To occupy myself, while I'm preparing to run my Chiaros campaign, I'm designing another setting from the top down, to be used in the indeterminate future. It's more of a far-out fantastic setting that overturns a lot of the standard D&D assumptions.
[spoiler=The Premise]
Time began about a year ago.
We think that before time, there was no land, no matter, no space at all, but there was one being called the Urge. It was all that existed, so It spent the entirety of Its energy speaking to Itself, singing and praising Itself for an unimaginable infinity of time. It did not imagine anything outside Itself. Perhaps it could not.
Something happened, and the Urge died. The continents are the remains of Its mind, and the words It once thought to Itself are etched on the broken Source Walls that once formed a great vault over each continent.
At the beginnning of time, some Thinkers generated from the shattered consciousness of the dead Urge. They are called Demiurges, and they fly above the continents, using their divine power where they see fit.
Below the Demiurges, lesser Thinkers generated spontaneously from the various substances of the continents. Though they lack the power of the Demiurges, each of them still borrows its substance from the dead mind of the Urge, and this common origin instills them with some basic knowledge and a common language. Further, it is thought that each Thinker represents some thought, feeling, or idea that once flashed across the mind of the Urge.
However, Thinkers were not the only creatures to emerge during the first days. Monsters came, perhaps from the remains of the Urge's vast unconscious, that lacked the self-awareness of the Thinkers. They contend with and feed upon the Thinkers as the Thinkers fight to determine the nature of their new world.
[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Races]
Creatures in the Overture don't divide themselves into races as such. If it can communicate in Common (the only language,) it's a Thinker. If it can't, it's a Monster.
Each PC can customize his racial traits using a point-based system (that I'm still working on) and can have whatever appearance the player chooses. Thinkers can be male or female, but a great many of them are genderless. If a player wants the PC to have better racial traits (as though the PC were of a race with a level adjustment,) the PC can take levels in a class called Monster (also still in the works) that provides more points to spend.
[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Classes]
Levels in the Monster class represents the strength of a Thinker's unconscious substance, and all other classes are developments of its conscious substance. I'm currently planning to leave most of the classes alone. I'll probably get rid of Wizards, but if wizards do exist, they learn their spells from writings on Source Walls. Psionic classes will be common. Divine spellcasters receive their power from demiurges, but demiurges sometimes grant their power to divine casters of different alignments, if they think it will serve their plans.
[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Nemeses]
Whenever a Thinker is born or generated, its nemesis soon follows. Even the demiurges have nemeses. We do not know why. Perhaps it is a reflection of the imperfect nature of all thinkers before the lost purity of the Urge. Perhaps it is an aftereffect of the Urge's habit of debating with Itself.
A Thinker and its nemesis might emerge on entirely different continents, but they are connected as long as they both live. Even though they may never meet, each lives as a counterpoint to the other's argument. Nemeses are always of opposite alignments, and a change of alignment in one will be mirrored in the other. Nemeses always resemble each other, but if one has a gender, then the other will have the opposite gender. A male nemesis is called an animus, and a female nemesis is called an anima. As yet, no animus and anima have ever had a child together (This would most likely occur with two true neutral nemeses, though even in this case the personal obstacles would be nigh-insurmountable.)
[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Timeline and cosmology]
The continents of the Overture have days, nights, and seasons. A tide of several small suns orbits each continent, followed by a similar tide of moons at night. The continents are separated from each other by an airy void, but they drift and sometimes touch each other. Gravity is the same direction everywhere, and the seasons come from a regular warming and cooling of the air, the cause of which is unknown. Time began on the first day of Spring, and the campaign begins the night before the world's first birthday.
During the first spring and summer, most Thinkers explored their respective continents, not forming much in the way of civilization. The first summer saw the birth of the first communities and the birth of some of the first children (though most Thinkers still generated spontaneously.) The first autumn saw many more Thinkers settle down and develop the beginnings of their own traditions of arts, crafts, and magic. The first winter was hard for Thinkers all over the world; monsters and the elements killed most of the remaining free-roaming Thinkers, and the first communities struggled to survive, some of them not even sure if the cold was ever going to end. Now, Thinkers both new and relatively old are met with the opportunity of the second spring.[/spoiler]
Next, I'll post the new race system and the Monster class.
advice/suggested changes/scathing critiques?
Also, how should I handle wealth and equipment? A stone age level of technology (or bronze age at the most) probably makes the most sense. Perhaps I should offer more enticing options to Thinkers who have natural weapons?
I'm not sure if I'm suppose to post here or not, but as I don't see discussion thread for Overture, I'll give ya my two cents here.
So far you have a really interesting and unqiue idea. I particularly like that you don't even have humans or any standard fantasy races yet it's still definitely a fantasy setting, or so it sounds. If you wanted something interesting, why not make magic derive only from the demiurges and psionics be inborn talent? If you want to dig into the mechanics of it, that would give you a nice seperation between teh two, and in a worldbuilding sense help explain the difference in power between thinkers and demiurges.
