The Campaign Builder's Guild

To me, the tarot elements seemed like something that would seem like a good idea at one time and I would get bored with later on. You are obviously more focused than I. I have not seen yet (though it looks like I am about to) what impact this has on your setting but I think it has the potential to be very interesting and the setting a certain feel. If nothing else, it would probably be something that people would remember about the setting, regardless of their like or dislike of it.

And now I move on...

QuoteOn the Street of Coins, in between the Wily Alchemist's Shoppe and Trader Robard's Domicile of Weaponry, is a tavern called the King of Coins. This would be the North Side of the street on the block between Primus and Secundus.

The front room is the common room. There's a bar along the north wall and tables in the middle of the room.[/quote]tarot poker[/quote]Tarot poker? Have you created this game?

Quote from: Ninja D!1) Based on this description, it seems that you have a very detailed idea of the layout of this city. Is there a map of it?
2) Again, fine details. Any rough map?
3) Tarot poker? Have you created this game?

1) There have been a few over the years.  I just resumed work on the latest incarnation.  I'll try to scan and post what I've got sometime.

2) No map.  I actualy haven't had to use this place tactically yet.  It was originally created to enter a contest here.

3) Not in any fine detail, but some vague ideas.  There's generally two major variants:
1) Major Arcana stripped out.  This makes it work mostly like a standard poker deck, although the pages add an extra four cards to the deck and change the details of how certain straights would work.
2) Major Arcana left in and wild.  There are some subtle variations, some make an all wild hand the lowest possible and others make it the highest possible.

Sylus Steel, Bear clan, legal lawlessness, exports adventurers.  Very macho-sounding place.  Do the Terrans consider bar brawls a national sport?

I'm working through Terra piece by piece (and was paying particular attention to Fall/demonic references).  One thing I was struck by was your use of mythology.

[blockquote=khryon1144]Everyone agrees that everything started with The One. Everyone also agrees that The One grew lonely.[/blockquote]

I find this a potentially problematic considering your approach to religion. The different sets of gods you've selected for various races/peoples suggests competing or mutually exclusive religious viewpoints.  Unless you substantially alter the backstory to say, the Greek mythology (and therefore by extension modify the gods themselves, since their personal backgrounds and attributes are tied to their cosmology's history), then the Greek mythological creation story (Uranus and Gaia create the earth and the gods) will run against the grain of the Norse one (Ymir gets slaughtered and his body parts and blood become the world), and both run against the grain of your apparently widely agreed-upon genesis (the One etc).

This is a problem I've had with some other cosmologies.  It's all well and good to say "all the gods are present, they all just coexist," but that starts to break down when subjected to a deeper inspection.  Who's the war god, Ares or Tyr?  The Romans identified the Norse gods with their own: they didn't recognize their veracity as genuine independent deities.  If both Ares and Tyr actually exist, what do they really govern?  Only wars where their people are involved?  If so, you've just radically changed the nature of the gods.  Ares and Tyr no longer resemble Ares and Tyr as we know them.  It's like having multiple sea gods... who then rules the sea?  Or do the various sea gods compete for it?  If they do, they are no longer the same gods - the struggle would affect they way they run things.  Some of the old DnD cosmologies never really addressed this sort of thing.

A few settings (notably the cosmology of Sandman) manage to pull off a pan-cosmological world in which various real entities interact, but they do so by modifying the way deities work.  The other route to go (and the one I'm inclined to, generally) is to make all the deities ambiguously real - maybe they are, maybe they aren't, as in the real world.  What that means is that various religions won't accept each others' versions of creation, which of course leads to conflict and turmoil.

Quote from: SilvercatMoonpawSylus Steel, Bear clan, legal lawlessness, exports adventurers.  Very macho-sounding place.  Do the Terrans consider bar brawls a national sport?

Yes, indeed they do.

