Magic and spell casting

Casting a spell has three steps:

1. Forging a Connection

2. Gathering Power

3. Shaping the Power

In Forging a Connection, the Mage temporarily opens himself to the magic at the heart of the world, or to some other source of power, and binding himself to it for the duration of the spell.  For a Blessed or Blooded Mage this is an easy task; as the Blood grows within them, they become their own source of power. For others, it requires a significant mental effort, that can be aided by ritual.  Most mages Forge with the Well, the main pool of magical and metaphysical power placed by the gods at the heart of the world. There are however other sources of power that can be tapped, usually for limited and situational purposes.  Shaman (and Defilers) can tap the life force and spirit of the natural world around them, for small and local effects. By sacrificing an animal or sentient creature, the Mage can tap into the life force and energy inherent to that creature. One who has been granted power by a Weeping can draw on that connection, as long as the Weeping allows it (or at least does not actively prevent it). 

In Gathering Power, the Mage, having opened himself to magic, draws upon that bond and fills himself with magical power sufficient to create the effect he desires. The wells of power are vast and deep, and the gathering power stage can take as little or as much time as the Mage desires. However speed comes with a great potential cost. A Mage must have the mental strength to absorb what he needs, and simultaneously requires sufficient mental agility to dive into the well without contacting the blood, and damning himself. It is much easier to do this in a slow and methodical manner, drawing in tiny amounts of power over a long period of time. Drawing great power through the bond rapidly runs a much greater risk of contacting Blood.  Note that the risk of becoming corrupted is lessened by using a source or power other than the Well, but with the sole exception of a Weeping bond, the risk is never entirely eliminated.  Even the slowest, most cautious and well protected Alchemist or Shaman still has a chance of touching the Blood at the heart of all magic. All power, all energy, on Maeleff is in a sense bound together by the magic of the gods, and us it is all subject to the blood.  

Shaping Power is an act of will and imagination. Now that the power has been gathered, the Mage must force it into the pattern he wishes to create to create the desired effect. 

Sinodytes - bug folks. Sapient larva, nonsapient adults.

New race notes

Aquatic insect race.  The medium sized larva are sentient, the ultimate huge beetle adult is not sentient. 

Relatively short lived as intelligent larva, but there are methods of extending their lives and avoiding pupating.

The adult beetles are fairly docile and slow, but very tough, and are both revered as ancestors and used as mounts and transportation by the young.

Very big river and coastline traders.

Shadowmancy

The Dwellers in Shade, or Shadowmancers, are a small and secretive ascetic order of Blooded mages, who believe that their discipline can be used to slow the progress of corruption while still making use of the power that it grants.

Because magic, and Blood power, are to some extent metaphysical in nature, and malleable by will, the Shadowmancers believe that the danger of the Blood is at least in part because of the way people think of it. They attempt to change this in part by changing the metaphor for its use.

As I've noted before, the Parable of the Poisoned Well is so widely spread that it is how most people - even most mages and magical scholars - think of magic and Blood.  The Shadowmancers believe that this metaphysical construct has become so widespread that it is effectively real, and they seek to change it. They instead believe that the corruption of the Blood of the Gods, as it is a phenomenal (if deadly) power source, should be thought of as the ultimate source of visible power - a sun. They attempt to focus their minds and wills to imagine the Blood in their systems as a small metaphysical sun, radiating its power and corruption outwards, rather than something internal that spreads outwards. They will then create what amounts to a shield of magical shadow to block the rays of this malevolent sun. Instead of manipulating the light from the Blood sun to create magic, they manipulate its shadow, using the negative metaphysical space to manipulate their environment in ways similar to those of standard mages.

This is all of course metaphor, and metaphysical construct. They are not physically creating a ball of light and a shield. Its essentially a use of creative visualization that manipulates the metaphysical realm in which magic has its physical stuff, rather than an actual physical creation.

Interestingly, the Dwellers in the Shade do seem to have something. On average, those Blooded who master their visualization exercises, and who can manipulate their own minds to fully set and accept the proper metaphors, do on average seem to be able to hold out against Corruption longer than most, and can seemingly hold off the decision between destruction and Blessing for years longer than most others.  Whether this is simply because the most studied ascetics possess the greatest willpower, or because of some material benefit of the discipline itself, is an open question.

So, the wastelands on Maeleff were basically painted by this guy.

http://i.imgur.com/P8jH0Z1.jpg

Shar male.

Ignore the writing on the image, it's a Shar male, not Sava.

Game systems

Been looking at open source tabletop RPGs, to try and find one to fit BoDG, but can't find anything that grabs me. Either not flexible enough to easily handle the corruption and transformation processes, or don't have a stat system that I think will fit. I think I really may have to just design a bare bones story based system and leave it at that.

Maeleff Underground maps!

