The Empress has authorized an expedition to the Old Capital. Any willing person of good standing may apply at the Tottering Trough near the Drake Gate. It is 3000 miles through the wastelands left by the Suthforn War to get to the Capital. Very dangerous, no non-combatants.
I have a homebrew setting, very not standard fantasy, in fact, there are many technology like devices powered by mana. Neither explosives nor true guns exist, though some gun like weapons can be found.
Magic is everywhere, but it is limited in what it can do. Magic isn't capable of literally anything the imagination can create. Most spell effects that are familiar at low levels still work.
Homebrew system, similar enough to d20 for easy learning, even find many d20 feats that are usable as is. Classless and levelless.
Looking for a good even mix between roleplay and rollplay.
Post rate of once per 1-2 days (I'm on mostly during the nights central time, more so on the weekend.).
Looking for players who will take charge and push things forward without me dragging them nose. I tend toward the style of saying "You are here. This is what you see. What do you do about it." That said, the world doesn't revovle around the players, so things off screen can still be affected and have an effect later on. (for example, if you retreat from the bandit camp, expect the watch to be doubled the next night.) Also, the monsters you encounter will usually be defeatable, but not always, so it isn't always smart to attack everything.
Modrate lethality, you shouldn't die if you are careful, but death is a real possibility, so Mr. Stupid Tactics will probably need to be saved quite often.
The core mechanic is the one for electronic rollers.
Two dice are rolled, but the size of the dice is adjusted by attribute and skill.
The result is compared to a DC.
Many non-skills in d20 are now skills, but otherwise works mostly the same. Attacks and AC for example are now skills, by weapon group plus shields.
I do use some things from Unearthed Arcana or similar modifications of PF, such as Armor as DR.
The biggest changes are magic, inclusion of skill specializations, and health is actually a save against damage and the more damage that gets past your save and DR, the worse the wound.
There isn't the kind of explosive number gain as characters advance either.
Players roll while npcs use average values, (of course special npcs, like a bbeg, will roll for added tension.) much like the Players Roll the Dice from Unearthed Arcana.
I also simplified and "unified" mechanic for exhaustion, starvation, etc.
I also went for fewer hard limits and went for soft limits, so things usually have an ever increasing chance of bad consequences rather than outright "You shall not pass!"
The system also encourages growth through new abilities instead of focusing only on one,.though a specialist can certainly become much better at something.
Advancement is through use and training. (by encounter or simple downtime rolls).
No classes, and the setting certainly makes pure martial characters a rarity, though mages don't have a damage advantage, but everybody can use magic to some degree, and soldiers learn to use magic (just like modern soldiers learning to use guns and tech.) so spellswords are the norm for soldiers.
Simple magics can be cast all day long, but more powerful spells can effect casting power.
You know, while the premise looks interesting, I need more knowledge before I can start creating a character.
1) I have no idea what the setting is like beyond those 5 lines of text.
2) I have no idea what the rules of the game, or character creation for that matter, are. I do have some very vague ideas based on the things you've said, but having a vague idea is not the same thing as knowing the rules
I could probably put a character together if I knew 1 of the above things, but without knowing either, I'm just sort of waiting to see what will happen next. I'm sure you'd get applications if people knew what the hell is going on here. Right now people can't really create characters, because they don't know the rules, and they don't know anything about the setting.
No published material required, though, as numbers are similar to d20, many feats and items are useable with minimal or no alteration, subject to be allowed of course.
The Setting,
The known world is about 15 thousand miles across and seemingly flat. There is a great desert to the north, great forests of various types to the west, hills with gulleys and canyons hidden by vast bamboo forests to the east with prairelands and shrub fields beyond. To the south is a vast sea, the southern side of which is not well explored but known to get occasional cold weather. There are many places with islands along the coast of the sea. Near the middle and west part of the sea there are two huge mysterious towers rising from the sea. No one has ever gotten inside, and the top is so high up that breathing equipment is required and it took a military airship to get there. Atop these towers are two lights produced by magic and have no known purpose but are used to navigate, at least as far as they are visible. The middle of the empire was surrounded by a great ring of mountains, within which were vast lands of farming and ranching, and had become the most highly developed area until the civil war which resulted in the destruction of the entire area and a few places elsewhere.
I will continue later, feel free to ask questions.
Unknown to the people, but might help your envisioning of the world, the world is actually a dyson sphere, hence the lack of stars and unmoving sun. Of course, this plane of existence is a little different, and that results in the sun's odd exploding cycle.
