<![CDATA[Rintaran's Blog]]> Wed, 14 Nov 2007 04:45:30 -0600 webmistress@dndresources.com (Forums) IP.Blog 60 The Races Noxians, Kobolds, and Goblins in the forums area of this site for people to give me some feedback on. I don't need to hammer out specs for Halflings or Elves, mostly because they aren't player races and I won't need those specs any time soon.

Dwarves are as listed in the PHB except as follows:

* +2 dodge bonus to Armor Class against mounted combatants. This bonus represents special training that dwarves undergo, during which they learn tricks that previous generations developed in their battles. Any time a creature loses its Dexterity bonus to Armor Class, such as when it loses it's caught flat-footed, it loses its dodge bonus too. This ability replaces the +4 dodge bonus against giants mentioned in the PHB (there are no giants on Zind).
* +1 racial bonus on attack rolls against elves, goblins and halflings. Dwarves are trained in special combat techniques that allow them to fight their common enemies more effectively. This replaces the +1 racial bonus on attack rolls vs Orc and Goblinoids mentioned in the PHB (as there are no orcs, or goblinoids other than goblins on Zind).


I think the races are balanced as I have them at the moment, but we'll have to see what the rest of the forum thinks.

While they're having a look at them, I guess I can begin work on the classes. I have made some decisions on that part. There will be no Barbarian, Druid, Ranger, Paladin, Monk, Soulknife or Psychic Warrior classes. Both the Sorceror and the Cleric require some modifications. I shall also have to have a closer look at the Bard, Rogue, Wizard, Fighter, Psion, Wilder, and Urban Ranger (from Unearthed Arcana) to see how those classes may fit in. More on this as I hammer it out.]]> Tue, 08 Aug 2006 15:41:36 -0500 The Gods
You can see the info on my campaign setting's deities at http://rintaran.klaporte.com/DND/divine.html#gods

You can see the gods relationships with one another here:
http://rintaran.klaporte.com/DND/divine.html#relations

You can check out my main site here:
http://rintaran.klaporte.com]]> Mon, 26 Jun 2006 21:22:34 -0500 Step 3: Cosmology
IPB Image

The Inner Planes for the building blocks of the universe, as well as providing the source of most magic powers. Originally there was just the positive and negative energy planes. The interaction between the two planes spawned the four elemental planes. The interaction between these six planes resulted in the "self-creation" of the gods. The first of these gods were destroyed because of the unstable nature of the inner planes.

Eventually, the interaction of the four elemental planes spawned the material plane, with a thin, porous boundry protecting it from the chaos of the inner planes. This boundry is mistakenly called the Etheral "Plane", despite the fact that it is not an actual plane. Future gods were plopped onto the material plane, giving them stable shapes.

When the dieties began to think, these thoughts formed ideas. Ideas solidified and formed the outer planes. Because of the shifting nature of ideas, the outer planes were relatively unstable until a fair number of gods were thinking. With ideas forming in their heads, different types of outer planes began to solidify. These eventually formed into nine distinct planes, representative of different mental perspectives (what is currently called alignment).

At first, the outer planes merely had physical elements that were representative of their nature, but as the ideas of the deities evolved, so did the planes. Planar creatures began to appear, sprung from the thoughts of the gods, and their repeated failure at crafting and keeping "souls". These creatures were remarkably different depending on their plane of creation, and for the most part, were not directly created by the deities. This was the beginning of the population and growth of the outer planes.

The deities weren't lazy on their own plane. With their tremendous powers, they were crafting a universe. Planets, stars, black holes, comets, whatever struck their fancy. The deities sacrificed some of their power in order to gain direct access to the Inner Planes, tearing small holes in the Etheral Membrane. Their first attempts at creating others like themselves, through the manipulation of the positive and negative energy planes, failed horribly. They managed to craft souls, but without corporal bodies, they dissipated and "disappeared". The souls actually went to the Outer Planes and into the first creatures that were being created there by thought.

Inevitably material bodies were formed before the souls, and one world on the material plane began to be populated with animals and the three races: Noxians, Dragons, and Dwarves. Eventually holes were ripped in the Astral Membrane allowing for some transport there as well. Due to worldly events, dragons eventually devolved into kobolds, and various non-intelligent creatures evolved into Goblins, Humans, elves and halflings.

The Outer Planes are not all the same size, or of equal power. The denizens of one outer plane can extend their lands onto another outer plane. The outer planes now survive, develop, and gain or lose power as much more as a result of the thoughts and ideas of mortals than of the gods.