TIL - the MTA has maps online of the subway tunnels all throughout NYC. I think I've found an instant map for some of the underground tunnels and pathways that cut all through Maeleff.

http://www.nycsubway.org/wiki/New_York_City_Subway_Track_Maps

Note to self

Need to remember to write up Despoilers (blessed anti-druidic types, typically corrupted Lotho). Also: someone on a reddit rpg thread said that they had a party member animate the corpse of a bear, hollow it out, fill it with shelves, and have it act as a walking closet. I so need to steal that.

Maeleff, southern continent.

Myth and History

Myth and lore tell us much that the scholars and alchemists of today can only guess at, or discuss in the abstract.

We know that the stars of the night sky are suns like our own, and have worlds around them both greater and lesser than Maeleff. We know that the gods came here from one of those worlds, and remade Maeleff as their battlefield and playground.

We know that all of the peoples of Maeleff were raised up by the gods to be their tools, both servants and soldiers against each other. We know that the gods made magic and gave it to their servants in order that they might better make war against each other.

We know that the gods died, killed in hatred by a weapon so powerful that it poisoned the world. We know that at their death, the gods spilled their poisoned blood into the world. We know that the Blood and its poison are the unmaking of everything, and that out of the arrogance of the gods, the world will someday die, either withered and foul, or so altered and rendered Blessed and strange that it will no longer seem our world.

We know that the world contains mysteries we no longer understand, artifacts of the gods and their servants from the elder days of endless war. We know that, and we have hope, that in the annals of those older and grander than ourselves, yet perhaps less wise, we may still find the wisdom to save us.

Some new flora and a blessed

Sanguine Blooms

A breed of flowers that grows only near or above physical pools of the Blood. Deep red roses that can grow either in the light or in total darkness. Their scent is hypnotic and grants visions that are sometime true, and sometimes perilous. Inhaling the scent of the blooms will cause hallucinations which may reveal truths, but is usually safe. The flowers themselves are poisonous to mortals, and the roots actually contain traces of the Blood.

Many Blooded claim that keeping or wearing a sachet made from the petals and other parts of the plant grants them powers of vision beyond the usually in incomprehensible imagery usually associated with the flowers. Certain Blessed have been known to smoke or otherwise consume the flowers. What they gain by doing so is unknown, but many will actively seek the blooms out.

Blessed:
The Hollow / The Faceless

Masters of illusion and manipulation.
Normal looking (whatever) except with no face, just an opening that appears usually to open up onto a portal into deep space - they appear filled with sky and stars.

The Hollow are empathic blessed that create illusions and hallucinations in the minds of mortals, do that they can feed on the powerful emotions. Brief contact leaves one feeling calm and dispassionate, incapable of deep emotion for a period if time. Longer exposure can damage minds, as the Hollow feeds on more and more, until they leave their victim mindless and drooling.

There are rumors of some people, usually wealthy and powerful, hiring Hollow to feed on a specific emotions, leaving them for example utterly (if temporarily) fearless.

Some have been known to become addicted to the gaze of the Hollow. These poor souls inevitably are one day found mindless and drooling.

The Hollow are not mindless at all. They are as varied in intelligence and personality as any mortal race. Their kind appear to drawn from all of the various races (save Sava of course), and some come from no race that can be readily identified.

Note that the blooded are not immune to a Hollow's illusions, nor are they safe from his feeding. Some Hollow who have not fully resigned themselves to evil have developed a taste for the Blooded, and will seek them out to feed upon.

Hollow reproduce by draining a blooded of their mind, and then pouring son of their own essence back into their victim. They may also expose the mindless (but alive) body of a victim to the blood after they have new drained, and then pour their essence into the vessel.

==========*===========


He screamed in fear and rage and struck the final blow, striking the creature's head from its shoulders, and dropping it at his feet. He set the point of his blade on the ground and leaned on the hilt, panting heavily as his adrenaline drained from him.
It was then that he felt a peculiar but not unpleasant tingling warmth in his hand.

Gateways, need a name...

I'm a bit ashamed to be cribbing an idea from the Eye of the World series, daft as it is, but I will admit that some bits of it inspired this thought:

Id like to have a series of permanent portals, gateways that are set up in interconnected sets of 3 or 4 all over the world, or at least the continent, offering near instantaneous travel from one to the other. They would mostly be underground, deep in labyrinths in the Dismal, and they are old relics from before the Blood.

As they are magical, and existed before the corruption, many of the portals are infected, and traveling though then would be perilous, probably impossible, for those who are not already blooded or blessed.

Why "the nails"?

I came up with the nickname without knowing what it meant yet.

I think the reason that the Office of Causal Oversight is referred to as "the Nails" is that in their earlier, less refined days, the criminals that they sought had an unfortunate tendency to be found later nailed to things.

The Wiki of Dead Gods

I'm starting to edit this shit into a real wiki, at http://blood-of-dead-gods.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page

Thoughts on changing the tone from undead-horror to unknown-horror

Is Maeleff a world, in the way we think of one? A roundish planet hovering in space somewhere around a star? Do I need to be that... I don't know, mundane? Literal?

