a universe will last, or the stars and planets inside them, is not known, but it is universally agreed that it is an unimaginable long time with the end still an incredibly amount of time in the future.
But based on this, people know with certainty that nothing ever is eternal, except for possibly the Void itself. And with many older elves having seen new islands rise from the sea and major rivers shift their course, even mountains and the stars are understood to be temporary things. The most important lesson taken from this for most people, is that their own cultures, with migrating peoples and constantly changing alliances and kingdoms, are not going to last forever. And are in fact particularly vulnerable to disasters and major disruptions. As a result, great importance is given to the ancestors and founders of any give clan or kingdom. The shared connection to this founder is what defines a clan or a realm in the eyes of the people (though in practice these connections can be of a highly ideological nature). With it comes a certain sense of fatalism. Everyone who builds a new farm or founds a new village does so with the knowledge that it will last for maybe ten or twelve generations, but possibly even not much longer than their own lives. But since virtually everyone grews up with that knowledge, it is genrally not considered anything particularly dreadful. It's just a simple fact of live as a humanoid mortal, that the landscape of the world slowly changes over time and that any signs of humanoid settlement will eventually be swept away by the wilderness. However, there is no real sense of conquering the wilds and making the forces of nature subjects to humanoid will. Any such attempt would be folly and a waste of effort and resources. Instead, it is considered much better to create places where the people currently alive have an easy time to grow and hunt food, and are protected from weather and wild beasts. It is good to work hard to create a save home for ones children and grandchildren, but having goals that reach even more into the future are mostly nonsensical.

The meaning of Fate
The common believe is that every person has a free will, but there are few moments in anyones life when a descision will really have a great impact on the future. One might chose to buy a fish instead of a rabbit, or to go to a tavern instead of sitting at the river, but it won't change ones fate or that of anyone else in almost all cases. Because of this, there are limited ways to predict a persons future. A seer can not see into the future, but the present does reveal more to them than to other people, and often can they predict with quite considerable accuracy how certain events will turn out. But in every persons life, there are a few moments in which even a small and seemingly unimportant descision will change everything. Usually mostly for themselves, but sometimes for whole villages, clans, or even entire regions. People who are aware when they are at such crossroads are considered greatly gifted, but not all of them also have the insight to know what results any of their choices will bring. Sometimes powerful spirits recognize that a person will have to make such an important descision but will also most likely pick a choice that will result in great suffering for anyone involved. Such people are considered cursed.
Seers and spirits can reveal to people what their immediate future will hold for them, and that they will come to such a situation where they will have to make a descision of great importance. But what exactly will result from that choice is almost impossible to determine in advance. (Not only is this a great way to deal with fate and divinations in an RPG, it can also be used as a tool by GMs when designing campaigns. In practice, most minor choices of the PCs won't affect the plot of the adventure, but quite often there will be different possible paths that a GM has prepared and it's left open to the players actions which one will actually happen. By using oracles and premonitions, this can be taken from the metagame and made part of the game itself.)

Duty and Responsibility to the Clan
In the Ancient Lands, there are no real states and even the few kingdoms are more formalized alliances of clan chiefs without written law codes and clearly defined separations of power. The primary unit of society is the clan. The members of a clan protect each other against attacks from the outside, as there is strength in numbers. But even if a crime is commited against a member of the clan, all the other clan members have to make sure that they are not considered weak and easy targets. As a result, every crime must be avenged. It is not about fairness, retribution, or reparation, but a basic neccessity to show everyone that any attacks against this clan will result in harsh retaliation. If any crime goes unavenged, it is just an invitation for other bandits and hostile clans.
Showing unity to others and participating in the defense and protection of other clanmembers is vital to survival. Even if you don't like your neighbor, you have to stand with him against attackers from outside, because otherwise you make yourself and your own family a target for the next attack in the future. There is usually some degree of wrigling room, when it comes to take sides in a conflict. There is never just the black and white choice of either being loyal to your clan or betraying it. But in situations where things are not entirely clear, supporting ones clan is much more important in the Ancient Lands than it is in the modern world. Sometimes outsiders have to be sacrificed to protect members of ones own clan, even if one would side with the other group if both or neither were part of ones own clan. Not just the players, also their characters don't have to like making such descisions. But in the Ancient Lands, loyalty to ones own clan is not only a philosophical or moral idea, but a neccessary element of protecting ones own friends and family. Because of this, almost any character who is not an outcast or hermit, should have have his own clan as one of his three allegiances. A highborn or clansman with no such allegiance would be a noteworthy exception from the norm, that should be part of what defines the characters personalty.

