Grindelrath (W.I.P)

[O Senhor Leetz]

It almost sounds more like a monster hunter game set in a rennaissance fantasy world.  I love it, really.

Why thank you sir. But hopefully I can work more than just monster-hunting into the work.

If magic is outright evil, then banning it from players would be understandable.  I should ask, though, it is inherently evil or just viewed as such?  Are we talking Warp Magic or just a good old-fashioned witch hunt?

A bit of both. I want magic to costly and mysterious and alien, but I also want the people of the setting to be irrational and superstitious and fearful of magic as well, very Inquisition-esque fear of the arcane.

[Humabout]

Oh, I think those classes I mentioned could handle a great variety of genres, so long as their internal structure is versatile enough to accomodate a wide range of way sot fill those roles.  "Fighter" would have to cover anyone who fights and offer options for those different styles.  Infiltrator would have to cover any sort of infiltration; investigator is more narrow, I suppose.  Just some ideas.

In what way is magic costly, exactly?  Mysterious and alien is easily achieved, I think, through flavor and a morbid DM.  Depending on the cost and how morbid you are about its flavor, that would easily spawn irrational superstition galore.  And btw, Inquisitions rock!

[O Senhor Leetz]

In what way is magic costly, exactly?  Mysterious and alien is easily achieved, I think, through flavor and a morbid DM.  Depending on the cost and how morbid you are about its flavor, that would easily spawn irrational superstition galore.  And btw, Inquisitions rock!

Maybe meta-costs? Damaged abilities, hit point reductions, saves vs. insanity.

I'm thinking very dark and morbid, more so than I normally. And I want irrationality and fear to be big themes/tones as well.

[Humabout]

Meta-costs?  Ewe!  But what do they represent?  Does magic make you insane?  Does it taint your soul?  Does it turn your mind toward depravity?  Does it cause maggots to infest your organs or make your flesh slough off?

The classic answer is that it erodes your soul.  It harkens back to the Tree of Forbidden Knowledge and trying to learn what God doesn't want you to know.  It's blasphemous, but moreso, it's hubris at its worst.  It's baptism in sin, reenacting the events of Eve and the snake, rather than John's washing of Jesus.

To drop the biblical stuff, I always liked how Legend of the Five Rings did it with Taint and Corruption coming from blood magic.  I, personally, use to enjoy removing other types of magic from the mix in dnd games and only using that yumminess.

[O Senhor Leetz]

I wouldn't think anyone, well at least most people, would begin delving into magic to become evil, that's just silly. They would, however, begint studying it because they think they can handle the price and the risk, despite evidence to the fact, as the average person think that they are above average and able to do things others can't. The Insanity and/or Corruption mechanics would probably work well.

I also think it would be fun to focus on all the really cool non-magical items of D&D (especially 3E) that seem to be forgotten as soon as the players start getting +1 loot and area of efffect spells - caltrops, grenade-like weapons, traps, etc. I'm pretty sure purely enchanted weapons are out. Also thinking that only silvered weapons can harm undead, as the necromantic magics that keep the corpse "together" would be strong enough to resist simple steel or wood - a ghoul sliced open by an iron blade would simply "knit" it's rotting sinew and muscle back together.

[Superfluous Crow]

Haha, wasn't the original idea to make a D&D setting? ^^ Anyway, I perfectly understand your motivation -  building a setting around a pre-defined system can be a suffocating endeavour.

If you are building the entire magic system from scratch, try to do it organically: where does magic come from? How do you control it? If magic entails being possessed by supernatural devilry controlled by blood sigils people would probably act more adversely to it than if it was, say, just some strange source of energy a few ascetic people could tap into to a limited extent.   
Are you going with alignment? Otherwise the "magic is EVIL" approach falls a bit flat.

Hmm, instead of having magic be persecuted by the church (or whatever), maybe the church has a monopoly on the arcane. Only monks and priests know the Language of God. Of course, they'd still pursue those unanointed pagans who dare speak the holy language. Challenge the idea that divine and arcane magic are separate things.
 

[Humabout]

I wouldn't expect people to delve into magic to become evil, either.  It's the power that attracts people, and it's their hubris that leads them to think they can handle the risks.  Always fun to watch that downward spiral.  Perhaps magic items are rare in the way that they are in LotR?  Even a +1 sword is the thing of Artifacts.

Now does using a magic item corrupt the user, the person who creates it, or both?

[Superfluous Crow]

Or maybe there are no +1 swords at all. Magic items are strange and ineffable things clearly not of human design, yet those trained in their use can evoke the supernatural.
Essentially mages would be collectors and students of these arcane antiques - archaeologists of the unknown. There are no spells, no incantations. There are only the Objects.
This has been done (badly) in the abominable novel Nights of Villjamur. A better match would be the mini-series the Lost Room where there are a number of unique supernatural items hunted and kept by secret orders and common men, although I think control of the items should be a more academic pursuit.   

I was struck by a sudden need to write down the above, but now that I am done I realize that it's really quite a bad match with this sort of Grimmian fantasy. Can't bear to delete it again, though.

Hmm, spirit-mongering and faustian bargains would probably be the best fits, but I feel like something is missing if it were only those two.