I might make it a flat world, with the "outer edges of the universe" being the far reaches of the flat plane, encircling a small island of order. But I do't want to have to figure out the physics of that.

I've said before that the gods found Maeleff as a raw natural world, file with animals but no intelligent life, and changed some of the animals into the intelligent races. Buy what else did they do to shape the world?

Ideas:

- no molten core, the gods changed the core into pure magic. That's where magic power comes from, and where mist of their blood now resides.  Thus it's not really a well of magic, it's a literal sphere of liquid power, with a denser liquid core if corruption.

- the planet below the surface was changed extensively over time, for whatever incomprehensible purposes the gods had. The entire crust and mantle is riddled with tunnels, huge caverns and cavern complexes, occasional decaying artifacts and incomprehensible machines, some of them incomprehensibly large, and all of then incomprehensible in purpose. Along with other things, this gives a reasonable excuse for the prototypical dungeon crawl.

- the gods cut Maeleff off from the rest of the universe when they were alive, but their walls fell when they did.  Stars and sun only became visible when the gods died, before that the surface had patches of light or darkness as the god willed.  Mages and academics are only now starting to really look at the universe outside their world and form theories about it.  For some years, it was believed that the sun was what killed the gods, and the stars were the gods' dead souls. Now we are unsure.

- the gods were simply another race, from another world. An old, old race, decadent and powerful, that had traveled the galaxy for uncountable eons performing experiments and changing worlds before moving on.  The creation of magic, and ultimately of the virus that killed them, were the first truly new things they had done for millions of years. One of their number had continued to explore the universe, and came to its absolute edges, where things broke down into insanity without form or natural law, and strange, directionless and shapeless power. He brought some o that strange stuff back, and the gods studied it, and from it they crafted magic. Unknown to the rest if the gods, that one explorer also brought something else back, the very thing that eventually killed them.

- magic is in everything and is a part of everything, but that was not always the case, the gods simply made it so. They were so enamored with their new creation that they bound it to life force somehow. In a sense, the sphere of power at the planet's core is thus in some sense a vast ocean of life force.

Think very carefully before making this change:

- magic is just shapeless power - like electricity that responded to will and intelligence.  The Blood of the Gods however is something else. It is, in some sense, alive. A parasitic organism, a virus, that lives for no purpose other than to spread itself.

Tonal changes - Blessed

Since I'm thinking of slightly changing the tone, from undead-centered to "outer strangeness" albeit diety-free lovecraftian in nature, consider the following Blessed changes:

- weeping - no change save that if you look into its cuts or empty sockets, you see things moving. Picture a writhing mass of tiny red worms.
- Shadekin - eyeless, otherwise unchanged
- skinwalkers- the ribcages of the skeletons, when not dressed in skin, are filled with twisted, discolored and distorted organs. Those organs can maintain the skin for months, even years if it is properly and ritually prepared
Otherwise unchanged

Kin/Shadekin

This is a picture of a dog with its head out of the window of a fast moving car. However, I like it and think it looks fairly menacing. I think this is what Kin and/or Shadekin look like. I'm even thinking about making them eyeless just to conform to the picture.
If eyeless: Kin rely on scent, hearing, and a sort of psychic awareness of their environment to "see". Psychic sense is tied in to the kin family group mind

Personnel with the Office of Causal Whatever I Called It

Oversight. Causal Oversight. That's it.

Racine Zed

Human female, 70 years old. Long and varied career, including merchant, smuggler, pirate, fence, and for the last 30 years, the captain of the Nails.

Tall (though getting a bit bent now with age), and still deceptively tough. Gray hair, hazel eyes. Still strong, though fighting off a bit of a gut. You can tell that she was once mildly pretty, if not outstandingly so, still has a very commanding presence.

Sarcastic sense of humor. Wickedly smart. Good with secrets, and nobody can be said to know all or even most of the projects and agents she is running at any point in time.

Tinkered with a bit of alchemy in the past, but has avoided the Blood.

Commands great respect from her people, who also (very reasonably) fear her.

Two husbands plus a Sava lover, three children, seven grandchildren. Has apartments within the trade quarter, as well as a modest estate outside the city walls.

Kepli Thikt Sen

Male Shar, Blooded Mage, and a close advisor to Zed, who is the only person in the Office who is aware that he is blooded. String willed, he has so far avoided any physical changes from the Blood, but it had started to affect his mind. Friends have noted that he is getting more paranoid and insular. Small, with blue and black stripes.

Taen Shalun Marithire Ru'Halena ma Sheer (Tall red blossom in the outer reaches of the high forest)

Called "Taen" by most non-Aelth, or "Red" by friends.

Female Aelth, former scout and mercenary with a Traveller's Society, joined customs and the Office about ten years ago, recruited by Zed. Thin, deep yellow skin, red hair and eyes

Landscape feature - Craters

Giant craters, leftover from the gods' wars, that breach huge networks of tunnels, and all kinds of strangeness.  Come up with a suitably dramatic name

The craters make up a significant portion of the landscape.

