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  1. - Top - End - #31
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    Default Re: Ancient Lands - Savage Heroes and Mythical Beasts

    I really love the idea of anomalies in Stalker and other small pieces of weirdness in an otherwise mundane environment. Much more interesting than a whole world that is full of unusual physics. So I am doing a few of my own.
    This is all conceptual stuff for now. The finished versions would be described in terms used by people in the Ancient Lands. This right now is the pseudoscience behind them, even if no people in the world fully know how they work and only can make guesses based on what they observe.

    Border Zones
    Usually the Material World and the Spiritworld (including the Underworld) are clearly separated from each other and it requires magic to move from one to the other. (Many spirits have the power to do so whenever they want.) In some places the border is more fluid and magical energies from the Spiritworld flow into the Material World. In extreme, and much more rare cases, even creatures and objects from the material world can move into the Spiritworld without the use of any magic. The spots where this is possible are often very small and just moving past one by a few meters may not lead to any noticable effect. One has to be spot on in hitting the portal and very often they are only temporary and last for a few days or even just hours before disappearing again. The portals are also invisible and the differences between the Material World and the Spiritworld happen gradually, so one might already be well into the Spiritworld before noticing the transition, at which point it might be impossible to trace the exact way back into the Material World.

    Gravity Anomaly
    When natural gas rises through cracks in the ground, it can pass through border zones between the material world and the Underworld, gaining some of the Underworlds magical properties. When the gas reaches the surface and rises into the sky, it sometimes can be seen as a faint green, blue, or purple glow. Even though the gas is very thin and travels slowly, its magical properties give it an amazingly high effect of lift, which can either make it appear as if gravity is significantly reduced or even canceled completely. As the gas escapes, it can get slowly absorbed by nearby rocks and combine into a magic mineral that is much stronger affected by the lifting effect of the gas than normal matter. Over centuries, even huge boulders or parts of ruined castles can begin to float above the vents. Stones brought in from outside the area are usually too heavy and dense to float, even when the lift is strong enough to support people and animals. Likewise, when the mineral is removed from the gas vents, it simply drops like any other stone.
    For some reason the shie build many castles around these vents and after thousands of years the stone has absorbed enough of the gas that collapsed walls and towers simpyl float in place instead of falling to the ground. It is also possible to make very long and high jumps above the larger vents or gently float down from great heights.

    Magic Springs
    Magic springs are created in a similar way when ground water travels through underground areas that are border zones to the Spiritworld or the Underworld and gains magical properties. While the number of possible effects on the water is countless, one of the most common and useful properties is a high concentration of life energy (which is the same as magic energy). Just like staying in the Spiritworld greatly increases a mortal creatures ability to heal wounds, drinking water from such healing springs has the same effect. Since the magical properties of the water usually fade away over time, healing water generally works only for a few days at the most and can not be stored for later use like alchemical healing potions.
    We are not standing on the shoulders of giants, but on very tall tower of other dwarves.

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  2. - Top - End - #32
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    Default Re: Ancient Lands - Savage Heroes and Mythical Beasts

    Themes and Worldviews
    IThis is a slightly revised version of stuff I wrote a few years ago.

    View of the Universe
    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 more of an ideological nature than any actual blood relationship). 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 safe 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.

    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, 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.
    Last edited by Yora; 2015-05-06 at 12:44 PM.
    We are not standing on the shoulders of giants, but on very tall tower of other dwarves.

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  3. - Top - End - #33
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    Default Re: Ancient Lands - Savage Heroes and Mythical Beasts

    How people see the world

    The difference between a good setting and a great setting is that great setting come with their own distinct worldview and believes. This how most people see the world and believe how it came to be.

    • In the Ancient Times, shie and naga build great castles in the world of mortals and kept mortals as slaves or forced them to hide in the wilderness.
    • When the fey castles were abandoned the mortal races came from their hiding places and either discovered some of the fey knowledge or learned it from former slaves. With it they could become more than the cave men they had always been before.
    • The mortal races carved out their tiny strongholds which are surrounded by endless wilderness, that is full of dangerous monsters and spirits. Their warriors are constantly fighting and endless battle to keep the wilderness out and prevent their islands of civilization from disappearing.
    • Also, there is a constant threat of demonic corruption, both from the Demons of the Void and from the Ancient Spirits of the Underworld. Even when the wilderness is kept at bay, the corruption can always take a hold in their own midst and consume the strongholds of civilization from the inside.
    • Both the battle to keep the wilderness in check and to supress the taint of corruption are eternal. There is no enemy that can be defeated and bring permanent victory. It is the nature of the world itself, that forces the defenders of civilization to always fight on.


    Underworld Cults Narrative
    Cults that worship the Ancients of the Underworld have a different view on the world: In their oppinion, the civilized strongholds are a futile attempt to fight the very nature of the world. It's a permanent battle that can't be won but very easily be lost. The spirits of the surface world can be powerful allies, but they also appear and disappear again and again over the eons. Instead, they turn to the spirits of the Underworld, which they believe to be eternal, having existed from the beginning of the world until it's eventual end. By worshiping the Ancients, the cultists hope to not neccessarily attain individual immortality, but for the mortal races to become part of the permanent constants of the world, impervious to the eternal changes and battles of the surface world. Since the Ancients have not changed over time, their nature is believed to be perfect, snd their worshipers hope to become closer to perfection themselves.

    Warlock Narrative
    • The world itself is only a temporary annomaly in the eternal existance of the Void. Material Worlds pop into existance at random, remain chaotic and everchanging for some billion years, and then vanish again leaving no trace behind.
    • However, during the existance of the Material Worlds, there are some limited ways for things to enter or leave it. If anything in the Matrial World is going to be relevant, it has to leave this temporary world and move to the Void.
    • Sorcerers seek out contact with the Void and its demons, as these interactions will still affect the Void even after the material world has vanished without a trace. It makes them part of something bigger and eternal, which can not be done within the confines of the material world.
    • Allowing a demon to possess a body, consume its soul, and adding all its memories and knowledge to its own, the person becomes effectivly immortal, even if much of the personalty is drowned out by all the other consumed souls and the demons own original essence.
    • Many are primarily interested in the power over other mortals that can be gained from demonic energies, but in theory most warlock philosophy is based on the idea to make the short existance of the material world matter as much as possible for eternity.
    We are not standing on the shoulders of giants, but on very tall tower of other dwarves.

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  4. - Top - End - #34
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    Default Re: Ancient Lands - Savage Heroes and Mythical Beasts

    As my work focuses more on the finer details, I think one thing that is becoming quite important to provide opportunities for adventures is to figure out the basic types of common conflicts.

    I think at the very start, it needs to be established what people want:
    1. Not dying. Always a good start here.
    2. Having secured access to food. So you don't starve.
    3. Keeping the favor of the spirits. Because they can cut off your food and bring plague and disaster.
    4. Being strong. So others don't attack you.
    5. Remaining independent. Having slaves is one thing, becoming a slave another.
    6. Rooting out sorcery. As sorcerers also can enslave you without battle.
    7. Having secured access to metal. To make weapons and armor to keep attackers away.
    8. Get rich. When everything else is covered, you can always use more comfort.


    This probably covers all the basic priorities the clans would have. Have sufficient food, the favor of the spirits, and no threat of attackers or sorcerers, and you would be pretty well of. But in the Ancient Lands, even rich clans never really get that rich and powerful that it would be enough for even the worst case scenarios. More wealth (in form of resources) and security is always desireable if you can get it.

    So my next thought is what ways people could have to improve their wealth and safety:
    • Avenge all offenses. If anyone tests your strength, you must show that they would have no chance to win. Or at the very least, that it will cost them so much it wouldn't be worth it. Retaliation is absolutely necessary, or your enemies will line up to steal your resources and enslave you.
    • Collect tribute. Not only does it bring you wealth, it also establishes that you're the most powerful in the region, making sure nobody tries to mess with you. (It also means you must defend those who pay tribute, so they are not enslaved by someone else or join them freely and no longer pay tribute in the future.)
    • Control trade. Once you have a reasonably secured supply of food for your clan, improving your comfort and your safety requires getting goods you can't provide yourself. And if you control trade with a specific good, you can control who gets access to it or gets cut off, and you also can get very wealthy that way. So the more powerful clans are always very much interested in having exclusive agreements with caravan masters and merchant captains. If they start trading with your enemy instead, you get a big problem.
    • Appear generous. Getting rich and comfortable is great, but if you share your wealth with weaker allies, those allies also have a real interest in keeping you rich. If you lose your wealth, they won't be getting any gifts anymore either.
    • If a valuable resource for trade is nearby, you have to control it. It makes you rich and gets you friends, and if your enemies had it it would make them rich and get them friends, which you really don't want.
    • Find protection against magic. If an enemy has magic he can use it against you. The only way to defend against it is to have more magic. That means keeping your shamans happy and wealthy (but not too powerful, or they might turn against you) and if you can getting a few witches in your service. If you can't get a witch to serve you, make sure they won't serve your enemies either.
    • If there is any chance for ancient magic treasure or arcane lore in the area, you have to get it before your enemies do.


    Now that does sound awfully like a lot of politics, plotting, intrigue, and commerce. Which, yeah, it is. But I think for the Ancient Lands, it wouldn't be old men and thieves with hoods murmuring at candle light in the night. It would be lots of angry shouting and making threats. Challenges to duels, ambushes on the road, and raids against enemy villages. Witches casting curses and shamans consulting the spirits. And at the same time chiefs supporting the heroes of their clans with gifts of treasure and titles.
    While there isn't really a terribly lot to do for wandering adventurers with this premise (and the setting was never intended to), this seems like a pretty solid base for plenty of adventure hooks aimed at clan warriors and noble scions.
    We are not standing on the shoulders of giants, but on very tall tower of other dwarves.

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  5. - Top - End - #35
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    Default Re: Ancient Lands - Savage Heroes and Mythical Beasts

    I've been spending some more thoughts on undead in the Ancient Lands. Since there is only a single source of natural power and energy, anything that is unnatural is a corruption of it and also comes from the same source. Sorcery, demons, and undead are all really different forms of the same thing. In that context, I've been doing some reworking of the common undead types so that everything fits together seamlessly and makes all sense.
    I particularly like the ghouls as being some kind of insane mutants. While they look more like diseased humans, they are actually a lot like Golum in most ways. The shadows are also cool. Usually they don't really do anything and just stand around being creepy, but that means you can use them in much larger numbers and make them a type of dangerous environment.

    Ghouls


    Ghouls are humans, elves, or other humanoids who have been corrupted by the dark magic of sorcery or demons. Though they have never truly died, they resemble the undead, existing in a state between life and death. They grow gaunt with pale skin and dark sunken eyes and are suffering from madness, but are also filled with unnatural vigor and are much more cunning than any beast. Their clawed fingers can crush a mans throat and leave deep rends in the flesh of their victims, and their teeth have the strength to bite through bones, as they regain their strength by feeding on the flesh of humans and beasts.

    Many ghouls once were adventurers and treasure hunters who delved too deep into ancient places where the living are not meant to tread, or what remains of those who become slaves of dark sorcerers or demons.

    Spoiler: Stats
    Show
    Ghoul (Barbarians of Lemuria)
    Attributes
    Strength 2
    Agility 1
    Mind -1
    Appeal -2

    Combat Abilities
    Attack with bite or claw +2; damage 1d6-1 plus paralysis
    Defense: 2
    Protection: 1
    Lifeblood: 10

    Any character hit by a ghouls attack must make a Moderate Strength roll (+0/TN 9) or be paralysed for one hour.

    Ghoul (B/X)
    No. Enc.: 1d6 (2d8)
    Armor: 14
    Move: Normal
    Hit Dice: 2 (9 hp)
    Attacks: Bite or claw
    Damage: 1d4 plus paralysis
    Save: F2
    Morale: 9

    A creature bit by a ghoul or hit by its claws must make a saving throw against paralysis or be paralysed for 2d8x10 minutes.


    Shades


    When people die who have been corrupted by demonic sorcery, the Corruption that wrecked their bodies can linger on, turning into Shades. With both the bodies and souls of the original person gone, shades are nearly mindless clouds of Corruption that float silently above the spot where they died. They are normally invisible, but cast dark shadows in the presence of bright lights and they can be clearly seen as shapes of darkness if any light shines upon them in the presence of dust or smoke.

    Walking through a shade drains a small part of the life force of living creatures and can start the spreading of Corruption over time. While most shades stand motionless in the spot of their death and don't seem to react to anything around them, some are aware of the presence of living beings nearby and attack when anything comes too close to them. While their insubstential clawn do not leave any physical injuries, being in prolonged contact with an attacking shade can quickly drain all the life energy of a living person and spread the Corruption through its body. People who survive the attack of a shade often show dark purple streaks on their skin that becomes ashen pale and cold, which will last for several days. Those who die will often leave behind a shade as well, joining those who killed them.

    Shades are common in places where lots of people have been killed through sorcery, like the lairs of demons or the sites of sorcerous battles.

    Spoiler: Stats
    Show
    Shade (Barbarians of Lemuria)
    Attributes
    Strength -
    Agility 3
    Mind -3

    Combat Abilities
    Attack with touch +3; damage 1d6-1
    Defense: 3
    Protection: 0
    Lifeblood: 5 (only harmed by magic)

    When a creature is killed by a shade, a new shade appears in the spot of its death 3 rounds later.

    Shade (B/X)
    No. Enc.: 1d6 (2d10)
    Armor: 15
    Move: Normal
    Hit Dice: 2 (9 hp)
    Attacks: Touch
    Damage: 1d4
    Save: F2
    Morale: 12

    Shades can only be harmed by magic weapons or spells.
    Any living creature killed by a shade must make a saving throw against Death or Poison or a new shade will appear where it died within 1d4 rounds.
    We are not standing on the shoulders of giants, but on very tall tower of other dwarves.

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  6. - Top - End - #36
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    Default Re: Ancient Lands - Savage Heroes and Mythical Beasts

    Even though I have all the pieces in place, which lots of cultures, creatures, magic, and spirit, the Ancient Lands as I have them now don't really feel right. With all the cities on the map in my mind, the world feels much too crowded and not really like Points of Light. Part of it is that many "tribes" live in far too lare areas. The Falden stretch from the edge of the Arctic to hot semi-deserts and the dark elves and lizard people occupy vast regions of jungle.

    Currently I have two big changes in mind which I'll let ripen (or rott) for three days before committing to them or discarding them as a spontaneous mood shift.

    For one thing, when I've been making city states, I had been thinking mostly of Greek ones. But what I did was create places like Carthage, Byzantium, or Babylon. These are the capitals of empires several times larger than the tiny corner of the Aegean Sea shared by all the many "kingdoms" of the Trojan War. What I really should have been doing is stuff like the hall of King Hrothgar, Hedeby, or Rivendell. A city in the Ancient Lands should be more like a castle with a second wall around the town, not the great metropolises of antiquity. It's easy to think that Greek equals Greek and Greek is almost like Roman, but even a place like Knossos or Troy is a completely different beast from Rome. Right now my revised map is almost completely blank, since I also don't have any "major coanon NPCs". I probably keep the names, but I am probably going to rebuild all towns and cities from scratch.

    The other thing that doesn't sit right with me are the Border Hills on the western end of the great forests and the Great Plains beyond them, through which Vandren caravans transport exotic goods from the Western Lands. Even though there isn't any piece of information about the Western Lands, other than being inhabited by humans, just knowing they exist feels wrong. It's the map running out of paper on the left instead of the map fading into an endless expanse of white, as I intend. However, the entire backstory of the Vandren, one of the biggest tribes in the setting, depends entirely on elves trading with the West. So it all has to go. Right now I think I make the Vandren into some kind of Hill People. Perhaps have them ride on hadrosaurs instead of horses.

