The Campaign Builder's Guild

Quote from: Cataclysmic CrowAs a final note, the aesthetics of the continents and landmasses by themselves is impressive, even without all the "make-up" provided by the style of the map. They are kind of neat with their varied, jagged, irregular shapes.

I may be wrong but it seems to me that he got his inspiration from the Greek coastline which is also very jagged and irregular with countless little islands.

Well, he has stated that he is very inspired by Greek myth and culture, I don't know if it extends to the shape of continents as well although it does make it easier to emulate a culture if you emulate the land it takes place in.
But this map does seem to beat Greece at least in scale.
Some of the cities are new creations, right? I don't recognize Harx for example, which also seems to be a city a bit out of the way.

well, I would say that Arga is more Greek influenced in its aesthetics than anything. it's still classic fantasy (albeit with its quirks) at its core.

also, I think it's fun and interesting to focus on the "barbaric" aspects of ancient Greece and Rome. For the most part (I'm generalizing here, so be nice) Greece and Rome have a nice, squeaky-clean reputation as these pinnacles of civilization and culture, were in fact they did some pretty crazy things on a normal basis - animal sacrifices, slavery, orgies, strange cults and rites, etc. etc. To me, those are the interesting parts.

Yeah, it's true that Antiquity could do with a more rough interpretation. Also, craziness and quirks is often what makes a setting exceptional so just pile it on!

alrighty, my next big obstacle is how far punk I should go with Arga. Since it's very first inception (like, seriously, 5 years ago) I've had an oil-like substance called pyronite (it originally was pyrite, but that's actually a real thing - fools gold) that would be Arga's version of a fossil fuel.

the city of Poxos and, obviously, the Pyron Ocean were made with pyronite in mind. Pyronite, or as it's colloquially know, sludge, floats up from the bottom of the Pyron Ocean in small, semi-solid globules about 1-3 feet in diameter. Big, ugly, dirty "tankers" would ply the Ocean, picking up the globules and bringing them to the smog-chocked port of Poxos to be refined by the ________ Guild.

Pyronite in it's various forms could fuel things from lamps and stoves to strange engines to some kind of primitive Argan firearm.* Like I've said, pyronite has been with Arga before it was finally called Arga. right behind the Dura, its one of the oldest things that keeps bouncing around me head. I think having a fossil fuel (read: oil) in a setting would be great for so many things: conflict, plot hooks, trade, etc.

*[rant]I have a personal tiff against settings that have 1000s of years of history, but nothing that goes boom. nothing against any of these settings by any means, I just find it very unbelievable, especially in low-magic settings like Arga, that the "common people" never got around to making something like blackpowder. I have a hard time believing that they'd sit around for 1000s of years gawking at magic and doing nothing to better their own situation. [/rant]

>>*[rant]I have a personal tiff against settings that have 1000s of years of history, but nothing that goes boom. nothing against any of these settings by any means, I just find it very unbelievable, especially in low-magic settings like Arga, that the "common people" never got around to making something like blackpowder. I have a hard time believing that they'd sit around for 1000s of years gawking at magic and doing nothing to better their own situation. [/rant]

Well it happened in real world history more or less.

The Chinese invented fireworks... around 1000 I suppose? But although fireworks were sort of used in some limited ways in conflicts they were not used for cannons or gunpowder until the 1400s? (Years are off, but you get the idea).

If Egyptian civilization has been around since around 4000 BC, then it took about 5000 years of civilized world civilization for gunpowder to be more than a novelty.

If you want stuff that goes boom but without messing with gunpowder, get a steam cannon.

