This past weekend was Method Con 2. It was a lot of fun and got me behind on posting. A con report should be up soon.
A pilgrim’s map of the Arothaem Road
The Arothaem is the only Rhodian road in Morensia. As such, it is quite good and mostly paved with stones, except where people have taken the stones to use in their buildings.
Popular history has it that Aros built the road in one night, when a surly mountain god challenged him to a foot race. Rather than ruin his new boots (freshly made from troll-hide) on the uneven ground, he paved his path and then proceeded to beat the mountain god easily.
Although both Chaegrae and Aropash have good stone bridges, the Road strictly speaking doesn’t extend to those bridges, so the Road itself only crosses water once: at the ford between Lomengab and Aron. The political atmosphere at the ford is usually rather tense, lying as it does between the demesnes of Earl Loroud and Count Dobros. Numerous bearers work there, carrying people and cargo back and forth. Both Bailiff Lothtol of Lomengab and Baroness Sermae of Aron agree that bearers should not threaten passengers with ‘loss’ or ‘tripping’ mid-stream, but it still occurs pretty frequently. Tolls are higher when going to the west, but neither side is exactly cheap.
As with many roads in Morensia, the road is plagued by bandits, many of them holdovers from the Interregnum. Perhaps the most famous is Uraen the Red.
Category:Roads
The Veil is the Morensian name for the main moon of Calteir. It is the most prominent astronomical feature of Calteir, besides perhaps the Sun and Calteir itself.
The Veil is usually pure white. Keen eyes can sometimes detect whorls and trails in the whiteness. Occasionally, and unpredictably, the whiteness clears and shapes are revealed. The shapes are unclear, but there are sometimes blue and green areas, sometimes a vast orangey-brown pall. A common type of prophecy is based on this.
A common belief in Morensia is that there is a woman hidden behind the white, and that the whiteness is her wedding veil. For this reason, some people call the moon the Bride. There are different myths as to who exactly she is to marry. Her face is almost never very clear, but there are parts that seem to suggest eyes.
The Veil makes its way around Calteir once every 28.15 days. The Veil therefore makes its circuit around Calteir 13.1826 times per year.
In Sashtia, the moon is considered to be a manifestation of Zarai.
Unknown to almost all residents of Calteir, the Veil is inhabited. By who or what, though, remains a mystery to even the wiliest of Calteirans.
Category:Celestial objects
The Indie Treasure Trove +2 featuring Blade & Crown has now ended. It finished with US$12,329.45. Thank you to everyone who contributed!
Please let me know if there’s anything about Blade & Crown I can help you with. And again, thank you!
The Bundle of Holding is well over US$9000 now. So I get to use that headline in all sincerity. (Edit: As I check now, it’s over $10,000!)
And Julia Bond Ellingboe’s Steal Away Jordan has now been added to the Bundle. That’s a game I’ve long since wanted to buy and play, and now I get it as part of the Bundle of Holding! And so do you, if you’ve already bought this Bundle or if you buy it now. So go check it out if you haven’t yet.
Since so many people now have Blade & Crown thanks to the Bundle of Holding, I thought I’d do a quick guide to getting started with it. Where to begin?
- The example of play and How to Play: The Basics sections should help you get a good grasp of how the rules work.
- The rest of the book is organized to be usefully read straight through, so it can’t hurt to just read all of it, if you want.
- Download the sample characters to get a sense of how characters can vary, and a sense of what nifty characters you can make using B&C.
- If you’re looking for a ready-made adventure using B&C, check out The Bandit Map. In it, the PCs discover a scrap of paper that leads them inexorably to an adventure through the dangerous western wilds, and eventually to conflict with a group of nefarious bandits.
- Tenement Defense is another adventure for B&C, this time one where the PCs are all city folk defending their home against a couple marauding gold-seekers.
- Read some of the many articles about Blade & Crown on this blog.
- Talk about the game in the discussion thread.
- Let me know if you have any questions I can help with.
- Don’t be afraid to break it, change rules you don’t like, use it in ways that work for your group.
- Have fun with it!