Nemesis sounds interesting, as well, but I'd like to read more about them before I comment there.
Lastly, I like that you are starting at the beginning of the world. That will allow any games you run to construct a very fluid history. One suggestion I have, though, is that you prep a couple of potential future timelines that have little or nothing to do with any games you intend to run. These will simply happen as your players adventure and thus allow for a fuller, deeper, and more dynamic history to emerge. It will also give your players the sense that they do not live in a static world.
But back to worldbuilding, good start. I'm curious to see what else you come up with.
"Time began about a year ago."
I applaud you sir. As a cynical GM long jaded by such words as "overturns a lot of DnD assumptions", I was quit surprised and intrigued by your opening sentence. Drew me right in.
This looks almost like a "Genesis" setting; that is, it deals with the actions of the early creatures of the Cosmos in the shaping of the world-to-come. Considering this, in what ways do the Thinkers resemble humans? Are they instead creatures of more elemental nature, being formed from the thoughts/feelings of the Urge? Do they make alliances among themselves based upon shared traits?
Also, you may not need to restrict yourself to stone/bronze age technologies. The Urge may very well have conceived of "clocks" a gazillion years ago, only its clocks were miles high (and inches wide) and instead of gears they consisted of interwoven strands of oscillating necromantic energy. So maybe there are clocks in the overture, but the Urge never finished them and so they are clumsy, chaotic and destructive (perhaps they don't even tell what time it is, but rather tell Time what It is a la Terry Pratchett).
Like a musician dying before completing his magnum opus, the world might be filled with impractical technologies of the Urge's devising. There is the potential for an almost "inverted post-apocalypse", where the Thinkers must contend with the Urge's disjointed, unfinished thought-creations in order to bring order to the rampant technologies of the world.
Just throwing it out there.
Loving what you've got so far, and looking forward to more!
As others have said, this is incredible, and I don't think I've quite seen anything like it. Starting so shortly after the beginning of time is a daring move, and I'm waiting to see how you work it out.
I like S???????A's idea about technology, and I think it might make sense also to give thinkers access to bits and pieces of advanced, or maybe just medieval technology, as they themselves did arise from the Urge.
Also, consider the effects of the demiurges on the survival rate of Thinkers in the first year, wouldn't they help many survive?
Anyway, good luck, and I'll be watching this thread.
This is a headtrip, and it's beautiful. It reminds me of some of my more abstract dreams. I'll be following this setting for sure. :)
This is kind of disorganized, but for now I'll keep the material and comments all here on the same thread. Maybe if there's a demand for it I'll make a new thread with just the material and make this the "discussion thread."
[spoiler=Demiurges]
Demiurges are all enormous, visible entities that float like clouds above the land. Each demiurge looks different: some have discernible anatomies, others are roilng, shapeless masses of some substance or other, and a few appear as little more than ripples in the sky.
Demiurges donâ,¬,,¢t see themselves in terms of alignment. Some have already worked out provisionary systems of what they think is right and wrong, but as a whole they are uncertain, almost childlike, as they manipulate the world below them.
Some Demiurges
Amma, the Conductor
Amma floats over a town of Thinkers that she has not yet named. She looks like a pale, transparent blue cloud that ripples with a regular rhythm.
Amma is delighted by music, and she protects the Thinkers in her domain as long as they contribute to her â,¬Å"song.â,¬Â Her faithful literally live in time with her rhythm, and she devises themes on which her faithful elaborate and improvise.
Amma sustains her people through direct gifts of food and other materials. As a result, they do not have sophisticated knowledge of crafts outside of music and art. She arms her people with weapons to protect her community from monsters and disobedient thinkers, but she prefers to ignore problems rather than confront them. Even when they fight, Ammaâ,¬,,¢s people are expected to conduct themselves with grace and harmony.
Amma empowers bards, sorcerers, and paladins. Her domains are Law, Protection, Air, and Healing.
Zaleukos, the Shade
Zaleukos appears as a broad, opaque mass of dark green scales that casts a shadow over his tower-city, Zalos. He created the stronghold himself, but he expects his citizens to do the rest for themselves, having taught them a few secrets of agriculture and ironworking. His citizens toil outside the walls by day and sleep under the shelter of their demiurge by night. His favored Thinkers are permitted to dwell on the roofless top floor of the tower.
Zaleukos amuses himself by experimenting on the minds and bodies of his Thinkers, and he asks nothing more of them than to let him indulge this pastime. Any of his Thinkers stand the chance of waking up with a reshaped body or a different set of memories and skills. At some point during the first winter, he decided that there exists an ideal form for every thing, and he is now searching for the ideal Thinker.
Zaleukos empowers wizards and sorcerors. He also gives many of his Thinkers levels in Monster, with or without their permission. His domains are Earth, Magic, Knowledge, and Healing.