Dwarves were first of known races, after a long war as they adjusted to the new world with nothing to aid them, and no existing leadership to unite them, they eventually formed the council of kings, and things settled down for the most part.
Humans arrived a bit later, and with some luck, managed to integrate fairly well with the dwarves, and it is widely believed that the two races are related, and possibly from the same world.
Halflings are actually human/dwarf crossbreeds, but some actually created "pure" halfling families.
Grettles are intelligent octopi, and live mostly in the sea to the south. The are mainly known for raising fish and seaweed which they trade for wood, metal that won't corrode, or other things that are difficult to make underwater.
After a war broke out, many folks pushed into the frontier to get away from the fighting. Those that went into the Bleakwood however, started to change. That and the almost unnatural attacks from monsters result in many fleeing back to settled lands. Most went through a cave system. Many made it back to civilisation, but some did not and settled the caves near the bleakwood.
Those who made it back to civilized lands, had been raddically changed and became the elves, orcs, and gnomes.
Those who settled the caves on the border of the Bleakwood, were changed even more radically and became the drow, duerger, and sniverliblin (whatever you call them.).
More to come.
Svirfneblin, knew I'd find it somewhere.
Zyphers and Reaplings are a pair of my races. They arrived together and from the same world. They also had an advanced society with technology, including manatronics (their equivalent to our electronics). They do use electricity for some things, particularly landline communications or nonlethal barriers like electric fences, but they don't really use it as a power source. Manatronics are difficult to manufacture and they don't have assembly lines as making manamatrices, the basis of any magic item, manatronics included, is difficult and can't be done in discrete parts. This makes technology a little harder to come by.
Zyphers are intelligent tigers, with wings, a crown of horn, and small stubby horns along their spine. They come in several colors and patterns. They are monogendered. They are also fairly magical with innate magical power.
Reaplings are artificial life. Despite many attempts, no one has ever created anything like them. They were banished from another realm when their creator defied the very powerful beings of that plane, and most ended up on the Zypher homeworld. New Reaplings are made by wrapping a skeleton, artificial or natural, and a magic item, in a caccoon filled with reapling blood. The blood then forms the body based on the skeleton, which allows reaplings of various forms to be created. They awake with the mind of a child and must be taught like other race, but their bodies are fully formed once they emerge. Their potential is tied to the magic item that created them, more advanced items tend to produce more capable individuals, while very simple items result in reaplings that are like animals or just very stupid, though they rarely create such versions.
The current Empress is actually a reapling made from the bones of a great zypher hero that died defending a reapling town. Their way of respecting that hero's sacrifice. Empress Seraphia was one of those that arrived on this world and quickly became the leader of the zypher and reapling people who suddenly found themselves here.
After some turbulent times, they eventually established the empire.
More later.
The empire is generally well regarded, though the empire is very limited in it's responsibilities, being education, currency, highest court, trade regulation, and to stand between outside entities and members of the empire. It also has science, medical, and library provisions, but otherwise it isn't allowed to do much, which is partly why the civil war got so bad, since it was member nations that fought, the empire legally couldn't interfere unless imperial personnel or property was attacked. When the council was about to vote to change that, everything went doomsday in the central area of the empire. Luckily, the empress had been doing an inspection of a project, which was wrongfully assumed to be in the capital.
That central area is now the wasteland that the PCs will be traveling through. The area is surrounded by a ring of mountains save to the south which is coastline cliffs.
To the east is various types of forests and the oldest inhabited areas.
To the north is some mountains and a great desert. These mountains have dragons and are recognized territories thereof.
I'm really only looking to form a group, possibly a general character concept. We can then work together on character creation and rules, which I figure on slowly introducing through play rather than just dumping it on you guys, all at the beginning.
I generally prefer larger groups on pbp, as they last longer with fewer dropouts. Somehow, I don't think we'll get that many.
To answer your mentioned questions, like Shadowrun, the character creation is more about whole character, so race, social, skill, etc are all at different levels. This is because some races, like reaplings and zyphers are considerably more powerful then humans and dwarves, so a starting dwarf character might be more skillful or have a higher social class than a starting zypher character.
Mercenaries are common, though mostly in outlying areas where monsters are more prevalent. The empire includes basic education including simple self defense classes, so most folks can at least hold a weapon with the pointy end aimed in the right direction. Those from outside the empire are not so lucky.
