tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29331907740302536172024-03-05T01:01:23.576-08:00Lord Archaon's GrimoireA recollection of all my D&D ramblings and homebrew material!LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.comBlogger85125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-43380574451240296572023-01-29T11:48:00.001-08:002023-01-29T15:11:42.410-08:00Daughters & Dragons - A surprisingly deep emoji-based RPG!<p> </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDqE_DZEEOpbAoKki-QQJ00MvzUrCIFnBhyv6ekErdnF1CPniq0ElDVDajXpzqUur3QxmP-Bh2oI1uqcePJSg4Gg6UVA2s61f8NK7hqZuWMH2dhxe0VLW_0wzRpeC-nub3iuXf1LiCiKPbfVHl5KuyWUsDqJvLE9swG5BLFHxRmPvmHg4DJjEyFqLo/s1024/DALL%C2%B7E%202023-01-29%2016.35.54.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="1024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDqE_DZEEOpbAoKki-QQJ00MvzUrCIFnBhyv6ekErdnF1CPniq0ElDVDajXpzqUur3QxmP-Bh2oI1uqcePJSg4Gg6UVA2s61f8NK7hqZuWMH2dhxe0VLW_0wzRpeC-nub3iuXf1LiCiKPbfVHl5KuyWUsDqJvLE9swG5BLFHxRmPvmHg4DJjEyFqLo/w640-h640/DALL%C2%B7E%202023-01-29%2016.35.54.png" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Image obviously created with OpenAI's Dall-E...</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><p>As a father of a 3 and a half years old girl, I should be quite far still from glorious RPG sessions with her and the like, but it turns out she is fascinated by dice of any kind, which of course she found plenty of, among my things.</p><p>This of course doesn't mean she is ready to play D&D, and in addition, as I made clear in my latest post, I came to really dislike the current edition of D&D, finding that it took the magic out of the game, by putting magic everywhere in it, other than adhering to game design principles I absolutely despise.</p><p>So I set out on a quest that used to be quite common for my young self, but hadn't done in a good while: creating an RPG!</p><p>My objectives were many, and often at odds with each other:<br /></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>A very accessible game, that can be understood by a 4 year old or so.</li><li>A game that is more immersive and can simulate realistic situation better than D&D 5e: "gamist" abstractions will still be there, but should make a lot of logical sense.</li><li>A game that is more fun to play than D&D 5e: rolls should be with many dice, and randomness should play a role, but not as much as in D&D.</li></ul><div>For the first point, I decided early on that I would have replaced basically any written word with emojis: I've been using emojis in game design and even in coding for a long time, and I quickly found out that entire rulings can be written with 4 emojis, making them understandable to kids (she understands the icons associated to actions in videogames already, and those are basically custom emojis.)</div><div><br /></div><div>But obviously the second objective is at odds with the rest, and I admit it was mainly my pet peeve, more than anything.</div><div>But since I'd have to play this with my daughter, I'd like something a bit educational while we're at it, and gamist abstractions are not educational at all.</div><div>Characters should get tired, and should have limits to what they can do that depend on their characteristics, not arbitrary numbers.</div><div>The game should teach that if you want to do more things of a certain kind, you should train to do so, and training to do so might mean not training to do something else.</div><div><br /></div><div>Anyways, here is how I proceeded in this weird quest.</div><div><br /></div><h3 style="text-align: left;">From Legend Of The 5 Rings, to a Legend of 4 Animals</h3><div>I made no mystery in the past of my fascination with this game, and in particular its latest edition.</div><div><br /></div><div>It's the only game that did away with physical abilities, in favor of abstract "rings" that determine very different aspects of characters, physical, social, mystical, and mental, by thematically grouping them together.<br /><br />Now, if you paid attention to my remarks about "gamist VS simulationist" systems above, you will think this should stay far away from my new game, to make it simulationist and educational... And I agree: as it is, it's too abstract to be understood by kids, and has very little connection to the real world.</div><div><br /></div><div>But what it does well, is to give a certain "spirit" to characters, and a way to "modulate" rolls, so one can do the same action with different approaches, and sometimes overcome physical or mental limitations, thanks to what comes down to character/personality, which I think is quite a good depiction of what happens in the real world.</div><div><br /></div><div>So here is my solution to have this nice feature and at the same time staying grounded to a simulation of the real world that can make sense:</div><div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Have the 6 ability scores, still, although modified to be more identifiable by a kid.</li><li>Have 4 (5 is too many) "spirits" that can intersect with abilities to add nuance to the resulting actions.</li></ul><div>This could create 24 intersections of abilities and spirits, but I didn't want things to be so needlessly symmetrical and clear-cut, because then if you miss the right ability or the right spirit, you can't do anything in some situations.</div></div><div><br /></div><div>So here comes the next adaptation to solve this.</div><div><br /></div><h3 style="text-align: left;">Rolling two abilities at a time is more fun, so let's couple them up!</h3><div>Coupling abilities is something I've seen in a couple of little-known RPGs, and I always loved.</div><div><br /></div><div>If every possible action always involves two abilities, it's first of all more probable that characters will be able to attempt everything without feeling it's a plain coin toss, and in addition it sets the system up for a lot of dice tricks: use only the best ability of two, the worst, do something when numbers match, do something when you "crit" with both, crit with one, and so on.</div><div><br /></div><div>Still, I didn't want all abilities to couple up with all the rest: it's a ton of couplings.</div><div><br /></div><div>So I resorted to a system that couples only what makes sense in the game world.</div><div><br /></div><div>In addition, some couples determine not only rolls, but the energy pools associated to those roles, and instead of numbers associated to abilities, we get dice, so it's more immediate for a kid than a bonus to be added to another die.</div><div><br /></div><div>Here is what I came up with:</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_NJmcKjAzc3smLprFQTvKvDq7KyJZDYtRneUCYAXvA2fbJhZTvsw8SmTQWi79lhW7rxr7kkQvqsI4tQLSCPrp9bqApe4CnkpVvf_SKRYK7oZPsUUSRc8CfTBp4tIZzIFgTXpWTsFkxvchuCezfdiZ7_aT9nNOAKDXziFsAHMX3nm9WqIEurihclPO/s590/Abilities.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="517" data-original-width="590" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_NJmcKjAzc3smLprFQTvKvDq7KyJZDYtRneUCYAXvA2fbJhZTvsw8SmTQWi79lhW7rxr7kkQvqsI4tQLSCPrp9bqApe4CnkpVvf_SKRYK7oZPsUUSRc8CfTBp4tIZzIFgTXpWTsFkxvchuCezfdiZ7_aT9nNOAKDXziFsAHMX3nm9WqIEurihclPO/s16000/Abilities.png" /></a></div><br /><div>The geometrical symbols correspond to the type of dice, and the "Energies" in the middle are shared by the abilities to their left and right, and calculated with admittedly slightly complex formulas, although very easy to put in emojis: "๐๐ ฑ๏ธ" (which if you're not on Windows might appear different than in the pic, but it's the formula for Stamina) means the top value of the worst dice of the couple. So Vitality, 6.</div><div>In Spirit we just sum them all. And Focus instead is half of the best die, which in this case doesn't make any difference, and is just 2.</div><div><br /></div><div>You might think this is way too complicated, but if you noticed, Energy is symbolized by coins, and that's how we play this with my daughter: she gets coins of different colors, and spends them. No need to count basically, as the totals are to be counted only once and stay like that until the abilities change.</div><div><br /></div><div><b>The ability couples</b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div>Without further ado, here is how abilities are coupled to determine skills and more. I called them Aspects, but it's not a final definition, and it doesn't even really matter, since these are nearly never used directly.</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgP_h0qVbFCWfPI7d98HiAgQjPr1r77YvdtwQkOkAVh4O90Zre1ftrJnXyWcmr4q_tE4JeH6cnU18qIh6etCe7aEOf1G92rwAAVcAasqyqU1UPTF1fgG9Si6W34jWENq11f8tjTFUBG6QDoZ60fZ0Fy_WfwP3IJZRvI0F-PEe13dgpu4QW8mwsqZbdm/s578/Aspects.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="578" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgP_h0qVbFCWfPI7d98HiAgQjPr1r77YvdtwQkOkAVh4O90Zre1ftrJnXyWcmr4q_tE4JeH6cnU18qIh6etCe7aEOf1G92rwAAVcAasqyqU1UPTF1fgG9Si6W34jWENq11f8tjTFUBG6QDoZ60fZ0Fy_WfwP3IJZRvI0F-PEe13dgpu4QW8mwsqZbdm/s16000/Aspects.png" /></a></div>As you can see, Wisdom became the coupling of Mind and Senses, and is separate from Awareness, which is Charisma and Senses. The former is more intellectual, the second more social/spiritual.<div><br /></div><div>If you noticed, they are color-coded both in their title, and in the background of the emojis.</div><div><br /></div><div>This ties them to the types of energy needed to perform (hefty) tasks with each, although it's not perfect, since I didn't want to use too many colors.</div><div><br /></div><div>Therefore, even if there is overlap, you can consider Endurance and Movement "Bodily", tied mainly to Stamina, Instinct and Technique more "Mindful", tied mainly to Focus, Wisdom and Brilliance more "Intellectual", tied to both Focus and Spirit, and finally Awareness and Power more deeply Spiritual/Primal.</div><div><br /></div><div>As I said, there is no symmetry but that's ok. If you noticed, resources have widely different quantities, and that's for a reason: Focus is not something you ever actually run out of: it's just that when you don't have it, you have to invest some seconds into refocusing, meaning that it's mainly to avoid characters doing too many difficult things in a row. Spirit instead is plentiful, and it should be because it will replace Spell Slots, it's basically Mana. Requires sleeping to recover. Stamina is in-between, and requires short rests and food to replenish, unless it goes negative (something other resources can't do) and then it can require days to fully recover.</div><div><br /></div><div>The second color-coding divides the Passive (green-blue) from Active (peach orange) Aspects, to continue showing what is more internal, and what external, like for Abilities.<br /><div><br /></div><div>Now, where do the 4 Animal Spirits figure in all this? Well, surprisingly or not, they modulate these 8 Aspects into what are basically skills, attacks, spellcasting, and almost everything else!</div><div><br /></div><div>But let's talk the Animal Spirits.</div><div><br /></div><h3 style="text-align: left;">A System 4 Animals</h3><div>Early-on I started calling this whole system 4Animals, because indeed, as I think it's typical for kids, my daughter is quite used to play make-believe, impersonating animals of various kinds, and this system is aimed at her. :)</div><div><br /></div><div>However, I wanted to stay very close to the Legend Of The 5 Rings system, when it comes to what these "elements" (traditionally Air, Fire, Water, and Earth, with the addition of Void, in that game) do and control.</div><div><br /></div><div>After all, that's an already balanced system, so there was no need to change it too much.</div><div><br /></div><div>The only thing I wanted to change was getting rid of the Void ring, which would have been very hard to represent with an animal, and basically distributing its stuff among others, giving them also more flesh.</div><div><br /></div><div>Therefore, I came up with the following. (Never mind the weird shapes, they will make sense later.)</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEju7Zhq_j3JXOH36wHZFKuKNCw5nv19tU3zjROj117Xi3BThVZAKKDJQgEvmwwL6xtcY3kZf4mc2NH4w5S3U0iCRLsXmke_XxmCRXCAbqCgm7-HJMN75UR6rdwZ77q5fQJQV6X33VADLDEU2ed6BK3-Gm_suWH0_-RS_7TBsZJ9ClHAX-cg-pWFa9_o/s575/TheAnimals.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="575" data-original-width="173" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEju7Zhq_j3JXOH36wHZFKuKNCw5nv19tU3zjROj117Xi3BThVZAKKDJQgEvmwwL6xtcY3kZf4mc2NH4w5S3U0iCRLsXmke_XxmCRXCAbqCgm7-HJMN75UR6rdwZ77q5fQJQV6X33VADLDEU2ed6BK3-Gm_suWH0_-RS_7TBsZJ9ClHAX-cg-pWFa9_o/s16000/TheAnimals.png" /></a></div><br /><div><b>The Eagle </b>stays very close to what the Air element does in L5R, which might be, surprisingly for who doesn't know that game, a lot of "bad" stuff, so much I'd have used a <b>Crow</b>, if the emoji existed. They are the finesse types, which means they are great at lying, tricking, and sneaking, but in a positive light they can be precise, detail-oriented, and elegant.</div><div>In D&D-style games, this would be the spirit animal of most Rogues/Experts, many Spellcasters, and even some Fighters.</div><div><br /></div><div><b>The Lion </b>stayed also very close to the original Fire element of L5R, being the most "aggressive", but I also made it the most "regal" of the bunch, being the one for natural leaders. It also associates Fire with Creation, so it's also one of the best spirits for crafters, especially tinkerers/inventors.</div><div>In D&D-style games, it's Paladins, Sorcerers, Barbarians, and Fighters.</div><div><br /></div><div><b>The "Seahorse" </b>(or Unicorn) is <b>sea- </b>because it obviously replaced the Water element of L5R (which would not be out of place for a Unicorn anyway) and it gained some stuff from the Void element as well, becoming one of the most mystical of the bunch. They can be fickle and shallow, or deep and powerful, like water. It's the most social of the 4, and is all about empathy and adaptability.</div><div>In D&D, it's Bards, but also some Wizards, Warlocks, Clerics, & Rogues.</div><div><br /></div><div><b>The Dragon </b>is the most different from the source element of Earth, because it's the one that got the most from the element of Void. It's even more mystical than the Seahorse/Unicorn, but also strangely more grounded/practical. It's the most static/passive of the bunch, controlling stuff like endurance, calculation, knowledge, and faith. A bit all over the place, but kind of representing a "hermit" spirit.</div><div>In D&D it's Druids, some Paladins, Rangers, Clerics, and Shamans.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>As you can see, most classes could be dominated by more than one spirit animal, and this is by design: the spirit animal is not a way to classify things, but a way to modulate/modify them.</div><div><br /></div><div>Now, if I would have to make a version of all Aspects for every Animal something with in-game meaning/use, that would be a ton of stuff: 32 "things" to be precise.</div><div>So I decided once again to avoid the temptation of symmetry at all costs, making sure that the 4 Animals would be associated with all the major groupings, but not all aspects.</div><div><br /></div><div>This is what I came up with:</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijYbQAW8YaId4O5kbL8uXmr5_2Kgk0GZr6VbYgHf5tQOSRQOKsZHN20ncvx3MohVWf5vjwYS-PDzfh_OZJcyDd2dedXC0vnY8mBIE28bQ-8CzdtB5ixsH0dSigTOhF50Zqy5oMwEivqGjpmQjNr0UwiAa1RMd4FecFAJr79-vSJiiZHmxL8MazVtYs/s1056/TraitsSkills.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="664" data-original-width="1056" height="402" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijYbQAW8YaId4O5kbL8uXmr5_2Kgk0GZr6VbYgHf5tQOSRQOKsZHN20ncvx3MohVWf5vjwYS-PDzfh_OZJcyDd2dedXC0vnY8mBIE28bQ-8CzdtB5ixsH0dSigTOhF50Zqy5oMwEivqGjpmQjNr0UwiAa1RMd4FecFAJr79-vSJiiZHmxL8MazVtYs/w640-h402/TraitsSkills.png" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div>As you can see, there's many holes all over the place, but it's "a feature, not a bug", because at the end of the day, too many choices hurt the enjoyment of games, even if they can be nice for geeks like me.</div><div><br /></div><div>There's many icons there that I didn't explain, and some of you might easily guess, but the important thing is that this actually is almost all you need to play!</div><div>Again, those with orangish backgrounds are active (Skills) and those with light-bluish background are passive (Traits) although there are special cases, in which this can change.</div><div><br /></div><div>For example, each Spirit Animal has a so-called "Hybrid Skill", which is the "skill-ification" of a trait.</div><div><b>๐ฆ - ๐ Attention -> ๐ฎ Interpret </b></div><div><b>๐ฆ - โค๏ธโ๐ฅ Temper -> ๐ Rush</b></div><div><b>๐ฆ - ๐คฉ Insight -> ๐ฅฐ Charm</b></div><div><b>๐ฒ - ๐ Belief -> ๐ Invoke</b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div>Yes, Traits are nouns, and Skills are verbs for no good reason other than being a cool difference...</div><div>And yes, many of these things are extremely tied to stuff like attacking and spell-casting, but never only that.</div><div>Basically the Bodily Traits and Skills are all related to Combat, but also Athletics, Movement, Resistance, etc, while all the Social & Spiritual are, as the name implies, both social and spiritual, able to generate magic, but also sway people, which is another parallel with the real-world I like...</div><div><br /></div><div>Wherever you see the star โญ, it means you could learn to do magic with them, and wherever you see the swords โ๏ธ, it means you could learn (or sometimes automatically know) how to fight with them.</div><div><br /></div><div>I won't explain everything else, or the post will become a manual. :)</div><div><br /></div><div>But now you might notice that the system for rolling is in place: every roll with involve two abilities (which you can see repeated here, on the left of the big skill icons), and a spirit animal, and each of these means one die from d4 to d12. (No d20s anymore for me!) The only exception is that at 1st level, usually no character should have all 4 spirit animals: it's ok to never have one for the whole game, and it's usually important to focus on 2, and have a backup third one, although of course having all 4 is a lot of versatility.</div><div><br /></div><div>So the sample character shown before, with ๐ช๐, ๐ฉธ๐ท, and ๐ฆ๐ would roll a hefty 2d10 and 1d8 for attacks made with Rush ๐, which is kind of the go-to attack skill, consuming Stamina only. (the others all involve Focus, meaning you eventually have to refocus to use them).</div><div><br />Also note how this is roughly equivalent to 1d20+6, which is not far from what a 4th level D&D character can do, and was indeed the target for this sample character, which is 3rd level.</div><div><br /></div><div>Speaking of levels though, that is something else I wanted to revolutionize, to finally have the concept of "separate pillars of characters growing in parallel".</div><div><br /></div><h3 style="text-align: left;">Class levels are not enough</h3><div>You may have guessed it: the idea is Race (or Species, whatever) and Background should matter more in games, and to do so, they can level up in parallel with the class!</div><div><br /></div><div>This could seem to add complexity, but it actually takes it out, because it means each of these will need less than the canonical 20 levels to feel interesting, since you will have three different level-up experiences.</div><div><br /></div><div>I don't have the full system in place, but the idea is the following:</div><div><br /></div><div><b>Race: </b>special abilities and the levelling up of actual abilities come from here. HPs, too!</div><div><br /></div><div><b>Class: </b>this controls mainly combat and magic, with a few extra skills and spirit animal connection thrown in for fun and differentiation.</div><div><br /></div><div><b>Background: </b>this is the realm of skills and social stuff, and you can think of the levelling of it a bit as a renown tracker. It eventually leads to having one's own property/stronghold, and sometimes can even grant some combat or magic to mix in with the class.</div><div><br /></div><div>Basically characters would be always multiclass, with Race and Background being mini-classes associated to the main class.</div><div><br /></div><div>At the moment, I aim at 5 levels of each system, which I'd eventually expand to 10, but nothing more, because it's already interesting to have 3x 5 levels to explore.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><b>So how do classes look in this weird system?</b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div>Well, it's pretty simple, they are so easy to create too:</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2Dk0KIyoLlq1UAMEZBFXMz5yfEXnQd9g2P837krikuS5izRgebghAd4mjYMAULQv8qXmMcoPjLz_egs-k_Mw5SmOd3Bycl4sHaAeargnkWa9i8MavLFin_6y8J8E69JNwmeWM5cz5osvOfulCRQL3DQw-LY03CZ9vaeg2V5lMa6y4rrbL2bIR170p/s1118/PaladinBard.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="453" data-original-width="1118" height="260" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2Dk0KIyoLlq1UAMEZBFXMz5yfEXnQd9g2P837krikuS5izRgebghAd4mjYMAULQv8qXmMcoPjLz_egs-k_Mw5SmOd3Bycl4sHaAeargnkWa9i8MavLFin_6y8J8E69JNwmeWM5cz5osvOfulCRQL3DQw-LY03CZ9vaeg2V5lMa6y4rrbL2bIR170p/w640-h260/PaladinBard.png" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div>Yes, a bit simplistic, but remember it's supposed to be for small kids. It's actually quite complicated for the target audience, and definitely requires a more adult guidance.<br /><br />But you might be able to interpret the meaning of all the "emoji formulas". Smite Evil for example, adds attack/damage (they are one and the same, you might see why in a later post) vs "monsters" or "evil ones", equal to the "Skill die" associated to Temper (something Paladins and Bards have.)<br />Bardic Inspiration is basically the same, but that die will be given to one ally. </div><div><br /></div><div>The emojis seem to portray this quite simply, IMO, but do comment if it's not clear to you: can't playtest this with many people!</div><div><br /></div><div>Also, might not be clear but at 1st level you get the Skills, Traits, and Magic stuff, which will result in 7 Skills/Traits for Bards, and only 4/5 for Paladins, as expected. <br />Note that this means certain usages of skills/traits, not all: they are learned separately, so these numbers should more or less be halved compared to the skills of D&D, and this is compensated by Race and Background giving more of them.</div><div><br /></div><h3 style="text-align: left;">More to come!</h3><div>This is of course far from an overview of the whole system: I have a full-fledged magic system connected to this, which allows for nearly on-the-fly spell creation, and systems that add synergy bonuses depending on combinations of various things, allowing for each character to be widely different from any other, but hopefully without rules-bloating, since everything is always only a result of combinations of few elements, instead of addition of new ones.</div><div><br /></div><div>It's incredibly satisfying to make this stuff, so you will surely see more.<br /><br />In the meantime, leave comments without mercy. :)</div><div><br /></div><div>Cheers!</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><p></p></div>LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-4513494257060658722022-08-19T15:07:00.041-07:002022-08-21T08:02:35.671-07:00#OneDnD size does *not* fit all...<p>Here I am, punctually after the announcement of D&D's new edition.<br />Punctual because for several reasons, I was waiting for this for a long time already.</p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>I'm really, really tired of D&D 5e. There is no fun material coming out anymore, and the few interesting things that came out after Xanathar's Guide To Everything (the last book I liked) were marred by game design choices that I seriously disliked.<br /><br /></li><li>I'm a game design freak, but instead of enjoying the differences of the many systems out there (which I anyway read whenever I get a chance), I always want D&D to be good for every need. This is inside me to stay, like an incurable autoimmune disorder...<br /><br /></li><li>I strongly believe that I can't be the only one who disapproves of the direction the mechanics of the game took. Sure, most of the gamers I know are utterly in love with 5e, but I refuse to believe I alone see the defects. I'm not a contrarian hipster or grognard: I really want to feel part of the community, because (at least until some years ago) I really always liked it, for as long as 80% of my whole life.</li></ul><div>Ok, I wanted to be concise and schematic with bullet points, but predictably wrote too much, so let's get into the "crunch", starting from what I've been teasing: what I don't like of 5e.</div><div><br /></div><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b>What D&D 5e was supposed to be, but never was.</b></h3><div><br />The 5th edition of D&D started as a very ambitious project during its playtest "D&D Next" phase, but even before release, it had already lost a lot of features it was supposed to have.<br /><br /></div><div>Here are the first things that 5e "lost" early on, which I really wanted and never got again.</div><div><b><br /></b></div><div><span><a name='more'></a></span></div><div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Modularity: </b>there was this constant talk of the game becoming modular, which was misinterpreted I think by SO many people, due to the wording. "Modular" meant different things to different people, and as it turned out, also to different people within the design team.<br /><br />What it meant in the beginning, for the designers that were promoting it, was that the game had to have some "complexity dial" system, such as:<br /><br />- Ready-made characters that played very simply, requiring almost no choices.<br />- Options for "middle complexity" people, which gave some choices, but not everywhere.<br />- The "full manual control" mode, where you could customize characters in every detail, and have many possible actions every turn, regardless of character class.<br /><br />What it ended up as was a <u>one size fits all</u> thing, or better "one size fits all within each character class": there were simple classes, middle classes, and complex classes. <br /><br />Subclasses kind of tried to add some complexity here and there where it was missing, but seldom managed to do the contrary, so that once again we had Wizards as nearly unplayable options for beginners because of how many choices they give, and Fighters nearly unplayable by veterans because they are BORING as hell. <br /><br /></li><li><b>Granular feats/features: </b>I remember a playtest package in which Rogues started with something between 4 and 5 feats, plus a choice of 3 different ways of generating sneak attacks, one of which didn't even involve attacking. YES: you could be a non-fighting Rogue that still managed to cause mayhem and DAMAGE. I don't even want to tell you what it was, because I'm so bitter that this didn't see the light of day, (and maybe I was also under NDA, by the way) that I just HATE that we never got all this. (You can check the post here titled "A Murder Of Rogues", plus some other, I think, so no, I guess there was no NDA at that time.)<br /><br />You might say: "whoa, I'm glad I don't have to choose 5 feats and 3 different sneak attacks now, that stuff is like 3e, or PF 2e, and it's not for everyone." And in fact, IT DIDN'T NEED TO BE FOR EVERYONE: with the modular system, this could have been the advanced option, along with packages that just had simple stuff, and others that just pre-made the choices for you, representing Basic and Middle options, or however they could have called them.<br /><br />But guess what, that would have required some serious math balancing, and some extra page in the class description, or maybe expansion modules/books, which polarized people a lot, since 4th edition had not been around for too long, and it had even been revamped with the Essentials line not 2 years before. So we couldn't get this bonanza. Not even in Xanathar or (much less) in Tasha's books, later in 5e. I guessed maybe because they were saving it for the next edition... But I guessed wrong.<br /><br /></li><li><b>Maneuvers for all martial characters: </b>this was also something that could have been relegated to the "advanced rules" module, but instead of that, they decided to make it a Fighter exclusive, and not only, the exclusive of the single subclass of Fighter worth playing: the Battlemaster.<br /><br />Note that back then I even thought it was kind of bad to have common maneuvers for all martials, because I thought it made the classes too similar. Boy was I in for a rough awakening, when it turned out they would have become EVEN MORE similar, since basic attacks were all they had, most of the time.<br /><br /></li><li><b>A sense of wonder and old-schoolness: </b>this indeed is very subjective, and was tricky to "modularize". I remember you could build a Rogue that could, with the right feats, cast spells from scrolls, wands, and even some of its own, without having to be an Arcane Trickster.<br /><br />It was so much better than "getting spells", because you really had to steal or "con" magic, in a true Rogue fashion, to use it. It generated what is still one of my most beloved characters (one of the few readers of this post who knows me, might even remember which one), and now it's just impossible to represent such character with mechanics, because this cool thing disappeared from one playtest package to another, and I can almost HEAR the reasons why: "too complex" or "too unclear" or "it steals the wizards' thunder", etc. etc. No more "Read Magic" cantrip, so scrolls became things usable only by the characters who didn't need them.<br />Never mind that all this could have been optional: the option just never freaking came out. For no good reason, since as an option it could have been there just for the people who like me loved it. No: <u>one size fits all.</u><br /></li></ul><div><br /></div><div>So these were the things I didn't like of 5e since BEFORE 5e came out.</div></div><div><br /></div><div>When it came out, the bitterness for all this was already a bit buried in me, and I decided to let go and have fun, but the thorn never really came out.</div><div><br /></div><div>Problem is, the things I really disliked started blowing out of proportion with time, especially with the Tasha book (I don't even want to search its full title) and everything that came after it (very little.)</div><div><br /></div><h3 style="text-align: left;">What really killed 5e for me, in no particular order.</h3><div><br /></div><div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Botched Psionics. </b>Apart from what I considered the AWESOME Mystic class not seeing the light out of the Unearthed Arcana playtest tunnel, my sadness here arrived when they finally decided to bring psionics to the official books.<br /><br />They had found a mechanic that I considered so genius, that I still want to implement it in nearly every custom thing I build: a die that could be rolled infinitely until you got the max result, which expended it, but that you could get back (I think) when you rolled the minimum.<br />This was SO psionic: mind in overload does wonderful things but gets tired, and mind fumbling something gets new inspiration. A simple die trick had reinvented psionics in my mind, and finally for the best (because this came after many other sad turns, which I will actually list down here), but guess what? When the book came out, this mechanic was gone. They became dice you would roll and expend, and that's it. Just increase the number of them, and regain them after rest.<br /><br />I was... Speechless. But as I said, this was not the last straw, and definitely not the first, so here comes a previous one.<br /><br /></li><li><b>Botched Ranger (and Paladin, and Sorcerer). </b>Ahhh the Ranger. I ranted sooo much about this class over the years, that I almost feel pathetic myself. There was so much talk about an alternate ranger, about the designers admitting they had failed the class, and then what did we get? Alternate class features that did almost nothing related to the various playtest versions we had seen (this is a constant trend, as you see) and especially didn't even acknowledge the MAIN issue: the class's identity.<br /><br />I will say it in a different way now, maybe, but this is something I've said since forever: if you think of some classes as hybrids of others, those classes should not be classes at all. You should build the concept via multiclassing.<br />A class should represent a unique thing, a primary color that you can mix with others, but can't be obtained by mixing other colors.<br /><br />And I ranted and ranted, that the Ranger was a major, major example of this (with the Paladin and Sorcerer coming close seconds), but even if at some point it seemed like they had listened (releasing two full and different fixes, and talking about having failed the class even in an official podcast), in the end it turned out as usual: they just upped the power level, and kept things as hybrid as usual, with spells, and all the bells and whistles that make you go "Hah, that's a ranger"... As if recognition was the definition of identity. <br /><br />No. You can go "hah, that's a cross-breed" when seeing a dog, but that doesn't mean it has a clear identity. It will mean you just recognized it as such, but its identity is just the sum of different, much more unique identities, which for the Ranger in D&D are the Fighter, the Rogue, and the Druid: classes that can be mixed, and the only thing you won't get is the freaking favored enemy, something that, if 5e would have been true to its original plan, should have belonged to Background, not Class. And this happened to so many other things that appear, unsurprisingly, only in hybrid classes: they need background-territory stuff because otherwise they fall apart.<br /><br /></li><li><b>Botched MAGIC. </b>For D&D to botch magic, well... I don't want to go there. But yes, IMO magic was botched big time, because it was just SPREAD LIKE BUTTER over all the classes. ALL of them. Now even a full Barbarian can access spells with the right subclass. Seriously. And that would be cool if that would be "Barbarian Magic". A special one. But NO! "Simplicity! Why reinventing the wheel? We got these spells done, we can just reuse them, and players will describe them as they wish! Reskin instead of making something new!" - This was the mantra then, and it's EVEN MORE SO NOW. (Getting there.)<br /><br />Once again: <u>one size fits all</u> was the philosophy, and while we got a half'-assed attempt at an alternate magic system with spell points in the DMG, and the Warlock in the PHB, the truth is that magic feels all the same all the time, and the only clear difference you can see is between Arcane, Divine, and Primal. Remember this for later, please, because it's going to get worse now here...<br /><br /></li><li><b>Botched Feats. </b>I won't explain this, really, because again it's just painful to me. I can just sigh with a bit of relief now, seeing that they finally realized the mistake. This was the only part of the game that should have not been (so) modular, and it's the only part of the game in which the original modularity concept was kept. I swear...<br /><br /></li><li><b>Botched Races. </b>And they botched them twice. They had their problems when the edition came out, mainly the usual problem of them being absolutely irrelevant after a couple of levels, and they botched them again around Tasha's book, just to cater to the woke crowd who just because they are called races instead of species (as it would be more accurate to call them, BTW) had to ruin the game for everyone making them even more irrelevant and basically interchangeable.<br /><br />For fun, here's what the races should be called nowadays:<br /><br />- The darkvision and no sleep race<br />- The infravision tougher race<br />- The brave and lucky race<br />- The breath weapon race<br />- The flexible race (was the only one that didn't need much else, but now ALL are like it)<br />- The magicky race(s) (the hellish rebuke race, and the darkness race)<br /><br />This is all they give, so why giving them names, you know?<br />And guess what, they will screw them up even more, a third time. It gets worse, I saw it already.<br /><br /></li><li><b>Botched Backgrounds. </b>Even what was my favorite part of 5e, at some point revealed itself as a huge missed opportunity, since once again, we were talking about stuff that was awesome at 1st level, and started falling into irrelevance by the 4th. Why? Because it takes some work to make cool things, this is the truth. They just didn't work on these. They just started them well, and then abandoned them. True for many things in the game already talked about.<br /><br />And now last but not least...<br /><br /></li><li><b>THE FREAKING THORN IN MY BRAIN... THE "TIMES PER DAY EQUAL TO YOUR PROFICIENCY BONUS" THING.</b><br />If you didn't think I was crazy before, you definitely think so now, right?<br />Well let me explain you why I'm not.<br /></li><ul><li>Setting this kind of limit on ALL features, like they started doing with Tasha's book, is a nightmare of book-keeping, because even if it's the same number of times for everything (which is an abomination, I'll get there), everything has to be tracked separately!</li><li>It breaks the immersion so much that I can't understand how can people play like this. Why the hell is my character able to do this and that only 2 times per day? When it was magic, well, it's magic, it works like this, it's a mystery... But now EVERYTHING can be done this amount of times. And you can't say "it's a representation of stamina, an abstraction like HP" because every <i>single </i>thing can be done this amount of times <i>separately. </i>This means that if I roleplay to hide what is the most gamist rule ever by describing how the character got tired, I could then start doing three or four <i>different </i>things all 2x times, because they are all tracked separately. Wasn't the character tired, goddammit?</li><li>It's once again a "one size fits all" mechanic, but one that even defeats the purpose of one-size-fits-allness!! Because once again, since it's all tracked separately, what good does it do that the number is easy to remember because it's a different unrelated number on my sheet? It will anyway be at 2, 1, or 0 for each single class feature, for the first 4 levels, and then it will be trickier, when it could be 3, 2, 1, or 0, and again and again till you reach a level in which the number of features and number of times you'll be able to use them will be so big, that people will just stop tracking, I think.<br />It's seriously a bad, bad, bad mechanic, that became the standard for absolutely no good reason if not what can be described as uniformity for uniformity's sake, and dumbing down not even for its own sake, since it ends up actually complicating things.</li></ul></ul><div><i>*Sigh*... <br /></i>And now on with the aptly named ONE D&D, coming in 2024. The ONE-SIZE-FITS-ALL-D&D, which we already know...<br /><br /><h3 style="text-align: left;">The direction ONE D&D seems to have taken<br /><br /></h3></div></div><div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Fixed Feats. </b>Let's start with the good stuff, finally. They understood their mistake, it's clear. Feats will now be core (<i>ONE SIZE FITS ALL)</i>, and they will increase, since you'll get one with your background, which will also mean...<br /><br /></li><li><b>Partially fixed Backgrounds</b>: now they actually matter a bit more mechanically, since they give you a feat. For the rest they're just the same, so their "backwards compatibility" is kind of a joke (who the hell would want the old ones, having these ones?) But yeah. They didn't fix the most important thing though: these are still static things that give you a bunch of benefits at 1st level and all at once. Leaving no excitement for later levels in this department. But after all, if it's a background it should be a thing of the past only, right? Well... Yes, <i>IF ONE SIZE FITS ALL...<br /><br /></i></li><li><b>Kinda fixed rules here and there: </b>I guess.<br /><br />And now for the bad...<br /><br /></li><li><b>DESTROYED RACES: </b>we knew this was coming. Now they matter even LESS than the little they mattered, with even ability bonuses being stolen by backgrounds.<br />The only thing they have which grows with time is SPELLS. Because now even regular elves gain spells, to be balanced with the rest. All stuff that can be learned by classes, mind you, so it's nothing more than a bonus something-everyone-can-know, instead of unique. Because why reinventing the wheel, of course. <br /><br /></li><li><b>AGAIN THE PROFICIENCY BONUS NUMBER USED TO TRACK FEATURES: </b>and again, we knew this was coming. They put this everywhere in Tasha's, and that for me was like the announcement of One D&D in advance. You can smell it's a different edition because it has nothing to do with the rules that came before.<br />And note that it's not used for everything, so not even its main purpose of uniformity is really fulfilled: race spells are usually only 1 time each, but if you happen to be a Gnome, for example... Here it comes, proficiency bonus times per day for your Speak with Animals (SPELL, of course). The same amount of times exactly that a Dwarf can <strike>analyze stonework</strike> TREMORSENSE. Because WHY NOT. Don't try to find a connection between things using this system. Just "if it can be done multiple times, it must be proficiency bonus times." For no reason other than uniformity. UNI. As in <u>ONE</u>.