Garm, the Pupil
Garm appears as a massive swarm of yellow birdlike animals. She has adopted a nomadic community of Thinkers that she discovered during the first autumn. She lives to travel the world and take in as much information as she can. She has a perfect memory, and she especially prizes writings on Source Walls. She has seen about half of the continent on which she lives, and during the first spring she even flew to the underside of the continent, though she will not speak of it.
Garm demands that her followers keep up with her. She has slowed her pace since she gained her followers, lingering in places that interest her for days or weeks at a time, but she still keeps a strenuous pace from a Thinkerâ,¬,,¢s perspective. Garm gives her followers the shelter and supplies they need to survive in any given place, and she has even directly attacked monsters that threatened them, but it is unclear how her followers fit into her greater plans.
Garm empowers wizards and rangers. Her domains are Knowledge, Chaos, Air, and Travel.
Dandao, the Wrath
Dandao appears as a vast network of thin black veins in the sky. It despises Thinkers and watches over monsters only. It travels among rough, inhospitable places where only monsters dwell, empowering them and directing them to attack the world of Thinkers. No other demiurges or Thinkers know what motivates Dandao; it may be envy, schadenfreude, the belief that simple lifeforms are best, or the simple thrill of competition.
Until late in the last winter, no Thinkers ever survived an audience with Dandao, but then it humored the pleas of a few desperate Thinkers who begged it to help them survive the cold and monsters. Now it sometimes bargains with Thinkers that come to it, but only in exchange for offerings of multiple sacrificed Thinkers. It empowers a few sorcerers, and its domains are Death, Plant, Animal, Strength, and Evil.
Teloth, the Father
Teloth appears as a gray, perfectly round disc of cloud-stuff over the city that bears his name. The city of Teloth consists of squat, largely identical granite buildings that keep out the cold well. Teloth remains in the spot where he first came into being, and he has no interest in what happens elsewhere. Some believe that Teloth is Garmâ,¬,,¢s nemesis, though they do not resemble each other in appearance.
Teloth commands and instructs his citizens to toil for their own security. He provides none of the material gifts that are common to other demiurges; he only provides laws and lessons in crafts and technologies. He discourages frivolity, idleness, contact with outsiders, and any innovation not provided by his own revelations. His rules seem grim to outsiders, but he did an admirable job of helping his followers survive the first winter. However, now that the weather is growing warmer again, some of Telothâ,¬,,¢s people are abandoning him, and this may cause him to rethink his strategies.
Teloth seems to be motivated by the challenge to make his Thinkers as productive and as fit to survive as possible. He might simply be intrigued by the fragility of mortals, and he constructs his society with the morbid fascination of a child constructing a house of cards. He frowns upon any interference on his designs, even the good intentions of his own people.
Teloth empowers wizards and paladins. His domains are Law, Earth, Protection, and War.
Aeschere, the Storm
Aeschere appears as a vast orange serpent, all arms and glowing eyes, constantly coiling over itself in a great tangle in the sky. It has the unique habit among demiurges of making itself invisible sometimes.
Aeschere is perhaps the most social of the demiurges, and the only one that speaks to other demiurges on a regular basis. It tells stories to demiurges and Thinkers alike, it toys with unique wonders of the world that it finds, and it sometimes manipulates Thinkers into acting out stories of its own invention. Despite these diversions, Aeschere has not set any real goals for itself, and its enormous divine potential has yet to be realized.
Aeschere has no followers per se, but it has befriended many Thinkers as it travels among the places that please it. Spellcasters who gain power from it display admiration more than devotion.
Aeschere empowers a few bards, sorcerors, and warlocks. Its domains are Luck, Chaos, Trickery, and Fire.
[/spoiler]
Here's a solution that will keep Favored Enemy and similar abilities working correctly.
[spoiler=Subtypes]
Any Thinker without the Weird Type trait is of the Humanoid type and has a subtype based on the substance from which he, she, or it was generated. Nonhumanoids do not need subtypes, though they may still have them. Note that a humanoid does not necessarily look anything like the substance from which it generated. Here are some common subtypes for humanoids:
Soil â,¬' Thinkers that generate from fertile soil are the most common subtype. Their bodies tend to lack bright colors and extravagant features. Animals, monstrous humanoids, plant creatures, and magical beasts also generate from soil.
Foam â,¬' These Thinkers generate from sea foam that collects on coasts. They are usually strikingly beautiful. They are sometimes amphibious, but they often show no signs of their watery heritage. Monstrous humanoids, deathless, and fey also generate from soil.
Ashes â,¬' These Thinkers generate from the remains of large fires, which can be either natural or artificial. They vary in appearance much more wildly than those with the Soil subtype, and they have a tendency to seek psionic power. Aberrations, magical beasts, and dragons also generate from ashes.
Fog â,¬' Some Thinkers generate from patches of mist or low-hanging clouds. They tend to be light-colored, slim, and extremely quiet and introverted. Fey, aberrations, undead, and deathless also generate from fog.
Meat â,¬' These Thinkers generate from the dead bodies of Thinkers or monsters. Their appearance is often repulsive to other Thinkers: they range from powerful insectoids to shambling, many-faced masses to starkly pale, cold-blooded ghouls. Vermin, aberrations, oozes, and undead also generate from meat.
