New Fantasy Setting Seeds.

[TGLS]

Originally Posted by tshiggins

So, does the familiar die if the mage does? Are they linked that intimately?

Yes, but not the other way around. Unless, you know, you time it right with when the mage does the regular ritual to ensure the pain's only one way. Or you figure out the ritual yourself.

[tshiggins]

Originally Posted by TGLS

Yes, but not the other way around. Unless, you know, you time it right with when the mage does the regular ritual to ensure the pain's only one way. Or you figure out the ritual yourself.

Or you say, "screw it," and strap a bomb to yourself, and kill your own master mage along with as many of his colleagues as possible, all at once.

(I think it's safe to say that my understanding of how this campaign should proceed may differ, somewhat, from the GM's expectations....) 8)

[TGLS]

Originally Posted by tshiggins

Or you say, "screw it," and strap a bomb to yourself, and kill your own master mage along with as many of his colleagues as possible, all at once.

(I think it's safe to say that my understanding of how this campaign should proceed may differ, somewhat, from the GM's expectations....) 8)

Well, to that I'd say, where going to get a bomb? Either way, the setting's engaged with and the game continues. The story of how a bound familiar persuades a mage that their system of binding unsuspecting creatures from another dimension is morally wrong, the story of how a "familiar" learns magic and imprisons a mage because they're the familiar's phylactery, and the story of how an unwilling familiar blows up a lecture hall are all equally valid stories.

Though I suppose I ought to have emphasized the fact that the local sapient population has reasons why they don't think any of the familiars are sapient. Most are simple animals (small mammals, birds, reptiles), emphasizing that extraplanar sapients are anomalous, extraplanar sapients are confusable with animals (i.e. they have hairless plains apes no more sophisticated than chimpanzees), not implying the abducted sapients are human or semi-human, etc. Maybe I should have written it from a more objective perspective.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by TGLS

Though I suppose I ought to have emphasized the fact that the local sapient population has reasons why they don't think any of the familiars are sapient. Most are simple animals (small mammals, birds, reptiles), emphasizing that extraplanar sapients are anomalous, extraplanar sapients are confusable with animals (i.e. they have hairless plains apes no more sophisticated than chimpanzees), not implying the abducted sapients are human or semi-human, etc. Maybe I should have written it from a more objective perspective.

I was expecting more elemental forms, actually. Ones associated with fire, water, body, mind, motion, and so forth.

[Astromancer]

Mouse Wars

Although the humans clearly don't understand any animals, let us remember to be understanding. Although many of us harbor ill feelings towards humans they to are part of the Most High's plan of creation.

That is why the Mouseinauti must be stopped. Genocide is evil in itself, but summoning demon lords you can't dismiss is madness!

Our council of mouse wizards must stop these fools!

Basically, Mage: the Ascension with mice. Take any twelve trads you like and create the good guys. Then take twelve of the more obnoxious groups to be the villains. Paradox comes from being caught by humans. All sorts of animal Mages can get burned. Humans, because they generate paradox, allow reality itself stability. The Mouseinauti believe that eliminating humans and paradox would mean freedom for all. The Council believes it will mean madness and death for all.

The fight is on!

[Jariel]

Mouse Wars sounds very similar to Things That Go Squeak in the Night by Gallant Night Games. You might want to check it out, since World of Darkness was one of the inspirations.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by Jariel

Mouse Wars sounds very similar to Things That Go Squeak in the Night by Gallant Night Games. You might want to check it out, since World of Darkness was one of the inspirations.

You caught me. I was trying to file the serial numbers off of Things That go Squeak in the Night . I definitely plan to buy that game. And my gaming group seems interested.

[Astromancer]

The Border and the Road

We of Aladore have always had the advantage over Dacia. Our lands are warmer, fairer, greater in extant, and gifted with stronger magics. I am told that magic is so weak in Dacia that many common and useful spells aren't even possible. Even the charm to recover mystic energy can't be cast. Little wonder that we always had the precedent.

But now strange things are happening. The Dacians have learned new arts. They steer their ships by pocket watches and measure their land by looking at the stars. That seems mad, but it works. They also organize their armies in strange new ways and field terrifyingly large armies. This war may go against us.

Basically, Aladore is a classic Chivalric Fantasy setting. A Normal Mana TL3 setting based on the most glamourous aspects of Medieval France and Spain. And a very print the legend take on the trope. Dacia is a series of Islands to the Northwest of Aladore. They were a Low Mana fantasy remix of the British Isles that could be described as Anglo-Celtic. They were TL3. Due to connections being made to distant realms they've gone from a late Medieval TL3 to an mid Eighteenth century TL5.

As you can imagine the power balance has changed. Aladore isn't helpless. People with Magery are one hundred times more common in Aladore. Magical skills are more widely studied and skills like Alchemy more broadly known.

Still, knights versus pirates anyone?

[Astromancer]

The Gate of Saturn and Apollo

It seems to be some combination of the old clock up on top of the building and walking these stairs at the right time. You can climb or descend the years as well as the stairs.

It seems to be a building secret. There's something like a jinx on anyone who tries to publicize this thing. But word does get to a few. There's an actuary in this building that knows which people not to insure.

Bet the horses? It doesn't quite work that way.

Time travel in this building seems to be limited by the orbit of Saturn. We can go back or forth one Saturnian year at a time. You can't go to anytime before the clock on top of the building started nor can you go to anytime after that same clock stops.

No, I don't know why it stopped. I just hope it wasn't the end of the world.


Saturn's year is 29.45 Earth years. Pick when you want the building built and the clock started and stopped. It lets you link a series of time periods to each other in a stable pattern. If the building with the clock (as written an office building in a large city) is built and the clock started in the 1880s. You can link the 1880s, the 1910s, the 1940s, the 1970s, the 2000s, and the 2030s, in one campaign with PCs and NPCs coming from any of those time periods. I chose Saturn's year. But there are multiple cycles that you could link the clock to.

Possibilities for PCs might include Private Investigators. Even with the time limits the ability to investigate before a crime happens can turn up some interesting clues. Similarly, tracing someone who went missing forty years ago is easier if you pop back thirty years.

Many other mystery scenarios can be worked into the setting because the limited time travel keeps the PCs from being all powerful.

Time travel can also provide a safe house. If someone has to disappear, taking them to the past or future seems a pretty good bet.

[David Johnston2]

Premise for a play by post campaign.

You are on the losing side of a succession war, and the victors are not inclined to be generous. Not only are they going to kill those of you who actually fought, but they also intend to eradicate your entire families and all memory that they ever existed. You have only one hope, a quest to find the spell to open a planar gate, allowing all of your surviving kin to flee to an empty world beyond your enemies ability to reach or even find you.

You get the spell, you test it and scout out several worlds until eventually you find one filled with life but seemingly devoid of natives who might object to your intrusion. With time running out you make your escape and close the door after you. All seems well until about a hundred days later when a keen eyed skywatcher notes that far off in the distance there are lights descending and ascending. Your team of scouts is dispatched to the east to discover what strange magic could be causing such a thing. The trip is mildly dangerous since a native predator has not learned to be cautious of your kind.

When you arrive you discover the beginning of another settlement not unlike your own in some ways, and very unlike in others. A circular pad made of stonelike substance is nearby and on it is a strange metal tower which after being unloaded of people and square containers ascended back into the sky on a pillar of fire.

The people are much like yours in appearance although they have round ears and no horns. But before you can learn much, one of the metal totems surround their community begins to make a loud noise and one of your scouts falls, their blue blood spraying the ground.