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  1. - Top - End - #1
    Barbarian in the Playground
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    Default Everain, a campaign setting (PEACH)

    History
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    Once upon a time, mortals lived alongside ghosts and incorporal creatures in the plane of spiritual energy.
    Despite living in relative peace, the incorporal creatures viewed corporal creatures as inferior, and that even being an enslaved spirit is better then being corporal. Some had a view more of a "parental" racism, believing that being corporal is like childhood and dying and becoming a ghost is like turning into an adult, and some believed that corporal creatures are abominations. They believed that killing a corporal creature actully helps him, becuse it turns him into a ghost, an incorporal creature.
    But that view started to change.
    Some mortals let spirits posess them temporerly, and "ride" them. Just to see how it was being corporal, and saw it wasn`t so bad being corporal. That phenomenon became more and more common, and it worried lord Masat.

    Masat hated corporal creatures, and commanded a vast army of spirits. He worried that if spirits would stop believing that they are superior, it will hurt the morale. Combined with his great hatred, that led him to launch an attack on all corporal creatures. Very quickely they decided to run, and moved to a diffrent plane.

    They moved to a plane filled with clouds. They found an enormous cloud and with magic changed it to become like the ground they are used to, and moved in. The natives of the cloud went to other clouds, and the natives of the plane of clouds thought of mortals as invaders and not as refugees. There were a few battles, but no full scale war. The natives who attacked lived in clouds above the mortal cities.

    One day, some mortals decided that enough is enough, and that the aggresive natives must be killed. So they cast a spell to create poison gas.
    The attack failed, as the natives managed to dispel the magic quickely with only a few casulties. As revenge, they cast a spell which droped an eternal rain, to drown the mortals. They made sure the water won`t flow sideways and slip downwards, and that dispelling the spell in normal means won`t work.


    The kingdom Kinhet
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    One of the kingdoms of mortals was Kinhet. To save themselves from drowning, their mages surrounded select cities in dome shaped forcefields. Many immigrents from all around the country ran to those cities, which cuased the cities to become very crowded. Quickely tunnels to connect between the cities were made, and many subternean creatures were slaughtered in the way, some that surrendered joined the cities and made them more crowded.

    Floors were built, neighborhoods on top of each other. The building process went quickely since magic was used a lot, and the crowdness problam got solved.
    Each city except from the capitol got many floors, the higher the floor the lower the quality of the metariels it`s made of, and there are many pillars. Floor distance ranges from 10 to 20 feet. Lower floors tend to be further apart from each other.
    Many staircases exist between floors, but there is always a spiral staircase in the middle of the city, from the top floor to underground.

    The higher you go, the worse the socio-economic state is. Some nobles live underground, while some payed a wizard to create a private demiplane.
    The cities are enclosed in a half transperent, blue glowing domes. Parts of the city that light from the domes don`t reach them are completly dark, mostly around the central spiral staircases. The originally underground races live there.

    The domes are unstable, and once every few days there is a leak. Prior to the leak, in a range of between a few seconds and a few hours, part of the dome seems to twist. The abjurers that are tasked with keeping the domes and their students fix those leaks quickely with temporery magic, and then use a more long term solution of human sacrafice.

    It`s not a secret that humanoids are sacraficed to keep the domes active, but it`s a secret that it isn`t neccesery. If the abjurers will do a magic ritual in which they will injure themselves and give up a portion of their power, it would keep the dome they are in charge of active for years without leaks and without need for maintaince. But the abjurers don`t want to do that, so they sacrafice random people. It is well known that anyone who disrespects an abjurer is sacraficed.

    The capital is diffrent from the other cities. Besides some palaces that were built, it is like it was before the rain, and the protactive dome is much more powerfull and stable. The formerly underground races serve the nobles there.


    About enslaved spirits and spirit armies in the spiritual plane
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    Most enslaved spirits were criminals or rebellers. After being captured, they were enslaved. Enslaved spirits look like they wear black cloths or armor, and always wear a mask. They have one or two tiny vases with them, sometimes held in a belt.

    Their appearence signifies who is their master, usually the one who enslaved them. In the vases they can hold souls of creatures they defeat. The more recently the spirit was enslaved, the more detailed it looks, since masters improve in shaping their slaves appearence. Behind the mask, there is no face. If an enslaved spirit becomes free willed, it gains a face.