Specializations are just like skills, except they cover a more specific use of a skill. There isn't intended to be a list of them, as a desired specialization is negotiated with the GM, and more specific ones can start at a better rank. I do have some guidelines for how far that can be taken, including a maximum of two specializations can apply to a roll unless it is a knowledge roll. An example specialization would be Trade (Smith [Chainmail]).
In this particular game, characters are fairly experienced, no being plucked from straight off the farm, unless that is what you are wanting to play.
Geography basics continued,
To the west are the broken hills, filled will canyons, gullies, and valleys, almost invisible under great bamboo forests.
Even farther west, is shrubland, and frontier. Some ruins predating even the dwarves are found, but not much is known about them.
To the south is a great sea, broader from east to west, than north to south.
In the middle and western side of the sea is a pair of impenetrable towers with glowing beacons on top, which can be seen for a great distance and used for navigation, since their is no regularity to the magnetic field to discern north.
To the east of the sea, is the Bleakwood, just of the coast if that are the Zodiac isles with some tribal people.
To the west of the sea is a small struggling colony of Gastro Freada, which is currently filled with poverty and desperation as they stopped getting support from home when the civil war ended so dramatically. The empire is trying to help, but the colonists are very divided on feelings, many blaming the empire for outcome of the war.
To the south of the sea, is not explored very well, but gets cold weather before the northern areas.
That (aside from the dyson sphere bit) is all common knowledge among the empire.
You guys will be starting in Noblu Zubaen, the new Imperial Capital, and capital of the New Solar Republic. A masive trade city, cut into the cliffs of the sea on the east side mountains bordering the wasteland. One of the most cosmopolitan cities of the empire, at least in the bottom sector, the middle and upper sectors are for citizens and spoken for guests only, as this is the place of a major military base and the last remaining Great Tree in this world (the two others presumably being destroyed in the old capital.) which is of great importance to the people of the Republic.
Some items characters may have or use.
Radio reciever, usually poor quality as they are used as practice for apprentices to make in learning to craft manatronics. Radio broadcasts are generally just news and weather with the occasional radio play. Often used by travelers or groups that go in the wilderness, though many middle to high class families will have one.
Radio broadcaster, expensive, usually a town will have a broadcasting office where general radio traffic is sent from, but also where telegraphs can be relayed to any other broadcast office in the empire. Some well financed groups, usually mercs or caravans will have one. Miltary units commonly have one per platoon or per squad.
Secure communication stations can be found in cities, they use landlines so interception is difficult and are run by imperials. They exist mostly for diplomatic messages between member nations, but anyone who can afford it can send messages quickly and securely.
Airships, most are military, but three are in civilian hands moving cargo or passengers quickly across the empire. Not cheap by any means, but no other way is faster over long distances.
Recorder, viewer, and movies. A rather difficult piece to make is a recordet, which can record what the wearer perceives. The viewer allows one to experience what was recorded. In major cities, there are places where people can view these recordings, and most are documentations of explorers or government meetings released to the public, but a recent and growing trend has been fiction recordings or recordings of reenactments of historical events.
I could probably go on fo awhile, but it might be more productive to answer questions at this point, if anybody has any.
Using magic involves reaching out with one's soul and producing an effect. In general, magic is either continuous as long as the caster concentrates and pours mana into it, or it is instant affecting a permanent change/starting a chain reaction.
To make an effect last longer, one must make a mana matrix to produce the effect and hold the mana reserves to keep the effect going. Leaving a manamatrix just floating around is rather unstable and prone to unintended consequences, not to mention the difficulty of crafting the matrix and putting in all that mana at once.
So Binding techniques were developed to bind the manamatrix to matter to keep it stable. This also allows one to add mana over multiple occasions, even after the manamatrix is depleted. Most magic items are like this and require the user to give it the mana to make it function.
Then came techniques to have the matrix hold the charge until triggered. More difficult to accomplish but useful in some cases and allows one to prepare the magic item and simply trigger it as needed.
It was eventually discovered how to create a matrix that gathers mana, though only slowly. Very few can make one powerful enough to absorb mana fast enough to maintain a spell effect.