In the time since the gods died, natural weathering and growth have started to change the landscape. Plantlife begins to reclaim the blasted lands.  The huge craters that broke open underground cities and networks of ancient tunnels have turned into cities reminiscent of Native American pueblos.  The great Geb city of (whatever it's called) is one example.

More on the death of the gods

The virus (for lack if a better term) that destroyed the gods was not of this world.  It was found in the outer reaches of the universe  by one forgotten god, modified and unleashed.

The virus was inimical to the stuff that the gods were made of. Not matter per se, as the gods were never truly material in the way we think of it, but they did have a real substance to them. Not anymore, they were utterly unmade.

The virus' effect on other things is less predictable.  Magic is similar to the power of the gods, but not identical.  Thus magic carries the virus, but is not destroyed by it.  In fact, the virus itself being made up of an incredibly powerful and strange energy, magic was in many ways made stronger, if far more dangerous.

As for mortal flesh, life on this world was altered drastically by the gods, and infused with a portion of their power and essence. Thus, the virus is almost always  inimical to it. But unlike the gods, who were helpless before it, mortals are made of different stuff that gives them strengths and options that the gods did not have.  Thus usually they are unmade, but sometimes they are only changed.

Work on making Blood-touched mutations and changes more Lovecraftian in tone than straight up undeath, at least in its greater forms.

I keep thinking I should come up with names for this stuff - the blood, the virus, the dead gods, etc.   But I kind of like having the stuff unnamed.  The names of the gods have been deliberately forgotten.  Nobody understands the virus or even know it exists really, so it just the blood as far as they know.

Time Line

I guess I have to decide once and for all how long it has been since the gods died.  I've been somewhat inconsistent over the course of my writing.

I've been vacillating between 1000's of years and just a few.  I think I need to sort of split the difference and make it a several hundred years, maybe between 500 and 800. I want enough time for society to rebuild in a new image, and for a lot of knowledge to be lost, but not all of it, with new technology/magic to be derived from the remnants of the old.  This also makes it long enough for archaeology to be a significant factor in the rediscovery of old knowledge and power.

So there was a bit of an apocalypse maybe 600 or so years ago. Civilization survived in isolated pockets until about 100 to 150 years ago, when isolated populations started to reconnect with each other.

That's not to say that those isolated populations had been idle all that time.  Ammadhur for example has been growing steadily for the entire period, exploring the ravaged world and starting to reconnect with whomever they could find.

There are some groups that have banded together - by choice, conquest, or whatever - into budding nations. But most of the world - or at least of this continent - remain smaller city-states, some like Ammadhur with areas around them that depend on the city for any number of things, like unofficial de facto nations.

Not with a bang...

The virus (for lack if a better term) that destroyed the gods was not of this world. It was found in the outer reaches of the universe by one forgotten god, and unleashed.

The virus was inimical to the stuff that the gods were made of. Not matter per se, as the gods were never truly material in the way we think of it, but they did have a real substance to them. Not anymore, they were utterly unmade.

The virus' effect on other things is less predictable. Magic is similar to the power of the gods, but not identical. Thus magic carries the virus, but is not destroyed by it. In fact, the virus itself being made up of an incredibly powerful and strange energy, magic was in many ways made stronger, if far more dangerous.

As for mortal flesh, life on this world was altered drastically by the gods, an infused with a portion of their power. Thus, the virus is almost always deadly to mortals that encounter it. But unlike the gods, who were helpless before it, mortals are made of different stuff that gives them strengths and options that the gods did not have. Thus usually they are unmade, but sometimes they are only changed.

Work on making Blood-touched mutations and changes more Lovecraftian in tone than straight up undeath, at least in its greater forms.

I keep thinking I should come up with names for this stuff - the blood, the virus, the dead gods, etc. But I kind of like having the stuff unnamed. The names of the gods have been deliberately forgotten. Nobody understands the virus or even know it exists really, so it just the blood as far as they know.

Shar city

Found this picture of a town in Buenos Aires that was underwater for 25 years after a dam broke, and is now being revealed again. I'd like to use this as the basis for the map of a Shar city.

The Office of Causal Oversight

Ammadhur's legal system, like every other aspect of its governance, is an immensely complicated tangle of rights, duties, obligations and spheres of influence. The guild of barristers is quite powerful as a result.

The city being a central port and hub of mercantile activity, the role of the customs office is extremely important, and they are universally given a surprising amount of leeway in the legal system. Some time ago, a smart Tyrant took advantage of this by creating a small cadre of the customs police whose job was ostensibly to investigate corruption at the highest levels, and who were answerable to nobody but the Tyrant himself. He then manipulated changes in several bodies of law to make sure that certain holes were left unfilled, and which resulted in the group having no charter to speak of, and few if any legal limits on their powers.

That group has the innocuous title of The Office of Causal Oversight, but are referred to by most as "The Nails", for reasons lost to history. In effect, they act as the Tyrant's own hounds and secret police. They recruit their numbers from many sources, not the least being Ammadhur's prisons, where any number of pirates and smugglers have found themselves shanghaied with the simple choice of service or death.

