A Fantasy Sandbox in Detail Part XXI

Part XX
This is the twentieth first in a series detailing the 34 steps I recommended for making a Fantasy Sandbox Campaign. Today's post will cover some clean up of the details of step 27. First I forgot to link in the generator files files for the names I created for the description. The post been updated and you can download them from here. Remember they are for NBos' Inspiration Pad Pro 3.

Pick or create 6 or 12 important buildings. Write a paragraph each

The final step once you detailed everything is place the businesses in the town.
First a numbered index

1) Chandler
2) Finesmith
3) Finesmith
4) Herbalist
5) Jeweler, Quality
6) Jeweler, Quality
7) The Leathercrafters of Piall*
8) King’s Sheriff
9) Mikva Trading Hall
10) Ostler
11) Temple of Veritas
12) Sea Brethren Hall
13) Resident Mage
14) Potion Shop
15) Tailor’s Guild*
16) The Red Wench (tavern)
17) The House of Fish (tavern)
18) The Oaken House (inn)
19) Weaponsmith
20) Weavers*
*These three business have multiple locations in Mikva.

1) Chandler
Since chandlers more or less function as general stores I will place this in the market.

2) Finesmith
Ecgric sounds like he would be in a better section of town.

3) Finesmith
Leudast would want to be near the wharves for his business and his connection to Piall's Thieves Guild.

4) Herbalist
Morath and Bernira seems like they would be in the common section of town but in a nice building.

5) Jeweler, Quality
6) Jeweler, Quality
Both jewelers would be in the heart of Mikva off of the main market square.

7) The Leathercrafters of Piall*
All but two are on the south side of Mikva near the swamp to keep the odor of the tanning process away from town. The two are located near the market square as they specialized solely on finished leather goods.

8) King’s Sheriff
The sheriff has his quarter in the building in the back of the Trading Hall.

9) Mikva Trading Hall
One of the more prominent building in Mikva and on the Market square.

10) Ostler
I placed near one of the larger buildings that has access to an large open space where they let the horses graze.

11) Temple of Veritas
The biggest building in Mikva outside of the Baron's castle.

12) Sea Brethren Hall
Next to the Wharf.

13) Resident Mage
Occupies one of the finer buildings.

14) Potion Shop
Occupies one of the building in the common quarter of Mikva.

15) Tailor’s Guild*
The tailors congrete in teh northwest corner of Mikva, except for one who does most of his trade with sailors and boat owners.

16) The Red Wench (tavern)
In the center of the commoner's quarter.

17) The House of Fish (tavern)
At the south end of the Wharf.

18) The Oaken House (inn)
And Mikva's high end estabilshment is off of the Market Square.

19) Weaponsmith
As a high end profession, Fikki has his shop next to the Market Square.

20) Weavers*
Four of the weavers live in the southeast corner of Mikva. Two are near the wharf and mostly produce canvas for the sea trade.

And now the finished map for Mikva

That it for part XXI next is Part XXII where we start fleshing out NPCs and monsters.

Taking a hard look at the Dungeon Fantasy RPG

So the Dungeon Fantasy Kickstarter is now live. And yes I pledged.

I also quickly joined in the choir asking "Where are the PDFs?". True to form SJ Games responded by incorporating PDFs as an option for pledging. Although there will confusion because apparently Kickstarter allow pledge levels descriptions to change after the campaign started.

It a bit gratifying to see this project because I been advocating this for a long time. I have to admit my tone got more critical over the years as GURPS market presence dwindled over the last decade. Probably annoying the SJ Games staff . In the end I was hammering on the fact if the OSR can revive older games on a shoestring budget what is SJ Games excuse? Even with the OSR success, market wise we are at the SAME level as GURPS and other 2nd tier RPG publishers. And that is only if you pool what everybody does in the OSR together. SJ Games and GURPS alway has the fanbase, they need to give them the product.

And boy they really went all in on this with a boxed and physical components. And it looks like they really took the lesson learned from the Ogre Kickstarter to heart and are proceeding very modestly in what the kickstarter will be offering. The prices of $50+shipping is not too bad for a boxed set that includes token and maps.