<br /><br /></li><li><b>SUCKED ALL THE MAGIC OUT OF MAGIC: </b>Again because UNIformity is good, now there are only THREE spell lists. Arcane, Divine, and Primal. Because the Sorcerer, Warlock, and Wizard were so similar already that why bother making them more unique? Just make them the same already. Sickening stuff. Could as well mean the end for Warlock and Sorcerer.</li></ul><div>_____________________________</div></div><div><br /></div><div>You got my point: the designers think that ONE SIZE FITS ALL when it comes to D&D, and I think this is the most stupid and lazy decision they can make for this new revision.<br /><br />They always understood, since the time of 4e Essentials, that they <u>CAN have MANY SIZES FOR MANY PLAYERS, making complexity and simplicity COEXIST in the game</u>, by making the <i>SAME STUFF </i>granular for the people like me, and lumped-up for the simplicity-loving crowds. It's an easy principle, but of course it requires more writing, or if wanting to keep writing minimal, at least more thinking, on the designers' side. <br /><br /><u>My question is: don't we deserve such a small extra effort from designers?</u><br /><br />Their answer for now is evident: <u>NO.</u></div><p></p>LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-24730388163655720532020-12-14T05:22:00.001-08:002020-12-14T05:22:52.374-08:00The Swamp Was Expanding, In Fritburg - #Fiction<p> </p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The swampland was expanding, from the rotten forest. Crawling closer to the farms with every moon.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It was in particular when the moon was gibbous, that a thick, dense haze would lift from the waterlogged soil, and the twisted vegetation of the marshlands would sprout vigorously from the ground. As if invisible hands were at work, but doing the exact opposite of what farmers would do.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Elshbeth was playing as usual with Emmet and Fred, her cousins that acted as brothers since she was left with her aunt while the parents were away on some trip.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">She wanted to enjoy this rare measure of freedom, since there was so little to do in the fields that even that bitch of an aunt could not find some stupid job for her or the two boys.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">She enjoyed playing with the boys much more than with the girls. Tesya, Ilsegard, and Amhilde were older and passed the time gossiping about the village and knitting, while the three younger ones she could not even remember the names of, were just playing nonsensical games, way too close to the adults. Elshbeth saw absolutely no fun in either of the two groupsโ activities. She was just happy that, unlike her โselfishโ parents, as they were defined by the relatives, aunt Brigit had made her eight siblings for her to choose playmates from. Only two among eight were fun to be with, but still better than the ghost of her dead brother, kept alive by the sad stories of her already old (40 years old) mother.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">With Emmet and Fred, she was indeed doing interesting things. And scary too: she was hunting monsters. Because there were monsters, even if the adults were making fun of their claims, if not making them take back their stories one slap at a time.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Just the other day they saw a thing that looked like a lump of moss and fungus, moving on stumpy little feet like a caterpillar. They ran away scared as hell at first, and when they came back with stones and sharp sticks, the damned thing was gone, probably inside one of the many holes that even brave Fred would not dare to explore.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">But at least that monster seemed harmless enough. Another evening instead, at the brink of that noisy hour before sunset in which all the invisible frogs were starting to ribbit like devils, the trio found something (or someone) much worse. Already chased by the moron of the family, uncle Mortz, the prepubescent youngsters went armed to the teeth with sticks, stones, and even a rudimentary sling, to the limit of the swamp.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There they were killing worms the size of snakes, when from the high canes, they heard some rustling and they started paying attention to the shadowy pattern of sticks and leaves. After some silence, they saw something that nearly scared them lifeless. All of a sudden, emerging from the shadows, a face like the one of a giant frog, but with big evil eyes in the front of the head instead of the sides, looking straight at them, and a wide mouth with four sharp teeth visible both from the lower and higher โlipsโ, if those could be called so. The color of the monster was a sick green, while purple was the tongue that seemed to fall out of its mouth as a dead piece of meat, before it moved as if having life of its own, flailing out jerkingly before being sucked back inside the mouth.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It was just a moment, but for the kids it felt like a full minute of horror, in which they could not move at all. They then started screaming, throwing the stones while running away, without even aiming, and reaching uncle Mortz. It was them dragging him to the house this time, for a change.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">At the house, the kids were still shaking and even the bullyish aunt Brigit and uncle Uskar looked concerned, at least before the three could regain the ability to speak properly.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Then they told the story, and thatโs when Uskar in particular got red with anger, and took out his belt while Brigit, understanding his intentions, took all three of them with her big arms, and held them. It was ass-whipping time, while the uncle screamed at them, two words each lashing: โThere are no monsters, you blasphemous little demons! Take your sacrilegious words back, you little shits!โ - The kids didnโt even try to rebel much this time, accepting the pain as a much nicer alternative to what they saw before.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Up in the barnโs loft where they were sleeping, next to the caged pigeons, the kids talked about the monster, voices still trembling.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">โI think it was a giant frog!โ - Said Emmet. - โNo, that was no frog!โ - โIt looked like one, Elshbeth!โ - Fred sided with his brother - โAnd we better fight that thing before it eats one of the little girls with that mouth!โ - โBut didnโt you see it had teeth? Frogs have no teeth!โ - Continued the girl, who was one year wiser, and far more tutored than the two boys. - โWhatever, if we canโt kill it, we better scare it away!โ - โAnd how do you scare a monster!?โ - โWe will kill his family!!โ - โHis family?โ - โYes, we will find other big frogs, but smaller than him, and show him we kill his kin!โ - โIโm telling you they are not his kin, Fred!โ - โWhatever, I think Fred is right anyway! At least we will show we can fight. If we donโt do anything like our parents, who knows how close that monster will come next time!โ - Emmet was the most scared of the bunch, being the youngest, and he shared the concern of the brother: protecting the little girls, like Uskar and Mortz taught them since they were even younger.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The plan was decided. The three went to sleep, but Elshbeth could not stop thinking. That thing could even eat her one of these days. Mom and dad, old like they were, might have died of heartbreak knowing they lost their only remaining child, and she would have lived her life without ever tryingโฆ What it feels like to be a woman. She watched Brigit and Uskar sometimes, when waking up because of those weird noises they made. Their room was next to the barn, so she could even peek into their window sometimes. And what she saw made her feel a strange heat inside, and made her want to try the same.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Exactly while these guilty thoughts were swimming inside her head, provoking the same kind of heat, Fred appeared next to her, nearly scaring her, and making her exhale that hot breath she was keeping in, producing a faint moan in doing so. The cousin looked at her with different eyes. And before they knew any better, the two were kissing and touching each other, far more than what they used to do as younger kids, years before. Far more, and far better. Or was that worse? Elshbeth didnโt even want to think about it. She silenced her mind, and focused only on the sensations. She didnโt even know what exactly she was doing, but somehow the moves were coming naturally to both.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Only after Fred abruptly stopped, she felt dirty and uncomfortable. She shoved him away from her and heard him slither back under his blankets, while she was left with her guilt and sense of dirtiness. It felt good at first, but not at all at the end. After some time, she cried: something extremely rare of her. And then finally she fell asleep.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">She dreamt that night. Maybe elaborating on that hot sensation of before, she dreamt of catching fire like a torch, and screaming. Fire would shoot out of her mouth, and light up shadowy figures in front of her, producing a macabre dance of burning silhouettes.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When she woke up the next day, she wanted to avoid Fred at all costs, but also couldnโt let the two brothers go alone in the marsh to try and execute their plan by themselves. So she avoided Fredโs gazes as much as she could, and after their usual breakfast of stolen food from the kitchen, they set out running towards the northern reaches of the swamp.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There they stayed the whole day hunting for frogs. Every time they would find one, they would impale it on a stick, on a place that was as visible as possible from afar, and cut the belly to let the guts out. โThis way they will see we are not scared!โ - Fred proclaimed. Elshbeth was not particularly impressed by that, but she was helping them anyway, although far less active than usual, still thinking about what she did with her cousin, the fiery dream, and the face of the monster.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">After a while, they found a really enormous toad. It was jumping away from them in high and long leaps, and Emmet was afraid of it, but Elshbeth hit it with the sling she had built and a very sharp stone, exactly after it landed from a jump, opening a gashing wound next to its big head, and disorienting it: the amphibian started to roll, more than jumping, and soon Fred could catch it with its spear-stick, and kill it, after numerous hits.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">This time even tough Elshbeth was grossed out about the killing, and she didnโt want to look when the boys impaled the lifeless body on a cane, and cracked open its belly with their wooden knives, making the intestines gush out.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The brothers instead were ecstatic: drenched in the blood and ichors of the animals, they shouted angrily at the monster (which meant in every direction, to them), that they were not afraid, and they would have killed all his family if he would have come closer to the farm.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Elshbeth just went after them keeping a distance, trying not to feel sick, and trying to hide all her worries and emotions that the killings could not extinguish.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A week passed, in which no monster showed up. Just a few more big worms and leeches, sometimes one of those โwalking shitsโ as the brothers called that strange creature they saw before the monster, but in general nothing to worry about except the violence at home.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Uskar was growing more angry every day, saying that the farm was going to hell, and that the family should have worked hard on the fields, even if they were rotten and nothing was growing. โTOMORROW YOU WILL START WORKING, OR I WILL FREAKING BEAT ALL OF YOU LIKE NEVER BEFORE!โ - He shouted, before throwing away his empty soup bowl and leaving the table. Silence didnโt last long. Uncle Mortz, stupid as he was, started laughing. At first it looked like he was laughing without any reason as usual. Then Elshbeth noticed he was staring at the same spot while laughing, for too long. She tried to follow his empty gaze through the dirty glass of the window, and then she felt petrified.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Fred, who never stopped looking at Elshbeth those days, to try and understand what the girl was thinking about him, noticed the horror on her face, and looked out as well. He shouted: โTHE MONSTER!!โ - โWHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT, YOU STUPID WASTE OF A SON!โ - Replied his mother, after delivering a noisy slap on the back of his head. Then the three young women of the house, Tesya, Ilsegard, and Amhilde started laughing as well like morons, like uncle Mortz, and aunt Brigit asked them what was wrong. Emmet could only shake on his chair and stutter a call for his father, while pissing his pants. Soon after, the little girls as well started to giggle like crazy: it was unclear if at the older brother who soiled his clothes, or the thing outside of the window, but what Elshbeth knew was that they were doomed, when scary uncle Uskar came back to the table and started laughing as well.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent;" /></span><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In that cacophony of stupid laughter, something came down the chimney and soaked the fire dead in a second. The big room went dark, and the only light illuminating the moronic faces of Elshbethโs temporary family was that of the gibbous moon outside, behind milky clouds.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">She never looked at those faces though: she was still looking at the bulbous yellow eyes outside of the window. They were grinning, just like the monstrous mouth below them.</span><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent;" /></span><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">After some time though, in that surreal moment of laughter and dread, the monsterโs face disappeared, and Elshbeth instantly knew: it was inside the house. THEY were inside the house.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It was Mortz again spotting the first one in the nearly pitch darkness of that awful dining room. He pointed up, and Elshbeth and the brothers already knew what he was pointing at. Emmet didnโt even want to look, preferring to run under the table, while Fred had the strength of grabbing a knife, reaching for Elshbeth, and then look up with her: together they had the strength that they were lacking singularly.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It was anyway difficult to understand what they were looking at, at first. It looked like a black spot on the ceiling, next to the chandelier, which only now they realized was put off by something, similarly to the fireplace. Then the amorphous black spot moved slightly, and another two grinning, enormous eyes popped out from an indefinite, inhuman head.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A stinking cloud of haze came out of the thing, right after Fred hit it with the knife he threw at it. The thick fog moved all over the ceiling and then down the walls, as if crawling. The rest of the family was still laughing, and it quickly inhaled the fumes. Elshbeth took a napkin from the table and covered her mouth, while running away towards the stairs. Fred wanted to follow her, but he was busy throwing more knives at the thing, and trying to get Emmet from under the table. Elshbeth suddenly felt sorry. She didnโt even know about what, but she was sorry. What did she do to this family? That strange question managed to break the sense of horror and entrapment, even if for just a moment.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Then something even more incredible happened. The laughing family members started to swell. Their bellies in particular, inflated like bubbles. While still laughing, they started to soil themselves, with loud cracking noises. Their laughter, from moronic, became completely psychotic, and they started to grab their excrements with their hands from inside their skirts and pants, and throwing it at each other, making the whole place reek like the pigsโ den in a matter of seconds. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Elshbeth felt like her mind was about to snap when even Emmet started shitting himself, even if he was not laughing and he was just looking confused. Fred was trying to drag Elshbeth outside, when the door opened all of a sudden and a big dark figure occupied nearly the whole space of the open door. Tendrils came out of it and grabbed the sides of the wall, trying to push the rest of its mass inside the house. Fred screamed at it, and the thing squirted a substance at him, making him instantly go silent and stand still like a statue.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The last remaining family member with a mind of her own, and absolutely no idea of what to do, Elshbeth tried to go up the stairs while not losing sight of the monsters that had invaded the house. From the floor above, though, undescribable squishy noises and strange flailing shadows were proof that there was just no way out of that freaky mess.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Holding the wooden railing of the stairs, the girl screamed at the top of her lungs, the only thing she felt she could do.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">She blacked out for a split second, in which she couldnโt even hear her own screaming. </span><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent;" /></span><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Then, flames erupted from her. The whole railing caught fire from her hand, which seemed to not feel the heat at all, and from her mouth, a tongue of flames came out and hit the monster at the entrance, where Fred stood before and now he wasnโt. Did she kill him? This question was the last conscious thought in her mind, before she just completely lost it.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">She woke up outside, in the field, hearing a loud crash in the distance. She opened her eyes to see the farmโs celing collapse, engulfed in flames.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A group of neighboring farmers approached the place running, and only after a while noticed her, and came closer. โWhat happened here? We heard demonic screams! What sparked the fire!? Where are your uncles and cousins!?โ - Elshbeth could not reply to anyone, to any question. She looked catatonic, although tears were jerking off her eyes without her noticing.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Right before some of the men could grab the girl, angry due to her silence, a big man showed up, head covered in what looked like bandages, which also covered his enormous arms. The villagers spread out to let the towering man pass, and he crouched down next to Elshbeth, opening his hands as if welcoming her in his embrace. She sprung up and slammed into him, crying. โDonโt be scared, little one: thereโs always hope. You will seeโฆโ</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">He smelled of something she couldnโt quite identify, something woody and spicy. Nice. She couldnโt think of anything, but she did feel sad when he gently pushed her away.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Soldiers were approaching on horse. Inquisitors.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The man caressed Elshbeth with a heavy, big hand, that felt hard but at the same time caring, and then went away quickly, although with the gait of someone who was either injured or cripplied, surrounded by the hostile grumbling of the farmers that he had scared away before.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Before she lost sight of him, Elshbeth shouted in his direction: โMY NAME IS ELSHBETH, IT WAS NICE TO MEET YOU!!โ - The man smiled behind the bandages, like he hadnโt done for years. But kept going. He would have not been able to help her if the inquisitors would have gotten a hold of him.</span></p><p><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Thus, the knights came, dispersed the crowd, and after bringing Elshbeth to the contsable, where they told her what had happened at the farm (according to them), they brought her to another farm, where another family lived. She stayed there terrorized for another week, before her parents came back, apparently rushing their trip. Her life had changed forever.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87); font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And the farms of Fritburg with it.</span></p><div><span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-75029142578610634392020-09-14T06:16:00.005-07:002020-09-14T16:16:27.507-07:00#Zendikar #DnD Take 2: Mana in D&D!<p> </p><p>Previously very excited about the new Zendikar Rising set in Magic: The Gathering, I was starting to write my update on Zendikar's geography, but I now see it all a bit moot, considering the little lore that came out about Zendikar, whether within the cards or as stories/articles.</p><p>I am now of the opinion that if following the original lore, I will just end up with many contradictions, geographical inaccuracies/holes, and personal disappointment, due to how little the interest from the creators seems compared to mine.</p><p>So I am taking a break from sticking to the source, and doing something else: a mechanic for D&D characters to use the five colors of mana in-game!</p><p>I was previously very contrary to this, when adapting the setting for 4e D&D. But 4e was a difficult beast to home-brew rules for: while incredibly fun IMO, it was like a complex piece of machinery: difficult to take apart piece by piece and improve on.</p><p>So I had this rule of thumb: role-playing in Zendikar should not use any concept from Magic: The Gathering. Only the setting should be used, and for the rest we are looking at regular D&D.</p><p>The Roil was still possible to implement following this line (it would have been just an environmental hazard like many others, if a tad more extreme), but thinking again about it, mana is really central to Zendikar as a concept. The point of Zendikar is its lands producing very potent mana. And this would have fallen flat in RPG campaigns excluding the concept of mana entirely, or relegating it to plot-device only.</p><p>This thought, combined with the fact that 5e D&D is much easier to customize, led me to think how mana would work, and I think I got the right idea now.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.artofmtg.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Scale-the-Heights-Zendikar-Rising-MtG-Art.jpg" style="margin-left: 0em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="588" data-original-width="800" src="http://www.artofmtg.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Scale-the-Heights-Zendikar-Rising-MtG-Art.jpg" width="600" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><span><a name='more'></a></span><p><br /></p><h2 style="text-align: left;">Proficiency Dice are dead, long live Mana Dice!</h2><div><br /></div><div>Proficiency dice were a mechanic I loved during the "D&D Next" playtest, which became just an alternative rule in official 5e, and one I never heard being played (although I don't follow the community much anymore. Don't even know what should eb the go-to forum for D&D these days.)</div><div><br /></div><div>Now, why would Mana Dice (my new mana mechanic) replace Proficiency Dice? If you think about it, it makes a lot of sense. Hear me out.</div><div><br /></div><div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>In the world of MtG and by extension on Zendikar, mana is not only used for magic. Warriors use it as much as wizards. You could argue they are just summoned by it, but then again many creatures are "mana-infused" even if not overtly spell-casting, and moral, ethical, or just rational concepts are domains of some color of mana or others.</li><li>This means that any character, magic or not, could use mana for anything governed by that color.</li></ul><div>Now the big question is: since mana colors are associated to concepts that don't directly translate to anything codified in D&D, if not in fringe cases, how do we create rules for it?</div></div><div><br /></div><h2 style="text-align: left;">Rules or rulings. Not mutually exclusive!</h2><div><br /></div><div>I am usually all for rules against rulings, but rulings can also be fine if following very clear guidelines. They basically become like very broad rules, and for mana colors, they would make a lot of seense.</div><div><br /></div><div><b>Mana colors ruling: </b>you can roll Mana Dice instead of applying proficiency if you are attempting an action within the domain of the color of the Mana Dice in question.</div><div><br /></div><div>Simple and effective!</div><div><br /></div><div>The problem is how much this would influence gameplay. Characters would try to use this at any possible chance (although as you will see later, there are risks to using this), and it would start to feel like a default, losing the special feeling of doing something extraordinary.</div><div><br /></div><div>Therefore, I think for each Mana Die (coming to the rule about them in a second) one should choose only a few key areas where it can apply. This will help a sense of progression and uniqueness, which I always think as central pillars of what make RPGs fun.</div><div><br /></div><div>So here are the first rules:</div><div><div style="text-align: left;"><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>At first level you gain two d4 Mana Dice <b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">โจ</span></b><b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">๐ฒ</span></b>. </li><li>You can choose them to be both from one color, or different colors, and choose two benefits for each, chosen from the respective Mana Color Benefits list.</li><li>You can choose the same benefit multiple times to gain a free <b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">โจ</span></b><b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">๐ฒ</span></b> recovery when using it for the chosen action/roll, for each time you have chosen it.</li><li>When your proficiency bonus increases, you gain a new <b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">โจ</span></b><b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">๐ฒ</span></b> (with two associated Mana Color Benefits) and all <b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">โจ</span></b><b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">๐ฒ</span></b> improve by one step (from d4 to d6, and so on, up to 6d12).</li></ul></div><p>I know, emoji. I think they can convey/imprint mechanics much better, though.<br />The Mana Color Benefits lists would be like this:</p></div><b><u>WHITE</u></b><br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Skills: </b>Persuasion; History; Religion; Insight; Medicine; Athletics.</li><li><b>Saving Throws: </b>Wisdom; Charisma</li><li><b>Tactics:</b></li><ul><li><b><b>๐ก๏ธ</b> </b>Attacks of Opportunity; </li><li>๐จโ๐ฆโ๐ฆattacks made when adjacent to two ore more allies.</li></ul><li><b>Spell Types: </b></li><ul><li><b><b>๐ก๏ธ</b> </b>spells that protect; </li><li>โ๏ธ spells that relate with life or light.</li></ul></ul><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"> <b><u>BLUE</u></b><br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Skills: </b>Deception; Arcana; Investigation; History; Perception; Stealth.</li><li><b>Saving Throws: </b>Intelligence; Wisdom</li><li><b>Tactics: </b></li><ul><li><b>๐คบ </b>Readied attacks; </li><li>๐ฅattacks made when the target can't see you.</li></ul><li><b>Spell Types: </b></li><ul><li><b>๐ซ </b>spells that mesmerize; </li><li><b>๐ฌ๏ธ</b>spells that relate with air or water.</li></ul></ul><div><br /></div></div><div style="text-align: left;"> <b><u>BLACK</u></b><br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Skills: </b>Deception; Intimidation; Arcana; Religion; Sleight of Hand; Stealth.</li><li><b>Saving Throws: </b>Intelligence; Constitution</li><li><b>Tactics: </b></li><ul><li><b>๐ฉธ </b>Attacks dealing extra damage to single target; </li><li>๐ attacks that would affect an ally negatively.</li></ul><li><b>Spell Types: </b></li><ul><li><b>๐ </b>spells that damage single targets; </li><li>๐ป spells that relate with death or darkness.</li></ul></ul><div><br /></div></div><div style="text-align: left;"> <b><u>RED</u></b><br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Skills: </b>Persuasion; Performance; Arcana; Nature; Acrobatics; Athletics.</li><li><b>Saving Throws: </b>Dexterity; Charisma</li><li><b>Tactics: </b></li><ul><li><b>โ๏ธ </b>Attacks against multiple targets; </li><li>๐จ attacks made against enemies with lower initiative.</li></ul><li><b>Spell Types: </b></li><ul><li><b>๐ฅ </b>spells that damage, charm, or support more than 2 targets; </li><li>๐ฅ spells that relate with fire or lightning.</li></ul></ul><div><br /></div></div><div> <b><u>GREEN</u></b><br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Skills: </b>Survival; Nature; Perception; Animal Handling; Medicine; Athletics.</li><li><b>Saving Throws: </b>Strength; Constitution</li><li><b>Tactics: </b></li><ul><li><b>๐ป </b>Attacks made against enemies with higher initiative; </li><li>๐น attacks made from lower ground.</li></ul><li><b>Spell Types: </b></li><ul><li><b>๐ธ </b>spells that change the body of the target; </li><li>๐ณ spells that deal with plants or animals.</li></ul></ul></div><div><div><br /></div></div><div>Admittedly, it's hard to equate skills with the other benefits, especially on a one-by-one basis, so I would be tempted to lump the choice of two skills as one benefit, especially considering every color gives 6 choices.</div><div><br /></div><div>I am also very proud of the "Tactics" chosen for each color, as they seem situational but the kind of situational one can often find in every encounter.</div><div>With spells, not so satisfied, because they end up being very generic, and since 5e spells don't (officially) have tags/keywords, it becomes basically a ruling. But that's why I say that rules and rulings shouldn't be mutually exclusive. A player might come up with a very good case for associating a skill to their chosen mana color, maybe by applying the bonus only when the skill is used in a way that is typical of that color, and I think it would be great to allow this.</div><div><br /></div><div>Now back to the rules, to show you how I would use these dice in-game, to differentiate them from Proficiency Dice.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Whenever you roll a die that benefits from your proficiency bonus for an action or roll that you chose when selecting your Mana Dice <b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">โจ</span></b><b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">๐ฒ</span></b>, you can roll the <b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">โจ</span></b><b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">๐ฒ</span></b> and apply the result instead of the proficiency bonus.</li><li>When rolling the maximum on the <b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">โจ</span></b><b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">๐ฒ</span></b>, you also expend the die, while if you roll minimum, a Roil Spot ๐ of the same color of the <b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">โจ</span></b><b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">๐ฒ</span></b> appears within 30 ft (DM's discretion).</li><li> If applicable to the same roll, you can roll multiple <b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">โจ</span></b><b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">๐ฒ</span></b> and take the best result, but this will automatically expend all <b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">โจ</span></b><b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">๐ฒ</span></b> rolled.</li><li> After a long rest, you recover all spent <b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">โจ</span></b><b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;">๐ฒ </span></b>of a color provided by the land/location you rested at.</li></ul></div><p>Seems elegant to me! It gives a reason to choose wisely when to use the dice and when not to, it gives more fun and dangerous Roil effects, and, as you may have noticed, works exactly like the newly described Psionic Dice from Unearthed Arcana: a daily resource that is potentially reusable at will, until you use it "too well" (expenditure on maximum roll).</p><p>Note as well that it makes the characters mote motivated to find specific terrain types to rest in, which I think is really Zendikarian in flavor. Some Background features or feats might of course interact with all these rules, making them more lax in certain conditions, or giving new uses for the Mana Dice etc.</p><p>Also a nifty reason to have specifically-colored dice at the table... :)</p><p><br /></p><p>What do you think?</p><div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"> </div></blockquote></div>LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-78819842418694755392020-09-07T04:49:00.001-07:002020-09-07T04:49:39.336-07:00First impressions of #MtGZNR #Zendikar Rising - a #DnD perspective!<p> </p><p>Hello Zendikari fans! The long wait for spoilers of Zendikar Rising is over, as it's the first week of them!</p><p>Although it might be too soon to review everything from a gaming perspective, as you might know here we care mostly about story and setting, for the purpose of playing D&D in the marvelous world of Zendikar.</p><p>As such, this will be a "Vorthos" perspective: in Magic jargon, it's the type of player that cares mostly about the flavor of the cards, and the lore surrounding them.</p><p>So let's start from the beginning!</p><h2 style="text-align: left;">Back to Zendikar, without Eldrazi</h2><div>As if the designers would have <a href="https://lord-archaon.blogspot.com/2015/08/role-playing-in-zendikar-without-too.html" target="_blank">listened to me specifically</a> (which they didn't, which means the majority fo the fans are like me) they got rid of the Eldrazi not only as a physical threat (not even small drones or spawn remain, apparently! YAY!), but even in their lasting effects: we haven't seen a single land art for Zendikar Rising depicting the awful effect of the passage of Ulamog or Kozilek (the latter being less awful and more interesting, admittedly).</div><div>It might be too soon, but look how green Bala Ged seems to be:</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_pX9WY5xHjd.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="370" data-original-width="265" src="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_pX9WY5xHjd.png" /></a><img border="0" data-original-height="370" data-original-width="265" src="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_su4yEOTDuE.png" /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Granted, this is a "sanctuary", but I suspect even the "recovery" was meant, originally at least, as the land recovering from Eldrazi influence, thanks to the Khalni Heart planted by Nissa during the Battle for Zendikar / Oath of The Gatewatch arc.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The flavor text and the art imply another meaning for recovery, but at least are quoted from a Bala Ged guide, meaning there are indeed still people from there, and going there. YAY!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">About Bala Ged, one small/big complaint: this would be their depcition of its Tangled Vales?</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_kEjaGmyaYQ.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="370" data-original-width="265" src="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_kEjaGmyaYQ.png" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">If not for the hedrons, I couldn't think of a single place on Zendikar tame enough to have such a tame woodland. And on Bala Ged even less!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">THIS is in my opinion the perfect depiction of the Tangled Vales, the home of the Joraga elves:</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Eg2Own9UcAAjqeU?format=png&name=small" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="370" data-original-width="265" src="https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Eg2Own9UcAAjqeU?format=png&name=small" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Beautiful, and already my go-to illustration for this verdant side of dark Bala Ged, which is the closest place to Central Africa or the Amazon in Zendikar.</div><div><br /></div><div>We even have Sejiri depicted without the crazy bismuth-like formations left by Kozilek:</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_3Vm6TFWOZg.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="370" data-original-width="265" src="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_3Vm6TFWOZg.png" /></a></div><br /><div>Beautiful art, although in Sejiri, for once, I am hoping they will keep some Eldrazi corruption, since it was mentioned (in the art book with writing by James Wyatt) that the excavation of the landscape by the Kozilek brood revealed more ancient ruins there... (And I think I know which... See next point)</div><br /><div>Now, what else changed with the Eldrazi gone? My main concern was: how do we get an "enemy" or new adventuring sites in Zendikar? Do we just get to explore new secrets in the old sites? Do we just get new sites? Who will oppose adventurers? Just traps? And who built those old ruins, now that we know the Eldrazi for sure never built anything and were never a civilization to begin with? <br />It would have been a bit underwhelming to have them just repeat the feeling of the first Zendikar, because it's impossible to keep it fresh: it's a classic that just works as it is, and about which a few key points (the origin of hedrons and the ruins) have been retconned.</div><div><br /></div><div>To be honest, I would have not been able to come up with such an elegant solution as they did...</div><h2 style="text-align: left;">Enter the Skyclaves</h2><div>Turns out it was the Kor who built many of the now-ruins which show very high degrees of civilizations.</div><div>And we know now, because even Emeria, The Sky Ruin itself, turns out to be Kor, and not just a castle or something that flies due to Zendikar's Roil... But an actual flying city of sorts (hello, Miyazaki), which was always kept hidden from newer generations by Iona guarding it... But that since Iona abandoned guarding duties to battle the Eldrazi, adventurers have explored and tampered with... Activating no less than ONE PER CONTINENT, that laid dormant for a thousand of years or more, hidden by the impenetrable nature of Zendikar..!</div><div><br /></div><div>These are the Skclaves: flying fortresses/cities through which the Kor, from their ancient capital of Makindi (always thought they were from there...) used to rule Zendikar with an iron (or stone, actually) fist..!</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://media.wizards.com/2020/images/daily/6sNWrpFJhp.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="582" data-original-width="800" height="466" src="https://media.wizards.com/2020/images/daily/6sNWrpFJhp.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>Now that's some great world-building. I don't know how much of this was supposed to be part of the original Zendikar history, as envisioned in 2008...</div><div>It's possible that they indeed have plans of whole flying cities and stuff, but made by "Eldrazi", when they had to retcon everything to make the cosmic horrors appear within Zendikar instead of in their own or different setting.</div><div>In this case, all they had to do is think who else could have built the things, and since Sea Gate itself seems to be made with advanced stone-forging magic, used by Nahiri to build the hedrons according to canon, well... Must have been the Kor, of the old times when Nahiri was born (how come she is immortal by the way..? Whatever)</div><div><br /></div><div>In any case, here is their laying out of the Skyclaves within Zendikar, with my comments within bracketss:</div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>The Roil swallowed the Guul Draz outpost and drowned it in a swamp.</li></ul><div>[I am betting the Hagra Cistern will be retconned or revealed to at have been at least part of this Skyclave, but no clue on this yet... Prediction made!]