It is rumored that the Nails have dealings with the Blooded, possibly even with Blessed, and may harbor some within their numbers. They are suspected especially of having several Skinwalkers in their ranks.

*chirp...chirp*

For the record, this project is not dead. It's been on hold during a lengthy hospitalization and recovery, but I'm starting to think about it again and hope to have some updates soon.
Cheers,
Chris

The old ways

"The world has abandoned the old ways. We have not. We  will be raised up, proven, when all else  fails."

"Proven to who? The gods are dead, the world is doomed by it. What ways?"

"They will return. We are being tested. We remain strong."

"You're mad. All geb are fucking mad and you'll doom us."

Ignore the names...

Living ships - controlled by a shipspouse. Left over from the days of the gods. Engineered from whales, semi-sentient, huge ships, originally warcraft but adapted to fast cargo hauling through rough and dangerous waters. Imagine a corrupted one..

In the days of war, some of the gods crafted certain enormous marine animals into living warships. Leviathans are something between a whale, a giant squid and an immense nautilus. The warships that were made from them are called Galleathans.
They are immense creatures the size of galleons, with decks covered by a transparent crystalline nautilus shell, and weapon ports covered by gill-like flaps. They lack any control schemata, instead each is mentally bound to a particular family of sentients. More specifically, they are bound to one person, and on the death or incapacity of that person the bond will pass to the most genetically similar person, usually a child. They can either be forced to obey, or trained to build a bond of trust and obey voluntarily. The Galleathans are relatively strong willed, so forcing obedience is difficult for most.

Pilots must be magically active and trained in order to create the bond in the first place, although they need not be trained to accept a bond passed from another. An untrained person who suddenly finds themselves bound to a Galleathans can actually be taught and trained by the beast itself

Because the nature of the bond is at its heart magical, the Galleathans may be corrupted through the bond to their pilots. Along the same lines, a corrupted ship whose pilot dies, whose bond then passes to another, will in turn corrupt that person.

Sava cannot be pilots, and cannot be bound by a Galleathans. In fact, Galleathans generally will not tolerate having a Sava on board, as their anti-magical field interferes with the bond and causes them pain.

Galleathans are affected by the will and personalities of their pilot. A pilot who is laid back, generally happy, and works with his ship rather than forcing obedience will generally have a playful, happy ship that may stretch its commands but will no seek to break the bond. A brooding, angry pilot who forces it's will on his ship will have an angry ship, difficult to control, that constantly seeks to break its bond or pervert it's pilot's intent.

Quick idea to be expanded later...

Living ships - controlled by a shipspouse. Left over from the days of the gods. Engineered from whales, semi-sentient, huge ships, originally warcraft but adapted to fast cargo hauling through rough and dangerous waters. Imagine a corrupted one..

A meeting

A long vertical stone chimney, smooth walls, leading deep into the ground. At the bottom is a spherical chamber, the bottom third of which is filled with a pool of gods blood, a viscous red liquid so dark it is almost black, and which radiates a faint purple glow that illuminates nothing but the blood itself.

Hovering above it is a humanoid in hooded light saffron robes, sitting it a lotus position in mid air. The robes are stained with blood, also glowing faintly. Her blood occasionally drips into the pool, the only sound in the chamber. The chamber has a single other entrance, a hidden door leading to a narrow ledge high on the wall, facing the back of the floating figure.

A group of adventurers enters the chamber, tensely and silently. The figure pulls back it's hood to reveal the rent and eyeless face of a Weeping . The creature's split and bleeding lips turn gently up in a small, sad smile. It's lips do not open, but each member hears its beautiful and hypnotic voice directly in its mind, each in their native language. "Welcome, my children. You are weary. Please take your ease. Be warmed. Be one, and at peace." The four hardened treasure seekers feel their eyes start to close, their attention wandering and their bodies relaxing, while in each, the core of their beings wails first in fear, then in despair, then in ecstasy.

Ammadhur city sections

1) Scholar's Quarter - universities (private and public), Mage guilds, archaeological societies. Homes of wealthier scholars, mages and some wealthy families with academic pretensions.

2) trade quarter - docks, trade houses and merchant's guilds, League of Guilds meeting house, Customs House, guard house for League Watch. Many of the moderately powerful merchant families have homes here. Some residential neighborhoods, lower and middle class.

3) Tyrant's quarter - Tyrant's palace and wealthiest citizens, including estates for those powerful merchant families who do not choose to live outside the city walls. Guard houses for Tyrant's Watch.

4) government quarter - Great Council buildings, bureaucratic buildings, guard house for Council Watch. Some homes for council members and upper bureaucrats.

5) various residential areas. Middle class home and apartments, poor quarters and slums, multiple small racial ghettos/neighborhoods.

Just a note to myself: draft (or get someone to draft) a map of Ammadhur and it's environs, based on medieval Mantua.