Some will wonder at the $100,000 goal, you have to remember that SJ Game bread and butter are Munchkin, board games, and then GURPS a very distant third. In the stakeholder report you can see how Munchkin just grew and grew and grew, knocking GURPS down on the company's priorities. So in order for them justify the labor spent they have to get a return equal to at least to the other board games they released. Steve Jackson and their staff love GURPS but that has to bend in light of the fact that there is a company that needs to be run.

Looking through my forum posts I found this from 2008.

In it said a Complete GURPS Dungeons Fantasy RPG needs to have.

• Introduction - check since is a given that they will have some type of intro.
• Character Creation - check
• Combat, Basic - Looks like it will be tweaked condensed version of the core book combat rules which is fine because even the core book combat rules have options to vary the complexity and detail. As long as they keep the defense roll (there is an opposed roll option), I will give this a check. Also it points out a flaw with my original idea in that they accounted for everything else and lumping it all together as Exploits.
• Combat, Advanced - going to to rely on the core books and the DF PDF line for this. That OK especially in light that this project is going to a lead-in to the GURPS product line.
• Magic - check, right in the kickstarter description one of the books will be about spells.
• Monsters - check, again in the kickstarter description there is a book called Monsters
• Treasure - check, covered in the Exploits book.
• Starting Setting, - They are including a 24 page adventure with a inn where they start out at. I will give this a partial check. Plus I am going to be pessimistic about this because SJ Games is not really known for having good adventures for GURPS. Fortunately one of the few good adventures was made for the DF Line.  Mirror of the Fire Demon.

Last I said 

Do this in 256 pages. Sell it along side the other GURPS Books. Have three 32 to 64 pages adventures available as well. This is not a replacement but rather the entry point to the larger GURPS line.

The total of all five books comes 408 pages. Frankly 256 pages is a wild ass guess. What important that you got the basic list covered in spells, monsters, magic items, and other stuff. If that takes 408 pages with the rules then so be it. DnD 5e has 1,002 pages scattered across three book so I give this a check. As for the adventures, obviously those will only come if the line is a success so that one is pushed to the future. Finally, yes it is indeed being marketed as a intro to the GURPS line, the physical component should make it that much more attractive, so a definite check there.

So with all these checks, yeah I pledged.

A Fantasy Sandbox in Detail Part XX

Part XIX
This is the twentieth in a series detailing the 34 steps I recommended for making a Fantasy Sandbox Campaign. Today's post will cover the rest of step 27.

Pick or create 6 or 12 important buildings. Write a paragraph each

In the last post, I did some preliminary work and used random tables in various ways to generate ideas. Now I am going to take this random information and pick out what I feel to be interesting elements. Then write a couple of sentences about the place. I use an old name table out of Dragon Magazine as the basis for my names. There are only 20 male and female entries for each type so I split them into a prefix and a suffix which gives me nearly 400 combinations. You can download this table from here.

I also try to include the age of the NPCs which is a useful aide to roleplaying. Another thing I do is try to interconnect characters with each other and places I already described. In general it enough to start off with one or two of these and leave it at that. Also remember that the amount of local interconnection is going to outnumber connections outside of the regions especially for fantasy medieval settings like the Island of Piall.

I also add notes on quality and prices. Harn from Columbia Games does this in their description of shops and I found it to be useful a general guide when price and service aggregations come into play.

Details

Big GURPS Dungeon Fantasy News

Well hot damn, SJ Games is doing a kickstarter to release a powered by GURPS Dungeon Fantasy RPG. And it is a boxed set no less with five books inside.

While I wasn't expecting a boxed set, this is something that I been advocating for a long time over on the GURPS forum. There are posts from me from as early as 2008 saying that this should be done. As well as the equivalents for the other major genres like Science Fiction and Horror. If this is successful we may see similar Powered by GURPS RPGS from SJGames.

Also note they are stressing the Ready to Run aspect which was a point I kept hammering to point where I was probably very annoying to a lot of the GURPS staff.

Back in the early 2000s after a few campaign of GURPS 4e under my belt I wished for three things from SJ Games

• Better support for the fantasy genre. Which I got in the Dungeon Fantasy
• Ready to run out of box GURPS RPG. Which is now happening.
• A Third party content program.

