#Zendikar #DnD Take 2: beefier races - Merfolk!

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!

This makes it very easy to incur in Mary Sue effects, so please be ruthless in your criticism about balance of this one.

The main characteristics that should be part of Merfolk are the following:

• Early flight: 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.
• Connection with the Roil: 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.
• Individualism and diversity: 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.
• Water-related advantages: 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...
• Some weaknesses: 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.

I hope the features I found for this will explain by themselves how I thought of covering all the points!

MERFOLK TRAITS

Ability Score Increase. Your Wisdom and Intelligence scores both increase by 1, and any ability score of your choice increases by 1.

Age. 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.

Size. Merfolk are as tall as humans, but usually weight less, since they are very lean. Your size is Medium.

Alignment. On Zendikar, merfolk can be of any alignment, although usually far from extremes, and tending more towards neutrality.

Speed. Your base walking speed is 30 ft, and you have a swimming speed of 30 ft.

Amphibious. You can breathe air and water.

Solitary Learning. 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.

Twitch. When an attack misses you, you can use your reaction to move 5 ft. without provoking opportunity attacks.

Languages. You can speak read and write Common and Merfolk.

ROIL FEATURES:

Roil Sense. 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.

Caller of Gales. Within the influence of Blue or White Roil, you can use an action to create an effect like that of a gust of wind 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.)

NEEDS:

• Sunscreen unguent
• Fin harnesses or piercings (reducing swimming speed to 20 ft.)

OTHERWISE:

• For every 4 hours under the sun you suffer 1 level of exhaustion.
• Your walking speed is reduced by 5 ft. and difficult terrain costs an extra 5 ft. for you to pass.

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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.

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.

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.

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 gust of wind 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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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!

#MtG's #Zendikar plane as a #13thAge setting - Part 5: Story Hooks

From the moment I read +Philippe-Antoine Menard's article on +Critical Hits titled “13th Age” Musings: Story Hook-Based Adventure Prepping, I knew (and I told him) I would have used this method for my Zendikar project. And here I am!

I am well aware that half the genius of the ChattyDM's idea was that with this method you can turn those often-forgotten loose threads of adventures into new and exciting side treks, or even new courses for the entire campaign, but since the other half of the geniality is just the simplicity and quickness of the method, I decided to write a post providing these Story Hooks as possible campaign or adventure starting ideas for Zendikar, without actually referring to any loose threads of a pre-existing campaign (since we're talking about starting, of course!)

So this will be my list of Story Hooks, which in a fashion similar to all my latest post, will be a growing list that I will update over time. I decided I will only add Hooks based on the Locations I already described in my Locations list, With an additional "sub-focus" on one of the organizations or authorities present in the location.
I'll also link every first occurrence of an Icon or Minor Icon in each hook to the relevant section, if I've already written it.

So we'll start from the continent of Tazeem, which non-coincidentally is also the best land-mass in Zendikar to start a low-level adventure or campaign, since it contains the highest amount of civilized population in stable settlements, with the exception of the even more highly populated Guul Draz. Although around there, 90% of the civilized population enjoys sucking blood of intelligent humanoids, and must also do so to survive, making it probably a little less than recommendable as a starting place...

Note that, to keep the spirit of ChattyDM's Story Hooks, I purposely choose less-than-obvious and less-than-epic hooks here. Even more than to keep the original spirit of the method, because since the obvious and epic ones are already quite clear when reading the Locations or Icons lists, it would be redundant to also describe them here in this fashion.
Actually, I go a bit far from the original model in terms of length and detail: I can't help being as prolix as always!