Birth â,¬' Thinkers with the birth subtype were born of other Thinkers rather than generated. They may have been conceived sexually or asexually. They look like their parents, so there are few visible traits that they share with each other. Still, they are of some importance to the worldâ,¬,,¢s future and share some behavioral traits that mark them as the second generation of Thinkers. In particular, they donâ,¬,,¢t have nearly as much innate knowledge as spontaneously generated Thinkers, since their origin distances them somewhat from the dead mind of the Urge. Birth creatures are very rare, given the young age of the world at large.
Other subtypes - Thinkers can generate from almost anything, as long as enough of the substance is collected in one place. In the first year, Thinkers have generated from clay, wood, straw, even ink and molten glass. Such Thinkers have rare subtypes of their own.
[/spoiler]
Some clarifications concerning magic and psionics:
Magic is everywhere, but psionics is unique to the minds of Thinkers. A Thinker spellcaster might have been generated with the potential for magic, he may have sought out magical power through arcane writings on Source Walls, or he may have been empowered by a Demiurge.
All Demiurges can grant spells to clerics, and each of them can empower some other kinds of spellcasters, as noted.
Psionics is a development undreamed of by the Urge. It springs from a state of mind that was impossible for the Urge to occupy, and demiurges and monsters cannot use it. Still, the disctinction between magic and psionics is lost even on most Thinkers who use them - both are just power, part of the way things are. The consequences of the schism between magic and psionics are yet to be fully revealed.
Some very metaphysical stuff lies within. I congratulate you for starting at the beginning; I've never seen it done before.
I'd think your world would better fit a more free form system than D&D. Sacrilege, I know! But something more free form like Mutants & Masterminds, Big Eyes Small Mouth, or even something light like Risus could be a good fit.
I will ponder these things in my heart. I'm not actually such a d20 loyalist, and I have experience with all of those systems. Here would be my motivations for keeping the d20 rules.
In a game with such a wonky premise, players will want to know exactly what their characters can and can't do, and freeform games sometimes rely on intuition in this area.
My players know D&D best. They enjoy the tactical gaming aspect of it, and they'll likely think that BESM and M&M PCs are too similar to each other, rules-wise.
I like the idea I wrote of the distinction between conscious substance (normal class levels) and unconscious substance (having leet ability bonuses and racial traits.) As I imagine it, Thinkers can choose the latter path to power, but as they do they become more like monsters and give up some of their identity as Thinkers. I think any system I use should keep that distinction.
In any case, I am in fact making the race system much more freeform, which is the next thing I'll stop procrastinating about and finally get around to posting.
Thanks for your thoughts!
All right, here's my race system so far. Let's call it a first draft. It allows PCs to be "human" rules-wise, or to give their PCs more far-out traits.
WARNING - the contents of this spoiler box are extremely crunchy and probably boring to people who aren't considering trying out a similar system themselves. It's all rules-related stuff, so I'm concerned with finding fuzzy or exploitable parts, but I'm also concerned with how well the system will contribute to the flavor of the setting in practice.
[spoiler=Racial traits for PCs in The Overture]
Instead of choosing a race, a player receives an allotment of race points to spend on his character. Characters can take levels in a new base class, the Monster, that improve their racial abilities.
A starting character with no levels in Monster gets 6 points to spend and has a level adjustment of +0. All PCs have a favored class of â,¬Å"any,â,¬Â like a human or half-elf does.
You can only take each trait once unless the trait description says otherwise.
Ability Tweak: 1 point
Your ability scores are different. Each time you take this trait, you gain a +2 racial bonus to one ability score. You must also take a -2 racial penalty to one or two other ability scores, depending on the ability score you increased, as listed below.
Strength â,¬' Dex, Con, or any two mental ability scores.
Dexterity â,¬' Str, Con, or any two mental ability scores
Constitution â,¬' any ability score
Intelligence â,¬' any ability score
Wisdom â,¬' any ability score
Charisma â,¬' any ability score
You may take this trait more than once. Its effects stack. However, you may not increase any one ability score by more than +4, and you may not penalize an ability score if it would lower that ability score to below 3.
Amphibious: 1 point
You can breathe water as well as air, and you suffer no harm from being in a deep aquatic environment. You have low-light vision when underwater, and you gain a +8 racial bonus on Swim checks.
Blindsense: 3 points
You gain blindsense out to 5 feet. This is a supernatural ability.
Bonus Feat: 3 points
Prerequisite: this trait may only be taken at first level.
You gain any feat for which you meet the prerequisites as a bonus feat.
Darkvision: 1 point
You have darkvision out to 60 feet.
You may take this feat up to three times. The second time you take it, your darkvision extends to 120 feet. The third time you take it, you gain the supernatural ability to see perfectly in darkness of any kind, even in the area of a deeper darkness spell.