[Xathan]

I love how the comfortable meatloaf setting instead became a comfortable but much more unique and awesome setting - gourmet meatloaf, as it were. :P

I'll have some more comments in greater detail later on, just wanted to put out a "I love this setting so much" again. :P

[arkham618]

Why does magic have to have any moral significance? Why can't it simply be dangerous in the way that plutonium is dangerous? Yes, it is difficult to fathom and confers miraculous powers to those who unravel its secrets, but it also emits strange energies that derange the mind and body, and this has absolutely nothing to do with how the substance is used.

[O Senhor Leetz]

Why does magic have to have any moral significance? Why can't it simply be dangerous in the way that plutonium is dangerous? Yes, it is difficult to fathom and confers miraculous powers to those who unravel its secrets, but it also emits strange energies that derange the mind and body, and this has absolutely nothing to do with how the substance is used.

Well, for this setting at least, I think it's key that the magic is at the very least inhuman and alien, power above and beyond our comprehension, which doesn't inherently mean it evil, just that it can't lead to good things, which makes the in-setting populace believe that it is Evil.

And like you mentioned, it you could do good things with magic - at first. But it's corrupting and devious, and it's only a matter of time before the weave of the mind starts unravelling. Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

EDIT: I was also thinking the other night, "Why can't fighters use magic?" I know it's a balance thing, but balance has never really been that important to me (it's roleplaying, not war gaming) and was thinking along the lines of using the d20 Modern Basic Classes (With some fluff rewrites) along with basic magic (well, more like anti-magic) abilities that they can learn outside of class choices.

Plus, the Defensive and Reputation Bonuses would work perfectly considering a.) the lack of uber-enchanted armor/Renaissance-era gear and b.) the fact that I was going to use Repuatation anyway.

[Superfluous Crow]

I don't think the fighters-can't-use-magic issue stems so much from balance as from a thematic decision. They wanted the fighter and the wizard to be fundamentally different. If a fighter can do everything a wizard can and vice versa there is little reason to talk of either as a separate entity.
On a fluffier note, magic is also often described as an academic pursuit. It would be like asking why the soldier can't do nuclear physics. Of course he can do both if he studies both, but so can the fighter/wizard multiclass character in your example.
That being said, it is of course possible to handle magic differently. Assuming you still want to operate within the D20 framework a good first step would be to remove all casters and make magic feat-based. Or limit it to class-neutral PrCs.

Also, just because you want magic to have a corrupting influence doesn't mean that it has to be evil. For one, if magic was capital-E Evil you would have to build the existence of such into your cosmology. Secondly, madness can take many shapes - it doesn't all have to be of the blood-drinking child-sacrificing variant.
Of course, with the Grimmian dark fantasy tone of the setting I can definitely see the virtues of having corrupting or even evil magic. This would just take magic out of the hands of the players, which could be either good or bad.

My big question: How much of this is still D&D-based? Are you doing away with wizards, classes, alighments, dragons and goblins? Having a quasi-clear answer to this question would make it immensely easier to comment since right now I am working from assumptions that might or might not no longer be valid! :) 

[O Senhor Leetz]

My big question: How much of this is still D&D-based? Are you doing away with wizards, classes, alighments, dragons and goblins? Having a quasi-clear answer to this question would make it immensely easier to comment since right now I am working from assumptions that might or might not no longer be valid! :)  

Not much. This has ended up evolving into an entirely different beast. A d20 ruleset will be at the base of any crunch, but yeah, for the most part, I'm just going to go for it an end all the D&D restrictions and constraints.

Anyhow, geographically thinking, I'm looking towards focusing on a single kingdom or land divided between several kingdoms, with a northern/eastern European feel - Germanic forests, brooding Transylvanian mountains, cold fens - with lots of rain, lots of snow, lots of clouds. I think I may make it landlocked, which would prevent lots of foreign influence and makes for an isolated, somewhat xenophobic populace.

[Humabout]

This is sounding more and more awesome.  Will the local government still be fuedal in nature or will it be in the process of evolving into the nation-state?  IF it's landlocked, what are the neighboring countries like?  Do they attempt to control this population or is the population seen as too backwater to care about?  What sort of influences do creep in?  How do the locals view their neighbors?

[O Senhor Leetz]

This is sounding more and more awesome.

Why thank you sir

Will the local government still be fuedal in nature or will it be in the process of evolving into the nation-state?  IF it's landlocked, what are the neighboring countries like?  Do they attempt to control this population or is the population seen as too backwater to care about?  What sort of influences do creep in?  How do the locals view their neighbors?

As for the government, it will be fuedal in that there is a king and lords that support him, but it will be much more modern in the sense that lords and barons and officials have much more power than in classical Medieval fuedalism. Lot's of violent politics exist between the nobility, but there is still a start difference between the common rable and the distant nobles.

As for bordering nations, I'm going to put some heavy physical bounderies like mountains and fens around Grindelrath, but for the most part, I'm not going to put too much thought and work into what exists outside. In keeping with the Brothers Grimm tone, I want to have the land be "quaint" in a sense, and avoid big politics and large-scale wars, which I think takes away from the dark fairy tale feel. There will of course be rumors and what not, but they will be short, tantalizing snippets. The people of Grindelrath are as misinformed about the oustide world as the common peasant in the 14th century.