CONTENTS

TAZEEM CONTINENT

• The Enclave:
   - Hook #1: "The Uncatalogued Specimen" - The Academy detachment
   - Hook #2: "Who "Lightmined" The Field?" - The Elite Corps
   - Hook #3: "If They Can't Debate On The Gender Of Angels..." - The Council
• The Magosi Portage:
   - Hook #4: "The Strange Young Journal Keeper" - The Merfolk Community
   - Hook #5: "The Ruins Of Ysterid" - The Tazeem Expeditionary House
• Sea Gate:
   - Hook #6: "What Happened Last Night?" - An aristocratic house
   - Hook #7: "The Covenant Of The Forgotten Relics" - A new guild-house
   - Hook #8: "Hell Breaks Loose At The Great Library!" - The Great Lighthouse Library
   - Hook #9: "A Next-Door Expedition..." - The Halimar Expeditionary / Halimar Sea Caves

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#MtG's #Zendikar plane as a #13thAge setting - Part 4: Locations

One idea that I vented in my brainstorming on Icons (a post that I removed from the project, to avoid confusion), was that of having some locations in zendikar act exactly like Icons. That is, you can have positive, conflicted, or negative relationships with these places. It works in Zendikar, because the world is literally much more alive than your standard fantasy setting. So I would definitely allow some characters to have bonds to some places, if their story or their concept justifies so.

However, it must be said that even in Zendikar, locations are rather static. Maybe you come up with an awesome reason for which your Merfolk Sorcerer is really hated by the mysterious Jhwar Island, but then what happens if the campaign stirs away from it, and maybe doesn't even touch the nearby continent of Ondu? Rather disappointing.

So basically I'll just talk about locations, starting with the ones cited in the Detailed Icons section, and if relevant, I'll add info about using the whole location as an Icon. After all, it can also make sense for certain small communities to be in good or bad relationships with ceratin individuals, and if they are active communities, it means by extension to have such a relationship with its people.

Here we go! Text in italics comes from the source material, copyright Wizards of The Coast!

CONTENTS
(Tazeem continent)
 - 1 - The Enclave
 - 2 - The Magosi Portage
 - 3 - Sea Gate
 - 4 - The Depths of Halimar
 - 5 - Oran Rief, The Vastwood
(Ondu continent)
 - 1 - Zulaport (Beyeen island)
 - 2 - Kabira (Agadeem island)
(Bala Ged sub-continent)
 - 1 - Bojuka Bay (and Bojuka Bastion)
(Murasa island-continent)
 - 1 - Sunder Bay (and Tumbled Palace)

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#MtG's #Zendikar plane as a #13thAge setting - Part 3: Minor Icons

I still haven't finished the full list of icons in my Icons mega-post, and I'm already thinking about more icons.

The idea is a bit different though, than just adding more icons. I just noticed that some of my icons were very close to some other powerful figures that should have influenced them somehow. So instead of creating "dual icons" (which might be an option anyway), I will put here these kind of "minor icons" that complement some of the standard ones for my Zendikar adaption.

The write-ups will be smaller, and having relationships directly and only with these icons should be mostly impossible, as they exist in symbiosis with others, for one reason or another.

For now I'll put just one, and will update the post when I have more, as I'm doing for the standard ones.
I will start with what should have been my entirely fictional (that is, not present in the cards) Icon, that then I replaced with the more "setting-integrated" Stoneforger (aka Stoneforge Mystic)

CONTENTS
 - 1 - The Lord of Cliffhaven
 - 2 - Tuktuk, The Returned
 - 3 - The Enclave Cryptologist
 - 4 - The Kabira Evangel
 - 5 - Sutina, The Speaker of the Tajuru

#MtG's #Zendikar plane as a #13thAge setting - Part 2: Icons

This post is going to be big, because I want each Icon of Zendikar to receive a treatment comparable to the Icons of 13th Age if not more extensive. However, it would take me too much time to post all Icons altogether, so I'm going to update this post over time, adding Icon over Icon, or possibly even expanding on Icons I already wrote about, although I will try to limit that.

I'm gonna post a small index here at the start of the page, with eventual updates on existing entries, so that if you're interested you can stay up to date. I will also share on Google+ and Twitter each time I make a change to the page.

CONTENTS:
 - 0 - Brief introduction
 - 1 - The Loremaster
 - 2 - The Vindicator
 - 3 - The Stoneforger
 - 4 - The Chronologist
 - 5 - The Treespeaker
 - 6 - The Surrakar
 - 7 - The Shield of Emeria
 - 8 - The Acquisitor
 - 9 - The Ruin Sage

Welcome to Zendikar! :)

#MtG's #Zendikar plane as a #13thAge setting - Quick Icons!