    These two changes also allow me to make the tribes a lot smaller. With a new map and the whole global trade network gone, I can start over with a new map on which each tribe is clustered in much smaller areas instead of forming a continous region of civilization. While it is a step further back from my original concept that had me starting to give some thought on my own setting ten years ago, I now want to go full barbarian tribes instead of "Glory of the Empires of Elves and Dwarves":
    We are not standing on the shoulders of giants, but on very tall tower of other dwarves.

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    Default Re: Ancient Lands - Savage Heroes and Mythical Beasts

    I now decided to do what I've been pondering for years. Removing the separation between the Ancient Ones and the Demons. There is just so much overlap and demons are very strongly inspired by Dragon Age, where some mages don't consider them different from regular spirits as well.
    The aboleth becomes a type of terror demon, as it demands obedience to all its commands from lesser beings. The creatures inspired by the Collectors from Mass Effect become greed demons, as they are completely single minded about completing their tasks but have no desire for destruction for the sake of destruction, but also mostly lack emotions unlike desire demons. The giant genius worm is simply a pride demon. Another one I had planed looked a bit like a chuul and a piscoloth from D&D, with a hint of mind flayer. Since they are of the brainy type but can pack a huge punch when they want to, they fit perfectly with sloth demons, who are really the same thing.

    This mostly removes the distinction between cultists of the Ancients and warlocks, but there's still a difference between worshiping the idea of demons and actually working together with them. One is just creepy, the other one clearly destructive.
    We are not standing on the shoulders of giants, but on very tall tower of other dwarves.

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    Default Re: Ancient Lands - Savage Heroes and Mythical Beasts

    My progress on creating the Ancient Lands setting for the last two years has always and regularly been slowed down to a crawl by two major obstacles: Making good names for all the people and places, and creating a good historic background for the world. History always seemed very important to me because I’ve seen it used for such marvelous effect in the Dragon Age and Mass Effect games. Not because there were so many fascinating tales that are exciting to hear about, but because historic events explained why all the major groups have grudges at each other and which encounters between two or more people are powder kegs with lit fuses before anyone has said a single word. It explains which subjects are touchy and where you need to tread carefully when attemting to negotiate, and also which buttons you need to push to get two people to kill each other. Dwarves hate elves? So what? That’s not very interesting. What do you do with that? Giving some hint why they feel that way makes a huge difference.

    So to have a rich environment for complex interactions between characters from different cultures or factions and get some ambiguity into the conflicts, you need to have a history for the setting. But try as I might, I’ve never been able to come up with anything but a few general ideas, never really making any progress with the setting. But now I’ve sat down to sift through the sources for some ideas I might be able to adapt. And realized there isn’t really anything either. Elric might be an exception (I’ve read only two random stories), but in Sword & Sorcery he is always the exception. But when I look at Conan, Kane, Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser, and the early stories of the Witcher (not very far with the novels yet), there actually isn’t really anything either. Two of the best Sword & Sorcery RPG settings, Dark Sun and Planescape don’t have any history at all in their original (and true) incarnations.

    And now that I think about it, the history elements from the games that inspired me are extremely brief as well. The story of the Krogan in Mass Effect is the most complex and difficult of them all, but it is also very, very short. The Salarians needed super soldiers to defeat the seemingly invincible Rachni, discovered the Krogan and gave them space ships and advanced weapons. After the Rachni where defeated the Krogan didn’t want to stop conquering planets and give back the weapons. So the Salarians created a bioweapon that could drive the Krogan close to extinction within a generation (annihilating them would be inhumane) and the Turians used it. Now Krogan civilization is a shadow of what it once was and the Salarians refuse to make a cure and let the Krogan population grow again. The Krogan are pissed, the Salarians and Turians have no regrets, and while many others sysympathize, the idea of the Krogan increasing their numbers doesn’t sound very appealing either. There are other old conflicts like that in the setting, but those are even much more simple. But the really great thing about them is that we don’t really know the name of a single person who was involved in those events or any planet where something happened. There also is no date or any numbers of populations or worlds. Because none of that really matters to understand the current situation and why Krogan are always hostile to Salarians and Turians. In the stories of Conan, everyone fears the warriors of the Cimmerians or the Picts, but we’re never really told anything about specific wars or battles in the past. Conan fought in the battle at Venarium when he was young, that is all we have. And I now feel confident that I don’t need any more than that either.

    So here I present the complete and very short history of the Ancient Lands.

    • Many centuries ago fey races from the Spiritworld built great castles in the world of mortal creatures and they often took elves and lizardmen as slaves, so the other primitive peoples hid deep in the forests and mountains.
    • At some point the shie began to abandon their castles, letting them fal into ruin and leaving their abandoned slaves behind. Some slaves understood the farming they had done in the fields of their masters or had seen them work with bronze, and as they faded back into the wilds, the basics of these arts spread among the other savages.
    • Humans had been hiding in the most impassable mountains far out of sight and never been taken as slaves. They also avoided the elves and lizardmen, so they did not learn about metal and farming until thousands of years later
    • In one great city of the naga, a group of lizardmen slaves secretly worshiped the Sun and gained the magic power to face the naga sorcerers and start a rebellion. The rebels defeated their masters and created the Mayaka kingdom.
    • The Neshanen elves discovered the secrets of naga sorcery and learned to use the power of demons for themselves. The druids of the Falden thought it to be too dangerous and tried to destroy them and the ongoing conflict of the two groups has led to many wars between Falden and Neshanen armies.
    • Naga and Neshanen sorcerers are constantly trying to steal each others magical secrets and burried magic treasures of other Ancients for as long as anyone can remember.
    • Eventually human Vandren came down from the mountains to trade with Falden and Takari and many Vandren became mercenaries for Falden chiefs. Some generations later three half-elves started a monastic order based on the equality of all people, with no distinction between clans and no slaves and masters. It quickly grew to include Vandren, Falden, Ruyaki, and kaas.
    • A warrior monk of the order decided that he had enough of trading great amounts of goods for every small piece of metal for their weapons and armor and take control of some mines for the order. That worked out really well and for the past hundred years their ships have been cruising the Inner Sea to take over any town that has something which they want but would be too expensive to buy, recruiting whoever wants to join their army. The sages of the order do not approve at all, but their opinion has stopped mattering to the warrior monks a long time ago and many of them have never been to any of the original monastery towns.
    • In the North Falden and kaas clans have been fighting for control over copper and tin mines for a very long time, and very often they are trying to drive each other out of the region entirely. When they think their rival clans are getting too strong and could become a threat, they raid each other for loot with which they can pay allies to fight at their side. (Which doesn’t mean that kaas are never raiding other kaas or Falden never other Falden, but kaas and Falden never ally with each other.) Since the Falden have the most trouble with the warrior monks, the kaas have a quite high oppinion of them.
    • The Demon Hunters are mostly Takari who have special mystical training to fight demons and sorcerers and always travel the Inner Sea to fight and destroy them. That makes Takari very unpopular with the Neshanen and enemies of the naga. Since the Mayaka also hate the naga, they sometimes are trained as demon hunters as well, as do some Vandren. However, since they use sorcery to destroy demons, the Falden Druids see them as no better than sorcerers who use demonic magic for their own benefit.



    That should provide enough hate to last for countless stories and adventures. No need for a timeline or the lives of any specific heroes.
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    Default Re: Ancient Lands - Savage Heroes and Mythical Beasts

    There’s been some maps of the Ancient Lands before in the past, so if you’ve seen any and remember them, the new map doesn’t really look much different than the old ones.

    Spoiler
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    Le perfectly drawn map


    The lables seem to be pretty much unreadable, but I think the coasts and terrain are hopefully still fully visible. The main change I made was to remove the open plains of Sanved on the western shore of the Inner Sea and cover it all with forest again, which is actually what you would get on the eastern coast of a continent. (Deserts are always on the western coast because of wind patterns. Except Arabia.) I also beefed the Vestanen mountains up in size and moved them a bit more south, as they will now be the new homeland of the Vandren.

    The Border Hills in the west and the Great Plains beyond them are now completely gone. Nobody knows what lies in that direction and when the forests might ever end. In the north I reshaped the Rayalka mountains a bit, but you might be able to make out that there is still a big question mark in the kaas homeland of Yakun. Got to do something with it, as I love the kaas, but that will have to wait for later.

    One thing my maps never show satisfactorary is the scale. This area is pretty huge. (Not when compared to those map nuts who do whole globes, but still distances that would take weeks to cover by ship and months on foot.) That bulge in the north is about as big as China and the whole map covers an area that ranges from the Subarctics in the north to the tropics in the South. Imagine you had the Russian pacific coast on the north edge of the map and Vietnam on the south edge. You probably could get all of Europe on this map (though perhaps without the northern parts of Norway, Sweden, and Finland).

    You might think that the sea coasts are boringly straight and there is going to be more detail in more refined maps, but mostly this is how real coastlines look like. Europe and Indonesia are the exception. Look at Africa, South America, and most of North America and you’ll see that there are very few bays or major islands except for the arctic regions.

    Something I’ve seen when searching for other fantasy maps as inspirations and which I still want to add are some major inland lakes. On Earth these are very rare and most fantasy maps do them pretty unrealistically, but they still look interesting and add some variety to the endless sea of trees. Also allows me to do more boat stuff even far away from the coasts.
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    Magic System: First draft

    After statting all the creatures for the Ancient Lands for Basic Fantasy/LotFP today, I've been looking at some OSR magic systems since spellcasting is the one real thing I hate in every possible version of D&D. I've been looking at the Basic Fantasy spells and they all suck (being pretty much identical to Basic D&D). Spears of the Dawn had a few interesting ideas with magic and so I looked up the psychic powers from Stars Without Number, which uses the same system. (And is free, so I recommend giving it a look.)

    It's basically the Expanded Psionic Handbook system (which I like) but drsstically simplefied. Like pretty much everything in SWN/SotD:
    A level 1 spell costs 1 energy point, a level 2 spell 3 energy points, a level 3 spell 5 energy points, a level 4 spell 7 energy point, and so on. Unlike usually in D&D magic systems, there is no minimum class level you need to learn and cast a spell. If you know it, you can cast it if you have the energy points. There is no augmentation as in the XPH, so you can't make the spells more powerful by spending more points on them. While augmentation is a cool idea, this makes it all a lot simpler, fitting with the rest of the game.
    Now all spells are grouped into disciplines, which have one spell of each level. First you need to learn the level 1 spell, then the level 2 spell, and level 3, and so on. You can't just pick any spell you like. Since there is no level limit to when you can learn and cast spells, you can get your first level 9 spell at 9th character level. A new mage selects one discipline as his primary discipline and at each level he automatically gets the next highest spell of that discipline. At every level, he can also pick any other spell as his second spell for that level, provided he has already unlocked it by learning the lower level spells of that discipline. Once your primary discipline is complete, you pick another. Either a new one or one you already started with your other free spell selections.
    An interesting new innovation is that you can master spell. When you master a spell you permanently remove energy points equal to the amount it takes to cast the spell once. But from then on you can cast that spell for free. You also have to master all lower spells, so if you want to master a 5th level spell you don't just reduce your energy pool by 9 points, but also by the cost of the 4th, 3rd, 2nd, and 1st level spell, or a total of 25. A 10th level mage (max. level for Ancient Lands) has between 100 and 120 energy points, so 25 is quite a lot. But then you can cast the whole discipline all day with no cost. Yay!

    I like this system and use it basically unchanged, expect that every discipline only has 5 spells instead of 9. That means you'll have completed your primary discipline by 5th level, but the magic I have in mind for the Ancient Lands is mostly pretty low level stuff. The big stuff above that are fancy rituals that take hours or days and you really wouldn't want to use them every day. The standard stuff for everyday use that can be cast within a few second is all in the 1st to 5th level spells.

    With that all out of the way, here are the spells I have on the list so far.
    Spoiler
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    Healing
    1 heal wounds (heals 1d6 damage)
    2 heal disease (ends disease)
    3 stop poison (ends poison)
    4 strength (+2 to attack and damage)
    5 regenerate (removes permanent damage)

    Entropy
    1 cause wounds (deals 1d6 damage)
    2 sleep (targets fall asleep)
    3 weakness (-2 to attack and damage)
    4 paralysis (target can not move while spell is maintained)
    5 cripple (permanently disables body part)

    Mind
    1 sense minds (sense creatures nearby)
    2 charm (makes target act friendly)
    3 invisibility (caster goes unnoticed while spell is maintained)
    4 read thoughts (read thoughts)
    5 domination (makes target obey commands)

    Spirit
    1 second sight (see magic auras)
    2 spirit ward (prevents spirits from approaching)
    3 banish magic (remove magic spells)
    4
    5 summon spirit (summons a spirit to serve you)

    Air
    1 shove (pushes the object back)
    2 fog (creates heavy fog)
    3 wind shield (blocks missiles, gas, and flames)
    4 levitate (caster or target levitates)
    5 fly (caster flies)

    Earth
    1 hurl rock (throws a magic rock)
    2 stone fist (strikes with fists deal huge damage)
    3 crumble (makes stone, metal, and wood crumble to dirt)
    4 wall of stone (shapes rock into walls or doorways)
    5

    Fire
    1 fire bolt (1d6 damage against a single target, or torch)
    2 fire blast (2d6 damage against all in burst)
    3 fire ball (3d6 damage against all in area)
    4 fire wall (3d6 damage to anything in wall)
    5 inferno (5d6 damage against all in area)

    Water
    1 splash (drenches target and pushes it back)
    2 ice needle (2d6 damage and can freeze target to ground or wall)
    3 drown (holds target in or under water)
    4 ice wall (turns water into a wall of ice)
    5 tidal wave (drenches everything in area and pushes creatures and objects back)

    Sorcery
    1 demonic power (+2 on saving throws against magic while active)
    2 fear
    3
    4
    5 summon demon (summons a demon to serve you)

    Blood
    1 blood power (1d4 damage each round, same amount of mana points gained)
    2 pain (target is unable to move or fight effectively)
    3 drain blood (2d4 points of damage, heal same amount)
    4 blood thrall (takes control of living or freshly dead body)
    5


    As you can see, there are still a few open slots. Spirit 4, Earth 5, Sorcery 3, Sorcery 4, and Blood 5.
    Sorcery is still very undefined, but maybe someone has ideas for the remaining spirit, earth, and blood spells?

    Yes, a blood mage can use blood power and drain blood to cast infinite spells. That's intentional.
    You might also have noticed that there are almost no defense spells. That is also intentional. Once a guy with a sword makes it next to a mage, that mage has very little chance to survive. (domination and paralysis could work, but if that fighter has friends, he's still screwed.)
    Cripple is potentially really powerful. But directly below it is paralysis and once you've cast that one you can just decapitate your victim. And a severed head is one of the things the regenerate spell can't fix.

    If you're alone in a room with a mage: Yes, you're in very great danger and when you fail a save, you're totally screwed. But PCs are rarely alone and almost always have two or three buddies with them, often one of them a mage as well. Paralysis is very powerful, but the mage can cast no other spells while it is maintained and it can only target a single creature.
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    Some new thoughts on demons

    One of the important changes I've decided on recently is to no longer deal with demons and old ones as two separate classes of beings. This requires a number of other changes to the setting as a whole.

    The Void still exists, but it is a place even more enigmatic and strange. It's not even a place really. The Void is the source of everything and while it has no time and no space, it is infinite energy. Though that's something only sorcerers and some priests of the old ones speculate and something that might never come up. The Void is the source from which the demons first originated, but their existence as beings stars in the Spiritworld. The demons have no idea how they came to be, they simply are the oldest things in the universe. Most people call them demons, but those who revere them or fear to draw their attention by saying their name call them the Old Ones.