The Khevan Vestments

A few scraps of half rotted cloth, named for the city in which they were found, and where they are being studied. The Vestments are believed to be portions of the ritual garments of a Geb priest-king from the age of the gods. Any Geb coming near them without powerful magical protections is filled with a powerful urge to touch them, but actually doing so causes immediate and powerful headaches in most and throws others into a coma. Non-Geb feel nothing, and oddly enough the Blooded also feel nothing from the scraps. They are kept ringed with protective circles in the University of Kheva Rhak and are being studied.

The Iron Word

An ancient Geb artifact, believed by many to be the item used by one or more of the Geb's gods to speak with and convey directions to their people. A fifty foot high tower composed of striated and seemingly random patterns of various metals fused somehow into a single piece with no visible seams. The top of the tower is ringed with large purple crystals inset into the metal, and irregular rays of the various metals used in its construction, resembling tree roots, spread out from its base. The tower has four circular openings, each about ten feet in diameter, spaces evenly around it, about five feet of of the ground. The openings lead to a single spherical chamber composed apparently of the same purple crystal as the stores around its crown. All of the crystals glow faintly, the brightness of the glow pulsing regularly in very slow intervals, each pulse taking about a week to complete under normal circumstances. The pulses speed up marginally if magic is used near the tower. Any attempt to use magic within the tower has proven to immediately infect the wizard with the blood of the gods.

The tower, which lies about 100 miles to the northwest of Ammadhur, is perpetually surrounded by mages and students of the Reevan School, a university of magic that has been studying it for centuries. They study the Word and keep strangers from entering it and possibly harming themselves and others. Despite hundreds of years of study, they have yet to definitively prove its purpose.

Another monster without a name. I'm bad at names.

Small, flying creatures with sharp features suggestive of a young aelth. They fly, and sing a strange, warbling song. Their song is psychoactive. Targeted creatures that hear the song will become fascinated by the creatures, hold them, pet them, and feel intense pleasure. with longer exposure, or exposure to multiple creatures' songs, victims will essentially freeze in place, paralyzed with ecstasy. At that point the singers will begin to feed, flaying strips of flesh and eating them. They feed in groups, but take their time.

Singers are roughly humanoid, about one foot high, with bat like wings. Their skin is silvery, with shimmer and highlights that range through a rainbow of colors. Enormous pearlescent eyes, tiny and viciously sharp teeth, and long razor-sharp claws. They nest in forests, in groups of a dozen or so.

Big fantasy tropes...

So I've been trying to sort of re-skin a lot of the standard fantasy tropes and give them an interesting (to me anyway) personality. So what to do, if anything about some of the bigger fantasy tropes?
And I mean that literally, BIG tropes, specifically giants and dragons.
A dragon equivalent would e way enough to explain - there was life on the world before the gods got there, there could easily have been a large, smart, dangerous, flying predator of some type. Easy enough to assume that some god or other tinkered with them, made them even bigger and smarter, and gave them access to magic. The latter would be necessary if the whatever was to be truly draconian in scope, as a creature that big would need magic to fly, at the very least.

But how to do it without just making a dragon, or something that screams "this is supposed to be a dragon, yet is kind of stupid"?
Wyvern would be easy enough to explain. Birds or local bird-like organisms that were boosted by the gods, or just mutated by exposure to the blood.
Maybe just have someone doodle something, and figure out what it is afterwards...

I totally want the city of Ammadhur to look like this,

Just a random thought...

Magic is finite, the corruption is not. The well of magic was kept full by the gods, until their death. Now that they are no longer there to refill it, it is a limited resource, and will eventually run dry. It may take 1000's of years, maybe longer, but it will run out eventually. However, the corruption is alive and self-perpetuating. As long as there is life in the world, the Blood will be there, and will be a path to power. This eventually, all magic will be corrupt, and some time thereafter the entire world will succumb to the blood.

DOOMED! DOOMED I TELL YOU!

Don't know if I actually want to use this or not, just a thought...

Notes on the nature of magic and sacrifice

Though the gods made constant war on each other, up until fairly close to the end they were surprisingly civil as to how they went about it. They chose a battleground together, and they reached a mutual agreement about many of the tools and weapons they used, such as the well of magical power that they created for their worshippers to wield against each other.

Magic is a power source. Discounting the corruption that now festers in its depths, it is value neutral. It is a source of energy that was designed to react to the will and desire of its users, and to conform easily to structure imposed from outside. Thus, rituals used by those with a firm purpose in mind will draw power from the well and cause it to shape itself into different forms.

There are those that say that magic itself has a kind of sentience, a rudimentary intelligence that responds to and communicates with those that try and use it, that consciously shapes itself in conformance with the desires of the mages wielding it. This has never been widely accepted or proven, and if true, nobody knows what effect the corruption has had on that mind.