</div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>The elves of Bala Ged, led by a pre-spirit Obuun, revolted against their kor rulers and toppled their Skyclave.</li></ul><div>[No major ruin site in Bala Ged seems to fit the bill of a clue for this, although I have two possible bets in mind: the Enatu Temple, never revealed to be in Bala Ged, or the Carnage Altar, which is not a unique thing, but I used it as a possible Bala Ged ruin in my "Zendikar Atlas" project... In any case, in Bala Ged vegetation is so dense that the Skyclave might have been rendered completely invisible by it. Or perhaps it sunk in Bojuka Bay, and in this case, having a bastion there looking like Sea Gate, as I have imagined in my old 13th Age adaptation might be fitting! Although it would be repetitive to have another Skyclave underwater because...]</div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>An enormous sea monsterโperhaps an ancestor of Lorthos, the Tidemaker, or maybe Lorthos itselfโdragged the Murasa Skyclave into the sea.</li></ul><div>[Beautiful! Very fitting. And they say somewhere else or in the <a href="https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/feature/zendikar-things-have-changed-2020-09-01" target="_blank">same article</a>, that now floating over Murasa, the Skyclave has been instantly covered by Murasa's especially powerful plant growth. Green-Blue/Green for the win!]</div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Then civil war tore the empire in half; the Ondu Skyclave turned against the capital at Makindi. The city was destroyed (and its lands transformed into the trenches), and the Skyclave fell onto Jwar Isle.</li></ul><div>[Standing ovation for whoever came up with this!! First of all, Jwar Isle really needed a big secret thing like this, being called the Island of Secrets for no particularly fitting reason otherwise... And then, the story of the Makindi VS Skyclave conflict sets up a history of different factions within the Kor which could be interesting even if old.]</div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>As the Empire crumbled, the Kargan tribes mastered the dragons of Akoum and rode them to victory against the kor, shattering the Akoum Skyclave.</li></ul><div>[More importance for the Kargan tribes, and another secret in Akoum, which could have been hidden within the Teeth of Akoum, as many others, or maybe wherever the Tal Terig tower is, with it being perhaps part of the fortress!]</div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>The archangel Iona destroyed the Tazeem Skyclave, creating the Sky Ruin of Emeria.</li></ul><div>[So she didn't just guard it from later discovery, she was the one responsible for its destruction, too! Nice.]</div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>The last Skyclave to fall was the one over Sejiri. When Sorin, Nahiri, and Ugin lured the Eldrazi to Zendikar to trap them, one of the Eldrazi titans appeared in Sejiri and destroyed the Skyclave with a thoughtless ๏ฌick of a tentacle. The shattered sphere was encased in polar ice.</li></ul><div>[And in this case, the Ikiral Ourpost might have been part of it. I was considering it gone after Kozilek's passage, but I guess we will know soon...]</div><div><br /></div><div>______________</div><div><br /></div><div>So now we have the places for adventurers to explore: inexplicably or not, they are full of working traps and live guardians which seem to have mutated in the meantime, like this one:</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://media.wizards.com/2020/images/daily/bSUUsAAK4W.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="582" data-original-width="800" height="466" src="https://media.wizards.com/2020/images/daily/bSUUsAAK4W.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div>So adventure is served...</div><div><br /></div><div>But as some of you may know, what I am really obsessed by is Zendikar's geography: although Zendikar's thing is the Roil, which has the landscape in an ever-changing mode, I retain that the continents and the key locations should have a more clear location, or at least be fully-acknowledged by the canon, instead of being just vaguely waved at, like during the Battle for Zendikar block.</div><div><br /></div><div>Well, it seems like designers again heard a lot of feedback like mine, about this...</div><div><br /></div><h2 style="text-align: left;">Zendikar Geo-Goodness Incoming!</h2><div><br /></div><div>First of all, a ton of lands depicting the iconic places are coming in the Modal Double-Faced Cards, already referred to as MDFCs...</div><div><br /></div><div>The land side is underwhelming first of all because it's, as of now, always mono-colored (while I envision many of these places as dual-colored), and then because the land itself is just a normal mana-producing land. It gets some cool effect if you don't play it as a land, but as whatever it is on the other side.</div><div><br /></div><div>As said, I am not really interested in the gaming aspect (although I will be sad if ZNR will go down in history as one of the least powerful sets ever, as it's starting to look like), but I am very hungry for geographical and geological details about the world... And I can confirm these people are basically producing an atlas like I am!</div><div><br /></div><div>They included many obscure places, such as Blackbloom Lake (although just quoted in a land called Blackbloom Bog, admittedly fitting since they said the lake was marshy, in the original guide), and the Singing City, or the Silundi Islands, which were just theorized by me before, but evidently in a good call based on the lore...<br /><br /></div><div><img border="0" data-original-height="370" data-original-width="265" src="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_hGGGbnHrl0.png" /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /><img border="0" data-original-height="311" data-original-width="223" src="https://cdn1.mtggoldfish.com/images/gf/Blackbloom%2BBog%2B%255BZNR%255D.jpg" /> <img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="574" height="320" src="https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/large/back/1/1/11568cdf-6148-494c-8b98-f5ca5797d775.jpg?1599436174" width="230" /> </div><br /><div><br /></div><div>All of this makes me happy, even if what would have made me even more happy would have been some minor effect on the land side, especially considering it enters tapped.</div><div><br /></div><div>Other great things in no particular order:</div><div><br /></div><div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Sejiri confirmed to be the North sub-polar continent, instead of being just ambiguously sub-polar.</li><li>In the same card that confirms this, also confirmed that Benthridix, the polar underwater Merfolk city, was pre-Eldrazi, or at least pre-worhsip of Eldrazi!<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_wJ2D9uGJ5x.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="370" data-original-width="265" src="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_wJ2D9uGJ5x.png" /></a><br /><br /></div></li><li><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The Roil (thankfully) didn't stop with the Eldrazi going out of the picture! Good because half of my ideas for Zendikar D&D depend on it!<br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_cwhzCwnFzf.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="370" data-original-width="265" src="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_cwhzCwnFzf.png" /></a><br /><br /></div><br /></li><li><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Valakut is indeed inhabited and not devoid of building either, hurray! (I put it as a possible background for characters in my Zednikar Atlas... Will have to point it's ideal for Kor other than Goblins, now!)<br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_gBE66MjZ8J.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="370" data-original-width="265" src="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_gBE66MjZ8J.png" /></a></div><br /></li><li><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Sea Gate is rebuilt, although they kept the videogamey look of Battle for Zendikar, with the ridiculous, Hollywood-style light beam shooting into the sky... (At least some old-skool Gnarlids are posing in the foreground...)<br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://cdn1.mtggoldfish.com/images/gf/Sea%2BGate%252C%2BReborn%2B%255BZNR%255D.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="311" data-original-width="223" src="https://cdn1.mtggoldfish.com/images/gf/Sea%2BGate%252C%2BReborn%2B%255BZNR%255D.jpg" /></a></div><br /></li><li>There's some crazy, and crazily-named legendary elementals out and about, which I don't particularly care for, but I guess can add some threats for adventurers, and the fact they are Legendary means they most probably also have some degree of intelligence.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_HGoeAV3lzm.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="370" data-original-width="265" src="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_HGoeAV3lzm.png" /></a></div><br /></li><li><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Archons are bad guys, confirmed! (Really not liking the griffins I have seen until now...)<br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_XOBfgbMqja.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="370" data-original-width="265" src="https://media.wizards.com/2020/znr/en_XOBfgbMqja.png" /></a></div><br /></li></ul><div>And that's it for the random trivia for now.</div></div><div><br /></div><div>What I can conclude with is a general happy feeling for the respect towards the established geography, and on the logical expansion on it, but also a cautious disappointment in the art direction: some places are depicted in ways that don't match the flavor (Tangled Vale... I am looking at you...) and in general everything seems more in line with the cartoonish style of Battle for Zendikar (and most other sets nowadays, save perhaps for gorgeous Dominaria), rather than the epic but gritty style of the first Zendikar block.</div><div>I am cautious about this because anyway some of the cards are indeed beautiful and fitting. Silundi Isle is now my absolute favorite, not only thanks to great and very-Zendikar art styld, but because it opens my whole once-theoretical campaign idea of isles beyond the known ones!<br /><br />Also: basic lands are true beauties, most of them, and the whole idea of Skyclaves is very welcome to me, although incredibly derivative. Thinking about it, Castle In The Sky by Miyazaki might have been a big inspiration even for original Zendikar, given that even the patterns on hedrons look like those on the anime's fortress of Laputa. So there's that: my favorite setting seems to be inspired by one of my favorite anime. </div><div><br /></div><div>In the next post you will see how crazy I got with my Zendikar Atlas now that we have this new info, and how crazy I am with it in general...</div><div>One tiny preview: there is now some crazy symmetry in the number of territories per continent, colors per continent, and color distribution... It was like an impossible Rubrik Cube solving, but I think I nailed it! I am just on the lookout for possible swaps, especially to take out a few "placer" territories in favor of more iconic ones.</div><div><br /></div><div>Till next post, and comments are welcome as usual!</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-66118291941740762012020-06-15T04:16:00.010-07:002020-06-15T13:22:29.323-07:00#Zendikar #DnD Take 2: An Atlas for Zendikar<br /><div>I have had a post on Zendikari "geo-background" in drafts for a long time.</div><div><br /></div><div>While writing it, I realized these should form a big part of what shapes the Zendikar-D&D experience, so I studied a way to make them more important, without overshadowing the regular D&D character background, but complementing them with situational, Zendiakr-only features.</div><div><br /></div><div>This led me to classify all the possible locations from which characters can come from, and come up with pseudo-unique features for all.</div><div><br /></div><div>I say "pseudo" because when I realized they would be around 20 or more, I understood it was not feasible to do something completely unique for each of them, and I also realized that possibly Magic's Mana colors could help me classify them, so that those with similar colors could have similar features, or something like that.</div><div><br /></div><div>The result has been something crazy: a table of 5x5 Magic colors with background locations for all of them.</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqc3HqiAWkteSTIcHk8wljgqznfhzD-YtmFjAp9n8RfBDwcqR-viBOZQzX3f8k6PDMKUoDyEOdjtxwvQlhv0ji0oyqJrKAw4B8PEhQKJtm0i9J2uDzPvynI7oGz1em-Zu8KJgz3ahEl0U/s713/Backgrounds.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="618" data-original-width="713" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqc3HqiAWkteSTIcHk8wljgqznfhzD-YtmFjAp9n8RfBDwcqR-viBOZQzX3f8k6PDMKUoDyEOdjtxwvQlhv0ji0oyqJrKAw4B8PEhQKJtm0i9J2uDzPvynI7oGz1em-Zu8KJgz3ahEl0U/w640-h554/Backgrounds.png" width="600" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>Mentally addicted by the "weirdly satisfying" feeling of having classified all of Zendikar's locations important to characters, I could not help creating the same table for Zendikar's iconic ruins and expedition sites.</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcm-H_WOCieZrOp0lcb7IUOyObNrdHpZ6hnqgZFHl6Z_gnUDJrziSzj2XXVwBVolNis3ryRuoFDi3_n78i_lDmN7Hh2e5rka3Vl4TVoR8cg9jMak7soPaA7PyNQiV9ahhMFKabuw88C-0/s699/Expeditions.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="609" data-original-width="699" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcm-H_WOCieZrOp0lcb7IUOyObNrdHpZ6hnqgZFHl6Z_gnUDJrziSzj2XXVwBVolNis3ryRuoFDi3_n78i_lDmN7Hh2e5rka3Vl4TVoR8cg9jMak7soPaA7PyNQiV9ahhMFKabuw88C-0/w640-h558/Expeditions.png" width="600" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>Realizing then that in Zendikar adventures are always a lot about getting to the place, other than just exploring the place itself, I also classified the dangerous locations that are too uninhabited or dangerous to be good for backgrounds, but are famous and/or represent interesting interludes for the typical adventuring expedition.</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-HNMWkTWnI7I/XudX6lu1fWI/AAAAAAAAB9I/0YZjRqVwfCwyYa1DtWJVW2xEnVpk_hJMACK4BGAsYHg/s701/Dangerous.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="612" data-original-width="701" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-HNMWkTWnI7I/XudX6lu1fWI/AAAAAAAAB9I/0YZjRqVwfCwyYa1DtWJVW2xEnVpk_hJMACK4BGAsYHg/w640-h558/Dangerous.png" width="600" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>All these tables can be combined in one giant one, and I did so.<br />Note that the coloring of the "tiles" is to group contiguous or similar terrain/regions. <br />Do click for the full view!</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9sFc591JEs5sBbEJbR2YSAo52Tfx4v8-RHuaABhyphenhyphenDe8OuLnizyuBCMHQEzGz4IFGe9ryq_AiQOzcymnkut3uKOqGnEB4sEy7od4zmORvB-i3g15JTK5gMBwgMdxQY3blZhZAEBCkgYBg/s1810/ZendikarAtlas2.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="574" data-original-width="1810" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9sFc591JEs5sBbEJbR2YSAo52Tfx4v8-RHuaABhyphenhyphenDe8OuLnizyuBCMHQEzGz4IFGe9ryq_AiQOzcymnkut3uKOqGnEB4sEy7od4zmORvB-i3g15JTK5gMBwgMdxQY3blZhZAEBCkgYBg/w640-h202/ZendikarAtlas2.png" width="600" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>Crazy, isn't it?</div><div><br /></div><div>This whole process, to use a Magic analogy, kind of "ignited our sparks" again (mine and my friend-fratello Gonzalo's) and we decided to up the ante and embark on a project that for now we are calling Zendikar Atlas. It's going to mix geography, lore, story hooks, and adventures/mini-campaigns, to become a multi-volume gazetteer of sorts for Zendikar.</div><div><br /></div><div>It's going to be published on Gonzalo's much more apt web project, <a href="http://codexanathema.com/" target="_blank">Codex Anathema</a>, as soon as we have the first volume ready, which will be for Tazeem.</div><div><br /></div><div>Not much to say now, except more tiled goodness, showing you the group of tiles coming from Tazeem, in two different fashions: a conceptual map...</div><div><br /></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-LQZX1mBwQz8/XudPiyMEq0I/AAAAAAAAB5M/PbQKWIUArZ09kGy77KyLAs776FBMSeVEACK4BGAsYHg/s906/TazeemTileMap.png" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="628" data-original-width="906" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-LQZX1mBwQz8/XudPiyMEq0I/AAAAAAAAB5M/PbQKWIUArZ09kGy77KyLAs776FBMSeVEACK4BGAsYHg/w640-h444/TazeemTileMap.png" width="600" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><font size="2">(The empty blue symbolizes the Halimar, bringing a physical map feature to the conceptual context..!)</font></i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>... And the source: a filtering of the above table, including only what is inside Tazeem:</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgL7H4GWazt3_pkibPToyGD736iCoZSMaqesgJivP7P1DvW3QAsdbrE4ectAx6qmKoLeWcSGZArFYK5a_lxi5dWscVCgW09Tkm8wKOFOCcSy4v6SbovjIfAwkai6KEUoX4zClMI8mY9g5U/s917/Tazeem.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="617" data-original-width="917" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgL7H4GWazt3_pkibPToyGD736iCoZSMaqesgJivP7P1DvW3QAsdbrE4ectAx6qmKoLeWcSGZArFYK5a_lxi5dWscVCgW09Tkm8wKOFOCcSy4v6SbovjIfAwkai6KEUoX4zClMI8mY9g5U/w640-h430/Tazeem.png" width="600" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>If you're wondering about the emojis' presence: I thought for someone who doesn't have a good knowledge of the plane, they would do a good job describing the places at a glance, although exactly in the case of Tazeem, I had to get a little too abstract, because there's only so many emojis out there.</div><div><br /></div><div>If instead you do have some Zendikari geography knowledge but you think you never heard of some of these places, here is where the strange ones come from:</div><div><br /></div><div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Tazeem's Calcite Flats</b>: these are described mostly in Art of Magic: The Gathering: Zendikar, although briefly mentioned in the very first line of the <a href="https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/savor-flavor/planeswalker%E2%80%99s-guide-zendikar-tazeem-and-merfolk-2009-12-02" target="_blank">original guide</a>. It's what the island-continet is surroudned by, its beaches so to speak, although more of a tidal plain.</li><li><b>Wren Grotto: </b>this is another place that was just quickly mentioned in the guide (quote by Ilori, merfolk falconer) as "the most beautiful place in all Zendikar", and expanded more in the art book. It's considered the place where merfolk breed and train giant falcons.</li><li><b>Tikal Harborage: </b>this is absent in the original lore, but mentioned as the outpost of Thada Adel, The Acquisitor (a legendary merfolk thief) in the art book. Although there is no official illustration of it, I decided to associate it to what is probably my favorite illustration ever:<br /><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPTSvaRBqpJB2sbBaorVv9JayB2tgwkJQzlIsehwWpInDXmylppoXiZggNmr9JWw0PcLfGqq987Ovk7Q_UiVZgg5mQT1zq3Q3LbrLHv4yH3YyWaFNx9c5ZCBCG6HLIQaDt_8CbUM_4cCk/s1360/Drowner-of-Hope-Battle-for-Zendikar-MtG-Art.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1360" data-original-width="1000" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPTSvaRBqpJB2sbBaorVv9JayB2tgwkJQzlIsehwWpInDXmylppoXiZggNmr9JWw0PcLfGqq987Ovk7Q_UiVZgg5mQT1zq3Q3LbrLHv4yH3YyWaFNx9c5ZCBCG6HLIQaDt_8CbUM_4cCk/w470-h640/Drowner-of-Hope-Battle-for-Zendikar-MtG-Art.jpg" width="500" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></li><li><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>Ruins of Ysterid: </b>these come from the original guide, although they are just mentioned by Piqua, of the Tazeem Expeditionary House, as a place at the bottom of a cave near Magosi Falls that will "poison you, boil you, and regurgitate your body up to the surface to be eaten by bloodbeaks." - Nice!</div></li><li><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>Lumbering Falls: </b>these were admittedly just a filler, since I wanted to have a category for forests that were actually moving on their own ("living forests" is not the best way to describe them, since all forests are living..!). So it comes from the card with the same name, which although it could represent some place in Ondu or Murasa as well, I decided to attribute to Tazeem due to Blue and Green mana being the prevalent ones there. It could be a nice "trampoline" to get to Emeria's Sky Ruin, if you can get on top of it while it lumbers by.<br />Here's the wonderful art:<br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7wro3Y3_Rlg/XudUIr2_USI/AAAAAAAAB6w/Ow9wsLdTQ1cOU9VrHqMxFTk3MrnBR_3LACK4BGAsYHg/s1280/Lumbering.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="965" data-original-width="1280" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7wro3Y3_Rlg/XudUIr2_USI/AAAAAAAAB6w/Ow9wsLdTQ1cOU9VrHqMxFTk3MrnBR_3LACK4BGAsYHg/w400-h301/Lumbering.jpg" width="500" /></a><br /><br /></div></li><li><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>The Jade Rooms: </b>this is an even more obscure reference, probably the most obscure of all, since it comes from the forgotten <a href="https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/savor-flavor/planeswalkers-guide-zendikar-2009-09-09" target="_blank">one-pager guide to Zendikar</a>, where a quote by Chadir the Navigator speaks of a Jade Room with capitals, from which he escaped, waking up on the shores of the Halimar. Due to the image conjured by jade being Green, I figured this could be a dungeon/ruin udner the Oran Rief (they also said there are such ruins under the forest, but never specified which, so this could be one of them), and made it plural to "rooms", to make it a more noteworthy location. It could also coincide with the dungeon that Gonzalo made me and a few other lucky players explore in his beautiful online Zendikar campaign, back int he days when we met in the official Wizards forum of old.<br />I picture the place to be the one shown in the iconic and wonderful art of Summoning Trap:<br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-TRPTjlJc3A8/XudVv8ZfuBI/AAAAAAAAB7c/xfgRgiWShmEoG37Q_5jVTZ4aaEZloqGqgCK4BGAsYHg/s620/Jade.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="453" data-original-width="620" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-TRPTjlJc3A8/XudVv8ZfuBI/AAAAAAAAB7c/xfgRgiWShmEoG37Q_5jVTZ4aaEZloqGqgCK4BGAsYHg/w400-h293/Jade.jpg" width="500" /></a></div></li></ul><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">And that's all for today, even if it's just one big teaser!</div><div style="text-align: left;">I hope you like where the project is going, and if you are another fan of Zendiakr lore and world, drop me a comment, and maybe you can even jump into the project yourself! There is surely a lot of stuff to write and figure out..!</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div></div>LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-61917836671791484532020-05-06T15:34:00.010-07:002020-05-09T14:21:09.226-07:00#Zendikar #DnD Take 2: beefier races - Merfolk!<br />
Was nearly writing Mefolk, and it would have been appropriate: Merfolk and in particular Zendikari Merfolk are the race with which I identify the most!<br />
<br />
This makes it very easy to incur in Mary Sue effects, so please be ruthless in your criticism about balance of this one.<br />
<br />
The main characteristics that should be part of Merfolk are the following:<br />
<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li><b>Early flight:</b> seems strange if you don't know the setting, but on Zendikar (and many other MtG worlds, Merfolk are able to acquire and even more often grant flight.</li>
<li><b>Connection with the Roil:</b> although I don't want to go look for the obscure source where I got this info from, I don't even care much, because canon or not, we kind of need at least one race that can be "the Roil race". This can or even should be connected to the flight mechanic, since it's not like they would be able to fly or make others fly without the Roil.</li>
<li><b>Individualism and diversity:</b> far more than because of their "creeds" (originally absent from their description, and kind of introduced later on with the problematic Battle For Zendikar), Merfolk should be a diverse lot because of their strong individualism. you could find a Merfolk more similar to just about any other race on Zendikar (save for Surrakar and Vampires) than to another Merfolk.</li>
<li><b>Water-related advantages:</b> this seems to go without saying, but I want something of their aquatic nature to be usable even in non aquatic environments, and I think I have an idea, taken from a famous cult movie...</li>
<li><b>Some weaknesses:</b> the usual "has to be in water for X hours" is a low-hanging fruit, and it's not something mentioned by the source material. If you analyze the original Zendikar articles, there are two other "needs" of Merfolk that are in my opinion more flavorful and less annoying: needing some protection against sun/heat, and needing to tie/pierce their fins if they don't want to be impeded by the difficult terrain of Zendikar.</li>
</ul>
<div>
I hope the features I found for this will explain by themselves how I thought of covering all the points!</div>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://www.deviantart.com/igorkieryluk/art/Guardians-181258735" style="margin-left: 0em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="658" data-original-width="900" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-mEv2v9xFrMc/XrcdfsnNMII/AAAAAAAABss/LnM-hOIposUp8xwpirKfH5W2Q5be1-RAQCK4BGAsYHg/w640-h468/guardians_by_igorkieryluk_d2zx04v-fullview.jpg" width="600" /></a></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><h2>
MERFOLK TRAITS</h2>
<br /><b>Ability Score Increase.</b> Your Wisdom and Intelligence scores both increase by 1, and any ability score of your choice increases by 1.<br /><br /><b>Age.</b> Merfolk reach maturity early, around 12 years of age, and have human-like lifespans but less decrepitude, sometimes approaching 100 years still able to be independent, although dying of old age soon after.<br /><br /><b>Size.</b> Merfolk are as tall as humans, but usually weight less, since they are very lean. Your size is Medium.<br /><br /><b>Alignment.</b> On Zendikar, merfolk can be of any alignment, although usually far from extremes, and tending more towards neutrality.<br /><br /><b>Speed.</b> Your base walking speed is 30 ft, and you have a swimming speed of 30 ft.<br /><br /><b>Amphibious.</b> You can breathe air and water.<br /><br /><b>Solitary Learning.</b> You gain one feat of your choice that grants an ability score increase, ignoring race requirements. You gain all its benefits except the ability score increase.<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Twitch. </b>When an attack misses you, you can use your reaction to move 5 ft. without provoking opportunity attacks.</div><div><br /></div><div><b>Languages. </b>You can speak read and write Common and Merfolk.<br /><div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>ROIL FEATURES:</b></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Roil Sense. </b>As an action, you can make a Wisdom (Survival) or Intelligence (Arcana) check to learn more about the presence, color, and state of any Roil within your line of sight. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Caller of Gales. </b>Within the influence of Blue or White Roil, you can use an action to create an effect like that of a <i>gust of wind</i> spell, without requiring components, but with an instantaneous duration, and with the possibility to center it under yourself, so that you and other affected creatures can be propelled upwards by it. (Affected creatures can choose to fail the saving throw.)</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>NEEDS:</b></div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>Sunscreen unguent</li>
<li>Fin harnesses or piercings (reducing swimming speed to 20 ft.)</li>
</ul>
<div>
<b>OTHERWISE:</b></div>
</div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>For every 4 hours under the sun you suffer 1 level of exhaustion.</li>
<li>Your walking speed is reduced by 5 ft. and difficult terrain costs an extra 5 ft. for you to pass.</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div>
_____________________</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
As you can see, there are no subraces: the bonus feat takes care of that, because racial feats will represent the "creeds", which in the WotC implementation were taken as subraces.</div>
<div>
The word "creed" doesn't even appear in the original description of Merfolk, but I guess I must acknowledge it since it's published. Instead of making it define the Merfolk though, I think their solitary nature allows them to choose, if to actually follow a creed or not.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Note that the thing of stealing a racial feat from others might seem crazy, but considering many of the feats with an ability score increase are racial, and I really wanted the clause "except the ability score increase", this is needed to have at least a few decent options. I didn't want just a free feat because that's the Human thin, and I still wanted the ability scores to be slightly better than Human, with some variability but basically only Int or Wis having the big increase.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The flying feature is very limited, as you can guess. Requiring Blue or White roil is already a big condition (which might be too much, honestly, but it might change, just like Roil colors might disappear, or be substituted by terrain types), but most importantly, the <i>gust of wind </i>effect can only propel 15 ft. in any direction. This means very short flights, and that's why I left it at-will: at least in those moments when the stars align and you can use the feature, you can use it as much as needed. It does burn the action, after all.<br /><br />An alternative, especially if ditching Roil Color completely, could be requiring positive Roil (difficult to fly when gravity or winds are pulling you towards one point!) This way, Merfolk would be encouraged to take the Lullmage feat, and use it to actually raise the Roil, like Noyan Dar does in Battle for Zendikar.</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://gamepedia.cursecdn.com/mtgsalvation_gamepedia/3/3c/Cardart_BFZ_Noyan-Dar-Roil-Shaper.jpg?version=a3647d37e0126120632f2b95ddc96111" style="margin-left: 0em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="450" data-original-width="750" src="https://gamepedia.cursecdn.com/mtgsalvation_gamepedia/3/3c/Cardart_BFZ_Noyan-Dar-Roil-Shaper.jpg" width="600" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div><br />This would of course require the Lullmage feat to be a "lower or raise by 1", or "improve or worsen by 1" instead of just improve: I wonder if that's ok, but I think so.</div>
<div>
Note that although Merfolk would be encouraged to take the Lullmage feat, they would get very little from it if they take it as their first feat, since they don't get the bump to ability score, and they already have Roil Sense.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Lastly, the Twitch feature, which I had devised in 4th edition for the same purpose (Zendikar D&D started in 4th edition) is basically only flavor, and is inspired by the way Abe Sapien fights (or better, avoids hits) in Hellboy 2. I think it represents this fish instinct of swimming away instinctively. Was considering making the move prone the character, but then it would really rarely be used, since it could mean more problems, unless we talk ranged attacks.</div>
<div>
I am still puzzling on it: any suggestions? Of course in theory I could just drop it and the race would be still fine, but I thought they should have at least one common thing that doesn't depend on the Roil.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
That's all for Merfolk, for now, and I think I will do one more race with Roil-based features, and then return to the Roil to really flesh it up and call it done!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-41515699158679200082020-05-02T14:26:00.000-07:002020-05-02T14:36:59.905-07:00#Zendikar #DnD Take 2: beefier races (starting from vampires!)<br />
While still puzzling on the "Backgrounds should matter more" issue, I couldn't help think about the same issue when it comes to Race choice.<br />
<br />
Just as with Background, Race is something that seems to matter less and less while you progress in level, and given the fact they just provide some "nice to haves" and little else, it feels more like a cosmetic choice than anything else.<br />
<br />
This is probably by design, since the philosophy behind D&D is you should play what appeals to you and not suffer for it. But Zendikar is a world where the adventurers suffer, and a lot..! And I think every race should have to suffer in a different way: the backgrounds of the races heavily imply this, and I think it should reflect on the game.<br />
<br />
The best example for this is Zendikari Vampires.<br />
<br />
Vampires from Zendikar are, first of all, not undead. They are capable of superhuman feats of strength, agility, and more, but they have very special needs, and vulnerabilities.<br />
While they don't have sunlight vulnerability, they are cold-blooded. This means that they can't keep their metabolism working properly when temperatures are not hot, and when they don't feed on blood regularly (although in theory not as often as humans eat food).<br />
They are known to wear elaborate and sometimes heavy clothes in the tropical humid climate of Guul Draaz, so imagine what they would need to wear in temperate climates or cold ones.<br />
<br />
But simple vulnerabilities or diet prescriptions are not enough to make a race choice matter, although they help. The thing with vampires is they also lose powers if they don't.<br />
<br />
While other races of Zendikar are not so extreme in their needs, and what they lose when they don't cater to them, I understood that both to make races matter, and to stay true to the "equipment matters" tenet of the setting, races of Zendikar should have a special section, where their needs are clearly listed, with drawbacks clearly stated when the needs are not met. For most races it's a matter of equipment/supplies (a special unguent/sunscreen for Merfolk, the "grit" mineral for Goblins etc.), while for Vampires it's of course also a matter of diet.<br />
<br />
So here is the Vampire write-up which groups a lot of advantages under one, to make it easier to state what they lose when they don't feed on blood (and when speaking of the haughty Kalastria vampires, on HUMANOID blood!)<br />
<br />
<h2>
ZENDIKARI VAMPIRE</h2>
<div>
<div>
<b><br />Ability Score Increase: </b>Your Dexterity score increases by 2.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Age: </b>Zendikari vampires reach maturity late, around 20 years of age, but can live up to 200 years and more.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Size.</b> Zendikari vampires are as tall as humans, but usually weight less, since they have no body fat. Your size is Medium.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Alignment. </b>Zendikari vampires can be of any alignment, but those of Good alignments are rare and don't last for long among vampires, ending up preferring (or being forced to) live among other races.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Speed. </b>Your base walking speed is 30 ft.<br />
<br />
<b>Vampire Metabolism. </b>If you are well-fed (see NEEDS below), you gain the following benefits:<br />
<ul>
<li>Your Strength score increases by 2.</li>
<li>Your base walking speed is 40 ft.</li>
<li>Your jumping distance is double.</li>
<li>You can use a reaction to reduce falling damage by an amount equal to 5 per level.</li>
</ul>
<b>Darkvision. </b>Being primarily a nocturnal predator<b>, </b>you have superior vision in dark and dim conditions. You can see in dim light within 60 feet of you as if it were bright light, and in darkness as if it were dim light. You canโt discern color in darkness, only shades of gray.<br />
<br />
<b>Pulse Tracker. </b>You have advantage on Perception checks to locate red-blooded creatures, and you know where to bite to drain blood without killing the victim (if the victim is at least of Medium size).<br />
<br />
<b>Bite. </b>Your fanged maw is a natural weapon, which you can use to make unarmed strikes and feed. If you hit with it, you deal piercing damage equal to ld6 + your Strength modifier, instead of the bludgeoning damage normal for an unarmed strike. You can choose to make this nonlethal damage.<br />
<br />
<b>Families: </b>Ancient divides among Zendikari vampires resulted in culturally distinct families, the main ones being Kalastria, Nirkana, and Ghet. Choose one of these families.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<br />
<div>
<b>NEEDS:</b></div>
<div>
<ol>
<li>Blood (killing a Small creature, or leaving unconscious a Medium or Large creature) at least once every 24 hours.</li>
<li>Heavier clothes in temperate and colder environments.</li>
<li>Disguise.</li>
</ol>
</div>
<div>
<b>OTHERWISE:</b></div>
<div>
<ol>
<li>You don't benefit from Vampire Metabolism, you suffer one level of exhaustion, and you can't spend Hit Dice to heal.</li>
<li>You can't take reactions.</li>
<li>You are recognized as a vampire and hunted down in civilized communities outside of Guul Draz.</li>
</ol>
<h3>
Kalastria</h3>
</div>
"The Nirkana are cutthroats who run about the swamps like drooling animals. The Ghet are no better than gutter rats. The Emevera are so common they couldn't appreciate a fine meal if it died on their doorstep. The Urnaav are obsequious idiots who think we are too stupid to see their machinations. They would all be Kalastria if they could, and who could blame them?"<br />
โLyandis, family Kalastria<br />
<br />
<div>
<b>Kalastria Culture. </b>You gain proficiency in the Intimidate skill.</div>
<div>
<b>Kalastria Superiority. </b>If you fed on the blood of a sentient creature, Vampire metabolism increases your Charisma instead of Strength score, and you are immune to the charmed and frightened conditions for 24 hours.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<h3>
Nirkana</h3>
</div>
<div>
<div>
"The pretentious Kalastria pretend that only human blood will satisfy them. Fattened weaklings. They never know how it feels to run through the jungles in pursuit of a bloodscent. The tang and pulse of feral blood has no equal."<br />
โNirkana Lacerator<br />
<b><br />Nirkana Culture. </b>You gain proficiency in the Survival skill.</div>
<div>
<b>Nirkana Metabolism. </b>For 8 hours after feeding, you don't need heavier clothes in temperate and colder environments, and you can climb as under the effect of the <i>spider climb </i>spell.<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
<div>
<h3>
Ghet</h3>
</div>
<div>
<div>
"Family Ghet has been using their alliance to gain access to the inner decision-making apparatus of Nimana, and are actively converting influential members of the town to their cause. Their plan is to eventually seize outright control of the city and integrate the city into their holdings, raising their own prestige and power."<br />
"The family Ghet suffered a major setback in political fighting that resulted in Emevera diverting water around their dykes and flooding Ghet. Ghet has built temporary dams, but the damage to their holdings was significant."<br />
<b><br />Ghet Culture. </b>You gain proficiency in the Insight skill.</div>
<div>
<b>Ghet Reputation. </b>You have advantage on Charisma checks against non-vampire humanoids, and disadvantage against vampires. You don't need to disguise as a human in most Zendikari settlements (Sea Gate is an exception).<br />
<br />
___________________________________<br />
<br />
As you can see, there's quite a lot of conditions, and the different families play on the restrictions, adding benefits if following more strict ones, or removing some needs under certain conditions.<br />
<br />
It might seem like there's quite a lot here, but I think a player wanting to portray a vampire in Zendikar is more than ready to remember the benefits (which by the way are mostly physical, with the exception of Kalastria).<br />
<br />
I didn't give vampires any Roil-related abilities, since even if I wanted races connected to each mana color with Roil interactions (and Vampires would have been perfect for Black Roil interaction), there was nothing in the official material suggesting such a link, so I will leave this to the Surrakar, that are also Black (although also Blue).<br />
<br />
Note as well that this being a Zendikari race, it has means of vertical movement: a very high jump, protection from falls, and climb speed for the feral Nirkana vampires.<br />
<br />
Next up: my favorite... The Merfolk!<br />
<br /></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-69771887036888774462020-05-01T05:39:00.003-07:002020-05-01T05:40:30.335-07:00#Zendikar #DnD Take 2: Zendikari backgrounds for Zendikari characters<br />