    The Old Ones are mostly like any other spirits, but they are primordial beings from the beginning of time, when the laws of nature were still different. Like nature spirits they live in the Spiritworld. But those parts of the Spiritworld that mirror places in the physical world also have changed to mirror the laws of physical nature, and so the Old Ones can no longer survive in them. Only in those places that don't mirror the physical world does the Spiritworld still work by the ancient laws, which are known as the Underworld. Deep below the surface of the world, there is no life, neither animal nor plant, so the Underworld is closer to the physical world in the deepest caves and portals can still connect the two.

    Because the laws of nature are not nearly as strict in the Underworld than in the Spiritworld, Old Ones have powers that no other spirits have, and can do things nobody else can. However, when an Old One enters the Spiritworld or the physical world, both the environment and local creatures as well as the Old Ones take great damage. The laws of their nature can just not exist side by side. Spirits from the Underworld can be summoned for very short duration but have to return within a minute or so or risk being annihilated. Some witches are very interested about these nature defying powers and investigate ways to tap into the energies of the Void and make their magic more like Old One magic than nature spirit magic. These are the sorcerers.

    Of course, magic spells that defy the laws of nature instead of bending them to a witches will in creative ways do disrupt the natural world just the same way the presence of an Old One would. And places where lots of sorcerous magic has been used become a lot more hospitable to the Old Ones. To make things worse, creatures and even unliving material that have been sufficiently warped can make vessels for Old Ones to inhabit and use as bodies to explore the physical world. The Old Ones do not necessarily want to hurt people but most don't really care about any damage they cause. And whether they want to or not, they corrupt everything they touch or get close to. It usually takes some days or weeks for visible signs to start but then people, animals, and plants quickly become weak and sick and first hints of madness begin to spread. When an Old One uses its magic powers that can happen a lot quicker.

    Some people see that the Old Ones are much older than other spirits and can do things spirits and shaman can't do and see them as much more worthy of worship. The Old Ones have been around since the beginning of time and worshipping them is seen by many as a way to become something greater and immortal. Most of the time nothing happens or they just get sick. At other times they become ghouls. Many believe that underground races like grimlocks and driders (and if I use the, derro and dark ones) are the descendants of people who went beneath the earth to find their gods. And some think they might have actually found them.

    There are no more warlocks with these changes. Some cult leaders might also be sorcerers, but there is no distinction between a priest of the Old Ones or someone who made a pact with demons. Most cult leaders are just normal shamans.

    The Old Ones themselves are like any other spirits in most respect. They have no bodies but may take ghostly shapes and can even manifest in physical form while in the Underworld. In the physical world any body must be a corrupted creature or corrupted matter like stones or tar.
    That means no more aboleths in the strictest sense. In the Underworld terror demons are often encountered as huge fish-like worms, but in the physical world they would most likely be a tar demon or an ash demon. Chuul are one common shape of sloth demons and gricks a common form of hunger demons. Pride demons are often encountered looking like neothelids. (Yes, I love worms. Lovecraft had his fishs, Howard his snakes, and Tolkien his spiders. And I got my worms. ) Insect men (inspired by Collectors) are a form of greed demon.
    Or maybe I make gricks wrath demons and then make them the Worm Of The Earth? In either way, they always have the same Hit Dice, damage, and special powers in any shape, regardless of how they look.
    The nastiest thing that can happen is when a living person becomes corrupted and then possessed by an Old One. The resulting creature is very powerful, having all the memories of the Old One and the person, as well as all magic powers either may have had. When it is destroyed, the Old One spirit returns to the Underworld and keeps everything. These beings are similar to elder vampires in many ways. They look human, are very strong, extremely intelligent, and highly ambitious. What they want to accomplish depends on what type of demon they are, but they really do it mostly for the experience of visiting a world they have never been able to see before in billions of years. While their schemes and ploys are really mostly diversions for immortal spirits, they react very agressively towards anyone who would try to get in their way. Very often their goals don't get them into conflict with everyone around them and sometimes accidentally even benefit others. While their plans are generally completely selfish and the wellbeing of others is of no concern to them, they often find it useful to be nice if it spares them unnecessary trouble and might even benefit their plans. Such a living demon can be a powerful ally against a common enemy, but usually a very unreliable one and not trustworthy in any way. To them allies are almost always tools of convenience and it's very hard to predict when they might no longer consider someone useful enough to stay on their good side. Of course, once a demon has found a mortal to be a useful tool, it is unlikely to let him leave.
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    Default Re: Ancient Lands - Savage Heroes and Mythical Beasts

    Anathema
    (from my website)

    Naming things in a fictional world is a terrible and most unenjoyable task. It’s bad enough when you do personal names and place names, but when it comes to more abstract things like organizations or types of creatures, finding a name that is reasonably acceptible (it’s never good) can take a very long time. I think I wanted to have a kind of creature similar to the abominations from Dragon Age from a very early point in working on the Ancient Lands, over 4 years ago. In the meanwhile, I added more ideas from other creatures, like folding the roles of both lichs and vampires into this new creation, and taking some elements from the Inspired from Eberron and the Eternal from Spears of the Dawn. But when it came to naming these things, nothing ever came close to fitting. But now I sat down and clicked my way through a thesaurus (they are actually good for something) and came on this wonderful word:

    Anathema

    A word that probably most people interested in fantasy have come across once or twice. Probably always refering to something blasphemous and unholy, and just the sound of it sounds ominous, even if you don’t know what it means. I had to look it up myself and it turns out to be ancient Greek meaning “offering”. (In this case, the a- at the beginning is not a prefix meaning anti.) However, in early Christianity it was used in the sense of “offered to the devil” or “devoted to evil” and referred to an early form of excommunication. Even though I made some efforts to weed out technical and religious terms that don’t really make sense in the world of the Ancient Lands, which is very different from a standard western-christian universe, anathema seems to be a word that still works.

    So what is an anathema exactly? You might recognize some of these guys. That’s what you have to expect.














    Anathema are mortals who have become possessed by a demon from the Underworld, their own spirit consumed in the process and all their memories, knowledge, and much of their personalty absorbed into the demons mind. While the mortals mind still exist in some way, all the ideals, values, and desires it once had become irrelevant as the demons original personalty dominates the mind of the anathema. It usually has very little interest in the good of the mortals clan or family, but may often retain some affection to people who were close to it in its previous life. Most anathema are greed, desire, or sloth demons and almost immediately set out to some ambitious plan to sate their craving. Usually with very little reagrd to those around it, but often enough cunning to keep their new nature a secret. At least for the time being. Demons can possess any mortal whose body and spirit have been corrupted by demonic magic and all anathema are very dangerous creatures. But the most terrible ones are those created from sorcerers who willingly summoned a demon to join with it and gain immortality and great magical powers. Many anathema note that their new nature is very different from what the sorcerer expected it to be, but at that point whatever the mortal once wanted is longer of any real relevance. The demons desire to visit and explore the physical world overrides any plans the sorcerer might have had and they never feel any remorse or despair about their new nature.

    So even though there are no Gods and no church in the Ancient Lands and not even true afterlives, anathema are still creatures that have turned away from mortal life and society and now exist entirely to pursue their demonic craving. They are “devoted to evil” and in the case of sorcerers “offered themselves to demons”. And they also “excommunicated” themselves from all mortal communites and their spirit will not join the clan shrine to give strength and courage to future generations. So the name fits in both its literal and proverbial meaning and it also sounds cool and ominous. What more can you want for a big bad monster?

    Big question now is what abilities they are going to have?
    I already made stats for almost all creatures for BX/LotFP/Spears of the Dawn. So easiest way would be the same stats as a demon, but if the mortal had a better value in anything the anathema takes that number instead. So a 6th level fighter who gets possessed by a hunger demon would have the stats of a hunger demon with 6 HD.
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    Default Re: Ancient Lands - Savage Heroes and Mythical Beasts

    This is how I wasted the whole day.

    Bestiary 0.3

    It’s not pretty and almost all stats with very little description, but this is what you can expect to be in the final version.
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    Sakaya

    The Sakaya are a group of people from many different tribes who live countless small villages in the Vestanen Mountains, regarding all of each others as equals, regardless of their birth. They are lead by mystics who preserve and spread the teachings of their founders, which emphazise equality, humility, self-sufficiency, and excelling at ones talents. They have no nobles and no slaves and also do not worship any gods or spirits, but they make regular sacrifices to the local spirits as tribute for beeing allowed to live and work on their land.



    Though the Sakaya regard each other as equals and all their villages and monasteries are forbidden from fighting among themselves, each community has its own warriors to defend against raiders and stealing of their land by other clans. Some communities consists entirely of warriors known as Sakaya-kera, who were founded to come to the aid of villages under attack by superior foes. The Sakaya-kera often take work as mercenaries for other clans, as fighting is their profession and it is not appropriate for them to seek other work when their talents are not needed by the Sakaya. Sixty years ago a commander brought many of these groups together to fight not for some foreign lord, but for their own glory and to capture wealth for the Sakaya. Since then the Sakaya-kera have become one of the strongest and most feared armies in the Ancient Lands. Usually they are spread out as individual companies doing mercenary work, but will often come together as groups of many hundreds or thousands for a raid against a wealthy city before dispersing again. If the High Commander sends out a call, he can gather an army that rivals the troops of the Mayaka king.



    The Sakaya are intended as one of the major power groups in the Ancient Lands. The original order plays only a relatively minor group, being mostly confined to small villages and monasteries in the Vestanen Mountains, where they live relatively isolated from the rest of the world. The Sakaya-kera on the other hand are one of the big military powerhouses. They have a headquarter and a commander, but just like the villages and monasteries, each company is highly autonomous and follows the teachings of the founders as they see fit. Since they often recruit new members wherever they find promising candidates and usually have no mystics among their numbers, many Sakaya-kera only know the principles of doing what you do best and not submitting to the rule of any nobles or priests. The other villages and monasteries, including their own warriors, don’t approve of the Sakaya-keras plundering of rich towns and cities, and few of the loot ever actually makes it back to them. But as there is no single ruler who could rein in the High Commander, they are not able to do anything about it. Since most people outside the Vestanen Mountains only have encounters with Sakaya-kera, the Sakaya as a whole have a rather low reputation throughout the Ancient Lands and often don’t use their traditional armor and symbols when visiting other lands.
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    Default Re: Ancient Lands - Savage Heroes and Mythical Beasts

    Factions

    I was sitting down, thinking about what more possible factions and power groups I could make for the Ancient Lands. Looking at all my favorite settings, these are really what are making them all so interesting and not any races, countries, or cities. These generally play very little to practically no role in heroic fantasy. What do we know about the government and internal politics of Stygia, the sights and social concerns of Cloud City, or Qunari food? Nothing, because we don't care. But factions and their conflicts are always right in the middle of everything and define how characters interact.
    Taking a quick count of the factions I already have, I realized that I already have a lot! There isn't really any need to have any more, just for the sake of diversity and generating more conflict. If I get a good idea in the future, why not? But it's not something that needs any more work done.
    Here's the ones I got so far.

    Druids: Probably as close as you can get to a real good guys faction. The Druids are a lose and informal association of hundreds of shamans north of the Inner Sea. Most of them belong to the elven Falden, but the influence of the group reaches to all the neighboring tribes, which includes the Eylahen, the northern and southern Skeyn, the human Vandren, and even some Brana kaas and Takari dark elves. The goal of the Druids is to fight the spread of sorcery. Sorcery is a very potent form of magic that can defy the normal rules of nature, but its use sickens the lands and all creatures that inhabit it. To the druids that price is much too high for all the great wonders sorcerers can create, and they are doing everything in their power to prevent the sorcerous arts from spreading and if possible end the practice of all sorcery in the Ancient Lands forever. While in some regions almost all shamans are affiliated with the Druids, their actual numbers are relatively low. But all of them can call upon all the warriors of their clans if they feel the need is great enough to risk the protection of their villages, which makes them potentially one of the greatest powers in the Ancient Lands. But usually most druids simply exchange information with each other and only deal with sorcery that directly threatens their homes. However, when the threat seems great, they often call together druids from neighboring clans to face the danger together, before it grows too big to be able to destroy them one by one.

    Sorcerers: Sorcerers are even fewer in numbers than the Druids and have even much less organization or shared goals. Most of the time it's just a single sorcerer and his apprentices working entirely alone, with perhaps some friendly but distant contact with other sorcerers to compare their work. As most people fear them and the Druids have a strong presence in many regions, sorcerers are usually very secretive, living in isolation from the rest of society or practicing their art in secret. Few people are able to tell the difference between a sorcerer and a reclusive, but ordinary witch, as long as they keep the destructive effects from becoming too apparent. Sorcerers are not inherently evil, but all of them are highly ambitious and at least to some degree reckless, and very well aware that many people would prefer to see them dead if they could get an opportunity. Fear of their sorcerous powers is what keeps most common people from turning against them, and most sorcerers cultivate a reputation of being very dangerous opponents.
    While sorcerers usually live in secret or are feared enough to become untouchable, the elven Neshanen of Senkand are one of the very few tribes where sorcerers have some form of acceptance and often wield considerable respect and power. Almost all sorcerers come from noble families and are frequently involved in local politics and and members of courts. Unsurprisingly, the Neshanen have a somewhat doubious reputation among the other tribes, but are also among the most educated and sophisticated people who produce many of the finest goods in the Ancient Lands. And since some of that knowledge comes from the work of sorcerers, the common Neshanen are much more willing to accept their presence in their towns and cities.

    Sakaya: The Sakaya are a kind of monastic order that is most common in the Vestanen Mountains and the surrounding lands. They reject allegiance to clans and accept people from all tribes, though most of them are human Vandren. They place great importance on performing their duties and excelling at all their skills, but are also encouraged to follow their own talents and find their own callings instead of taking the trade of their parents or living a life according to the station of their birth. The sharing of both goods and labor is central to their culture, which makes joining them very appealing to people of low birth, little wealth, or who have been cast out of their clans. (While outcasts are generally mistrusted and closely observed, they are still given a chance to prove their honest will to live by the rules of the Sakaya instead of being chased off at sight.)
    Though most Sakaya are farmers, craftsmen, and scholars, they also have warriors who are needed to protect their settlementa from bandits and other clans. Often these form their own communities who wander around to help other Sakaya wherever they are needed, but in peaceful times many seek work as mercenaries in other lands.These warrior companies are who most people in other lands encounter most often, and since they have no farms of their own and always go where there is war, they are among the best trained and most experienced warriors in the Ancient Lands. But in recent decades companies have increasingly banded together for great raids against major towns and cities instead of doing the same thing in the pay for other lords. Though generally considerably smaller in number than most marauding hordes, they are really good at it and almost all chiefs snd kings are highly concerned that the Sakaya warriors have begun to take over some of the towns they raided and turn them into fortresses from which they are taking tribute of neighboring clans and merchants passing through the area. The biggest problem with the Sakaya warriors is that they can't really be appeased, as fighting is what they are really after. The Sakaya in the mountain communities don't approve of any of these, but the marauding warriors care very little for what the mystics say. The are now almost a completely separate faction in their own right, but few outsiders know or care about the difference.

    Royal Guard: The lizardmen kingdom of the Mayaka is controlled by the priest of the Temple of the Sun, but the defense of the city, the temple, and all the Mayaka people is in the hand of a king, who is selected and appointed by the priests. As leader of the armies he has their complete trust, and as long as he does not go against their explicit wishes, the king has always had great freedom to rule the people as he sees fit. In additions to tens of thousands of ordinary warriors that can be called from the many villages of the kingdom, the king also has a large troop of elite soldiers who guard the capital city and the royal palace, and also form the heart of the armies in times of war. In all of the Ancient Lands, they are one of the few armies that are considered equals of the Sakaya.
    While the Royal Guard is primarily an army, they are also tasked with many important missions to other lands on behalf of either the king or the temple. Temple guards never leave the Temple of the Sun and priests who have to travel are given an escort by the king. Royal Guards on a mission travel either as whole companies, or sometimes in pairs or alone, depending on their task. Usually these task have something to do with the naga, as the king and the priests have few other things beyond their borders that are of much interest to them.