Energy Resistance: 2 points
You either gain resistance 10 to one kind of energy or resistance 5 to two kinds of energy. Choose from among the following energy types: fire, cold, electricity, acid, or sonic.
You can take this trait multiple times. Its effects stack, but your resistance to a particular kind of energy cannot be greater than 10.
Extra Arms: 4 points
You have four arms instead of two. If you fight with more than one weapon, you have only one main hand and three off-hands. You may fight with two two-handed weapons or two double-weapons, but if you do you are treated as having one-handed weapons in all your off-hands (not light weapons.) If even one of your off-hand weapons is not light, all your hands get the associated penalty to hit. You do not get extra unarmed strikes, but if you have natural weapons you may treat them all as light weapons. Multiple shield bonuses do not stack. You may take the Multiweapon Fighting feat in the Monster Manual (this isnâ,¬,,¢t a bonus feat)
Highly Skilled: 3 points
You gain 4 extra skill points at first level and one extra skill point per level after that. You do not gain skill points retroactively.
Large Size: 5 points
Prerequisite: Medium size
You are Large instead of Medium. Your speed increases by 10 feet. You have a space and natural reach of 10 ft. Your ability scores are unaffected.
Light Sleeping: 1 point
Like an elf, you require only 4 hours of a trancelike state each day to gain a full dayâ,¬,,¢s rest. You are also immune to sleep, nightmare, and any spells that depend on sleep or dreaming to work.
Life Support: 3 points
You do not need to eat, sleep, or breathe. Spellcasters still need to rest for 8 hours to restore spells. You are not immune to magically induced sleep or fatigue.
Natural Armor: Varies
You have a natural armor bonus to AC. If you have natural armor from other sources, the bonuses stack.
+1: 2 points
+2: 2 points
+3: 2 points
+4: 3 points
+5: 3 points
+6: 3 points
+7: 4 points
+8: 4 points
You may take this trait multiple times. Each time you take it, you upgrade your natural armor bonus to the next highest value and pay the amount of points next to the new value.
Natural Weapon: 2 points
You gain either two claw or slam attacks or one bite attack You are proficient with your natural weapons, but bite attacks count as secondary weapons (you only add half your Str bonus to damage, and you receive a -5 penalty to attacks with it.) Natural weapons deal 1d4 damage for a Medium creature. If you fight with more than one claw in a full attack, you incur the normal penalties for fighting with two light weapons. Because your bite attack is a secondary attack, you may add it to a full attack action without penalizing your other attacks.
You can take the Multiattack and Improved Natural Weapon feats from the Monster Manual. Hese are not bonus feats.
You can take this trait multiple times, once for two claws or slams and once for a bite. If you have the Extra Arms trait, you can take this trait once more to give claws or slams to your other two arms.
Poisonous Bite: 3 points
Prerequisite: a natural bite attack
Choose an ability score when you take this trait. Creatures that take damage from your bite attack must succeed on a Fortitude save (DC equals 11 plus half your Hit Dice) or take 1d6 damage to that ability score, or 1d3 damage if your bite deals Constitution damage. They must make the save again a minute later or take secondary damage of the same die size as the initial damage.
Psionic Gift: 1 point
You gain two bonus power points, and you count as a psionic creature, even if you canâ,¬,,¢t manifest any powers and donâ,¬,,¢t have any levels in a psionic class. You can take psionic feats for which you meet the prerequisites, and you can use the Concentration skill to gain a psionic focus.
Quadruped: 3 points
Prerequisite: cannot have the Serpentine trait
In addition to your arms, you have four legs. You gain a +4 circumstance bonus to resist being tripped, bull rushed, or overrun. (This stacks with the benefit from the Stability trait.) Your land speed increases by 10 feet. You cannot wear footgear.
Scent: 2 points
You gain the scent ability, including the ability to track creatures by scent if you have the Track feat.
Serpentine: 2 points
Prerequisite: cannot have the Quadruped trait
You have a snakelike tail instead of legs. Your land speed is reduced by 10 feet, and you gain a climb speed and a swim speed equal to your new land speed. You can rise from prone on your turn as a swift action. You cannot wear footgear.
Shapeshifting: 4 points
You gain the Shapechanger subtype in addition to your other subtypes. You can change your physical appearance at will as though with the disguise self spell, but with the following changes. The ability is an extraordinary ability that lasts until you dismiss it or lose consciousness. Since the effect is not an illusion, characters get no Will save to disbelieve it. Activating it is still a standard action that provokes attacks of opportunity, and dismissing it is a free action. Any clothing or equipment does not change appearance. You may change your basic body type to appear as though you had the Quadruped, Serpentine, and/or Extra Arms traits, though you do not actually gain the benefits of these traits. The effect grants you a +10 bonus to Disguise checks, or it can be used as a kind of camouflage to grant a +10 bonus to Hide checks, +20 if you remain motionless.
Skill Affinity: 1 point
You gain one of the following feats as a bonus feat: Acrobatic, Agile, Animal Affinity, Athletic, Awareness, Deft Hands, Nimble Fingers, or Stealthy.
