Just a note -- there's no railroading here; I'm legitimately waiting for everyone to respond to Almah's offer to accompany Slavathras to figure out if I need to write two or more different scenes to continue the action.
Sorry about my absence, life decided to rear its ugly head. I should be back on track now.
I haven't forgotten about the village of Amlitkayek, which I now have some more details to share about to fill in the home town of Kuro, Gaanon, and Memnon.
Let me know if you all approve these ideas before I start adding them into the narrative,
Amlitkayek is one of four villages each with 1-3,000 inhabitants that are arranged in points around Tyr in the mountainous valley of the Ringing Mountains that houses the Free City. They are each protected by a maze work of canyons, and the villages sit on plateaus in the midst of this network of rivulets and narrow defiles.
There were originally four of these settlements, and Amlitkayek is the only one to survive. It is dedicated to the Queen of Fire Drakes Ymera, while the others were established by cults of the other great Elemental Drakes. It is rumored that all the villages have foundations that go back to the Blue Age, and were associated with the ancient halfling city of Ty'ragi. They provided some massive network to focus the power of the elements through the Valley of Tyr, something like the Pristine Tower perhaps in design and object.
There were/are two populations in each town -- a group of humans associated with the elemental cult, and native to the village, and another of outsiders adopted into the community. These form two castes.
Memnon is a member of the former, known as the 'Holders of the Flame' -- these, as in the other towns, are rumored to descend from a population that has its origins in the Green Age.
Gaanon and Kuro are members of the latter group -- the outsiders. Kuro was originally from the town of Fuyuki, which was dedicated to the cult of the water drakes. This town was destroyed in his youth and he was adopted into its sister settlement of Amlitkayek.
Gaanon joined the community through proving himself over a series of trials after he escaped from slavery to the hinterlands of the Valley of Tyr.
The town was destroyed by the forces of Hiero, a renegade templar of Kalak whose was possessed by a malevolent ancient psion housed in a psionic artifact he stole from the treasury of his sorcerer-king. Gaanon had helped fend off any earlier assault by the mad templar's forces, including a wicked thrashing by his deputy Unagg Skullcrusher, a mul gladiator with a gigantic hammer.
And I just want to tease everyone, there are some interesting hypotheses being thrown out, but what's actually going on in Kalidnay is much weirder and more complicated than anything that's been guessed at yet. I think you'll all really enjoy some of the plot twists I'm throwing into my take on Athas and it's crystal sphere.
Wow, looking forward to it!
Just want to say love being hit by a cerulean storm. While Prism Pentad gets alot of flak, I love the setting after it. Still have sorcerer kings, but now there is the faintest glimmer of hope in a world which is still dying.
This isn't actually a cerulean storm since Tithian isn't dead yet -- see campaign overview, it's just a storm from the Estuary of the Forked tongue, which does get a lot of rain, being sucked up into the wastes by whatever strange power is now pulsating in the ruins.
Ah I see. I was confused, thanks for clarifying!
Was reading through Athas.org, and a few things stuck out to me.
(1) The green age wasn't all that nice. The lawkeepers' punishments were progressive in that they went from the death penalty to jail time...psionic, eternal, jail time. Ouch.
(2) A psionic from the present was able to send a message to the past. One king was going to listen, but was taken out by his advisors who wants this future. Jerks.
(3) There were elven civilizations during the green age that had griffon riders and cities. They were destroyed, riders and mounts alike.
(4) The dwarves held off for a few centuries, and their last king nearly killed Borys. The dwarven capital held out through everything...until Borys became a dragon, flew back, and sucked the life out of everything within the city. The last dwarven town, Kled, is built over the ruins.
Really is a great setting.
The other thing I really like about it is that there is a lot of awesome unique detail -- like the distinctive forms of undead -- but also several versions of the canon, so you can legitimately make it your own.
It also has, in my opinion, the best fan resources by far of any setting. I'm getting so many great ideas from some of it.
I'd still say FR is a little better, just the candle keep forum is proof alone. They've been known to correct Ed Greenwood at times.
Still, I'm digging darksun
For my money, the old world from Warhammer was the best, until it blew up :)
Never had a system like it, where players find a magical item and are afraid to pick it up as a rule of thumb, and where wizards think twice about casting spells because all magic can miscast.
—-
That said, darksun is awesome
I got into D&D at 2nd edition with a heavy emphasis on Dark Sun. I'll admit there's a *lot* that's coming back to me (it seems I forgot quite a bit over the years), but for me nothing beats it :) A proper dark sun revival by Wizards would be the *only* reason I would bother looking at 5th ed.
