Akashic / Incarnum flavored Campaign Setting


Homebrew and House Rules

Liberty's Edge

I was wondering if anyone had ever done a campaign setting based off of the Akashic or Incarnum magics? (Not city of the seven seraphs.) If so tell me about it. If not what do you imagine such a world to be like?

Scarab Sages Designer

I've had two major akashic/incarnum campaign settings for my home games. The first one I ever did was loosely inspired by the old Al-Qadim campaign setting, but with daeva ruling over cities and oases like sultans or pashas, or hidden away in sand-covered, forgotten shrines. A lot of deadly environments, very few actual clerics since daeva and daevics tend to become the focus of worship, and lots of monsters that have basically evolved through use of or exposure to akashic magic (it's actually the same setting I used when we did the streaming 5E akashic playtest game for Cobalt Sages).

The other setting (and the first one I used Pathfinder rules for) is an entirely aquatic campaign where the whole world was flooded away. Arcane magic is basically unheard of due to all of the times and scrolls being washed away, and akashic magic is incredibly common since many species have naturally integrated it into their cultures and way of life.

Liberty's Edge

Those both sound awesome.


A concept I'd been playing with was a world with all kinds of magics and powers, but certain types are more analogous and appropriate to certain cultures. Akasha is seen as a more 'primitive' magic to many, and some cultures don't deign to recognize it as actual magic at all! Though I considered a few instances of where the name is also a filter of sorts, with a particularly advanced society that utilizes it referring to it by the Incarnum nomenclature.

One particular project that I kept starting on, but failed to fully realize, was a specific setting piece with regards to a quasi-mideastern Al-Qadim-alike of not-quite 'Genies and Janissaries' where a key part of the background lore is about Geniekind specifically, with as much focus and detail as the Titular Dragons of D&D. The underlying conceit is that Genies are Special, of course, but the universe partially conspires against them after they accidentally came into being. True Genies (excluding Jann)cannot breed true - the quirk of their original spontaneous manifestation is not readily reproduced, either. The Jann are the result of a LOT of experimentation (and no small amount of chagrin) and the nomadic lifestyle is a feature as much as a bug. So what's a series of races with phenomenal cosmic power to do with themselves when they can't breed? Why, unravel the secrets of magic in pursuit of an answer, of course! And the net result is that Geniekind, comprised of a mix of pure element and raw magic, learned to shape raw magicstuff of themselves and ambient available into veils, only unlike lesser beings theirs take actual physical form, even if not bound. In fact, all genie magics - arcane, divine, and otherwise - are essentially woven veils, contributing to the perception of Geniekind as being fond of overly gaudy accessorizing and ostentatious materialism; they're frequently loaded to the proverbial gills with magic to use that won't pull from their own being. And this became their secret leverage for reproduction - when people seek genies to learn their secrets and become sha'ir they think they are simply performing an exhausting, fatiguing ritual to earn a gen to serve them. What's actually happening is that they're unwittingly carving off a potion of their own soulstuff for their future patron to shape into a gen, implant with a false memory and history, and send to be partner to their 'master', learning and growing and, hopefully, in the end, eventually transcending their limitations to ascend to fellow True Geniedom.

Thus, gen can retrieve spells of all kinds, but it takes time to create these spell 'tokens'...and my writeup of a sha'ir as a sort of veilweaving summoner was to allow for storing spells as veils to an extent, but I never finished it.

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