Small Size: 1 point
Prerequisute: Medium size
You are Small instead of Medium. Your ability scores are unaffected.
Stability: 1 point
You receive a +4 racial bonus to resist being tripped. bull rushed, or overrun.
Stench: 2 points
As a swift action, you can release a cloud of foul-smelling chemicals that affects living creatures within 30 feet. They must make a Fortitude save equal to 11 plus half your Hit Dice or be sickened for 10 rounds. Creatures that succeed on their saves cannot be affected by your stench for 24 hours. Creatures with Stench are unaffected, as are creatures that are immune to poison.
Superior Natural Weapon: 3 points
Prerequisite: Natural Weapon
Either your claw, slam, or bite attacks (choose one) receive a +1 enhancement bonus to attack rolls, as though they were masterwork weapons. Characters who can create or enhance magic items may add magical enhancements to your superior natural weapon as though it were a masterwork weapon.
You can take this trait more than once. Each time you take it, it applies to a different kind of natural weapon.
Superior Saves: 1 point
You gain one of the following: a +1 racial bonus to all saves, a +2 racial bonus on saves against magic, a +2 racial bonus on saves against psionics, or a +4 racial bonus against mind-affecting effects.
Tiny Size: 3 points
Prerequisite: Small Size
You are Tiny instead of Small. You have no reach, and your size bonuses to attacks and AC are +2. Your ability scores are unaffected.
Spell Resistance: 3 points
You have spell resistance or power resistance equal to your character level +5.
Weird Type: Varies
Monstrous Humanoid, Magical Beast, Giant, Aberration, Fey: 1 point
Dragon, Plant, living construct: 2 points
Undead, Construct, Deathless: 4 points
You are a type of creature other than humanoid, gaining all the traits of your new type, except that your weapon and armor proficienceies do not change. You cannot become an elemental, animal, ooze, vermin or outsider in this way.
[/spoiler]
Eventually I have to get around to fleshing out the Monster class and making sure it's not degenerate, but I think it's more important to come up with more actual setting material.
Here's something a little less rules-heavy. As always, comments are appreciated.
[spoiler=Fancies]
Fancies are unique nonliving or semi-animate objects that litter the continents.
No fancies are designed for Thinkers, and a great deal of fancies are quite dangerous to Thinkers who get too close. Fancies were not gifts of providence by the Urge to the Thinkers who would succeed It; fancies were only personal intellectual exercises of the Urge before time began. Even the fancies with moving parts do little more than keep themselves running.
Still, Thinkers who find and study fancies stand to gain a great deal. Every fancy contains the secret of a different spell, which wizardly types can add to their repertoire as though it were an arcane writing. Uncovering the secret of a fancy requires a Spellcraft check (probably DC 25 + the spell level.) In addition, sorcerers and other spontaneous casters can replace any spell they know with a spell of the same level spell hidden in a fancy they discover, as long as the new spell is on their spell list. Any number of Thinkers may use a fancy in this way without exhausting its magical secret, but they have to visit the fancy in person. If a fancy is destroyed or altered in any way, its secret is lost.
Some fancies are completely static, and serve as little more than the inscrutable artwork of the Urge, mental gifts from itself to itself. Others are moving mechanical contrivances with no apparent purpose, often of a size that is patently inconvenient for most Thinkers to study. Still others radiate permanent, possibly unique, magical effects.
Many fancies are logically impossible constructs. Such fancies might be static or dynamic, but they all outright defy the laws of nature, gravity, geometry, or even the basic laws of thought. These fancies might be useful on their own, most obviously when they create perpetual motion.
[/spoiler]
More on how the setting handles certain classes.
[spoiler=The Lucid Dreamers]
Most monks in the Overture follow the path of the monk because they are fascinated with their own dreams. These monks are called lucid dreamers by the demiurges in whose communities they live. True to their name, they learn to dream with full awareness that they are dreaming, and they want to explore the distinction between the sleeping and waking world. Their ki power comes from the successful blurring of this line: they can move as though drifting through a dream, empower their bodies by dreaming it so, and heal their own wounds by simply denying their reality (A lucid dreamer who uses its Wholeness of Body ability sometimes recites a mantra such as â,¬Å"Think but this and all is mendedâ,¬Â¦Ã¢,¬Â)
Lucid dreamers can be of any alignment, even nonlawful alignments, and retain their monk abilities, but they must be able to sleep and dream (so they cannot have the Light Sleeper trait.) They do not need to be a member of a monastery or any other group of lucid dreamers.
[/spoiler]
Some possible futures/adventure hooks:
Zaleukos decides that he has found the ideal form for Thinkers, the â,¬Å"human.â,¬Â He reshapes most of his followers, destroys the rest, and commands them to bring more Thinkers to his tower to be refined.
Zaleukos decides that he has found the ideal form for Thinkers, the â,¬Å"dragon.â,¬Â He reshapes most of his followers, destroys the rest, and commands them to bring more Thinkers to his tower to be refined.