I was hoping this could be my "Z is for Zendikar" post for the "To Boldly Go" Blog Carnival hosted by my friend Gonzalo, and in a way it will be, but again this will be more brainstorming then finished material, as usual.<br />
<br />
This time though, I feel particularly inspired, and I think I have nailed my vision of the backgrounds of Zendikar and at the same time a fix to one of the issues I have with most editions of D&D: non-combat features mattering only as first level choices.<br />
<br />
In my last post I noticed how the fact that Zendikar poses new challenges and mechanics by itself can be used to give Races something extra, without it really unbalancing things, since it will be consequential only within Zendikar and only within the influence of the Roil.<br />
<br />
This made me think that we can apply this lesson to Backgrounds, but then I thought: what about the regular backgrounds from the Player's Handbook? You can add only so much Zendikari flavor to them, before making them all feel similar.<br />
<br />
This made me think about Backgrounds more radically: many features I would like Backgrounds to give are the domain of Classes now, and I don't want Zendikar to just feel like "over the top D&D", offering just more without taking anything away.<br />
So the main solution I have in mind is to actually nerf Backgrounds at first level, and then make them reach the usual features around 3rd level, with additional features kicking in at higher levels, when the power level of the character should eclipse buffs in the Background domain.<br />
Plus, taking a hint from the "Custom Background" rules, they would actually offer choices, acting more like "curricula" than backgrounds. After all, there's already basically free choice when the skills of Background and Class overlap.<br />
<br />
Basically, there should be a progression table, or "menu" for Backgrounds. Let's take one of the free ones: <b>Criminal</b>.<br />
<br />
<b> Level Feature</b><br />
<ol>
<li> Feature: Criminal Contact, Thieves' Tools, One skill</li>
<li> Criminal Specialty, One tool</li>
<li> One skill</li>
<li> Feature: Specialty Mastery</li>
<li> Expertise in one skill</li>
</ol>
<div>
The skills could come from the whole Rogue list, with tools being much more limited</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
So the real power up here is an Expertise. How big is it? Well, it's basically like half a feat. At 4th level, potentially, Humans can get it through the Prodigy feat, so a Human Rogue could end up with a lot of Expertise. The use of a "Skill Die" could make everything more fun, so it could be considered even instead of proficiency, but this could add more complexity.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
In general I think gaining an extra Expertise would not hurt at all, but I could see about making it situational.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
What requires work is basically a second feature, making the Specialty matter more. This could actually mean choosing between 8 different mini-features (a lot of writing to do for just one background!) or possibly a free-form feature, where the DM just figures out the details with the player. A compromise could be a fixed feature, representing the mastery of the background in general, leaving the specialty as it is now: a role-playing cue without any noticeable in-game effect.<br />
<br />
Other options I was considering:<br />
<ul>
<li>Removing Thieves' Cant from the Rogue features, making it a Criminal Background feature, thus removing this BUG, where all Rogues are Thieves in the book.</li>
<li>Adding even some combat-related bonuses to the Background, as substituion features. The power level should be something akin to a 1st level spell slot. As a Rogue, for example, I think Expertise would count as 1 slot, and Sneak Attack as another slot. So basically gaining Sneak Attack could be a replacement of a 1st level slot, or Expertise (but it would not stack with the Rogue feature, so basically the Rogue would never take it), or Fighting Style from Fighter/Ranger/Paladin, etc.<br />The problem is this feature=feature equivalence is broken: a Paladin would easily give away Divine Sense to gain Sneak Attack, while it's much more balanced with Lay on Hands. So a blacklist of un-swappable should be made, where Thieves' Cant, Divine Sense, Druidic language and such "flavor on top" features are taken out of the menu. </li>
<li>The above "flavor on top" features are actually the ones I would remove from classes in general, and it could be a prerequisite of using these powered-up backgrounds: some classes lose something, which they can easily regain with the right Background.</li>
</ul>
Going this way, here is another rework of the <b>Criminal</b> Background:</div>
<div>
<br />
<b>Level Feature</b><br />
<ol>
<li> Thieves' Cant, Thieves' Tools, One skill - Feature swap: Sneak Attack</li>
<li> Criminal Contact, One tool</li>
<li> One skill - Feature swap: Sneak Attack</li>
<li> Feature: Specialty Mastery</li>
<li> Expertise in one skill</li>
</ol>
<div>
No Rogue would get Thieves' Cant without the Criminal Background. But no Rogue would use it to gain more Sneak Attack (since the feature is offered at the same levels they get it in). So you can either become a classical Thief Rogue, or if you select this as a Wizard, you can potentially be as good at Sneak Attacks as a 3rd level Rogue, if you let go of two 1st level Spell Slots.</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
At 5th level, a Criminal Wizard having swapped twice, would have only 2 first level spell slots, but would also have one Expertise and 2d6 Sneak Attack.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Conversely, the <b>Sage</b> background would act as a multiclass Wizard of sorts:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Level Feature</b><br />
<ol>
<li> Obscure Language, One skill - Feature swap: Spell Slot, Spell Known</li>
<li> Researcher, One language</li>
<li> One skill - Feature swap: Spell Slot, Spell Known</li>
<li> Feature: Specialty Mastery, One language</li>
<li> Expertise in one skill</li>
</ol>
<div>
The Soldier, not giving out a flavor class feature for free (because no martial class has one, unfortunately), would need a bit of a different progression, granting the feature before. To compensate, the Military Rank would be up-gradable.</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Level Feature</b><br />
<ol>
<li> Military Rank, One skill - Feature swap: Fighting Style</li>
<li> One skill, One tool</li>
<li> Military Rank up - Feature swap: Maneuver, Superiority Die</li>
<li> Feature: Specialty Mastery, One vehicle</li>
<li> Expertise in one skill</li>
</ol>
<div>
And so on.</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
So what would an actual Zendikari background look like? A <b>Lull Mage</b> <b>Apprentice</b> could be represented.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Level Feature</b><br />
<ol>
<li> Academy Contact, One skill - Feature swap: Spell Slot, Spell Known</li>
<li> Minor Lull Magic, One tool</li>
<li> One skill - Feature swap: Spell Slot, Spell Known</li>
<li> Feature: Specialty Mastery, One language</li>
<li> Expertise in one skill</li>
</ol>
<div>
Minor Lull Magic could give a daily version of the Lull Mage feat, usable only once per day, unless you burn Spell Slots, which the Background conveniently provides. This would combine well with the feat, giving basically more uses, without providing any extras (the feat should raise Wisdom or Intelligence by 1).</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Academy Contact sounds more like the regular Background features which I moved to second level in other cases, but in reality it's more like the Thieves' Cant: something situational, which comes up only with your own, since the Academy/ies in Zendikar don't have the widespread networks of criminals, or the more widely recognized ranks of military.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
And now the most Zendikari of Zendikari backgrounds: <b>Explorer</b>!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Level Feature</b><br />
<ol>
<li> Expeditionary House, One skill - Feature swap: Natural Explorer</li>
<li> Treasure, One tool</li>
<li> One skill - Feature swap: Natural Explorer (2nd terrain)</li>
<li> Feature: Specialty Mastery, One language</li>
<li> Expertise in one skill</li>
</ol>
<div>
Again as per the Lull mage, we have the "social" feature, more limited than most, at first level, while the true feature would be something akin to the Hermit "Discovery", but represented by a material object: a unique hedron cube, or some arcane device of this kind, able to provide some out-of-combat help in the same way the feature of the Hermit would, but on a less "cosmic truth" level and a more practical, yet limited fashion.</div>
</div>
<div>
Note that offering Natural Explorer at a faster rate than Ranger means that a Ranger Explorer would be more Explorer than a regular Ranger, if swapping one spell slot. For a Rogue it would mean swapping one Sneak Attack to be "as explorer" as a Ranger of the same level, or they could choose to be "even more explorers" than a Ranger of the same level by taking out all Sneak Attack till 3rd level included. Choices!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I realize these could feel more like Multiclass rules rather than Background rules, but again, the fact they provide class features in lieu of others of the same kind I think balances things a lot, just with the actual extra stuff being just a secondary background benefit and expertise in a single skill, coming at levels that usually don't make these bonuses very consequential, and more as "nice to haves".</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Another possible way to make "beefy backgrounds" more applicable to any game, would be making them actual class levels, making you choose if to level up in background or class.</div>
<div>
This would make them basically prestige classes of sorts, and slow down a lot the progression, making them contrary to my game design philosophy tenet of "combat and non-combat features not having to compete with each other". </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Considering this, I think a good optional rule to balance things out could be requiring specific quests to actually attain 4th and 5th level in a background: those features would basically be the rewards in treasure and XP of the quest, and would be instead of these. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
That'all!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-55051170782135385442020-04-27T16:37:00.000-07:002020-04-27T17:12:00.270-07:00#Zendikar #DnD Take 2: designing it organically, starting from PCs<br />
As you can see, Zendikar is again in my cross-hair, and I can't get it out, so expect me to ramble about it even more!<br />
<br />
In particular, I was thinking about my previous post and how the mechanic for the Roil could need to be simpler. So I am actually postponing a final version of it, to think more about the Player Character's experience, starting from character creation, and how this can actually shape the mechanics of the settings.<br />
<br />
In particular, these I think should be the "tenets" of the Zendikar D&D experience:<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li><b>A focus on vertical exploration and combat</b>, which means:</li>
<ul>
<li>Most characters should be able to move vertically somehow.</li>
<li>Some characters should be able to provide vertical movement to those who can't.</li>
</ul>
<li><b>Omnipresent Roil: the environment can always change</b>, which implies:</li>
<ul>
<li>Some characters can innately interact with the Roil (Merfolk, Surrakar, Goblin)</li>
<li>Any character can learn the right skills to interact with the Roil (Lullmage feat)</li>
<li>Some characters can specialize in the Roil (Roil Soul Sorcerers, Roil Mages, etc.)</li>
<li>The Roil affects any encounter as a localized force, or travel as a regional force.</li>
</ul>
<li><b>A focus on small-scale adventuring</b>, which means:</li>
<ul>
<li>Equipment is particularly important, and some tools and supplies should be extra-important. This means that...</li>
<li>Environmental dangers, whether it's the Roil, traps, or hostile flora/fauna, sometimes damage/remove/eat equipment/supplies, making it important for characters to be careful when planning their expeditions' supplies.</li>
</ul>
<li><b>Hedrons are an integral part of the experience</b> and can be:</li>
<ul>
<li>Equipment (pathway stones, hedron archives, hedron blades etc.)</li>
<li>The focal point of Roil phenomena (and in this case, interacting with the Roil is like interacting with the hedron, and vice-versa).</li>
<li>Having effects different from those of the Roil (and in this case, magic affecting the Roil can't affect the hedrons).</li>
<li>Part of the scenery (when it's giant and/or inactive hedrons). </li>
</ul>
</ul>
<div>
Considering the abilities to interact with the Roil that characters can have, I can also picture better what kind of mechanic we really want for it.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I was thinking to leave the Roil at a fixed d8, so that players know what to expect, but can't help thinking the d6 is also nice. What I don't like anymore in this perspective is the split to 2d4s, because from there players seem to lose control of it too much. It could be a nice mechanic to represent the mess that happens when you BREAK a hedron, which should be something low level characters could not do even if they wanted to.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Thinking more about player-side control means that every change to the Hedron/Roil die should mean something. Hence, I would go for a table with a bit more variability, such as:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>d8 Roil effect</b></div>
<div>
1: Change to d6 and roll.</div>
<div>
2: Implosive Roil Storm</div>
<div>
3: Implosive Roil</div>
<div>
4: Negative Lull</div>
<div>
5: Lull</div>
<div>
6: Positive Lull</div>
<div>
7: Explosive Roil</div>
<div>
8: Explosive Roil Storm</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
This way, first of all we have symmetric effects, which will be easier to design, and then we also reduce the numbers that don't have any effect to just 1 (5). We also don't need to add caveats to the roll of the d6, because every roll of the d6 will be ok (no crazy split to 2d4s).</div>
<div>
Here would be the d6:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<div>
<b>d6 Roil effect</b></div>
<div>
1: Change to d8 and roll.</div>
<div>
2: Weird Implosive Roil Storm</div>
<div>
3: Weird Negative Lull</div>
<div>
4: Weird Lull</div>
<div>
5: Weird Positive Lull</div>
<div>
6: Weird Explosive Roil Storm</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Here we have actually more desirable states in proportion, but no half measures, making the d6 a high-risk/high-reward one.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Now, I would like to leave the duration of each state a bit under DM control, with random options being very random, such as:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<div>
<b>d8 Roil duration</b></div>
<div>
1: 1 round</div>
<div>
2: 2 rounds</div>
<div>
3: 3 minutes</div>
<div>
4: 40 minutes</div>
<div>
5: 5 hours</div>
<div>
6: 6 days</div>
<div>
7: 7 weeks</div>
<div>
8: 8 months</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
This might seem to escalate pretty quickly to semi-permanent effects, but since the duration of each new state would have to be re-rolled, a very long-lasting effect could disappear quickly with a small interaction.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Another easy option, if one wants the roil to last only rounds, but without having to do book-keeping, is to just put a die next to it and decrease it every round.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
As a last resort, as I said, it can be fully under DM's control. The point is that players with ways to interact with the Roil should also know how much the Roil is meant to last. So even if the DM makes it arbitrary, there should always be a way for the players to know about the duration, so they can play around it/with it.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Now, Roil effects in the hands of players could be the following:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<i><b>Roil Sense: </b>as an action, you can make a Wisdom (Survival) or Intelligence (Arcana) check to learn more about ongoing Roil effects within your line of sight. </i></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Not many details on the ability: depending on the result, the type, duration, stage etc can be learned.</div>
<div>
This would be one of the abilities granted by the Lull Mage feat, and possibly one of the Merfolk racial features.</div>
<div>
Then there's the fun stuff:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<i><b>Lull Magic: </b>as an action you can make a Wisdom (Survival) or Intelligence (Arcana) check to change a Roil Die affecting an area within 30 ft. The DC is set by the DM. If you succeed, you can either increase or decrease the Roil Die number by one towards a Lull state, and you can't use this feature again until you finish a short or long rest.</i></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
It's a bit limited being once per rest, but I envision actual Roil Mages and such using it more often by burning spell slots. A way to calculate the DC would be the assign value of severity to both Roil States and Durations: the more the effect is far from the average value, the more severe it is. That is: it should be more difficult to change a very short or very long state, and more difficult the more it's far from a lull state.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<i><b>Em's Flight: </b>if you are within a Positive or Explosive Roil's area of influence, you can spend an action to grant yourself and another creature within 10 ft. of you a flight speed of 30 ft. until the end of your next turn. After using this feature, you can't use it again until you finish a short or long rest.</i></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
This would be the main Merfolk feature, or perhaps the one for the Emeria Creed, although I don't like separating Merfolk into creeds at racial level, so it might also end up on a racial feat instead.<br />
<br />
Now, speaking of Creeds, Cosi Tricksters could actually most probably manipulate the Roil too. But doing basically the exact opposite of Lull Mages. This could be a way of enabling Em's Flight, or Ula's Waters.<br />
<br />
<i><b>Cosi's Trick:</b> as an action, you can spend a Hit Die and instead of regaining hit points, you can invert the state of a Roil's area of influence within 30 ft. of you. You can't use this feature if the Roil's state is Lull or Weird Lull.</i><br />
<br />
And on to Ula's waters:<br />
<br />
<b><i>Ula's Waters:</i> </b><i>if you are within a Negative or Implosive Roil's area of influence, you can spend a reaction to attract water from below or above and give it a shape kept pressurized by the Roil. You can use it to propel yourself, and up to one creature within 10 ft of you, 20 ft in any direction, or grant you and the chosen creature three-quarters cover. </i><i>After using this feature, you can't use it again until you finish a short or long rest.</i><br />
<div>
<br /></div>
Goblins would use the Roil very differently from the Merfolk, and very differently depending on the tribe.<br />
<br />
<b><i>Grotag's Lullaby:</i> </b><i>when you are within a Roil's area of influence in any Lull state (including Positive and Negative), you can spend an action to make a Wisdom or Charisma (Animal Handling) check to charm a beast within 10 ft. of you. The DC is equal to 10 + the number of Hit Dice of the beast. If you succeed, the beast is charmed as if under the Animal Friendship spell. If you fail, the beast becomes hostile and the Roil state worsens by one step. </i><i>After using this feature, you can't use it again until you finish a long rest.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
This is a funny one... Of course the Grotag's expertise with beasts was never officially tied to the Roil, but since I tie it to Lull states (and careful: this still means you need Roil to use it...), it can be easy to miss how the Roil is involved. The Grotags are basically finding a way to make the Roil help them in taming beasts, without even knowing. The fact the Roil worsens when they fail means the Roil is also connected to living things nearby, and an animal getting enraged makes the Roil enraged. Very Zendikarian!<br />
<br />
Also, this brings me to a nice terminology for the Roil: to <i><b>worsen</b></i> or <b><i>improve.</i></b><br />
<b><i><br /></i></b>
<i>A Roil's state can always worsen or improve. This means changing the Roil Die number so that it's respectively farther or closer to the Lull state, by a certain number.</i><br />
<i>For example if a d8 Roil Die is on 6 (Positive Lull), worsening by one gives a 7 (Explosive Roil) while Improving by one gives a 5 (Lull). <br />A Roil's state can't worsen more than the maximum or minimum of its die.</i></div>
<div>
<br />
With this terminology set, Lull magic becomes easier to phrase:<br />
<br />
<i><b>Lull Magic: </b>as an action you can make a Wisdom (Survival) or Intelligence (Arcana) check to improve a Roil state affecting an area within 30 ft. If you succeed, its Roil Die improves by 1, and you can't use this feature again until you finish a short or long rest.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
Continuing on the wave of Goblins, I would love to redo the Tuktuk tribe's feature based on the Roil. This is actually tricky, because it used to be based on the usage of Daily Arcane spells, if I remember correctly, so not just any spell, but I think we could convert it to just any spell of 1st level or higher.<br />
<br />
<i><b>Tuktuk's Fortune: </b>when you take damage from a spell or magical effect of 1st level or higher within the the area of influence of a Roil state, as a reaction the Roil state briefly changes to its maximum, but you fly right outside of its area of influence in a random direction (use a d10, with 1 being directly upwards, and 10 meaning diagonally upwards, needing another roll for the direction.)<br />If the spell had hit you with an attack roll, it misses you, and if it affected an area and you move outside of it, you are not affected.<br />If you flew up, you still take falling damage as normal, unless you prevent it somehow.</i><br />
<i>The Roil's state returns to its previous state at the start of your next turn.</i><br />
<br />
A bit wordy, but a lot of fun! It enables tactics like having the Tuktuk attract enemies near a Roil's epicenter (that's another nice term to use!), and then targeting it with a spell on purpose, to provoke a Roil Storm and affect the enemies in the area. Too bad there is a 20% chance the Tuktuk will take some damage, and a 10% chance the poor devil will take a LOT of damage (flying directly above, meaning landing/crashing within the Roil Storm just created..!)<br />
After all...<br />
<br />
<i style="font-family: "Open Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3em; text-size-adjust: 100%;">"Survival rule 883: Fire distracts the eye of danger and warms the heart of fortune."</i><span style="background-color: #151515; color: #333333; font-family: "open sans" , sans-serif; font-size: 10px;"></span><br />
<i style="font-family: "Open Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3em; text-size-adjust: 100%;">โZurdi, goblin shortcutter</i><br />
<br />
Note that since the epicenter is basically a point, one could also rule you just go out of the area in a straight line out of the epicenter, meaning "up" only if you are standing on it. But this could also mean the feature would be useless many times, since the goblin could already be very close to the border of the area, and in that case nothing much would happen, while the random flight actually gives more chances of being moved far away.<br />
<br />
<i><b>Lavastep's Grit: </b>you are immune to the effects of Red Roil. When within the area of influence of a Black, Green, or White Positive or Explosive Roil, you can use an action to briefly change the Roil color to Red in a radius of 10 ft centered on you. The change lasts until the end of your next turn.</i><br />
<br />
This is a bit cheesy and probably more at home with Roil Soul Sorcerers or Roil Mages, but it could be funny for these fiery goblins to actually bring the fire where they go. Blue Roil, being so elementally opposite, would be immune. And even Green honestly seems like a stretch. But changing White and Black Roil to Red seems really cool. I just wouldn't exactly know how would that "look" and "work" thanks to the Lavastep's "grit" mineral.<br />
A possible solution could be making the Tuktuk feature belong to Lavastep (with the addition of immunity to Red Roil), and coming up with something more tame for the Tuktuk. Needs some thought.<br />
<br />
By the way, this brings me to an easy write-up of the three Goblin tribes.<br />
<br />
The basic race would be the official one from Volo's Guide to Monsters, but I would eliminate the <b style="font-style: italic;">Fury of the Small </b>feature and include instead the following:<br />
<br />
<b>GROTAG TRIBE:</b><br />
<b><i>- Proficiency in Animal Handling</i></b><br />
<b><i>- Grotag's Lullaby</i></b><br />
<b><i><br /></i></b>
<b>TUKTUK TRIBE:</b><br />
<b><i>- Proficiency in Survival</i></b><br />
<b><i>- Tuktuk's Fortune</i></b><br />
<b><i><br /></i></b>
<b>LAVASTEP TRIBE:</b><br />
<b><i>-</i></b> <i style="font-weight: bold;">Proficiency in Arcana</i><br />
<b><i>- Resistance to fire damage</i></b><br />
<b><i>-</i></b> <b><i>Lavastep Grit</i></b><br />
<b><i><br /></i></b>
Note that Lavastep would get resistance to fire also because I see their feature as more situational and less universally useful than the others'. In addition, for another Goblin to gain such resistance would be easy: just eat as much grit as the Lavastep.<br />
<br />
Also, if you're thinking power-creep, remember that all these features are very situational, since they depend on the Roil. Zendikar races are meant to be slightly better and have the extra power be tied to the Roil exactly because the Roil adds difficulty to the game: you lose some and you get some. Plus, the race becomes or remains useful enough in other settings only if these features are mostly on top of regular racial features, and not in substitution.<br />
<br />
That's all for now! We have a more or less final general rule for the Roil, a nearly complete feat, cool features for Merfolk or Merfolk feats, and the Goblins.<br />
Next I should complete the Merfolk!<br />
<br />
<br />
<br /></div>
LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-37934559860088466022020-04-24T17:47:00.000-07:002020-04-24T17:49:56.863-07:00#Zendikar #DnD Take 2: new mechanics for a new edition<br />
All right, I got distracted with some Ikoria, before that I passed through some tough D&D 4e nostalgia, but who am I fooling: "fixing" D&D is a titanic task that I can't hope to do by myself (at least not unless they hire me at WotC heheh...) What I CAN do is finally get Zendikar back to the present form of D&D!<br />
<br />
In this blog you find tons of material that is marked as for 13th Age (I passed that phase too), but honestly it's perfectly fine for D&D. Icons and relations with icons can first of all not require additional mechanics, and then they can just be implemented with 13th Age mechanics within D&D, no tools required.<br />
<br />
What I never properly converted to the new system are the things that need conversion, like races, subclasses, feats, backgrounds etc.<br />
You could say: "Hey Lord, excuse the informal register, but WotC did that already, it's called Planeshift: Zendikar, and it's a free PDF!". And, "Well" - I'd reply - "I believe that document is one of the worst adaptations they could do!" - Because come on, Zendikar is widely different from other settings, and the mechanics have to show it.<br />
<br />
When I praised recent design coming out of WotC was few days ago, when they came out with mechanics for Psionics that FINALLY made a good job conveying the flavor of the theme.<br />
This is what I firmly believe: you can have fantastic narrative, world-building, and ideas, but if the mechanics are always the same, the playing experience will be always similar.<br />
A brave new world requires brave new mechanics.<br />
<br />
Speaking of this, the first mechanic that I would introduce is actually an add-in, something of a thin layer covering all or most of Zendikar D&D gaming. The ROIL.<br />
<br />
Zendikar without the Roil is like Ravenloft without the Mists, or the Forgotten Realms without Drizzt and Elminster. You just can't. And although some types could say that you could easily reskin spells and environmental effects to "represent" the Roil, I don't want to just represent it: I want it to be an integral part of the experience. Something the players will have to think about. Possibly even something to build characters around.<br />
<br />
The Roil mechanic I have in mind borrows again from 13th Age, and in particular from its Escalation Die. But only on the surface.<br />
It's meant to be a die that can add randomness, but also some kind of "track". And it's not meant to be just a unified "this is how we do the Roil" thing either: the Roil is a force that manifests differently in every continent, and many times differently within each continent of Zendikar, as I briefly mentioned at the end of my previous post.<br />
<br />
So each time there is Roil (spoiler alert - there's ALWAYS Roil on Zendikar, everywhere. It's just not always something visible. Or at least this is my plan for it) there is a particular die that can have different colors, and a different table, depending on the continent it comes from, and the mana involved.<br />
<br />
Taking a page from the Psionic Die, this die can change in size, but the typical size is the Zendikarian size per-excellence: the d8, shaped (a bit) like Zendikarian hedrons!<br />
This die is for "real roil", which can escalate to something terrible.<br />
In "lull" conditions, the die is a d4. While in certain specific conditions, the die is a d6 (like the cube hedrons, and this may or may not be related...)<br />
<br />
The idea is to have roil specifically tied to hedrons (although this is not canon, but it could be if you know the story) and the shape of hedrons being an indication of particular roil configurations.<br />
This could mean two different scenarios: each die works in its own way (but that's three tables for each of five continents and each with five color variations, might be too much), or they follow the same "track", with the d4 obviously never reaching the "bad" levels of a d6 or the "terrible" levels of a d8.<br />
<br />
What I came to prefer, though, is the exact contrary, and this is kind of supported by Rise Of The Eldrazi art: when Hedrons are Octahedrons, things are okay-ish. It's when they reconfigure in cubes that the Roil hits the fan... So it could be cool to have the three tables just for the system to go backwards in size, with the d8 being the most controllable (abilities and effects changing its value by 1 would not be as drastic on a scale of 1 to 8 as on a scale of 1 to 4, obviously), and the d8 would figure more prominently, which could kind of be the signature of the setting. The d4 could actually be 2d4, and symbolize the mess that happens when a hedron gets broken: worse effects, less controllable, and now you have two of them.<br />
<br />
In particular, following this latest model which seems to me like the most iconic, the typical situation would be this:<br />
<br />
Roil Die: 1d8<br />
1 Reconfiguration to d6 (roll it, rerolling 1)<br />
2 Negative Roil<br />
3 Lull - something<br />
4 Lull<br />
5 Lull<br />
6 Lull + something<br />
7 Roil<br />
8 Roil Storm<br />
<br />
Roil Die: 1d6<br />
<br />
1 Reconfiguration to 2d4s<br />
2 Weird negative Roil<br />
3 Lull - something weird<br />
4 Lull + something weird<br />
5 Weird Roil<br />
6 Reconfiguration to d8, level 8<br />
<br />
Roil Die: 1d4 (the two d4 act separately)<br />
<br />
1 Negative Roil Storm<br />
2 Very Negative Roil<br />
3 Roil Storm<br />
4 Dire Roil Storm<br />
<br />
Yes, the d4 would not reconfigure anymore, but they would also not last for long. Possibly a number of turns equal to the number. After which it would reconfigure to... d8 level 4: easy to remember (from d4 to d8 set on 4), and makes sense.<br />
<br />
Now, what is positive or negative Roil? I picture it very simply: it can be explosive (positive) or implosive (negative). A sudden geyser, gravitational uplift, awakening water, or vegetation bloom are examples of positive Roil. A quicksand, gravitational pull, whirlpool, or vegetation encroaching are examples of negative Roil. Note that I didn't say vegetation withering: a withering is a Black effect, which would have both positive and negative variants, but it would work kind of counter-intuitively, with explosions being actual creation of ooze, sludge, and decay, and implosions working like anti-blooms: withering concentrically to the point of implosion.<br />
<br />
And speaking of points of explosion and implosion, here's the cool thing: the die can be placed directly on the map, as the source of the roil. Note that it could represent a hedron, or not. I would say that having it tied to the hedron would give extra ways of dealing with it (and especially a clear clue on where to tread carefully), while if there is no hedron, the die should be only on the DM's map, revealing itself only when the effect makes it obvious (the lake suddenly balls up in a floating gravity-defying bubble of water: pretty sure that makes the point of origin at the center of the bubble! And it's Blue Negative, d8 set on 2!)<br />
<br />
The d6 Roil is cool because it should completely change the way you deal with it. First of all it's more subtle (although it's at the tipping point to the crazy state of d4s), and then it should also be more useful: there's plenty of characters shown manipulating hedron cubes, and while we are talking Roil here and not Hedrons exactly (or necessarily), I think it would be cool if the d6 Roil could lend some power to those who know how to channel it, although it could backfire (Hexaroil now sounds like the best name for it!)<br />
Example: a Black Hexaroil on negative numbers could make a character either cast Hex together with a "Black spell", or suffer it when casting it. On positive, it would probably just deal Necrotic damage straight up, either to the target of a spell and surrounding creatures or to the caster and surrounding creatures.<br />
<br />
The continent variants would provide first of all the diversity of colors (according to what I found out, Zendikar's remaining five continents go from 1 to 5 colors, each), and then peculiar effects, especially on positive. A Roil Storm in Ondu (where Roil tends to be circular) would be something like a hurricane, with a very calm eye of the storm in the middle, while in Akoum, (where Roil comes from the earth), it would be lava geysers erupting everywhere with or without an associated vegetation bloom, depending on the presence of Green mana.<br />
<br />
Lullmages, a very common mage in Zendikar, so much so that I would make it a feat accessible to everyone with Arcana proficiency, would have the power of stabilizing the Roil die, bringing it to middle values in case of d8s and d6s, or reducing the duration of whatever mess the d4s are.<br />
<br />
Merfolk instead could ride the currents of some Roil settings gaining the ability to fly, and could possibly have the racial power of making the die go closer to those settings they prefer (possibly of mild to medium Roil, most probably positive.<br />
<br />
An actual Roil Mage, a Wizard specialized in this stuff, or a Roil Soul Sorcerer, could instead be aiming at changing the d8s to d6s, so that they can use the Roil to power spells. This could of course result in a mess happening, before they manage, and even more probably after they manage.<br />
<br />
I better stop here, because anyway I am not going to create all the tables here and now: this is just a pitch, and possibly a more complete take would be my Z post for the RPG Blog Carnival of my friend Gonzalo!LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-80934723488873038032020-04-21T15:45:00.000-07:002020-04-21T16:24:04.860-07:00#Ikoria and #Zendikar in #DnD: fanta-geo-ramblings<br />
Hello folks!<br />
<br />
I think I am finally regaining the will to continue this blog, and I must say the recent developments from D&D's design team were a big boost. But not the only one!<br />
<br />
The thing I am most excited about is the return to the Zendikar setting, in Magic: The Gathering. And not from the perspective of the game of Magic itself of course, but because of my usual fixation with role-playing in that marvelous world!<br />
<br />
The fact they declared it will be Eldrazi-free (or at least not focused on them) and adventure-heavy is pure bliss! So I have been thinking about a few things.<br />
<br />
<h3>
Then there is Ikoria. </h3>
While to me it feels like an "un-set" (an expansion of the game that is not playable at tournaments and is full of "joke cards"), it must be said I am judging like a thirty-something years old a product that probably was aimed at pre-teens (at least I think it must have been, with that trailer...) <br />
But when I got to play with it I actually liked it, which speaks volumes about my maturity I guess..! :D<br />
<br />
Again though, I am considering it mostly as a source of RPG inspiration, and I am totally in love with the characters and settings connected to my favorite cards: the blue-black flash crowd, and in particular the enabler of it all: Cunning Nightbonder!<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi57RY1Gdp_yifXiOoUMZWfzBFxlPMc2AV7DUbcofB3aB9UshgIIwzlrICX2IcyVntSHIOObJ9EPOQRv797h6vdvmfL94gUqHQsYfTPn4LaU2FNZkEbjk22zKQ8n-m-HXQh5DnkUw0vRUg/s1600/cunning-nightbonder-IKO-219-art-mtga.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="374" data-original-width="512" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi57RY1Gdp_yifXiOoUMZWfzBFxlPMc2AV7DUbcofB3aB9UshgIIwzlrICX2IcyVntSHIOObJ9EPOQRv797h6vdvmfL94gUqHQsYfTPn4LaU2FNZkEbjk22zKQ8n-m-HXQh5DnkUw0vRUg/s1600/cunning-nightbonder-IKO-219-art-mtga.png" /></a></div>
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Apart from the mechanic effect of the card, which I love, the character made me want to explore animal companions and such, which I seldom do.</div>
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In addition, she seems to me like she could be a psionic character as well!</div>
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<br /></div>
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For now, excluding Blood Hunter which is not official, I think she would be a weird Ranger/Warlock with Wild Talent focused on Wisdom and a pact with the Lurker in The Deep, reflavored as a Nightmare lord from Indatha, the land where these little mean beasties come from.</div>
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But enough with my character ideas, and let's talk about something more useful!</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>Roleplaying in Ikoria</b></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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While I don't doubt a Planeshift: Ikoria document will come out soon, with rules for bonded animals, mutating ones maybe, and interesting locations for adventuring, I wanted to speculate a bit about the latter.</div>
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First of all, there is a bit of a strange thing when it comes to the locations, its inhabitants, and the mana colors they are associated with. Although this shouldn't influencing the adventuring aspect, I wanted to point out that Indatha, the region (or "triome", in the setting's terminology to refer to a biome connected to three mana source) where the nightmare creatures are from, is White, Black, and Green. These are not the colors you find Nightmares in, at least not all of them: my favorite one, is Blue-Black.</div>
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<a href="https://www.deviantart.com/yigitkoroglu/art/Slitherwisp-838475087" target="_blank">Slitherwisp</a>, by <a href="https://www.deviantart.com/yigitkoroglu">yigitkoroglu</a><br />
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Which is a combination of colors that fits much more the Zagoth triome, which is my favorite: Blue, Black, and Green.</div>
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I think they might have thought more about the function of the card and what colors would that be, as it's typical of such a technical game, but there is also another explanation: the two triomes share some land. Something confirmed in this tidbit from the guide:</div>
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"It is said that some of Indatha's lowlands were formed by a long trail of enormous footprints, leading from the forests of Zagoth in the south to Indatha's northwestern coast."</blockquote>
<br />
Now, this common swampy coast area between the two triomes, THAT's where I would like to have adventures set in!<br />