Quote from: GhostmanIf you want stuff that goes boom but without messing with gunpowder, get a steam cannon.

oh no, I want stuff that goes boom! I was just looking to see what people thought of the Argan "fossil fuel" pyronite. I just have to make it fit in the setting without making it seem forced. I'm leaning very heavily towards low explosives (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low_explosive#Low_explosives)

also, I thought about this some more and my rant may have been a bit hasty. While saltpeter occurs naturally (albeit in special environments), it could be very plausible for settings not to have fossil fuels, as they require millions (thousands? I ain't no rocket scientist man) of years to make. so in a setting only 10,000 years old, it's very plausible oil/coal would not exist at that point, considering that the setting rests on the same laws of chemistry as ours does, but I digress.

quick question: what is a reasonable amount of time to have players spend sailing between locations? between close cities I was thinking days, regions weeks, and across the world, months. reasonable?

Quote from: Leetzquick question: what is a reasonable amount of time to have players spend sailing between locations? between close cities I was thinking days, regions weeks, and across the world, months. reasonable?

That's hard to give a quick answer to.

The thing is, sailing speed varies enormously based on ship type/technology and winds, and also geography. In his book Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World, Lionel Casson gives some estimates to the speed of Greek/Roman age sailing ships on the Mediterranean:
[ic=Page 288]"Combining all the above evidence, it would seem that, under favorable wind conditions, ancient vessels averaged between 4 and 6 knots over open water, and slightly less while working through islands or along coasts."[/ic]
And also:
[ic=Page 291]"It would seem therefore that ancient vessels averaged from less than 2 to 2½ knots against the wind."[/ic]

That makes about 170-270 km or 110-170 miles per 24 hours under favorable winds. Sailing against the wind, you cover 90-110 km or 50-70 miles per 24 hours.

Quote from: Ghostman

Quote from: Leetzquick question: what is a reasonable amount of time to have players spend sailing between locations? between close cities I was thinking days, regions weeks, and across the world, months. reasonable?

That's hard to give a quick answer to.

The thing is, sailing speed varies enormously based on ship type/technology and winds, and also geography. In his book Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World, Lionel Casson gives some estimates to the speed of Greek/Roman age sailing ships on the Mediterranean:
[ic=Page 288]"Combining all the above evidence, it would seem that, under favorable wind conditions, ancient vessels averaged between 4 and 6 knots over open water, and slightly less while working through islands or along coasts."[/ic]
And also:
[ic=Page 291]"It would seem therefore that ancient vessels averaged from less than 2 to 2½ knots against the wind."[/ic]

That makes about 170-270 km or 110-170 miles per 24 hours under favorable winds. Sailing against the wind, you cover 90-110 km or 50-70 miles per 24 hours.

Also recall that it took Odysseus 20 years to sail from Troy to Ithaca.  Considering Troy has been figured to be in Turkey, and Ithaca is in Greece, which are adjacent countries, that's a long time.  It would have been faster if he'd walked.  Of course, it WAS a MYTH.  And there WERE a FEW complications :-P

A prime example of why one shouldn't piss off the god of the seas right before sailing home :hammer:

I can't remember, was 1 mila = 1 mile?

EDIT: Ah, found it. 1 mila = 3 miles. So I'll just make some edits in my calculations.

I figure there is between 2400 and 2600 milas from Penzanda to Kharza following the sea lines, which is equal to 7200-7800 miles.
Assuming the slowest speed and the longest distance (50 miles/day and 7800 miles) the journey would take 156 days, which is over 5 months, and in addition to this you should probably add time to stock up and unload cargo in the intermediate cities, and perhaps shore-leave and harboring to take cover from a storm. So roughly it could add up to 6 months if they operate under the worst conditions.
A similar calculation for 170 miles/day and 7800 miles would result in a journey of more or less exactly one and a half months.

Of corse, all this assumes that there's wind, even one blowing to the "wrong" direction. A sailing ship that gets caught in a dead-calm will be helpless, drifting along with what ever sea current there might be (unless anchored in shallow water).

so would a 6 month voyage in a strongly maritime setting across the known world be too much to ask of players?

(this is also considering that they don't find alternative ways of travel, of which there could be plenty: portals and gates, ancient artifacts, sea creatures, "flying machines", etc.)