Loyalty to the Chief
A great part of what makes a clan strong and able to protect and avenge its people, is unity and obedience to a common leader. Disobeying the chief is not only breaking the loyalty to him, but also a violation of the duty towards the clan, since it makes the whole clan weaker. But at the same time, the position of chief is an appointed and elected office, not a right of property or divine will. It is simply customary that a son or nephew of the old chief is the most able person for the job, as he has assited with leading the clan for many years (and shares all the wealth and political power of his family).
The chief also has a duty to his clan to lead it successfully. If a chief ever takes actions that threaten or severely weaken the clan, he himself is breaking his duty and betraying the clan. In such a situation, it is the duty of the people of the clan to remove such a traitor from power. Ideally, loyalty to the clan ranks above loyalty to the chief (that means, its allegiance is ranked higher), but very often this is not the case and the chiefs most loyal companions and retainers will continue to support and protect him even when his rule becomes unpopular.

Warrior Duties and Honorable Battle
While warriors who fall in battle are highly praised and honored, the actual ideal of a warrior is to serve his clan and protect him, not to be killed by a weapon instead of age or sickness. Dying an inglorious death is not considered a shame as long as the warriors always gave all he had while he still had the ability to do so. Seeking a death that makes for a glorious story is even frowned upon, if the warrior could have escaped alive and continued to serve his clan for many more years.
But defending the clan always comes first and if a warrior can serve his clan better by facing certain death than saving his life, this is considered the ultimate service to the clan.

[Yora]

Solving the Jedi Problem
I've been talking about this before some time ago. Basically, when you allow warriors to have magic powers, why do these warriors not always outshine everyone else? And in Star Wars that's exactly what the Jedi do. But Ancient Lands is supposed to be relatively low-magic, and lots of magic warriors being the champions of every army won't do. But I don't want to simply not have magical warriors at all either. They are just too cool for this.
So what I came up with is this. The role of fighters who have some adept levels would be similar to that of monks, or more specifically of Sohei as in Oriental Adventures or the PF archetype. Of course, player characters don't have to conform to that, as they can be some of the rare exceptions. This is more for the world in general and the creation of NPCs. These magic warriors do not neccessarily form a hierachical order, but are still a distinct tradition in which teachers train their students over many years, instead of it just being some skill that normal warriors just picked up somewhere. They are mostly fighters and have only two or three levels in the adept class.

I've been spending some thoughts on reflecting it in their stats that magic warriors are not just plain better than normal warriors, and I think it works resonably well.
Since adepts are based on psionics, there is no arcane spell failure and casting spells in armor is not an issue. Adepts need Intelligence, but fighters need at least Strength and Constitution, plus some Dexterity as well. There simply won't be the point to get Intelligence very high and as I have planned it, there are no spells like foxs cunning, owls wisdom, and eagles splendor and no magic items that replicate them. So dipping into adept levels means low save DCs and a rather small pool of spell points. With two levels in adept and Intelligence 13, a character has only 7 sp, and at 6th or 7th level, that is nothing. You can do some cool stunts with that, but it won't really replace your attacks with weapons and your armor. And I think the Practiced Spellcaster feat should not be available in an Ancient Lands campaign. It can give a quite nice bump in spell points and the ability to augment spells four levels higher is a rather significant bost. Which I think such characters don't need.

With low spell points and barely any augmentation options, shoting fire and lightning would be simply a very poor choice and it would be much smarter to focus on spells that buff your combat abilities, like cloak of shadows, jump, thicken skin, or featherfall. Magic warriors could still learn cone of flames or illusory image, but NPCs of this archetype wouldn't usually do that.
If you don't have stuff like fly, dimension door, hold person, or stone skin, I don't think it would appear implausible that really well trained mundane warriors can still beat them up badly. Magic would be a slight edge for which they have to trade attack bonuses and damage bonuses, which in the 5th to 8th level range with few magic items wouldn't be trivial.