While there is no consensus as to whether or not magic is alive in and of itself, it is clear that magic reacts to life, and is tied to life force in some way. Natural plants and animals will draw up and store a small amount of magic by themselves, and can even use it in rudimentary ways. Thus shamanistic mages have found ways to use plants and animals as intermediaries between themselves and the raw force of magic, sacrifices of plants, animals and people can give access to a sudden burst of power, and natural ingredients can aid mages in the casting of their spells.

Some shaman have found ways to use sacrifices to place a barrier between themselves and the corruption at magic's heart, or at least they believe they have. The idea is to use another person or being to cast a spell through, allow the corruption to infest that person, and kill them at the height of the spell, this gaining both an extra boost of power and a filter for the corruption and it's effects.

Need to put a few new things together soon, here's a few notes:
- Lightbringers - they are to mages what the cherubim were to the gods. Beings of light created as servants, now mostly wild an corrupted.
- want a new race, something small and quick. Possibly an airborne race as well.
- need to describe the current Tyrant and a few others in the Ammadhur government
- need to add a second animals an beasts post, set out some domestic animals.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1613260297/shadowrun-returns

I need maps

I need some maps, and I can't draw for fuck all. I know Ammadhur should be visually based on Mantua in about the early 17th century, with guard towers along each bridge, and the bridges separating parts of the city. Don't have a clue what the surrounding landscape should look like. Would any of my lovely and talented friends like to help me create the geography of the world of Maeleff, and possibly draw me a map or two?

Cherubim/Blood Wisps

Called "blood wisps" by most, or "cherubim" by scholars that study the dead gods and their creations, these creatures are invisible and silent, and only semi material (to most). Only way to tell where it is is that anywhere it touches anything (including the ground) it leaves a bloodstain. It's blood is poisonous, but not a power source, having been extremely degenerated from the original source of its power.

They are degenerate forms of what amounted to angels, spirit servants of the gods. Originally they were pacifistic, body servants and sex slaves for the gods and their chosen servants. When the gods died, they were affected as well, being composed of something like the same stuff. But as they, like the servitor races, are only similar to the gods physically, rather than identical, their numbers were drastically reduced but not utterly destroyed.

The few that are left are somewhat inbred and highly aggressive, cunning rarher than truly intelligent, unlike their ancestors.

Visible and audible only to those that have been corrupted. To them, they appear as androgynous creatures of unearthly beauty, naked and alluring despite being covered in blood. To the uncorrupted their blood is a powerful poison, to the corrupted it is a powerful euphoric. The creatures seek to kill the uncorrupted and seduce the corrupted.

Animals and beasts (pt. 1)

Thisp
Mammalian snake like creature covered with "fur" which is really a symbiotic algae colony. The photosensitive algae colony provides chameleon like properties, shares it's photosynthesis with the animal when hunting is scarce, and shares the snake's caloric intake at night. The snake has a euphoric venom, which is in fact plant based. 2 - 3 feet in length, brown skin with a "fur" that changes color with the leaves.


Karr Hound
Quadrupedal mammal, powerfully built, 5 to 6 feet from nose to hindquarters, with a long tail.
Resembles a large, powerfully built hyaena in basic form, though longer of limb and with feet that resemble rudimentary hands. Hairless save for a strip of fur that runs down their backs. Climbing pack hunters that live in hilly and mountainous terrain.a

Need:
[swamp dragon]

[plains ape]

[desert cat]

Some thoughts on corruption in the natural world

Need to consider what effect the corruption has on the natural world.  The gods came to a world already full of life and merely modified some of it to fit their dneeds, so it's not like all life in the world was inextricably intertwined with them.  But I've established that there are "natural magics" so there must be some connection.

Shamanistic magic is a slow and gradual accumulation of power to subtly manipulate the natural world. As such it is relatively safe, much like alchemy and enchantment. But of course the corruption is insidious, and even the most careful use of power has the potential to become tainted. 

Occasionally, in areas where a lot of magic directed at the natural world has been practiced, a thread of corruption will affect a plant or animal. Usually, this ultimately leads to blighted areas devoid of life and radiating sickness. Every now and then, the plant, creature or area is merely changed, warped and mutated.  This is how rothounds are created, but they are not the only such creature. 

When entire areas are so affected, becoming twisted and corrupt parodies of nature, they are often inhabited by a Lotho Defiler, who will become its protector. 

Started to put a character together in my head. A black-skinned Geb shaman, who had touched Blood and decided to embrace it, still alive, but on his way to transforming into a blessed, and gaining considerable power from the blood. Tall, with a row of small horns across his forehead. Jet black skin, broken by patterns made up of glowing veins of red blood. Carries a staff.  After I pictured this in my head, I realized that I had just made Darth Maul...

Some brief notes on tone.

   Okay, so the vast majority of what I've written here so far has been very dark in tone. And I'll admit, this is pretty much intentional. Plagues of undead, the blood of dead gods, malevolent blessed, fairly heavy stuff overall, and a pretty dark world outside the city walls.

