[Lore] Worldbuilding Part 2: The Gods!

    As I mentioned in earlier posts, the people of the Great Kingdom belong to the Church of Radiance which is a universal, monolatrous religion centered around the worship of Ohm the Almighty. The Church also canonizes many saints, particularly martyrs, who are prayed to for assistance and guidance by followers.

    Ohm is a Lawful and jealous god among several, but his powers are greater than any god the people of the Great Kingdom has ever encountered so they elected to worship him alone, while still acknowledging the existence of "lesser" gods. This insistence is one of the causes of strife within the alliance between man and demi-human. While the Great Kingdom does claim that their god is king of all others, the fact that they are able to accept the existence of other gods allows for alliances to be made with other cultures and races that follow different Lawful gods. Still, the clerics of the Great Kingdom are encouraged and commanded to spread the faith and convert as many people as possible.

    The Church holds honesty, selflessness, fairness, obedience, compassion, justice, and keeping your promises as virtues. While most followers are human, they are (mostly) accepting and encouraging of nonhuman converts. They strive to do good and help their fellow brothers and sisters. Their holy symbol is a cross, often made of wood or precious metals. The cross symbolizes Ohm the Almighty and his outreaching arms that protect all of His followers.

    Unless stated otherwise by the player, human characters are all assumed to be members of the Church. The Church of Radiance has a strict hierarchy and canonizes many saints, whom followers are expected to pray to for guidance and help. Player character clerics must choose (or create) a patron saint to dedicate themselves to. A saint might have a different holy symbol than the cross but a cross will always suffice. Each saint has at least one domain and can be invoked against certain things (such as plague, death, famine, etc) in times of need. Characters can also donate money, in addition to being a devout follower, to the Church in the name of their patron saint in order to gain a blessing (such as a +1 on saves vs death) from their patron saint. Characters are only allowed to have a single patron saint (and therefore only a single blessing) at a time and it should be rare for a character to change their patron saint, although they are allowed and encouraged to pray to any and all saints.

List of Saints & Blessing Rules:

In order for a character to receive a blessing, they must donate at least 10% of their level XP cost in gold coins, per month and follow the teachings of the Church.

St. Omes the Old, forced to take iocane powder, patron saint of elders and hermits, invoked against death, poison, and plague. (+1 to Saves vs Death Ray and Poison)

St. Zernmet the Pious, burned within a wicker man, patron saint of elves and magic users, invoked against magic wands, witchcraft, and heathens. (+1 to Saves vs Magic Wands)

St. Yorrana the Merciful, stoned to death, patron saint of dwarves, invoked against paralysis, turning to stone, cave-ins, and greed. (+1 to Saves vs Paralysis and Turn to Stone)

St. Arik the Bold, beheaded, patron saint of men-at-arms, justice, and bravery, invoked against dragon breath, cowardice, and impotency. (+1 to Saves vs Dragon Breath)

St. Erazell the Pure, killed by the iron maiden, patron saint of women, chastity, and the family invoked against rods, staves, spells, and demonic possession. (+1 to Saves vs Rods, Staves, and Spells)

St. Moldvay the Wise, burned at the stake, patron saint of clerics and children, invoked against the undead. (+1 to Turn Undead)

St. Zeb, exiled into the wilderness, patron saint of halflings, travelers, and reformed thieves, invoked against getting lost, banditry, and restlessness. (-1 to Lost Chance)

Other Gods

    The various tribes and clans of humans and humanoids worship too many gods to count.  If a player character wishes to be of a tribal ancestry, they are free to create their own god(s) as they desire.

    The elves worship several celestial, musical, and nature based gods.  The dwarves worship gods of mountains, smithing, gold, axes, and alcohol, etc.  Halflings don't really have organized religions but will generally make offerings to whatever spirits are in the area.  Again, player characters are free to design their own gods if they play a demi-human, but even a player-made god should fit thematically with the general domains already listed.

    In the next post (hopefully), I'll have a way for characters to call upon their gods and goddesses in their time of need.

[Lore] Worldbuilding Part 1: The Campaign Area & Political Divisions

The Wild Reaches (aka Outdoor Survival)

    The campaign area is set in the wilderness region, known as the Wild Reaches by the people of the Great Kingdom, which is the most dominant, Lawful human realm. The Wild Reaches is a vast area of largely untamed wilderness with a handful of Lawful settlements scattered around. The region is mostly populated by tribal humans, savage humanoids, and plenty of monsters. The majority of "civilized" people come from the Great Kingdom who go out into the wilderness in order to protect the realm of mankind. There are some areas within the Wild Reaches that are occupied by some non-hostile (towards humans) demi-humans, but they aren't super common. It also helps that the ruler of the Great Kingdom, King Grognard, in an effort to incentivize the taming and settling of the wilderness, has granted titles and land rights to any person capable of building and maintaining a stronghold.