The deity and race histories will be covered in future posts.

In summary:

6 Inner Planes (Positive Energy, Negative Energy, Earth, Air, Fire, Water)
1 Material Plane
9 Outer Planes (1 per "alignment")

It is important to not that the inner and outer planes cannot be "seen" from the material, or from each other. A thin membrane keeps the outer planes out of phase with the physical. This membrane is often called the Astral "Plane". A similar membrane protects, but connects, the Outer Planes to the Inner Planes, and that membrane is called the Shadow "Plane". It is important to note that the Astral, Etheral and Shadow "Planes" are not actually planes. All spells in relation to them as such, no longer exist in this campaign setting.]]> Fri, 05 May 2006 15:09:44 -0500 Step 2: The Overarching Theme
Imagine a world, where goblins and kobolds are among the civilized races. Imagine elves and halflings as feral creatures viciously haunting woods and hillsides, foaming for the taste of your flesh. Imagine a world that has suffered great wars between psions and wizards, tearing great holes in the fabric of reality and inflicting the curse of sorcery upon unsuspecting mortals. Imagine a world plagued by creatures seeping through portals in the darkest caverns and deepest chasms, determined to free their overlord, who has been chained to the mast of the world since before the birth of the current mortal races, back when dragons ruled the seas and the skies that they have now deserted. Imagine a world, where the protectors of those chains will stop at nothing to prevent the release of the deity locked below. A world filled with sacrifice and needless bloodletting. A world ruled by the darkest of passions. This world, is Zind.

Across this vast world, two mighty organizations pursue an endless war from the shadows, striking at their foes, destroying whole villages if they deem it necessary, all in the pursuit of their eternal goal: superiority.

One the one side are the chain-breakers, determined to release Kaltesh from the divine chains that keep him from bursting through the world and laying waste to his siblings. They are the Right Hand, determined to right what they believe the other gods have wronged. But their god must feed, and he has a voracious appetite for souls. By consuming these souls, Kaltesh is able to grant some of his followers a piece of his magic: the divine gift.

The other faction, the imprisoners, fight tooth and claw to keep Kaltesh weak, to keep him chained. They are the Glengoth Council, a union of leaders from the three most ancient races on Zind: the Nox, great black-winged creatures with razor-sharp claws for hands; the Dwarves, stout creatures brandishing weapons in hands as often covered in dried blood as dirt; and the mighty Kobold, the last remnants of the ancient dragons gifted with a vicious flair for traps and torture. As hungry for blood as their counterparts, the Council has no qualms with sacrificing souls to obtain the power of their gods, creatures nearly as soul-hungry as Kaltesh himself.

Between these two factions are the children. The young races. Split between the ‘civilized and intelligent’ humans and goblins, and the feral and ‘savage’ elves and halflings. The humans and goblins are used as pawns and fodder for both of these secretive organizations, while the elves and halflings inflict their own devastating blows to all the races of the world. Whether they know it or, more likely, not, all are playing out the plot of either the Hand or the Council, at the cost of their own kind.

The trick, is that on the surface, everything appears as it should, mostly. There is an appearance of relative peace. There is an appearance of relative harmony. There is an appearance of freedom. There is an appearance of development and growth. But for all of this, there is the real situation, small parts of which are known by many, but the grand picture is captured by none. That is the trick. Zind, for all its apparent peace and prosperity, is a cesspool of filth, sinking deeper and deeper towards its cruel destiny.]]> Sun, 05 Mar 2006 00:53:14 -0600 <![CDATA[Step 1: Geography & Climate (Completed)]]>
Anyhow, the five continents are Novoi (No-voy), Pravda (Pra-v-da), Percepa (Pear-sep-a), Nadanis (Na-da-knee), Valerus (Val-air-us).

The oceans are: Arctic, Ice, Psycleman (Cycle-mon), Terrenemon (Tear-en-u-mon), Lufftarman (L-oof-tar-mon), and Gendarman (Jen-dar-mon).

Other notable bodies of water include: Leva Sea (Lay-va), Kvart Divide (K-v-art), Serenus Sea (S-air-en-us), Exus Seaway, Manun Bay (Man-noon).