Mythic Adventure Rules
Mythic Adventures is going to be released in a month and I just took a peak at the playtest version from last november. It's an interesting concept. In addition to class levels, which are advanced by gaining XP, there are also mythic paths which are advanced by performing a certain number of impressive heroics. By advancing the tiers of your mythic path, you gain bonus feats, ability increases, and a bunch of special abilites that are not dependant on your class levels.
How a character starts a mythic path is left to the GM for the specifics of any given campaign. I think it could be an interesting option to let any PC or NPC that reaches the maximum level of 10th automatically ascend to mythic status as well. From that point on, they would no longer get any XP (as PF doesn't really have any ways to lose XP), but might still ocasionally qualify for additional mythic tiers by performing the neccessary heroic acts. Characters get no hit dice, skill ranks, or increasing saving throws though, which is somewhat similar to E6. I'll have to see how the final rules will turn out when they are released next month, and maybe it won't really be worth it to deal with this hazzle. But since mythic rules can easily added to any running campaign at any point, a small sidebard that says "if your campaign reaches 10th level, consider having the PCs ascend to mythic status as a way to allow for continued character advancement".

The Marshal path might be great for the Lord General of the Warrior Order, and the King of the Lizardfolk Empire would be a great Guardian, being a divinely appointed protector of his people.

[Yora]

Turns out I can take the big and quite difficult Japanese exam next semester, so I now can again spend more time working on the setting.

Something that might be of interest to some of you, is that the rules from Ultimate Combat are now in the PRD. Of which I want to include the Downtime system (building a stronghold), Honor, and the Kingdom and Army rules as part of the setting.

Honor will be included by default and part of NPC stat blocks, but still be an optional choice for every individual player character.

Regarding the Army rules nothing will really be much different in the Ancient Lands, but I might write up stat blocks for some common troop units that are often found in the setting, as a quick reference for GMs and player.

For the Kingdom rules, I've already wrote up a revised list of buildings you can build in the Ancient Lands, with the addition of some new ones. Now that the complete rules are openly accessible, I'll probably do another clean writeup of those this weekend, so everything is in order and you can read them within the context of the rules and tell me your impressions.
And maybe, I'll also get the new Honor codes done.

[Sythirius]

Thanks for posting this great thread, I've been looking at a lot of your stuff with great delight.

Lately, I've been designing a setting in the bronze age as well, and I will pretty surprised at the similarities between our work, though yours has a lot more development, and a lot of differences from mine.

Biggest difference is probably my strong focus on a very harsh world (using an improvised wound points system), and heavily revised classes.

[Yora]

Thanks, that's always the best kind of reply one can get.

Having had two weeks to think about it, I still really like the list for major cities (#106). And usually I scrap such things after two days because it doesn't really fit the original vision I had. But I think this one can now considered to be finalized.
Also, I havn't really made any changes to the set of main power groups that are fighting with each other about things other than territory and trade. The list from last year (#32) has only slightly changed. The Shadow Druids are no longer a major faction, though I still intend to have them stick around as a radical branch of the general druid group.
New are the demon hunters, who are based on the underground port city in the central region of the Ancient Lands, and the order of hermits. The hermits are a movement that rejects clans and backgrounds, and instead follows an ideology of equality of all people. Often quite radically and without compromise, but they have very strong loyalty to each other, which makes them a major faction. Very losely based on early buddhists and muslims with a rather strong communist leaning. Effectively, they are a single massive clan that is spread all over the Ancient Lands without any true homeland. If their interest match with those of local clans, they can be a really poweful ally. If their interest conflict, they become a major problem than the other clans can't ignore.

With races, geography, major cities, and main organizations set, I'd say this is no longer just a style concept or a campaign model. I would say we have ourselves now an actual distinct campaign setting!
Or as they say in video game development, an early alpha build. Still far from finished, but now the foundation and the frame is standing. From here on, it's all details.
Yay!

[Yora]

This is basically a repost of something I found in the old thread, that hasn't really changed much. I only updated it slightly to accomodate what minor differences there have come to be in the meantime.

Elves
The elves are one of the humanoid races that inhabit the Ancient Lands. Along with the lizardfolk, they established many of the first and oldest humanoid civilizations in the known world.

Physical Description
Elves and humans share a great resemblance when compared to other races and can in fact be mistaken for one another at a distance or by people not familiar with either race. Elves typically stand between 5'6" and 5'10" in height and of noticeably slender build. Elven muscle structure is noticeably more dense than humans, which tends to obscure an elves actual physical strength and makes even very strong elves appear very lean. While highly agile, the lack of fat and low body mass puts elves at greater risk from long term exertions, exposure to cold, poisons, and malnutrition, which is the cause for the elven reputation of weakness and frailty. However, this does not translate into a lack of physical strength and many elves are quite capable at hand to hand combat. However, as they tire faster than humans, kass, or even gnomes, elves prefer to not draw fights and battles out and make decisive strikes or retreat.