Then came matrices that have a series of triggers that can make decisions. Often called Spritescripting. This forms the core of "summoning" magic, which is actually creating a manamatrix called a Sprite which is basically an AI of sorts, and giving it a body to control. Usually these are made partially by copying pattrns from the brains of dead animals. The easiest way to give a sprite a body is to use a dead body, but those with the skill and a desire to avoid desecration of the dead will often make semiillusory bodies for the sprite to control (like shadow conjuration from dnd).
Eventually this lead to techniques similar to programming a computer and thus to manatronics.
Each matrix must be made at once through a process that gets very complicated very quickly, hence the rarity of manatronic devices. Some matrices can over a day of nonstop casting to create, and few have the endurance for it.
Matrices can be crafted to communicate with each other through simple connections, but these are kept simple to keep it easy to form and sever such connections, though recent technology actually use convrrsion to electricty and back, allowing purely mechanical adjustment to connections, making it easy to swap out parts without disrupting or even accessing the matrices.
In any case, the process is difficult enough that few can do it, much less do it well, and a Master is a highly respected individual in general, and very valuable, worth capturing alive at great cost. Most don't go anywhere without guards.
Matrices do best in crystals and gems, and the moe complicated the matrix, the better more it becomes practically a requirement to use a crystal.
Of course, a gadgeteer could be one who uses tech, or one who makes it. In the case of one who makes tech, this is the perfect chance to get out of the lab and have an adventure. :)
For the one who uses tech, some recently developed toys are available to certain folks, such as spelldisks which can be inserted into a pipcomm, each with a different effect. Of course a pipcomm alone is a great tool.
More to come.
There are a number of effects that can be learned, then shaped or adjusted with aspects (area, target, range, etc).
Some effects, such as teleport, require casting multiple effects in conjunction with each other, each of which must be done correctly, or bad things can happen.
Interrupted again. Will post more later.
I am interested
Basic magic is similar to PF's Words of Power, you have an effect, you pick range, targets/area, intensity, etc. Except each has a cost in power and skill. Higher skill is more difficult to successfully cast, higher power is more draining.
To cast spell with a duration other than concentration/instant, you must make a manamatrix and cast the spell, essentially casting two effects at once.
Some advanced magics, like teleport require casting multiple effects together.
Casting multiple effects together requires a focus check.
All in all, many folks can use basic magic, but there is still a place for those into magic beyond the norm.
Creating a magic item requires creating the spell, the manamatrix, and binding it to an item.
It looks like I have four people interested,
Jiggy
Boris the Slayer
Trekkie90909
david barker
Boris wanted a few more details on the system as well, which I'll post momentarily.
Otherwise, if all folks still interested would please chime in with the minimum number of people you want to play with, we will see if anyone drifted away and make a game (unless everyone wants a minimum of more players than we have.), though I'll still happily take a few more if anyone else is interested.
These are the basics of the rules, of course, I'm not superstrict, and can negotiate some changes if the players feel it is needed.
I assume everyone is familar with d20, so I'll use d20 s a reference point.
This system has fewer secondary statistics than d20 (bab, ac, cmb, cmd, etc are all gone, converted to skills, or handled differently)
The core concept of rolling and comparing the result to an objective DC is the same as d20, and like d20, attributes and skills affect the roll. How they affect the roll is a bit different however.
A check has a rank. The rank is equal to 6 plus the ranks from an applicable attribute and skill and sometimes even a bonus. Then two dice are rolled, each with a number of sides equal to the rank of the check.
There are ten attributes, Strength, Heartiness, Reasoning, Ingenuity, Nibleness, Charisma, Luck, Aura, Mindfulness, Power (SHRINCLAMP). Each has a score and rank. The rank is one quarter the score, round up, minus one. (Individual descriptions upcoming)
1-4 is rank 0,
5-8 is rank 1,
9-12 is rank 2,
13-16 is rank 3,
etc
The average character's attribute score is 10.5, just like d20. Unlike d20, these scores grow slowly, so even veteran hero characters will have a highest score of around 16-20.
Skills have just a rank, and instead of class or cross class skills (since there are no classes), skills have three categories based on how easy or hard that skill is to learn, which really only matters in learning a new skill. Natural skills start at rank 1 when untrained as these are skills that are natural, such as athletics, or perception. Advanced skills are skills that start at rank 0, though anyone could easily try them but are not as easy as natural skills, such as drive/pilot or perform (piano). Exotic skills are skills that require a teacher or years of experimenting to become even somewhat proficient, such as using a chain sythe, programming in raw binary, or academia. Exotic skills start at -1 rank.
