The Clockmaker's World: Springtheory

[Magnus Pym]

Hey clockman. Welcome to the CBG. I'm new too and found this community to be very ressourceful. I'm pretty sure you will as well!

Like Llama said, the "rivalry" between technologies seems pretty exciting, but I feel like it's the only thing that's intriguing in your setting. Of course, for the moment. I'm well aware that you only released a tiny parcel of information. So I'll keep looking for more interesting bits! hihi :D

Due to a bit of bad writing, I implied the dwarves were made of stone. They are not. They are still flesh and blood.

An interesting note concerning that;

I used to work on a project way back then with a bunch of friends. It was called Shattered Souls: Atlantis. The work was pretty greekish-romanish with a great touch of mythology (Titans shaped the world, e.t.c) while remaining medieval-style (It was for the game Neverwinter Nights, so yeah...). What we did was that we had the Titans shape the humans (dwarves and orcs and w/e as well) with clay and then imbuing them with life and magic, or w/e.

Of course I'm not trying to impose this idea on you, but it could definitely be used for this. :P It'd also add a bit of funkiness!

"And so the gods were amazed by the small statues their creation, the humans, had built from the very earth. They decided to imbue them with life and pride, creating the dwarves!"

^
I guess that could be an idea :P

Hihi

[The Clockmaker]

Luminous Crayon, yes I have been adding pages in the wiki. 24 pages in 24 hours! Not bad for never having touched the wiki markup language.

Magnus Pym, I do hope to have more intriguing things in time.  As I move farther away from the standards, I should have more fitting details.

And you actually traced my line of thought back, as that thought came from that same Greek idea of molded then imbued with life.  

Right, so Springtheory is on the wiki here: http://www.thecbg.org/wiki/index.php/Springtheory

[Seraph]

Oh good, there's more on the Wiki.

First, I very much like your banner.  It makes a good first impression, and peaks my interest.  (Not that I wasn't interested already)

So far, my favorite bits have to do with undead.  Is the undead plague pretty much the standard zombie-virus scenario, or are there different kinds of undead formed with this plague, with different abilities?  I like your Dark Alchemists, but not their name.  I'd say work on that, but a faction of Dr. Frankensteins sounds pretty awesome.  I don't expect they'd be the most well organized, though, a bunch of mad scientists. (For a given value of science)  I find your Gentlemen of the Raven to be particularly exciting.  Nice bit of flavor, and evokes the image of dapper gents in their long black coats and top hats, slaying undead.

[Tangential]

I must know more about the circumstances that gestated the created the Iounic Encyclopedia.

I second DL's banner love.

[The Clockmaker]

DL, Jaerc, thanks for the 'banner love.'  As soon as I decided to make it, I knew exactly what it had to be, regardless of the name.

DL, regarding the undead plagues, yes and no.  I would see zombie uprisings as being 40% of the undead problems, but I am in the possession of the 4e sourcebook Open Grave.  It has a ton of undead creatures and undead flavorings, and it's probably my absolute favorite of anything 4e yet.  It features a wide array of undead, and I will probably feature variants in differing plagues.  (And on another note, Vyrsovia the state is going to heavily feature vampires and undead, and Stahlstamm will certainly have Grimm's Fairy Tales-esque quests and settings.)
As for the Dark Alchemists, yes, the faction itself is more a catch-all term for unrelated but similar minded mad scientists.  The town of Oldcastle is meant to feature them.
I happened to dream up the Gentlemen of the Raven  after puzzling through how the Raven Queen would interact with the Ankytheran world. I am rather proud of the idea and might even make a class for them.  And it just kind of makes sense, since a fantasy world with zombies wouldn't just have ordinary morticians, now, would it?

Jaerc, about the Iounic Encyclopedia: since I have a Printer's Guild, and a vast world with goodly tech level, it makes sense some follower of the goddess of knowledge would want to spread it to their fellow man.  The core idea of it came from a post in the RPGnet forums, from poster WieldsRulebookHeavily.  In a series of posts, WRH came up with differing ideologies for the churches of the different gods.  In the post on Ioun, WRH had the idea that Ioun's followers would be all about knowledge for good, whereas Vecna is knowledge for evil.  I believe this is nuanced in the notion that paladins of Ioun seek knowledge to help their fellow man, while followers of Vecna seek knowledge for themself.  Given this (admittedly verbose) concept, it made sense that given the ability to widely disseminate information, Iounites would jump at the chance.  It would also give my PCs a good long spate of adventures, gathering information for the printers.  In the game world, I would see the Iounic Encyclopedia being developed in Northrow or perhaps Quencham, by a dual group of archivists of Ioun and Printer's Guildsmen.  

[Superfluous Crow]

Hmm, if the orcs were created by the elves why is there a god of Orckind? This would make perfect sense in a setting with silent gods as opposed to walking gods, but you seem to have the latter as exemplified by the gnomes' loss of Garl; surely a civilization wouldn't willingly kill off an imagined supreme entity on its own.

EDIT: could you add a link to your wiki in your signature for easy access? (go to profile or settings or some such)

[Seraph]

Jaerc, about the Iounic Encyclopedia: since I have a Printer's Guild, and a vast world with goodly tech level, it makes sense some follower of the goddess of knowledge would want to spread it to their fellow man.  

There's pretty much two possible attitudes from followers of a god[dess] of knowledge: Spread the Knowledge, or Hoard the knowledge and jealously guard it.

EDIT:  Well, they could also pick out what knowledge they want disseminated, and keep the rest for their advantage . . .

[The Clockmaker]

Oh my yes. I must fix that about the god of the orcs. Hm. I shall have to revise that.

[Tangential]

Can mortals ascend to divine power?

[The Clockmaker]

Yes. Definitely.  I would see the gods as just beings of great power, but that's all that's special about them.  Mortals, through the right means, could absolutely gain enough power to become a demi-god or outright god.

[The Clockmaker]

Not trying to shamelessly bump my own thread, but I have just completed preliminary work on a new plane, complete with some mechanics and planar geography.  I'm posting the regions here, and in the main article mechanics can be found. What do you guys think?  Too vague?  Does this initial write-up conjure any images up? I need some fresh perspective.  The info is in post #6, or here on the wiki.