A flash of insight hit me suddenly about the icons in Zendikar and I had a stupid idea that proved less stupid than first thought.

It started thinking about the "everything goes" philosophy I was beginning to think was the only solution to the Icons in Zendikar. I thought: "At this point, you could even just take the cards that most closely approximate the 13th Age Icons, and call it a day." - And then I tried the experiment..!

The Archmage: Seagate Loremaster

It can definitely be a legendary (aka unique) figure in Zendikar, even if the card itself is not Legendary in type, and thus allows multiple copies of it to be in the game. But we're not playing Magic: we're devising a setting. So in our setting, The Loremaster is a legendary figure of which there's only one!

It's also extremely appropriate in Zendikar for the Arcane/Lore Icon to be a Merfolk.

#MtG's #Zendikar plane as a #13thAge setting! - Icons Brainstorming

It's proving extremely difficult to devise Icons that work in the standard 13th Age way for the Zendikar world.

A bit of background explanation is needed to understand why. Then I'm going to basically propose some "models" and see what you guys in the community think about this.

BACKGROUND: Why Zendikar lacks world-shaping NPCs.

First and foremost, we would be tempted to cut the matter short by stating that Zendikar has never meant to be role-played into. As all Magic: The Gathering worlds/planes, it's just meant to be a backdrop to battles that involve tapping the magical resources that are embedded into the world's lands (and this is also the focus of Zendikar compared to other MtG worlds), and havng creatures and spells summoned in this way.

But Zendikar has everything it needs to be at least a common D&D setting. It has dunegons, it has adventurers, it has sorts of guilds of adventurers, and it has all manner of artifacts and magical stuff, a strange unfolding prophecy and a culmination into an eldritch apocalypse involving three Chtulhu-like aberrant gods that will devour literally all reality unless they are stopped. (Oops, spoiler!)

So what it lacks is exactly the classical important NPCs/factions that the Dragon Empire of 13th Age has. Or doesn't it? It depends on the scale used to measure their possible equivalents in Zendikar

LARGE SCALE ICONS: Zendikar doesn't lack big players, but can they be Icons?

The three apocalypse-igniting alien gods trapped within the very earth of Zendikar are immensely powerful.

The triads of gods that the major religious races (Merfolk and Kor) have in their theologies, are just cargo-cult versions of the long-forgotten appearance of the three mentioned world-enders. That is, technically the "true gods" of Zendikar don't even exist: they are historians' failures in keeping the memories of those old terrors for what the truly were. BUT. But... There still are clerics of these gods that have powers. And there still is a connection between the true Eldrazi (the names of the alien elder gods) and the "theological illusion" gods. So two routes are possible here: either we consider the religons' gods as some kind of spiritual avatar of the imprisoned Eldrazi, maybe become so thanks to the mortals veneration, or we even think that while inspired from the Eldrazi in origin, these gods also became something "kind of real" as separate mystical entities.
In any case, we're still talking of distant entities, in all senses.

And that's the problem with the large-scale players of Zendikar: be them imprisoned, mystical avatars of the imprisoned that became somewhat stand-alone gods, or very abstract deities, they lack a lot of the characteristics required by icons.

#MtG's #Zendikar plane as a #13thAge setting - Part 1: Races

If you know me from the Wizards community or even just if you are one of the few regular readers of this blog, you know that I have a passion for Zendikar, the Magic: The Gathering world that I consider most playable and fun from a fantasy RPG point of view.

I already spent a lot of time in the past trying to "convert" the setting to D&D 4e, with mixed results, and now, after seeing how good of a job does the 13th Age system do in giving life to settings, thanks to the Icons idea, and pumped up for the opportunity to contribute to a 13th Age fanzine proposed by +David Eglinton, I want to try out a 13th Age conversion of Zendikar!