    There is currently an alliance between the Great Kingdom and some of the various demi-human realms within the Wild Reaches however, there are some demi-human settlements that aren't so friendly to humans. Even within the alliance, tensions exist due to a variety of reasons (racial, religious, territorial, etc) but the alliance is still maintained because each member realizes that their chances of pushing back against the forces of Chaos is significantly higher if they work together.

    The people of the Great Kingdom are generally Lawful, good natured, and honest folk. While generally good, people of the Great Kingdom are also wary of outsiders due to the dangers present on the frontier. Despite this, they will let outsiders enter their gates if a tax is paid upon entry as well as if some questions are answered. The same can be said for the demi-human settlements although some of them might have stricter policies, such as requiring a member of their race present within a party to act as an escort. The average man in the Great Kingdom stands at 5'9, weighs 175 lbs (1750 cn), and has brown hair and eyes, as well as a fair complexion. Other skin, hair, and eye tones exist but are less common. The official religion of the Great Kingdom is the Church of Radiance, a monolatrous religion whose members view Ohm the Light Bringer as the most powerful deity. In the next post, I will elaborate on the Church of Radiance but for now I'll leave it at that.

[Lore][Homebrew] Gods and Saints

St. George slaying a dragon

    In order to incentivize characters interacting with the Church in my setting, which I will go into more detail in a future post, I thought it might be cool to give patron saints specific domains that directly tied into game mechanics like turning undead and saving throws.  Originally, I was going to keep the gods and saints fairly distant from the player characters but when I was creating some saints I had remembered the stories about St. George killing dragons and thought that a devout follower of his would likely get a bonus on saves vs dragon breath.  That's when I edited my saints to directly tie into game features and mechanics.

    Basically, how it's gonna work is that a character, of any class, can select a patron saint whom they can pray to for assistance.  The actual mechanical benefit comes at a cost though.  Characters are expected to not only be devoted to their patron saint (you know, following their teachings and actually roleplaying your character's beliefs) as well as a payment in gold of a value equal to 10% of their XP cost.  The donation to the Church would be a monthly thing and the price only goes up as the character levels up so a 1st level cleric who's devoted to St. Carr the Vampire Slayer would only need to pay 150 gp per month to the Church in order to get a +1 vs turning undead (or maybe turning vampires specifically).  

    I might also add specific requirements for each saint that is somewhat independent of the religion as a whole.  Right now all I have for a code of conduct is a set of commandments (given to humanity on a golden scroll) but it could be fun for saints to have their own little objectives.  St. Carr the Vampire Slayer might require his followers to never leave an undead... alive.  I'm not sure the right word for that but basically he could have a rule where his followers HAVE TO kill any and all undead they come across and if they don't, they'd lose the blessing.  This could make for interesting religious orders but it could be a bit much imo.  I'll have to work on it some more.

    I want to keep the blessings useful but also somewhat minor.  Basically I want them to just be in the background as something that's kinda cool and useful but isn't too complicated for players to the point of making them disinterested.  That's why I feel that a +1 bonus to a saving throw or something similar could be a cool mechanic, plus it encourages the players to interact with the setting's religion a bit more.  One thing I find really lame is when a player chooses to play a cleric simply because they think the party needs a healer as opposed to actually wanting to run a character who is devoted to god(s).  To me, a cleric should be similar to Sister Rebecca in the Moldvay Basic example of play.  They've sworn an oath to their deity and are willing to take a stand, even against their own party members, to stay true to their beliefs.  From what I've seen, a lot of clerics (and paladins) are all too willing to turn a blind eye to the evil committed by their fellow adventurers because they don't want to cause any friction or conflict.  Clerics, imo, should be some of the most annoying people as well as some of the most beloved people by their party.  Sure, it might be frustrating riding with a cleric when all you want to do is kick in doors and kill monsters but you'll be glad they're with you when you come across hordes of the undead or if you need your burial site to be consecrated so that you don't end up rising up again.

    Currently, I'm still fleshing out my starting saints (players will be able to make their own and I'll make more as the campaign progresses but I wanted to have a handful of options for players to select from to start off with) and once I'm done with them I'll make a post about them.

[Homebrew] Cyclops Race-as-Class

Krull

    Inspired by one of my favorite science-fantasy movies, Krull, I decided to make my own cyclops class for B/X based off of the cyclops character Rell.  I used the BX Options Class Builder to determine the XP requirements and feel that it turned out pretty good, hopefully you think so too.

Rell the Cyclops

[Session Report 7 - 9/1/24] The Cave of the Owlbear

The party surrounds an owlbear.