Features are like feats, racial abilities, and similar rolled together. Unlike d20, features must be learned through training or practice, since there are no levels to gain them through. Some features have levels which can be improved.
Saves use two attributes instead of an attribute and skill. (luckily for you, this game doesn't suffer from the high number creep of d20). There are two saves, Reaction, and Will.
Attack and defense use skills for weapons, shields, and armor.
Health is a fort save with increasing penalty, failure gains a wound which is based on the damage type and penetration bonus. Probably, the wound conditions is probably the most complicated part of the system, I just haven't figured out how to simplify it yet without going totally for gm fiat or making wounds overly genaric. And it isn't really complicated, just has different conditions for different severities of wound and different types of damage.
There is a duant system for noncombat encounters. But we will explore that later.
There are minor things, like encumbrance, size, etc, mostly simplified over d20. They can be described later.
I'll answer those questions in a moment.
Electricity is rather uncommon and most technology doesn't use it. Electricity is primarily used for three things, Secure communications, traps and fences, and nonlethal weapons. Generating electricity is easy as it is a basic magic effect, though finicky without a natural path to follow such as a wire. It is an easier effect to produce in small amounts (older kids tend to play shock tag), though producing enough to be dangerous is much more difficult.
Converting any energy into mana is next to impossible.
Electrimancy is using mana to shove electrons around, creating positive and negative ions, not to mention the bit of electricity of the shoved electrons moving.
###
Hacking is very difficult, usually involves tricking a matrix rather than anything else.
Manamatrix programming is like hardcoding it into the matrix, and each matrix is like a work of art and heavily styled by the one who made it. It is not like modern computers where programs are merely software that can easily be copied or edited.
It is still somewhat possible on more advanced systems, but it is more difficult than real life hacking and requires a fair bit of time to study the matrix you are trying to hack and figuring out how to trick it into doing what you want.
Since military airships usually include such advanced systems, the military keeps careful track of potential hackers and design their systems to prevent a hacker from having enough time to study the matrix, not to mention other things to make the process harder such as camouflaging the matrix and wrapping it in mana resistant materials.
Against military hardware, breaking a system is often easier than hacking.
###
A note on mana senses,
Someone who learns how, can reach out to perceive magic around them, allowing them to have a sixth sense of sorts, which can sense normal things to various degrees, but to mana senses, magic items usually standout like a white rose among a sea of red roses and living things are more like pink roses. As soldiers often learn to sense things this way, magic items are often considered less stealthy as even against a backdrop of living things, they still standout. Mana senses though have a rather short range and is like looking through a mist, the further away, the less detail.
Camouflage against mana senses is less about trying to hide that something is there and more abour trying to make it hard to discern details or specific locations. This is the common way to hide jagic traps, fill an area with mana camouflage so the trap itself is hard to find, though the fact that camouflage is there is generally a dead giveaway that a trap is in there somewhere.
Unless you lived there more than 150 years ago, not much more than stories will be known about the old capital.
What may have been learned if your character payed attention in school:
Teruziba was once the greatest city of the world, home to the best craftsmen, the best libraries and academies too. It was built in three sections surrounded by cliffs. There were even grettles there who managed numerous waterways, fountains, and water treatment stations.
It was the first city created by the Republic when the Zyphers first arrived in this world. It stood strong even surrounded by enemy armies before the empire was established. At one time it had as many residents as any three other cities in the known realms. Twice as big as Anvilford, seat of the Council of Kings and oldest known city.
It fell during the Suthforn War, the civil war of the empire. No one knows what happened to it, but as half the imperial airship fleet was stationed there, and non have escaped, it is presumed to be destroyed.
Can't claim to be very familiar with it as Fate is more narrativistic for my tastes, but I have glanced over it and it reminds me of Savage Worlds really.
In this system, I'm going more for soft boundaries rather than hard limits. Which basically means, the penalties just keep growing till they overwhelm rather than having a hard line in the sand.
An attack has three parts, atk vs def, dmg vs soak, wounds.
When damage and soak are rolled, if soak is greater, then the character only takes one soak penalty (which is gained regardless of the soak result), but if the soak is less than the damage (or equal to*), the excess damage is added to a weapon's penetration bonus (if it has one) and the result determines the type of wound gained. Low numbers will just be minor injuries like burns or gashes that might bleed or penalize an attribute. Medium numbers will be greater injuries such as broken bones that can seriously impair a character. Medium high numbers can be lost limbs or being disabled. High numbers can result in a character dying but in a revivable way. Really high numbers can result in a character being squashed into goo, or torn limb from limb, or some other seriously bad irrecoverable mess.
