D20rpgs.co.nr

[Erik Mesoy]

QUICK SUMMARY:
The races of the People are Elf, Man, Orc. These can interbreed freely. The People as a whole arrived on these shores and founded the New Kingdom ten years ago, fleeing a cataclysm on the previous continent. Arcane magic as we know it did not exist there; it's begun to sprout here since then. The pantheon has only Good and Neutral gods; archfiends replace Evil gods. The system of government is monarchy, and the ruler is King Hakim Tsanako II. Years, BTW, are 341 days long. Because I'm random like that. Skip to the end for chargen rules and an introduction.


LONG VERSION FOLLOWS.



GEOGRAPHY:
You're on the southern coast of a surprisingly fertile land. Seasons are: Rainy Season, First Harvest, High Summer, Second Harvest. The capital city is Corretheus; it lies on the coast, straddling the large river Noom. At equidistant points of a hemicircle and roughly 12 miles away in each direction lie four smaller cities. Clockwise, they are Mille, Oppidum (which Noom passes through), Alambra, and Leviathus. Oppidum is the largest. Between the cities are dirt paths hacked out of the land, which has rather a tendency to have trees everywhere, forest near the coast and jungle further in.


COSMOLOGY:
* Greater gods:
* Rubenda (LG), goddess of honor and right action. Wife of Olaf. Domains: Law, Good, Healing, Fire. Holy symbol: A person standing in a great flame.
* Olaf (NG), god of the good society. Husband of Rubenda. Domains: Good, Protection, Strength, Air. Holy symbol: Two arms, one thick and one thin, holding hands.
* Christina (CG), goddess of the oppressed. Domains: Chaos, Good, Luck, Water. Holy symbol: A torn cloak.
* Brock (LN), god of war and justice. Domains: Law, War, Destruction, Earth. Holy symbol: A broken sword resting on a shield.
* Lesser gods:
* Death (N), whom everyone should be familiar with. Domains: Death, Travel, Healing. Holy symbol: A heavily stylized skull.
* Lily (CN), goddess of the seasons and nature. Domains: Chaos, Animal, Plant. Holy symbol: A circle containing a bird, a stalk of wheat and a raindrop.

Evil: evil clerics owe allegiance to any archfiend, and get as their domains Evil and any other domain apart from Good.


HISTORY:
*RECENT
The current date is 10AV (After Voyage), Rainy Season 80. It's dated from the day Hakim II stepped ashore in the pouring rain on this new land, where he would come to found the city of Corretheus. In the past years since then, the gods began communing with the People far more often, often naming persons as their agents. The city of Oppidum was founded in 3AV. In 4AV the People began to come in conflict with the native inhabitants of the land; the barbaric and savage Goblins, forest- and jungle-dwellers. After the conflict simmered for some time, Hakim II led an army in 6AV that carved a swath through the disunited goblins, conquered a goblin stronghold, killed the few leaders that were to be found there, and founded the city of Alambra on the site. With the goblins leaderless and scattered, Mille was founded in 7AV and Leviathus in 8AV. After that, the goblins began to return, more wary and cunning this time.
*LONG AGO
Once you sort away the stories of dragons founding royal bloodlines and the like, reliable history begins about 400 years ago on the Old Continent, then a meager and cold land, now a land under the waves, with the reconciliation and union by royal marriage of the Tsine and Anako clans. Over the next eighty years and three generations, the "Tsinako" family conquered all the People and declared themselves absolute monarchs by the will of the Four Greater Gods, and relegated the other clans to permanent second-tier status. Some sixty years later, the corrupt King Beadle Tsinako was overthrown, allegedly by the will of the Four Greater Gods, certainly by a revolt that was led by a great many priests. The new order raised Beadle's seven-year-old son Kefanor in a temple of Olaf until he came to maturity and led humanity into a time of peace and prosperity. Kefanor lived to a ripe old age and was suceeded by his son Albert. During and after Albert's reign, the Greater Gods appeared to withdraw from the People, leaving the various movements following the Goddess Lily to prominence, where they were for a hundred years. This is now generally recognised as having been part of a greater plan to increase the number and quality of trees growing on the Old Continent, as the Greater Gods then guided the People towards establishing shipyards now that timber was available, eventually, ten years ago, commanding the King five years before the cataclysm to build a great fleet and lead humanity to a new land. He did; but the fleet lost half its size by leaving too late and being partly caught in the wave that drowned the Old Continent, then lost more ships along the way.