    The sociel structure in the spiritual plane is feudal – enslaved spirits are vassals of masters, which are vassals of other masters etc, and Masat got the biggest number of masters and enslaved spirits under his command. Some spirits that are in his territory are not soldiers, and are more like citizens, and he genuinely cares about them and protacts them.

    I haven`t manged to decide what will be the CR of enslaved spirits, what do you think it should be?


    I won`t use any of the aquan races that exist, instead I`m planing on making templates for humanoids who changed themselves to become like aquatic creatures, each will be +1 or +2 LA and will fit any humanoid. What kind of freshwater fish I could take inspiration from to create those templates and monsters?
    Also, what do you think in general about what I wrote?

    Added in later then the rest:

    Due to feedback from Ituem, the mortals who escaped to the plane of clouds would be called landed, and the natives of the plane of clouds would be called the clouded.

    The clouded:
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    The clouded are humanoid in form, with wings and without a head. Each one of them got eyes in an unusal place, and normally they cannot hear, smell and speak (see drawers and oparators). Their height is between 6.5 to 8 feet.

    They contact each other by telepathy, and can only contact other clouded by telepathy. Due to the difficulity of communication, most of them know very little about the landed, and some believe that they are almost unintelegant.

    Their homes are crafted in the clouds, made by moving bits of the cloud.

    There are four subraces of clouded:

    Drawers: Their wings are straight and red, and their skin is bright blue. Their fingertips have no nails, and glow with bright green colour, and sometimes a diffrent colour when they draw. Their eyes are where their shoulders are.

    They can extract naturel colour from their fingertips and draw runes with them, even on the air. Each rune got a diffrent rule, with runes they can see, hear, set off trap, teleport or attack. They can carve the runes instead of drawing them, making them harder to get rid of, and they can do it on any solid surface (like flesh) and on clouds, but it takes much more time then drawing.

    They rather blind their foes in the start of battles. In a clouded kingdom wth mixed subraces, they serve as politicans, police and secret police.

    They feel no desparation or boredom, so they have no problam to dedicate days to carving runes.

    Oparators: Their body is wide, their white wings look short compared to their body. They are very musceler and their skin is grey. Their eyes are in their shoulders, and their hands come out of the middle of their torso.

    The oparators can use objects that lost their power – used wands, scrolls etc. It also works on things that are not usefull regulary – if they would hold a corpse, they could control the corpse movements, access his memories, known leanguages, senses, and be able to speak through the corpse. To talk to humans, oparators ripped off heads, held them and talked using the heads.
    If an object is broken or badly damaged, they can not use it.

    In mixed clouded kingdoms, they buy objects no others can use, often in exchange for favours, so sometimes they act like servents. They use yellow harppon like spears, which can shoot lightnings. In the hands of any other clouded, they only shoot a lightning once.

    Oparators feel no compassion, and since landed only had a chance to talk with oparators which held heads, that led them to believe that the clouded are complete monsters.

    Focusers: Their feathers are long and white but their wings are short, their skin is dark grey. Their body is much more narrow then the averge clouded, and their four eyes are in both of the sides of their palms.

    They can focus their magic power and use it effectively in groups. They can also donate pure magical force to be used later. They can cast very powerfull spells togather, and it was a big group of focusers who activated the eternal rain.

    In mixed clouded kingdoms, they act as mages. Usually when they cast spells as a group they put their hands on their shoulders.

    They feel no pain, no physical neither mental, so they have no problam casting spells while they are attacked.

    Catchers: Their wings are metalic, their hands are limp and flexible, and their big eyes are in both the sides of their wings. Their skin is white.

    The catchers are known for their speed, and can catch almost every ranged attack – spears, lightnings, ray attacks, and then return the attack to the sender (or to someone else). They can suddenly move in great speed, and move quickely normally. They can shoot some of their metalic feathers and use them as long range weapons, like arrows, and can create a small storm of feathers, and their feathers take a few hours to grow back.

    In mixed kingdoms, they serve as soldiers, messengers and body guards.

    They have no worries, fears or hesitation, so they are very determined.