Comments are most welcome. View the map here: http://rintaran.klaporte.com/images/ZindRough2.jpg

One thing I would like to do would be to have this map programmed like those "where are you" maps that some people are placing on their sites. I'd like to be able to put a little pushpin type of thing on the locations that I want to bring people's attention to. So they could click it, and open up a sub-page on the particular country, historical event, or whatever. I think that would be really cool.]]> Fri, 24 Feb 2006 23:59:01 -0600 Step 1: Geography and Climate
For me, I then drew using a protractor a circle on a sheet of paper. Using a pencil, I drew on a large single continent, a pangea (or however that's spelt). Then I used the mighty scissors and cut it out. This shape, which looked oddly like a giant Casper, is my starting base. This shape is the entirety of the land on my world, with only the remote possibility of some volcanic hawaii-like islands which weren't a part of the original pangea (nor a part of my current plan).

Right, so I take this single piece of paper, and I cut it up into, say, thirteen individual plates. From what I've looked up, I've noticed that Earth only has seven (NA, SA, EU/As, Af, Ind, Ant, Aus). This means that Zind is going to probably be a bit more mountainous than Earth (I think). I then outlined these plates with a sharpie, slapped them on my scanner, and scanned them into the computer. I had to redo the outline of each of them in paintshop pro in order to get vectors that I can turn and move easily. These scanned plates I transfer over to my world file, and there we go, cut-up pangea in a globe.

Now comes the tricky part (not the difficult part, that comes later), spinning and moving the plates in a way that isn't absolutely ridiculous. I probably failed at this, but seeing as both India and Australia was once part of South Africa, I figure that extremes can exist. One thing I kept in mind was that my world only spins in one direction, so most of the plates were rotated in the same direction, though not all to the same degree. Why'd I do this? Dunno, just felt right and seemed to make sense to me, an individual with 0 ranks in knowledge(geography).

So I've got my plates set up. A couple of them just look wrong, and I figure I'd break them up into small islands that drag across the distance between where it ended up, and where it's partner plate ended up. Seemed to work out well and produced essentually three major island chains. I figure that's how I want them layed out for good, so I merge the various vector/layers into one vector/layer.

Ok, so at the moment I got two layers. The background layer with the big blue circles (R45, G172, B253 gives a nice blue). And the first layer with all the lines, some of which cross each other. I copy this second layer, and line it up perfectly on a new layer. I call this layer "Outline". Returning to my main layer, using the magic wand, I select everything but the land masses, and then invert my selection. I then fill it white, killing all the working lines on this layer. Thankfully, my Outline layer preserves the lines for me. This is important.

Now, wherever lines overlap, I use the spraypaint tool to spray some brown. The whole regions where lines are overlapping is mountains. These are the areas where plates have smashed into one another, sending land high into the sky. When I did this, I noticed an area where three plates overlapped, with a fourth one not too too far away. That tells me that it's gonna be an area with lots of volcanic activity. Meaning probably few civs, if any. I make the Outline layer invisible since I don't think I need it anymore.

On a new layer, I put in the equator and the tropics. I appropriately label this layer "Equator/Tropics". With this, I know generally what areas are warm and generally where the frozen wastes of Zind will be. This much I know.

Unfortunately, now comes the difficult part. For the rest of the world, I have to decide which areas are plains, which are forests, which are swamps, which are jungle, and which are deserts. I know mountains in hot climates tend to have jungles on one side, and deserts on the other, based on how clouds being forced over said mountains are forced to lose their moisture, feeding one side while starving the other of water. But I don't know which side of the mountain is supposed to be which. As for the forests and swamps, the later is in temparate zones with high water, and the former in temparate zones with regular water. But how do I know where high water and low water are? And how do the plains fit into all this? I know here in Canada, on the west side of the Rockies we have a very mighty forest, and the large portion on the east are the plains (aka prairies), until we get far enough from the mountains for the clouds to be able to build up considerably. But then I also recall that the prairies are mostly sediment from the decayed ancient mountains that once formed Ontario & Quebec, and I have no idea how to work that into my world creation either.

Hmmm...

If anyone has a knowledge of formation geography, help would be appreciated. I've uploaded the image as it is now to http://rintaran.klaporte.com/images/ZindRough.jpg . Comments are of course welcome.]]> Thu, 23 Feb 2006 00:01:58 -0600 World Build Methodology
I will begin by developing:

The general geographic & climatized areas of the world, complete with the common names of continents, oceans, and large seas.
The overarching theme that affects the world, including two global organizations.
The nature of magic, psionics & the origins of sorcerous magic. This will include a treatise on magic surges and the residual effects of psionic/magic interplay. This will also include a major restriction on classes available to some races.