    This was another shorter session with my cousin.  His party had heard some rumors from the local town guards about a tribe of goblins who were spotted nearby the northwestern portion of the Dragon Peaks.  The adventurers gathered themselves and set off on foot into the wilderness, hoping to slay some goblins and get some treasure in the process.

    It was the 11th of Second Seed when the party left town and almost immediately, they stumbled onto some ruins.  The party made a note of it in their map but pressed on towards the mountains.  After a few more days of travel, they finally found a cave entrance in the Dragon Peaks.  They searched around the entrance before descending and saw several tracks.  "This must be where the goblins live!" thought the party members.    They lit their torches and made their way down the natural steps of the cave.

    In the first room they entered, they saw some bloody remains and a blood trail that led to an eastward passage.  They followed the trail and tried to listen for anything or anyone that could still be inside the cave.  One of the adventurers thought that some kind of ogre or troll must lurk in these tunnels because of how gruesome the remains were.  The party heard heavy foot steps further down the passage but they kept going.

    They entered a room and were overwhelmed by the disgusting smell coming from a mound of dung.  The dwarf of the party decided to search it and one of the fighters in the group vomited from the sight and smells.  After about 30 minutes, the dwarf was actually able to find some treasure hidden in the dung.  "Whatever made this mess must've eaten some adventurers." said one of the party members.  The party kept going and entered another room that was a ways off.  Inside was an owlbear and it stood on its hind legs and yelled out a frightening roar.

    The party, getting the drop on it, quickly surrounded the beast and started attacking it.  The owlbear clawed and bit at their cleric, Fredrick, killing him.  The rest of the fighters continued to attack and finally slayed the monster.  The dwarf, Ermerer, took the valuables from Fredrick's bags before departing.  Now, the party was starting to worry.  They still haven't encountered any goblins yet and started to wonder if the owlbear had beaten them to the punch.  They double backed, wanting to explore other areas of the cave.  Unfortunately, they were not as cautious as before and fell into some pit traps.  One of the fighters, Kratos, died in one of the pits but fortunately they weren't spiked or else more could've died.  The other party members pulled Peter the Veteran up out of the pit and retrieved Kratos' body, only to immediately loot him for valuables too.

    Deciding that they had taken enough punishment, the party elected to leave the dungeon and return to Dragonwrath with the treasure they found.  It didn't take too long before they were back within the safe walls of the settlement where they could sell some of their loot and rest before their next adventure.

[Session Report 6 - 8/31/24] Wandering Around the Wilderness

Druid Circle of Standing Stones

    This session was quite a bit shorter than the previous ones but was still quite fun.  After celebrating the execution of the bandit leader, Dantar, the party decided to hang out in town for a few days to gather some intel.  They spent their time mostly in the tavern, inn, and market where juicy gossip was bound to be and were able to find several rumors regarding a recently discovered ziggurat located in the Swamp of Dread.  According to the locals, the ziggurat resembles a famous structure previously thought to be only a legend.  Upon hearing these rumors, the party elected to travel elsewhere in the hopes of encountering something that was a little less frightening.

    So, the party gathered their belongings and set out into the wilderness in the hopes of locating the lair of a goblin tribe that the local guards have been complaining about.  They knew from the rumors that the goblins were spotted near the Dragon Peaks, northwest of the town of Dragonwrath.  Unfortunately, they were unable to find it but did stumble upon a druidic circle of large standing stones.  They inspected the stones and saw strange markings on each one, and the clerics of the party were able to recall that the Highland Clans are known to sometimes use runes and other pagan symbols.  Our adventurers then realized that they needed to take a rest since they've been travelling for several days.  

Black Dougal's Bandit Keep

    On their day of rest, they spotted a gorgon about 160 yards away.  They tried to flee but were noticed by the metal bull and it kept chasing them.  Now the party was starting to worry, they weren't able to rest and now were being forced to continue running.  Eventually the monster lost sight of them and they tried to catch their rest but then a gang of 75 bandits saw them.  The bandits were immediately hostile, no doubt due to the party accidentally entering in their territory.  The party had tried to evade but failed and the pursuit was on!  After another day of chasing the party, the bandits decided that the party was a sufficient distance away from their bandit keep and ended their pursuit.  Now the party was really beat and weary but they knew that they could reach the safety of Dragonwrath in just another day of travel.  Not wanting to rest in the wilderness for 4 or 5 days to regain their stamina they forced themselves forward until they were greeted by the welcoming gates of Dragonwrath where they stayed at the Wayfarer's Inn and were able to rest without fear.

Discovered Hex Features

Hex Features

1: Bandit Keep

2: Druidic Standing Stones

3: Halls of Ghuldesh

4: Dragonwrath

5: Grujek the Cruel's Tower (Formerly Mezhag the Imposing's)

6: Bandit Hideout

7: Fenhor the Fearless' Stronghold