Establishing Factions and shit

[Sent]

Alright, so, we have this world, right? We can assume that what we have here is a typical Fantasy-esque place somewhere between dimensions, so it's left undiscovered and exists outside of time. This lets us be pretty loose with establishing things until we need to get downright canonical all up in this bitch, but let's assume what we have here is a sort of Conanean Hyperborea.

Shit we will need:

Histories and politics of characters and factions involved.
An established list of powers and abilities held by players, and how they were obtained.
Some rules on how mortal magic works, how it is harnessed, and what it can do.
Gods worshipped by players (If any) lore, philosophy, mythology and mysticism, and what they can do to help or hinder those that contact them.
Factions and who they are, how they got to this in-between that the Wolf God was in, and what they plan to do now.

We'll also have to do some world-building for the currently established wolf faction. Here's some food for thought:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cynocephaly

Here we have people (Probably Norse Mercernaries, if we're going to assume they aren't just a fictional scare tactic by the Lombards.) portrayed as canine monsters. They like their rare meat and their pillaging. They are typically portrayed as a tribal, pack-like warrior society in most cultures they show up in, or at the very least, are considered "Barbaric". Nevertheless, it's more apt than werewolves, because these guys are actually portrayed as having societies.

I'm thinking something like an Aztec society would be worth considering. People who work as a powerful warrior faction moving between various semi-permanent settlements and fortifications, with lots of nomadic branches and sub-packs. "Alpha" is a term that gets thrown around a lot, presumably based on how many people you can beat the shit out of in a formal challenge, effectively leading to a sort of feudal system where everyone struggles to be a certain tier of top dogs.

If you're demonstrably the "strongest" in a group, whether it be a social circle or a city council, or you have the "strongest" friends/family vouching for you, you're effectively in charge of that circle. And since Derp was weird in making wolf standards apply to ape cultures, you're only allowed to initiate sexual or romantic relationships with people who are subordinate to you, and you have to climb your way up. Because, let's face it, if Derp was actually the Alpha of a civilization, they would have a lot of trouble sustaining their numbers if the top alpha were the only one allowed to breed with people. He would NOT have time for all the porn he bragged about having before this.

Not all duels for power are trial by combat, though. You can challenge someone for their position in any number of ways, whether it's an arm-wrestling match, a balancing contest, or, say, a rap battle. You can always challenge the notion of what the contest should be, based on what the group values most. For example, if the group prefers fighting skill over tactful speech, the duel must be a combat rather than a philosophical debate, because they don't think it's important or useful. A duel can be cancelled only by a mutual agreement that the duel is no bueno and unneeded, and then nobody loses. Quitting by either the challenger or the challengee, without the other's explicit agreement, is considered a loss, and therefore the one still in the game wins and the one who quit is their direct subordinate.

Basically, I'm thinking this is how culture and politics would be for this main native faction in the game, but culture and shit takes time to build, so a faction war worthy of restoring the forum games will take a lot from everyone. Hopefully, this will get the site hopping again, if we don't fuck it up.

[Matthias]

What do you mean by rules for mortal magic? Like, rules on how we can use magic in general? Is the List of powers going to include magic or just some sort of special abilities and such?

[Sent]

Obviously if gods, creator gods, and magical creatures with their own rules come into play, they'll have their own exceptions as is necessary for their existence, but magic users that we play as will probably need a defined system that their powers can work on, so the physics of magic can work on the same logical, sense-making level that other physical forms of combat can work on, and we can use them in tactics.

[zaghero]

I like the sound of this. So you want us to brainstorm an entire world? Fun.

I say that the substance magic is produced from is simply an essence emitted by all things, and naturally pools and collects in different places. Therefore, some regions may have an abundance of mana, dreamstuff, or whatever we shall decide to call it and will be magically superior to other groups. While remaining parties may be of moderate magic power, while some may have none whatsoever, heavily relying on technology and strength.

So, the wolf people are an established race. They work within an organic hierarchy. That's cool. I'll think of some other races and parties or just submit stuff I have already created in my own works.

[Sent]

I like the idea of using energy from the universe around you, because it becomes something that you can measure that you need to obtain, and has a more tangible nature than the energy from within, but tying it to certain geographies makes it weird from a design standpoint. Genetics, technology, and resources can be transported, but if a naturally occurring energy pools out mostly in certain places, it makes even well-practiced magicians inconsistent and impractical in certain areas.

I would agree with the idea that magic could be something like Feng Shui, a flowing force that more or less moves through the world equally, but those who know a lot about how it works can draw it in, push it away, or influence its direction in ways that can give them the metaphysical high ground and influence the physical world around them. Except, y'know, instead of getting a raise at your job and keeping the sniffles away, it's toying with the direction of timespace and throwing fireballs at people. A mage could create areas of high magic and areas almost devoid of magic, but only in a specific area for a short amount of time before nature starts taking measures to balance itself again.

[Mardox]

I'll throw in the Nastrondi for this war.

[Sent]

Ooh, who are they? What are they like?

[Mardox]

Mar 9, 2017 10:52:51 GMT -5 Sent said:

Ooh, who are they? What are they like?