“Smeekyx is home to a special breed of gnome. These gnome travelled below the surface of Athas to escape the Champions encroaching armies. The gnomes of Smeekyx died in one terrible instant, when Gallard caused a tide of scalding magma to flow through their tiny tunnels and burnt them all to death. The undead gnomes eternally reenact the last hour of their lives, a time spent celebrating their strength, unity and perseverance, inevitably ending with their horrific deaths as imaginary magma ends their imaginary lives.”
Dark! Love it though.
Yeah, there's definitely a dark side to the villages -- there's a inner group that lives in the best area and has all the power, and another, outsider group that gets to do most of the unpleasant tasks and take orders from the natives for the 'gift' of living there. It's no utopia.
Eberron is my Favorite, though Planescape is also awesome.
Because Eberron came along in... 3rd/4th edition? I missed it. But I'm currently in an Eberron campaign on the boards here and I like the setting alot. Playing a warforged is an interesting experience. It's sort of like playing a... very capable child?
The novels of R A Salvatore were my first taste, so Forgotten Realms will always be my favorite. Eberron is alright and Dark Sun is pretty cool thus far.
Eberron came out in 3rd edition. I didn't get to play any of the settings in edition 1.5 until afterwards because was playing other games for that era.
One of the things I like about Eberron is that it has the depth of other settings but doesn't require the investment. A person that wan'ts to play a generic fantasy character can fit in. You can get a good idea of the possibilities of the world from the core book, and then it's got the depths that a dedicated person can. A lot of the other settings are a lot harder to do that in.
I've been in groups that simply refuse to play in world where they've got to read three books before they start to get it.
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I just want to reassure everyone we are heading somewhere -- there's a common criticism of the adventure paths that a lot of the backstory never makes it on to the 'front stage' area for the players. I'm trying to let everything slowly develop so the interesting lore will be involved in the spleunking through Kalidnay -- though that's also going to probably involve a lot of negotiation and exploration unless the party ends up being amazing brutal.
Just to let everyone know -- I am going to set up a recruitment thread to see if I can get a group to play one of other parties in the ruins of Kalidnay, kind of building off the idea of multiple factions that was tossed around in the original recruitment.
DO NOT LOOK AT THE THREAD. I want it to be a surprise who you encounter if it ends up happening.
Sorry I have been really sick and I found it hard to post with my lung feeling enflamed. I appear to be better now so I'll get a post up tonight.
No worries -- just please note somewhere in the ensuing thread Husayn started talking to you (I'm trying to constant keep something happening for each character), so it would be super if you'd respond to him at some point.
I have found that I have to go to some national guard mandatory fun in June. From the 3rd to the 23rd I’ll have limited internet connectivity. While I’ll finally learn how to use an m249 light machine gun...it’ll limit my posting. My apologies in advance.
Have fun!
Friends, it seems the posts have slowed a bit -- do we need to have another event that is easier to react to, or are people just busy? I just don't want to lose momentum more than necessary.
I'm following, though the social part isn't really my character's forte. She's mostly waiting and watching.
I can't speak for the others, but Rokan was sticking close to Dalman and Misra and their dialog was running out of steam as it seemed that they were deciding whether or not to approach Nalacaros. As they make their moving I'll keep Rokan moving along with them.
I admit to having a little difficulty following along. Not due to the complexity or anything but most posts seem to occur while I am sleeping. I wake up early and go right to work and come back in the late afternoon or early evening.
As a result I tend to log in and discover 4-8 next posts on average. Im still following along but Memnon doesn't have much to say at the moment.
Could we have a quick post in gameplay from those who are following the druids into the Pavilion of Mercy -- the title of Faalcuun's levitating barge?
Doooooone :)
It's been a little while for me, I'm going to make sure to post in the morning. I'll have more time after Wednesday, having my wisdom teeth pulled means no gym for a little bit.
It's been a little while for me, I'm going to make sure to post in the morning. I'll have more time after Wednesday, having my wisdom teeth pulled means no gym for a little bit.
Ouch!
Husayn talked to you a few posts back if you'd like to tie that dangling bit up when you post.
@Memnon and Ja'far, we're still waiting on you here -- I'm going to continue the scene tomorrow evening and assume you're following everyone else unless you post something different.
On it now.
Just to let everyone know, Gramork/Memnon has unfortunately parted ways with our humble company -- I may be puppeting him time to time as an NPC, but I'm currently looking into getting a replacement Athasian from another recruitment thread. So that's why I'll be mouthing Memnon for future reference.