On shorter distances, the differences between elves and humans become more noticeable. Compared to humans, elves have pointed and slightly elongated ears, which usually are a dead giveaway, but also the easiest part to conceal. Elven faces are usually more narrow and have less prominent features, like short noses, thin eyebrows, and narrow lips. Only noticeable at very short distances is that elven eyes have relatively larger irises and show less white, making them appear slightly more animal-like.

A well known trait of elves, that get frequently exaggerated, is their comparatively long life span. It is not uncommon for elves to live over 300 years before they succumb to old age, but given the long time span, the majority dies at an earlier age from accidents, injuries, or disease or from generally failing health caused by hardships at an earlier age. Elves are regarded adults at age 24 and aging significantly slows down during their 30s. It's usually when reaching ages over 200 years that the age of elves truly starts to show, with graying hair, aging skin, and slowly diminishing endurance. However, only the few truly ancient elves show signs in age as commonly seen in humans that live for more than 70 years before they reach the natural end of their lifespan. Judging an elves age is quite difficult for non-elves and even among themselves elves mostly use hints from small differences in clothing and speech, and the behavior to other elves of known age, to discern the generational differences between elven strangers. Age doesn't play such an important role in elven society than it does among other races, which usually only recognizes children under 16, youths under 32, adults, and elders who have lived for over 200 years. Age differences between adults barely play any role and close friendships and marriages with over 100 years of age difference are quite common. Elves encountered outside the lands of their clans are usually at least in their late 30s or 40s.

Elves do in fact have as many children as humans, but often with much greater time spans between births and it's not uncommon for elves to have uncles and aunts younger than themselves.

Elves possess a remarkable sense of perception, which manifests in heightened hearing shared only by gnomes, and the ability to see without difficulty in only very dim light.

Wood Elves
Most elves living in the Barbarian Lands are wood elves, but are usually simply referred to as elves by most people outside the southern jungles. Wood elves generally have lightly tanned skin and hair ranging in colors from dark brown to almost black, though lighter browns and shades of blond and green are common among the Moreshin. Wood elves most commonly have green eyes or occasionally brown. In the northern parts of the Ancient Lands, gray eyes also occur, with blue being exceptionally rare and often attributed to fey ancestry.

Dark Elves
In southern Jungles, most elves one encounters belong to the dark elves. The most striking difference to wood elves is their dark skin, which ranges through several shades of ash gray, that sometimes even reaches to charcoal black in some clans. In stark contrast, dark elven hair is often, white, silver, and very pale blond, but a bluish gray is also not uncommon. Dark elven hunters, who usually hunt at dusk and night, often dye their hair dark to better blend in with their surroundings. The eyes of dark elves most commonly have the same shades of green found among wood elves, but red, purple, and blue also appearing frequently in some family lines.

Dark Elves are semi nocturnal and are mostly active from noon until deep into the night. Their ability to see in darkness is even much greater than that of wood elves, but they are also slightly sensitive to bright light and either live in areas with very thick foliage overhead or remain inside until the sun is low on the horizon. Some dark elves, especially the Keiyashei, even live mostly underground and only come to the surface when absolutely necessary.

Culture and Society
Many of the unique and unusual aspects of elven culture are closely connected to elven longevity. As age differences among siblings often span decades, families are usually small and elven children form much closer bonds with others of similar age, with which they grow up together. These childhood friendships are often the most important relationships of elves, right after their parents, and usually rank higher than the bonds of blood. Once elves reach their mid thirties, they stop visibly aging for almost two centuries, which makes it almost impossible to tell an elves age even for other elves. As a result, age plays a much smaller role in elven society than for any other race and only true elders, who have lived well over two hundred years, are treated with any kind of special respect and reverence. Instead, personal ability becomes a much larger factor in determining social hierarchy. Elves take great pride in their crafts, as it determines their social standing.