They are a people from a cold, mountainous land that supports very few crops but contains useful and sometimes valuable ores. They are mostly human although there has been some interbreeding with demons due to the invasions. They are skilled smiths and in their world, weapons and armor made by them are highly sought after. While they can raise some crops and trade their weapons and armor, this isn't enough to support their population and they have embraced the practice of raiding and the art of war. Their culture is highly militaristic and has an absolute monarchy with the people being fanatically loyal to their leader Nieldun Gildedtongue. Some of their traditions are considered barbaric with one example being that they make rugs out of the skins of their defeated enemies. Loyalty and honor are the most important values and given the choice between killing an enemy and killing a traitor, any Nastrondi will choose to kill the traitor almost regardless of who the traitor betrayed. They do not have much magic with what they do have being some limited abilities with hellfire inherited from demon ancestors and the ability to speak to ghosts/spirits.

TLDR: Fantasy warriors, highly ferocious, well-equipped, well-trained, low-magic, late medieval tech.

[Sent]

If they settle mountains, they may have to compete with Penguinites, since they're also mountain/coastline settlers.

And let it be known that Penguinites aren't usually spellcasters, but they do practice necromancy to get by. In Ankea where they come from, "Somamancy", or mastery over flesh energies, is how the dead are raised and also how health-potions and similar curatives are made. They also have a tendency to sacrifice their criminals and enslave their bodies, and it's traditional for the family badass to request to be charmed and buried on the outskirts of their home-village (and, in rare cases during dangerous times, be exhumed by their family and brought on any travelling excursions) to serve as guardians to descendants and loved ones in the physical world. This plays heavily into their ideas about ancestor worship and the afterlife as many separate dimensions. They're also big into enchantments and conjuring, since they're generally able to bind and associate themselves with certain artifacts after death (Or before death, if they can reach a state of deep meditation) in order to give them magical powers and aspects. So, where in most cultures an ancestral weapon passed down for generations is a symbolic, decorative gesture, the century-old knife your dad left you in his will before getting killed in battle is an actual superweapon that drinks blood and spits fire or whathaveyou.

[Mardox]

Mar 10, 2017 11:06:38 GMT -5 Sent said:

If they settle mountains, they may have to compete with Penguinites, since they're also mountain/coastline settlers.

And let it be known that Penguinites aren't usually spellcasters, but they do practice necromancy to get by. In Ankea where they come from, "Somamancy", or mastery over flesh energies, is how the dead are raised and also how health-potions and similar curatives are made. They also have a tendency to sacrifice their criminals and enslave their bodies, and it's traditional for the family badass to request to be charmed and buried on the outskirts of their home-village (and, in rare cases during dangerous times, be exhumed by their family and brought on any travelling excursions) to serve as guardians to descendants and loved ones in the physical world. This plays heavily into their ideas about ancestor worship and the afterlife as many separate dimensions. They're also big into enchantments and conjuring, since they're generally able to bind and associate themselves with certain artifacts after death (Or before death, if they can reach a state of deep meditation) in order to give them magical powers and aspects. So, where in most cultures an ancestral weapon passed down for generations is a symbolic, decorative gesture, the century-old knife your dad left you in his will before getting killed in battle is an actual superweapon that drinks blood and spits fire or whathaveyou.

That reminds me. In rare cases, a Nastrondi spirit will stick around one of their descendants and offer guidance. In drastic scenarios, the guiding spirit will (with the permission of the descendant) possess the descendant to unleash their power. Usually the spirits are around because they did some fucked-up stuff in life and either by choice or by curse, they have to atone by helping their descendants become heroes. I already have an idea for one character who is pretty much descended from the Big Bad Wolf who is haunted/guided in this way.

[Sent]

Yeah, Penguinites have a similar sort of punishment thing going, but instead of being forced to atone for their sins through divine judgement, it's because their ancestors and other more powerful spirits, like Gods, will not accept them as 1st class citizens in the afterlife until they are seen as fulfilled/righteous beings. "Sins" that get you kicked down rungs on the ghost ladder can range from being an asshole to living an incomplete life, or running from unfinished business. While you're never explicitly kicked out, you're not welcome, and it's hard to live well. (Similar to the Chinese belief that when you burn money for your ancestors, you're giving them something to pay to the military ghosts who rob them.) So they come back down and live with their family and seek guidance, or get really desperate and try to take life from other people.

This ties into stuff like Penguinite Exorcism, where priests go about getting spirits to possess them and then trapping the ghosts in their own mind until they can be sent back to the spirit realm or there's a suitable vessel to contain them in.

[Mardox]

Mar 13, 2017 8:29:40 GMT -5 Sent said:

Yeah, Penguinites have a similar sort of punishment thing going, but instead of being forced to atone for their sins through divine judgement, it's because their ancestors and other more powerful spirits, like Gods, will not accept them as 1st class citizens in the afterlife until they are seen as fulfilled/righteous beings. "Sins" that get you kicked down rungs on the ghost ladder can range from being an asshole to living an incomplete life, or running from unfinished business. While you're never explicitly kicked out, you're not welcome, and it's hard to live well. (Similar to the Chinese belief that when you burn money for your ancestors, you're giving them something to pay to the military ghosts who rob them.) So they come back down and live with their family and seek guidance, or get really desperate and try to take life from other people.

This ties into stuff like Penguinite Exorcism, where priests go about getting spirits to possess them and then trapping the ghosts in their own mind until they can be sent back to the spirit realm or there's a suitable vessel to contain them in.

Sounds like the Penguinites and Nastrondi have a good amount in common. Also, I have already been doing some writing with the character, though it's a very different setting and it was a collaborative effort.