From these very general structural points, I will focus in and follow the general pattern listed below:

Unique & important character, developed complete with combat tactics, physical looks, personality, personal history. May require hammering out race PC-build info, and (if a sub-race), sub-race developmental info (general history).
Any closely associated living characters tied into the above unique character, complete with the same information.
Development of Unique character's current local. This includes personal home, city surrounding home, terrain surrounding city.
Development of above city's cultural and industrial core. This includes specific shops, quarters, etc as well as determining the population base and percentages. Laws regarding banned products, and any others of interest. A brief list of nearby trading cities.
Development of local organizations, including basic info on their leaders, their outlook towards other leaders & unique characters. Also include organization activities, legality, approximate size, etc.
Development of local churches. This includes developing the specific deities involved and list creation of other deities perticular to their pantheons. Requires basic info on local church leaders, and their interactivity and opinions of other local churches & their leaders. Relation of churches to the larger church structure. Requires a handful of basic myths.
Repeat process for each of the second-tier characters, cross-relating information as necessary (ie development of new civ now requires opinions in relation to this civ & vice-versa).
Repeat process for non-destroyed locations in unique character's history.
Repeat process for non-destroyed locations in second-tier character's histories.
Select second-tier character, use as unique character and repeat processes above.
Repeat process ad infinium (or until either everything's mined out, or world is fully developed).

Sourcebooks:

PHB, DMG, MM, Unearthed Arcana, Expanded Psionics Handbook, Stronghold Builder's Guide, Deities and Demigods, Manual of the Planes, Complete Adventurer, Complete Warrior, Complete Arcane, Complete Divine, Book of Vile Darkness, Book of Exalted Deeds, Sandstorm, Epic Level Handbook, Libris Morte, Arms and Equipment Guide, The Slayer's Guide series, and Frostburn. Others may be added in time as deemed necessary. This list will be updated at that time.]]> Sun, 19 Feb 2006 15:04:26 -0600 A Change in Direction
As I do not currently have a campaign running at the moment, this will no longer be a campaigning blog at all. Instead, this is going to become a developer's blog. I find myself with some free time to develop parts of my campaign world in more detail, and will be keeping track of my progress here. I will post new additions, maps, characters, etc as I have them ironed out. I'm hoping for some comments on some of these creations as they form. I will not be creating topics in the forum for them, as it would be a waste since I can keep the whole campaign materials here, and since the comments option allows for further developmental feedback, I'll be able to modify the creations to fill gaps or problems that other developers may see.

The campaign world development posts will begin with the next post. I thank you all for your patience and hope that you will find my upcoming developmental contributions useful and interesting.]]> Sun, 19 Feb 2006 13:24:42 -0600 Session 2A: The Hunt Begins
Ok, so the first session of play is officially over. They're all noobs, but it wasn't as bad as I was expecting. Two of the players were actually half-decent (for their first time). They're all rough around the edges, and a couple just don't see to understand that they're supposed to basically be their character (don't tell me your character is telling the other characters about the posters, actually tell the other characters about the posters). But there was an overall improvement over the course of the 5.5 hr session. One of the characters is still without skills & feats, so we just pretended he had none for the sake of the first session. The rest of this entry will detail the events of the evening. It will probably be quite long.

What happened:

First, the characters were filled in on the ending of their character's histories: they all met each other on a boat heading to Abarjo, realized they were all in search of adventure for some reason or another, and decided that it would be worth teaming up so they could handle the more difficult (and higher paying) missions. They landed early in the morning on the 20th of Quiet Moon. After paying the various fees, they went straight to the closest inn (Sea Legs), rented their rooms for that evening, and bought themselves porter. The scene begins with our five mismatched adventurers sitting quietly at the bar minding their own business.

The bartender is a large bald man. He's wearing a green vest and a simple pair of brown pants. He has a gold nosering and is polishing an empty mug. There are three occupied tables in the tavern. The group of four, two brown-haired men, a blond woman, and a brown haired woman, sitting at the table closest to the door are wearing the same uniform at the two brunettes and the blond man sitting at the table furthest from the door: a blue tabard with a silver crocodile on it, simple chain mail, a varying assortment of swords, and other mismatched and descriptorily unimportant clothes.