    The slaves of the clouded:
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    During the rain, some landed crafted ships. They were crafted so the water would slip from it, so the ship would stay afloat.
    However, they did not count the clouded.
    The clouded destroyed the ships and catptured them, making them their slaves on the more physical clouds. They work on crafting palaces for the clouded.

    It is very easy to craft from clouds, but it is very hard to correct mistakes, and the usual punishment is death. Some landed also fall slowly through a cloud in their sleep, falling to the water and drowning to death.
    Last edited by akma; 2010-12-28 at 12:59 PM.
    Madly In Science, an RPG in which you play mad scientists, you can get it for free.

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    A world behind the mirror (stand alone plane)
    (Wall) passer, a rogue variant
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    Quote Originally Posted by Grinner View Post
    In a world ruled by small birds, mankind cannot help but wonder how this state of affairs came about.

  2. - Top - End - #2
    Dwarf in the Playground
     
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    Default Re: Everain, a campaign setting (PEACH)

    I like the general idea and there's promise, though you'll still have a fair bit of work ahead of you fleshing things out. Keep going, though! It's worth it.

    Also, I'm going to give you the advice I give everyone. It's simple, but it really makes a difference: Please line space between paragraphs. On the internet or any sort of screen-based textual medium it makes it a lot easier to parse what you're saying. Where text is unbroken, the eye has a tendency to run straight down to the bottom.*

    You may wish to start thinking about what sort(s) of terrain Kinhet rules over, as well as getting a rough idea of what (if any) neighbouring countries, states or barren wildernesses it has.


    *I realise you have paragraphed properly, but without the additional line in between them it is still hard to tell.
    Various Homebrew: Why not check it out? You're unlikely to be disappointed.

  3. - Top - End - #3
    Barbarian in the Playground
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    Default Re: Everain, a campaign setting (PEACH)

    Quote Originally Posted by Iituem View Post
    I like the general idea and there's promise, though you'll still have a fair bit of work ahead of you fleshing things out. Keep going, though! It's worth it.
    I`m glad you liked it

    Quote Originally Posted by Iituem View Post
    Also, I'm going to give you the advice I give everyone. It's simple, but it really makes a difference: Please line space between paragraphs. On the internet or any sort of screen-based textual medium it makes it a lot easier to parse what you're saying. Where text is unbroken, the eye has a tendency to run straight down to the bottom.*
    Done.

    Quote Originally Posted by Iituem View Post
    You may wish to start thinking about what sort(s) of terrain Kinhet rules over, as well as getting a rough idea of what (if any) neighbouring countries, states or barren wildernesses it has.
    I completly forgot about terrain. I guess I could use it to diffrentiate between the cities more easily.

    Being shielded by domes makes the country quite isolated physically, but I guess they could have relations with underground creatures who were too powerfull to defeat or a nation that fled underground when the rain began. Magical communication is possible to keep in touch with more distant countries, but they might not know that they exist. I`ll sleep on it.
    Madly In Science, an RPG in which you play mad scientists, you can get it for free.

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    A world behind the mirror (stand alone plane)
    (Wall) passer, a rogue variant
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    Quote Originally Posted by Grinner View Post
    In a world ruled by small birds, mankind cannot help but wonder how this state of affairs came about.

  4. - Top - End - #4
    Dwarf in the Playground
     
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    Default Re: Everain, a campaign setting (PEACH)

    Well if you'd like my analysis on terrain and environments, let's take a look at what you already have.


    Geographical Analysis: The Clouded Plane (Part 1 of ?)

    Quote Originally Posted by akma View Post
    [The mortal immigrants] moved to a plane filled with clouds. They found an enormous cloud and with magic changed it to become like the ground they are used to, and moved in.

    As revenge, [the natives of the plane of clouds] cast a spell which droped an eternal rain, to drown the mortals. They made sure the water won`t flow sideways and slip downwards, and that dispelling the spell by normal means won`t work.
    Raw Terrain

    Cloud

    The first paragraph immediately establishes the primary basic terrain type of this plane; Cloud. We won't cover variation on the different terrain types within that basic terrain type (which there probably should be) just yet - for now, it is important to recognise that there are differences between the various Cloud terrain types. This is one of the aspects that will probably make your campaign setting unique - beyond the island of firm ground established by the magi, most humans cannot travel without the aid of magic. Given the terrain, I would suggest that perhaps there is a fairly common (level 1) spell along the lines of 'cloud walk' that allows a spellcaster and his party to walk on clouds as they would terrestrial ground.