Dare I hope for a triple? Probably will have to wait a while considering how long it took for the first two.

I keep everybody posted on further developments.

An update on the Majestic Stars and other things

First off, I will posting part 20 of the Fantasy Sandbox series tomorrow. I plan to update the sandbox series every Tuesday and Thursday until it done. Here to hoping that plans don't go awry.

Some bad news on the Majestic Star front, the campaign fell apart due to real life circumstances so that is done for now.  Plus I contacted Green Ronin and they are not interested in any type of third party development for the AGE system right now. 

However luckily half of the work I did on the Majestic Star is pulled out of the d20 Modern SRD so I will able to reuse a lot of it for a similar game. Right now I am pulling together DnD 5e, d20 Modern, and the Mongoose Traveller SRD and seeing what I get. 

Hopefully I get enough done to inflict it on the J Squad at Gold Star Anime on the 10th.

So everybody knows Jason Kemp of Samardan Press pulled together an excellent retro-clone of Traveller with the Cepheus Engine System. What happened is that Mongoose Publishing went ahead and released a 2nd edition of Mongoose Traveller. The problem is that they decided to drop OGL support and the Logo program in favor using the Community Content program over on the various OBS web sites. Well that problem is fine if you want to publish Third Imperium related material. But for publishers with original setting it totally screwed them.

And just like DnD 4e, they don't have to wait for Mongoose to fix the situation, they returned using the 1st edition SRD and now using a variety of euphemism to indicate that they are still supporting traveller (2d6, etc).  This situation leads to people, like Jason Kemp, to create full rule sets to serve as a reference and play aid for these publishers.

The lesson to be learned from all this, is the if you are a publisher with a long established product line and you decide to break compatibility either totally or partially. Your customers won't view this as a favor. So you better have a damn good reason other than you want to "improve" it.

  

A Fantasy Sandbox in Detail Part XIX

After a long hiatus the How to Make a Fantasy Sandbox series is going to be finished.

Part XVIII
This is the nineteenth in a series detailing the 34 steps I recommended for making a Fantasy Sandbox Campaign. Today's post will cover part of step 27.

Pick or create 6 or 12 important buildings. Write a paragraph each

One reason for the long gap in time is that my original advice boiled down to “make something up”.  I wanted to write something more concrete than that. So over the next couple of projects and campaigns, I experimented with a variety of methods that helped me to make stuff up.

One thing I found is just how useful random tables are. I said in previous posts that the amount of ideas what we have for a project is a dozen or two, the rest we have to make it up on the fly as we write. A random table can very useful as it is far easier to explain something than it is to make something up out of whole cloth.

So let’s get started. In the last post we came up with a list of 75 buildings for the castle town of Mikva. Out of that list I am going to pick the following.

chandler
finesmith
finesmith
herbalist
jeweler
jeweler
leathercrafter*
legal
merchant
ostler
religious
sailor
scholar      
scholar      
tailor*
tavern        
tavern        
tavern
weaponsmith
weaver*

The ones I marked with an asterisk I am going to make notes on the guild as well as individual NPCs. There are 10 leathercrafters, 8 tailors, and 6 weavers so those will be probably the most important and powerful of the Mikva Guilds.

Next I refine the list with what I know from the description of Mikva

0403 Mikva (castle, town) HumanThis is a small castle town of 800 humans with several dozen Dwarves and Halflings. The castle itself sits on a bluff overlooking the bay. It is the seat of the current Baron of Piall, Argus Gervon. A several trading vessels stop here every week to pick up ingots from Southpoint. Before the fall monsoon season dozens of traders put in at Mikva to attend the Piall Fair. Here the island’s grain, and more importantly wool is traded for goods and supplies needed for the next year.

Currently the King’s Sheriff Tomar Revan is staying at the one of the wealthiest merchants in Mikva; the Honorable Orlon Beras. The Sheriff is currently using offices at the Mikva Trading Hall to conduct his investigation and any other Royal business. There is considerable tension between Baron Argus and the Sheriff.

