Here’s the questions and answers for the months of September 2021!
I want to thank everyone who participated. Remember, all Warden tier (or higher) members are able to join in on the Q&A.
If you’re interested in the project and want to help support it, please consider becoming a Patron. You can find more information about the Beyond the Pale Patreon [here].
In terms of premade difficulty monsters, maybe dealing with a kelpie or haunting.
One of the features intended for the game is a way for Game Masters to have a variety of options for all difficulty levels. You could, for example, have an entire campaign that focuses on vampires because the Game Master has access to several kinds of vampires, each with differing difficulty rating.
The intended goal is to give the Game Master a large degree of freedom to tweak encounters to best suit their players.
So much of the cosmology of a lot of myths and religions in the setting are metaphorical or misinterpretations. Atlas doesn’t literally hold up the sky, for example.
So while I have read and researched these things, it’s not likely they’ll be given direct credence in the setting. The established cosmology of the game is the Yggdrasil, the World Tree, and the Nine Worlds.
The Four Horsemen is an angelic concept, a sort of ideology and mini-pantheon.
When humanity became known to Heaven and Hell there was much debate on both sides on how to approach the new possibilities. In Heaven, the seven archangels held council and weighed the pros and cons of humanity.
Three opted to spare humanity out of compassion, who argued that humanity would aid them in their fight against Hell and deserved direct intervension. However, three wanted humanity exterminated to deprive Hell of any potential advantage.
The deciding vote was held by the Archangel of Patience, who characteristically abstained. To this day, he still holds that vote and is still making a decision on if humanity deserves Heaven’s full grace or full wrath.
The three who voted for humanity’s destruction, plus the abstainer, are represented as the Four Horsemen. And should the vote finally be caste against humanity, they themselves will bring about humanity’s apocalypse.
It’s still a planned feature. The lore around genuine black magic that there the fall into darkness is an emotional one. Black magic is the rock bottom of that pit and if you can cast black magic you’re already too far gone.
Black magic is a complete corruption of someone’s humanity. Joy becomes pain, misery becomes bliss, empathy becomes hatred in a literal sense. There is no coming back from it.
A character who is struggling with that darkness within is not going to be able to cast black magic. It is only when that darkness has fully taken hold and completely consumed them that it is possible. And as a result, the character is effectively insane, similar to if their Sanity Points drop to lethal levels.
From a mechanical point, the moment you can cast black magic, your character is treated as incurably insane and is under the control of the GM. If you’re looking for a struggle with corruption, there are innumerable other options available.
Black magic is the exception. It is that bad and (mechanically) overpowered.