<br />
So what is there?<br />
<b><br /></b>
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<b><br /></b>
<br />
<ul>
<li><b>Skysal, the airhip city: </b>this actually rather Zendikarian locale is hovering Indatha in general, so it could be one of the safe havens from which to explore the swamps between Indatha and Zagoth. Admittedly though, having your base on airships when exploring swamps is kind of pointless, since you wouldn't be able to reach them just escaping on foot...</li>
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<ul>
<li><b>Zagoth's hunter camps: </b>although a true settlement is not mentioned in the guide, these hunters of Zagoth must live somewhere, and the self-proclaimed leader (a certain Chevill) is said to "spend most of his time slogging through the wetlands like he owns them." So there's that!</li>
</ul>
<div>
I guess a bonder like the favorite of mine I mentioned wouldn't be very welcome among the hunters, so there could be this kind of rivalry dynamic, between bonders and hunters, with the beasts and nightmares preying on both when they're not careful enough.</div>
<div>
Then there's the people of Skysail. The cards and guide picture them as very isolationist/defensive, so they would want to mind their business, but they would be sought from the afore-mentioned parties, whether for equipment, shelter, or as actual prey from the monsters' point of view, since many can be or become aerial in Ikoria, thanks to mutations.</div>
<div>
<br />
The main ruin to explore would be that of Orn, the only settlement in Indatha that used to be rather big, the citizens of which were the ancestors of the poeple of Skysail.<br />
I picture nightmare bonders as isolated survivors of that old tragedy, who found a way to coexist with nightmare creatures.<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
Not much else to say, except I see this as very similar to Zendikar adventures, due to the verticality involved in Skysail and aerial creatures, and the crazy monsters and landscape.</div>
<div>
And speaking of landscapes...</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
<h3>
<b>Let's talk Zendikar geography!</b></h3>
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<b><br /></b></div>
<div>
One of the things I never liked of Zendikar, and I noticed online that many noticed the same, is how many discrepancies and subsequent ret-cons there have been from the source, when it comes to the setting and its history.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
Most of this has to do with "Zendikar: In the Teeth of Akoum: A Magic: The Gathering Set Novel" (yes, that's the full title, and no, the novel itself doesn't fare better than it) being such a low quality book, with a lot of inaccuracies and mistakes.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
But I also suspect the designers themselves simply didn't talk or agree enough, between the first sets and the "sequel" of Battle for Zendikar, which happened much later.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
In fact, when the continents are described in the latter set, on the land cards, the descriptions are partial at best, especially since they tried to shoehorn entire continents into a description tied to two mana colors, which was not the original intent in the first Zendikar at all.</div>
<div>
So I want to go through them, and "correct" them, by adding at least one more color, if not two, for each, explaining why I see this more accurate, according to the first sources.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>MURASA: Canopy Vista</b></div>
<div>
<b><br /></b></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQ3C_X1OXBPtlBQk_SMLOm5j5uGrZrJl-jWncyL641p64wjlU1pcSJ4iU4HyxPuUGICKfqitWfK-gvtIzQTvr7j-ogYVQuTeQoLgBZBo-waBvTX3vu9iEBtmhCelwtlhfUANGAC67Lpmw/s1600/bfz-234-canopy-vista.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="936" data-original-width="672" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQ3C_X1OXBPtlBQk_SMLOm5j5uGrZrJl-jWncyL641p64wjlU1pcSJ4iU4HyxPuUGICKfqitWfK-gvtIzQTvr7j-ogYVQuTeQoLgBZBo-waBvTX3vu9iEBtmhCelwtlhfUANGAC67Lpmw/s640/bfz-234-canopy-vista.jpg" width="459" /></a></div>
<div>
<b><br /></b></div>
<div>
<br />
Now, the illustration is actually quite right to represent a <i>part </i>of Murasa: the forest of Jaddi trees that dominates Kazandu. Bust Kazandu is also described as "a mass of irregular canyons, twisting valleys, and high broken steppes, all dotted here and there by plateaus that tower above the landscapeโsurviving pillars of the previous ground level." If you ask me, this is pretty Red due to all of the mountainous/rocky features. And in fact the previous Kazandu Refuge card was Red-Green.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
So to define Murasa, the "walled continent" with white and green is very reductive. It should at the very least have Red in it as well, without mentioning the not-so-minor Blue and Black sources, respectively Sunder Bay and the Root Caves, both of which rather attached to Green. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Based on this, I would say Green is dominant, with White and Red being both strong secondaries, making Murasa like Naya in Alara, suggesting that Zendikar is more about "allied" colors, rather than "enemy" colors. </div>
<div>
The Green dominance also matches the fact we are talking about a mostly Elven land, hosting both Tajuru and Kazandu elves, with Kor (White) and Orcs/Ogres (Red) being the strongest minorities in numbers.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>ONDU: Prairie Stream</b></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiK8fKimsg4MJ_Nm6q3zqlH7ofmH3vpAH1_i1Wk9ordTR0HIO-v79gu5-tWcQzSjhy77JfLZyIXlNosUpMHsStYgAvYMRLKn0LYFiv7cKhg-LS1NzGTfbt7gtzzBoBp5mhtoXDizsiN0DI/s1600/bfz-241-prairie-stream.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="936" data-original-width="672" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiK8fKimsg4MJ_Nm6q3zqlH7ofmH3vpAH1_i1Wk9ordTR0HIO-v79gu5-tWcQzSjhy77JfLZyIXlNosUpMHsStYgAvYMRLKn0LYFiv7cKhg-LS1NzGTfbt7gtzzBoBp5mhtoXDizsiN0DI/s640/bfz-241-prairie-stream.jpg" width="458" /></a></div>
<div>
<b><br /></b></div>
<div>
Ondu is tricky, because more than a continent it's an archipelago, although it is said to have a "mainland". Ondu proper, so to speak. So I will limit myself at this land.</div>
<div>
<br />
And Ondu's mainland surely can't be reduced to White-Blue. It has a very strong Green component: we are talking about the birth place of Omnath, Locus of Mana: the greenest thing ever existed, except when it got "enraged", becoming Green-Red.</div>
<div>
There is also quite a confusion between Ondu and Murasa I think, because plateaus and meandering rivers sound a lot like the Na Plateau and Raimunza and Vazi rivers of Murasa, while the sheer verticality of the landscape that should characterize Ondu, seems to have been assigned mostly to Murasa, lately.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
All in all, I would say Ondu's mainland is like Bant of Alara, making it another three-allied-colors land, with White perhaps being the primary one. Minor sources of other colors would include Red for the Makindi Trenches/Cliffhavens, and Black for the Binding Circle's globular swamp and its Soul Stair.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>AKOUM: Cinder Glade</b></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-qZxaa_Ni1c8/Xp9s5Nyki9I/AAAAAAAABqw/2mlsl3yE-Tkq_uYPPKNsxYXxXOK_eO87gCLcBGAsYHQ/s1600/c19-236-cinder-glade.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="936" data-original-width="672" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-qZxaa_Ni1c8/Xp9s5Nyki9I/AAAAAAAABqw/2mlsl3yE-Tkq_uYPPKNsxYXxXOK_eO87gCLcBGAsYHQ/s640/c19-236-cinder-glade.jpg" width="458" /></a></div>
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This is one of the most accurate: it shows the life blooms of Akoum next to its rivers of magma and floating rocks. I would be even tempted to say it needs nothing more, with the previous land cycle of Refuges (Akoum Refuge) being the inaccurate one, since it was Red-Black, for no apparent reason, unless it referred to the selfishness of the people in such refuge, which include the tomb raiders of the League of Anowon.</div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Black is indeed tempting as an addition, to complete the Alara comaprison, but I really don't see it: there's nothing swampy anywhere in Akoum, and if anything one should say White or Blue could be secondary together with Green. So we are either looking at a more Naya combo like Murasa, with Red primary instead of Green, or at something in enemy colors like Tarkir's Temur clan lands or Ikoria's Ketria triome. But again, I think limiting it to Red with secondary Green should be enough, geography-wise. After all Glasspool and its Ior Ruins were said to be its only "reliable" source of Blue mana, and it's a simple lake, and the plains that would mean White are not mentioned anywhere, and are just implied as the few routes used by the Goma Fada Caravan.</div>
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<b>TAZEEM: Sunken Hollow</b></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-3AaPZrXhSfY/Xp9v9V_JqiI/AAAAAAAABrc/sxGYirKL3egWMpNs4jalmE_3v_YQrTYMwCLcBGAsYHQ/s1600/c19-278-sunken-hollow.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="936" data-original-width="672" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-3AaPZrXhSfY/Xp9v9V_JqiI/AAAAAAAABrc/sxGYirKL3egWMpNs4jalmE_3v_YQrTYMwCLcBGAsYHQ/s640/c19-278-sunken-hollow.jpg" width="457" /></a></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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This is probably the most inaccurate yet, because just as there is no Black in Akoum, there's extremely little of it in Tazeem too.</div>
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The exception would be perhaps the pit caves that possibly inspired this land, but they are described as sources of fresh water, so not swampy at all, and even sometimes as geysers, which would make them Red-Blue.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
The true colors of Tazeem are again Blue-White-Green, or like Bant in Alara, and similar to the main ones of Ondu, with the difference that Tazeem, having an inner sea, would have Blue as primary, instead of White. Green is important because of the Vastwood, and White because of Emeria the Sky Ruin, and the city of Sea Gate itself (which is White-Blue by definition).</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
I don't see much in terms of tertiary sources, since Black is basically absent and Red would be only associated to the geysers, which anyway don't seem to define any region in particular.</div>
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<b>GUUL DRAAZ: Smoldering Marsh</b></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTzaqIzg7BADWhPh-w9a38IgnQ2XVxpjfdJ6MIdPOpMtY7-i4RIeMRvYmSuOYyMqzC-2pbyhUplep19doIu2UqgVcRgQ0PIK1UfPDwF4klZI5x5gMXzYGMcWIzPr8fWxPg7B2x0RR3WBA/s1600/bfz-247-smoldering-marsh.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="936" data-original-width="672" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTzaqIzg7BADWhPh-w9a38IgnQ2XVxpjfdJ6MIdPOpMtY7-i4RIeMRvYmSuOYyMqzC-2pbyhUplep19doIu2UqgVcRgQ0PIK1UfPDwF4klZI5x5gMXzYGMcWIzPr8fWxPg7B2x0RR3WBA/s640/bfz-247-smoldering-marsh.jpg" width="458" /></a></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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I said Tazeem was the most innacurate "YET", because I knew this was coming. If Tazeem has little to no Black, Guul Draaz has absolutely ZERO Red. There is no mention fo mountain, hills, rocky landscape, geysers, or geothermal anything in the guide.</div>
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Guul Draaz is the most monocolor of the continents, with Black being absolutely dominant, with perhaps traces of Blue and Green, making it if anything a triome like Zagoth and Sultai lands, which are in fact very similar in their description to Guul Draaz, but only if you stretch things: Guul Draaz is really just an immense swampland, with colorless features (Hagra Cistern, Helix of Zof) more common than other colors.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>So what did we learn?</b></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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Strangely enough, I think if we count the five REMAINING continents of Zendikar (my beloved Bala Ged and Sejiri are no more... So sad!), the only symmetry I find is they all have different degrees of diversity when it comes to geography/mana sources.</div>
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I would in fact go as far as ordering by color diversity:</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
</div>
<ol>
<li>Guul Draaz (Black)</li>
<li>Akoum (Red/Green)</li>
<li>Tazeem (Blue/Green/White)</li>
<li>Murasa (Green/White/Red/Blue)</li>
<li>Ondu (White/Blue/Green/Red/Black)</li>
</ol>
<div>
Which is for sure not intended, but still a nice way to look at them.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
What the designers probably forgot about, is a nice coincidence-or-not with the gravitational Roil effects in each continent.</div>
<div>
In fact, it seems like each continent has a general "direction" of the Roil, or preferred movement if you wish:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>Guul Draaz: no direction/hanging (like its Hanging Swamp)</li>
<li>Akoum: from the ground (all the geothermal activity)</li>
<li>Tazeem: from the sky (Emeria the Sky Ruin)</li>
<li>Murasa: from the sides (hence the wall, the winds etc)</li>
<li>Ondu: circular (as seen in the disc-shaped geography of Agadeem, the Binding Circle, the Piston Mountains etc)</li>
</ul>
<div>
This is partly referred to in the Akoum guide ("Whereas the Roil on the continent of Tazeem seems to affect the land from above, the Roil seems to affect Akoum from below.") with possibly the only stretch being Murasa, where the Roil is just described "unpredictable". The wind is there though.("The interior of Murasa is a rugged landscape of steep, windy hills and precipitous jungle valleys.")</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
So this makes me think there might be some kind of connection between these forces, especially since we know the Roil is a form of rebellion of Zendikar to the Eldrazi imprisoned within it, and that the prison was located mostly in Akoum. One could for example imagine Akoum and Tazeem being at opposite longitudes, with Ondu and Murasa in-between, where the Roil would form currents of some kind, and Guul Draaz being the farthest from all the mess.</div>
<div>
There are of course many many ways of looking at it, and the best is not to try to make much sense. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
But I am happy to see these peculiarities, because they might influence new mechanics to described the Roil in D&D, that I have in mind... And for that, we better write another post!</div>
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<br /></div>
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<br /></div>
<br />LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-77122462232429434852020-04-16T08:21:00.000-07:002020-04-17T15:22:33.910-07:00My Prayers Listened!! New #Psionics in #DnD5e: a most welcome surprise!<br />
<br />
After the last entries of crazy psionics subclasses, I was disheartened and disillusioned about the whole direction WotC took with D&D design.<br />
<br />
I wrote lengthy feedback, stressing mainly the following:<br />
<ul>
<li>Psionics has to be mechanically different compared to magic. Otherwise it's just Psychic magic and we already have it.</li>
<li>Psionics has to have unique mechanics not just to be different, but because the concept it should convey is that of something that is totally enclosed within the user, so it should be more flexible than magic, but at the same time more straining. Closer to martial abilities than spellcasting.</li>
<li>The concept of Psionic subclasses is ok in principle, but they can't all just add some psi-sounding features and call it a day: they have to draw from a common system/mechanics, showing that the mind's power has many forms, but is ultimately a unified power source.</li>
<li>A true Psionic class would still be nice.</li>
</ul>
<div>
Now, the last point hasn't been covered this time around, and maybe never will be, but on the other points, <a href="https://dnd.wizards.com/articles/unearthed-arcana/psionic-options-revisited" target="_blank">they delivered EXACTLY what I asked for!!</a> And this after being called all sorts of names in forums, reddits etc. when I was exposing my point of view is proof that, as I thought, I am actually in a majority that may be less vocal on social media, but takes feedback to the designers seriously.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Because here's another point that I mentioned in the feedback, and was not well received in social media:</div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>If you want to do Psionics right, you have to listen to people who are actually invested in the concept. If you ask the people who don't care, they will just want to avoid "messing" with the game, so they will say everything is good as long as it's bland and irrelevant, even if it's terrible at representing the concept.</li>
</ul>
<div>
I am not saying that hardcore fans of Psionics should be the only ones dictating how it goes of course, because there are indeed those that enjoy the concept only if it serves as a way to power-play. But I am convinced this is a minority: most fans of Psionics are actually happier with LESS power, as long as it conveys the concept as something truly unique. <br />
And if before I was saying this just as the outcome of a personal "Insight check" on the community, seeing what they did after feedback I now see it's actually a good approximation of reality: they indeed listened to fans that, at the cost of a bit of added complexity (which is welcome I think, in a game that has become so simplified) asked for a unique mechanic that just FEELS PSIONIC.<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhL5tuV_786eG8fqTuPA12p0nSDQ1_YogmXWd7CwG9GwgM804qDDC247X7KFStuAce0azzThQ2g_Y-HNYY9jG9neEWvBJXMkYMiqD5mZ8RQI177ZDcwReIWqhijCRiHSd2_MyhqC-9nGsg/s1600/e611b1cd023f31f0c3c2499497d35831.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="629" data-original-width="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhL5tuV_786eG8fqTuPA12p0nSDQ1_YogmXWd7CwG9GwgM804qDDC247X7KFStuAce0azzThQ2g_Y-HNYY9jG9neEWvBJXMkYMiqD5mZ8RQI177ZDcwReIWqhijCRiHSd2_MyhqC-9nGsg/s1600/e611b1cd023f31f0c3c2499497d35831.jpg" /></a></div>
<br /></div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
This mechanic came under the guise of the extremely elegant "Psionic Talent die": a d6 at first, growing with levels, that simply dictates the maximum numerical bonus (or substitution of other die in some case) provided by the mind power, with a few important caveats:</div>
<div>
<ol>
<li>If you roll a maximum, you actually strain your mind and you will use a smaller die afterwards, which means initially a d4.</li>
<li>If you roll a minimum, you can regain the larger die (but you will have probably botched the action you were trying to perform, not to mention it's irrelevant if you already have the largest die in use: a wonderful balance!)</li>
<li>If you roll a maximum again when there is no smaller die available (so you roll 4 on a d4) you just lose the Psionic Talent die for the rest of the day.</li>
</ol>
<div>
I don't even know where to begin to praise this design, because I think it's one of the most elegant ideas coming out of the designers since EVER.</div>
</div>
<div>
<ol>
<li>The connection of a good roll with something bad (risking losing the power for the day) and of a bad roll with something good (regaining stamina, if you had lost some) is not only just balanced, but extremely good at conveying the Psionic flavor: the mind can overwork and get tired, or botch something but find new paths. It's PERFECT.</li>
<li>This crazy thing of having a power function at-will or not at all is also SO PSIONIC! Typical in pop culture is in fact seeing these gifted people use their power with little to no limits for some time, and then at some point suffering some kind of outburst or drain, and just lose their powers for a long while.<br />It's portrayed by the mechanics with incredible efficiency and style. This is what I meant with "mechanics that convey a concept"!</li>
<li>It's a system that can be applied to so many things. In this playtest material we have it in three different subclasses, plus a feat that makes it available for everyone, even for characters already having Psionic subclasses! In fact you never have more than one die: you just grow it in size, and add more ways to use it, which also means more ways to lose it... </li>
<li>It adds a new layer of strategical thinking: do you use the Psionic Talent now, and risk not having it later? Is a bonus now better than more bonuses later? It really is a game inside the game, and this is awesome, and truly distinguishes a Psionic character, making you feel the weight of such power: it's basically a constant Russian Roulette!</li>
</ol>
<div>
Now, the material is not perfect either: the Sorcerer remains a poor way to represent a true "Psion" (although it's ten times better than that nonsense "Psionic School" Wizard we got before...) and the fact the designer still wanted to consider "psionic spells" a thing, and just call all of Divination and Enchantment such, is bad in my opinion. But all in all, the subclass is a nice try, and an original concept: this Sorcerer really conveys a mix of Magic AND Psionics, and does it well. Perhaps even too well, which brings me to what will be the most common criticism for sure...</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>There are a few slightly overpowered things. But easy to fix!</b></div>
<div>
<b><br /></b></div>
<div>
Adding a d6 to an ability check, even limited to a single ability (speaking of the Wild Talent feat) is VERY powerful, even considering you have a chance of running out of this power.</div>
<div>
It stacks with Expertise, meaning I KNOW I want a Rogue or Bard to be Psionic from now on, just to be able to add, potentially, +13 to a skill check at first level. It's a bit too much and could have been probably solved by making the bonus be half the die result, capping the total at a very good +10.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
With damage it works perfectly, and in the feat it's even slightly under-powered, although it can be awesome if for some reason one uses small-die weapons (the double-scimitar from Eberron would be the optimal choice!), since it substitutes a die, instead of adding.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Which brings me to another possible fix for the skill bonus granted by the feat: leave it as it is, but make it substitute the Proficiency bonus, effectively becoming my beloved Skill Die which never saw the light of day after the old D&D Next public playtest phase. It would still mean adding on average a +1 and many times +2 or +3, up to +4, at first level. So still amazing. But interaction with Expertise would become harder to figure out. I guess for those cases, the best would be basically die and single Proficiency bonus: like it is now, basically.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Another feat offender is Tower of Iron Will: although it's supposed to be fairly high level for non-psionic characters, a Fighter might take this at 6th level and become basically a nightmare for the DM, since adding a whole d6 to saving throws, yours and others' means saving the day many times.</div>
<div>
Again, if this would be instead of proficiency bonus, or half the die's result, it would probably be a bit more in-line with other bonuses.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>When it comes to the</b> <b>subclasses, instead</b>, <b>as I mentioned the Sorcerer might be an offender</b>. <br />
I don't see any reason to play any other Sorcerer subclass after seeing this, and not just because I like it, on the contrary: the strength of the mechanics attracts me even if the flavor itself is the worst of the bunch for me personally. I really love the Psi Knight and the Soulknife (ten times better than their last incarnations, although it was a low bar...), but this Psionic Soul Sorcerer is just WOW: temporarily learn spells? Amazing. Avoid the spell components? At last! Telepathic Speech? Of course!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
It's just a bit too much, and it gets crazier at higher levels, although all very thematic.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
This I don't have many fixes for, honestly. Discovering spells is probably the most amazing feature, and I think it could be ok if it came later on, and/or if it would be limited to a selection of spells (like Cleric's domain spells), and not two entire schools, which by the way also forces one to find indexes of spells by school, which are weirdly not present in the manuals.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>One more highlight:</b></div>
<div>
<b><br /></b></div>
<div>
The awesomeness of the new mechanic is shown in the cost of some powers of the Psi Knight and Soulknife, which is a great example of how the Psionic Talent die can be used for more powerful effects too:</div>
<div>
<i><br /></i></div>
<div>
<i>"Once you use this feature, you canโt do so again
until you finish a long rest, unless you decrease
your Psionic Talent die by one die size to use this
feature again."</i></div>
<div>
<i><br /></i></div>
<div>
See, this is a great way to control daily uses of powers, without even having to do book-keeping of slots and numbers: the player just keeps the Psionic Talent die close at hand, and instantly knows how many uses left, and how good or bad an idea it is to lower it. Plus, again, it makes you ponder your decisions much better, because all your other Psionic abilities will be affected by the decrease. <br />
This is an example of drawback of Psionics compared to Magic that we fans actually LOVE TO SUFFER! Imagine if a Wizard would have all its spells weakened after using a Fireball: players would come down on the streets marching in protest, but for Psionic fans, this is actually cool!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>One more fixable problem:</b></div>
<div>
<b><br /></b></div>
<div>
Wording. Although the mechanic is awesome, it takes a lot of space to be described. This is better fixed by designers than me, since I am notoriously verbose, but in general I think the worst offender is the Wild Talent feat: it's just too long, and while it's basically the same in the classes, one expects this length of stuff more in classes than in feats. My solution would be, once again, to actually nerf it, for example not giving out with it the Psi Replenishment feature, or even the scaling die size, although the latter would mean the ability would at some point become irrelevant, at least for damage.</div>
<div>
The best solution would just be to really shorten the explanation in the whole <i>Changing the Die's Size </i>section: it perhaps states too many examples, and could be shortened a lot.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
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All in all, we don't want Psionics to be considered convoluted or difficult, at least not too much, otherwise the same usual vocal minority will have another excuse to complain it makes the game worse, just because they don't like it in general. Never mind the fact they would have not wanted to use it anyway, and they could just avoid it... It's like people wanting to ban a product that they would have all the rights of banning just from their houses! Which brings me to an appeal to the designers, to end this anti-rant...<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Speaking of feedback which might be against this new development, I appeal to the rational mind of designers.</b></div>
<div>
Don't miss opportunities just to please naysayers: create something liked by the ones who actually care, and then the naysayers can always choose not to use it. But us the fans, we can't really choose to use something if it doesn't exist, unless we home-brew it, which inevitably distances us from the game, like it was already happening to me...<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
So just continue on this path: balance things out, and have Psionics be really unique, really different. And if someone doesn't like it, nothing will happen to them: they can always ban it. If instead you will go back to avoiding new mechanics and lean heavily on spells to do everything psionic (which unfortunately is still being done here and there, like <i>mage hand </i>representing<i> </i>telekinesis...), you will just have created something that nobody complains about, but nobody really enjoys.<br />
A complete waste of time!<br />
<br />
So here is hope we are on the right path to a great comeback of Psionics, perhaps tied to Dark Sun or similar "psi-heavy" setting, and that perhaps we will even see a true psionic class, instead of only subclasses. A man can dream!<br />
<br />
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<br /></div>
LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-30933631979916456962020-04-11T11:04:00.003-07:002020-04-15T04:35:34.167-07:00I is for Ixalan - My entry for the "To Boldly Go" #RPGBlogCarnival<br />
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My dear friend and digital brother Gonzalo is the host/protagonist of this month's RPG Blog Carnival, titled <a href="http://codexanathema.com/2020/03/24/to-boldly-go/" target="_blank">To Boldly Go</a>, and themed around planes of existence, both from D&D and Magic: The Gathering. It's combined with the Blogging A to Z Challenge, but with my geologic rhythms I would have never been able to follow through with it...<br />
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But when it came to "I", I couldn't skip it... And not only because I am egotistical, but because I is for Ixalan, one of my favorite Magic: The Gathering settings/planes to date, which is saying a lot!<br />
<br />
Of Ixalan I absolutely LOVE the Merfolk, which seem to me like the most solid tribe, culturally and anthropologically speaking: you can sense their traditions, culture, and history just by looking at the illustrations, and the fact they are so synergistic in-game adds to the feeling.<br />
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Speaking of their culture, the language comes to mind, of which we get a glimpse only through their names.<br />
Out of sheer obsessive-compulsiveness, I noticed the names were always recycling the same syllables, other than always being composed of three syllables. This got me thinking that their names follow some sort of convention and pattern (apart from the declared intention of following the names of the great nine rivers of Ixalan), and made me think that, from a role-playing perspective, players wanting to create a Merfolk character would stick to this convention.<br />
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From here to what I envisioned, there's quite a big leap, but it's just too satisfying for the rules-tinkerer inside me: racial bonuses based on character's names!<br />
<br />
So for this entry I will present a draft for an Ixalan Merfolk race, with a few shared traits, and most of the rest coming from the choice of character name, or syllables that compose it.<br />
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<b>Ixalan Merfolk Syllables</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Analyzing the names of the nine river heralds (Tishana, Kumena, Pashona, Vuhana, Mitica, Notana, Falani, Tuvasa, and Kopala), I came up with nine syllables, each with a few variations.<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>Na/No/Ni</li>
<li>La/Ra/Li </li>
<li>Sha/Sho/Sa </li>
<li>Ti /Tu/Ta/Te</li>
<li>Vu/Va</li>
<li>Ku/Ko/Ca</li>
<li>Ha/Hi</li>
<li>Pa/Fa</li>
<li>Me/Mi</li>
</ul>
<div>
Associating each of them to an "element", a class, and an associated ability (roughly inspired by the characters and what they have in common) I came up with this</div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>Wood, Warrior, Dexterity - Na/No/Ni</li>
<li>Water, Wizard, Intelligence - La/Ra/Li </li>
<li>Wind, Shaper, Wisdom - Sha/Sho/Sa </li>
<li>Jade, Mystic, Wisdom - Ti /Tu/Ta/Te</li>
<li>Mind, Scholar, Intelligence - Vu/Va</li>
<li>Gold, Leader, Charisma - Ku/Ko/Ca</li>
<li>Monkey, Expert, Dexterity - Ha/Hi</li>
<li>Rock, Protector, Constitution - Pa/Fa</li>
<li>Sun, Tyrant, Charisma - Me/Mi</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div>
This already gives meaning to the names (using alternatively the element or the class, such as Tishana being either "Jade Wind Warrior" or "Mystic Shaper of Wood" or any other combination), and also some bonuses. <br />
<br />
To go with a bonus to the ability, I came up with a few thematic bonuses. At first I thought to just make them stacking, since I wanted the syllables to be repeatable once in a name, considering there are variations to the vowels and not only. But then I thought it would be cooler if the repetition would just give something cooler.<br />
To avoid missing out on these cool effects and kind of forcing the repetition, I would allow a feat that would make you take an extra syllable chosen from one that you already have. Just once.</div>
<div>
<br />
<ul>
<li><b>Na/No/Ni</b>: Your Dexterity score increases by 1. You have proficiency with a weapon of choice that doesn't have the heavy or two-handed property. You can use Dexterity instead of Strength for the attack and damage rolls with the chosen weapon.<br /><br /><i>Taken twice:</i> As a bonus action on your turn, you can give yourself advantage on a weapon attack roll. Once you use this feature, you must finish a short or long rest before you can use it again.</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<ul>
<li><b>La/Ra/Li: </b>Your<b> </b>Intelligence score increases by 1. You know the Shape Water cantrip.<br /><br /><i>Taken twice</i>: When you reach 3rd level , you can cast the s<i>hield </i>spell once per day. When you reach 5th level, you can also cast the <i>mirror image </i>spell once per day.<br /><br />Intelligence is your spellcasting ability for these spells.</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<ul>
<li><b>Sha/Sho/Sa: </b>Your Wisdom score increases by 1. You know the Gust cantrip.<br /><br /><i>Taken twice:</i> When you reach 3rd level , you can cast the <i>catapult </i>spell once per day. When you reach 5th level, you can also cast the <i>warding wind </i>spell once per day.<br /><br />Wisdom is your spellcasting ability for these spells.</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<ul>
<li><b>Ti/Tu/Ta/Te: </b>Your Wisdom score increases by 1. You have resistance to necrotic damage.<br /><br /><i>Taken twice:</i> You have advantage on all Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma saving throws against magic.</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<ul>
<li><b>Vu/Va: </b>Your<b> </b>Intelligence score increases by 1. You have proficiency in two skills among Arcana, History, Nature, or Religion.<br /><br /><i>Taken twice:</i> You gain expertise with the chosen skills, which means your proficiency bonus is doubled for any ability check you make with it.</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<ul>
<li><b>Ku/Ko/Ca: </b>Your<b> </b>Charisma score increases by 1. When you use the Help action to grant advantage in combat, the friendly target can be up to 30 ft from you.<br /><br /><i>Taken twice:</i> You can use the Help action as a bonus action on your turn.</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<ul>
<li><b>Ha/Hi: </b>Your<b> </b>Intelligence score increases by 1. You have proficiency in one skill and one tool of your choice.<br /><i><br />Taken twice:</i> You gain expertise with the chosen skill and tool, which means your proficiency bonus is doubled for any ability check you make with them.</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<ul>
<li><b>Pa/Fa: </b>Your<b> </b>Constitution score increases by 1. You gain proficiency in shields.<br /><br /><i>Taken twice: </i>When a creature you can see attacks a target other than you that is within 5 feet of you, you can use your reaction to impose disadvantage on the attack roll. You must be wielding a shield, or be able to cast the <i>shield </i>spell.</li>
</ul>
<div>
<br /></div>
<ul>
<li><b>Me/Mi: </b>Your Charisma score increases by 1. You have advantage on Charisma (Intimidation) checks.<br /><br /><i>Taken twice: </i>When you take the Ready action, you can make another friendly creature perform it, instead of you. When the trigger occurs, you can take your reaction to make the designated creature perform the chosen action.</li>
</ul>
<div>
<br /></div>
</div>
<div>
As you can see, most of the abilities are borrowed from other races, or sometimes classes, with the exception of the last one which is basically a reinvention of the Warlord, from my beloved 4e D&D.</div>
<div>
The rest of the racial entry is much more simple, as you can see below.</div>
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<h3>
Ixalan Merfolk</h3>
<div>
Ixalan Merfolk have varying abilities that come from the spirits evoked through their names.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Syllables: </b>You can compose your name out of three syllables, with the possibility of repeating one of them. You gain the bonuses associated to the chosen syllables. You can't choose a combination that would increase by 3 an ability score.</div>
<div>
<b><br /></b></div>
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<div>
<b>Age: </b>Merfolk reach maturity early, around 10 years of age, but can live up to 200 years.</div>
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<div>
<b>Size.</b> Mefolk are slightly shorter than humans, averaging about 5 feet tall. Your size is Medium.</div>
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<b>Alignment: </b>Although depending on their names and therefore on their place in society merfolk can tend towards chaotic or lawful, most of them favor neutrality when it comes to choose between good and evil, with the exception of protectors and tyrants, which respectively tend towards good and evil.</div>
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<b>Speed: </b>Your base walking speed is 30 ft and you have a swimming speed of 30 ft.<br />
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<b>Amphibious: </b>You can breathe air and water.</div>
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And that's it! I hope you have fun making up your own crazy merfolk as much as I do!</div>