Quote from: SteerpikeI find this a potentially problematic considering your approach to religion. The different sets of gods you've selected for various races/peoples suggests competing or mutually exclusive religious viewpoints.
[snip]
A few settings (notably the cosmology of Sandman) manage to pull off a pan-cosmological world in which various real entities interact, but they do so by modifying the way deities work.  The other route to go (and the one I'm inclined to, generally) is to make all the deities ambiguously real - maybe they are, maybe they aren't, as in the real world.  What that means is that various religions won't accept each others' versions of creation, which of course leads to conflict and turmoil.

Thank you.  You have given me a lot to think about.

There's a brief interview with George Lucas tacked onto the front of the Special Edition VHS version of the original film trilogy where he says:  "Films are never really completed, they just get abandoned at some point."  
I'm beggining to believe this applies to campaign settigns as well.  I liked what I wrote at the time, but I now think it's sorta weak.


Thanks again.  Please take a Terra badge, if you like:
That applies to both of you.

My first question is what exactly is a Geometer?

If Dwarves have to import a lot of food, has this ever caused problems for them? Like if one of the other races started raiding the food caravans? Also, how long could Dwarves survive without a new shipment of food?

Serfs technically have no rights when dealing with the samurai or Khan, including the right to expect to be still living when the conversation ends. I get the feeling that this applies to anyone who talks to the Khan. Now just curious, but are you mixing the mongolian Khan and the japanese Samurai on purpose instead of calling the Khan the Shogun as they did in japan?

Are Jotuns giants?

For the people who lost the War against the One and were banished to the Hell Planes, are they still stuck in the hierarchy of the One, needing worship? Or are indifferent to worship? Why did the Good and Chaos beings not rebel along with them? Seems like the entire concept of Hierarchy would rub them the wrong way from the start. Why didn't most of the First multitude rebel because the One made himself immune to the worship of the third multitude? Did they accept him being a hypocrite? Finally, why would the One want to create the Third Multitude anyway?

Quote from: Llum1) My first question is what exactly is a Geometer?

2) If Dwarves have to import a lot of food, has this ever caused problems for them? 3) Like if one of the other races started raiding the food caravans? 4) Also, how long could Dwarves survive without a new shipment of food?

Serfs technically have no rights when dealing with the samurai or Khan, including the right to expect to be still living when the conversation ends. 5) I get the feeling that this applies to anyone who talks to the Khan. 6) Now just curious, but are you mixing the mongolian Khan and the japanese Samurai on purpose instead of calling the Khan the Shogun as they did in japan?

7) Are Jotuns giants?

8 ) For the people who lost the War against the One and were banished to the Hell Planes, are they still stuck in the hierarchy of the One, needing worship? Or are indifferent to worship? Why did the Good and Chaos beings not rebel along with them? Seems like the entire concept of Hierarchy would rub them the wrong way from the start. Why didn't most of the First multitude rebel because the One made himself immune to the worship of the third multitude? Did they accept him being a hypocrite? Finally, why would the One want to create the Third Multitude anyway?

Thank you.

1) A wizard specialist class from the late days of 2e (introduced in Player's Option: Skills & Powersand expanded on in Player's Option: Spells & Magic).  Wizards that deal a lot with writing and symbols.  Somatic gestures are so important to their spells that they can actually treat spells as if they had only Somatic and Material components and cast while silenced.  They could also create scrolls quicker and easier than other spellcasters could create other magic items.
2) Yes.
3) Probably has happened more than once.
4) Indefinitely but the quality of grub would go downhill quickly: fried rot grubs, black pudding pudding, and aboleth sushi.
5) True.
6) It was deliberate, but I don't know my exact reason why.
7) Yes.
8 ) This whole thing is a complicated mess that needs more work.

Thanks again.  Please take a Terra badge, if you like:

Resumed work on the actual campaign world.

I like to hear things.

Quote from: khyron1144
House Rules:

Paladins's Detect Evil ability is usable at will, not always on. Detect Evil (and Detect Good)is also somewhat restricted in what is Evil (or Good). Sentient living humanoids native to the Prime Material never detect as Evil or Good, unless currently engaged in clearly Good or Evil activities. Violence is Evil. Kindness is Good. An Orc giving alms at a temple of Gruumsh detects as Good. A Paladin fighting a Demon detects as Evil.