    Naga: The naga are one of the three races of spirits that ruled the Ancient Lands many centuries ago. While the shie and raksha are now rarely seen in the mortal world, the naga still rule some of their ancient kingdoms, though in much smaller form than they used to. The land of the naga lies to the southwest of the Mayaka kingdom and is one of the most remote regions of all the Ancient Lands. Once their control reached far to the east, including all the lands of the Mayaka and beyond. Like the other spirit races their former might had faded a long time ago and when the Mayaka rebelled, they were able to conquer many of the half abandoned naga cities, forcing them back into just a few remaining cities in the western parts of the jungle. Though nothing like the great race that once ruled half of the Ancient Lands, the naga are still very powerful, being unaging and creatures of great magical powers. Most of their cities and armies consist of lizardmen slaves, who are utterly loyal to them and almost never allow themselves to be taken prisoners by the Mayaka to join their lizardmen kingdom. To the Suji the naga are gods, and in many ways they actually are. The naga also have a race of serpentmen slaves, who many believe to have been magically created by them as elite warriors for their armies. The naga and the Mayaka are almost permanently at war, as the naga want to reclaim many of their old cities and the Mayaka see it as their sacred duty to keep fighting until all naga slaves are freed. But most of the time the war consists of frequent border skirmishes in the jungle, with either side attempting larger invasions every few decades.
    Many of the naga lords are sorcerers and their power and knowledge exceeds even that of the Neshanen by far. This makes the two groups great rivals, as each seek to steal each others secret and find any artifacts left behind in old naga ruins throughout all the lands of the Inner Sea before the other does. Neither naga nor Neshanen sorcerers have high regards for their peers, but sorcerers from both side would never consider working together with the others. The great interest of naga in sorcery might be one reason why the are still in the mortal world while all the castles of the shie and raksha have been abandoned thousands of years ago, since the summoning of demons is impossible in the Spiritworld where all the other spirits reside.

    Anathema: While sorcerers are regarded as highly dangerous and evil in general, almost all people have even much more fear of anathema. Anathema are demons who have possessed mortals, devoured their spirits, and have claimed their bodies for themselves. Many anathema were created from sorcerers who sought great power from a demon and dis not know what exactly they were being offered, but any living person who has been touched by sorcery can potentially become possessed by a demon, in some cases even by accident. Not only have anathema the ability to look entirely like mortals, they also have all the knowledge and memories of the mind they consumed, allowing them to walk among normal people almost undetected. Only druids, demon hunters, and sorcerers are able to identify an anathema as what it is, but anyone who knew the person who has been possessed can tell that something has changed them greatly.
    Like all demons and sorcerers, not all anathema are evil and destructive, but almost all of them are throughly selfish, vain, and reveling in excess. Smarter ones are able to indulge their cravings in secret and rely on minions to remain undetected, but they almost universally mean trouble for anyone near them. Like all demons, anathema are driven by basic but very powerful cravings that compell them to all manner of nefarious ploys. While newly created anathema often seek out simple thrills of mortal existence, older ones usually come up with very elaborate plans that can span decades as the targets of their cravings become more sophisticated. Particularly the most powerful kinds of demons often seek to create their own kingdoms or religions with themselves as a god. Often these plans seem needlessly convoluted and highly unlikely to suceed, but as immortal beings with no true material needs, demons are often enjoying the struggle much more than the eventual fruits of their labor. To anathema, the excitement of defeating their enemies and overcoming obstacles is often the main goal of all their work and so many of their plans appear outright insane to mortal minds. Thankfully there is even less organization between them than between sorcerers and almost every anathema works completely alone and relies entirely on mortal minions.

    Demon Hunters The Demon Hunters are a small group of warriors who share the belief of the Druids that sorcery and demons are a great threat to the world and that sorcerers must not be allowed to continue their dark research. However, the Demon Hunters also belief that there is no other weapon as effective in fighting demons as their own sorcery. They are under vow only to use their magic to defeat demons and sorcerers, but generally they consider it better to have one great battle of sorcerous energies than allowing a sorcerer to continue practicing his magic for decades or centuries.
    Unsurprisingly, the Druids do not agree and regards the Demon Hunters as just another cabal of sorcerers.

    Merchants: While most traders are running modest businesses and travel between towns with a few wagons or a small ship, trade in the great port cities is almost entirely within the hand of a much smaller number of very powerful and outrageously wealthy merchants. Usually their power is based on their ability to get anyone who trades in certain goods to either work for them or to stay well away from their cities. Many of them are well connected with each other, which enables them to have almost complete monopolies on certain goods throughout the Inner Sea. Anyone trying to sell these goods independently gets quickly shoved out of business or over the railing to the sharks.
    Since there are generally very little laws about what can be sold and traded in the ports of the Ancient Lands, much of the business of these merchants is not really illegal in any way. But there are always people who try to smuggle goods into the cities without their knowledge or harbor officials who are not responding to the usual bribes for mishandling tax calculations, so most of them have gangs of enforcers in their pay who ensure business is running smoothly. Their contacts allow them to get hold of even the rarest and most exotic things, which regularly serves very well to get city nobles into their debt. In most towns and villages of the Ancient Lands the merchants of the Inner Sea are basically unknown and have almost no influence. But to anyone who has business in or with any of the port cities, they are an extremely powerful group that can get almost anything they want.

    I am really quite happy with these. Not only did I manage to get quite a good number of factions that make sense in a bronz age world mostly inhabited by tribal clans, they are also all not true evil and can make for great villains and quirky allies. You could make PCs that belong to any of these groups and still be pretty decent people and also use the groups as allies that have a common goal, even if the people might be quite despicable to the players.
    And most importantly, they are almost all enemies with each other, but not so much that they would necessarily kill each other on sight. The only downside is that there aren't really any natural alliances. But Royal Guardsmen might both allies with Druids and Sorcerers to fight a naga, which I find pretty cool. Or even sorcerers working with demon hunters to destroy an anathema. Very happy with these.
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    Demon Abilities

    Still more demon stuff.
    I've figured out all the basics stats for the demons in B/X D&D, but still working on the special abilities that each type is going to have.

    All Demons
    • Partially or fully resistant to normal weapons, vulnerable to silver and magic weapons.
    • Immune to fire, half damage from acid and cold. (Except for ash, ice, and tar demons, which have slightly different ones.)
    • Magic Resistance.


    Wrath
    • Two attacks per round. (Usually reserved for high level monsters.)
    • Never panics or flees. (And hard to call back for those who command them.)


    Hunger
    • Spells: Detect invisible


    Greed
    • Very high and far jumping.
    • Sneak Attack
    • Spells: Invisibility


    Desire
    • Flight.
    • Change into any humanoid form.
    • Spells: Charm person (lasts for weeks or months)


    Sloth
    • High armor and magic resistance.
    • Poisonous bite.
    • Level draining breath.
    • Spells: Darkness, dispel magic, sleep


    Terror
    • Spells: Charm person, dispel magic


    Pride
    • Change into any type of creature.
    • Spells: dispel magic, polymorph others


    Dread
    • Nothing


    Battle
    • High armor.
    • Steel armor negates silver weapons.


    Ice
    • Nothing yet.


    Shadow
    • Flight.
    • Gaseous body. Can only be hurt by magic and takes little damage from energy.
    • Spells: Darkness


    Ash
    • Flight.
    • Gaseous body. Can only be hurt by magic and takes little damage from energy.
    • Claws deal fire damage.
    • Fire breath.


    Tar
    • Spells: Web


    Rock
    • Throw rocks like giant
    • Spells: Wall of stone


    The Sloth Demon and the Ash Demon are already looking pretty good. In particularly the Sloth Demon only exists to spoil other peoples fun. But that's the whole concept behind the creature. Everything you have he breaks and everything you are good at he negates. Players won't be encountering them at random but most likely know they are dealing with some major source of corruption and decay, so I don't think it's an unfair monster.
    I want the hunge demon to be a hunter, the greed demon to be an assassin, the terror demon to be a tyrant and control freak, and the pride demon to believe itself to be a god. The rest of the demons in the lower half of the list are basically corrupted elementals.
    Do you have any ideas what might be good abilities for them that fit with their theme and make fights more interesting?
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    Dark Elves
    Dark elves are at home in the Mahiri Jungles between the Red River and the Mayaka Kingdom on the southern shores of the Inner Sea. They resemble wood elves of the northern lands in stature, but their skin is a dark ashen gray and their hair ranges in colors from white to light blond and various shaded of silvery gray. The color of their eyes is usually in shades from dark ember or copper to a deep dark red and they have excellent vision in the night, even under the dark shadows of the thick jungles. Being well adapted to the dark, dark elves often make their homes in caves or live in homes with small windows, and life in the villages and towns usually starts only in the afternoon when the trees of the surrounding jungles provide plenty of shade and continues deep into the night. Like wood elves, dark elves are fully grown at around 24 years of age and often live well over 300 years if they don't fall victim to disease, war, or accident.

    Ruyaki
    The Ruyaki are the smallest of the three tribes of dark elves that lives in the Ancient Lands. They inhabit the northernmost parts of the Mahiri Jungles and the lands along the Red River south of the Vestanen Mountains. They often wear shawls and hoods to protect themselves from the sand that gets blown up from the dry banks of the Red River and to provide some shade for their eyes in more sparsely forested northern reaches of the Mahiri Jungles. They are also known for their armor, which is often made from the hides of giant insects that live in the region. Ruyaki clans are often rather small, often numbering just several hundred people or a few thousand. Vandren from the Vestanen Mountains rarely travel into Ruyaki territory, but the relations between clans most commonly depend on the past history between specific clans. There are few Ruyaki towns of remarkable size and some clans are almost entirely nomadic and live from hunting and keeping antelope-like mountain goats.

    Takari
    The Takari clans live along the coast of the western Mahiri Jungles between the Kuremo swamps at the mouth of the Red River and the territory controlled by the Mayaka. Like the Neshanen on the northern shores of the Inner Sea, their culture is centered around several major port cities and towns that have come to considerable wealth through trade with other cities. Highborn Takari often live in great city mansions or villas in the surrounding villages. In addition to the valuable goods from the jungles, the Takari also trade in slaves, which are usually captured from the Yagashi clans deeper in the jungles or Amakari and Gandju villages in Sunvanea.

    Yagashi
    The Yagashi are the largest tribe of dark elves and are spread throughout a vast region of jungle south of the Takari coast and west of the Mayaka Kingdom. Most live in small villages that have little contact with the people from other land, but there is also a number of great temple cities deep within the jungles, which are ruled by powerful shaman queens. The Yagashi use little worked metal and most bronze is used for spear blades and arrow tips. Their warriors wear simple armor made from corded tree fibers and reinforced with animal bones that serves them well in the hot and humid jungles of their homeland. Their warriors are also painted in complex swirling runes made from a mixture of white clay and the ground bones of monsters, which binds the spirits of those creatures to them and gives them some of their powers. As much as they revere and honor the creatures of the jungles, they rarely wear more than two or three such runes on their body at the same time, as they fear the spirits might be able to possess them fully if they use too many at once and for a long time. Sleeping without washing off the runes is regarded as highly dangerous and warriors will often destroy the runes on an ally who falls unconscious in battle even before treating his wounds.
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    Humans
    Humans are one of the minor people who live in the Ancient Lands. They consist of four major tribes that are very different from each other and live separated by many hundreds of miles from one another. They have been few in numbers and of little importance in the history of the Ancient Lands for the most time, but in recent centuries Vandren from the Vestanen Mountains have been coming into the lands on the Inner Sea in increasing numbers and started to settle in some parts of the lowlands. There are still many Falden or Ruyaki who have never seen a human in their entire life, and with the exception of the Amakari in Sunvanea they are almost unknown to the lizardmen of the Mahiri Jungles and Kemesh. Humans are very similar in height and stature to elves, though usually somewhat bulkier build. By the age of 20 they are fully grown, but rarely live for more than 80 years and even that is very rare except for some powerful shamans and witches.
    Even though humans are not as strong as kaas or lizardmen and lack the speed and agility of elves, they have an endurance toughness that beats that of all the other humanoid people. As long as they have sufficient water, humans can travel almost an entire day with very little rest, even in heat that brings the strongest kaas or elves down within an hour and they can keep doing so for many days with only little food. Humans who are traveling light can easily cover as much distance in a day as a horse, and even outdistance them on a hot day. Scouts and patrols of other people rarely attempt to pursue humans who have a good head start as the chances for catching them are slim. And outrunning human pursuers on foot is a situation in which even the most experienced and toughened never wish to find themselves. Skeyn may have a similar ability to keep up hard physical work for long time, but nobody outruns even a moderately healthy human over long distances. In addition to that, humans are also exceptionally hardy when it comes to dealing with malnutrition and the various diseases that often accompany it. They are able to survive on a wider range of food sources than almost anyone else and it's often said that there is nothing sold as food in the markets of the Ancient Lands that humans couldn't digest. Their bodies are also able to deal reasonably well with food that has been partly spoiled and become inedible to other people without becoming thick. In the centuries in which human mercenaries have been hired by elven warlords, it has become well known that they will almost always outlast nonhuman enemies in a siege, regardless of which side of the walls they are on. Unsurprisingly, this has made them highly valued as mercenaries for the wood elven tribes and Amakari slaves often bring the best prices for Takari slavers. In recent generations they have even started to be hired as sailors on Keyren ships.

    Amakari
    The Amakari are one of the two tribes that inhabit the countless islands of Suvanea in the eastern waters of the Inner Sea. They are taller and broader build than humans of the other tribes and have deep brown skin with dark earth and sand colored hair and beards. They are not very numerous, even in their home islands, which they are sharing with the Gandju lizardmen. Amakari technology is very similar to that of the Gandju and uses almost no metal except for a few small ornaments. They travel between islands and catch fish in small but very fast boats that can be both sailed and rowed. They have the fewest similarities to other human tribes and some think that they might actually be neither humans nor elves, but something else entirely.

    Kaska
    The Kaska are a small tribe that is very similar in appearance to the Vandren of the Vestanen Mountains and speaks a similar language, but as at home many hundreds of miles to the north in the Witchfens between the great Nareven forest and the Rayalka Moutains. They are of similar height to Vandren and wood elves and have straight black hair and light brown skin. The Kaska are very reclusive and usually hostile to people of any other tribes, but many of the neighboring people believe that they are fighting just as much among themselves. Not much is known about them by people from other lands, as the Witchfens are a highly inhospitable place and nobody is sure what drive the Kaska to make their homes there in the first place. Kaska warparties regularly creep through the hills of the Erhait to raid villages in the valley of the Kaldaven for weapons, grain, and slaves. Within the Witchfens, the true power over the Kaska clans lies in the hands of their witches. Most of them are women who have great power over the clan chiefs, but they also have their own hierarchies and rivalries of which even the common Kaska understand very little.

    Mari
    The cold northern land of Venlad on the coast of the Northern Sea is the home of the Mari, a small human tribe that has lived mostly in isolation from the rest of the Ancient Lands for countless centuries. Unlike other humans or elves they have relatively light skin and brown hair and they tend to be somewhat taller than most of these people, though not as big as the Amakari. Most Mari are reindeer herders or fishermen, since the cold land doesn't lend itself well to growing crops. Villages are small and most houses built partly into the ground to be protected from the fierce winter storms, but there are also a few small towns of wooden houses on the coast where ships from the South come during the summer to trade for pelts, whalebone, and dried fish.