While elves are well aware of the changes in perspective and ideals as they become older and new generations follow, this is a fairly slow and gradual shift. In practice, even age differences of forty or sixty years are not considered great enough to be an obstacle to friendships and romantic relationships, and even much larger time spans are not regarded as something improper. As a result, it is a common experience for elves to see their friends and spouses become elders and eventually die of age while they still have more than half of their own life ahead of them. And that is in addition to the numerous dangers that all people in the Ancient Lands face on a daily basis. To elves, this is simply a part of life. Over the span of up to three centuries, an elf does not attempt to live a single life, but in his lifetime will leave an old life behind and begin a new one several times. As a side effect, elven villages and especially towns frequently gain new residents that become part of the community and are much less stable than communities of other races. The one exception to this fact of elven life are the childhood friendships, which are the most stable and long lasting relationships among elves. While even elves change greatly over the span of more than twenty decades, the connection of being the only people from their childhoods that are still alive is extremely strong for elven elders. Many elves who feel that it is time to permanently settle down for the last station of their life return to their birth places to find any traces of their friends from their childhood who are still alive. This strong bond between many elven elders is also a part why they are regarded with special reverence. Often it is only two or three who find back together, and with the other elders, who share similar experiences, they form their own small segments of society within a community, which nobody who hasn't reached that stage of life yet can fully understand. While elders are usually not active leaders, it is no surprise that they wield very great powers, both because of the special reverence they are shown and the exclusivity of their group.

While gender roles exist in elven society, they are usually much less pronounced than in other cultures. While certain professions have clear tendencies to be performed by either men or women and there are slight differences in male and female dress, gender is much less of a barrier for elves to find their chosen calling and there is generally a rather high tolerance for deviations from the average. Given the great variations in upbringing and experiences among members of an elven communities, certain eccentricities are also very much permitted and rarely cause for ostracism as long as it doesn't upset the common peace.

[Yora]

Gnomes
Gnomes are one of the major humanoid races that inhabit the Ancient Lands. While they are both short in stature and small in numbers, they play a comparatively major role in the affairs of the taller people.

Physical Description
Gnomes have similar statures to humans and elves but stand noticeably shorter at less than four feet. With their round faces and noses, their heads appear proportionally bigger in relation to their body, and they are usually somewhat stout and broad shouldered in stature, which clearly makes them stand apart from human children. Gnomes have light brown skin in shades of earth or clay, brown or gray eyes, and brown hair, while males grow short beards. Like elves, gnomes have slightly pointed ears, but this is usually much less pronounced and less notable.

Despite their small size and lack of physical strength, gnomes possess a remarkable endurance and resilience towards exertions. Gnomes can walk or work in mines for hours without breaks and possess phenomenal resistance to disease and poison and even can tolerate the corruption of Taint much better than almost anyone else. The toughness of gnomes rivals that of the kaas, which are several times their size and more than twice as tall.

And addition, gnomes are also very long living and surpassed in that only by elves. Gnomes are generally considered to be adults in their early thirties and can live well over two centuries. Unlike elves however, gnomes age visibly throughout their whole lives and are much more similar to humans in that regard.

History
Like elves and lizardfolk, gnomes have been living in the Ancient Lands for a very long time. However, very few is known about their early history before the Age of the Clans. Gnomes have always been most at home in hills and mountains where the majority of their present settlements are located. There are only a few gnomish clans living in the foothills of the Northlands, which always have been especially secluded.

Relations between gnomes and the other humanoid races have increased significantly since the dawn of the Age of Kings, when elven merchants showed an immense demand for gnomish steel weapons and quality steel ingots, which had a major effect on elven clan politics.

Culture and Society
Even when compared to humans, gnomes live in very densely packed communities of large inter-related families. Gnome houses are often home to one to two dozen people.

In gnomish society, gender roles are quite similar to those of humans. Fieldwork and hunting is mostly the domain of men, while women have almost complete control over the homes. Business is one of the fields of gnomish society where men and women are roughly equally involved as it is related to both the male and female sphere of responsibilities, though finances and bookkeeping are generally regarded as female skills. Gnomes do have a concept of nobility, but it includes few legal privileges and is more an aspect of social standing, which is mostly determined by wealth and success of certain families. In larger towns, they do form a patrician elite that holds the most political and economic power.

Gnomes are perfectly aware of the fact that they are the smallest and physically weakest of the humanoid races, which greatly influence how they interact with people of other races and face the outside world. Generally, gnomes try to avoid open confrontation as much as possible as there are few situations in which they could easily overpower their opponents. Instead appeasing the other side is usually their first course of action. While they do have their pride, most gnomes are quite willing to accept temporary humiliations instead of being drawn into a fight with unfavorable odds. Seeing this as a sign of weakness or gnomes being pushovers can prove to be quite dangerous however. When a direct, and potentially lethal confrontation seems inevitable, gnomes will often concede defeat and initially give in to the demands of their opponents. Which particularly larger and stronger opponents are often much too willing to take at face value. When armed fighting breaks out, fast but ordered retreat is often the first priority. However, it is a mistake to believe that gnomes are easily defeated as they will often use that opportunity to prepare for the next confrontation in which they will have the odds decisively in their favor. Only if everything is in place will gnomes strike back, with very underhanded business practices, ambushes, or even outright assassination, after their enemies thought them defeated and themselves in safety. This has given gnomes a reputation of being liars or cheats, as they will often make promises they have no intention to keep, to get themselves out of tight spots.