RACES:
All of the People get a bonus feat and a bonus skill point and favored class:any. They are all considered humanoid(human) for purposes of various effects.
Elves get +2 DEX +2 WIS.
Men get +2 CON +2 INT.
Orcs get +2 STR +2 CHA.
There are no racial weapon proficiencies, skill bonuses, automatic racial languages, orcs do not have Orc Blood, elves do not have low-light vision, etc.
Everyone lives about 40-50 years on average, though this average is dragged down by heavy labor, disease, and medieval accidents. Someone who avoids those can expect 120. Screw the Middle Age and Old Age stats; make up your character's age and decide which category he's in as long as it's sane. Ditto height and weight and suchlike.

CULTURE:
You're a monarchy. You're a very small nation. You have about four cities outside of the capital, the other four spread evenly a bit under a day's march from the capital. The local languages, which I don't feel like making up funny names for, are "English", which is used in everyday conversation, "Latin", which is used in liturgies and old documents, and "Greek", which is used for scientific and magical treatises. Racial languages are not available with the exception of Goblin; planar ones and Draconic are, although Draconic is largely an oral tradition as no dragons have been seen for longer than anyone remembers. Clerics (and Favored Souls, and whatever splatstuff you have) of the Greater Gods have minor command over their elements; enough to do parlor tricks, or more often, show that they are acting on that god's behalf. For good writing style, I suggest you use "People" about the whole race much like you would use "humanity", "man"/"men" with a small "m" or "person(s)" about someone in general, "Man"/"Men" with a large "M" about one of the specific subraces, along with Elves and Orcs.


CALENDAR:
The year is 341 days long, plus Death's Day which is special. Each season is considered to be 82 days long, and there are 13 special days named here which are not part of the seasons proper. There is no cold season, only a wet one, and the climate is summerlike all year round.

• New Year's Day falls prior to the start of Rainy Season. Celebrations are held, people give one another gifts, the King gives out pardons, and new ventures are begun and contracts are signed as this is considered an auspicious day for them.
  
• Founding Day is between the 10th and 11th of Rainy Season, more out of tradition than any accurate calendar count. It is traditional to perform acts of charity on Founding Day, of either work or money.
  
• The day called Aubade of Lily is between Rainy Season 26 and 27, four weeks after the start of the year.
  
• Once the first week of First Harvest is passed and the ripest crops are in, the First Feast of Plenty is held.
  
• Mid Year's Day falls after the first day of High Summer.
  
• The Godsdays, five days dedicated specially to the Four Greater Gods, are in the middle (between 41 and 42) of High Summer.
  
• The Second Feast of Plenty is much like the First Feast of Plenty, but with different food.
  
• The Vespers of Lily is between Second Harvest 54 and 55, four weeks before the year ends.
  
• Lastday is the last day of the year and falls after the last day of Second Harvest. It is usually spent throwing out old things and making preparations for New Year's Day.
  
• Death's Day falls between Lastday and New Year's Day, and is not counted part of any year. No official events take place on this day; people generally stay at home and avoid doing more activity than necessary, often eating meals prepared on Lastday. Children born on Death's Day are considered very unlucky and may be set out to die. Death's Day only happens two years out of every three, before and after years divisible by three.

Confused? Try this list instead.