    Vandren
    The Vandren are the largest of the human tribes that live in the Ancient Lands and have their traditional homeland in the Vestanen Mountains between the forests of Nareven and the Red River. They are similar in height to most elves with black hair and light brown skin and make many of their clothes and armor from leather, as they keep many herds of goats, sheep, and mountain horses to survive in a land where growing crops is hard and difficult work. Though gold, silver, and copper can be found in the mountains, the greatest treasure of the Vandren is salt, which they trade with merchants from all over the Ancient Lands. For several centuries elven merchants have been hiring Vandren warriors to protect the valuable caravans from bandits and the warriors of hostile clans, and they soon began to employ large numbers of Vandren mercenaries in their wars against each other. Vandren have been migrating from the mountains to the borders of the elven lands ever since, and while still mostly disorganized and relatively few in numbers, they are becoming a new powerful tribe on the coast of the Inner Sea.
    The most famous of the Vandren mercenaries are the Sakaya, who began as a religious group in the Vestanen Mountains that had its own warriors to protects its great monasteries and farming villages. During times of peace, these warrior monks took up mercenary work to hone their skills of combat, but some never returned to the mountains and instead made their new homes in the conquered fortresses of their defeated enemies. Though the Sakaya of the lowlands accept warriors of any tribe or clan into their ranks, the majority of them are still Vandren, and for many people on the Inner Sea there is very little difference between the two.
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    Lizardmen
    The Lizardmen are the dominant race of the Mahiri Jungles, Kemesh, and Suvanea, with smaller isolated groups being found on islands and in marshes as far north as the Tavir Mountains. They are on average a head taller than humans or elves and often weight twice as much, but the clans of some regions are of much more slender build. While not particularly fast or agile on land, they are very good swimmers and divers and most often make their homes directly at the water. As the other races are concerned, lizardmen show few emotions or individual personalty and seem generally somewhat dull, but in reality they are not any less intelligent. Much of their culture seems very strange to other peoples, such as their apparent lack of families. Eggs and young children are cared fore collectively by the women of a village and most make very little difference between their own children and those of others. Men are often not aware which children of the village are their own and young lizardmen become mostly independent of their caretakers by the age of ten. Positions of authority are usually attained entirely be merit and not by right of birth. To people from other tribes lizardmen often appear as highly indifferent and uncaring towards their children and eggs are usually regarded as replaceable, but they protect their young just as committed as all other peoples.
    The cultures of the lizardmen are among the oldest in the Ancient Land, with many of their realms predating even the earliest elven kingdoms. However, the people of most major cities consider the lizardmen to be stuck in the past and having reached the limit of their abilities. While many of the outlying tribes do indeed have no writing or barely any metal, the major cities hidden deeper in the jungles are just as advanced as any elven kingdoms.

    Gandju
    The tribe of the Gandju lives in the many islands of Suvanea on the eastern end of the Inner Sea, which they share with the much less numerous human Amakari. Though there have been a few old naga castles in Suvanea, the Gandju never were made slaves in large numbers and their culture is entirely their own. Like the Amakari, the Gandju use no metals except for a few knives and spear blades taken from elven ships that have been boarded or run aground in the region. Gandju villages are mostly found on the beaches or lakes found on some of the larger islands. Their boats are much smaller than the merchant ships of the Keyren, Neshanen, and Takari and not well suited to endure storms out on the open sea, but very fast and maneuverable and perfect for travel between the islands. Some clans are frequently visited by merchant ships buying fresh food for the long journeys across the Inner Sea, but others are pirates who simply steal whatever goods from foreign lands they find a taste for.

    Kuraka
    The Kuraka a group of highly diverse clans of lizardmen whose most common trait is that they never were slaves to the naga or part of the Mayaka kingdom. They have no cities and only a few towns of significant size and they don't make bronze, but have long ago learned to work the metal taken from dead Mayaka and Suji soldiers and they have many bronze spears and daggers in addition to their own stone and obsidian weapons. The Kuraka are most numerous in the highlands west of Kemesh, but small clans can be found throughout the huge unclaimed territory that separates the lands of the two great powers of the region and on many stretches along the coast. Most clans don't want anything to do with either the naga or the Mayaka and live in small villages in hard to reach places.

    Mayaka
    The Mayaka are the largest of the lizardmen tribes and one of the most advanced civilizations in the Ancient Lands. Enslaved by the naga lords who ruled over most of the Mahiri Jungles and Kemesh many hundreds of years ago, the lizardmen in the western cities rebelled when the power of the naga began to wane and over several generations gained control over a large territory. Shamans of the slaves had been worshiping the Sun in secret for centuries, and it was these shamans that eventually were able to overcome the naga sorcerers, allowing the warrior slaves to conquer the great city Nakat Sahri. The shamans chose one of the greatest warriors of the rebellion to take charge of the armies and made him the first king of the Mayaka. While the king has been the leaders of the Mayaka warriors and in control of most of the everyday business of the kingdom for almost a thousand years, each king is chosen by the high priests of the Temple of the Sun, who may even replace him if he ever becomes unworthy as the avatar of the Sun.
    Having driven the naga from one of their greatest cities and making it the seat of their new kingdom, the Mayaka had access to large irrigated fields and mines of copper and tin from the very beginning, when most other tribes where still living in trees and caves with nothing but sharp stones for weapons. Even almost a thousand years later, only the Neshanen and the skeyn have achieved a sophistication of technology to rival theirs. Though only a relatively small number of Mayaka is living in the great cities of the kingdom, most villages are well connected to the bureaucracy of the kingdom and the army of the kingdom is well organized and has many fortresses and camps on the borders to the dark elves in the West and the remaining naga cities of Kemesh in the East. In addition, the king also commands the Guard of the Royal palace, which is one of the most well trained and organized forces in all of the Ancient Lands, being rivaled only by a few of the best companies of the Sakaya. Soldiers of the Royal Guard wear bronze lamellar armor and swords, which make them stand out clearly from the regular Mayaka soldiers, who are equipped with armor made from corded rope and iron spears. While Mayaka soldiers are rarely seen outside the borders of the kingdom when not on a campaign to destroy enemy troops, soldiers of the Royal Guard also have the duty of escorting dignitaries of the kingdom to other countries and are sometimes chosen send on special assignments that lead them to far away places. Within the great cities of the kingdom, children of women of the palaces are raised away from those of the common masses, creating a kind of aristocratic caste that is unknown to the other lizardmen tribes. Commoners can still rise to position of great power and might even be selected to become king, but the children of the palace are given much better education, which puts them at a great advantage.

    Suji
    The Suji are a unique tribe in the Ancient Lands, as they have no chiefs or shamans and are entirely under the rule of the naga of Kemesh. They are almost never seen outside the naga realms, except when crewing the rare occasional ships that transport their naga masters to other lands. The Suji perform almost all manual labor in Kemesh except for the casting of weapons and armor for the naga and their elite serpentmen guards, and they also make up the majority of the vast naga armies that are in a slow but almost constant war with the Mayaka, and occasionally come to clash with each other. According to the Priests of the Sun and the Mayaka king, they are continuing their rebellion to free all lizardmen from naga slavery, but to most Suji they are heretics who are refusing to bow to their divine masters. Fieldworkers from villages captured by the Mayaka are often brought to the kingdom and live pretty much as slaves, with their young being raised in Mayaka hatcheries. Suji soldiers often fight to the death rather than joining the heretics and it is rare that any are taken alive by victorious Mayaka armies.
    We are not standing on the shoulders of giants, but on very tall tower of other dwarves.

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  20. - Top - End - #50
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    I am needing some help here. I've been giving some thought on the basic economic aspects that dominate trade and commerce in the setting. I think it looks good, but there's probably a lot of errors in there. Do you notice anything that doesn't really fit?

    Weapons and Armor

    Bronze
    The main material for making weapons and armor in the Ancient Lands is bronze. Made from copper and tin it is quite easily produced and to work with and it doesn't get damaged by rust. Weapons and tools made from bronze are made by melting the copper and tin until it becomes liquid and pouring it into a cast, and broken bronze objects can easily be molten down again in relatively small fires. If needed, this can even be done on the road without use of a propper forge. However, the scarcity of tin makes it quite expensive and only available in large quantities to people who have established trade with other lands. While copper can be found in many places, most tin in the Ancient Lands comes from the Erhait, the Vestanen Mountains, and the Highlands of the Mahiri Jungles. Much of the wealth of the skeyn and the Vandren comes from the mining and selling of tin, which in many places is as valuable as salt or gold.

    Iron
    Smelting iron ore into raw iron is more difficult than turning copper and tin into liquids and the resulting material requires many hours of hammering until it becomes a usable metal and even then the wrought iron doesn't stand up to the toughness of bronze. It is also highly susceptible to rusting when not kept clean and dry and broken or rusted pieces can not simply be remade without use of a large foundry and a lot of labor. However, iron ore can be found almost anywhere and in much larger quantities, making it a much cheaper material when quality is not important, such as nails, arrowheads, or small plates for lamellar armor. The most important exception is chainmail armor, as wrought iron is much easier turned into rings than bronze. Both the Vashka and the Neshanen possess this skill and their armor often find their way into the hands of their neighboring tribes.
    The skeyn of both the Erhait and the Tavir Mountains also know the secret of turning iron into steel, which is a much more advanced process than simply making wrought iron and requires the use of large foundries and forges. Weapons and armor made from skeyn steel are almost as good as those made from bronze, but the much cheaper production of the metal allows them to create them in much larger numbers and the soldiers guarding Barregal and Falreig are the best equipped anywhere in the Ancient Lands. They also sell steel weapons to clans of other tribes, but most warriors anywhere would rather use weapons made from bronze.

    Silver
    Silver is not a good metal to make weapons with, but it is unique in it's ability to harm spirits and many other other magical creatures. It has a unique connection to the Spiritworld, which not only makes it very valuable for withes and shamans in the creation of magical devices and amulets, but it can also cuts the flesh of creatures that are unharmed by bronze, iron, stone, or wood. Taken by itself, silver is far too soft to be made into blades, but when molten and coated on bronze, it will form an inseparable bond that can not be broken by any means. A bronze blade dipped into molten silver will gain a coating of silver that can harm magical creatures but retain it's original strength and toughness. The silver edge of the blade needs to be frequently sharpened and blunts quickly when striking other metal, but for a small number against unarmored creatures it is a sharp as any other blade. Sharpening the edge will eventually wear down the silver to the bronze core, at which point it needs to get a new coating of silver. These weapons are very expensive and dull quickly when used against armored opponents or parrying the weapons of armed enemies, but they are invaluable to those who are fighting monsters and the creatures of the Spiritworld.

    Trade

    Tin
    Tin is required for the making of bronze and a relatively rare material found in large quantities in only a few places in the Ancient Lands. Almost all tin comes from the Erhait, the Vestanen Mountains, or the highlands south of the Mahiri Jungles. Those clans who control the mines are among the richest and most powerful of their regions, since otherwise they have been conquered by their neighbors long ago. Copper just by itself is even less suited for weapons and tools than wrought iron and many wars in the Ancient Lands have been fought over the control of tin mines and the highly lucrative trade with the metal.

    Salt
    Salt is one of the most valuable resources in the Ancient Lands and the real source of the wealth of the Vandren. Nomadic hunters in the wild or the people in small fishing villages can do well enough without it, but for those people who live by farming and storing food for the winter it is both vital for their health and the preservation of meat. People in farming villages who live mostly on the plants they grow will soon become sick and eventually die when they have no access to salt and meat is almost impossible to store for later without it. Not only is salt necessary for survival in the civilized parts of the Ancient Lands, it is also demanded in huge amounts. When tin runs out people can keep using the weapons and armor they have and melt down broken pieces to make new ones, but when the trade with salt comes to a stop it becomes an immediate matter of life and death.
    Both the Tavir Mountains and the Vestanen Mountains have several large salt mines, and digging the salt out of the ground is backbreaking work that often falls to thousands of slaves who rarely survive for very long. Both the Vandren and some of the Neshanen cities in Senkand gain their wealth primarily from selling salt to Eldanen, Halond, and even the Mayaka kingdom. The Ruyaki also have some limited trade in salt with the Takari, but in the last hundred years the Vandren salt mines have given the Takari access to much more salt than ever before.

    Cloth
    Wool is found almost everywhere in the ancient lands and comes mostly from sheep and goats. Linen and cotton cloth is much finer and lighter but requires a lot of work to make and the flax and cotton plants don't grow in many parts of the Ancient Lands, which makes both yarn and cloth highly desired goods. The most prized and valuable cloth is silk, which is only produced by the Takari on the coast of the Mahiri Jungles.

    Furs
    The largest and thickest pelts come from the winter coats of animals found in the coldest lands of the North, such as Venlad and Yakun. These fetch very high prices in the markets of Halond, Senkand, Eldanen, and even the Vestanen Mountains where they are highly desired over wool from local animals. They are one of the main reasons why people from other lands make the long journey to the Northern Sea.

    Bone and Ivory
    While bone can be found in any places in the Ancient Lands and there are several large beasts with big tusks and horns in the jungles of the South, they are nowhere found in such large numbers and sizes as in the Northern Sea. Walrus and whale hunters in Venland bring a bounty of tusks and whalebone to the markets every year that is greater than what most kings of the South will see in their entire lifetime. And which makes those merchants who successfully make the journey to the frozen lands and back very rich.
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  21. - Top - End - #51
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    I've spend the weekend reading the rules of the new Fantasy Age game and I am loving it. More substance than Barbarians of Lemuria, less rules than Atlantis: The Second Age, and much more polished mechanics than B/X Dungeons & Dragons. And it has pretty much just the type of magic system that I want.

    One of the first things I made for it are statting the player character races for the Ancient Lands. Here they are:

    Elf
    • Add 1 to your Dexterity ability.
    • Pick one of the following ability focuses: Dexterity (Stealth) or Perception (Seeing).
    • You have Dark Sight, which allows you to see up to 20 yards in darkness without a light source.
    • Your Speed is equal to 12 + Dexterity (minus armor penalty if applicable).
    • Roll for or pick two items from the Elf Benefits table for additional benefits.


    2d6 Elf Benefits
    2 +1 Accuracy
    3-4 Communication (Persuasion)
    5 Dexterity (Acrobatics)
    6 Strength (Climbing)
    7-8 +1 Perception
    9 Weapon Group: Bows/Accuracy (Bows)
    10-11 Perception (Hearing)
    12 +1 Communication

    Human
    • Add 1 to your Fighting ability.
    • Pick one of the following ability focuses: Constitution (Running) or Communication (Persuasion).
    • Your Speed is equal to 10 + Dexterity (minus armor penalty if applicable).
    • Roll for or pick two items from the Human Benefits table for additional benefits.


    2d6 Human Benefits
    2 +1 Communication
    3-4 Accuracy (Brawling)
    5 Communication (Bargaining)
    6 Communication (Deception)
    7-8 +1 Constitution
    9 Perception (Searching)
    10-11 Constitution (Stamina)
    12 +1 Willpower

    Kaas
    • Add 1 to your Strength ability.
    • Pick one of the following ability focuses: Strength (Climbing) or Strength (Jumping).
    • Your Speed is equal to 10 + Dexterity (minus armor penalty if applicable).
    • Roll for or pick two items from the Kaas Benefits table for additional benefits.


    2d6 Kaas Benefits
    2 +1 Fighting
    3-4 Constitution (Stamina)
    5 Accuracy (Brawling)
    6 Perception (Smelling)
    7-8 +1 Constitution
    9 Weapon Group: Axes/Fighting (Axes)
    10-11 Strength (Might)
    12 +1 Perception

    Kidari
    • Add 1 to your Dexterity ability.
    • Pick one of the following ability focuses: Dexterity (Acrobatics) or Strength (Climbing).
    • Your Speed is equal to 10 + Dexterity (minus armor penalty if applicable).
    • Roll for or pick two items from the Kidari Benefits table for additional benefits.