    Light

    One extremely important question that needs to be met is where the light and heat in this plane is coming from. We could have light simply come from an endless source in the distant 'above' of the plane, but perhaps it would be better to have small, localised and very hot pseudosuns (but nowhere near as hot as the real sun) that either hang stationary or move about the plane.

    Of course, you could have something wild instead - like dragon-like creatures composed of living flame that consume prey from the clouds and shed light and heat as they fly around.


    Sea

    The second paragraph makes things even more interesting, but depends on the exact nature of the plane. The setting has been described as a 'plane full of clouds', and I choose to interpret that (if I'm wrong, tell me, though this will be somewhat interesting) as a plane filled with nothing but clouds. On the other hand as I mentioned above, said clouds are themselves very varied in terrain types to the natives.

    This suggests that there is no 'bottom' as such but that the plane is either infinite (you fall forever) or finite yet unbounded (you fall to a point where the universe wraps back around on itself and start falling from the 'top' of the universe - you may eventually hit the point you fell from). The fact that there is a 'down' for the rain to fall suggests that gravity is monodirectional - it is not affected by large masses (as in our universe) but instead is subject to a universal 'down'. We're going to look at this more closely later, in 'Weather'.

    What all of this has been building up from is your statement that the rain 'does not flow sideways and slip downwards', which I interpreted to mean that the rain that hits the land does not run off the edge of the island but builds up into a sea capable of drowning the mortals therein. What this does mean is that the sea has very definite vertical edges (as if it were contained in a goldfish bowl or tank) rising up from the edge of the island. The important question is where the sea ends.

    Either there is an upper limit to how high the sea can grow before the excess water simply slips over the 'edge' of the invisible force holding it in, or the sea reaches a point in size that evaporation from its surface is equal to the rate at which the rain continues to fall. I personally prefer the second answer, as this holds truer to the idea that the sea never falls sidewards, although perhaps the force that holds it together only stops water from passing.

    The Sea, then, exists only atop the island of land created by mortals. It's probably going to be populated by variants of freshwater fish kept by the mortal colonists, but we'll cover this in Ecology.


    Also, for convenience's sake I am from now on going to refer to the natives as the Clouded and the mortal humans as the Landed. These are temporary names. (I realise one of the mortal kingdoms, the one we're concerned with, would make them the Kinhetians, but this then encompasses any from outside that kingdom.)


    Land

    Obviously, there used to be a lot more of this. Well, dry land anyway. We'll cover here that degree of dry land which continues to persist, all of it beneath the domes. Let's consider the creation of the land for a moment - we know from your history that the mortals fled to the Clouded Plane from their world, presumably at first powerful wizards seeking a viable route of escape and new home.

    Unable to find anywhere with the kind of solid ground they were used to, these immensely powerful magi created spells that allowed them to reform the material of the endless (and at that time they thought uninhabited and undifferentiated) clouds into a solid landmass they were able to live on. The magi extended the landmass significantly enough to support hundreds of thousands of people - this means that their exodus whilst sudden was probably over the course of a decade.

    The wizards and their followers erected gateways into the new plane and brought livestock, animals, plants and as many other parts of home as they could manage to bring, stocking the new Island and employing druids also inclined to escape the devastation of home to ensure it flourished quickly. From all of this we get a rich Terran ecosystem aboard the Island - or at least we originally did.

    Now the Island being what it is, we can do a little dovetailing here. The magi who created the Island probably saw the very real threat of people simply falling off the edge. To that end, maybe the force that keeps the sea in place is not the work of the Clouded, but a safety measure the magi put in place to stop people accidentally falling over the edge of the world. By the time they were ready to react to the flooding it was too late - deactivating the fields would have caused massive destruction as the escaping waters dragged plants, livestock and countless Landed off the edge of the world.

