#rpg worldbuilding

[bluebirddiary]

An adventure time map done in my cartoon map style! Made in procreate.

[enddaysengine]

Changeling the Lost Resources

This is a resource for all Changeling Storytellers and Players, in particular, those who are new to the Freehold. I've included a couple of non-Changeling resources that I think may be useful as well. If there is something you think should be included, please let me know what it is and why it should be on the list and I will take a look.

Hey! This post is designed to be updated as I find more resources! You can click here to get the most up to date version.

2e Changeling Core 2e

Condition Cards Dark Eras 2 - Arthur's Britannia - Mysterious Frontiers - Seven Wonders Hearts on Trial - Jumpstart The Hedge (forthcoming) Kith and Kin Oak, Ash, & Thorn Storyteller Screen & Companion

Consent in Gaming Google Forms RPG Consent Checklist (by @jl_nicegirl)

Dark Eras - A Grimm Dark Era - Beneath the Skin (blue-book) - Requiem for Regina - Three Kingdoms of Darkness Dark Eras Companion - Lifting the Veil (blue-book) Mortal Remains

Chronicles of Darkness

Olivia Hill's Changeling 2e Arc's Paris Freehold

1e Changeling Core 1e Autumn Nightmares Character Sheet [Free] Dancers in the Dust Dark Eras - Lily, Saber, Thorn Equinox Road Goblin Markets Lords of Summer Night Horrors: Grim Fears Ready-Made Characters Rites of Spring SAS - The Fearmaker’s Promise SAS - The Fearmaker’s Promise Compendium SAS - The Rose-Bride’s Plight Swords at Dawn Winter Masques Victorian Lost

Astral Realms Book of the Dead Glimpses of the Unknown

Bundles CofD Dark History Complete Bundle Starter Kit

Fiction Tales of the Dark Eras

Selected Vault

Book of Seemings Curiouser and Curiouser Bargins Lost Entitlements Vol 1, Vol 2, & Vol 3 Venice Unmasked Wyrd Tides

Actual Plays Hedged In The Littlebrook Reunion (The Primogen)

[deafmangoes]

Currencies in fantasy settings and particularly TTRPGs (and the genre of vidya games they spawned) is a personal interest of mine.

Because they're often really boring and plain. I shall now vent about this.

Now, there's one very good reason for it: players can't be arsed with exchange rates and complexity in this area. Gold is just how much wealth-per-stab your murderhobo is currently making.

The less good reason is designer laziness. Even on the rare occasions they decide not to just name them "gold, silver, copper" it's nearly always just a fancy fantasy name slapped on top of a decimal system.

For us that makes sense. Pretty much everyone uses decimal coinage these days.

You may be aware, however, that in the past most coinage was bonkers complicated - at least, to the modern person. Before decimalisation in the 1970s, the UK had a currency loosely based on a Base 12 system.

That is, you had 12 pence (d) to 1 shilling (s) and 20s to £1 (originally, pounds were only of real use to bankers and nobles, hence the shift in number). 1s could be subdivided into sixpence, threepence and tuppence, while 1d could be divided into hapennies (1/2d) and farthings (1/4d). You also had crowns (5s) and half-crowns, groats (4d, sometimes) sovereigns (£1, different name, don't ask) and guineas (eventually fixed to £1, 1s). Plus a whole bunch of short-lived coins, which happens when your system has never been properly reformed for 800 years.

When I, a decimal child, first learned about this I thought it was insane. How could shopkeepers do anything with that mess? But what I missed was that Base 12 is the easiest for the human brain to calculate.

Yes, without computerised registers (for which Base 10 was already standardised), a human merchant, shopkeeper or customer could do more with Base 12 because 12 has so many factors: it's divisible by 2, 3, 4 and 6. 10 is only divisible by 2 and 5. Despite all the weird extra coins tacked in, the basic units of pounds, shillings, pence (£sd) was easy to use. We changed it because everyone else was.

So on a setting without computers or even mechanised calculators, why do they have a decimal system?

Be brave! Confuse your readers and players! Make the currency Base 30 except for some foreign coins used as bullion that are treated as Base 7 for religious reasons.

This also lets you play around a bit with rewards - instead of a sack of coin worth 30 gold, why not present your party with some old gold coins that might be worth 30g to a lord's personal bank, or up to 200g to the right collector.

Escape from gold, too - explore your dwarves using palladium or various alloys, mithril fractions set in "less precious" metals, etc. Elves might eschew coinage altogether and use other tokens that represent a value of age or crop yield. Pre-Meiji Japan based their economic system on rice yields, with 1 ryō (the basic gold coin) being equivalent to the amount of rice one person could eat in a year (a koku).

Of course for the sake of ease you should always have a conversion chart handy, but I find that toying with currency is a simple but very effective way to worldbuild and create immersion. Plus, it's just kinda fun.

[virovac]

Instead of making certain dragons dumber than others

Why not make it so some reach physical maturity faster? Like living in an ecosystem where advantageous.

That allows your characters to fight full grown dragons that don't have the experience and wisdom of a really terrifying dragon yet.