Finally I will use NBos’ Inspiration Pad Pro 3 to generate some Tavern names.

Revised List
chandler
finesmith
finesmith
herbalist
jeweler
jeweler
leathercrafter*
King’s Sheriff
Mikva Trading Hall
ostler
Temple of Veritas
sailor
scholar      
scholar      
tailor*
The Red Wench (tavern)
The House of Fish (tavern)
The Oaken House (inn)
weaponsmith
weaver

Now for some inspiration from random tables.

Next random table time, I am going to randomly roll the NPC Personality of each of the shops. The tables I found to be the most useful is a combination of the ADnD's NPC personality traits and a table on NPC personality and motivations from Paizo Gamemastery Guide. I coded up both for use with Inspiration Pad Pro which you can download from here.

Raw Results for the NPC Personalities
Chandler
Alignment: chaotic good, Possessions: above average
Age: mature, General: imposing, Sanity: normal
General Tendencies: malevolent, Personality: Average: friendly, Disposition: morose,
Nature: hard-hearted, Honesty: scrupulous, Energy: energetic, Morals: immoral, Intellect: average,
Materialism: aesthetic, Bravery: cowardly, Thrift: wastrel, Piety: martyr/zealot, Interests: wines 8 spirits
Background: Military Veteran, Goal: Achieve a higher social rank, Physical: Calloused hands,
Personality: Tosses a coin to make decisions.,
Secrets: Has a secret illness, Reward: Loan you property

Finesmith
Alignment: neutral, Possessions: scant
Age: youthful, General: rough, Sanity: normal
General Tendencies: opinionated/contrary, Personality: Average: well-spoken, Disposition: unfeeling/insensitive,
Nature: forgiving, Honesty: deceitful, Energy: normal, Morals: lustful, Intellect: anti-intellectual,
Materialism: greedy, Bravery: craven, Thrift: mean, Piety: reverent, Interests: drugs
Background: Killed someone in self-defense, Goal: Marry a prince/princess, Physical: Homely,
Personality: Polite bus calls attention to it with elaborate bows or other gestures.,
Secrets: Is the bastard child of a noble, Reward: Offer the hand of a relative in marriage

Finesmith
Alignment: neutral evil, Possessions: average
Age: ancient, General: immaculate, Sanity: normal
General Tendencies: moody, Personality: Introverted: rude, Disposition: unfeeling/insensitive,
Nature: vengeful, Honesty: average, Energy: normal, Morals: virtuous, Intellect: average,
Materialism: greedy, Bravery: fearless, Thrift: average, Piety: reverent, Interests: politics
Background: Criminal who retired after betraying rest of gang, Goal: Find a better job, Physical: Very hairy,
Personality: Ask rude question without realizing they cause offense,
Secrets: Is a member of a secret local cult, Reward: Sabotage a bridge, road, or something equally important

Herbalist
Alignment: neutral, Possessions: scant
Age: youthful, General: imposing, Sanity: unstable
General Tendencies: malevolent, Personality: Average  Disposition: compassionate/sensitive,
Nature: vengeful, Honesty: very honorable, Energy: normal, Morals: virtuous, Intellect: dull,
Materialism: covetous, Bravery: normal, Thrift: mean, Piety: reverent, Interests: athletics
Background: Pious member of a notorious family, Goal: Find a better job, Physical: Scarred from pox,
Personality: Compulsively wipes or cleans things.,
Secrets: Is secretly related to another NPC, Reward: Take the blame (and punishment) for a minor crime

Jeweler
Alignment: neutral, Possessions: scant
Age: mature, General: dirty, Sanity: normal
General Tendencies: altruist, Personality: Extroverted: blustering, Disposition: morose,
Nature: forgiving, Honesty: liar, Energy: energetic, Morals: lustful, Intellect: scheming,
Materialism: avaricious, Bravery: normal, Thrift: spendthrift, Piety: average, Interests: none
Background: Criminal who retired after betraying rest of gang, Goal: Become the recipient of a actual miracle, Physical: Different colored eyes,
Personality: Blames trolls for every trouble he encounters,
Secrets: Has some orc blood in their family, Reward: Look after your home while you are away