    Trapped between death by being washed off the edge of the world or death by drowning, the magi re-used the very magic they had employed to create the Edge Barriers to create dome shields over the various cities. The magi who did this were more concerned with saving lives than long-term measures, planning it as a temporary affair until they could solve the whole 'the world is flooding' problem. Unfortunately for one reason or another they did not (quite possibly they either all died, got caught up in a power struggle or it simply became too great a problem for them to handle) and so not only are the few remaining portions of dry land very small and originally rather terrain-specific but barely sufficient to support the populations they protected. Again, this is something to cover later in Ecology, but one major problem you will need to consider is feeding everyone.


    Subterrain

    The idea of subterranean creatures is interesting because you established that a) there were subterranean creatures and b) some of these were sapient races capable of serving humanity. Presumably these races also escaped from the spirit plane with the rest of the mortals and were living beneath the earth in the first place. Depending on how organised these races are, they may have made a concerted effort to steal through the gates (or even forcibly take one to make their escape) and power through into the underworld, made a pact with the original magi to let them through, or simply fought their way/wandered through in small groups and set up shop in the underworld.

    The fact that there is an underworld does beg some questions. If the underground races are organised (or at least one of them is) then if they came through by making a pact with the wizards perhaps the wizards carved out some subterranean tunnels for them. Alternately they may simply have moved in themselves and dug out their homes by hand or magic. Water could certainly create underground caverns (as it does in life) but this tends to take centuries if not sped up by magical or mundane means (ever seen a sand-blaster in use?).

    Or are the subterranean races like Morlocks, humans who decided to retreat into the darkness after migrating to the new world?



    Weather

    To be added. Weather is going to be rather complex to consider, but the basic points are this; Clouds form the majority of the land. Something (and I'm warming to the idea of fiery dragon beasts) creates light and heat (light so we can all see what's going on, heat so there is enough local variation in temperature and pressure for there to be clouds). This gives rise to the clouds, which can in places be amorphous but many are likely to be semi-stable and give rise to the various cloud-type terrains.

    Gravity is objective so rain always falls 'downward', but if it passes close enough to the heat sources it evaporates and goes towards forming new clouds. When the clouds hit cold or higher-pressure patches in the void, they can partially condense into fresh rain. The rain falls until it heats, expands, and becomes new cloud. Rinse and repeat.

    Once rain hits the Island, semi-normal weather can continue, but this is weather that may well be affected by multiple light and heat sources that can vary wildly, so we'll have to revisit this.



    Ecology

    To be added. Complex, this will need further analysis. Your marine ecology should be fairly straightforward - evolutions over a short period (depends how many hundreds of years have passed since the Rains started and the ocean formed) to create a new ocean based from either saltwater or freshwater fish.

    Land ecology, that which of it remains, is now subject to two overwhelming influences. First, urbanisation. Land is at an extreme premium, and some of this is going to be needed to grow food. Meat is going to become extremely rare (unless it's fish) because meat animals are not land-intensive. Second, light. These cities are now beneath an ocean. Unless they can create an artificial light source, they may have problems arising from the ocean depth. If the ocean is deep enough to block out light, this places the cities in darkness. On the other hand, if a city is very close to the Edge Barriers the thickness of water may still let light in from the side of the ocean.

    If artifical light sources exist, crop growth can happen in underground passages, though power becomes an issue instead. Even without reliable artificial light sources, if you can get an external source of nutrients (say, from the ocean floor or surface) you can dump them into fertiliser beds full of mushrooms in the dark. You'll probably want to recycle most human waste this way as well. The mushrooms (along with other sorts of microbes) if they're the right strains will break down pretty much anything you give them and recycle them as edible foodstuffs. They won't be tasty, but they will be nutritious. Greens and citrus fruits will probably be grown as well to provide supplemental vitamins to this sort of diet.

    Given how specialised the growth of subterranean food sources is, it would make sense that this type of knowledge was not possessed by the overlanders until they conquered/subsumed the subterranean folk who they learned it from.


    I am not even going to think about getting into the ecology of the Clouds yet. That is going to have to be a post of its own.



    Spirits and the Clouded Plane

    Why did the spirits of the spirit plane not come through as well? Did the mortals merely guard their portals well? Did some get through but have not been noticed? Or is the case that there is some property of the Clouded Plane (perhaps a lack of food suitable for spirits) that makes it inhospitable or outright dangerous to these spirits - except perhaps when possessing a human?



