The Campaign Builder's Guild

THE WORLDS OF HUMANKIND
All the worlds encountered by Panoply have a number of features in common.  They all have a single natural moon, though four possess one or more alien satellites whose presence has severely disrupted the natural order of their planet.  They also feature one sun, and while the colour and quality of light may vary, in every instance the native peoples attest that its appearance is quite normal and natural.  It is generally assumed that all known skies are filled with stars.  However, at least six skies are either so cloudy or totally cluttered with debris that this has not yet been confirmed as a universal constant.

Any given world has multiple names provided by its natives.  Panoply has developed a system of names based on symbols from an obsolete numerological art; the old practice of allowing the discoverer of a world to name it has long been discarded.  The worlds listed here are in order of their discovery.

Chorus[/b]
The central hub of the Panoply Collective, Chorus has been reshaped again and again by alchemical revolutions.  The earth is scarred, moulded and animate.  The air is abuzz with the songs of elementals.  The cities are sprawling, eager and flamboyant, but that same restless heart hungers for revolution.  It is said that Chorus has been so consumed by the Alchemical ideal that it cannot tolerate stability: there are only creations, confrontations and calamities.  Thus, those who return to Chorus after a time off-world come see why it is called the Crucible.

As the heartland of Panoply, the numerological designation for Chorus is Eter.

Yan[/b]
A typical or 'standard' world, featuring five principle landmasses and a fertile ocean.  In the world's principal language it is called Kush, and as one of the closest allies of Chorus, natives of the Heartland are content to call it Kush as well.  Yan took quickly to the sciences introduced by Chorus, but foreswore almost all future Geodesical developments after learning the truth of the Integer War.

Hāt[/b]
One gets a sense that an invisible design is at work on the winds of Hāt.  It is nothing overt, only the subtle impression of uncommon coincidence, of happenings that nudge the edges of probability.  The natives have an eerie confidence, not necessarily that things will go right but that something interesting is bound to happen.  This expectation has been a burden for many who leave, though, for other worlds seem chaotic, irrational and directionless by comparison.  It is also markedly peaceful, and its wars can be predicted by offworlders long before they happen.

Qo[/b]
This world is one of the theatres of the fourth Forever War.  Panoply relinquished its dominance over Qo three centuries ago, and the Forever's agents have been busy softening its rulers and undermining its military ever since.  It is predicted that the incursion will begin soon, but Panoply's resources are too heavily committed in Urel, Domed and the Marhydd Complex to institute any preventative measures.

Karvat[/b]
Wayfarers call it the Little Heartland.  Ever since its discovery, Karvat has incorporated every new invention from Chorus with an obsessive, fetishistic kind of devotion, so that it appears a haphazard imitation or caricature.  Streets are flooded with elixirs, knickknacks, homunculi and other inventions supposedly in vogue on the Crucible; the 'enlightened' bourgeoisie mindlessly parrot whatever controversy is currently raging in the High Colleges.  For someone who's never actually been to Chorus, Karvat can seem a wonderland.  For those who have, it is by turns endearingly pathetic or perverse.

Eter-Un[/b]
Intellectuals still debate the existence of Eter-Un, as little reliable evidence can be found and no known paths lead to it.  It was supposedly encountered by wayfarers who at first believed it to be an entirely new world.  They soon discovered that it was in fact a far-future Chorus, which had been severed from the rest of the Collective (and perhaps from the common timeline) by the technologies of the Forever.

Wayfarer Modeah, who would later become famous for her travels into the First Sea, speaks in her memoirs of an inverted, endless, cityscape suspended over this familiar world, and of resplendent, demonic beings whose human forms somehow seemed to fill the universe.  These memoirs are illegal within Chorus, so convention naturally requires that distinguished persons possess a copy.