The center table is occupied by three male sailors, and a farmer in plaid. The farmer's hands move as he speaks and the sailors seem enraptured by the story. From the party's position at the bar, they can't hear any of the conversations.

On one wall is a dart board, a set of stairs on another leads up to the party's already rented rooms, and a third wall holds a number of tacked posters that you haven't had the chance to look over yet; across the fourth wall is the bar, where our five mismatched adventurers, a male human sorcerer, an female elven fighter, a female half-elven rogue, a male half-orc barbarian of the boar clan, and a male dwarven paladin of freedom, sit drinking porter and slowly realizing that they've only two coppers to their names and are afflicted by the curse of unemployment.

After a few moments of silence and glancing around the room, the women get up and make their way over to the posters, while the human approaches the table of sailors looking to hear a part of the story.

There are five posters.

The first poster, written in a delicate old-lady handwriting, reads "Have you seen my husband? He's 5'9" tall, about 175 lbs, has brown hair and green eyes. He has a birthmark on his right hand covering his thumb from the knuckle to the joint. His name is Peter Milakov. If you have any information concerning his wherabouts, please contact Marla Milakov at 26 Beggars Lane. He's been missing since the 13th of Quiet Moon. Last seen near the Wheat & Chaff tavern. Reward for information leading to his discovery."

The second poster, written as though stencilled using a thick brush, reads: "Hunters Wanted: The woods around the southern logging road have become treacherous due to many nuisance bears. 2 GP/ Bear Pelt. See Volodya Rasputin, 13 Greenfinch Grove."

The third poster, obviously produced en mass by some sort of press, reads "Visit Bulgakov's Bazaar! Strange and Mysterious items at a bargain of a price! Coming to the Market District during the 4th week of Quiet Moon. One Week Only! Don't Miss Out!"

The fourth poster, carefully printed to appear both official and legible, reads: "Party of five wanted to track down the Low Town Slasher. Inquire with Captain Tatiana at Prostos Arms for details. Generous Reward."

The fifth poster, written using extreme and crazy characters, reads "It’s all a plot! The Government is responsible for the recent Disappearances! They’re trying to keep us enslaved! The wealthy should not rule us! Rise up with the XAOS and overthrow our oppressors! Freedom or Death! Rally outside Trade Hall in the market on The 1st of Ice Moon!"

The women gossip about the posters in Elven for a while. The half-elf wants to hunt bears. The elf is arguing for hunting down the low-town slasher.

Meanwhile, the human is approaching the sailor's table. As he approaches the storyteller, he begins to pick up a part of his story. "and I ran as fast as we could, but the screeching just got louder and louder. We turned down Deadpan Alley and that's when we saw it sihouetted against the moon. A great winged beast! Alexa and I, we wheeled around, but the thing was too fast. It carried Alexi into the air with it! No one has seen Alexi since, and the beast," he wimpers a bit, "the beast has seen my face. It'll be hunting for me next. That's why I need passage on your boat. Just as far as Bojestva. I've got to leave the city, maybe it'll follow me and leave my wife and daughter alone. Will you help me?" The sailors turn to each other and confer among themselves in low voices for a few moments. The sorcerer turns back to the bar with a thoughtful expression on his face, he can hear the sailors assent to take the poor farmer with them when they leave town the next day.

Upon arriving back at the bar, the human discovers that the half-orc has drunk not only his own beer, but also the elf's and the humans, and to top it off, the dwarf seems to have taken the half-elf's porter for his own. He slaps the half-orc on the back of the head and informs him that he now owes him four copper. The human then relates the story he just heard to the half-orc, and the dwarf overhears.

The women return to the bar and begin discussing the bear hunt and the low town slasher. Being unable to remember many details, the human fetches the low town slasher poster and brings it back with him (Item Acquired: Poster 3!). After some discussion, they decide that they should atleast get some details about this low town slasher and head toward the door on their way to Prostos Arms to speak with "Tatania" (as they continue to mispronounce her name).

As they move toward the door of the tavern, it swings in quite abruptly, missing the half-orc's nose by a mere couple of inches. The half-orc tells them to "watch it" and is pushed back into the room and told to take a seat. The person in the door is a tall, well-muscled woman with cropped red-brown hair and green eyes, wearing a blue tabard with a silver crocodile emblem over a blue-grey chain shirt, a pair of manacles hanging from either hip, a bastard sword strapped to her back, and a dagger attached to the strap that runs across her front, walks in. Her face is somewhat reddened and several tears mar her pretty face.