I'm surprise no one's using knowledge checks of any sort to try to figure out what on earth happened to Faalcuun, since his form appears decidedly inhuman.
Also, this is your big chance to get some more info on what is exactly going on -- but he's going to be pretty reticent beyond trying to order your party around unless you explicitly try to pry some answers from him. This is an ancient being who is used to just telling others what to do.
The info will draw on some of the Spelljammer/Athas links I posted in the campaign description if you want to know where I'm getting some of these ideas.
Apologizing again for my lengthy absence. I’m still here in spirit.
No worries, let's just try to keep moving forward as we can :)
At this point, I'm sitting around waiting for something to happen that is more in my character's area of expertise. I wasn't expecting months of social scenes with huge walls of text. My character isn't designed for this so there's little I can do. If I had an idea that this was more of the game, I'd have designed a character more in line with this.
It looks like a couple other people aren't very into this part of the game either.
I'm considering leaving as well.
Can you let me know how much more of this you expect at this rate? August? December?
The next part should be the spleunking through the Kalidnay ruins for a good bit, which should be more of your character's speed.
The time table sort of depends on the post rate and where the other characters steer things -- I'm actively replying when people post, but the post rate hasn't been very consistent, certainly not once a day, for the last several weeks, and that's definitely slowing the pace down.
I do tend to be a highly descriptive, wall of text, kind of narrator, so that wouldn't be a an aspect that will change, even when we move on to scenarios with combat. The worldbuilding is what I enjoy about DMing.
You're welcome to create a new character if you'd like if you're still interested in the story but what a different vehicle for engaging it -- if the issue is you want a different style of campaign, that might be an insurmountable issue, as what we're going right now represents a pretty good sample of how I DM.
Can we get people to let us know what they feel about this part of the adventure? If most of the group is not happy about this, can we fast forward through it?
We can perhaps try to move more quickly through it if people would post more, but I'm not going to do a 'fade to black' cut-scene -- the stuff we're doing now is what I enjoy about DMing.
Also, the stuff in the ruins is going to be highly descriptive exploration and social interaction with other characters there -- no part is going to be like Slumbering Tsar or a similar dungeon crawling slug fest -- I don't find that style of game enjoyable.
If the issue is you don't like this highly descriptive style of DMing, or an emphasis on drawn out social interactions, this is more of a player/DM fit issue and I'm not sure we can resolve that.
That's why I said you're welcome to make a different character if you find the story interesting, but want a different mode of interacting with it, but if the issue is you don't like the story, I can't really help that. No harm, no foul, my feelings won't be hurt if you want to depart.
My take (for Tkk-Tkk's reference):
I did not *really* know what to expect. The DM stated the expectation was, roughly, at least a "quality" (3+ sentences, quality material) post per day. I admit this was intimidating on its face but I decided to give it a shot. I'm not sure I'm fully living up to that expectation, but I try :)
I appreciate the rich narrative, and in fact I'm currently very intrigued by where this might go (forming my own theories, starting to become surprised at some of the revealings, etc.)
What I see as the problem for the players: after 2-3 posts of long narrative have been posted it's hard not to feel like a chance may have passed you by. Or, if players are willing to backtrack and follow up on a (perceived) hook, it then becomes a little rough to track all of the threads and how "parallel" they are really occurring. TBH in the scene in the audience room, before the performance, I got a bit lost on what conversations were really still active. To this, all I can really say (and I admit it may not really be very constructive to this style), is that hooks buried in the narrative may need to be a *little* more obvious, and the DM may want to "time out" sooner on characters not responding to said hooks (i.e., just move on, maybe with occasional warnings in discussion).
All that said, I'm getting used to it, enjoying the story, and hopefully there are other players feeling that the story has something interesting to provide as I do.
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it's not a issue of the game of players for me, i've been rapid job searching for the past week, im sorry for my lack of posting recently. personally i love where this is going, i just haven't been able to get an accurate read on what's really been happening, adding to the fact that i'm trying to grasp what i can really say or add at the moment. but ive decided to just do inner monologues if there is nothing to add to a convo from now on.
when it comes down to it, i just havent had the time to sit down and really think about my next move, but my time has now cleared up so i should be good now.
I second Rokan. Sebcloki's posts are amazing in detail and word choice, but seeing 6 paragraphs just from him and more from the players can leave you in a lurch as to where to proceed.
I'll admit, my personal lack of familiarity with Athas has hurt my participation, because I've only ever played on Golarian.
OK, Pak'cha's gear is selected and his appearance set.
DM are we utilizing Hero Points as well?
Yes