New Year's Day
-start of RS-
Rainy Season 1-10
Founding Day
Rainy Season 11-26
Aubade of Lily
Rainy Season 27-82
-end of RS, start of FH-
First Harvest 1-7
First Feast of Plenty
First Harvest 8-82
-end of FH, start of HS-
High Summer 1
Mid Year's Day
High Summer 2-41
The Godsdays (5)
High Summer 42-82
-end of HS, start of SH-
Second Harvest 1-7
Second Feast of Plenty
Second Harvest 8-54
Vespers of Lily
Second Harvest 55-82
-end of SH-
Lastday
(Death's Day)

CHARGEN AND QUICK INTRODUCTION:
This is an E6 game in a homebrew setting. Only the races described under Races (Elves: +2 Dex +2 Wis, Men: +2 Con +2 Int, Orcs: +2 Str +2 Cha) are available. Ability score generation is 32 point buy. The story here starts as King Hakim II has drawn up a charter to hire serious adventurers, Avernum II-style. (Yes, the name is a homage.) Therefore, your character must be willing to and/or have a good reason to go adventuring and doing odd quests and being privvy to special information and risks of sudden death and the like. To avoid evil people being chartered, the King has required that would-be adventurers provide two letters that witness their good standing, at least one from a person not of immediate kin. So make up two (or more) such letters as part of your character's backstory. These should indicate what sort of person your character has been associated with.
A semi-official E6 PDF (badly formatted)
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[EvilDarkLord]

Looks like a nice big farming community.

Since there's no winter I imagine food is not difficult to come by. Are there much nobles? Crazy inventors? Merchants? Hunters? It's a pretty small ecosystem. How large are the cities?
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We rode on the winds of the rising storm,
we ran to the sound of the thunder.
We danced among the lightning bolts,
and tore the world asunder.

[Erik Mesoy]

[ChrisAsmadi]

What happens to anyone who disagrees with the king?

On the subject of evil clerics - are they accepted, are they renegades, do they have to practice their worship in secret? What?
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desu

[Erik Mesoy]

People who disagree with the king are told "Yes, now shut up" and then have their taxes collected. There isn't any disagreeing that will really get you anywhere; the King is a military leader and a decent ruler and you can't very well emigrate to another country.

Evil clerics practice their worship in secret cults which are occasionally attempted stamped out.

Also another thing I'd thought I'd CP in here:

[ChrisAsmadi]

Are the archfiends well known? Known to learned people? Whispered only in back alleyways?
_________________
desu

[Erik Mesoy]

Whispered in back alleyways and known to a few learned people who bother to study that sort of thing. Of course, those who seek them will find them.
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[AbuDhabi]

I have questions.

• Capstone feats - available or not?
  
• Youse didn't post the gestalting rules. Deliberate?
  
• Optional rules for E6 (raising the stakes and whatsit points)?

Also, !Micah. Hehe.
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[Erik Mesoy]

Capstone feats yes. Gestalt rules available later once I hammer them out. Optional rules probably not. This was more a thread on the setting than E6 itself.
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[AbuDhabi]

Okay, in that case: I like it. I like it muchly.
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[Reiver]

I approve vastly, and have come to consider an Orcish Paladin of some sort. The exact details I'm still making my mind up on, but hey, it's all good.

[Erik Mesoy]

Scribbled map:
Edit: DEPRECATED
Was at: http://i30.tinypic.com/2lkrwg4.jpg (removed for bandwidth reasons)

The Noom does continue further up, but nobody's traced its sources yet. Light green is thickly forested, dark green is serious jungle. Roads are essentially packed dirt trails cut out of the forest. The one between Oppidum and Alambra swings south for a bit for reasons of a jungular patch resistant to cutting.
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[Erik Mesoy]

Version 0.2 changelog:

• Death's Day changed to a form of leap year day that happens two years out of three.
  
• Road near Oppidum made to follow river.
  
• Dots added to indicate smaller towns not worth names on map.
  
• Rubenda gained Healing domain.
  
• Named the country the New Kingdom for simplicity.
  
• Added a note saying that other racial abilities such as low-light vision are removed relative to the normal PHB races.
  
• Added the map under Geography.
  

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