Jeweler
Alignment: chaotic good, Possessions: above average
Age: ancient, General: rough, Sanity: unstable
General Tendencies: helpful/kindly, Personality: Extroverted: blustering, Disposition: proudlhaughty,
Nature: soft-hearted, Honesty: deceitful, Energy: lazy, Morals: amoral, Intellect: average,
Materialism: avaricious, Bravery: normal, Thrift: miserly, Piety: average, Interests: gambling
Background: Refugee from land overrun by evil, Goal: Move out of parents' house, Physical: Crack knuckles,
Personality: Give people nicknames or uses terms of endearment,
Secrets: Is an assassin, Reward: Offer the hand of a relative in marriage

leathercrafter*
Alignment: chaotic neutral, Possessions: scant
Age: young, General: rough, Sanity: normal
General Tendencies: precise/exacting, Personality: Average: well-spoken, Disposition: even tempered,
Nature: vengeful, Honesty: very honorable, Energy: lazy, Morals: virtuous, Intellect: active,
Materialism: intellectualist, Bravery: normal, Thrift: wastrel, Piety: average, Interests: handicrafts
Background: Outwitted a powerful monster, Goal: Become a hero, Physical: Jolly looking,
Personality: Acts like someone from a lower social class as a sing of solidarity but comes across offensive instead.,
Secrets: Knows how to placate an angry ghost, Reward: Follow someone for you

King’s Sheriff
Alignment: neutral evil, Possessions: superabundant
Age: young, General: dandyish, Sanity: normal
General Tendencies: altruist, Personality: Average: friendly, Disposition: even tempered,
Nature: jealous, Honesty: deceitful, Energy: lazy, Morals: aesthetic, Intellect: active,
Materialism: intellectualist, Bravery: fearless, Thrift: mean, Piety: average, Interests: none
Background: Practiced magic before a traumatizing accident, Goal: Find a new home for a mistreated animal, Physical: Double chinned,
Personality: Asks for advice or opinions about very unlikely situations,
Secrets: Is being blackmailed, Reward: Pay for your lodgings

Mikva Trading Hall
Alignment: neutral evil, Possessions: exceptional
Age: mature, General: foppish, Sanity: normal
General Tendencies: trusting, Personality: Average: aloof, Disposition: easy going,
Nature: hard-hearted, Honesty: average, Energy: energetic, Morals: normal, Intellect: active,
Materialism: avaricious, Bravery: cowardly, Thrift: wastrel, Piety: average, Interests: armor
Background: Criminal who retired after betraying rest of gang, Goal: Get cured of a disease of affliction, Physical: Pierced ears,
Personality: Delighted by puns and other sorts of work games,
Secrets: Has a secret stash of funds, Reward: Loan you property

Ostler
Alignment: lawful evil, Possessions: scant
Age: mature, General: immaculate, Sanity: unstable
General Tendencies: helpful/kindly, Personality: Average: diplomatic, Disposition: humble,
Nature: jealous, Honesty: very honorable, Energy: energetic, Morals: immoral, Intellect: ponderous,
Materialism: greedy, Bravery: brave, Thrift: spendthrift, Piety: reverent, Interests: athletics
Background: Left at the altar, Goal: Erase past failure with a single dramatic act, Physical: Sneezes a lot,
Personality: Question others about their background in order to determine if they are "suitable",
Secrets: Is a member of a secret local cult, Reward: Organize a festival or other public event

Temple of Veritas
Alignment: neutral, Possessions: average
Age: youthful, General: ragged, Sanity: normal
General Tendencies: optimist, Personality: Extroverted: overbearing, Disposition: morose,
Nature: soft-hearted, Honesty: truthful, Energy: normal, Morals: aesthetic, Intellect: brilliant,
Materialism: covetous, Bravery: foolhardy, Thrift: wastrel, Piety: martyr/zealot, Interests: husbandry
Background: Ran for office and suffered a humiliating defeat, Goal: Earn enough money to retire, Physical: Covered in tattoos,
Personality: Name drops constantly,
Secrets: Knows how to get the oracle to answer truthfully, Reward: Boycott one of you rivals or enemies