     But I don't want to leave the impression that it's pretty much pure doom and horror.  I mean, a fair amount of doom and horror, but unrelieved blackness is boring, and needs some contrast. There are steampunky elements, commercial intrigues, piracy, and plain old interspecies conflict to provide breaks in background foundation and narrative tone. In the end I want portions of the world - the city of Ammadhur and its environs, other similar places - to be beacons of enlightenment and civilization, and provide opportunities that are less survival horror and lovecraftian vision and more swashbuckling, urban, investigative, and noir.

     Okay, kind of schizophrenic in tone, but that's in part why I want to make this a group effort and an open/mosaic fictional world, to allow these conflicting tones and backgrounds to find a way to mesh and play nicely together...

Some random collected notes on magic and the blood of the gods

Alchemy is a subset of Enchantment, and is a blend of magic and science, Alchemy is the safest of the magical disciplines. It's slow and methodical, skimming the top of the well, and the corruption can (generally) be effectively filtered out and avoided. Enchantment is used to create magic items and objects, including all of the techno magical stuff in the rich parts of Ammadhur.  The items you end up with can be quite powerful, but enchantment in and of itself has no direct combat or improvisational use.  Basically engineering, for all intents and purposes.  Enchanters' guilds tend to be quite politically powerful in Ammadhur.

A sorcerer who embraces the corruption and delves deeply into the Gods' blood can use it to create a variety of effects, almost anything imaginable, limited only by the skill and strength of will of the caster. However, how easy it is and the effect it has on the caster will vary depending on where the effect falls on a scale from corrupt to pure.

It can create poison, rot, darkness and corruption effects quite easily, and casters are "rewarded" (so to speak) for doing so. Fire, and mental domination are slightly more difficult. Healing and purification are nearly impossible, and would exert a terrible toll on the caster if attempted.

If performing tasks that are evil and fitting in with the corruption theme, the caster either is either unaffected or moves one step closer to "transcendence", turning into one of the more powerful and intelligent undead.   Attempting more "pure" effects brings the caster closer to death, or to transforming into a mindless undead. Willpower and discipline can slow or mitigate that change, but cannot eliminate it. Destructionor transformation are inevitable.

A direct attack that poisoned it's victim's mind and body would be a fairly straightforward use of god's blood.  Drawing someone else's strength and life force into yourself  would be more difficult, but still possible, as it has a balanced affect - harming another while benefiting yourself.  Healing wounds on another would be impossible or nearly so.  Any beneficial effect must generally be at least balanced with a harm.

Once one has physically touched a pool of gods' blood, one can draw on it from anywhere, with some limitations that I don't know yet. Merely touching it causes pain, damage and corruption, but creates the link. Immersing oneself in it entirely will either destroy one utterly, or immediately transform you into an undead.

Note that one need not eve physically touch or even see a Blood pool to draw on or utilize the Blood, or to feel its corruption. Any use of magic has a chance of opening one to the Blood, the more power used or expended the higher the chance.  However, drawing on that much power without physical contact takes a tremendous amount of magical skill and/or willpower. However, the weakest minded person, with no magical skill or training at all, can find themselves possessing tremendous power if they actually physically touch Blood.

Random story/stories idea

     The city of Ammadhur is a huge commercial shipping hub, and is largely run by mercantile concerns. But the city extracts taxes and tariffs, and struggles to prevent smuggling and piracy. To that end, customs police and customs inspectors would b a huge power.

     I know this is extremely tropey, but: The customs police types have a team made up of former smugglers and pirates, caught and given powerful motivation one way or the other to work for the Tyrant and the city government. They also, for all intents and purposes, and the Tyrant's secret police. at least as to policing the merchant houses. Could form the basis for a series of short stories.  Having them run afoul of a Skinwalker who had integrated himself into a merchant house could be a good introduction to the Blessed.

Race: The Lotho

Giants, eight to ten feet tall, heavily built, with long fur that they wear in elaborate braids. The Lotho are  based on a creature that is the local equivalent of prehistoric giant ground sloths.

Most believe that the Aelth are the first race, though in fact they are not. The Lotho came first, but were considered a failure by the gods that created them, and were abandoned.  They lived alone in an isolated area for years, with no contact with the other races until well after the death of the gods.

Thr Lotho were made to be simple - near mindless - warriors. Instead, the giants became philosophers and deep thinkers, with deep a connection to nature, and little or no interest in warfare or gods. The Lotho are herbalists and thinkers, Druidic in nature, and are generally pacifistic. They are not at all defenseless however, and if they or their love ones are attacked, they can transform into powerful and terrifying beserkers.

Huge and powerful, with a deep natural wisdom. They have an incredible understanding of and communion with nature, are skilled herbalists and alchemists,  and their natural magic is as powerful as that of the Aelth, though more focused on healing and protection then that of the Aelth, which is more aimed at stealth and the savagery of nature.

It is exceedingly rare for Lotho to embrace corruption, but the very few that do are terrifying creatures to behold. Defilers are huge beastial savages that warp nature around them into twisted and diseased living weapons.