Cheved[/b]
Before the arrival of Chorus, Cheved had already established an intercontinental confederacy (albeit a tenuous one) founded on an alchemical renaissance.  Unfortunately, the science was almost exclusively militarised, and the threat of shapewar was ever-present.  The beginnings of a global conflict were evident when the So-Karvat Armada drifted into Cheved's waters en route to Helit.

Panoply's sudden appearance was sufficient to avert catastrophe, but Cheved is far from a peaceful world even to this day.  So-Karvat backed the empire of Vossair in the submission of its enemies and other rogue states, and order has been maintained through violence ever since.  While Cheved has provided many alchemical discoveries, they are all weapons, and because of this, the New Alchemists maintain that this world's discovery was the darkest contribution to the Great Work before the creation of the red-negative.

Monad[/b]
Though it was discovered early in Panoply's interplanetary history, Monad has not been fully integrated.  The most stable oceanic routes to it are frequented by the Unborn, whose exorbitant and often dangerous tolls are more than many Wayfarers can afford.  Thus, large scale engagements with the native governments (political or military) are impossible, and only small contingents of diplomats can travel there at a given time.

Much of Monad remains ignorant of the existence of Panoply.  The Ghs Empire, which is most accessible to Wayfarers, has longstanding ties with the Collective, and has benefited from the sciences introduced by missionaries, but other peoples tend to regard Panoply as something of a myth, or a distant, irrelevant power at most.

Yensa[/b]
The sky is gleaming white and festooned with black stars like scattered ink.  Its dominant celestial object is an shadowy disc radiating long wavering tendrils of indigo that snake paths between the stars and sometimes seem to caress them.  The land itself is normal, but the sky's light lends it an eerie starkness.  The people of Yensa claim that their black sun speaks directly into their minds.  Every person enjoys a unique dialogue with this entity, which exhorts them to staggering acts of brilliance and barbarity.  No non-native has ever had such an experience.

The connection with Yensa is unreliable.  Often, decades will pass before it is accessible, and it may disappear again after only weeks.  Some scholars suggest that the black sun itself is the cause of this, but none can say for certain.

Degan[/b]
A desert world, Degan's waters are sealed away within thousands of prodigious craggy towers, some so tall they seem like pillars supporting the sky.  They stand where the ocean once was, rooted deep into the earth, and kingdoms have grown around them, eager to monopolise the effusions of watery green matter that blister on the towers' surfaces.  The continents were abandoned long ago.  Only sweltering, airless death lingers on their endless plateaus.

Amn/Kalel/Nestor/Sul[/b]
Four worlds, ruled by the stridently anti-Panoply Sophist Kings.  Their characteristics are not known for sure; while they are purportedly standard worlds with ordinary human peoples, the Sophist Kings' facility for mind control and disinformation makes the truth difficult to discern.

Tammurand[/b]
And means shade, a sort of fleeting impression left by an object or idea that is gone.  Tammur is, according to the natives, an invertebrate god of death (all their gods are apparently insectlike or otherwise unhuman) and a guide for the souls of the dead.  Thus Tammurand can be interpreted as the death of death, or the memory of death.  A local adage goes 'Tammurand is Eternity'.

Tammurand is like a colossal insect made from dark earth and a sweeping, jutting, and teetering assortment of various architectural wonders.  Its inhabitants live within and upon it, and some worship it while others damn its existence and their confinement to its lamplit streets.  They come from many worlds, most of which Panoply has never encountered.  The world-city swims through an ethereal, starry sky, charting a course between worlds, landing only to rejuvenate its form with new substance or to stir up trouble at cosmically inappropriate moments.

Brilliant, as per usual. Tammurand and Yensa, I like particularly. More on them please.

Very literary and evocative, as usual, though I think it would benefit if you clarified the genre. I was a bit put off by the fact that everything is discussed so tangentially that any hint about possible levels of magic and technology might just be a metaphor for something else. It's a bit hard to identify with a setting when I can't even tell how and why people travel between its various locations.