    2d6 Kidari Benefits
    2 +1 Accuracy
    3-4 Dexterity (Stealth)
    5 Perception (Hearing)
    6 Perception (Smelling)
    7-8 +1 Perception
    9 Perception (Tracking)
    10-11 Strength (Jumping)
    12 +1 Willpower

    Lizardman
    • Add 1 to your Constitution ability.
    • Pick one of the following ability focuses: Constitution (Swimming) or Dexterity (Initiative).
    • Your Speed is equal to 10 + Dexterity (minus armor penalty if applicable).
    • Roll for or pick two items from the Lizardman Benefits table for additional benefits.


    2d6 Lizardman Benefits
    2 +1 Fighting
    3-4 Constitution (Stamina)
    5 Accuracy (Brawling)
    6 Strength (Might)
    7-8 +1 Strength
    9 Willpower (Morale)
    10-11 Willpower (Self-Discipline)
    12 +1 Willpower

    Skeyn
    • Add 1 to your Dexterity ability.
    • Pick one of the following ability focuses: Communication (Deception) or Constitution (Stamina).
    • You have Dark Sight, which allows you to see up to 20 yards in darkness without a light source.
    • Your Speed is equal to 8 + Dexterity (minus armor penalty if applicable).
    • Roll for or pick two items from the Skeyn Benefits table for additional benefits.


    2d6 Skeyn Benefits
    2 +1 Intelligence
    3-4 Dexterity (Stealth)
    5 Dexterity (Crafting)
    6 Perception (Empathy)
    7-8 +1 Constitution
    9 Perception (Hearing)
    10-11 Perception (Smelling)
    12 +1 Willpower
    We are not standing on the shoulders of giants, but on very tall tower of other dwarves.

    Spriggan's Den Heroic Fantasy Roleplaying

  22. - Top - End - #52
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    Big reshuffling time in the Ancient Lands again. I've never been anywhere close to happy with the geography of the setting and I think I now figured out why. The traditional fantasy campaign setting "satelite view" map very much conflicts with the sword & sorcery and space opera approach to setting design I am using. So right now I think I am not actually going to do a true world map at all. Instead there will be just a very rough and sketchy outline for the major landmasses. All the actual content regarding settlements and landscapes is confined to a number of relatively small areas, which get covered in considerable detail. These will be comparable to Icewind Dale, the Eldeen Reaches, Skyrim, Ferelden, Tatooine, Tuchanka, or any other of hundreds of "countries" you encounter in fiction outside of roleplaying games. The ones that I cover may not necessarily be the most densely populated or most representative regions of the Ancient Lands, but I am picking them by how well they are suited as places for adventures. Big fertile lands of peaceful farming villages are not really places either players or GMs would care about.

    A good reason to have accurate world maps for fantasy settings is for judging travel distances and to see what kind of places and areas you'll be passing through on a long journey to another region. This can be quite important information for some campaigns, but in a pulp campaign like Sword & Sorcery or space opera it normally doesn't matter at all. Some weeks or months have passed and then you're standing right next to the place you wanted to go to. The journey itself doesn't really play any role in these genres. It's the parts with the villains and the old ruins that matter, the rest is glossed over. Doing a good world map poses a lot of challenges (even if it's just a continent or part of one), but for a setting like the Ancient Lands where it is not needed, it really isn't worth the effort. And I think not having an accurate map actually enhances some of the themes and the overall atmosphere of the setting.

    Currently, all the material I have crated over the years seems to come together very neatly in 16 thematical and geographical regions. The layout is very simple, consisting of a single long coast that runs from north to south with the land in the west and the ocean in the east. Similar to the American East Coast all the way from Greenland to Florida, or the eastern coast of Asia.

    The Far North: This remote region is the northernmost part of the known world for the people of the Ancient Lands. It's mostly rocky coasts and treeless tundra that experiences many months of winter. It's the homeland of the human Mari, who survive by fishing, whaling, and herding reindeer, and a few small bands of Vashka kaas. This is the land for true arctic adventures and visiting the frozen castles of spirits of cold and ice.

    The Kaas Lands: Cold, but less bleak and inhospitable than the lands of the Mari, this region is dominated by vast forests of pines and firs that stretch on forever to the west as far as the local people know, and high mountains that are covered in snow all year. It's the land of the Brana and Vashka kaas tribes and also home to some strongholds of skeyn. This region is a relatively ordinary "Viking setting", except that the locals are not human.

    The Witchfens: The Witchfens are a very large cold wetland that is home of the human Kaska. There are few natural resources and the Kaska don't welcome any visitors to their land. It's covered by fog almost all year and an absolutely miserable place to be, but for some reason the Kaska rarely travel beyond it. Groups of raiders who have attacked settlements in other regions are probably the main reason why anyone would want to go there, but it's also a very strange and mystical place inhabited by mysterious spirits and home to ancient magic.

    The Dusk Coast: This long stretch of coast lies between the Northlands and the Inner Sea, which is pretty much the only reason anyone ever comes near it. Though the climate is quite mild and the coast consists of sandy beaches, it is always somewhat gloomy as if some kind of haze is obscuring the sun. There are several small villages on the coast which have been build by Keyren elves from the Northern Islands and are popular stops for ships traveling to or from the Northlands. Just a few miles inland the land becomes more rugged and choked by very dense forest that is part of the huge expanse of trees that covers almost the entire northern half of the Ancient Lands. There is something unnatural about those woods and even the locals rarely travel far from the coast.

    The Northern Islands: This group of islands lies many miles to the east of the Dusk Coast in the ocean and is the homeland of the Keyren elves. Some of the larger islands have mountains in their centers but the rest of the land is quite flat. Most of the land is covered by forest and for most time of the year it either rains or gets very foggy, but the constant sea winds usually get a few hours of sunshine on most days and weather can change very quickly and frequently. (This region is highly influenced by the North Sea and Baltic Sea coasts where I am from, but without vikings.)

    The Burning Mountains: Many miles south of the Dusk Coast lies a high mountain range comparable to inland Greece, the Caucasus, or the Pyrenees. The region is home to many volcanoes and in many places smoke and vapors rise from cracks in the ground. Not many people live in these mountains and they are a strange mix of elves from the Falden, Neshanen, and Keyren tribes with even some human Vandren and possibly Kaska thrown in. To the Neshanen and the Keyren they are wild people who are brutish and superstitious. Many people believe that the cracks in the ground lead all the way down into the underworld and the local barbarians regularly worship the ancient gods below the ground. To other people they are demon worshippers and usually quickly driven away from any civilized settlements. In many places it is not just smoke that rises from the ground, but strange green and purple glowing mists that have strange effects on the local plants and animals and surely could be able to turn even people into monsters.

    The Island Ruins: A few miles off the coast from the Burning Mountains lies a group of islands that consists mostly of barren rock but are home to a large number of very ancient ruined cities. Thousands of years ago they were inhabited by naga and it's likely the place where the first sorcerers mastered their arts. Most sailors stay as far away from the islands as possible as they are said to be haunted by ghouls and demons, but many Neshanen sorcerers have a great interest in all the ancient magical lore that might still be hidden in the lifeless ruins and the tombs of ancient naga sorcerers. Some naga of the southern jungles have become aware of that and also have great interest in recovering the knolwedge of their predecessors before the elves get them into their hands.

    The Rocky Coast: South of the Burning Mountains the coast turns from it's north-south direction towards the west and forms the northern shore of the huge gulf that is the Inner Sea. This is the home of the Neshanen elves and somewhat inspired by the coasts and islands of Greece and Italy. There are various small city states, which in most cases are really just a fortified palace surrounded by a town of craftsmen and traders. Though even that makes it one of the most highly civilized regions in the Ancient Lands. There are hundreds of small islands near the coast and the rocky cliffs are full with caves, of which many are unexplored or still unknown.

    The Elven Forest: This is a large section of forest which is the home to the Falden tribe. It's a fairly standard place and I don't have any really outstanding ideas for it yet. It sits to the west of the Rocky Coast and the Burning Mountains. After this region the coast goes back from north to south, forming the western shore of the Inner Sea.

    The Deep Forest: A good distance further inland and quite far away from the coast of the Inner Sea lies this region of increddibly huge trees that block out most of the daylight and make the forest floor pitch black during the night. There are some Falden villages high up in the trees, but otherwise this land is entirely under the rule of the beasts and spirits of the forest. This is one of the furthest outposts of civilization in the Ancient Lands.

    The Other Mountains: This mountain range is even larger than the Burning Mountains and the home of the human Vandren tribe. They are considered quite primitive by elves and most lizardmen, but produce most of the copper and salt that is traded in the Ancient Lands. This region is somewhat inspired by the lower sloped of the Himalayas, particularly in China but also northern India. Not completely sure where to put them geographically, but they will separate the Elven Forest from the Red River.

    The Land of the Red River: This region forms the western shore of the Inner Sea. While the coast is extremely wet and swampy, the land rises very quickly and turns into an almost barren expanse of rock and dust. The main feature of this seemingly empty land is the huge river network of the Red River, which carries the water of almost all the springs on the southern side of the mountains. Over the ages the waters have carved a gigantic maze of deep canyons into the ground and earthquakes and landslides have frequently redirected the river to result in countless dead arms and large underground caves. It's not a highly populated region, but there are some settlements of human Vanren and Takari elves, many of which are build into the canyon walls.

    The Takari Jungles: In this region the coastline bends again towards the east to form the southern shore of the Inner Sea. These jungles are home of the Takari, though I am afraid I don't have much else on it yet.

    The Mayaka Jungles: East of the Takari lands lies the great kingdom of the Mayaka lizardmen. It's more jungle, but also the home of lots of giant reptiles.

    The Southern Islands: North of the Mayaka Jungles and south of the Rocky Coast lie the Southern Islands, which separate the Inner Sea in the west from the great ocean to the east. They are the home of the human Amakari and the Gandju lizardmen but also for many pirates and the location of various naga ruins.

    The Naga Jungles: To the east and south of the Mayaka Jungles lie the last lands that are still ruled by the naga and are also home to their Suji slaves. This is a very mysterious and dangerous land of strange magic. Almost nobody else knows really much about it.

    I am still thinking of possibl idea for one or two more regions, but I think these already include almost all the things I've always wanted to incorporate in the Ancient Lands. 16 regions is already quite a lot and I think there's a good balance betwen cold, temperate, and warm regions, as well as three main groups of islands. All the tribes have a homeland too. (Though I put a few of them together as their differences weren't really that meaningful.)
    We are not standing on the shoulders of giants, but on very tall tower of other dwarves.

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  23. - Top - End - #53
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    I love the idea of a fantasy world in it's beginning. It's a very weird, but amazing concept for a world. The question I asked myself about this is; what are you exactly planning to do as soon as you're finished (I'm sorry if yu answered this in like the proloque, but I am a non native and probably didn't read it right).

  24. - Top - End - #54
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    Put it all into a pdf and release it for free.

    Depending on the response, I might eventually try to collect funding for a deluxe edition with art, and maybe print on demand options.
    We are not standing on the shoulders of giants, but on very tall tower of other dwarves.

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    Some thoughts on religion
    I had decided very early on not to have standard fantasy gods but instead to make the Ancient Lands an animistic setting where the world is full of spirits and people worship the spirits of the land they live on, which makes the plants grow and bring rain, but also cause plagues and famines. While that is pretty easy to do, many of the best fantasy storylines I've seen in regard to RPGs are all about ideological disagreements instead of just someone deciding to be evil out of nothing but greed and the other side just fighting back. And since modern political conflicts don't fit in most fantasy worlds and I've taken a lot of classes on antropology and religion in university, this really is an excelent field to focus on. While the Dragon Age series is not as fantastic as it's sci-fi counterpart Mass Effect, the main plots of all three games and their addons are all about religion. Or more precisely, they are about hordes of horrible monsters and demons and inhumane living conditions, but both the explanations people have for their existance and the answers to deal with them come directly from their religious believes. And the conflicting details of these believes are why everyone is fighting against each other just as much as against the monsters. I've also come to greatly appreciate the worldbuilding of Morrowind, which is a very exotic place and to a great deal because of the way how religion affects the whole rest of the local culture.
    Dungeon & Dragons has had clerics from the very beginning, but never really dealt with religion. Some of the older settings have gods, but they don't deal with believes,dogma, or their effect on culture at all. Lord of the Rings has any religious elements burried very deeply and entirely out of sight, and since then the majority of RPG setting writers just went with that. Which is a shame, because there's a huge amount of potential in that direction. The best example I can think of is probably Warhammer 40k, and that is something you never expect to say about anything that is meant serious.
    So I have been giving this some thought on how to incorporate religion into the Ancient Lands.

    General: Everyone in the Ancient Lands agrees about some basic facts about the makeup of the world and the nature of deities. While common people don't really know or care much about it, scholars pretty much all agree that the universe came from nothing and will eventually return to nothing. The timespans involved are completely beyond mortal comprehension or imagination. There is also an uncountable number of other worlds coming into existance and disappearing all the time, either in this universe or others. But either way they are so far away to be unreachable. Much more important to the common people is the fact that the world is always changing. Too slowly to be seen (though the very oldest elves often notice quite significant changes compared to their childhood memories), but everyone knows that nothing lasts forever, not even rivers or mountains. And especially nothing build or created by mortals. People don't build for eternity, but for immediate use, well aware that tribes often pack up to settle somewhere else, are driven from their homes, or go extinct entirely. Even for elves, planning for more than a century ahead is regarded as foolish dreaming and hubris. People in the Ancient Lands live for the present, and there is commonly no belief of living on in another world or form. Dead is dead, and there is no magic to restore a spirit that has disappeared. (Though there are some ways to restore a destroyed body and capture the spirit before it fades away.) Even the spirits of the lands and the gods are not forever, though they outlive any mortal and even entire races.
    It is also common knowledge that the world consists of three realms. The world of mortals, the Spiritworld, and the Underworld. The Spiritworld and the Underworld are really two different places in the same world, with the Spiritworld mirroring the forests, mountains, and seas of the mortal world, while the Underworld lies entirely deep underground. But they are two extremely different places. The Spiritworld is the home to spirits who govern the plants, the weather, the animals, disasters, and diseases. Mortal people pring them sacrifices and pray to them to aks for their help and protection, and to keep them friendly towards themselves. Shamans can hear the voices of the spirits and talk to them directly, but the spirits watch everything that happens in their domains and reward acts that please them and punish those that offend them. Below the surface that sees the sun and the moon, the world is dead and barren and the spirits from the Underworld are much more strange and alien beings and also much more dangerous. In times long past they ruled the entire world, before there were trees and other plants and animals that exist today. When they take physical form they resemble nothing thst can be found anywhere in the world of mortals and their thoughts are completely unknowable. Spirits, shamans, and scholars call them the Ancients, but to most common people they are simply demons.
    In addition to the common spirits there are also the gods, which are the spirits of the Sun and the Moon, the Earth and the Sea, Hunting, Healing, the Darkness, and the Skies. These gods are spirits of such great power that they take almost no notice of the lives of mortals and even the prayers of hundreds of people matter nothing to them. They are as much forces of the universe as they are beings, and temples and cults dedicated to them are usually much more mystical and philosophical in nature and offer no earthly rewards.