( I was inspired by an Order of The Stick bonus strip in one of the compilations where a young ice dragon is a figurehead emperor)

[firebirdeternal]

Goblins not being a core race smells of antisemitism

Hi hello Anon! I hope you're having a good day! Re: Goblins and Antisemitism. While a certain transphobic bigot author did definitely write a bunch of Antisemitic stereotypes into her world's version of Goblins, the base concept of "Goblin" in fantasy media doesn't have the same general association with Jewish people. In particular, I was thinking about Goblins in "Pathfinder" when I made The Post you're referencing: Funky little gremlin guys with lots of teeth and an air of Wacky Chicanery that lends itself well to comedic relief.

Re: "Core" races. "Core" in this context did not mean "The Normal Guys who count as real people", it meant "The races/ancestries who had Rules for Playing As Them in the 'Core' Rule book of a tabletop rpg". Specifically in Pathfinder first edition you had Elves and Dwarves and Humans and Half-human-half-orc-or-elf and Halflings (Which are Hobbits but Legally Distinct so nobody sues anybody over it) but even though Goblins were a really fun and flavorful group of little guys they didn't actually start out in the Core Rule book as playable. They were a 'Monster' race, in the Bestiary book. (A thing that the publisher Paizo rectified in 2nd Edition Pathfinder!)

In case the original post didn't make it clear, I'm not a big fan of writing a race of Fantasy People as having some kind of innate moral tendency towards Good or Evil. People are people, and it's their decisions and actions which define who they are, not their blood or genetics. While the culture that a person grows up in can have an effect on what they consider 'normal' behavior, part of becoming an Adult Person is assuming responsibility for your actions and behaviors, and changing when you learn that they were or are Harmful.

tl;dr= Goblins in Fantasy Literature do not necessarily equal Caricatures of Jewish People, and the word "Core" was used with Specific Context that you probably didn't already know (And I do not fault you for not knowing)

[nana-writes]

WbW - 22nd September

Happy Worldbuilding Wednesday! As always, answer when you can and regardless of whether or not you follow me or reciprocate!

in honour of the new arthurian rpg im starting today with friends, let’s talk myths!

Are there some cool myths in our world you want to tell us about? Are there any that are particularly relevant to your characters or the goings on in the world right now? Let us know!

Alternatively, or if your stories are set in our world, tell us about your favourite myth or folk tale!

Happy creating everyone! ^^

[ Tag list: @adie-dee​, @justaleafinthewind @nightingalewritings​ @sleepysera​ ]

[eyeloch]

Goliath Lifebreakers

Goliath societies, nestled among the frigid peaks of bleak mountains, are often harsh and unforgiving.  However, the desire for fairness runs just as strong.  As such, in some tribes, their chief doesn’t have the final say in all disputes.  This is where a “Lifebreaker” comes in.

When disputes between (usually less than a handful of) tribe members happen it is the solemn duty of these folk to hear both sides of the story without bias, find whatever evidence may support these claims, and then punish those at fault. 

Those who would take credit for the accomplishments of others, distort the truth, or threaten their fellow tribesfolk with unearned power. . .well, there are but 3 punishments:

Death by means of hammer, axe or blade - whatever the Lifebreakers’ badge of office might be.

Scarring the offender, in patterns that could not have been earned in battle - so they can never hide their crimes.  In a fair few tribes, the patterns of scarring have developed a complex symbology.

Exile from the tribe (perhaps with some scars as a parting gift).

Each punishment will utterly change the life of that who they are inflicted upon - and often the life of the entire tribe, too.  This is how the role, and the individuals that have it, found the name “Lifebreaker”.

Some lifebreakers serve this role for but a short time - training a successor, then leaving this taxing role to the next set of capable hands.  Others shoulder this grim duty for the rest of their lives - perhaps to spare others the pain it can bring. ...still other use their position to threaten and control - manipulating and deal-making behind the scenes, to gain a quiet power over the lives of their entire tribe.

[bluebirddiary]

Thoughts on Magic.

Magic is about feelings. The fantasy (which is in an of itself a feeling) that our feelings can change The Rules. We are all sadly bound to this earth and victims of physics as a whole. Magic lets us ask “What if we weren’t tho?”

Magic systems change depending on how writers express these feelings and how what they feel they might impact the world. A persons magic system in a book often tells one about the author, the cost of writing a magic system is the cost of being Known.

Is the magic a narrative means to an end? Is it perhaps something that is rigid and must fit The Rules? Or is it a soft magic system that has a small sticky note behind it saying “I do what I want?”

Magic is about what we feel we need and how we may in the vaunted halls of sorcerous fantasy, accomplish what we need at any given time. Runes, chants, ley lines. Those are all common tropes but not necessarily the whole. We are social animals as human beings, our psyche is impacted by what came before. Is the written word a magic in itself for conveying these ideas? Is the written word therefore a system dedicated to describing systems?

If that is true we have a magic system here on earth. It causes hallucinations of grandeur or gritty grim dark visions. It gives us windows into the perceptions on how a writer solves problems, and how the consequences of those problems may manifest. The consequence of magic is to be known for how we would plunge into these unknowns as individuals.

The consequence of escapism is other people learn how to run away with you.