First of all, let it be clear that "conversion" should not be the term to be used. It's not about taking the actual Zendikar block cards and converting them to D&D or 13th Age rules. It's about making the world behind those cards into a playable setting.

Set this in stone, even before the Icons, which will prove quite difficult in Zendikar, compared to the straightforward Guilds->Icons correspondence of Ravnica, I want to start with the iconic Zendikar races, one of which, the Merfolk, I just re-wrote for D&D Next.

Races in 13th Age are extremely simple. They only get one ability score bonus chosen between two, and one racial power. There should also be a racial feat for Champion tier, but it's kind of secondary: you can play the first levels without it.

So let's do it!!

Part 1: RACES

#Merfolk, the #MtG variety, home-brew as a race for #dndnext!

Merfolk                          

As a merfolk, you share these racial traits with others of your kind.
Ability Score Increase. Your Intelligence score increases by 2.
Age. Merfolk grow and age at approximately half the rate of a normal human, attaining adulthood in 30 to 35 years. They live to be around 160.
Alignment. Merfolk tend to be neutral on the cosmic war between chaos and law, although exceptions exist, especially for very tight communities where lar prevails, or banished or orphan indivudals who can tend more toward chaos. Their side on the good and evil axis depends a lot on their personal experience, tending toward evil if they experienced or witnessed evil acts, or towards good if vice-versa.
Size. Merfolk are more or less the same height as humans, but tend to be lighter in build than the average human.
Speed. Your base land speed is 30 feet. You also have a swimming speed of 35 feet.
Aquatic. As a merfolk you can breathe underwater, and being underwater imposes no penalty on your attack roles or ability checks.
Languages. You can speak and read Merfolk and Common.
Reflexive Twitch. In place of an Opportunity Attack or when surprised by or surprising enemies, move half your speed without provoking Opportunity Attacks and without expending movement or actions.
Curious Researcher. Choose a feat that grants a bonus to an ability score. You gain its bnefits, except for the bonus to the ability score.
If feats are not in use in your game, choose two different bonuses among the following: proficiency in one skill, one weapon, one saving throw, one tool, or learn a language.
Subrace. Merfolk exist in many planes, and in each plane they develop substantial differences and adaptions

Zendikar

Zendikar is a plane of stronger and more pervasive magical forces, where the land itself changes constantly under the geo-magical phenomenon known as the "Roil". Zendikar merfolk have attuned so well to this that they know how to be nexuses for the Roil, even in planes where the Roil doesn't usually manifest: when any spell disturbs the natural order, you can "ride" the magical currents that get amplified by your presence and take advantage as the laws of physics change around you.
Ability Scores. Your Wisdom score increases by 1.
Roil Nexus. When casting a 1st level or higher spell, or as a Reaction when a 1st level or higher spell is casted within 10 feet of you, choose one of the following effects:

• One or two creatures within 10 feet of you are pushed up to their speed in any direction (Strength saving throw negates, saving throw DC is 8 + your Proficiency Bonus + your Wisdom modifier)
• You and a willing target within 10 feet of you gain a fly speed equal to the respective base land speed until the start of your next turn.
• Choose an area within 10 feet of you up to 10 feet per side to become heavily obscured or 4 areas of 5 feet per side to become lightly obscured, until the start of your next turn.

After you use this feature, you can't use it again until you complete a short rest or a long rest.

Ravnica

In Ravnica, Merfolk have lived in isolation under the surface of the city for centuries. When they emerged, they found themselves at home in a recently battered Simic guild and eventually took control of it and brought it back to a prominent position.
The guild's take on evolution matches perfectly your own fast adaption to new environments.
Ability Scores. An ability score of your choice other than Intelligence increases by 1.
Fast Evolution. If after two consecutive long rests you exhaust your Hit Dice by healing, you gain an additional Hit Die to spend in healing until the next long rest. Alternatively, if after two consecutive long rests you exhaust your daily spell slots, you gain an additional daily spell slot of the highest level you can cast until the next long rest. These bonuses can't happen at the same time and are not cumulative. If both conditions apply, the Hit Die benefit applies.