A lone Thinker gets in a disagreement with Aeschere and seemingly destroys him with the power of her mind alone. Having discovered that demiurges may be vulnerable to psionic power, she decides to seek out other psionic Thinkers until she has a force that can deal with the demiurges on their own terms.
Two continents crash into each other with unusual force, creating massive earthquakes on both sides, and curious Thinkers and Demiurges on both sides meet one another.
The city-states of Amma and Teloth declare the first war, which may make a mark on the world that can never be erased.
Garm and her followers discover the axes of moral and ethical alignment and their effects on Thinkers, monsters, and magic. Garm decides that she doesnâ,¬,,¢t like it, and she searches for a way to destroy it before the other demiurges learn too much about it.
The other demiurges all ally against Dandao and rally their followers against his monsters. Dandao dies, and the remaining monsters on the continent devolve into weaker, animalistic forms. The continent becomes a paradise for Thinkers, but the machinations of the demiurges and future contact with other continents may change all this.
All spontaneous generation suddenly stops, and the only new Thinkers and monsters brought into the world are those born from others of their kind. Aeschere and Garm form an alliance to try to discover why this happened and to reverse the change.
Aeschere decides that each living thing should eventually die. Suddenly, his nature changes.
Thinkers that originated from different substances, even those who once followed the same demiurge, turn against each other and begin to regroup based on common physical traits.
Garm decides that all the continents should remain bound to each other rather than drift in the void. The next time her continent touches another, she will be there waiting.
A cult of Thinker wizards wants to try to revive the Urge from death. However, since everything that exists is a piece of the Urgeâ,¬,,¢s dead mind, this would mean the end of life, the continents, and everything.
XsiriusX's review of Bill Volk's 'The Overture'
The premise
The setting has a very unique and highly creative premise to it. Having everything be the thought, dream, fantasy, or idea of a dead, (for the lack of a better term) overgod is rather inspired. It allows you and your players to use anything from D&D or other role playing systems without really having to make massive changes to the setting.
The Demiurges could use more explaining, not about who and what they are, because you have already done that, but more about how they came to be. From the source material I gather that they were generated from the shattered consciousness, but what does that mean? were they originally dreams, figments of the urges minds, parts of his personality, maybe his emotions?
What exactly is a source wall? Are they actual physical walls or magical barriers?
Now my big questions about the premise, does life still just appear? when something dies is it permanently dead or does it soul, spark, or whatever, enter a new body? Get reborn? Go to another plane?
The Races
Everything seems right on track. I like how you are able to spend points to truly create a custom race. It really keeps the game fresh and doesn't feel like you are playing the same character over and over again. At least that is how I feel when I play D&D.
Also I like how you have explained where types and subtypes of creatures come from, it still needs to be flushed out more but its a good start.
The Classes
My big question is, are you using the wizard class? How does taking levels in a monster class work? Is it similar to 'savage species' or is it new options that a player can spend points on when he builds his race?
The Demiurges
I like how you have moved away from the traditional deity system and created a system where the thinkers can interact with the demiurges and vise versa. Also begin able to see a power greater then you floating in the sky, is a nice visual.
The Nemeses
The Nemeses is a cool idea, but I think it needs to be really worked out more. How strong is the connection between the thinker and the Nemeses? In the source material you speak of opposite alignments, but If one takes damage does the other? What happens to one if the other dies? When they come in contact with one another do they know that they are the others reflection?
Fancies
The entire concept is pure genius, it adds great flavor to the setting. I do have one question; do psions gain anything from Fancies?
Overall I think it is a very interesting idea for a setting, you have a lot of interesting concepts in place. It just needs to be flushed out more. I am highly interested in seeing where this setting goes and I hope you keep working on it.
For getting players involved, I really don't know what I can help with. I know that for me to be active and interested in playing, I have to be interested in the game. What I mean by that is, being excited about playing a character or a new class. Now, I can see players being really interested in playing a custom race that they build themselves, I know I would be. I don't think that is much help, but I think once you get a complete setting you won't have a problem getting people interested in playing.
I loved the name The Urge. Very creative, and it seems almost like a non-creature. The Urge sounds more like unbottled emotion and, well, urges. Living thought. The fact that this setting's gods are known as demiurges is fantastic. From the Urge, the Demiurges. I love it.
Like many others, I find the premise of 'Time began a year ago' very interesting. Everything fits in, and the Thinkers being 'born' from the Urge's thoughts is a great concept. The one thing I raised my eyebrow at was children being born in the first summer. Unless children grow in the womb considerably more quickly than humans do, this doesn't work. There's just no time for pregnancy.
The fact that races are customizable sounds good because it's both incredibly simple and incredibly complex. Since everyone is different it eliminates all notions of race, meaning less work for you, and that you do not fall into the habit that some DM's (myself included) do of creating a nation of this race and a nation of that. There is no long boring list of races, everyone is different and thus 'Race' is a very concise entry.