    Well, this turned out to be less of an analysis than an essay, but I hope it was helpful.
    Various Homebrew: Why not check it out? You're unlikely to be disappointed.

  5. - Top - End - #5
    Barbarian in the Playground
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    Default Re: Everain, a campaign setting (PEACH)

    Quote Originally Posted by Iituem View Post

    Light

    One extremely important question that needs to be met is where the light and heat in this plane is coming from. We could have light simply come from an endless source in the distant 'above' of the plane, but perhaps it would be better to have small, localised and very hot pseudosuns (but nowhere near as hot as the real sun) that either hang stationary or move about the plane.
    I thought about having a pseudosun above the clouded, and that the rain forces them to move their clouds upwards and closer to the sun, and therefore they want to cancel the eternal rain too but cannot.

    Quote Originally Posted by Iituem View Post
    Sea

    What all of this has been building up from is your statement that the rain 'does not flow sideways and slip downwards', which I interpreted to mean that the rain that hits the land does not run off the edge of the island but builds up into a sea capable of drowning the mortals therein. What this does mean is that the sea has very definite vertical edges (as if it were contained in a goldfish bowl or tank) rising up from the edge of the island.
    Exectly.

    Quote Originally Posted by Iituem View Post
    The important question is where the sea ends.
    Either there is an upper limit to how high the sea can grow before the excess water simply slips over the 'edge' of the invisible force holding it in, or the sea reaches a point in size that evaporation from its surface is equal to the rate at which the rain continues to fall. I personally prefer the second answer, as this holds truer to the idea that the sea never falls sidewards, although perhaps the force that holds it together only stops water from passing.

    The Sea, then, exists only atop the island of land created by mortals. It's probably going to be populated by variants of freshwater fish kept by the mortal colonists, but we'll cover this in Ecology.
    There will be an eternal rain spirit - sort of a manifistation of that rain, created by the spell, that keeps the rain eternal an limited in area, and will stop any attempts to stop the rain.
    So it could theoritically keep raining forever without sliding.

    Quote Originally Posted by Iituem View Post
    Also, for convenience's sake I am from now on going to refer to the natives as the Clouded and the mortal humans as the Landed. These are temporary names. (I realise one of the mortal kingdoms, the one we're concerned with, would make them the Kinhetians, but this then encompasses any from outside that kingdom.)
    Good idea.

    Quote Originally Posted by Iituem View Post
    Unable to find anywhere with the kind of solid ground they were used to, these immensely powerful magi created spells that allowed them to reform the material of the endless (and at that time they thought uninhabited and undifferentiated) clouds into a solid landmass they were able to live on. The magi extended the landmass significantly enough to support hundreds of thousands of people - this means that their exodus whilst sudden was probably over the course of a decade.
    Making the cloud physical was done pretty quickely, shaping it took more time.

    Quote Originally Posted by Iituem View Post
    Now the Island being what it is, we can do a little dovetailing here. The magi who created the Island probably saw the very real threat of people simply falling off the edge. To that end, maybe the force that keeps the sea in place is not the work of the Clouded, but a safety measure the magi put in place to stop people accidentally falling over the edge of the world. By the time they were ready to react to the flooding it was too late - deactivating the fields would have caused massive destruction as the escaping waters dragged plants, livestock and countless Landed off the edge of the world.
    I haven`t decided about exect measurements, but the landmass would be pretty big, so to fall from the edges you will need to go through a big distance.
    Still, I`ll consider it.

    Quote Originally Posted by Iituem View Post
    Subterrain

    The fact that there is an underworld does beg some questions. If the underground races are organised (or at least one of them is) then if they came through by making a pact with the wizards perhaps the wizards carved out some subterranean tunnels for them. Alternately they may simply have moved in themselves and dug out their homes by hand or magic.
    The magi simply let them pass through the portals, too concerned about the threat of attacking spirits to fight to prevent them from going through the portals.

    Quote Originally Posted by Iituem View Post
    Or are the subterranean races like Morlocks, humans who decided to retreat into the darkness after migrating to the new world?
    I might make such creatures too.