SA,
I always enjoy your stuff. I know that part of what I enjoy so much is your ability to write from the perspective of within the setting, not as a xenographer from earth, but as someone from (in this case) within panoply, complete with the prejudices of intellect and knowledge.
Path's, the First Sea, mention of future versions discovered as seperate worlds, all lend a layer of consistent off-kilterness.

Now, let's see what you do with this one.

 

You call this Magnum Opus--does that mean your focus has shifted entirely to this from your two other settings?

As always, you have a talent for originality.

Magnum Opus is entirely an in-setting reference, referring to its alchemical focus.

ALCHEMY
The Great Work, or the science of transformation.  It is not a single discipline but a broad category of sciences, incorporating base chemical processes, complex transmutation and even spiritual ascension.  There is a profoundly theological tenor to alchemical study in some schools, and many academics are troubled by the influence of scripture on new studies.

Chorus was considerably advanced in alchemy before its discovery of the Stellar Paths.  Its wealthiest nation already possessed a standardised golemic labour force and a populace strengthened by medical elixirs.  Interworld commerce has increased this knowledge greatly, with notable contributions from Cheved, Keter and Koht before its destruction at the hands of the Verix.

SHAPEWAR
A war in which alchemical weapons are used extensively.  The consequences of a shapewar can be apocalyptic: bedlam elementals (beings rising spontaneously from high-density Form-dissonance), mutation, disrupted atmosphere, widespread infertility, and casualties amounting to a high percentage of the global population.  At least one planet, Koht, was all but obliterated by a shapewar, and at least three other planets are at risk.

ASTROLOGY
The sky is a map of the universe.  In the patterns of stars are written coordinates to new worlds and strange awakenings, and through intuition and calculation humankind can chart a course across the cosmos.  It is not easy, though.  Wayfarers watch for signs in the night sky: strange convergences, subtle alterations in stellar positions and constellations; a prodigious heavenly cipher written across the firmament.  As a vessel sails further from land, following these portents, the sky soon becomes unrecognisable, and the wayfarer eventually finds herself in another world.

Before alchemical advances made flight possible, some worlds were impossible to reach due to obscured skies or the absence of navigable oceans.  Today, starships have circumvented the second problem (though their expensiveness currently precludes large-scale transport), but nonvisible stars continue to prove an obstacle.

THE INTERSTICE
The Interstice is the place between worlds, where origin and destination become merged and indistinct.  It has no unique properties, as it is merely a commingling of things that already exist, but it is notable for the presence of the Unborn, who navigate it through distant epochs, perhaps into other realities.  It includes both the World Ocean and the Astral Sea: the former is the water that joins worlds, the latter is the endless sky navigated by starships.

Cool. That latest post helps clarify how these worlds fit together quite well.

Is this your synthesis of elements from Dystopia/Panglossia etc?  Very much like the look of it so far, whether it is or not.  Having read a lot of your earlier work its interesting to note how different your writing is now in terms of style: your writing has grown a lot more concise but retained its evocative power, so that each word and line are working overtime, poetically, to divulge information.  I particularly love the descriptions of Chorus, Karvat, and Yensa, and the emphasis on alchemy and numerology.

Dozens of questions spring to mind.  Who are the Unborn?  What is the Forever War or the technologies of Forever?  Who are the demonic beings of Eter-Un?  What exactly is a Wayfarer?

I'm glad Tammurand showed up. I've loved the thing since you first posted it on the Wizards of the Coast boards when I believe I described it as "a giant plane-hopping bug," to which you responded "Hell yes!"  Is the great insect-city going to be substantially changed?  It's the city's presence primarily that make me think of Dystopia or rather its "vivisected" new form, but I realize that due to its reality-shifting nature Tammurand might actually be present in both worlds...

The synthesis is primarily in my other setting (work in progress).  A lot of the metaphysical elements of my old settings, like Tammurand, the I-----E and the Q----A have carried over here because the work in progress has no place for them, but they are too awesome to leave unused.