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LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-63099899769127700502020-02-03T14:39:00.001-08:002020-04-15T04:34:36.739-07:00Carwyn & The Revelthanes Of The Feywild - ][<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The garden of delights had turned into a hellish landscape.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">While it was the bodies and blood of nymphs and hags making for the macabre visuals, the tormented souls were the ones of the living, or so it seemed.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Red Mane, as they called him when his long hair was undone, sat on the deformed stump of a tree that someone or something had fell with multiple savage strikes. His head cupped in his hands, the shaman seemed to be crying, but it was impossible to decipher which emotion made the tears well: sadness, melancholy, or some more profound disturbance of the soul.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Blyrdian wailed like a true tortured soul, walking aimlessly, alternating the tormented screams to hysteric laughter.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Delsevas was busy digging some resemblance of tomb (or hiding) to dispose of the bodies and limbs, chanting some sort of mantra in Ancient Elven. It could have passed for a mourning dirge, but was really more a meditation to recover the expended spirit essence.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Thyrona also performed some sort of funeral, although it would have been sacrilegious judged by almost any religious metric, save for some twisted goddess of death like the Raven Queen, which she sometimes mentioned, even if she despised the non-fey divine beings, like most inhabitants of the Feywild.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Carwyn, finally, managed to be the most melodramatic and twisted of all, crying over the bodies while caressing them softly (although only the ones of nymphs).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">He finally took the initiative for a speech, like everyone was expecting him to do.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br />"Oh, companions! <br />Oh, dear comrades in arms, and in sadness! <br />What is the meaning of such a wasteful bloodbath, you must be asking yourselves. Because I am! <br />And let me tell you once again, it's clear to me: the meaning is far from what would give us peace in this torment. <br />The meaning is far from what would satisfy our heart's thirst.<br />The meaning is far from... Our reach. <br />And in our reach instead there is form. <br />The form that all this took before our eyes: take it in! <br />Try, if you can, to see the beauty of this bacchanal that turned onto itself. <br />For whatever reason the nymphs went mad and wanted to rip us apart, they craved blood. And they got it. <br />What beautiful deaths! <br />Look at their faces: satisfied of the carnage even in their final crazed rictus. <br />Love, I tell you. <br />Love was probably responsible. <br />Terrible, drunken, elated love. <br />But don't dwell too much on this! <br />Don't let such waste weight on your soul and deprive you of your rightful joy: we are thanes of revel! <br />Our joy shall never be taken from us! <br />Nor our freedom! <br />So hide these ruined bodies well: none should know of what happened here. <br />None would understand! <br />Don't tell this to your best friends, even less to your families.<br />And rejoyce that none of us lost their lives.<br />That none of us lost this fated battle. <br />That all of us won! <br />Like destiny dictates!"</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">"What about the hags, my jarl?" - Said Thyrona with her usual boldness - "What was the beauty of their bodies twisting lustfully with yours, before the blood spilled?"</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Both Blydrian and Delsevas sounded the discord they felt at those words, as if trying to show the shame that the little pixie didn't, sure that Carwyn wanted to hear about those details the least.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">"Nepenthean wine, my dark baroness! I remember little if at all! For my mind, soul, heart, and even body: this never happened."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">"Oh but it did." - Continued Thyrona in a stinging mood.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">"Enough! For a few instants during the heat of the revel, I almost felt the love I was craving. The hags gave me that? I don't want to know that, and I <i>won't</i>! But that special sensation, that special state of the heart: I think we all felt it at some point. Some from others, some from within. That's the meaning you can get, if so much you want to find some, because I know you in particular have this fetish for meaning, Thyrona: the deaths's meaning was for you to feel that special moment. Those fragments of eerily infinite satisfaction: save them in your memories forever, and enlarge them. Let them cover and delete the memory of all this bloody waste. Let your spirits be sated with beauty, and rid of hideous death!"</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">"Well, hideous for you, maybe: death is just as beautiful to me as those half-forgotten, delightful..." - Continued shockingly the pixie.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br />"You evil-on-wings! What else can that tiny stomach of yours digest?" - Interrupted Blyrdian nearly scandalized, but also envious of the tiny lady's guts.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">"More than yours for sure, green fleck." - Delsevas didn't miss an occasion to bully the gnome. The careless wickedness was coming back to him at last.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">"I dare you to say that again!! I FEYDARK-DARE YOU!!" - Retorted the gnome after jaunting in the eladrin's face, ensorcelled blade all but cutting at his neck. The elementalist monk didn't even flinch, and actually grinned slightly</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Red Mane seemed to mirror that grin, losing his sad face for the first time.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">"Please, my friends! Quiet your arcane fires... But YES, keep them alive!! ...This is the spirit! Let's restore this place to a verdant haven, my red friend, and let the necromancer deal with her specialty, while we reason together of novel and ambitious plans, other than necessary and useful contingency plans! Such as those we should employ should word of this as much as get near the Teal Tower of Autumn, were <i>the lady you know </i>rules sovereign."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">"HAH! That I wanted to hear! That's what troubles you, right, oh our fearless leader!?" - Blyrdian appeared in front of Carwyn this time, blade in hand, to which the fey knight responded with an arcane flourish of his mithredain long-sword, and a jaunt-blink of his own, appearing behind the gnome, followed by another blink of the duelist, who appeared on his head, to which Carwyn replied dive-rolling onto some bushes, to then disappear again: a faux-fight resembling that of ermines or weasels, an adult and a cub, chasing each other's tails in jumps and spins.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">"I tell you: you should be even more afraid than I am, of the witch of Teal Tower! She could make sure you will all only dream of revels, from bleak prisons of air and shadows!"<br />"That is fairly true." - Commented Delsevas, who knew the capabilities of this phantomatic <i>lady, </i>since he came from a related eladrin house, making him a distant cousin of Carwyn.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">"Let us move on."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Red Mane spoke.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Silence followed.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-26698341623206807712020-01-21T15:44:00.003-08:002020-04-15T04:34:46.387-07:00Carwyn & The Revelthanes Of The Feywild - I<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">"ARGH!" - The cry of Carwyn was not of pleasure anymore, but it went unheard, absorbed by the densely misty night as if the Feywild itself would have wanted to silence it. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">His most unwise companions were near but distant at the same time, embowered as they were in their concubines' gardens of delight. Lost in Feywilds of their own, rather literally.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Red was the only friend to hear the knight's pain, but couldn't do much more than replying with another dire howl, which resonated in the soaked air as if piped through an organ, to the cheers and inane replies of the three unaware companions, and their apparently frivolous lovers.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The willowy firbolg was pinned to the ground by four nymphs, which proved extremely strong, making him enraged for not having seen through the illusion before. Although at last he did pierce it. The same could not be said of the others.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Red managed to free his mind enough to call his loyal companion: a vortex of wind and primal spirit, which carried moss, dirt, leaves, and anything else it could carry from the ground, to which it appeared vaguely tethered.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The elemental came bobbing up and down like a pouncing predator made of zephyr and roiling anger. </span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">It took one of the berserk nymphs in its bludgeoning currents, freeing him from her grasp.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Carwyn in the meantime had recovered a measure of consciousness: the nepenthean mead was the only lymph animating his thinking tissues, but since that matter must have been rather vegetable in nature, the sweet sap was strangely capable of making the cogs of his thought turn.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">In that instant of clarity, Carwyn touched one of the nymphs while pronouncing a word of power that not even oblivion could delete from his mind. Suddenly, the being changed under his very nose, appearing like a twisted knot of bones and sick flesh of a vaguely human form. Carwyn's mind probably didn't register the horror of having been intimately touched by that being, but it was for the best: he absent-mindendly flicked a finger and the monstrous humanoid crouched into a ball of claws and hair, and then jumped like a rabid toad onto a nymph that was about to replace the lost grip of the magically fooled sister. Sister? Carwyn's mind was drifting in the astral sea, and yet it perceived more truth then when it rode the horse of sober judgement.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Exiting the roaring fire, drunk of flames more than alcohol or passion, Delsevas finally focused, perceiving the ugliest of beings next to Carwyn, clawing at one of the nymphs.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">All but enraged, he leaped in supernaturally high bounds, accumulating momentum like a topspin about to be played with by a cloud giant.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Arrived at the scene showing the meaning of haste, he released a flurry of rotating kicks and spear slashes, igniting the air with each stroke: he HAD to save the NYMPH!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The deformed hag screamed in pain, looking back at Carwyn as a a surprised wife witnessing betrayal (she was in fact unable to see Carwyn as anything else than a lover after he placed the eldritch spell on her). She then turned to Delsevas joining his dance of pain with crazed moves of her own, clawing and biting at the eladrin. Notoriously hard to catch, Delsevas was nonetheless left bloodied by the onslaught, and redoubled his efforts in a defensive position, calling for the others, who were now pinned by nymphs themselves.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Carwyn was trying to tell Delsevas about the nymph behind him not being what she appeared to be, but while remembering magic words of power easily, he could not speak high elven for the death of him.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">While tiny Thyrona was unable to escape the strong hands of a nymph, even if she was starting to understand in her mind what was happening, Blyrdian was much more agile, and managed to free himself, and watch the degenerate bacchanal while hiding in the undergrowth.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Red in the meantime was trying to push aside the beings to reach his staff. Unable to do so decided to resist, healing his multiple lacerations with primal words of regeneration, and sending the elemental to retrieve the unassuming weapon, which it did quickly in a series of mad low flights.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Once the firbolg had the staff in the grasp of just one of his reaching hands, he unleashed the power of Shillelagh, becoming a force to be reckoned with. The false nymphs got hit one by one and forced to exit the reach of the mighty magic wood. Then from the ground emerged a new spirit called forth by Red: a spirit of the earth which threatened to entangle the unseelie fey into the roots of Yggdrasil itself.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Blyrdian was still thinking how to save the nymphs from the hag, when he witnessed the nymph behind Delsevas join in the flesh-eating just like the monstrous annis.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Seeing how the two companions had a chance of surviving (Delsevas not as much, but he never liked him anyway), he went back to the bower were Thyrona was held, not in lustful bondage as he thought, but as true prisoner.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The scene on his arrival was a mire of skeletal hands raising from the ground and holding the screaming nymphs. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Thyrona's playful mood had ended. In fact, she then unleashed a spell of darkness and death so great, that Blyrdian got lost in its arcane shadows, even if his eyes had been used to the pitch black of the feydark for most of his life. Or maybe exactly because of that.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Memories of his sad childhood of slavery mixed with the narcotic effect of the faerie wine and the disheartening necromancy: the gnome started crying desperately, but that didn't stop him from throwing knives into the darkness, wherever he remembered the enemy to be standing.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The bacchanal raged on into its deathly crescendo, until some annis hags were lying lifeless in the bower.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Their blood coagulated hastily, forming mockeries of berries on the bushes where it had been sprayed.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The turn of the tide came when Carwyn had started singing drunk, while engaging in confused swordplay, raising the spirits of his wounded or deeply upset friends to the point of making them even more deadly than the crazed hags.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Strangely, though, not all the downed creatures turned to their ugly forms. Some stayed nymphs, golden and silvery fluids mixed with blood on their sprawling bodies.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">What was happening? None of the companions really cared, since Carwyn's song had started: they had to WIN. Win against any attacker. Possibly chasing down those who escaped the battle, too. Which Delsevas and Red were happy to do.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">When the wild chase brought the two noble fey outside the reach of barely-conscious Carwyn's elating song, though, they lost their will to fight, exhausted and wounded, and went back to the camp.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">They found their noble half-elf friend sleeping half-standing, his sword impaling a nymph to the ground, and forming a grim and cold pillow for his limp body to rest on.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Blyrdian was throwing knives at the bodies while still crying like a shaken toddler.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Thyrona was the only one in her right mind, as much as her studying of the corpses in detail could be right in the minds of the two disgusted friends.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br />"Some of them were nymphs. The rest were annis hags. I have no idea what they were doing together, but they nearly took our lives. Of you two in particular. The mage tended their wounds, making sure none of the hag's taint remained stuck in them. Red Tail did the rest of the healing, the earth spirit helping in replicating it for all the nearby allies, sleeping and bloodied Carwyn included.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The Revelthanes had survived another revel, which turned into another fight. But at what cost? This is the question none of them asked themselves. A question they <i>never</i> asked themselves.</span><br />
<br />LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-78252771428371807492020-01-13T14:32:00.003-08:002020-01-13T14:49:42.767-08:00Carwyn & The Revelthanes Of The Feywild - Intro<br />
In my latest installment of "Playing a *Twisted* Fey Knight" I confirmed I would go on and finally write Carwyn in some fiction of his own, as I had also said as a comment to the last of the "ancient posts" I rediscovered about him.<br />
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I already said it twice, and even more times outside the blog, so the time has now come.<br />
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I will totally improvise this, and as the title should suggest, it will be nothing serious, but will try to be something fun.<br />
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I will still continue the old series with some goodies such as the character profiles of the "Revelthanes Of The Feywild" (Carwyn's companions), and my usual ramblings on game mechanics, but will keep the fiction separate, in a series bearing this post's title.<br />
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No more boring introductions then, and let's get going!<br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> "Hello, I am Carwyn Sidherfein, jarlet of the Teal Tower domains..."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><i>*Nymphs swooning coquettishly.*</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> "Me and my Revelthanes will be off hunting dragons till third dusk, but we would love to share the spoils of the hoards with you, at evening-star set, if you would be so friendly inclined..."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><i>*Nymphs' swooning intensifies.*</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> A tall gnome sporting a shiny mithril breastplate, and dazzling green hair styled like a frozen flame, jumped on a big moss-covered stone idol next to Carwyn, to reach his ear: </span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">"Great job, mate!!"</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> Carwyn ignored the companion and let out a sunny smile to the group of scantily clad fey ladies, probably as a diversion so they wouldn't listen to the gnome's blather.<br />Their sparkly eyes welcomed the gesture.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Carwyn and The Revelthanes were after this fabled circle of nymphs for months. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The rumors they gathered feverishly had entangled them in a confused ball of threads, weaved by the likes of easily-offended sprites, frivolous boggles, less-than-bloodthirsty redcaps, and love-crazed coures, which all lead them astray.</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A love-crazed coure</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">In the end, it was a strangely romantic colony of myconids to guide them to their quarry, having left a trail of spores in the wind, revealing their bashful thoughts on the fair ladies they spied from underground.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zMT6pF6Hamo/XhzljwRkgiI/AAAAAAAABns/61xTYrZx7FYrSt6_P0u3_THBz0SFVtB5QCLcBGAsYHQ/s1600/Mushroom_men_sage_3.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="965" data-original-width="498" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zMT6pF6Hamo/XhzljwRkgiI/AAAAAAAABns/61xTYrZx7FYrSt6_P0u3_THBz0SFVtB5QCLcBGAsYHQ/s640/Mushroom_men_sage_3.png" width="330" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A romantic myconid</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">After kisses blown to the wind, long rhymes of good bye, and painfully prolonged prancing of their rides, the band of fancy adventurers galloped off in style on their mage-bred steeds, never to return to the fairy circle before having killed "at least two" dragons. <br />Or so they bragged to the nymphs.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> "So what's the plan, my tall jarl?"</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">M</span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">agnifying the noble title on purpose to attract his attention,</span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> pixie mage </span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Thyrona</span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">, only female member of The Revelthanes, interrogated Carwyn with inquisitive eyes.<br />Clearly, she knew they wouldn't kill two dragons by third dusk.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> "Don't stress, my little dukess," the title repaying the wizard's humour in kind, "I know of a stash of rich-looking trinkets made by lousy humans that should not be guarded. If you will be so kind as to perform that little magic of yours on them, you might manage to make them look like the hoard of an ancient red dragon, at least."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> Thyrona expressed her disdain in an exaggerated pout, before replying. "Excuse me?? I am a necromancer!! Dabbling in the alchemical nonsense is the stuff of swindling gnome artificers! No offense, Blyrdian."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> The green-haired fey replied instantly: "None taken: no gnome artificers here... Only a gnome duelist sorcerer-extraordinaire!"</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> The rest of the regular-sized band laughed at the gnome's hat flourish, with the bare-chested Delsevas quick to add his sarcasm: "If you can call yourself a duelist wielding that tiny dagger, then I am a lancer of the court with my-"</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> "Gentlefey! Come on now, let's not spoil the thrill of this <i>wild hunt </i>with images we won't be able to un-cairvoie..." Sober Carwyn did not fancy jokes on male anatomy, even if when drunk he was quite liberal about them (the jokes <i>and</i> the parts<i>, his and others'</i>).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> In all of this, Red Tail was silent as usual, although smiling absently. Slim to the point of gauntness for a firbolg, his presence still commanded respect because of his tremendous height, and the aura of blissful calm he emanated. Sunset-winged butterflies often frolicked around his namesake long red hair. The eye of the storm that was The Revelthanes, Red Tail could actually bring and become a storm of his own when need be, and was no less of a crazy reveler when the tall order of emotion needed to move his spirit was reached.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> Carwyn commanded silence by taking the word yet again, ending the boasting and bickering of the unlikely party in the only way possible: by catering to their egos.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> "Thyrona! You... Are our key to the arcane secrets of creation! True, your art is that of darksome puppetry of death, but sometimes the lower kind is needed, and you are so kind as to provide..."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> The tiny raven-haired lady smirked with a flash of her violet eyes.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> "Blyrdian! Yours is no dagger, but ensorcelled rapier, to which many a foul creature paid tribute in currency of blood! May it become ever-richer! By the taxing will your wrist imposes!"</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> The gnome didn't understand much, but seeing the approving motion of Thyrona allowed himself to chuckle boastfully.<br /> "Delsevas then, our master of graceful and fiery pain by hand... And kick, and elbow, and spear! Your dance of summer flame has bewitched hearts from Winterfell to Everspring... And left burning reminders on flesh and bones of our unworthy opponents!"</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> The Summer Eladrin's pointed the chin up as much as his vein-riveted neck allowed, in pride.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> "And our Red friend, finally... Your mastery of the Great Spirit is the anchor keeping the caravel of OUR spirits steady, in the rocking waves of youth and l...ove. May your guiding bliss always be with us!"</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> The willowy firbolg gently swayed using his long staff as a crutch, as if to avoid falling from the saddle. Smiling without baring the teeth, his crimson hair and slow motion made him look like a true tree dressed for autumn.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"> The band cheered, and stirred their steeds to speed: another stolen prize was nearly in their grasp.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Worthless treasures were uncovered, magic rituals unraveled, vats of mead unsealed, and the revel in the faerie circle soon got stoked into a dire bacchanal.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Carwyn sung his songs of serendipity and dragon-slaying with a voice broken by pleasure, while his ornate plate armor was replaced by a chainmail of entangled, thirsty nymphs.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Thyrona buzzed madly like a bug around too many lanterns, diving from one nymph to another, giving free rein of her usually rational mind to her peculiar appetites.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Blyrdian jumped on the pixie's preys when they were most distracted by the tiny surprise on wings, using her as a diversion to sneak into the fun, barely noticed.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Delsevas didn't need company: he engaged in a dervish dance around the fire, which later continued <i>inside</i> the fire: his elemental-attuned body burning of passion but not flame.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Finally, shrouded in a whirpool of primal spirit-wind while standing on a statue's severed head, Red Tail howled like a beast-daemon of Brux, voicing the unfathomable inside him.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">That was the last thing Carwyn saw, before giving in to the oblivion of the nepenthean mead.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-11089355353106014832020-01-11T18:26:00.000-08:002020-04-15T04:42:54.804-07:00My Fixes to #DND5E - Part 1: Blending #L5R<br />
Previously on this absurd blog, my rant about me not liking D&D 5e anymore focused on how I would hybridize 4e with it, to get the feeling I was looking for.<br />
This is a fairly recent idea of mine, born mainly out of nostalgia, which sparked in me when I recovered old 4e-era material I thought lost.<br />
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What I did already with my main online group, with whom I play extremely rarely, so we want to have fun and advance meaningfully when we do, is blending D&D and Legend Of The Five Rings, the feudal Japan fantasy RPG, which has recently seen a new divisive edition. Something of the caliber of D&D 4e when it first arrived, with the difference that it was play-tested publicly, and from what I see it provides a really solid system and experience, which I remember wasn't exactly the case with 4e, which kind of came into shape after a year or two of books, errata, and constant expansion through official game-expanding magazines.<br />
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What I love of this latest edition of L5R (Legend Of The Five Rings) is that their namesake five rings (scores) which describe the characters (the four traditional elements plus "Void") don't really cover different things each like before, where some things were determined by your Fire ring, some by the Water one etc. While it's still true for some basics, which anyway usually take two rings and blend them (such as Endurance being derived by Water+Earth or "Focus" by Air+Fire), what these descriptors of the characters really provide is different <i>approaches </i>to every single skill/action. That is, you have five different ways of approaching everything, and you can usually be very good at one or two approaches, lacking in one or two more, and mediocre at the rest, depending on how you distribute your points, which in L5R depend in large part from your clan, family, school and background.<br />
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The connection of these elements with the story of the character can be very cool in the context of L5R, which is by design culture-heavy, but what really interested me is the mechanic of the game.<br />
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The five different approaches, with one or two kind of reliably good, make for a great addition to any RPG, in my opinion, because they kind of lower the chances of failure in performing some task, if you do it with your "good approach" (which of course it's not always possible or easy), and because they are a wellspring of role-playing opportunities.<br />
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They are particularly cool for a group like mine because when you play by post/chat very seldom, you don't want your bad luck with dice to plainly ruin the day of the character: it's just not realistic. Instead, you will succeed at the tasks you are good at, with the approaches you are good at, but it will be extremely difficult for you to perform other approaches, which sometimes are needed. This means the resulting story won't see a warrior failing to do anything because for some reason he was fumbling all the time with his swings at the monster, but an aggressive warrior perhaps failing to read the terrain and ending up in a bad situation, because he was trying to charge headstrong in a situation where flexibility and movement would have been the best approach. It doesn't compare.<br />
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In addition, the amount left to luck in this system, if you use the special L5R dice, is less in every way, even when you aren't using your best approach. The dice use special symbols which offer "success" quite often, but often at a cost: performing at your best is costly, like in real life. You accumulate "strife", which in the Japanese-themed game is especially connected to the characters having to restrict their emotions, but in a more generic take can just represent a mix of mental and physical strain. If you accumulate enough of these stress points, represented by flames on the dice, you become first of all unable to choose symbols on the dice that have them (usually they accompany success or opportunity results, more on that later), making you inefficient at everything you do, and then they kind of force you to have an "outburst", basically acting against your interest and, more practically speaking, losing time.<br />
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So compared to D&D, you have much more control: as a fighter, in D&D there is no such thing as "saving your strength to keep strong till the end of the fight", which instead here you can do by hitting less strongly, or less often, thus avoiding a build up of strife/strain. You also can score a "critical" much more often, and in an "explosive" way, meaning that a critical could lead to another critical, which could lead to another critical, since it's a dice pool system. This means that luck can indeed make you go "nova", as we say in the gaming slang, scoring a great success perhaps early on in an encounter or challenge, but that will mean most probably the next round or the one after that you will be severely worse, due to the accumulated strife/strain.<br />
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As I mentioned, success is not the only result you can get through L5R dice: you can also get Opportunity, represented by a flowery symbol, which can allow for all sorts of things leading to situations where perhaps even if you fail at what you set out to do, you end up with a favorable situation for the long run, or you even discover a completely different way to do what you want.<br />
A possible use of Opportunity is even "formalized cooperative story-telling", so that depending on the element/ring you rolled Opportunity in, you can add details or even entire objects or people to the scene/story, of one type or another, depending also on the type of action you were performing.<br />
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This is getting very wordy very quick, so first of all here are the fabled L5R dice:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLOhQiJXoZqCC5pZQZZ0aWdRObIZ_gLMBrE3UgC5RHsmiV2ntftwmrthkLraFO778pO4tX_nEj5CbDadyR2Cb_L6YyUCZ3MCC46WnQ-YMSREC1KaBvmInMESF5j95thFi4QoJhf6MAt4c/s1600/l5r01_dice.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="408" data-original-width="700" height="232" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLOhQiJXoZqCC5pZQZZ0aWdRObIZ_gLMBrE3UgC5RHsmiV2ntftwmrthkLraFO778pO4tX_nEj5CbDadyR2Cb_L6YyUCZ3MCC46WnQ-YMSREC1KaBvmInMESF5j95thFi4QoJhf6MAt4c/s400/l5r01_dice.png" width="400" /></a></div>
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And here what you will think is an extremely complex thing, but it's really not: a character sheet of one of my characters fusing D&D and L5R, attaching the five different approaches to the ability scores themselves, magic, skills, and everything.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgC1hGXajjfkp1FoT_i2mHKlDMURM-LiZIK9qFYQMrrju2abVUQUkKzz20_nf3LBTp09o6y1dQekVu3Nkkw6roYHJHJ54C37SoqZUpelh1KR3_dQNijGLiUpNoyReGgyQZCsHzRBrf_ycA/s1600/Sovia.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="944" data-original-width="1600" height="235" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgC1hGXajjfkp1FoT_i2mHKlDMURM-LiZIK9qFYQMrrju2abVUQUkKzz20_nf3LBTp09o6y1dQekVu3Nkkw6roYHJHJ54C37SoqZUpelh1KR3_dQNijGLiUpNoyReGgyQZCsHzRBrf_ycA/s400/Sovia.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Click for full view, and sorry: it's mostly in Italian!</td></tr>
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After a lot of trial and error, I went for a system where the ring/element value would basically raise or lower the ability score for the given approach, using an equivalence of points and a simple average between the two. Then I left the possibility of using these averages to determine the number of L5R dice rolled, or the bonus on the single d20 of the classic D&D system. (respectively the bold numbers in the colored matrix and the smaller number in parentheses). The latter was usually inferior in success rate, as I mentioned, but it also avoided the outburst possibility, so in the end it ended up fairly balanced, with characters sometimes opting for the d20. The rule however was: once you start accumulating strife, you have to continue with the L5R system. Otherwise one could just use the d20 when close to the strife limit, allowing to have the best of both systems.<br />
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An interesting thing with this system is skills: they have to be more generic compared to the D&D ones, because sometimes what a D&D skill does is fully covered by one approach. So for example no more Stealth: it's something you can do with the Air approach of Dexterity, and if you want to get skilled specifically in it, you first need a generic Agility skill, and then acquire Expertise in the Air approach. Yes, this is another change: Expertise would have been too powerful with new and more generic skills. So to keep it as it is, influencing two different skills at a time, I restricted it to two approaches per skill, leaving the others out. This means one can't be an "Athletics Expert" anymore (Athletics having stayed since it's pretty generic): you will be expert at Fire Athletics (power/sprint) and Water Athletics (flexibility/fluidity) or perhaps Air Athletics (precision/reflexes) and Earth Athletics (endurance/balance). Not everything, which is unrealistic.<br />
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I don't want to explain all the ideas and adaptations that went into this, but I would like to use this experience as an inspiration for creating a new system that integrates better with D&D.<br />
For example, five approaches might be too much for typical D&D, especially with the fifth one being this very Japanese "Void" one, that being so connected with self-sacrifice and magic, could end up being "the magic approach", making the whole system skewed. Why would a magic user be especially good at self-sacrifice, for example? Doesn't make sense. The manual of L5R offers examples in which this approach could be used for mundane tasks, but some work in typical D&D settings, most don't. When would you roll Void Athletics, for example? L5R explains "when you know you are risking your life", but that's too open to interpretations.<br />
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So most probably I would keep it at the four elements, or I would transform the fifth quite a bit.<br />
In addition, this system offers a lot of ideas when it comes to skills. While I said before, for example, that I would like Classes giving out mostly combat benefits, while Background/Themes would focus on non-combat, with Approaches into the mix, things can be more fluid: a class could indeed give some skills, as well as a bonus to an approach. For example, if Wizards need Earth (which in intellectual skills is associated to memory), it would make sense for the class to boost that element.<br />
Some classes seem indeed prone to use one approach more, while others are more generic. This would mean that some classes would leave a choice of which element/approach to boost, while others would probably be fixed, or partially fixed. A Rogue must boost Air for sure, and then whatever else, for example.<br />
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I also thought many times about these elements representing different kinds of magic, and even different spells. A Wizard would be more interesting I think, if by personal inclination some spells would come more naturally than others. Air for Illusion and Divination, Water for Enchantment and Transmutation, Fire for Evocation and Conjuration, Earth for Abjuration and Necromancy.<br />
Sure, it would limit the choices of spells of many Wizards and Sorcerers, if the ring value influenced the efficacy of the spell, but these are the things that really define characters and make for great role-playing.<br />
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Enough for now: these ideas need a good Earth approach, which I surely can't be good at when sleepy!LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-57365004876240036522020-01-10T17:41:00.003-08:002020-04-15T04:52:21.173-07:00Undead Posts: "Playing a *Twisted* Fey Knight!" - Part 3<br />
Part 2 of this series was the last one that came from the dead blog of 2011.<br />
But we are talking D&D and fantasy here, so with a bit of cheap necromancy, we can raise even dead blog posts, so from here on we have an undead blog series, shambling forward from its grave into its new third chapter! What undead, you ask? Well a death knight, of course!<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><a href="http://lord-archaon.blogspot.com/" target="_blank"><b><span style="font-family: inherit;">PLAYING A *TWISTED* FEY KNIGHT! - III</span></b></a></span></div>
Saturday, January 11, 2020, 1:32 AM<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">First of all, the CRUNCH</span></b></div>
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It comes too easy to me to talk about game mechanics, I just can't miss the opportunity even if I know most readers don't or can't care, because they either never played D&D 4e, or hated it. But yes, I re-did Carwyn using D&D 4e rules, and had to change quite a few things, so before continuing (or actually starting) his story, I want him to be a "legal" character in at least one game system. If he is balanced in the game system, he is credible in the story, this is my mantra.</div>
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So a Blackguard/Binder hybrid Bard dilettante (wow, three B classes), turns out, could just not work.</div>
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He needs to be Paladin/Warlock hybrid Bard dilettante. This turns out, allows for just the same powers, but first of all it's game-legal (before I was using a Paladin basic at-will which a hybrid Blackguard simply can't have if not fully Human), and secondly it's basically exactly the same. The only unintended downside is that it's his magic user side to have the striker potential, instead of his melee fighting side. This is bad because I still took mostly controlling magic, so the potential to deal high damage went down big time. In exchange, we got an actual at-will Defender mechanic, which before the character lacked even if he was supposed to emulate it through some tricks.</div>
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-n55UEFZrJN4/Xgzq2U3almI/AAAAAAAABe0/QEZNq_bPQ_QIxNIK6FDQFGuICWK7h4eMQCPcBGAYYCw/s1600/Josidiah.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="462" data-original-width="318" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-n55UEFZrJN4/Xgzq2U3almI/AAAAAAAABe0/QEZNq_bPQ_QIxNIK6FDQFGuICWK7h4eMQCPcBGAYYCw/s1600/Josidiah.jpg" /></a></div>
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Funny detail: both his Paladin side and his Warlock side use exactly the same powers I would have used for his Blackguard and Binder sides before. This is because Blackguard and Binder are subclasses of Paladin and Warlock. So no big deal. </div>
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However, I said "would have used", because between then and now, better options came out that I just couldn't pass. In particular for the Binder, for which an actual Fey Pact came out on Dragon magazine. True, Carwyn was supposed to be from the Court of Gloom, and he aptly drew power from a Gloom Pact, but this turned out to be the fruit of a fantasy philology mistake: there is no Court of Gloom, and the Gloom Pact is not related to the fey. By Court of Gloom I must have meant The Gloaming Court (which is actually a Seelie/Good court), or the actual Unseelie Court which draws power from shadow magic, which is what the Gloom Pact is about. However, the magic that actually is closest to both the Unseelie Courts and the Gloaming Court, is not the Gloom Pact magic, but the Fey Pacts made with Unseelie Fey which are basically corrupted by Shadow. And this is the type of pact Carwyn has as a Warlock.</div>
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The powers coming from this Pact are much, much more suited for Carwyn. Here is an example, his basic at-will spell:</div>