Life in gnome burrows is very cramped with lots of people living living tightly packed together. Politeness and respect for personal privacy have an extremely high value in gnome society to compensate for that. Provocations and insults are frowned upon greatly and while gnomes can show great restraint to not respond to them in kind, it significantly affects the respect gnomes have for other people and their willingness to compromise or provide help. People who unnecessarily aggravate arguments and disagreements will fiend very few friends among gnomes, but if their enemies are willing to do the same, gnomes are generally trying their best to remain civil and find mutually acceptable compromises. Life in the communal areas of gnome burrows is often loud and crowded with everyone trying to take part in the cheerful spirit. As most gnomes see it, bad mood and anger can easily be pushed aside for a few hours just by being willing to go with the flow. With the living condition in gnome settlements, one has to learn to swallow personal pride and restrain oneself from being rude to others who are getting bothersome. As a compensation, private quarters, which are often very small and belonging to no more than one to three gnomes, are absolutely forbidden places for everyone else. Only when offered may anyone enter the private room of a gnome, and even asking for permission is a serious taboo. Secretly entering, or even forcibly intruding into the private rooms of others is a very severe crime and an almost irrevocable breach of trust. Because gnome settlements have few open spaces, gnomes may appear as quite bold in how they show up at other peoples homes and expect immediate entrance, but they are usually very reluctant to enter sleeping quarters and private studies. And while some might go as far as helping themselves at food and drink, only the most unscrupulous would even touch any personal items of other people or search through bags and backpacks of others.

Settlements
Gnome villages often consists only of a few houses, which are mostly located underground. On the surface, villages consists mostly of barns, stables, and some workshops that produce a lot of smoke and fumes, while living quarters are mostly below ground. Only the main gates of most gnome homes are visible on the surface, which lead to an entrance hall from which tunnels and staircases lead down to the majority of rooms. It is not uncommon that villages and towns also have large communal spaces underground, which are connected to the homes by tunnels that serve as underground streets. Unlike real underground living races, gnomes spend a great deal of time outside on the surface where they tend to their fields and herds. Only during winter does public life move almost entirely underground with many gnomes not taking a step outside for weeks.

Craft
Most gnomes take their crafts and professions very seriously. In the high buzz activity of gnome homes and villages, concentrating on ones work is a highly valued distraction and it is considered very impolite to disturb other peoples work. Workshops and kitchen are often used by many people, but most gnomes learn very early in their lives to tone out the drone and chatter that is occurring right behind their backs.

Gnome craftsmanship is often sturdy and simple, made from solid and durable materials and eschewing delicate details for more stylized shapes. Since gnomes are well at home underground, they are also the greatest and most experienced miners anywhere in the Barbarian Land. Their most well known and most appreciated handiwork are the arts of metalworking. While gnomish smiths and craftsmen also work very well with bronze, silver, and gold, it is the steel produced in Komkaren foundries that is their most prized, and most valuable industry. However, their craftsmanship in forging weapons and armor is also among the best and frequently surpasses the work of the most talented elven smiths. Masterwork weapons and armor are almost always made from gnomish steel and most suits of heavy armor found among any of the humanoid races has been made by gnomish armor-smiths.

[Yora]

Two new creatures: Fish People and Dragonhawks

Nothing too unusual, just my take on these rather common creatures that are not covered by the Pathfinder Bestiaries.

[Yora]

Travel Distances and Times

One of the biggest problems I have when designing the geography of the world is forgetting how vast and uninhabited it is. So I sketched up a rough map to get some estimates for the distances between the major cities, which when combined with my plans for mountains, forests, and rivers, allows me to calculate some rough projections for travel times. I though I share those with you here.