Cool.  A few more random questions - probably all this will be explained in time anyway, but I'm impatient, damn it!

You capitalization of "Form" as in "Form-dissonance" suggests a phenomenon distinct from "form" as we know it, an energy or pattern or numinous something-or-other... what is Form?

The Verix: alchemical masters and participants in the Shapewar?  A race?  A civilization?  A religious group?  All three?

The red-negative sounds really sinister but I have no clue as to what it could be other than some kind of esoteric alchemical phenomenon or breakthrough.

How do you envision typical adventure and/or adventurers in this setting?

WAYFARER[/b]
Strictly speaking, anyone currently in transit on the World Ocean or Astral Sea is called a wayfarer, but the term is usually reserved for the likes of pirates, explorers and interworld merchants, who make such voyages regularly.  Many worlds under Panoply's control or observation have very strict policy regarding wayfarers: unwelcome vessels may be turned away, interrogated or even destroyed on sight.  In order to minimise the possibility of new worlds being discovered by independent pathfinders, governments often license vessels as privateers.  The rewards for such discoveries are phenomenal, and at least twenty worlds have encountered Panoply in this manner.

THE STELLAR LEXICON[/b]
Astrology maintains that there are a finite number of constellations in the cosmos, and that those can be found across multiple worlds.  The encyclopaedia of these formations, their permutations and locations, as well as other celestial phenomena (comets, auroras, ghost constellations, bad moons etc.) is known as the Stellar Lexicon.  Every wayfarer ship has some version of the lexicon, and updates are constantly required.

BAD MOONS[/b]
The academic term is lunar phantom but most wayfarers are content to call them 'bad moons', which is apt enough.  Though they have the appearance of a natural moon, they occur only in the interstice and are omens of misfortune.  By scrutinising the face of a bad moon one can determine the nature of its ill tidings; some scholars have even claimed that they are in fact cosmic lords of probability and fate, and can be bargained with to forestall disaster.

PATHFINDER[/b]
Navigating the interstice is far more complicated than any natural voyage.  It requires extensive knowledge of the stellar lexicon, as well as a strong intuition, exceptional mathematical ability and fine attention to detail.  Pathfinders are, without exception, remarkably intelligent, and their services are highly sought after by would-be adventurers.

Ereguruidjd i koubut byd - I have lost the way home
Hwaib pu gersknamrt zgodjnei - For a great cloud has swallowed up the stars
Inzbodr okkn gvantn - My darling Inzbodr
Koseba mhutdjnamrt rei - Your father goes now into the waters
For centuries scholars had known, or at least believed, that a world unseen lay waiting beyond the dark ocean.  Even after their maps were completed to the last detail, when it was proved without a doubt that the planet was a sphere and not a plane; even then their conviction remained.  We do not know what sustained their belief, nor how Kyse Ern, the first pathfinder, discovered the path to Koht, the second world.  But at last their faith was proved, and by this fabled act, the landing of the white ship Ergoli on the shores of Qhunduu, the future of Chorus was set.

Contrary to the nonsense passed off as history in penny dreadfuls and sermons at the Cosmopolitan, Chorus did not begin its forays into the World Sea with grand dreams of conquest.  The first years were cautious, filled with danger and darkened by the loss of many courageous souls.  We did not know what lay in the depths of the Interstice, or fathom the strangeness of the lands we would encounter.  We were not prepared for the monstrosity of the Verix, the cunning of the Nethereal, the mystifying truths of the Unborn...

DIPLOMACY[/b]
The propagandists greatly simplify the intricacies of interworld politics.  The commoner, who rarely thinks of other skies, let alone considering their relevance to his own existence, conceives monolithic global empires of exotic but undifferentiated peoples, devoid of the nuance and ideological complexity indigenous to the nations of their own world.  In reality, every world is a grand confusion of languages, faiths, traditions and fears.  Hundreds of discrete languages might be spoken on a single continent.  Ancient vendettas can tear rifts through nations and inspire wars, revolutions and genocide.  Mighty empires often exist for centuries wholly unaware of each other.