The thing about it is that it is easy to adjust these things for desired lethality without changing other aspects of the system. I also wanted a way for a character to get actual injuries, such as missing an eye, or losing an arm, something that can't be done in d20 or any game I know of really.
Of course damage type plays into it as getting a severed arm is more likely with a sword than a staff.
I had hoped I explained it well before, but I hope I explained it well enough now.
* Ties go in favor of the initiating/active character, or in favor of the PCs when opposite NPCs.
Attributes,
Neat acronym = SHRINCLAMP,
Strength, physical power to apply force, move and carry things, etc
Heartiness, physical ability to withstand poison, disease, fatigue, etc
Reasoning, logical thinking and memory
Ingenuity, creative thinking and problem solving
Nimbleness, ability to move quickly and accurately
Charisma, social magnetism and leadership ability
Luck, nuff said
Aura, reach and sensitivity of one's soul and self
Mindfulness, awareness of oneself, surroundings, and world
Power, the strength of one's soul and their energy level
###
Saves,
The reaction save is about reacting to sudden things that need to be avoided or done very quickly, such as traps or surprise attacks. A reaction save is a check with rank 6 + Nimbleness + Mindfulness.
The Will save is about mental discipline and response to stressing things, such as being wounded and still pushing forward, or refraining from eating that cake while on a diet. A will save is a check with rank 6 + Mindfulness + Reasoning.
Sure,
Each time you get hit, you get a soak penalty, a successful soak means that is all that happens.
So lets say you have an utterly average set of stats (all rank 2), so your base soak roll is 2d10 [base 6 + Heartiness 2 + Heartiness 2].
The first time you take damage, you roll 2d10 for soak, then gain 1 soak penalty or SP, regardless of the success or failure of the soak roll (success avoids being wounded).
The second time you take damage, you roll 2d10-1, because you have 1 SP. And then gain another SP.
The third time you take damage, you roll 2d10-2, because you now have 2 SP.
Basically, this means that even weak attacks will eventually wear you down. SP can be easily removed through rest and basic first aid, and represents minor or nonlethal damage, such as bruises, scrapes, or just general battering.
Nonlethal weapons will add extra SP if you get wounded by them (in addition to possibly knocking you unconcious.)
Honestly, I don't plan on starting everyone with full character sheets. I find that teaching a system tends to lose interest at that stage very quickly, even more so on pbp. Rather, I prefer to get the players playing, then slowly introduce mechanics during play, only bringing in more mechanics as the players get comfortable with the already known ones.
To start, players really only will have attributes and a few skills to start thinking about. Everything else will be brought in later. So, a character concept is the core of what is needed right now. There wil be a fair bit of combat, but I've never been one to treat it like a standardized minitures combat game.
That is also why I've focused on giving more info about setting rather than system. Besides, known or not, I've always held the belief that the system should support the gameplay and not be the focus of the gameplay.
###
Some more setting detail,
Work animals,
Horses are rather uncommon, and expensive to keep. They tend to eat the various grasses including ones from worlds other than earth, some of which block up their insides. If it wasn't for people, they probably would be gone from this world. As it stands, they are usually used as prestigious mounts, for racing, specialized tasks, and sometimes as cavalry.
Most work animals are dogs or nonasi (six limbed creatures, scavangers like hyenas.) in teams. Nonasi have become popular as they are easy to care for and feed as they'll eat nearly anything (in fact, a very insulting thing to say about food would be to claim that even a nonasi wouldn't eat it.). Think of Alaskan dog teams, that is the general image of working animals.
Tricycles are not uncommon, particularly in cities. Using magic, the metallurgy is easy enough, and so they are not only possible, but cheaper than a mount, in more ways than one.
There are fewer then normal here in Noblu Zubaen, because it is a very rocky and hilly area, and only the cut roads are suitable for vehicles of any sort.
Security guards are far more common and a more respected profession as safes that aren't relatively easy for thieves to break are rare and very difficult to make, thus more reliance on guards, traps, and deceptions. Guards are also paid better and seen as a rather respectable professionals and fairly well trained.
So, did people get scared away, or is the setting just not as cool as expected?
still interested
That makes two. Any ideas on recruiting more? or is two good enough for you guys?