The inn goes silent and everyone turns to the woman expectantly. Though cracked because of tears, her voice is clear and commanding when she speaks.

"Thank-you for your attention. I have some bad news. Ivan was found a short while ago. His... his throat had been ripped up pretty badly, and there were odd knife wounds all over the body. I don't think he suffered long, but..." She wipes a couple tears off her cheeks. "Well, he's dead. As a result I have decided to raise the reward for whomever captures the low town slasher with my entire year's salary. The reward is set to 500 gold for a party of five." She turns to the bartender who has poured two shot glasses of whiskey. She downs one shot quickly, and places the other in the center of a vacant table.

"Break's over. Back to work." Both tables of guards rise immediately and make their way out the door, offering their condolences to the woman on the way. The woman sinks into a chair at the empty table, her head sinking into her arms. The bartender brings her a full mug of porter and offers his condolences.

The party looks at each other, and then decide that this woman must be Captain Tatiana, the head of the city guards. The dwarf looks at the half elf and says "That's more than two gold." The half-orc gets up and approaches the table, making a few stupid and possibly insulting remarks, invoking the ire of the good Captain. The human comes to the rescue, pushing the half-orc out of the way. He inquires about the killings, requesting some information on them so they have something to work with. Tatiana hands them a notebook with a small map at the back, and tells them a few things. This is the information they recieve:

From Tatiana:

Over the past two weeks, 10 people have been found murdered in the Low Residential Area (aka Low Town).
All have had their throats torn horribly, and odd three-bladed knife wounds over their bodies.
The slasher title was given by the local paper because one of the first bodies found has several gashes cut across his side in addition to the current wounds.
The murders seem to be moving toward the center of the city, the first body was discovered near the palisade, and the most recent just a couple blocks from the market.

From the notebook:

QUOTE
Murder 1:  Human, Male.  Name unknown.  Found behind the Wild Boar by the innkeeper.  No weapon found.  Body had been picked clean of valuables, but that likely happened quite some time after his death.

Murder 2:  Human, Male.  Name: Aldar Boarfoot.  Nationality: Great Plains, Boar Tribe  Known Foes: None local.  Found in an alley between Beggar's Lane and Waif Street.  Body had also been picked clean after death.

Murder 3:  Orc, Male.  Name: Gromsh  Nationality: Geran  Known Foes: Bloodsnout (8 Wait Street).  Bloodsnout was seen at Coin Changer tavern around the time of the murder.  Body found on the corner of Waif St & Low Avenue.  Body also picked clean.  Slash wounds on body in addition to knife wounds and torn throat.  A tuft of brown fur, probably from assailant's clothes, found under victim's fingernails.

Murder 4:  Clik-chi, Female.  Name: Ska  Nationality: Clik-cha Noi, Cli-cha-nay Clan.  Known Foes:  None local, but as a member of the Xaos (from pamphletes found on body), any pro-government individual could have done it.  body found on Low Avenue just off Northern Logging Road.  Something new this time.  A message scrawled in blood on the wall: "With blood, order is obtained."  Seems fitting under the circumstances.  Valuables still on body, motive cannot be theft.

Murder 5:  Human, Male.  Name unknown.  Body found by Lini Brighteyes, visiting from the Great Plains (staying at wheat & chaff).  The body was located in the home of Kayla Strianna on Northern Logging Road.  Her neighbours say she has been off in Bojestvo conducting business for about a month.  None of them heard or saw anything.  Lini was apparently dropping in to see if Kayla had anymore "beads".  A new message in the victim's blood: "A circle drawn by order marked, he will be released soon."  Somewhat puzzling -- who is he?  Where is "he" being held?  By whom?

Murder 6:  Human, Female.  Name: Ranya Kurbskii  Nationality: Geran  Known Foes:  Sveta Riasanovsky, they were competing for the same man; Burian Sviatoslav owed here a rather large gambling debt.  Boyfriend: Nikolai Pushkin, could not be found for questioning.  Body found by Rurick Turgenev by the Northern Logging Road and Back Row.  Blood writing found again: "It cannot be stopped, the overlord returns."  What can't be stopped?  Who's this overlord?  Overlord of what?

Murder 7:  Elf, Male.  Name unknown.  Body found by Rurik Turgenev again, he must be after the bounty.  Body was found propped into a sitting position this time, seemingly with its back to the warehouse wall.  A long streak of blood runs from near the top of the wall, as though it were dropped from above.  No message on sight.  Valuables still on body.