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Now it would be time to remind or explain to new readers what a "Defender" role meant in 4e: to punish enemies that attack your allies instead of you. Something that the Paladin can do even without swinging his sword. This power's synergism with the Defender role is double: you pull enemies towards you (making them potentially provoke opportunity attacks if they move away, or at least making it more difficult for them to attack your allies), and then also punishes enemies for attacking you. Lose-lose situation: if they attack you they get damaged, if they attack your allies, as well.</div>
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In addition, the pull is to be considered, as the power suggests, a "lulling" and "fascinating" effect on the enemy: very Carwyn-esque!</div>
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But this is actually the low end of our fey knight's arcane arsenal... Watch this:</div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span class="fontstyle0"><b><span style="color: #073763;">Level 7: </span></b></span></span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span class="fontstyle0"><b><span style="color: #073763;">Fey Pact Encounter Power</span></b></span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><span class="fontstyle2"><br />Though many might dismiss tales of men being enchanted by a fey<br />song or by the whispers of a dryad, there is one warning from those<br />tales that all travelers in the Feywild know: never let a creature<br />touch you, for that is the surest way for a capricious fey to make<br />you its slave. The binder masters the magic that makes this possible, <br />and by laying a hand on a foe that gets too close, a warlock can </span></span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">make <br />that </span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">enemy into a slave for a short time.</span><br />
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Now, in theory Carwyn doesn't count anymore as a having a Fey Pact (Binder) since he is not a Binder, so he shouldn't apply 5 damage here, but this being a Warlock attack means he would apply the Warlock Curse extra damage which a Binder doesn't have, so it's more or less the same.</div>
What's really good here is: the Paladin mechanics pretty much force enemies to attack him, and then what does he do? He react to the attack by DOMINATING the enemy. This means the attack is lost completely AND the enemy will most probably attack its own allies next. Extremely Carwyn-esque!</div>
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Although these new "Dark Fey" powers are great (there is one more that is so twisted I don't even want to show you, cause it will spoil the moment he will use it in a story), I couldn't avoid taking some old truly shadowy powers that Carwyn either had or wanted at higher levels, such as this:</div>
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<span class="fontstyle0"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: x-large;"><span class="fontstyle0"><b><span style="color: #073763;">Level 5: </span></b></span></span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span class="fontstyle0"><b><span style="color: #073763;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">Daily Power</span><br /><span style="font-size: large;"> </span></span></b></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="fontstyle0">De</span><span class="fontstyle0" style="color: #2a2928;">a</span><span class="fontstyle0">thl</span><span class="fontstyle0" style="color: #2a2928;">y C</span></span></b><span class="fontstyle0"><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">onduit </span><span style="font-size: large;"> </span></b> </span><span class="fontstyle0" style="color: #141414; font-size: large;">The Shadowfell's darklands are some of the most blighted places in that plane</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #545454; font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">โ</span></span><span style="color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">regions where death holds no release for the </span><span style="color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">creatures that fall there. This dread spell tears open </span><span class="fontstyle2" style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">twin </span><span class="fontstyle0" style="color: #141414; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">portals to such <br />a site, drawing you through it from one to the other as their noisome <br />influence blinds and tears at your enemies.<br /></span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"></span></div>
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Anything involving teleportation and blinding enemies is Carwyn's thing: he is supposed ti be Half-Eladrin instead of Half-Elf (a variant which never came out, strangely enough), so anything emulating the innate teleportation of his mother's race is welcome. Blinding is amazing because it's one of the ultimate forms of defending.</div>
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Now, he will have some more ways of screwing up enemies, but my favorite is the following, which is his basic bread-and-butter attack:</div>
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Seems normal, apart from the abusable "can be used as a melee basic attack", but the real power here comes through the combination of two feats which were famous back in 4e's times:</div>
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Apart from enabling a cool sequence of accurate sword swings and extra-accurate spells or additional swordswings (since by making these powers arcane and then giving bonus to arcane, it buffs itself), this power means suddenly Virtuous Strike is an Arcane At-Will, which means it can enable one of the best feats in the game: White Lotus Riposte, dealing damage equal to the ability modifier used by the At-Will (Charisma, a nice +6 for Carwyn) to an enemy that attacks you after you hit it with the attack. So there we go again: punished for attacking Carwyn, punished if they don't thanks to the fundamental Divine Challenge coming from Paladin.</div>
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But didn't we mention Bard before? Oh yes, and in particular Skald, through the "Master of Stories" feat. This, combined with Carwyn's Half-Elf heritage granting him another class's At-Will as an Encounter power exploits this powerful and thematic little thing:</div>
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Since this is an At-Will that has an Encounter-long effect, having it only as an Encounter power means having... IT. And since Virtuous Strike as I said is a basic attack, now every time Carwyn hits some enemy, he makes his allies better at hitting stuff themselves. Note that this is actually a Martial power, making Carwyn use FOUR power sources (Arcane, Divine, Martial, and Shadow) but all related to the Feywild, as the nice intro text about this Bardic power reveals:</div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><span class="fontstyle0">Luck and fate are two concepts that find their way into almost every song and tale about the Feywild, for the fey races seem to be masters at bending chance to their will. Bards who sing about these events often find that their allies are suddenly overcome by a streak of good luck themselves. Some believe that it is enough to sing of the fey in order to steal their luck, but most bards believe it is simply the ally making his or her own good fortune.</span> </span></div>
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Enough about "crunch", and enough with this third part: next time we will put to good use this and other powers and abilities of Carwyn in some crazy story. <br />
For now I will just anticipate that I have no clue myself about what I will make him do!<br />
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LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-85967477541605194092020-01-07T08:42:00.003-08:002020-04-15T04:52:46.996-07:00Ancient Posts: "Playing a *Twisted* Fey Knight!" - Part 2<br />
Second and last part (at least among the ancient recoveries) about my "twisted fey knight", Carwyn.<br />
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This one was the single blog post I was the happiest to have recovered because, although I remembered the main plot of the character's story, there were some details I knew I had forgotten, and they didn't disappoint me: they turned out as cheesy as I was expecting them..!<br />
Cheesy because, although Carwyn does have some (perhaps a lot) of traits that are not my own (or not anymore), this was one of the most blatantly autobiographic characters I had ever made, especially in his family's background, which is basically a fantasy allegory of my own.<br />
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Related to this, a big part of my happiness in recovering this piece was due to the pictures.<br />
Not the still from the movie Excalibur (1981) of course, but the two related to Carwyn's parents.<br />
The mother Thindreve is basically a fantasy version of my mom, even in looks, and the one I wanted to see again even more is that heraldic stylized capricorn at the end.<br />
I know: all this fuss for a drawing? Well, first of all I never found the same or a better one, ever (you can verify there's no other online by reverse image search), and secondly it was about the choice of that symbol for Carwyn: even if you will see it makes perfect sense that the capricorn would be his heraldic animal, it was also a reference to the zodiac sign of my father. Silly, I know, but at that time it felt like a spark of genius, and now it just makes me look very nostalgically at the whole thing, just like Carwyn would...<br />
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Yep, the penchant for melodrama is another autobiographic trait!<br />
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P.S.: My father is alive and well, I made it sound as if he's long gone! Actually, today it's his birthday: happy birthday (grand)Pops! :)<br />
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<a name='more'></a><br />
<a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20130720174318/http://community.wizards.com/lordarchaon/blog/2011/12/12/playing_a_*twisted*_fey_knight!_-_ii"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>PLAYING A *TWISTED* FEY KNIGHT! - II</b></span></a><br />
Monday, December 12, 2011, 9:19 AM<br />
Categories: <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20130720174318/http://community.wizards.com/lordarchaon/blog/cat/Dungeons%20%26%20Dragons">Dungeons & Dragons</a><br />
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Something I really wanted for Carwyn was a strong, nearly "heavy" background, and a peculiar personality.<br />
I didn't tell my fellow players and DM, but I nearly always had an inspiration behind Carwyn's idea, one that came from a very famous movie, Excalibur. And it is the character of Mordred.<br />
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-297NO_hIOwg/XhSrKl45yvI/AAAAAAAABhA/yb_nxSu-qo0oWGDozs58GreKhVyJCsG6QCLcBGAsYHQ/s1600/OIP.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="355" data-original-width="474" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-297NO_hIOwg/XhSrKl45yvI/AAAAAAAABhA/yb_nxSu-qo0oWGDozs58GreKhVyJCsG6QCLcBGAsYHQ/s1600/OIP.jpg" /></a></div>
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Not his story mind you, Carwyn is very far from a bastard child and neither him or either of his parents are evil, but I did want him to have a very close bond with his mother, and I wanted him to be a "spoiled child" of the likes of Mordred. I pictured a very protective, and magic-using mother (Eladrin), a noble of the Court of Eternal Autumn, giving him a lot of magical training and instilling in him a lot of self-confidence. After adolescence or during it, he would have eventually started having some contrasts with his mother. Feeling a bit overwhelmed by her protectiveness, he would have travelled a lot alone or with friends and eventually lived some years of adventures, even if not very heroic sometimes...!<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">A spoiled child?</span></b><br />
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So this is the concept: a bit of a spoiled child, grown up accustomed to dominating others (Blackguard: Vice of Domination), and with a very close bond to his warlock mother, which both gives him strength and dignity and at the same time makes him feel a bit oppressed, and paranoid, often thinking of his mother like a schemer wanting to dominate his life. This is an important aspect: he likes to dominate, and is fearful of others dominating him. His rebel part kicks in at this point, with him adventuring far from home to avoid his mother (who was a strict teacher besides being protective), and I imagine him searching for the company of nymphs and other comely fey beings, and getting involved in stormy fey romances from a young age... <img src="https://web.archive.org/web/20130720174318im_/http://fast1.onesite.com/community.wizards.com/smileys/smile.gif" /> After all he's very handsome and charismatic. But his fear of being dominated also makes him fly away from relationships very soon, sometimes provoking all manners of ill reactions from dangerous beings such as nymphs..! Anyway, he eventually survived to his twenties or we wouldn't be telling his story! <img src="https://web.archive.org/web/20130720174318im_/http://fast1.onesite.com/community.wizards.com/smileys/grin.gif" /><br />
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">Son of a great love story ended in sadness</span></b><br />
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Before devising all these last details, I had already decided the story of his father and how he would have become more attached to his mother. To tell the truth, the love story between his mother and father came to me even before deciding the whole character concept, and influenced it quite a bit!<br />
The story goes on briefly like this.<br />
His father came to the Lands of Eternal Autumn from the sea of the Feywild, aboard a large and unusual vessel, along with his Tuatha thanes. Think a bit Beowulf-like but instead of rude Norse warriors, these were chivalrous and fey-blessed Celtic-like Tuatha. The Court of Gloom welcomed the visitors very well, eager as it was to hear their incredible stories and sagas, and eventually, the Tuatha fell under the spell of those lands, reaching some sort of "nirvana" and staying there long years. It didn't take long years anyway for Carwyn's father Cadfael (meaning "Battle Prince") to fall in love with soon-to-be-mother Thindreve (the name should evoke "reve", French for dream, "thin" and also the name Guinevere). Thindreve was good with the sword, the only one to be able to duel with Cadfael, and both were noble, passionate, and art-lovers. In particular, they loved to hear to each other's stories and songs.<br />
Their marriage was a grand event and is recorded as one of the greatest parties and good times of those lands, but their happy love story did not attract only admiration, but envy. Carwyn was already 7 or 8 years old and passed all his days playing and training with both his father and mother when tragedy struck: Cadfael was poisoned with magic, in a way that left him physically and mentally crippled. Two long years of sadness passed in which the other Tuatha suspected more and more of Thindreve. Then one night, their suspects and indignation managed to even break the spell of the land. They took Cadfael and every painting and personal object of him, and they left on their vessel just as they had arrived more than 10 years before. Thindreve probably had cried all her tears already when that happened, since she didn't fall in to sadness as everyone expected, but found a lot of strength from that event. She became less dreamy and more severe, but her attentions towards young Carwyn grew even more, and the rest is history... That's also the reason of the name Carwyn, which means "Blessed Love". <img src="https://web.archive.org/web/20130720174318im_/http://fast1.onesite.com/community.wizards.com/smileys/smile.gif" /><br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-WH1G16FOqcY/XhSu1_AhGXI/AAAAAAAABhg/jyCt_20OL30Sx8iZz0Xm9USG9vvFQ8-zwCLcBGAsYHQ/s1600/ca128548800d8902d8155e7747b868b8.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="1600" height="362" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-WH1G16FOqcY/XhSu1_AhGXI/AAAAAAAABhg/jyCt_20OL30Sx8iZz0Xm9USG9vvFQ8-zwCLcBGAsYHQ/s640/ca128548800d8902d8155e7747b868b8.jpg" width="580" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Here is a young Thindreve, when she was still far from knowing the happiness of love, and she enjoyed solitude in the mystical forests of Eternal Autumn.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b><span style="font-size: large;">A strong heritage</span></b><br />
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Carwyn never forgot his father and his teachings. He being a blackguard (although more of a paladin actually) is the fruit of those teachings. I decided that the Tuatha were all a group of paladins/blackguards, whose power derived from the Seldarine (Corellon, Sehanine and Lolth) but not directly... Since the Tuathan theme stated that they were a people blessed by ancient fey, I thought of a time when maybe even the Seldarine walked the Feywild and the Natural World, and they could have instilled the Tuatha with enough power as to access divine classes without actually revering any god. And in fact, both Carwyn and his father know of the gods only through songs and poems as they were just mythical figures, but don't actually revere them, and the very concept of veneration is alien tot hem. They feel the divine powers coming from their own blood, an instrument to exalt the best and worst of their capabilities and use them in battle.<br />
Carwyn misses his father a lot, especially recently, when he started to despise his mother a bit. He sees his father nearly as a mythical figure, and he even created his personal heraldic symbol as an allegory of his father: the Capricorn, a mystical and mysterious creature coming from the sea, but also with a strong elemental-earth component, maybe also a symbol of the union of sea and land that brought him to life.<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">What else?</span></b><br />
<br />
I talked a lot of Carwyn's background, general story and a bit of his personality.<br />
I might add some more traits. For example, he inherited the parents love for art, and in particular songs, music, poems, and stories. He enjoys creating ones of his own, and as I already told in the first blog, he views himself and his friends always as heroes, always right in their deeds. He also is generally very cheerful on the outside, contrary to what you may have thought reading about his more angst-y side. He laughs a lot, he enjoys drinking and sometimes behaves like a satyr, a creature that he esteems, probably another reason behind the Capricorn symbol he chose to represent him and his heritage. He's also a romantic, of the decadent type: he views many unimportant things in an excessively poetic manner, as driven by the need of making everything beautiful, and this same drive also makes him treat important things like life and death in a romantic way that ends up stripping those concepts of their importance. To him, life must be a beautiful song, with all the good and the bad that this means..! Apathy and selfishness end up being strong inside him... And this, as I stated before, is at the center of what I call "the fey theme", an alien morality that is both fascinating and scary.<br />
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Should I write more about Carwyn?? It doesn't make much sense anymore: I never got to play him more than once, never developed the setting, and I don't even remember who his adventurer companions were supposed to be anymore, so I would have to think all these details, at a time when I barely find time for this blog or anything else.<br />
For some reason I think he should be part of a comedic story, which I never wrote. Some sort of He-Man in fairyland, but with some dark humor, and possibly satirical (in all senses)... We will see!<br />
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<br />LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-38027884550502714162020-01-03T09:12:00.003-08:002020-04-15T05:03:15.569-07:00A Damning Rant: I Don't Like D&D 5e Anymore<br />
One of the first new posts I'd like to write on this old blog of mine, is of a type I posted a lot in the past: a rant! Oh yes: I got older, so if anything I rant more, not less... And while before I was mainly ranting about details I didn't quite like here and there in the game, nowadays I find myself rather seriously disappointed by the direction that D&D took, design-wise.<br />
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<b>The cost of success?</b><br />
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During the times of 4e there was talk of "D&D being dumbed down", especially around the time the so-called Essentials books came out. The then new and radically different 4e was accused of wanting to cater to the masses that were playing videogames, making the game dumb like one.<br />
But I think it's clear to everyone now that the version that really dumbed down D&D is the 5th.<br />
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Sure, the edition is a big success, and it's in part responsible for this big renaissance of D&D and pen & paper RPGs, that the world is living right now. (I think Stranger Things has a much larger share of this responsibility, but alas, this is all speculation anyways.)<br />
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But see, this is the point: D&D became a game for the masses, which basically by definition means it has been dumbed down. I'm not playing elitist here: I love to see my favorite game accessible and liked by more and more people. My point is this had a cost: now I don't like it as much as before.<br />
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<b>Of forgotten (or ditched) ideals.</b><br />
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When 5e was in the making, the famous #dndnext you see named all over the place in this blog, back when I was one of the official alpha-testers of the game, it was exciting: a lot of new and radical ideas were being considered, and there was this feeling that we were going to have a super-simplified rules-set first, but that later on an advanced one would have surfaced, being totally compatible with the simplified one, but catering to the players that enjoy complexity, like me.<br />
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This never happened.<br />
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While there are here and there, even nowadays, some efforts to do this (recently Variant Class Features, or the Mystic class, which seeing recent tweets by the designers and the direction taken to represent psionics, I am about to consider dead in the water), the impression is that designers got blinded by the gold of the good sales, and just thought "Hey, we don't need no complexity: just do more of the same!" While simplicity has its virtues, and more options actually do add a bit of complexity in that they make every choice a little bit harder, there is really a big lack of complexity at the core of the game, and I can very easily identify where it lies.<br />
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<b>The (forgotten) magic word is: modularity.</b><br />
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Modularity was all the rage during the development of 5e, in the dndnext times. It seemed like the game was going to become something that you could customize however you wanted, down to the core.<br />
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You can see a fossil of this long-lost gamelogical era in Feats, in 5e: they are optional, and if you choose to play with less complexity (yes, even less!) you can exclude them and just get ability score modifiers. Now, not only this is the only piece of modular design left, but it's a bad one to boot: many of the feats, or at least many of the first ones which are STILL the majority (because very few others were released), don't provide ability score bonuses, making you ache like crazy when choosing to go for them, even if they add flavorful concepts that sometimes define the characters, given how "big" they are, in design space, compared to 4e or even 3e feats.<br />
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The cool idea of skill dice? It could have been modular, replacing proficiency bonuses. But nothing, it got lost. And what about granular skill improvement, 3e-style? It could have been another modular piece, without losing anything, but again, no luck. Same examples could be made about many many mechanics: the math of 5e is solid, so there could be many ways to dance around the same balance level but moving stuff around, or increasing the amount of "choice points" in character creation, or class feature usage, or more.<br />
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<b>But the great sin is my usual pet peeve: class identity</b><br />
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The examples above are just details. The big losses in my opinion are in the way classes and spells were designed. By wanting all the classes and "traditional spells" in the first book (a clear message, going against one of the big whining wars against D&D 4e), 5th edition cornered itself in a very bad spot when it comes to class identity: whatever they released as Ranger should have been the Rangers for years to come. Same for Warlock, Sorcerer, Paladin, etc.<br />
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The few of you who know this blog, know that I played the part of the "lathspell" in this, many times. And guess what: it all came to pass as predicted. The problem with hybrid classes was never solved, with Ranger seeming just a jumble of Rogue, Fighter and Druid in a single package, and the problem of Vancian magic used to represent everything was also just accepted by the majority, probably as another design-middle-finger against 4th edition, which had dared kill this sacred cow.<br />
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So the problem runs deep. While designers acknowledged the fact that some classes (and in particular the Ranger, as I always always warned) "fell flat" compared to others, their abandonment of modularity as a key concept of the game made it very hard to correct the mistake. Even when they announced they COULD have (they still didn't) release a revised Ranger, they always said this would have been an optional alternative, not a true revision. And of course it would be, because the way classes are designed, you can't do much else. For all its reputation of being monolithic and hard to modify, 4e was much more modular in comparison, with powers potentially changing a class without even having to modify a single bit of it. Not to mention how the whole system of AEDU could be changed into AADU, or AEU, changing the game as we knew it, as shown by Psionics and Essentials. What can still have the same effect on 5e? Spells. But that's another can of worms, because as I said, part of the issue of class identity is represented by spell design.<br />
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<b>From everything is a power to everything is a spell</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
One of the latest ways in which designers tried to save some classes (and the interest of players like me for the game, I guess) was by giving them more access to more spells.<br />
In the problematic case of the Ranger, it was free access to Hunter's Mark (a spell with VOCAL components, mind you), as a replacement of the trainwreck class feature "Favored Enemy". This would replace it imaginatively with "Favored Foe". Where to begin in explaining how wrong this is?<br />
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<ol>
<li>A ranger casting spells with vocal components is extremely contrary to the class identity of "silent and lethal woodland warrior". Can you imagine Rambo chanting magic words to be do more damage to an enemy? Ok, Rambo might be a bit of a bad example (although to me he is the most iconic ranger), but you can see this with any elf archer usually represented as a ranger, or Aragorn, or Drizzt, or anybody. It's just plain silly.</li>
<li>It tries to go back to the previous philosophy of 4e of "everything is a power", which could be a solution, but changing powers to spells means we are shoehorning them into daily vancian slots, assigning them somatic/vocal/material componenets, and giving mundane abilities a mystical flavor that they shouldn't have.</li>
<li>It's an attempt of driving attention away from the flaws of the system, and of classes, which in the cae of the Ranger are much deeper.</li>
</ol>
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This problem fell like an axe on the necks of other classes too: Sorcerer and Warlock. Classes that, while beloved by many, are in my opinion monuments to missed opportunities.</div>
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<b>The usual problem of arcane magic</b></div>
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Again, this might feel to you like "just another dogmatic opinion", but it can't be argued that by using largely the same system (vancian spell-casting), Wizard, Sorcerer, and (to a lesser extent) Warlock missed the opportunity of being truly different from each other. </div>
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Already many times people noted that the Sorcerer is basically an upgraded Wizard. The problem might become even worse if the Variant Class Feature allowing the Sorcerer changes of spells every rest becomes official. But mine is not a point of balance: what's really sad to me is having three classes just access the same power source in slightly different ways, instead of accessing truly different power sources. And you might say "But the Sorcerer and Warlock ALWAYS accessed the same power source as Wizards: Arcane magic." And I'll reply: "And is that a good reason to continue that way?"</div>
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The Arcane could have become something really arcane, really mysterious, by dividing it into truly different wizardry, sorcery, and witchery (or whatever you would call Warlock's magic).</div>
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Many people feel like it's bad to have to "learn different systems to acknowledge the same thing", but this is an ungainly union of two different and equally bad fallacies:</div>
<div>
<ol>
<li>Thinking that different systems are inherently harder to learn than a single one.</li>
<li>Thinking that different magic systems try to accomplish the same thing: magic.</li>
</ol>
<div>
The first one is wrong because of course it depends on how those systems are designed.</div>
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<div>
The second one is the worst, because it ASSUMES that these three classes try to accomplish the same, which is exactly the problem with their class identity. If they try to accomplish the same they shouldn't even be separate classes. The fact that <i>until now </i>they always tried to accomplish the same is just another fallacy, because it doesn't mean they should.</div>
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<b>The big improvement of role-playing is actually not enough at all</b></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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I am one of those players that thinks roleplaying should not be regulated at all, but since everyone agrees "4e was terrible for roleplaying, 5e is great", I assume people talk about roleplaying but actually mean the game elements that define characters out of combat. And although Backgrounds in 5e did improve this somehow, the problem of "this pillar of the character never levelling up" remained: you take a background at level 1 and it stays there, counting less and less in your characters, while spells become (whether you are a spell-caster or not, mind you) more and more important in your character sheet, especially if you would write them down and see how much space they take compared to everything else.</div>
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So what did 5e do exactly to improve "role-playing"? A set of rollable/choosable personality traits and flaws for each background? It's quite nice, sure, but it can't be worth much. Those things existed since forever, and everyone could have used them in 4th edition as well. So I'm quite sure that the change was just proportional in nature: there is less space devoted to combat (although mainly due to the fact spells are not considered "combat", even if 90% of them are all about it), so the general impression is that "story" became more important.</div>
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Less is more in design, or in some design school, true. But the way things are now in 5e, the system will stagnate very soon, and become a cemetery of lost opportunities, which will if anything be raised as rotting zombies, when finally the people's cry for MORE will be listened to. It will be too little, too late. And a 6th edition will be inevitable, just as the huge community-breaking rift it will cause.</div>
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<div>
<b>All right, so that was a long rant, but what do you actually propose?</b></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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Oh, so many things. </div>
<div>
<ol>
<li>I like how, system flaws aside, classes have actually much more identity in 4e. It had a Ranger that without spells managed to be truly different compared to the Fighter and (to a lesser extent) the Rogue, and the same for other classes, especially when you consider how much they evolved (with less being more, as per the 5e design philosophy) in 4e Essentials.<br />I would seriously play 4e classes with 5e math (mainly Hit Points), and be much happier, BUT:</li>
<li>I like many non-combat features of classes in 5e. The thing is: they compete for space with the combat stuff. Solution? Take them out of the classes and put them where they belong: Backgrounds! Backgrounds should be more like classes, in that they should evolve in time, level up so to speak. Heck, one should even be able to "multi-background", because it's frankly silly to think that a couple of years in the army would count so much for the character that decades of adventuring wouldn't change the character's mindset from the "Soldier background".</li>
<li>I would redesign completely the Ranger, the Sorcerer, the Warlock, and perhaps also the Rogue (since so many of its features would go into the Criminal background), and the Paladin.<br />Sorcerer would get on-the-fly magical effect creation, and Warlock would return to using powers that are more than just spell-like, they are <i>supernatural. </i>Paladin and Ranger would borrow a thing or two from the Tome of Battle, Mike Mearls true forgotten masterpiece, in 3rd edition times.</li>
<li>Advantage and Disadvantage are nice and all, but they can't be used for every damn thing. I feel like randomness has way too much weight on the game's math. Advantage and Disadvantage should, if anything, stack (roll 3 or 4 dice, take best or worst), and/or be accompanied by other bonuses, such as skill dice, proficiency bonus, and also a return of additional modifiers which could be standardized to +2, maybe.</li>
<li>Skills should be much more important and feel like they develop more in time. This proficient/non-proficient dichotomy is boring as hell, and just doesn't do justice to how much time and effort it takes to become really good at something. Expertise kind of solves this, but guess what, all my characters dip into the Rogue class just for this. You know the system is wrong when you have to multiclass all over the place to represent something that shouldn't require it.</li>
<li>I would welcome back Themes of 4e with open arms, and make them marry Backgrounds of 5e. With a big difference: the features and powers they would offer would not compete with class, but be totally parallel and in addition to it. If anything, they would compete with other Backgrounds-Themes the character might want</li>
<li>Quite the same for Race: it should matter more. It should basically provide a standard background for those that don't want to think about a Background-Theme, and allow those that want a Background-Theme to choose if to develop more towards the default of their race or their Background-Theme, at every level, and not only: these are features that could even be swapped in-level with the right story.</li>
<li>I would have Arcane magic split into Wizardry, Sorcery (with this split into elementalism and chaos sorcery), and Witchery or Eldritch Magic for Warlocks. All of them using different systems.</li>
<li>I would do Psionics justice with another separate system, and powers that feel really different compared to magic, much closer to the abilities of martial characters and monks. In fact, I might even have the Monk be the first Psionic class, like in 4e.</li>
<li>All of this, and everything else should follow a single design principle: modularity.</li>
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Sounds very complex, right? Well, first of all it doesn't have to be: taking modularity in mind means that you can have complexity or opt out. In some cases, classes would provide the difference in complexity by themselves (an elementalist would be extremely simple compared to a wizard), but most of the time, even within the same class you would be able to opt in and out of complexity, with premade choices expandable into multiple ones, subclasses that provide builds that "just work" even for the Wizard, and so on. On the surface, a character of this "new edition" would seem the same as a 5e one, but it would be much more interesting to make and play because of the additional choices, or lack thereof in case one opts for simplicity. What 5e should have always been.</div>
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Then you could also say there's a lot of 4e in it. Well yes, I discovered only now how much 4e had done right. You realize the good of something when you don't have it anymore.</div>
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And in fact, my next post will be some kind of "conversion manual" to merge 4e and 5e into a system that more or less does what I described.</div>
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Stay tuned!</div>
LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-8296980310601159952020-01-02T08:12:00.000-08:002020-01-02T08:56:19.905-08:00Recovered post: The Charms of Weavers<br />
Together with the recovery of old material from outside, I also found material that had never been published because it was in draft form here for a long time.<br />
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Connected to my aborted project of the Weaver class, here is a lore post about their "charms": movement-based spells, if you want, although I always wanted to make them much richer than that, and maybe one day I finally will.<br />
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This of course makes a lot of references to my World of Cthon setting/cosmology, so a lot of things might sound strange.<br />
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I will not comment any further, if not by saying that by hastily publishing the draft, I lost the actual date of drafting. Somewhere around 2015, maybe? Will make sure to record it next time: I got some more of these posts lying around as drafts.<br />
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<i>"Charms of Power were said to have been first discovered by angels.</i><br />
<i>Angels of Fire and Ice, of Light and Darkness, discovered their own powers encoded directly into the weave, or probably even had a role in their presence.</i><br />
<i>According to many, usually discredited academics, many wordy tomes of theological matters seemingly speak of the Charms of Powers among Angels, although giving out evidence that the original authors didn't actually know what they were writing about. Despite the conundrum, those scholars claim that the texts still convey a clear description of weaving practiced by angels, when read by someone who has the right knowledge. However flawed this point may be.</i><br />
<i>What would be a perhaps more interesting question, though, is who would have made the prophetic scribes write about these arcane matters, without even them knowing or understanding them.<br /></i><br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-4WWkgwmM9FU/Xg4cTjCkW6I/AAAAAAAABgE/fHmTEQTiMHAfNkSAaJtv17dnLTYXxOZIgCLcBGAsYHQ/s1600/site.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="744" data-original-width="1024" height="420" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-4WWkgwmM9FU/Xg4cTjCkW6I/AAAAAAAABgE/fHmTEQTiMHAfNkSAaJtv17dnLTYXxOZIgCLcBGAsYHQ/s640/site.jpg" width="580" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Angels from the Monster Manual 2 of D&D 4th edition: elemental powers were commonplace among them.</td></tr>