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Original "design notes" of my 4e Zendikar adaption (here) - annotations in italic. 

I envisioned two principal themes while exploring Zendikar's Merfolk [cards]: exploration/scouting and knowledge.
They are described as solitary in the sense that they enjoy researching in solitude, but most of their abilities benefit their allies as a group. They have a leader streak mechanically, without actually being charismatic. They lead with their knowledge.

There were many powers that fitted as a racial power for them, so I decided to make a single power with many uses depending on the merfolk's power source. This encourages hybrids and/or multiclassing, and makes the Bard an attractive class for the merfolk (which is thematically fitting IMO), even if Charisma is not given a bonus. - I simplified this by just letting them choose the effect. The concept of power source could still be used in Next, but the caster classes are too few for now, and even if I considered making the effect tied to spell school, it would have made the effect more "arcane", when it's intended to be more a "ride the currents of magic" thing.

Their other signature ability is knowing an extra encounter or at-will power of their level but needing to swap it with another one in order to use it. It's like they all have a mini spellbook, which I think is fitting because they're listed as wizards more often than any other class, and this power swapping during resting also sounds as something a solitary explorer/researcher could do, to prepare him or herself to the next challenge in advance. - This was of course re-adapted into the toned-down feat.

The explorer feature can be powerful and it can be extended to allies via feat: extra move action during surprise rounds. Note that it can be combined with the racial power, which is a minor action, and can thus be used by burning a move action if need arises. - No more racial feats, and no combination of racial power with the Reflexive Twitch. After all, it's not intended to be an at-will racial power, but a feature that can be linked to a spell, it's more passive.

Last thing, maybe the most overpowered, the racial power doesn't scale with level in quantity of bonus, instead gaining more uses per encouneter. Two at paragon and three at Epic. I thought that maintaining the effects low, it could have been a good way to represent the resourcefulness of the Merfolk. - Of course, I didn't make the "racial power" scale, because it's already quite powerful for Next standards.

P.S.: The Ravnica subrace is quite uninspired I guess, but I think it was uninspired in the setting as well. They just needed an iconic Blue race to put in Ravnica, but they didn't expand on them enough, so I just wanted to make them flexible and with a take on the theme of evolution, typical of their Simic Combine guild.

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And that's all! Above you see my favorite Merfolk character, Cylonea, whose card-inspiration, Caller of Gales, is also the inspiration for the flying-giving power of my Merfolk race write-up (she's a very basic Merfolk but she can give flight to any creature, so I figured it was quite a basic thing for them in Zendikar!).

She can't be converted right now, because there's really nothing like the 4e version of the Shaman (and a World Spirit Shaman at that!) and the Artificer.

I could eventually try to make the spirit companion a matter of Feat, but then I wouldn't really know on top of which class to put it to represent her. Druid would be ok if it wasn't for the unavoidable Wild Shape which really doesn't suit her. I just hope that between the Warlock and the Sorcerer, something will come up in Next to represent her in a nice way!

Crunchy Bits: New, #Zendikar themed, Rogue and Barbarian #DnDNext Subclasses!

Yes, I got inspired again. Yes it's gonna be crunchy bits, this time!

Zendikar's under my spotlight again. A fellow Italian player wants to D&D-ize the setting using 3.5-PF rules (no surprise: no 4e or Next fans in Italy!), so he contacted me, having seen my previous work on the setting, which can now be found here: http://community.wizards.com/group/zendikar-dd-campaign-setting

Ravnica would also be an evergreen and although none of the two are the latest setting MtG has touched, seeing the latest setting only makes me want to think about the old ones and eventually what's coming next..! Seriously, a setting based on a B- movie (Clash of The Titans), certified B- by seriously awful metacritic scores. And it's even graphically inspired by it, completely. The artwork is even good to the eye, but when the brain connects to the eye... Oh my God(s)... </rant>

However, I decided to focus on Zendikar because its adventuring theme makes it effortless to come up with D&D material for it!

So here we are, trying to design some new stuff for Next, waiting for the crunchy bits to come from Wizards itself...