Murder 8: Elf, Female.  Name unknown.  Boby found by Rurick Turgenev same time as the 7th victim.  Either the killer was surprised or he's speeding up and becoming bolder.  Again no message.  Valuables still on body, including an expensive opal necklace.

Murder 9: Human, Male.  Name:  Rurik Turgenev  Nationality: Geran  Known Foes:  Just about every low-life in the Low Residential Area.  Body found by Sergent Ivan Tolstoy and Private Vera Gogol while on patrol.  Rurik must have stumbled too close to the killer.  At least there was some visible reason behind this death.  Body located only one block from the Market, at Frontline and Trolley.  Bloody message: "There is only one order, stop looking and accept his sway."  This guy is really starting to piss me off.  I've doubled the number of patrols in the market & low residention/eastern warehouse areas.  Hopefully we'll catch this bastard soon.

(This page stained with tears)
Murder 10: Human, Male  Name: Ivan Tolstoy  Nationality: Geran  Known Foes: None.  Body found at Trolley & Tasya by Private Grisha Mussorgsky and myself.  Ivan's partner, Vera Gogol, has gone missing, suspected dead.  Bloody message:  Order marching circle round, Kylana's chains to be unbound, By rule of he we will prevail, Once he's released from his jail."  I don't like how things are going.  On a personal note, Ivan was a very close friend of mine.  I've decided to add my year's wages to the bounty, hopefully someone will lend us a hand and have more luck than Turgenev.


The sorcerer thanks Captain Tatiana for the information and the party makes it's way out into the bright sunny day. They make their way out to the Market District, because the line of the murders seems to predict that the next murder will happen close to there. The ward is pretty empty at this time of the year, it having been three full months since the last trading run. There are still a good dozen kiosks or spread blankets about with hawkers trying to sell a number of different items. But the prices are rediculous and the quality is unimpressive. The PCs notice Bulgakov's Bazaar and decide to stop in.

The first item on the selling block is a pickled skull that once belonged to a necromancer. The skull was owned by the necromancer, and therefore his own, it wasn't the one attached to the rest of his body however. Anyways, Bulgakov, in a thick accent of some kind, claims that the skull, when worn about the neck will allow the wearer to jump ten feet vertically (but says nothing about landing). The price is around 200 gold. Then Bulgakov tries to sell a crooked fingerbone, said to be enchanted with the power to do something of no actual significance (as in, i can't remember all of my own BS), it was running at 10 gold. The half-orc said he just wanted something to pick his nose with. Bulgakov, of course, had just the thing: a tiny fly, in a tiny jar, that was said to fly up the nose and live off your snot. Guaranteed to render the user immune to the common cold. He could have it for only two copper. The half-orc was very tempted, but just decided to pick his own nose anyways. A final item was a short-staffed executioner's axe, guaranteed to cut through absolutely anything. Only 2000 gold, which is still way out of the PC's price range, and thus went ignored. The PCs left the place, not really believing any of Bulgakov's products did what he claimed (except the half-orc).

On the way to Sveta Riasanovsky's (16 Low St), the PCs pass the 7th & 8th murder scenes and decide to see if the guards missed anything. After a few minutes of searching, they find a single feather: white with a black bar and a red bar. When they arrive at Sveta's, the notice that the otherwise relatively shoddy building has a nice door. They knock, and Sveta comes running to the door. She's your stereotypical vain blond-haired, blue eyed ditz. She turns out to be totally useless and spends a lot of her time pining for Nikolai, who she hasn't seen in a couple weeks. The half-orc intimidates her trying to get some info out of her, but that just makes her cry and run up to her room. The door being left unlocked, the half-orc enters and makes his way to the kitchen. He pockets a carrot and notices the stew over the fire. Unthinking, he tries to lift off the lid with his bare hands and recieves a nasty burn as a result. The half-elf and elf make their way in and try to ransack the place, but only find a very pathetic love letter to be of some interest, but niether of them are willing to read it, so the dwarf does. The half-orc finds something to remove the lid with and then starts spooning the stew into a bowl hungrily. The first scoop only yields water. The second soup yields a sock, and the half-orc realizes that it's not stew, but laundry. Dissappointed, he yells up "You have no food!" and storms out eating a carrot. The others follow.