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<a name='more'></a><i><br />Charms of Hearts were logically discovered and used first by fey. It is not even known if fey discovered them because of their link with emotions, or if this latter link exists because of a direct natural connection of fey with this aspect of the weave, instead. This latter thesis would surprisingly make more sense, since it would explain why nearly all fey could be classified as embodying one of the Charms of Hearts, and its associated season. Speaking of these associations though, it has actually been the fruit of a conscious work by the fey themselves, to associate these charms with seasons. The further associations with the other charms would have been easy afterwards, and are also believed to be the work of high Fey Court master weavers.</i><br />
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<i>Charms of Making, often named singularly The Charm of Making by those who master all of them, are said to have been discovered by an ancient order of druids who, probably after contact with the fey, associated their own cult of the seasons to their practicing of weaving in the Charms of Hearts with the fey. Apparently, during their learning, they discovered by chance the material-influencing aspects of the weave that corresponded to those which influenced emotions. It is said that in those times, there could only be one Great Druid, and that only one Great Druid held the secret of The Charm of Making for an extremely long time (since a druid that powerful is practically immortal). Then some world-shaking event came to pass, and that legendary powerful spellcaster somehow decided, or was forced to, share his secret with the world. Many versions of this obscure legend exist, but in all of them is implied that only humans could have unlocked the Charms of Making from the weave, for some arcane reason connected with the gods, and thus probably again with angels.</i><br />
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<i>The Charms of Flutters, called like this by the winged fey, were not discovered by them at first. It is said that creatures resembling harpies, and that apparently opposed the fey in distant times and lands, the Sirens, were the first masters of these forceful charms. Legends abound of how they would have woven them so that ancient explorers could reach exotic lands by sailing the sea, and sometimes never return from them, or travel for long before making it home. It is not known why these beings might have acted like this, nor anything is known for sure about their origin, but apparently there was a scheme behind their actions, because through those ancient travelers, a lot of knowledge was spread in the ancient past, to the point that some scholars believe the current civilizations of the world owe to these ancient pioneers, and to the beings that made them travel against their will by weaving the winds of that ancient, arcane world."</i><br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Tmr4Tm4tmSk/Xg4fFplwumI/AAAAAAAABgg/4IHMSH8WuJUMqzgGIfiyWh-vtcyvKjndgCLcBGAsYHQ/s1600/Art_4bd623_6389986.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="882" data-original-width="1200" height="426" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Tmr4Tm4tmSk/Xg4fFplwumI/AAAAAAAABgg/4IHMSH8WuJUMqzgGIfiyWh-vtcyvKjndgCLcBGAsYHQ/s640/Art_4bd623_6389986.jpg" width="580" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"Lookout Dispersal", from Magic: The Gathering's Ixalan expansion. Art by Ryan Yee.</td></tr>
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<i><br />In the Golden Age of the world, dryads were much more diverse, and they were the spawn of the Titan Gods. Only the Forest God's spawns were actually called Dryads, while from different gods came different beings. The Sea Gods spawned the Nereids, the Mountain Gods spawned the Oreads, the Harvest Gods spawned the Alseids, and the Underworld Gods spawned the Lampads. These dryads are said to be the very first to master the art of Weaving. Their connection with the elemental gods and the land have them the ability to see the strands of magic in a way that not even the Gods were able to. Each of them favored different seasons, which back then were not called as such, and were just the typical powers of these god-spawned. The Alseids favored the "Summer" weavings, the Nereids favored the "Spring", the Oreads favored the "Winter", and the Lampads "Autumn". The Dryads were a special case, because by embodying the temperate forests, they became linked to all its seasons. This is why the Dryads were in the end the true saviors of the art: they learned it all, and secluded themselves in the mystical lands of the Forest Gods. So when the great cataclysm ending the Second Age of the world came, and the Forest Gods isolated their realms and closed most of the contacts with the material world, the Dryads remained there and preserved the art.<br /></i><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ff9hCqudnNY/Xg4Yt7-jfLI/AAAAAAAABfo/kFvkjcO2QEUQvohzClR50VmhWq3oJwlXACLcBGAsYHQ/s1600/ee2ca60195a386a847def82a2cdd56b6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="512" data-original-width="700" height="423" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ff9hCqudnNY/Xg4Yt7-jfLI/AAAAAAAABfo/kFvkjcO2QEUQvohzClR50VmhWq3oJwlXACLcBGAsYHQ/s640/ee2ca60195a386a847def82a2cdd56b6.jpg" width="580" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"Observant Alseid", from Magic: The Gathering's Theros expansion. Art by Todd Lockwood.</td></tr>
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<i></i><i>Now, in the Third Age, the Dryads have passed on their art, either willingly or not, and many other gifted beings have become Weavers.</i><br />
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LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-3102420776241921392020-01-01T11:15:00.001-08:002020-01-02T13:11:20.467-08:00Ancient Posts: "Playing a *Twisted* Fey Knight!"<div>
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Hello folks!</div>
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As mentioned, I'd like to kick-start this long overdue new season of the blog with some content from the past, miraculously recovered through The Internet Archive.</div>
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This entry from the end of 2011 was one of my favorites, since it contained images that I had not otherwise saved, and also quite a deep story (detailed more in the second part, which I will post later) and an enigmatic character build, which I remembered in broad strokes but could not replicate fully these days that I took an interest again in D&D 4e (more on this later).</div>
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It turns out the build was not "legal": I was using probably beta rules, or even inferring my own version of rules that were not out yet, with the result that this character, at least as conceived initially, would have never worked.</div>
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Still, few modifications would be needed (most notably a change from Blackguard to Paladin, which is anyway the same class), and at the end of the series I will post an updated version and perhaps even a 5e version of this beloved character of mine, which I played very little in the end, if at all.</div>
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So there you go, an internet and D&D fossil from nearly 10 years ago!<br />
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(Apologies in advance for the strange non-native English you will find: I see 10 years ago I was in fact worse off than now, with my English!)<br />
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<a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20130719192013/http://community.wizards.com/lordarchaon/blog/2011/12/10/playing_a_*twisted*_fey_knight!"><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">PLAYING A *TWISTED* FEY KNIGHT!</span></b></a><br />
Friday, December 9, 2011, 8:33 PM<br />
Categories: <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20130719192013/http://community.wizards.com/lordarchaon/blog/cat/Dungeons%20%26%20Dragons">Dungeons & Dragons</a><br />
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It's been a long time since I wrote a blog entry here... But let's get to the post subject already!<br />
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My latest Play-by-Post experience, the first outside of my Zendikar-D&D group, is a themed one: a "Nature's Allies" party hailing from the Feywild!<br />
In a group effort of cooperative story-telling (which I love) and also cooperative party-building (which I love again), we and the DM acknowledged that we needed a fey noble of sorts in the party. I caught the opportunity quickly and said I would have made a noble fey knight! And since I wanted to try out the Half-Elf exploiting the new Skald powers, I would have been a "Half-Eladrin", something that the Master approved, making it possible for me to use the Eladrin-only Fey Knight feature and power. But all of this wasn't enough...<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">It ain't good if it ain't twisted</span></b><br />
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I'm a lifetime DM and started being a player only recently: I hope this is enough to explain why I really can't play a character which hasn't a lot of dark side on him/her! Ok, that's not always true, I do have a Good character and an Unaligned one which acts quite well morally speaking, so it's not really my rule, maybe just the tendency of this period. After all, each character we build and play, I think it can be a picture of our current state of being and more. So maybe I'm a bit "bad" these days and I want to play characters that are a bit bad themselves! <img src="https://web.archive.org/web/20130719192013im_/http://fast1.onesite.com/community.wizards.com/smileys/razz.gif" /><br />
Back tot he point, after building my classic fey knight (using the Knight class) I quickly discovered that even with the Skald multiclass and Dilettante power, I just didn't have enough options to represent the complexity I wanted my character to have. I needed to be a defender, so I quickly started considering the other classes of the role, but none of them had what i wanted. I wanted darkness. So I thought "Why not a Blackguard taking defendery paladin powers? Will it be enough?" - To do it while still being able to be a "basic attacker" (and to have a first level daily power), I needed it to be a hybrid Blackguard. But what class to hybrid with? Warlock was nearly my instant choice, but since I was already choosing a Striker class, why not choosing the Controller Warlock, aka Binder? And what do we have here... Gloom Pact Binder. haven't I heard of the Fey Court of Gloom somewhere..?<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">A noble from a fey court of gloom!</span></b><br />
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Yes, the choice was made. When I started talking about the possible background, the DM who had just kindly accepted my strange build (hybrid weren't allowed in theory, but he liked the concept enough to make the exception!), he even devised a way for us to be all part of the court of gloom I was proposing, a court based on the "Lands of Eternal Autumn", an accordingly gloomy part of the Feywild we made up!<br />
More or less at this point or little before, I had chosen he would have been a Tuathan, using the character theme with the same name appearing in Heroes of The Feywild. Descending from heavily fey-influenced humans and eladrin, he would have had the right to be played as a "full fey", which was my aim from the start. Mechanically speaking, it wasn't a good choice, especially since I didn't choose the shapeshifter-like Tuathan powers, but the "heroic" ones which are a bit underwhelming, but it was a strong flavor choice. And he was already quite strong mechanically, being able to cover more or less every role, with a lot of marking powers, a striker mechanic, two controller powers one of which at-will, and leader healing once per encounter and leaderish effects on each basic attack (which also happened to be striker due to Balckguard's mechanic). You could ask what's left of the original fey knight idea, but that's only if you look at the names on the character sheet. Those things are meaningless in the game's world if you don't metaplay. And in the game's world, Carwyn Sihderfein is a blond handsome half-eladrin in shining plate armor, with a big shield and an elegant eldritch long sword. He uses dark magic but that's typical of the fey of gloom, and he's one of them.<br />
He's also the typical Face of the party, and uses seduction, trickery and intimidation as needed to reach his goals. For Carwyn (and most fey), the end justify the means, and "morals" are something rather alien..!<br />
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<img height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-n55UEFZrJN4/Xgzq2U3almI/AAAAAAAABe0/lHwUJwm_gfoQo7RApiJEfbjgCmscPH_sgCEwYBhgL/s640/Josidiah.jpg" width="440" /><br />
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">Fey and morality</span></b><br />
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Carwyn will be a defender and a leader mostly, one of those party members who actively care for their allies. But that doesn't mean he must be selfless as a character..! On the contrary, he's rather selfish. He does have a peculiar "code of honor", but being a fey, it's a very "open for interpretations" code! He values challenges, oaths, duels and all these things for example, as his proud Tuathan blood tells him from inside, but he will play dirty in each and every occasion, because for him losing is not an option. He's a zealous teller and listener of epic sagas of the fey and tuathan: he firmly believes that the heroes *must* win, and he firmly believes that he and his allies are the heroes, always. Besides, all the heroes of the stories he grew up with, or at least all the successful ones, were mostly of the trickster type, and eager to use any kind of magic for their advantage. So he's just following "good examples". I think this is the heart of the "fey theme": they're not without morality, they just have a very different, nearly alien version, influenced by the magical nature of their world, just like "natural morality" is influenced by the world it appeared in.<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">Dark arts</span></b><br />
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So Carywn is also a magic user, dark magic user. One of the players, probably having seen the word "paladin" on my character sheet, asked me how would have Carwyn felt when benefiting from death, if he had used his necromancy power to give him THPs when a creature died in battle. Here's my reply!<br />
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That's a good question, it helps flesh out the character! I think he'd feel quite "normal". Not only he's accustomed to dark magic, he's also a "the end justify the means" type, and having been instructed by her warlock mother in that dark part of the Feywild, he also thinks that the arcane (or shadow magic) is just another "vital fluid" of nature, just like many others. That is, he doesn't deem necromancy as unnatural, on the contrary he sees it as a way that nature (or better yet intelligent beings) have to "recycle" vital energy (he surely thinks this in other terms though!). He uses death too with his Shadow Warp power: each death allows him to slide creatures around, be it enemies, allies or even himself.<br />
Edit: he also tends to speak of death (and many other things) in romantic and poetic terms, sometimes giving the impression he cares, but more often making it appear as something largely insignificant..! He's not exactly a heroic knight, he's a fey after all!</blockquote>
So this is all for now, I'll post more about this character, speaking of his background and personality first, then the mechanical aspects, and in the end what it feels like playing him!<br />
I realize the whole blog series will be a bit narcissistic, but then again so is Carwyn... <img src="https://web.archive.org/web/20130719192013im_/http://fast1.onesite.com/community.wizards.com/smileys/smile.gif" /><br />
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My "voice" was not that different 9 years ago, after all, and I am still as verbose now as then!<br />
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Thanks for reading!<br />
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<br />LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-25658265998092482772019-12-31T07:29:00.001-08:002020-01-01T05:53:09.118-08:00I'm BACK!<br />
Every blog's got to have an "I'm BACK!" post, right? Well, I never thought this blog would.<br />
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Sometime in 2015, the official Wizards Of The Coast's community shut down. They did give a warning some time before, and I did say to myself I would have saved at least a selection of the crazy amount of content I had created there. But alas, I forgot, and on the announced day, the lights at Wizards' servers went off.<br />
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Together with hours of writing, a lot of the images that were used for this blog went down the drain, making the blog look like a war-zone of broken-image placer icons and empty space.<br />
I felt so bad that I found no more will to go on, with this otherwise pleasant hobby.<br />
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Now, all of a sudden (and I have no clue how) I found out that the Wayback Machine of The Internet Archive had saved quite a lot of my stuff, including most of the images that were linked here!<br />
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I quickly saved all the blog and forum pages in PDF and all the images I found.<br />
Now, the question that remained was where to host all this stuff, to then link it here.<br />
Turns out cloud storage is extremely bad for this purpose, due to the way they dissuade direct linking to file.<br />
Therefore, I dusted off another extremely ancient fossil of my digital presence online: a Sourceforge project I abandoned in 2002 (I was 15!!), but that is incredibly still online: the <a href="http://gremlin.sourceforge.net/eng/home.shtml" target="_blank">Gremlin Engine</a> project, also related to RPGs, but back when I was smart and I could code them, instead of just write about them.<br />
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The problem was how to get access to something that was connected to my first email address ever, by Tiscali, the first free internet provider in the world, if I remember correctly, and one of the only such "firsts" from Italy, and from its island region of Sardinia.<br />
Turns out they never deleted me from there either, and even if the domain changed, they even kept the redirect from the old domain to the new one. So when I went through password recovery on Sourceforge, I got back all my access credentials, including FTP access to my Sourceforge space, and with it a new place for the images for this blog!<br />
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So for now this is all I want to write here, but I will soon post old and new content, to celebrate this blast from the past.<br />
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See you soon, my minions! :D<br />
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<br />LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2933190774030253617.post-10018619183374473612018-03-12T07:04:00.000-07:002018-03-12T07:04:44.400-07:00#RPGBlogCarnival "Gamemaster's Cut": my two cents on cinematography and D&D!<br />
When my dear friend Gonzalo, owner of the beautiful <a href="http://codexanathema.com/" target="_blank">Codex Anathema</a> gaming blog (and company!) decided to host his own <a href="http://ofdiceanddragons.com/the-rpg-blog-carnival-archive/" target="_blank">RPG Blog Carnival </a>I had to go back to this almost defunct blog of mine and write something! It's like a Geas spell... :P<br />
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The topic could be described as cinematography in D&D, or D&D in cinematography. Or both, if possible.<br />
I was initially unsure I could contribute with something meaningful, but I also remembered that my current campaign, which runs in a world loosely based on the "Cthon" cosmology/setting detailed in the deepest archives of this blog, basically started exactly as an attempt to bring the best thrills of cinema into D&D, in a very specific way.<br />
So I'm going to talk about this specific way of mine, which could be summarized as...<br />
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<b>Bringing back the Fear of the Unknown to D&D... And cinema</b></h2>
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Yes, it's self-evident to me that the fear of the unknown is something that has been missing from both camps. Movies such as the very first Alien, with their all-but-cheap thrills and scares, are extremely rare nowadays. The closest example in recent movies that I can think about is The Witch. Although it achieves the objective in a very different way. And then also some alien abduction movies, which by definition fit in this trope, and usually manage to deliver the chills even when done poorly.</div>
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Seeing how very different movies and methods can be used to convey what is perhaps the most primal emotion in the human repertoire, I asked myself what's the "winning recipe", not only when it comes to movies, but also in tabletop RPGs such as D&D.</div>
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<b>The Monster must be unknown until the very final showdown.</b></div>
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This is arguably the most important point to consider. So many movies nowadays sin in this respect.</div>
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In D&D, the sin is even easier to commit, because you know how it is: character rolls high on Perception, and that's it: he/she sees the monster in all its macabre detail. Well, no. It doesn't have to be that way.</div>
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First of all, the characters might not understand what they perceive.</div>
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This is very important in my game: the monsters are something completely unfamiliar to the characters, they are not supposed to exist in the world. So even when they see them, they don't make sense of them. They might be simple CR1 creatures from the Monster Manual, but that shouldn't be clear to the character, and not even to the player. Even when one or two of these monsters fall down to the characters' magical or martial firepower, the corpses might disintegrate (especially when the monster is extraplanar) or puzzle even more due to their alien anatomy.</div>
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A gnoll might be described and portrayed as a humanoid with a hyena head, but this description might be an approximation, and a character seeing one for the first time, might not immediately understand the similarity to the animal. As a GM, I take some pain in describing the creature in ambiguous terms, so the description might still be truthful, visually speaking, but hiding the "meta" about the creature, both to players and characters.</div>
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To this end, a few other methods, apart from the description of the monster can be used, which I better list separately.</div>
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<b>Your Monster is different.</b></div>
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Sometimes considered a cheap trick of GMs, I think it's fundamental both in movies and games.</div>
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In the past I re-imagined the simplest monster, the Goblin, resulting in something that could have came out of the worst nightmares. Some players would consider this unfair, since it also inevitably makes their knowledge of the game less useful, but that's exactly the point: fear of the unknown.</div>
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If players don't like this, they don't belong in such an adventure/campaign, and the GM is responsible for announcing in advance that the adventure/campaign will subvert what they know about the game's usual opponents.</div>
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As said before, sometimes description is enough for this, but sometimes it isn't. Think about the xenomorph in Alien. It would have been original enough due to its appearance and abilities, but guess what: it also has acid for blood. That's the type of detail that the aforementioned players would have considered foul play by the GM. But it's also what changes the whole situation. Suddenly, the classical methods of confrontation are not so useful anymore.</div>
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The true monster is not just a threat when alive, but when dead too. This is especially important if there is more than one of them, but not only. Even when the baddie is just one, having something unexpected happen on its death, will confound the characters and the players alike.</div>
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Just as a new method of movement, something happening when the monster is hurt and so on.</div>
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But that's not all: the scariest movies don't scare you just with the monster, they use other things. Such as...</div>
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<b>The claustrophobic locale.</b></div>
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You might say that dungeons are by definition claustrophobic, but that's not exactly true. A Dungeon is, first of all, a place where you expect threats. You go in there expecting to fight, so the thrills go down from the very first moment. A true claustrophobic locale doesn't even need to be actually closed, or small, although it helps. A forest can be claustrophobic, if done right. The feeling must be that you want to be out of it, but you can't, of course, but also something deeper. Something more akin to "this place is not what it should be". The best claustrophobic locale, both in movies and D&D, is some place which is usually safe. </div>
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This is played especially well in the typical alien abduction movies: the classical isolated farm or cabin. Nothing beats it. Because it's familiar (so it's easy to picture yourself there), and because it can be easily put under a siege from the outside. This is what makes it claustrophobic. Four walls, some windows and a door. It seems ok, until unknown forces are known to be outside, and possibly even INSIDE. That's another hallmark: the threat should be both outside and inside, in poorly known fashion and proportions. You have clues to both presences, but you can't quantify them. And a house is much smaller than a dungeon... You can't just "run back": the problem is most likely exactly what's at its entrance.</div>
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I mentioned that even a forest can be claustrophobic, and this is especially true if the characters get lost. It's not that hard to get lost in a forest, even experienced trekkers will tell you this. So even high level characters might fall into this apparently trivial problem.</div>
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Even without being lost, there might be reasons for which you can't or won't go out of the place. In my campaign, the characters are confined to a swampy, dark, mysterious forest for weeks. They are not far from the nearest village but guess what: they are wanted in that village, the very commoners would be glad to hang their necks, and the Inquisition would gladly do it for them.</div>
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Inside the forest though, of course, that are other dangers. Of the unknown variant. Even outside they actually don't know exactly what's waiting for them, because for some reason I won't explain, they know that the people looking for them, found corpses that look exactly like theirs. So in theory the search for them should be over. But what happens if some criminals thought dead pop back into existence? In addition, the problem which they would like to solve, lies inside the forest... So a lot of forces compel them to stay, making the typically open environment an actual prison.</div>
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<b>The Alien Abduction trope</b></div>
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This needs a point of its own. It's not entirely evident, but if you do some cross-referencing, you may find out that humanity has been writing (and delivering scares) about alien abductions for centuries, or maybe millennia. It's an archetype. Nowadays it's aliens, before it could have been hags, or even gods. But most of the time, generically speaking, it's "The Monster", whatever it is.</div>
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The fact that the Monster is kidnapping, more than killing, is a big part of the fear of the unknown.</div>
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Death, afterlife not included, is something of a known. It's the end of the line, and it's reassuring in a way. But being taken away by unknown, possibly inhuman forces, for purposes unknown... Much worse. This should not happen to characters, at least not to all of them. They should witness it, or even better suspect it, about other people first. But at some point, it might happen to a character, and it should be a nightmare.</div>
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The trope of Alien Abduction though, is not only about the abduction itself. It's also about what described before. The threat from outside finding you in a familiar place, suddenly transforming it into a hell on earth because of the ensuing claustrophobia. </div>
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It's of course perpetrated by the most unknown and unknowable monster(s). It kind of summarizes everything I talk about, but by itself is still not enough, because it doesn't provide enough depth and variety. It can make for a nice movie, but not for a lengthy campaign/series/saga.</div>
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<b>The Unknown World</b></div>
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Monsters must come from somewhere. Once the first, traumatic contact is made, and the monster(s) are momentarily defeated, the Righteous have to take the next step: venturing into the home of the monsters to end the threat once and for all.</div>
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This is where things get really interesting and challenging for GMs and film-makers alike. This is where world-building becomes the skill you need to roll high on.</div>
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This unknown world doesn't have to be completely unknown, or the players/viewers will not identify with it enough to feel involved. At the same time, making it just the typical "cave of the dragon" or "temple of doom" will not engage in the other sense.</div>
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Once again, the best lesson comes from the movie that in my opinion delivered the best in this department: alien.</div>
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The alien nest is a place that is familiar, in theory, but made alien by the threat itself. The Monster transformed a place that should have been normal, into something hellish, or at the very least unsettling.</div>
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This is one way to do it, and it solves an important issue: having this unknown world near enough for it to be an urgent threat.</div>
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There are other ways to do it. Stranger Things, borrowing heavily from D&D, does it with a parallel dimension, which is conveniently accessed from physical portals. Modestly speaking, this was the whole idea behind my setting/cosmology: having the classic "planes of existence" as places that can actually be accessed from specific locations, even when their space overlaps "normal space".</div>
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Another nice unknown world can simply be, as suggested before, the "forbidden forest", which can of course be any other terrain type (although of course the forest is a primal archetype, that engages humans at an instinctive level).</div>
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<b>Can you seal the Unknown away?</b></div>
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Stranger Things season 2 [spoiler alert] replies to this question with its ominous ending. Of course not. Not completely. Even when you win against the monsters in their own world/home, you might find out that you just closed one end of an extremely intricate maze. </div>
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I'm not saying that every story should end with nihilistic realization that the unknown will always be out there, but a bit of this concept sure helps. Maybe you actually managed to secure a nice slice of your cherished reality from the threat of the Unknown, but you might discover you just saw the tip of the proverbial iceberg, with your face-off against evil.</div>
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I think heroics can still be a thing even in a world full of evil unknown. The whole point of the unknown is more of a conflict between Chaos and Order. The Unknown is of course Chaos. When we add Evil and Good to the equation, things get more complex. That's where you could find "people like you" working against you, conspiracies and so on, and it opens an entire new topic, but the point is Chaos and Order. The Unknown, the Monster, is an agent of Chaos, and it doesn't have to be overly complex in that. Schemes, complexity, possibly even intelligence, are hallmarks of Order, more than Chaos. So my point, in the question "Can you seal the Unknown away", is that depending on the case, it could actually be easy. Maybe that particular unknown threat is actually minor (it could be), or extremely simple in its nature. </div>
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The heroes might discover that the threat was coming from an unintelligent, or at least not so smart source. In this case, it might be easy to at least confine it, if not seal it off. </div>
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Discovering that a lot of suffering, if not death, was coming out of something actually simple, might be as horrifying as discovering it was all a plot by some powerful individuals. The point is making something simple not so simple to understand. </div>
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The needs/drives of the monster, of the Unknown, might be simple only when understood. It might not be a simple matter to understand them... And even when understood, the simplicity might be horrifying. </div>
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Just as in, again, Alien: their need to reproduce using humans as hosts is actually simple, but not less horrifying. And the moment you put the last of them and their eggs under the flame-thrower, in theory you are safe. But then again, someone might have interest in using all of that. That's when Evil Order wants to put Chaos under its leash, it's a another classic trope. Maybe, instead, the threat is just something naturally occurring (not in the sense it's truly natural, but in the sense it occurs spontaneously) and at that point, you will need a constant effort to keep it in check. That's probably when the Fear of The Unknown ends, but it's also just an episode. The Unknown being Chaos is extremely varied, if not infinite. There will always be a new horror, a new Unknown, popping out from where you least expect. </div>
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EXTRA: How I'd do a D&D movie, based on this.</h2>
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As you might have guessed, I would first of all do a horror. It would be the "session 0" of the campaign. Just one big session, in one movie. It would be session 0 because the "heroes" are still all level 1, or actually level 0. They are not heroes yet. It's what happens in this story that will make them heroes. And of course, it would be a horror movie.</div>
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Here's my pitch:</div>
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"THE TIME OF THE FROGS"</div>
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Children playing in swampy fields spot strange creatures after dusk. The creatures seem to be hiding from them, but the children are sure they are malicious. Talking to each other, they describe the creatures as having the face of a frog, and they start hunting for frogs, in an effort to "exorcise" the threat. They impale frogs around the fields, leaving them gutted open on sticks, to try and "scare" the frog-faced creatures.</div>
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One of the kids disappears, and the kids speak up with their parents, who are ignorant and impatient, struggling all day to bring enough food to feed the families. The parents, furious about the "fantasies" of the kids, don't believe their stories and think they are actually responsible for the other kid's disappearance. They start keeping the kids indoors, prohibiting them from playing in the fields. </div>
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After a while, the kids start thinking that the creatures are closing in on the farms, and they are not mistaken, but the parents again don't believe them.</div>
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One fateful night, one of the farms gets attacked. The adults are so indoctrinated (by the local faith) about the non-existence of supernatural creatures, that they take the whole matter in a foolishly light-hearted way, basically letting the creatures in. At that point, chaos ensues. The creatures seem to have the power to hide in plain sight and make people literally shit themselves. Adults go completely crazy, and seem to be basically cooperating with the creatures: they become affected by uncontrollable hilarity, and disturbing scatophilic behaviors. One by one they get abducted, while a few of the kids, still able to react rationally, manage to fight the creatures. They manage to escape only by setting the whole place on fire thanks to previously-dormant magical powers in one of them, that were hinted at beforehand.</div>
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They find out that dark figures outside seemed to be watching the whole thing, and appear menacing enough to prevent them from reaching the village. They run towards the nearby forest/swamp.</div>
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At dawn, soldiers investigate the burned farm. They find adults and kids burned to death, the adults seemingly still laughing. They find no evidence of the monsters, and thus can't believe the stories of the kids of nearby farms. </div>
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Meanwhile in the forest/swamp, the kids found shelter in an abandoned ruin. There, they find engravings of monstrous faces that seem similar to frogs, and various artifacts. They arm themselves, they slay a giant frog that was lurking nearby, and they impale it gutted at a stake, out of an improvised "fort" they build up. They shelter there. A hermit finds them and fends off their attacks, telling them "I BELIEVE YOU... I BELIEVE YOU!" - he manages to win their trust and opens a book he is carrying, a bestiary, to show them a page describing the frog-faced creatures - The movie then ends ominously, with a cacophony of ribbits resonating both in the forest and nearby the farms.</div>
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THE END.</div>
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You might say this is not at all a D&D movie, although you might have understood it's a take on the classic Bullywug monsters. The thing is, it would be chilling (if done right), and it would set the start for a series of adventures, where young adults become heroes against all odds.</div>
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It would also show, if endorsed by the D&D trademark, how far can the game and its concepts be stretched, which is the entire point of this (now a tad too long) blog post: a return to the unknown.</div>
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Now, I'm kind of obsessed by this concept, to the point I want to write a novel based on it, and on my whole campaign (which also started more or less like this, although the kids were not the playing characters). But it's more of a manifesto than an actual working idea. I hope you can appreciate this manifesto, use it, and make your own "Gamemaster's Cut" a bit more thrilling thanks to it. </div>
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LordArchaonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04042343401427431749noreply@blogger.com0