The mystery revealed —
The latest Bundle of Holding features a bunch of cool games: Awesome Adventures by Willow Palecek; Cogs, Cakes, & Swordsticks by Lynne Hardy; A Tragedy in Five Acts by Michelle Lyons-McFarland; Another Fine Mess by Ann Dupuis; Cartoon Action Hour – Season 3 by Cynthia Celeste Miller; Monsters & Magic by Sarah Newton — and Blade & Crown, by little ol’ me!
For US$7.95, you get the first three titles. If you surpass the (as-of-this-moment) $18.58 threshold, you get all seven games. Neato!
You may also notice that all the designers are women. This is not by accident.
And part of the money goes to two important charities: Amnesty International and Doctors without Borders.
Pay what you want. Donate to charity. Get a pack of great games. Support women game designers. What’s not to love? Go check it out!
This is a mysterious placeholder for something very, very cool that is in the works. I can’t give more specifics yet, but I hope to announce it Wednesday. Watch this space!
(Edit, November 2014: Since the mystery has now long since been revealed, I can add the appropriate tags. 🙂 )
Set in a semi-mythical past, Chakola & Gembrig is a traditional play in Morensia. It is considered one of the classic plays of familial tragedy. The author is uncertain.
The story
In the play, Gembrig and Chakola are brother and sister. They grow up quite strong and agile; the first scene is traditionally the two of them performing various acrobatic and martial feats to best each other. They join a mercenary company and see the world.
War comes. (In recent performances, this has been the Morensian Interregnum.) There is a great battle. Chakola and Gembrig’s units are split. They end up thinking the other is dead.
Months later, Chakola’s unit continues to fight as a mercenary band. Gembrig’s unit, having sworn loyalty to a lord who lost, has turned to banditry to support itself. Chakola’s fellow troops call her the Golden Sun, for her shining prowess on the field. Gembrig’s call him the Castle, for his unswerving loyalty.
Chakola and Gembrig find love in their new units. Chakola loves a beautiful, fierce woman named Terjada. Gembrig falls in love with a rock-hard sergeant named Terjad.
There is a fierce forest battle, where forest spirits cause confusion. Chakola ends up killing Terjad, and Gembrig kills Terjada. In a scene with the two troops’ camps, on opposite sides of the stage, the sister and brother swear vengeance on the unknown killers of their lovers: “This Sun shall set!” “This Castle shall fall!” The two sides rest for the night.
In the morning, there is another great battle. The two sides slaughter each other in horrible but very entertaining ways. (This is traditionally done with a mix of amazing acrobatics and seeming gore, using red streamers and the like.)
In the end, out of the confusion, two implacable helmeted foes face each other: the Castle and the Sun. In the end, the Sun strikes down the Castle, only to find that she, too, has been dealt a mortal blow. She removes her helmet, and the Castle’s helmet, and discovers the horrible truth.
One of the dead soldiers stands up and says “Let us, the spirits of the dead, remind you: tearing down your enemy’s Castle may tear out your own heart. The setting of every Sun may come at the cost of eternal night.”
Context
This story is almost always performed as a stage play. It is sometimes recited, but it was apparently created with the stage in mind.
The story occupies a place in Morensian society similar to that of Romeo & Juliet, or the Legend of the White Snake.
Categories: Drama, Mercenaries
Now that I have The Bandit Map published, my attention turns to the next big project: Calteir.
It’s a fantasy game setting I’ve been working on for many years. I developed it alongside Blade & Crown, but neither requires the other. It exists as a wiki, as I’ve mentioned here before. The wiki format allows easy cross-referencing, search and modification. Calteir is designed with adventure in mind, making life easy for the busy GM.
Calteir is analogous to early medieval Europe in terms of technology. The first culture I’ve detailed in Calteir is Morensia, which resembles 11th century England, with some important differences. But I think other cultures will not give such a Eurocentric feel.
There are many mysteries in Morensia and Calteir, from what happened to the Dwarves, to who will succeed King Perseda, to the very origin of humanity itself. Calteir is already very deep, and I hope to make it far deeper. There is a strong sense of place, and adventure lurks around every corner.
This is the first post in a series of snippets from Calteir, like hitting the “random article” button at Wikipedia. Hopefully this series will help give some of the flavor of Calteir, and entice you into wanting to know more!