They decide to visit Bloodsnout next. Bloodsnout is suffering from a bit of a hangover, but when the half-orc calls up to him in orcish, he rushes down wondering if it's his drinking buddy Sammy. A little uncouth, he invited the PCs in and shares some orcish moonshine with the half-orc, the two of them getting right wasted in about a half-hour of discussion. Bloodsnout had a disagreement with Gromsh because Gromsh had stolen his job unloading crates at the docks. He claims now that Gromsh is gone, he can get his job back whenever he wants, which will be right after he finishes celebrating at the Coin Changer. The PCs learn a little bit of gossp about the low town slasher, claiming that it was sent from Bojestva because the head merchant in Bojestva disagreed with the building of the cana between Fluval and Gorod, and that there have been some demon sightings in the farm district. A quick visit to the Coin Changer verifies Bloodsnout's alibi, and leads the PCs to check out the Wild Boar where "if anybody were to hide, that'd be the place."

On the way to the Wild Boar, the PCs spot a blond-haired woman in a guard's uniform huddled near some refuse at the back of an alley. The woman is rocking back and forth with her blue eyes wide open. She's chanting: "Order in blood, pathways open" over and over again. The half-orc draws his double-axe as they enter the alley. The woman begins screaming "Keep it away! Keep it away from me!" and huddles further into the alley. The sorceror manages to convince the half-orc to put away his axe, but a cat runs by and out into the street, and the half-orc pursues it trying to kill it for food. Eventually, Captain Charisma (the sorcerer), manages to calm the madwoman a bit and gains the following tidbits:

"'He's coming,' that's what it said, 'and there's no way to stop it'"
"It... it wasn't human."
"Aaah! It's here! It's right behind you!" (The PCs look back to find no one behind them).
"It looked into my soul! As though it were rummaging around for something."
"Fangs. I'm sure I saw fangs. But in the day? How can it be out during the day?"

After a time, and some vague ranting about talking rats, flowers, and a winged creature, the PCs decide to knock her out and bring her to Prostos Arms, where they recieve a 10 gp reward (split 5 ways = 2 GP each), and a small amount of Tatiana's ire for having struck a city guard.

<More Coming, Broken into another entry>]]> Thu, 12 May 2005 10:12:03 -0500 Session 1: Character Creation http://rintaran.klaporte.com ). In this blog, I intend to follow the adventures of the characters in my campaigns. Eventually, these entries will be split up into categories based on the campaign that they're a part of, but as I'm only running one campaign at the moment, I'm going to put them all here.

On the evening of April 27th, my friends and I got together to begin to create characters for a campaign that will last atleast the summer. We met around 9:00pm to begin. I had hoped to be a player, but as none of them had any experience with 3E, I was "elected" the DM once again. So, a lot of the rules had to be explained during character creation (which took until about 1:30am and was still incomplete). Many, though not all, of my unique rules are being put into play (a copy of those rules can be found on my website). We decided to opt out of Sanity, and my Percieved/Actual alignment schemes because the players are all new.

Essentially, the following is the party:

Level 1 Female Elf Fighter Trait: Reckless Flaw: Weak Willed
Level 1 Female 1/2 Elf Rogue Trait: Suspicious Flaw: Shaky
Level 1 Male Human Sorceror Trait: Focussed Flaw: Vulnerable Familiar: Toad
Level 1 Male 1/2 Orc Boar Barbarian Trait: Yet to Choose Flaw: Yet to Choose
Level 1 Male Dwarf Paladin of Freedom Trait: Stout Flaw: Shaky

They seem to be looking for a campaign that's a little more combat heavy than I normally run, so I'm going to have to think hard about what I want to do. All the characters are either CG or CN (which works well).

I have yet to choose the starting location for this campaign, though I am tempted to put it on the south-western continent of my campaign world. Since there's a forest right next to the Great Plains, that allows for the boar barbarian to join the party. So, basically, my country choice is narrowed down to Geran, Lita, Voonland, Malinka, Balsha, Rovia, Balta, Rinchar, Gusvar, and Sheva (which is actually a significant narrowing) which are all forest/marsh countries both near an ocean and the Great Plains.

As a result of the campaign being in a different part of the world from usual, that means I have to create a lot of stuff from scratch, which means upcoming updates in the D&D section of my website.

Suggestions for campaign ideas are welcome at this point. The first session of gameplay will not be until May 11th, 2005 (because my parents are coming to visit). There will be an update with some basic information between now and then (hopefully).]]> Thu, 28 Apr 2005 23:27:59 -0500