    Cults of the Ancients: While most people worship the spirits of the land around them, there are some few and often remote clans that worship the Ancients of the Undeworld. The surface world is in constant change and new people are born and die all the time. But in the Underworld the Ancients still survive, in the same form they always have (according to the cults) since the beginning of time and until its eventual end. Maybe they may even be reincarnated in another world that comes into existance to replace this one. While mortals, spirits, and gods are impermanent, the Ancients seem eternal, and therefore perfect. By worshiping them as their gods, the cults hope to gain at least some degree of that perfection and join them in the Underworld after the death of their bodies.
    Most cults believe that mortal life is really just a short random accident in the whole history of the universe and quickly be over in the scales of cosmic time. Everything in the mortal world is without meaning and ultimately futile.Only the Underworld and the Ancients represent the true way all existence is meant to be. Because of this, cultist place even less significance on material things and have no interest in wealth and riches. The desire for things only removes a person more from their goa of becoming morr like the Ancients. What they care for instead are experiences and emotions. Things are ephemreal and without value, but emotions are real. Most cults practice a disciplined mysticism aimed at strengthening the force of their own spirit, even though their ways are strange and unsettling to outsiders. But some cults focus entirely to throw off any trace of humanity, believing that a beast is closer to the true form of the Ancients than contemplation of ones own nature. These beast cults are feared even by other cults of the Ancients and often very dangerous.
    Their worship of the Ancients makes them very suspicious and treated as highly dangerous by the Druids, who think their shamans are very close to becoming sorcerers. In reality most cults regard sorcerers as heretics whose magical arts are blashphemy, as they try to steal the powers of their gods. Occasionally priests of the Ancients to start to explore sorcery, as cults generally have no contact with each other and the priest alone teaches the followers about their gods. While uncommon, that makes very little difference as far as the Druids are concerned.

    Sorcerers: Sorcery is the art of casting magic spells by using the powers of the Void instead of drawing on the life energy of nature, just as the Ancients do. The Void is the source from which each universe is born and to which it ultimately returns, and it is pure chaos free of any laws of nature or physics. Regular magic allows a witch or shaman to make the natural world behave in ways in which it usually does not, but principally could. By using the powers of the Void, sorcerers do not need to abide to the rules of the natural world and are only limited by their imagination. They could make things truly disappear or cause water to be solid but hot at the same time. With enough knowledge and control, a sorcerer could do anything. But in practice all uses of sorcery are imperfect and whenever it is used the energies of the Void errode the rigid laws of nature around them. After a few uses of sorcery, things and places touched by it become warped and sick, and if not given sufficient time to return to their normal state (over many months or years) eventually become dead and turn to rubble and ash. Even more Void energy than that and they can give birth to unspeakable horrors and open gates into the Underworld. These places often become haunted by undead and demons, who then continue to spread the corruption over even larger areas. If used carefully, sorcery can be a source of great miracles and magical wonders that can save entire clans and cities from disasters and enemies. It can be used to create places that would be impossible by normal means and might even have the powers to provide eternal life and health. But most people think very little of these distant dreams of sorcerers but have a very real fear of the blighted lands and undead horrors that often follow in their wake. And those who see the great potential of sorcery often fear the powers it could give to a conqueror or madman. Neither sorcerers nor sorcery are inherently evil, nor do they always bring destruction or suffering. But outside the lands of the Neshanen, where sorcerers from noble families hold great power, they are widely regarded as dangerous madmen.

    Druids: The Druids are ordinary shamans who serve the spirits of the Spiritworld to protect and bring prosperity to their people. But beyond that they are also a loose society devoted to fighting sorcerers and demons wherever they appear in the world of mortals. Like everyone, the Druids know that the natural world and living creatures are fragile and subject to slow but permanent changes. But the use of sorcery and the presence of demons outside the Underworld is always hastening the eventual collapse of the worlds of both mortals and spirits. There is no risk of that happening anytime soon and the mortal creatures might still have hundreds of millions of years ahead of them, but every sorcerer allowed to practice his art and every demon summoned into this world can mean the annihilation of an entire future generation and unspeakable horrors for countless others before them. To most people these longterm concerns are completely irrelevant and they only worry about the demons and sorcerers currently within their borders, and the Druids are widely regarded as heroes and saviors throughout all the Ancient Lands. But as the Druids are concerned, they can not simply allow any sorcerer to continue his studies even on a remote island or mountain where they pose no immediate threat for others. Every sorcerer killed or demon destroyed will allow the beings of the mortal world a few more years down the line.

    Kaas: Like almost all people in the Ancient Lands, the kaas worship the spirits of the land on which they live, and they also honor the great gods of the the sky, the earth, the hunt, and healing. Perhaps even more than other people the kaas think of the gods as impersonal forces first, even though they accept that there are powerful spirits behind them. In the believes of the kaas, every being has compassion, violence, wisdom, and treachery in it, but how much power they have over a person depends on how much each individual opens its heart to them. Skill and experience is important for the mind, but they are meaningless without the heart being fully in harmony with the force that guides as action. And often a person has much more knowledge and instinct than they know, before they truly find the force they need inside themselves. People acting in ways unusual for them are seen as being controlled by a god they usually don't open themselves to. Commonly this is treated as a good sign, but most kaas believe that no single good should ever be fully in control of a person and that the highest spiritual ideal is to have full control over which force is allowed to guide his action. While a warrior who is fully guided by the spirit of the beast in battle is greatly admired, it is unacceptable to let it take control when among friends and allies.
    Last edited by Yora; 2015-08-09 at 05:05 PM.
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  26. - Top - End - #56
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    Some ideas about the Kaska
    The Kaska are one of the four human tribes in the Ancient Lands and live in the Witchfens, a large cold wetland avoided by most other people. Originally the Kaska were part of the Vandren that live in the mountains far to the south on the other side of the great forests, and like them have black hair and are of a similar height to elves. There is no metal to be found anywhere in the fens and the Kaska mostly rely on stone when they can't get tools and weapons from other tribes. Several centuries ago their witches did something that greatly angered the spirits and they were forced to leave their ancestral homes and flee north into the forests. Eventually the survivors reached the Witchfens, which have many deep pools of dark water that lead down into the Underworld and keep the angry spirits at bay. The Witchfens are a terrible place to live, but to this day the Kaska fear the revenge of the spirits and stay in the only place they know to be safe. Small groups of warriors are regularly raiding settlements of elves, kaas, and skeyn in surrounding areas for weapons, animals, slaves, but also food. Smaller groups seem to draw less attention from the angry spirits and occasionally one or two Kaska warriors can be found in places quite far away from their home and traveling for many years without being attacked. Some people think the Kaska are just superstitious about the wrath of ancient spirits, but since it keeps them in the fens nobody has any interest in convincing them of that.
    Kaska warriors are led by clan chiefs, but the real power over the clans lies in the hands of their witches. The vast majority of witches are female, though some do have a few male apprentices who have shown an exceptional talent for magic. When warrior go to war, they always have the approval of their clans witches, but usually the witches fight out their own conflicts among themselves, removed from the eyes of the common tribesmen. Since the Kaska believe that the sunken passages to the Underworld below the fens protect them from hostile spirits, most clans worship the Ancients as their gods, but they have no real priests. Simple rituals for favors and blessings from the Ancients are usually performed by the head of the family and in some cases the chief, but protection from evil spirits and magical creatures is entirely the domain of the witches. Kaska witches usually don't use sorcery, as it is widely seen as blasphemous against the Ancients, but blood magic is very common and most witches know at least the basics.
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    I've not been really happy with the character races for Fantasy Age as I did them some posts above. There's just so many possible benefits for each race that there is just as much culture as physical abilities in them. So here's a revised version that accounts for the vastly different cultures of the various tribes of the Ancient Lands.
    Backgrounds in Fantasy Age consist only of a single focus which doesn't really do much to differentiate characters with different origins, especially when there's already differences between the tribes. So instead of chosing one of two possible focuses as part of your race, characters automatically get both. Which I think works better for physical traits than picking only some from a list.

    Elf
    • Add 1 to your Dexterity ability.
    • You get both the Dexterity (Stealth) and Perception (Seeing) focuses.
    • You have Dark Sight, which allows you to see up to 20 yards in darkness without a light source.
    • Your Speed is equal to 12 + Dexterity (minus armor penalty if applicable).
    • Roll for or pick two items from one of the following tables for additional benefits.


    Eylahen
    The Eylahen inhabit the vast temperate forests in the lands of Valarn and Keltir.

    2d6 Eylahen Benefits
    2 +1 Accuracy
    3-4 Weapon Group: Bows / Accuracy (Bows)
    5 Perception (Tracking)
    6 Strength (Climbing)
    7-8 +1 Perception
    9 Willpower (Courage)
    10-11 Perception (Hearing)
    12 +1 Willpower

    Keyren
    The Keyren tribe lives on the islands of Halond in the Northern Sea, but they also have several smaller settlements on the mainland in Revand. They are known in the other regions of the Ancient Lands as a tribe of great sailors who come to trade with port cities throughout all the Inner Sea and the Northlands.

    2d6 Keyren Benefits
    2 +1 Communication
    3-4 Communication (Persuasion)
    5 Communication (Bargaining)
    6 Constitution (Swimming)
    7-8 +1 Intelligence
    9 Intelligence (Navigation)
    10-11 Perception (Hearing)
    12 +1 Perception

    Neshanen
    The Neshanen live on the coast of Senkand, where they have many major port towns with some of the greatest palaces in the Ancient Lands, and they are also known for allowing sorcerers among their leaders.

    2d6 Neshanen Benefits
    2 +1 Communication
    3-4 Communication (Persuasion)
    5 Dexterity (Crafting)
    6 Intelligence (Research)
    7-8 +1 Intelligence
    9 Willpower (Self-Discipline)
    10-11 Perception (Hearing)
    12 +1 Perception

    Ruyaki
    The Ruyaki are a small tribe of dark elves who live in the barren land of Baikat between the Red River and the Mahiri Jungles.

    2d6 Ruyaki Benefits
    2 +1 Accuracy
    3-4 Perception (Tracking)
    5 Dexterity (Acrobatics)
    6 Dexterity (Riding)
    7-8 +1 Perception
    9 Willpower (Courage)
    10-11 Perception (Hearing)
    12 +1 Willpower

    Yagashi
    The Yagashi dark elves inhabit the Mahiri Jungles and have both several important port towns and great temple cities deep in the jungles.

    2d6 Yagashi Benefits
    2 +1 Communication
    3-4 Strength (Climbing)
    5 Communication (Deception)
    6 Dexterity (Acrobatics)
    7-8 +1 Perception
    9 Perception (Tracking)
    10-11 Perception (Hearing)
    12 +1 Willpower

    Human
    • Add 1 to your Constitution ability.
    • You get both the Constitution (Running) and Communication (Persuasion) focuses.
    • Your Speed is equal to 10 + Dexterity (minus armor penalty if applicable).
    • Roll for or pick two items from one of the following tables for additional benefits.


    Amakari
    The Amakari are a small tribes of barbarians who live on many of the small islands of Suvanea in the Inner Sea. They are exceptionally tall and strong compared to other humans and sometimes work as sailors on Keyren ships.

    2d6 Amakari Benefits
    2 +1 Fighting
    3-4 Accuracy (Brawling)
    5 Constitution (Swimming)
    6 Weapon Group: Spears / Fighting (Spears)
    7-8 +1 Strength
    9 Strength (Might)
    10-11 Constitution (Stamina)
    12 +1 Willpower

    Kaska
    The Kaska make their homes hidden deep within the Witchfens and are rarely seen by other tribes unless they come to raid the neighboring regions. Within their homeland they are ruled by powerful witches.

    2d6 Kaska Benefits
    2 +1 Dexterity
    3-4 Dexterity (Stealth)
    5 Perception (Tracking)
    6 Strength (Intimidation)
    7-8 +1 Perception
    9 Willpower (Courage)
    10-11 Constitution (Stamina)
    12 +1 Fighting

    Mari
    The Mari live in the far northern land of Venlad, surviving in the harsh environment by fishing, seal hunting, and herding reindeer.

    2d6 Mari Benefits
    2 +1 Dexterity
    3-4 Communication (Animal-Handling)
    5 Perception (Seeing)
    6 Perception (Tracking)
    7-8 +1 Perception
    9 Strength (Climbing)
    10-11 Constitution (Stamina)
    12 +1 Willpower

    Vanyar
    The Vanyar are the hill people of the Akai Mountains, who in recent centuries have begun to often travel in the surrounding lowlands of Baikat and Valarn.

    2d6 Vanyar Benefits
    2 +1 Fighting
    3-4 Strength (Climbing)
    5 Accuracy (Brawling)
    6 Weapon Group: Bows / Accuracy (Bows)
    7-8 +1 Perception
    9 Willpower (Courage)
    10-11 Constitution (Stamina)
    12 +1 Strength

    Kaas
    • Add 1 to your Strength ability.
    • You get both the Strength (Climbing) and Strength (Jumping) focuses.
    • Your Speed is equal to 10 + Dexterity (minus armor penalty if applicable).
    • Roll for or pick two items from one of the following tables for additional benefits.


    Brana
    The Brana inhabit the northern forest of Yakun, living in many small and mostly independent villages.

    2d6 Brana Benefits
    2 +1 Fighting
    3-4 Willpower (Courage)
    5 Accuracy (Brawling)
    6 Perception (Tracking)
    7-8 +1 Constitution
    9 Strength (Intimidation)
    10-11 Strength (Might)
    12 +1 Perception

    Vashka
    The Vashka live in the Rayalka Mountains of northern Yakun, sometimes hunting in the tundra of Venlad as well.

    2d6 Vashka Benefits
    2 +1 Fighting
    3-4 Streng
    5 Accuracy (Brawling)
    6 Constitution (Stamina)
    7-8 +1 Constitution
    9 Willpower (Courage)
    10-11 Strength (Might)
    12 +1 Willpower

    Kidari
    • Add 1 to your Dexterity ability.
    • You get both the Dexterity (Acrobatics) and Strength (Climbing) focuses.
    • Your Speed is equal to 10 + Dexterity (minus armor penalty if applicable).
    • Roll for or pick two items from the following table for additional benefits.


    2d6 Kidari Benefits
    2 +1 Accuracy
    3-4 Dexterity (Stealth)
    5 Perception (Hearing)
    6 Perception (Smelling)
    7-8 +1 Perception
    9 Perception (Tracking)
    10-11 Strength (Jumping)
    12 +1 Willpower

    Lizardman
    • Add 1 to your Constitution ability.
    • You get both the Constitution (Swimming) and Willpower (Self-Discipline) focuses.
    • Your Speed is equal to 10 + Dexterity (minus armor penalty if applicable).
    • Roll for or pick two items from one of the following tables for additional benefits.


    Gandju
    The Gandju are many independent tribes that live in the islands of Suvanea, who have very little dealings with the naga and are rarely seen in other parts of the Ancient Lands.

    2d6 Gandju Benefits
    2 +1 Dexterity
    3-4 Dexterity (Stealth)
    5 Weapon Group: Spears / Fighting (Spears)
    6 Perception (Tracking)
    7-8 +1 Perception
    9 Strength (Intimidation)
    10-11 Strength (Might)
    12 +1 Fighting

    Kaska
    The Kaska consist of many tribes that are spread out over the remote regions of Sarhat and Kemesh, maintaining their independence both against the naga and the Mayaka kingdom.

    2d6 Kaska Benefits
    2 +1 Constitution
    3-4 Strength (Intimidation)
    5 Accuracy (Brawling)
    6 Constitution (Stamina)
    7-8 +1 Fighting
    9 Willpower (Courage)
    10-11 Strength (Might)
    12 +1 Willpower

    Mayaka
    The Mayaka live in the southern land of Sarhat, controling the greatest single realm in all of the Ancient Lands and being in an eternal war with the naga cities of Kemesh since they broke free from their slavery and drove their former masters to the east.

    2d6 Mayaka Benefits
    2 +1 Fighting
    3-4 Dexterity (Crafting)
    5 Constitution (Stamina)
    6 Intelligence (Military Lore)
    7-8 +1 Willpower
    9 Willpower (Courage)
    10-11 Strength (Might)
    12 +1 Intelligence

    Suji
    The Suji live in the distant land of Kemesh, serving their naga masters like they have done for countless centuries.