    Quote Originally Posted by Iituem View Post

    Ecology

    To be added. Complex, this will need further analysis. Your marine ecology should be fairly straightforward - evolutions over a short period (depends how many hundreds of years have passed since the Rains started and the ocean formed) to create a new ocean based from either saltwater or freshwater fish.
    I thought about the rain being active for 60 years, and landed being on that plane for 200 years before the rain started, but I might change that. Also, since there is a lot of powerfull magic in the setting, I could create some aquatic monsters and say a wizard made them (but for specific reasons, not just a crazy wizard playing god).

    Also, the rain will be much more intense then real life rains - if the rain drops will hit you it would feel more like hail.

    Quote Originally Posted by Iituem View Post
    Land ecology, that which of it remains, is now subject to two overwhelming influences. First, urbanisation. Land is at an extreme premium, and some of this is going to be needed to grow food. Meat is going to become extremely rare (unless it's fish) because meat animals are not land-intensive. Second, light. These cities are now beneath an ocean. Unless they can create an artificial light source, they may have problems arising from the ocean depth. If the ocean is deep enough to block out light, this places the cities in darkness. On the other hand, if a city is very close to the Edge Barriers the thickness of water may still let light in from the side of the ocean.
    With agriculture I`m thinking of mainly mushrooms, maybe some even tree sized, so there could be a mushroom "forest". Also, druids could help a lot with agriculture.
    With meat people could eat animals they don`t normally eat - like rats, moles etc, and I might create an underground herbivore race that tends to adopt those animals as pets, that could lead to some conflicts.
    The domes themselves glow, but the light doesn`t reach specific parts of the cities.

    Quote Originally Posted by Iituem View Post
    If artifical light sources exist, crop growth can happen in underground passages, though power becomes an issue instead.
    Haven`t decided on how much underground passages will be lit, but nobles houses would be lit and they will likely have slaves responsible for getting them food. They could also hire druids.

    Quote Originally Posted by Iituem View Post
    Given how specialised the growth of subterranean food sources is, it would make sense that this type of knowledge was not possessed by the overlanders until they conquered/subsumed the subterranean folk who they learned it from.
    Makes sense.

    Quote Originally Posted by Iituem View Post
    Spirits and the Clouded Plane

    Why did the spirits of the spirit plane not come through as well? Did the mortals merely guard their portals well? Did some get through but have not been noticed? Or is the case that there is some property of the Clouded Plane (perhaps a lack of food suitable for spirits) that makes it inhospitable or outright dangerous to these spirits - except perhaps when possessing a human?
    Lord Masat simply didn`t send his soldiers through the portals.
    While his original goal was to extinct corporal creatures, he decided that them escaping would be enough for him. The spirits felt more superior then ever, and there were many ghosts for him to enslave or integrate in society. He gained respect as the one who cleared corporal creatures out of the plane.

    Also, corporal creatures are not his only problam - there are rivaling lords and treacherous vassals that want to overthrow him and take over his army and territory.

    Quote Originally Posted by Iituem View Post
    Well, this turned out to be less of an analysis than an essay, but I hope it was helpful.
    It is.
    Madly In Science, an RPG in which you play mad scientists, you can get it for free.

    Spoiler: Some other things.
    Show
    A world behind the mirror (stand alone plane)
    (Wall) passer, a rogue variant
    My not realy extanded homebrewer signature

    Quote Originally Posted by Grinner View Post
    In a world ruled by small birds, mankind cannot help but wonder how this state of affairs came about.

  6. - Top - End - #6
    Barbarian in the Playground
    Join Date
    Jul 2007
    Gender
    Male

    Default Re: Everain, a campaign setting (PEACH)

    I added information about the natives of the plane of clouds, and about their slaves.
    Also, I`m thinking of calling them angels. I`m not going to make creatures of pure good (I don`t like the idea of good and evil being universal powers in general), and they feel angelic to me - winged, live on clouds, powerfull.
    They will be usually true naturel in alignment, but other then that they seem pretty angelic to me. Any thoughts?
    And any feedback in general?
    Madly In Science, an RPG in which you play mad scientists, you can get it for free.

    Spoiler: Some other things.
    Show
    A world behind the mirror (stand alone plane)
    (Wall) passer, a rogue variant
    My not realy extanded homebrewer signature

    Quote Originally Posted by Grinner View Post
    In a world ruled by small birds, mankind cannot help but wonder how this state of affairs came about.

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