I like this take on the ability.  I like seeing that, aside from presumably demons and the like, it is only actions that register as "evil" or "good." It complicates things, so you can't simplify everything to "The Pally could tell he was evil, so let's kill him!"

Quote from: khyron1144House Rules:

Paladins's Detect Evil ability is usable at will, not always on. Detect Evil (and Detect Good)is also somewhat restricted in what is Evil (or Good). Sentient living humanoids native to the Prime Material never detect as Evil or Good, unless currently engaged in clearly Good or Evil activities. Violence is Evil. Kindness is Good. An Orc giving alms at a temple of Gruumsh detects as Good. A Paladin fighting a Demon detects as Evil.

Would the demon also detect as Evil? And what about non-sentient creatures? Can animals be read as Good or Evil, which I suppose would indicate their likelihood to attack without provocation?

My understand was it was the action that read as evil, so animals that were ATTACKING might register as evil, but the ability would not reveal their LIKELIHOOD to attack.  And I just assumed that a demon, being a non-humanoid evil outsider would have enough essence of evil to always detect as evil.

Though now I have another question: if Violence is evil, do you read as evil if you are fighting off someone who is attacking you? Or do you read as "Good" when on the defensive?

Quote from: SuperbrightAnd what about non-sentient creatures? Can animals be read as Good or Evil, which I suppose would indicate their likelihood to attack without provocation?

Most animals are True Neutral, and thus unlikely to detect as Good, Evil, Lawful, or Chaotic.  Being an aggressive predatory animal species or a proactively defending herbivore is not in and of itself Evil, either, unless the actual fight/attack is already in progress.

Quote from: Seraphine_Harmonium
My understand was it was the action that read as evil, so animals that were ATTACKING might register as evil, but the ability would not reveal their LIKELIHOOD to attack.

Sounds about right.

Quote from: Seraphine_HarmoniumAnd I just assumed that a demon, being a non-humanoid evil outsider would have enough essence of evil to always detect as evil.

Yeah, Demons, Angels, Modrons, and Slaad being so much concentrated the stuff of their alignments will always trip the correct alignment detection spell.

Quote from: Seraphine_HarmoniumThough now I have another question: if Violence is evil, do you read as evil if you are fighting off someone who is attacking you? Or do you read as "Good" when on the defensive?

The forces of the cosmos, and me the DM, tend to regard violence, even in self defense, as less Good than bearing what one must.  However, I think alignment detection spells allow for determining degree as well as kind, and in such a situation the attacker would show up as more Evil than the defender.

Quote from: khyron1144
The forces of the cosmos, and me the DM, tend to regard violence, even in self defense, as less Good than bearing what one must.  However, I think alignment detection spells allow for determining degree as well as kind, and in such a situation the attacker would show up as more Evil than the defender.

This is such a niggling little detail, but I always obsess about alignment systems in D&D so I guess it makes sense. Why not just have a general 'Detect Alignment' spell that works for everyone? It'd make sense, at least in my mind, that a Paladin would be able to detect a paragon of good just as easily as an embodiment of evil.

Quote from: khyron1144The forces of the cosmos, and me the DM, tend to regard violence, even in self defense, as less Good than bearing what one must.  

Wow.  That's an astounding level of complacency the gods (I saw lists of gods, and am assuming they are what "forces of the cosmos" refers to.  I could be mistaken) want from their followers.  Is that purely an "ideal response," to attack, or are people actually expected to just let people beat them up and/or kill them without defending themselves?

Quote from: Seraphine_HarmoniumWow.  That's an astounding level of complacency the gods (I saw lists of gods, and am assuming they are what "forces of the cosmos" refers to.  I could be mistaken) want from their followers.  Is that purely an "ideal response," to attack, or are people actually expected to just let people beat them up and/or kill them without defending themselves?

On some level, maybe the deities simply cannot comprehend how fragile mortals are in flesh and spirit. Perhaps they think: "why don't you just, you know, switch off your pain sensors or something", or "don't be like that, you can always get a new family".