    2d6 Suji Benefits
    2 +1 Dexterity
    3-4 Dexterity (Crafting)
    5 Dexterity (Initiative)
    6 Dexterity (Stealth)
    7-8 +1 Perception
    9 Perception (Seeing)
    10-11 Strength (Might)
    12 +1 Intelligence

    Skeyn
    • Add 1 to your Dexterity ability.
    • You get both the Communication (Deception) and Constitution (Stamina) focuses.
    • You have Dark Sight, which allows you to see up to 20 yards in darkness without a light source.
    • Your Speed is equal to 8 + Dexterity (minus armor penalty if applicable).
    • Roll for or pick two items from the following table for additional benefits.


    2d6 Skeyn Benefits
    2 +1 Intelligence
    3-4 Dexterity (Crafting)
    5 Communication (Persuasion)
    6 Perception (Hearing)
    7-8 +1 Constitution
    9 Perception (Smelling)
    10-11 Dexterity (Stealth)
    12 +1 Perception
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  28. - Top - End - #58
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    Currently the Ancient Lands consist of 16 main regions. These actually cover only 10% of the map, but include a sizable majority of the population, somewhere between 1/3rd and 1/4th. Even these regions are far from completely covered and have no clear borders or population numbers. Since almost everything happens on a local level and there are no real countries or states, knowing the actual numbers of people and settlements wouldn't be very useful anyway. There aren't any roads either and most of the world is completely unmapped and unexplored, and the setting is designed for episodic play with long journeys taking as long as the GM wants them to.
    So the Ancient Lands are more a toolbox for multiple local scale adventure than a comprehensive catalogue of cities and countries.

    The 16 regions of the Ancient Lands are meant to be mini-settings that each have their own individual themes and atmosphere. I first started designing them based on environments from fiction I found inspiring and intriguing. But now I have their general character and the people that inhabit them roughly lined out and the next step is to define what themes they will be about specifically.
    This list is what I got so far.

    Venlad
    Venlad is the distant northern land of the Mari who catch fish and hunt seals and whales on the coasts and herd reindeer on the tundra. Most visitors are traders who come to the few larger ports to trade goods from the south for pelts, dried fish, whalebone, and walrus tusks.
    I want to do something with the spirits of winter and cold, but no clear idea for adventure hooks yet.

    Yakun
    This is the homeland of the kaas, a race of tall and strong beastmen. It consists of large subarctic forests and is surrounded by steep mountains and jagged hills. There are also some town and fortresses of skeyn and Keyren on the southern borders of this land.
    I also don't have any specifics for the main plot hooks yet, other than kaas clans getting into wars with each other.

    Witchfens
    The Witchfens are a large moor south of Yakun and west of Revand. There are a few rocky hills and small clusters of birches in a few places, but mostly it's just and endless land of shrubs and bogs, prone to frequent rain and often covered by fog. Only the Kaska make their homes in this dreary land, as they believe something below the waters is keeping away the angry spirits that have sworn eternal revenge against them for a terrible blasphemy in the past.
    Trailing Raiders: The Kaska are very poor people and barely get by surviving in this land by hunting and growing a few meager crops. Bands of raiders often sneak into Revand and Yakun to get whatever weapons, food, cloth, and slaves they can before returning swiftly into the fens. Only the bravest heroes dare following them into the thick fogs to rescue prisoners or retrieve stolen relics.
    Spirits of the Fens: The Witchfens are a strange land inhabited by even stranger spirits. Many believe the dark pools that dot the landscape to lead to the Underworld and that there are many demons mingling with the spirits. The clans of the Kaska have made pacts with these dark spirits to protect them from the wrath of their old gods, but even they don't know exactly what powers they are dealing with.

    Revand
    Revand is a stretch of coast north of the Tavir Mountains, sparsely inhabited by the descendants of the Keyren who didn't leave for the islands of Halond to the east. The land lies in the shadow of the mountains in more than one sense, as they are almost permanently shrouded by a misty haze that obscures the sun even on a clear day. Strange creatures are often found in the great rivers that come down from the mountains and few people live far from the coast where the forest are lightest and a steady breeze from the sea keeps the air clean. The deeper one travels into the forest, the darker and gloomier they get, and dangerous creatures can be found in large numbers.
    Tombs of the Ancestors: Very few ruins of old fey castles are found in Revand and even on the coast there are not many traces of the naga, which might be one of the reasons why the ancestors of the Keyren lived in this unwelcoming place. But deeper within the forests are the tombs of ancient elves, build with the most primitive methods but often withstanding the passing of the ages with remarkably little damage. The elves living on the coast avoid going anywhere near them as many are haunted by wights.
    From the Deeps: Something about the gloom of Revand seems to be strangely attracting to creatures from the sea, especially the lagura fishmen. They are often seen roaming the beaches at night and can be quite a danger to smaller fishing villages.
    Death in the Water: The people Revand generally avoid drinking the water from the large rivers that flow from the Tavir Mountains and don't swim in it until absolutely necessary. But sometimes the water becomes much more foul than usual, spreading illness and noxious fumes along their banks. Traveling up the river by boat to discover and put and end to to the sources of these blights is something even the most seasoned warriors rarely dare to attempt.

    Halond
    Halond is a land of numerous islands, many miles off the coast of Revand in the Northern Sea. Several of the larger islands in the south have been settled by Keyren who now far outnumber their kin on the mainland. It is a land of short and mild summers and cold rainy winters, covered mostly by trees but also having several mountain ranges that most visitors would not expect.
    Lords of the Sea: Many of the gods worshipped by the Keyren seem strange to other peoples of the Ancient Lands and barely recognizable as the same ones worshipped in other lands. Many of the smaller islands have small shrines to spirits of the sea and not all of them are build and visited by the elves. Many of the more remote villages have frequent contact with strange creatures from the sea not usually seen or known in civilized regions.
    Merchant Lords: Even though scarce in valuable resources, Halond has become a very rich land due to the merchant ships that travel all across the Inner and Northern Seas and as far as Venlad and Sarhat. The captains and the owners of these ships are very influential people and not just in their homeland. Few people have as much control over trade in the Ancient Lands as the merchant lords in distant Halond.

    The Arkean Islands
    The Arkeans are a small group of rocky islands east of Senkand and the Tavir Mountains. Ships traveling between Revand and Senkand avoid getting anywhere near them as they are covered in the ruins of an old civilization of naga. Usually scholars and treasure hunters from all over the Ancient Lands would come flying to such a place to rid it of its ancient treasures, but the Arkeans are well known as a place ravaged and devastated by sorcery. Nobody knows what happened to the sorcerers who once lived there and whether they abandoned the place or were all killed in some terrible release of sorcery. Either way, the islands are almost inhabitable today, still being firmly in the grip of the Corruption caused by huge amounts of sorcerous magic after more than a thousand years. Anyone who gets near their rocky shores immediately feels their strength draining from them, breathing becoming painful and bones starting to ache. Few who explored these ruins stayed for more than a few days and many have been killed by the ghouls and wraiths of those who came before them much faster than by the Corruption itself.
    Quest for Power: In recent decades sorcerers from Senkand have started to become more interested in the ruins that cover the island and confident that their powers can protect them from both the Corruption and the undead. Though their spies the naga of Kemesh have become aware of this increased interest and many of them have their own plans to reclaim the secrets of their ancient kin before they fall into elven hands.

    Tavir Mountains
    The Tavir Mountains are of the main mountain ranges of the Ancient Lands, separating the two coastal lands of Revand and Senkand. Many of the mountains are volcanoes and earthquakes and eruptions of toxic fumes are common in the region. It is commonly accepted throughout the Ancient Lands that many of these vents lead all the way down into the Underworld and many encounters with ash, rock, and tar demons are very compelling evidence that this is correct. Despite all these dangers there are considerable numbers of people living in the mountains. These hillfolk appear to be the descendants of Neshanen, Eylahen, and Keyren who have been intermingling for countless generations, and also include many half-elves descended from Vanyar and possibly Kaska mercenaries who escaped from battles in the surroundig lands. These hill people avoid most contact with people from the lowlands and a fierce enemies of both druids and sorcerers and worship the spirits of the Underworld as gods.
    Rise of Demons: The Tavir Mountains are most likely the most demon haunted place in the Ancient Lands. Both the Druids and sorcerers from Senkand have considerable interest in this region, though for completely opposite reasons. Both groups frequently send agents and expeditions into the mountains to learn more about the demons and the effects of magic seeping up from the ground. The local hillfolk tend to be hostile to either, as they see them as enemies of their gods.

    Senkand
    The land of the Neshanen is one of the most advanced places in the Ancient Lands in building, trade, learning, and magic. Most people live near the coast as the land at the foot of the Tavir Mountains is poorly suited for farming. There are more than a dozen port cities and towns in this region and it's location between the Inner Sea and the Northlands makes it a major center for trade.
    Sorcerer Lords: Though sorcerers are not usually ruling the cities of the Neshanen, they have a far greater amount of power in this land than anywhere else outside the naga citadels of Kemesh. Most sorcerers come from important families whose wealth serves them well in recovering ancient relics and the creation of great magical wonders. Many people in the courts of Senkand see sorcery as a great potential source for future wealth and power and there is no clear separation between the aristocracy and the sorcerous societies in this land.
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  29. - Top - End - #59
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    Default Re: Ancient Lands - Savage Heroes and Mythical Beasts

    Valarn
    Valarn is the land between the Tavir and Akai mountains, reaching from the coast of the Inner Sea far inland into the endless forests that dominate almost all of the northern Ancient Lands. It is the homeland of the Eylahen and also contains many settlements of skeyn in the foothills of the Tavirs in the east, as well as many small clans of Vanyar that have come down from the Akais in the west over the past centuries.
    The Sakaya: Most Vanyar in Valarn were originally mercenaries who were hired to guard caravans transporting salt from the Akais to the ports of the Inner Sea and the elven lands. One particular of these mercenary groups were the warriors of the Sakaya, a religious order from the Akai Mountains who believe in always working on improving ones professional skills. In times of little threat to their communities by other clans of the mountains, their warriors often travel the Ancient Lands looking for work as mercenaries. About two centuries ago some groups decided not return to the mountains and share the money they earned with their monasteries, but to keep working as mercenaries permanently. And in times where work was scarce, they turned to raiding. While the Sakaya of the Akai Mountains greatly disapprove of this practice, the mercenary bands dropped almost all ties with them and since started to recruit their own new members and focus exclusively on increasing their skills as warriors, relying on tribute and ransom from local towns for anything else they need. These Sakaya are highly valued mercenaries by those who can afford their service and they changed the outcome of many wars between clans on the Inner Sea. But in the last century they have steadily increased in numbers and begun to make a habit starting small wars for their own benefit, which makes many of the chiefs and kings of Valarn very uneasy.

    Keltir
    Keltir is a vast and not clearly defined region within the endless forests north of Valarn. Few people live in this land, most being Eylahen or some smaller groups of Vanyar or skeyn, with a few groups of roaming kaas occasionally being seen.
    Fey Courts: Ruins of old fey castles can be found almost everywhere in the Ancient Lands but except for the naga of Kemesh their builders have almost entirely disappeared from the world of mortals. Deep within the ancient forests of Keltir, not all of the old castles are abandoned and there are many stories of courts of shie that rule over them to this day.

    Akai Mountains
    The Akai Mountains are a large mountain range on the western coast of the Inner Sea, rising above the coastal plains only a few dozen miles from the sea and stretching far inland towards the west. These mountains have been a hiding place for the Vanyar for countless generations, as they were outside the range of both the shie in the north and the naga in the south during the time when the fey races ruled the world. Dispersed over a large and almost barren landscape and being only few in number, the Vanyar were little known to either the elves or the lizardmen until relatively recently. While today they are known as salt traders and mercenaries throughout the Inner Sea region, their mountainous homeland is still a dangerous wilderness with small fortified villages and almost no major towns other than the great monasteries of the Sakaya.
    There's no specific theme for this region yet.

    Baikat
    Baikat is the land of the Red River, which runs south from the Akai Mountains and then turns east towards the Inner Sea. Even though Baikat is a very flat land with few major hills or mountains, it lies well above the coastal lowlands and recieves only little rain. It's mostly dry grass and shrubs with occasional forests of small hardy trees, but some parts consist only of bare clay or gravel. The Red River has carved a huge canyon that cuts deep into the otherwise almost featureless land and contains the vast majority of all water in the region. The canyon is so deep that even though the land drops quite steeply as it approaches the coast, ships can travel up the river all the way from the sea to the feet of the Akai Mountains. There are many caves in the canyon walls, many of which have been made into villages, fortresses, or shrines. The coast on the eastern edge of Baikal is very different from the highland plains, consisting of the massive Kuremo swamp at the mouth of the Red River. During the summer rains, most rain falls on these swamplands and few clouds make it to the top of the cliffs that form the border to the highlands. The highlands are the homeland of the Ruyaki, especially south of the Red River, while the northern section has become home to smaller groups of Vanyar.
    Again, sadly no strong theme for the region yet.

    Mahiri Jungles
    The Mahiri Jungles begin south of Baikat and form the westernmost part of the southern coast of the Inner Sea. Along the coast the Yagashi have several major ports that are important centers of trade, but the culture heart of the tribe is deep within the jungles, based around vast temple cities.
    Alchemical Wonders: The Mahiri Jungles are full of rare plants and stange insects found nowhere else in the Ancient Lands, many of which are extremely valuable for alchemists. They are an important source of wealth for many of the powerful merchant families on the coast and there is a very strong competition over control of both the trade and their sources.
    The Red Goddess: One of the temple cities in the Mahiri Jungles is ruled by its deity itself. The Red Goddess is a powerful red skinned shie who has ruled over her domain far longer than any of the oldest Yagashi who serve her. Her grandchildren and great-grandchildren form a powerful caste of priest-administrators whose influence reaches far beyond the borders of this land.

    Sarhat
    Sarhat is the greatest kingdom found anywhere in the Ancient Lands and the only country of its kind. Once part of the lands ruled by the naga, the lizardfolk slaves of the western cities rebelled almost a thousand years ago, succesfully driving the naga to the east into Kemesh and creating their own kingdom as the Mayaka.
    The Royal Guard: In addition to the vast armies of warriors, the king of Sarhat also has command over a strong force of elite warriors who guard his palace and the capital city, but are also frequently send on special tasks related to protecting the kingdom from its enemies, which is mostly the naga of Kemesh but also dissenters against the dominant Temple of the Sun. Sometimes these tasks lead members of the guard to other regions of the Ancient Lands as well.

    Suvanea
    The islands of Suvanea lie between the Inner Sea and the ocean, southeast from Senkand and north of Kemesh and Sarhat. Consisting of thousands of often very small islands, the region is home both to the Gandju lizardmen and the Amakari humans. As neither tribe is very numerous or builds any large towns or cities, there is not a lot of trade going on in the region and the waters are difficult to navigate for sailors used mostly to traveling between cities on the coast.
    Pirates: The waters of Suvanea are full small islands and reefs, making it very easy for ships to get lost or running on ground. It is not only Gandju and Amakari who plunder the wrecks, but there are also many bands of pirates from other lands using the islands as hidden camps and hunting grounds. Most of them are Keyren or Yagashi, but many ships have highly mixed crews including Neshanen, Amakari, Gandju, and recently also some Vanyar.

    Kemesh
    Kemesh is a remote land seen by very few people from other parts of the Ancient Lands. East of Sarhat and south of Suvanea, it is what remains of the once vast kingdoms of naga who once ruled over all the lands south of the Inner Sea. Today they are few in number but still have large numbers of Suji slaves. It is a land of wonder and there are countless tall tales about it in the ports around the Inner Sea, but very little is really known for certain.
    We are not standing on the shoulders of giants, but on very tall tower of other dwarves.

    Spriggan's Den Heroic Fantasy Roleplaying

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