[blockquote=Nemeses]Whenever a Thinker is born or generated, its nemesis soon follows. Even the demiurges have nemeses. We do not know why. Perhaps it is a reflection of the imperfect nature of all thinkers before the lost purity of the Urge. Perhaps it is an aftereffect of the Urge's habit of debating with Itself.
A Thinker and its nemesis might emerge on entirely different continents, but they are connected as long as they both live. Even though they may never meet, each lives as a counterpoint to the other's argument. Nemeses are always of opposite alignments, and a change of alignment in one will be mirrored in the other. Nemeses always resemble each other, but if one has a gender, then the other will have the opposite gender. A male nemesis is called an animus, and a female nemesis is called an anima. As yet, no animus and anima have ever had a child together (This would most likely occur with two true neutral nemeses, though even in this case the personal obstacles would be nigh-insurmountable.)
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I LOVE THIS!!! The implications of the word 'nemesis' already give you the flavor. An unbeatable opponent. What is more undefeatable to you than you? I also love that they are the Thinker's complete opposite. Like a mirror. If I were you, I would make sure to continue the Mirror Motif. I also love that the male is called the Animus and the female the Anima. Very Jungian of you. I love this. This is probably my favorite part. It makes me happy inside. Wow. I feel like a girl. On this note though, you said that many Thinkers are androgynous. Would a genderless Thinker engender a genderless Nemesis in the same way that an Anima and Animus would be assumed to yield two true neutral nemesis children? Oh, and did I mention I love this?
This is a great setting. I mirror everything the previous two posters have said.
One question though, are all of the continents already formed, or do the thoughts and desires of the first Thinkers there determine the landscape?
Thanks, guys! Your reviews have really pointed out the holes I've overlooked and given me some work to do. First, answers to the easier questions:
Sirius:
If this makes sense, the demiurges are pieces of the Urge's self, Its awareness and point of view, as opposed to the things It felt or thought about.
Source walls are made of real matter, and I'm going to devote a later post to them. They fit in with how wizards are going to work. Source wall shards are kind of like arcane writings that can be copied into a wizard's repertoire.
A Thinker doesn't take damage or die if its nemesis does the same. If a Thinker dies, its nemesis is simply freed. Aside from the mirroring of alignment, there are no game rules for the connection between nemeses.
The Monster class is the big thing I still have to work on. It's going to work like a base class, not like a race with a level adjustment. In other words, the Monster will have twenty levels, a BAB, base saves, and all that. Its perks will include a few extra race points to spend, as well as ability score bonuses and options for big, shiny things like wings at later levels.
Speaking of, does anyone know of a good template for posting base classes on this forum?
Seraphine_Harmonium:
I imagined that because the Thinkers have such varied anatomies, a few of them have super-fast gestation periods. I'm sure a few thinkers reproduce like flies, laying a ton of fast-growing eggs and moving on. Maybe there are some genderless Thinkers that reproduce through binary fission!
Yep, a genderless Thinker would have a genderless nemesis. And nobody in the setting knows what the children of an animus and his anima would be like. Maybe there'd be a set of true neutral twins, maybe the child would have no nemesis and embody the resolution of its parents' conflict of ideas, maybe it would be so at peace with the world that it would just sit there and do nothing forever, maybe it would get sucked to another plane and become its own Urge, or maybe something even stranger would happen. The whole idea is so trippy that I think I'd like to leave it to the DMs to judge on a case-by-case basis. That way the players are always surprised.
Stargate525:
In this setting, nothing is really "already formed." It's not even set in stone that Thinkers have to grow old and die yet. So, it follows that a continent can change its nature if its inhabitants do the same.
Once again, thanks for everything, and stay tuned for more!
Quote from: Bill VolkThanks, guys! Your reviews have really pointed out the holes I've overlooked and given me some work to do. First, answers to the easier questions:
Sirius:
If this makes sense, the demiurges are pieces of the Urge's self, Its awareness and point of view, as opposed to the things It felt or thought about.
Source walls are made of real matter, and I'm going to devote a later post to them. They fit in with how wizards are going to work. Source wall shards are kind of like arcane writings that can be copied into a wizard's repertoire.
A Thinker doesn't take damage or die if its nemesis does the same. If a Thinker dies, its nemesis is simply freed. Aside from the mirroring of alignment, there are no game rules for the connection between nemeses.
The Monster class is the big thing I still have to work on. It's going to work like a base class, not like a race with a level adjustment. In other words, the Monster will have twenty levels, a BAB, base saves, and all that. Its perks will include a few extra race points to spend, as well as ability score bonuses and options for big, shiny things like wings at later levels.
I don't know if you have ever heard of it, but wizards released a book called savage species back for D&D 3.0. It is very similar to what you are talking about doing for you monster races and I think it might help you out.
Ah, yes. I have Savage Species (and Libris Mortis,) and they've given me tips on power balance, but I don't like the way the "monster classes" dole out stuff like feats and hit dice so irregularly. Players can use these if they want, but I want to make a class that works like all the others and continues the "make your own race" vibe.