• Kaas Trade City to Snow Elf Mountain City: 400km, 20 days on foot or cart, 12 days by horse.
• Snow Elf Mountain City to Northern Coast Trade City: 1,200 km, 50 days on foot or cart, 30 days on horse.
• Northern Coast Trade City to Elven Sorcerer City: 700 km, 14 days by ship or horse, 24 on foot or cart.
• Elven Sorcerer City to Elven Druid City: 200 km, 5 days by ship or horse, 8 days on foot or cart.
• Elven Druid City to Cave Port City: 600 km, 12 days by ship or horse, 20 days on foot or cart.
• Elven Druid City to Dark Elven Port City: 1200 km, 24 days by ship.
• Cave Port City to Dark Elven Port City: 700 km, 14 days by ship.
• Dark Elven Port City to Dark Elven Jungle City: 800 km, 20 days on foot.
• Dark Elven Port City to Lizardfolk Sun Warrior City: 800km, 8 days by ship plus 20 days on river.
• Dark Elven Port City to Naga Port City: 1000 km, 20 days by ship.
• Caravan Route from Cave Port City to Western Lands: Ca. 3 months by cart.
• (Snow Elf Mountain City to Cave Port City: 1800 km, 120 days on foot.)

Those durations are given for the easy routes by ship and the few major roads and highways. Once you head into the wilds with only some basic tracks or no paths at all, travel speed will often be cut down by half.

There are no reliable forms of teleportation and very few ways of flying for prolonged times, so even kings and high priests can not have their agents get from one place to another much faster than this. Unless you can catch passage on a ship, overland travel between the major cities will take a couple of weeks most of the time. There are of course hundreds of smaller towns and countless villages, but mostly the few big cities are unique places unlike any other settlement within a weeks distance and they are not in direct contact with each other.

The whole ancient lands region is on a map about 4000x4000 km, so about the size that could hold all of Europe or modern China.
For comparison, during the Roman Empire, depending on the wind, crossing the mediterranean sea would often take about 10 days, longer if you also wanted to get some distance to the east or west. So think of the major cities of the Ancient Lands not so much as the greek city states of the aegian sea, but rather of an area considerably larger than the mediterranean sea. Going from the wood elf port cities to the dark elf cities could be compared to getting from Spain to Turkey or from England to Russia. Or from India to Thailand.

--

In addition, I think I'll drop the Honor system. With backgrounds and allegiances already in place, I think there are enough character elements that define the characters personalty and standing in society. Adding honor to this, it probably just gets a bit too much to keep track off and there is only little gain from having it.

[Yora]

I got a new map:



Larger size

In this version, the northern part is much too small, while the jungles in the south are way bigger than they need to be. That's also why the lower part looks so empty. But from the general layout, that's about how I think the final version will eventually look like.
Every field is 48 miles across, or four days of travel under most conditions.

[Zap Dynamic]

I got a new map:

Looks awesome! I particularly appreciate that the body of water is to the east, not the west. There are too many European-influenced fantasy maps!

When you say each "field" is 48 miles across, are you talking about the hexes?

In the "Travel Distances and Times" post, you mention that there are hundreds of cities and countless villages... do you have any specific numbers there? Or a population count for the entire region? I'm just asking for my own geography nerdiness!

I just checked out The Sword & Sorcery Anthology from the library, and I've been thinking of this setting as I'm reading it. You're doing a great job cultivating the primal feeling of the setting! If you get a chance, you should read "Gimmile's Songs" by Charles R. Saunders. It's only 20 pages or so, and it paints a vivid picture of iron age Africa (disclaimer: I say that with no knowledge of the African iron age).

Keep up the great work!

[Yora]

The overall population of elves, lizardfolk, humans, kaas, gnomes, and nezumi is about 20 million. That number was based on the estimated world population in 1,000 AD and reduced to about 40% or so, to account for other people living in the other parts of the world. Though the map is quite big, it still covers only about 5% of the entire planet (though most of it is water).

[Yora]

Ruins and Ancient Cultures

When creating a dungeon that does not look like random rooms drawn on graph paper, the two most important questions are who build the place and for what purpose. Personally, I love it in games and movies, when the world has been detailed to such a degree that you can draw your own conclusions about what's going on just by looking at the environment in an unknown place, so for the Ancient Lands, I want to achive something similar by creating a number of distinct architectural styles that most ancient ruins follow.