The thought, then, that an ambassador from Chorus could meet with the collected representatives of an entire planet (as depicted, by way of example, in the Exploits of Young Modeah periodical) transcends the absurd.  The task of bringing the message and sciences of Panoply to the cosmos is, and always has been, phenomenally arduous.  It took two hundred years for the mere knowledge of Chorus to reach every corner of Yan, and to this day many cultures there are utterly indifferent to the politics of the Collective.

THE RISE OF PANOPLY
However ardently our patriots and recruiters might claim the contrary, in truth the Collective was born not out ambition, but fear.  Slowly, as ever further reaches of the World Sea became known, Chorus began to understand that humankind was not alone in the Cosmos.  Incredible creatures dwelled in the Interstice, warring beneath mountainous waves that broke against clouds, forging nations of blood and light in the vastness between the stars.  Even beyond the Sea, past the predatory chill of the Nether, a whole other universe espied our own with hungry eyes.

And so it was in fear that we sought allegiances.  Together, we might find a common purpose, and in the sharing of knowledge perhaps arm ourselves against our race's enemies.  Some leaders were more receptive, while others regarded it as a transparent ploy for Chorus to seize power and vehemently opposed the idea.  Nevertheless, Karvat and Yan joined the Collective almost immediately, and with their combined influence many others soon followed.

THE FOREVER[/b]
The World Sea is potentially infinite in size, and only a small fraction of the planets known with certainty to exist have any sort of relationship with Panoply.  There are other interplanetary dynasties too, with designs comparable to, but oftentimes more sinister than our own, and their expansion into familiar space and contention for worlds courted by our own plenipotentiaries has been the cause of much discord.  But only one has ever had the tenacity and cunning to contend with the Collective overtly.

To this day, no-one has set eyes on the Forever's capital, though its people speak with reverence (and often fear) of its sweeping, indomitable aspect.  Indeed, for most who encounter the Eternal Empire it seems diffuse, decentralised and uncoordinated, and one could easily doubt the existence of this fabled world.  It would nevertheless prove a grave mistake to underestimate the threat posed by its agents: they are patient, merciless and invisible; their masters, so they claim, long ago transcended the fetters of mortality.

There is no denying that if not for the vexations of the Forever, Panoply would be a very different thing.  Prior to our first encounter, it was inconceivable that the Collective would wage open war on another world '" to do so would be both immoral and woefully impractical.  But the sack of Lintu exposed us to a creature for whom bloody conquest was as native as breathing.  The Forever's aspirations were without mercy or half-measure; its universal motto, canted by its every living subject, reflects the very soul of its ambition: 'victory is inevitable.'

It was also inevitable, then, that Panoply become a harsher, hardier beast, unyielding where its foe was unrelenting.  Pre-emption, too, would become essential, to waken virgin worlds to the danger of the Eternal, and wherever possible to enfold them in the safety of our confederacy.  This task has not been bloodless.  There are those who do not understand that unity is essential to our continued existence.  Others, in their eagerness for comradeship, do not see that some who bear liberty's lantern all too eagerly feed their charges to the flames.

[ooc]Visualise This:
Long-distance communication is very limited.  Mirror communication requires an instrument weighing more than half a tonne that must be kept heated in order to function, and it is far from cheap.  The necessary hardware to broadcast a mirror signal between worlds is about the size of a house.  Consequently, only the really important news gets around quickly and most people are woefully out of the loop, relying on oceangoing vessels for news of loved ones and other mundane goings-on.  By and large Panoply maintains its influence through buzzwords and memes planted by agents, propagandic fiction available in thousands of languages and the constant manufacture of new curiosities and amusements.  Swords help, too.[/ooc]