The Campaign Builder's Guild

I was going through some old home brews of mine from years past looking for new ideas for Kaidan, and I dug out my Gnomic Syndicate:

About fifteen years ago, I was running a campaign where gnomes maintained a racial thieves guild that governed all gnomes, called the Gnomic Syndicate. Their religion, military and commerce system was built around it. Their holy tome was called the Gnomicon.

Gnomes sponsor if not actually establish all thieves' guilds for all races, world wide.

Their gods comprised a shrinking pantheon, where rivalries between them caused many of their weaker gods to be slain and their portfolios of power get taken over. Thus the Gnomicon is always changing. There have been gnomic religious wars, where unupdated Gnomicons caused reactions of heresies by those gnomes with current tomes.

Gnomic military consists mostly of spell casters: bards, illusionists, sorcerers and mages, their favorite arcane energy for spell use is "sonic". Though assassins are often their most "visible" agents.

All gnomes are born into the Gnomic Syndicate, though not all qualify and some are eventually ostracized from the race due to lack of skills, abilities and powers. And so become estranged travelers, which is how the race as dispersed into other realms.

Though I came up with the idea before so, Star Trek Next Generation's Ferengi are very much like my gnomes. But they don't have fetishes for ears, instead its boots! Ah, boots!

Unlike Ferengi, the goal of Gnome society is more than the acquisition of wealth, rather it is the total feduciary domination of all non-gnome races as indentured slaves and commodities for the greater marketplace.

This probably doesn't help Kaidan, but it reminds me that my Gnomes are cool!

GP

I appreciate this post for a number of reasons.   Thank you, GP.

I find saying "Gnomicon" with a straight face to be enough of a challenge that it deserves an XP reward.

QuoteAll gnomes are born into the Gnomic Syndicate, though not all qualify and some are eventually ostracized from the race due to lack of skills, abilities and powers. And so become estranged travelers, which is how the race as dispersed into other realms.

The children of the ostracized are allowed in? If so, are they taken from their parents by force? If not, wouldn't eventually an outcast society develop?

I mis-spoke, what I meant to say is a Gnome doesn't join the Gnomic Syndicate, one is born into it. The ostracized gnomes become the gnomes of all other fantasy settings (at least it says so in the Gnomicon), decendants of those who couldn't cut it in true Gnome society.

Though it wouldn't surprise me that Gnomic agents are on the prowl for gifted Gnomes, raised outside of the Syndicate, perhaps to kidnap them and "retrain" them for their own purposes.

The Gnomic Syndicate is headed by their Feduciary High Priests. The current top god is keeper of the Gnomic Treasury, who he took from a previous god he accused of stealing from the till. Many senior members of the Syndicate are accountants and litigants, as well as senior staff spellcasters of Gnomic military. The majority of the members manage protection rackets, weapons trading (stealing and reselling), slave sellers and breeders, gambling institutions, brothels in every port, smuggling, fencing stolen goods, black markets, and other nefarious and profitable ventures across the planes.

Besides, I've said "Gnomicon" enough, that as long as I don't think about it, I can say it! :)

GP

GP

Whoa, this is awesome.  My brothers and I played in a campaign awhile back where we group homebrewed the world, and they had something extremely similar.  Cool, cool!

Brief on Gnomic culture:

Gnomes enjoy relaxation, creating and consuming gastrologic delights, especially confectionaries. Their appearance among their kind is of key importance and helps determine a gnomes hierarchy among his peers. Dressing well is important, including the types of fabric, and material that are used in their clothing. Colorful wide brimmed hats, with giant exotic feathers crown most gnome heads, male and female alike. Coats with braids, big shiny buttons, and tailored of fine fabrics and properly fitted over their loose trousers and wide, large buckled belts. But the most important garment, to the point of fetish, are their boots.

One of the most popular godesses of the Gnomicon, especially among common gnomes, is Patti Middy. She is a bardic power with the loves of confectionaries, song and boots. She is a consumate negotiator and schemer, through varying alliance and assassination, she has moved herself into one of the top three powers of the Gnomic pantheon.

When a given gnome has acquired some wealth or ill-gotten gain, their first investment will be a new pair of boots. Finest leathers and skins of rare endangered species, buckles of gold, mithral - whatever they can afford is the first measure of a gnome's status among their kind. When two gnomes first meet, a glance at one another's boots is always first before even looking into each other's eyes. Boots will determine a hierarchy between two gnomes. The leaders among them have the best boots!

As a race of exploiters, Gnomes have become a sedentary/nomadic race, that is to say, Gnomes settle into a region, adapt to local cultures, participate in trade with them, all the while learning how best to take advantage of them, how to access the local wealth and bleed it into Syndicate coffers. Eventually, economic crisis will occur and the gnomes to be pointed as the blame, already hated for their growth in wealth. Back lashes frequently occur enforced by laws, military or angry mob. Not a few gnomes have been tortured to death as a result.

The highest status for any Gnome is to become the consumate exploiter with the finest boots, but not recognized as a villain among the non-gnomes around him, through disguise, obfuscation or deceit, because the best would never get caught.

GP

QuoteGnomes enjoy relaxation, creating and consuming gastrologic delights, especially confectionaries. Their appearance among their kind is of key importance and helps determine a gnomes hierarchy among his peers.

Those two sentences together at first made me think the appearance of the pastries determined social standing.

Nice details on the boots :)

Is this a side project from Kaidan, or are you just posting goodies to keep us smiling?

Smilies!

Actually, being the consumate business man, I am seeing a side project splat down the road called the Gnomicon!

GP

You have gnomes with Kaidan? They seem kind of out of place in a Japanese ghost-style setting. You could substitute something more thematic, but you lose the word "Gnomicon."

Quote from: IshWhoa, this is awesome. My brothers and I played in a campaign awhile back where we group homebrewed the world, and they had something extremely similar. Cool, cool!

Did they have the boot fetish? 'Cause that's a big part of the awesome.

No the Gnomic Syndicate has nothing to do with Kaidan. The idea of possibly developing a one-off separate product as a Pathfinder Supplement and as a stand alone product.

Actually Kaidan include Korobokuru, which have been considered dwarves in previous iterations of Oriental Adventures. However, someone commented on my Paizo thread, that Korobokuru are forest dwelling, peace loving, sneaky types which seem much more like D&D gnomes than they do dwarves, so that may change in Kaidan. But still, they won't be Gnomic Syndicate gnomes - that's a completely different animal.

GP