Square Towers: Ruins of the square tower type have a number of distinguishing elements that make them very easy to identify even to people who don't know anything about the ancient past. Square tower ruins usually consist of a number of connected buildings that each have a square base, slightly slanted walls, and flat roofs. Many of these buildings are much higher than they are wide and most ruins are dominated by two or three large main towers.
Square Tower ruins are made from large irregular blocks of stone that have been precisely cut to fit together seamlessly, which has proven to be an extremely durable design. Even if no traces of buildings can be found on the surface and only underground levels remain, these types of ruins can be easily identified by their distinctive doorways, which are almost always made from two large stone blocks leaning inwards serving as the posts, and a single block of the same diameter serving as the beam. When intact wooden doors are found, these usually consist of a regular rectangular door set into a wooden wall that covers the opening of the stone arch, but these do not seem to be part of the original design and latter additions. Rooms almost always have a square floor and corridors tend to be exactly three, four, five, or more times their width in length.
Square Tower ruins are quite common throughout all of the Northern Ancient Lands and many currently inhabited keeps and castles are rebuild or expanded ruins of this type.
Rock Carvers: The rock carvers were probably a culture of shie, as their buildings seem to be perfectly proportioned for human-sized humanoids. The most distinguishing element of all rock carver ruins is that most buildings are entirely constructed by digging doors, rooms, and corridors inside the walls of mountains and rocky hills. From the outside, these ruins are easy to miss as most of the time the only visible signs are holes for windows and doors, with occasional balconies on the larger and more opulent castles.
Newly constructed masonry walls are rare and appear to be additions made by later inhabitants. Rooms also have precisely angled corner and rooms and doorways that have been dug later can often be identified by their more rounded edges. Because of their construction, rock carver ruins are extremely durable and only damaged by significant earthquakes or volcanic erruptions.
Not much is known about the ancient rock carvers, but they seem to have had a strong affinity to the earth and most ruins include large forges. Since the these ruins are mostly found in places with few vegetation and away from major rivers, they are often relatively easily accesible and only rarely burried by landslides. As a result, most of them have been looted for valuables a long time ago, but when one can discover one that has remained undiscovered throughout all the centuries, chances are quite good to find ancient enchanted swords and axes. Rock Carver ruins are mostly found in the warmer regions of the Northern Ancient Lands, but a few are known to lie in the cold mountains in the far north as well.
Tree Weavers: Tree Weaver ruins are among the most exotic and unusual ones, as they are build from living trees. The Tree Weavers had the ability to make trees grow to immense size and probably at considerable speed, and direct their growth to form large towers and pallisades, with interwoven branches forming platforms high above the ground or even entire pavilions and small huts. Since they are made from living plants, many tree weaver ruins are still in excelent shape, as any minor damage caused by the elements or fires simply grows back in a couple of years. Even where the trees have died, the wood is often well enough preserved to keep the whole structures stable, though some are known to have suffered dearly from lightning strikes and rot. Tree weaver ruins are found in the large forests of the northern ancient lands and are often home to groups of druids or harpies, but also all kinds of guardian spirits, like tree nymphs and spriggans, who are not fond of humanoid visitors.
Magical items are rarely found in tree weaver ruins, but many include magical springs in caves below the trees roots.
Black Castles: The black castles are large fortresses made universually from large blocks of black granite of regular size and shape. For humanoids, everything in these fortresses seems to be oversized, with stairs often beeing about knee high and windows too high up for smaller people to look out from. The castles are clearly meant for defense and are often inhabited by warlords or bandit leaders and their men. One of the greatest mysteries of the black castles is the origin of the granite, since the stone is not found anywhere within several weeks of travel from any of the known ruins.

(five more to come later)

[Yora]

Ancient Lands Campaign Guide

I suddenly and unexpectedly found myself being GM for a new group and couldn't pass on the opportunity to give the Ancient Lands another practice run. I put together some information for the players, who are mostly not familiar with RPGs, and I think it might be an interesting read for some of you as well.

Currently, I am trying to get away from focusing on the map. I have a very basic geographic layout figured out, but I think I am constantly turning back to trying to build a world like the Forgotten Realms or Eberron, while I really want a universe like Star Wars or Mass Effect, which are all about cultures and a few specific towns instead of modeling entire countries.

While writing the guide, I noticed that writing these small entries on specific aspects of the world really is much easier and enjoyable than trying to hammer down a full master plan for the entire world. There is a slight risk that I end up creating stuff that is not really fitting the original vision, but I think the basic framework is really nailed down now and not much going to change anymore. (I just looked up the first thread from over two years ago, and noticed that pretty much all the important parts are allready there on the very first page. Everything since has really been about polishing up those things and experimenting with different ways to represent it in game rules.)

And from what you here when snooping around, most great settings really started with an initial idea and then going out there in the world and figuring out all the details as they are encountered. The complete settings like Eberron seems to be rather the exception than the norm.