Sailor
Alignment: lawful evil, Possessions: average
Age: young, General: imposing, Sanity: normal
General Tendencies: fanatical/obsessive, Personality: Average: abrasive, Disposition: humble,
Nature: vengeful, Honesty: average, Energy: normal, Morals: lustful, Intellect: average,
Materialism: intellectualist, Bravery: normal, Thrift: spendthrift, Piety: impious, Interests: hunting
Background: Killed someone in self-defense, Goal: Solve a mystery no one else really cares about, Physical: Tall,
Personality: Ask a kobold glove puppet it's opinion at inopportune moments.,
Secrets: Murdered spouse, Reward: Call in an important favor and use it one your behalf

scholar  
Alignment: neutral good, Possessions: superabundant
Age: mature, General: imposing, Sanity: maniacal
General Tendencies: studious, Personality: Introverted: taciturn, Disposition: even tempered,
Nature: forgiving, Honesty: average, Energy: slothful, Morals: normal, Intellect: active,
Materialism: greedy, Bravery: craven, Thrift: wastrel, Piety: iconoclastic, Interests: handicrafts
Background: Once owned an inn that was burnt down by bandits, Goal: Impress a disapproving parent, Physical: Many tattoos,
Personality: Always has a reason why something won't work,
Secrets: has a secret identity, Reward: Pay for your meals
   
scholar 
Alignment: neutral good, Possessions: superabundant
Age: young, General: ragged, Sanity: normal
General Tendencies: careless, Personality: Average: hostile, Disposition: compassionate/sensitive,
Nature: hard-hearted, Honesty: truthful, Energy: normal, Morals: virtuous, Intellect: scheming,
Materialism: covetous, Bravery: cowardly, Thrift: miserly, Piety: average, Interests: history
Background: Ran away as a youth and joined the circus., Goal: Travel, Physical: Terrible facial disease,
Personality: Always has a reason why something won't work,
Secrets: Has some orc blood in their family, Reward: Wash or mend your clothes and equipment
     
tailor*
Alignment: neutral good, Possessions: none
Age: mature, General: dandyish, Sanity: normal
General Tendencies: foul/barbaric, Personality: Average: abrasive, Disposition: humble,
Nature: soft-hearted, Honesty: scrupulous, Energy: driven, Morals: immoral, Intellect: ponderous,
Materialism: avaricious, Bravery: brave, Thrift: miserly, Piety: average, Interests: legends
Background: Comes from a long line of tanners, Goal: Become a monster, Physical: Winks a lot,
Personality: Refers to self in third person,
Secrets: Knows why no one in the village eats meat anymore., Reward: Sell you goods at a discount

The Red Wench (tavern)
Alignment: lawful neutral, Possessions: average
Age: mature, General: foppish, Sanity: unstable
General Tendencies: precise/exacting, Personality: Average: diplomatic, Disposition: compassionate/sensitive,
Nature: vengeful, Honesty: average, Energy: lazy, Morals: normal, Intellect: average,
Materialism: avaricious, Bravery: brave, Thrift: average, Piety: average, Interests: none
Background: Falsely convicted and escaped from jail., Goal: Get in better shape and learn to fight, Physical: Twitches,
Personality: Give people nicknames or uses terms of endearment,
Secrets: Is an obsessive collector hoarder, Reward: Bury or high something dangerous
   
The House of Fish (tavern)
Alignment: lawful neutral, Possessions: average
Age: mature, General: imposing, Sanity: normal
General Tendencies: malevolent, Personality: Average: friendly, Disposition: morose,
Nature: hard-hearted, Honesty: average, Energy: normal, Morals: amoral, Intellect: anti-intellectual,
Materialism: intellectualist, Bravery: normal, Thrift: average, Piety: impious, Interests: books & scrolls
Background: Wanted for serious crime, Goal: Visit the next village, Physical: Covered in pustules,
Personality: Collects small, relatively worthless objects like spoons, salt shaker, or win corks; enthusiastically inspects any encountered and extols their "unique" qualities,
Secrets: Knows command word for a magic item, Reward: Follow someone for you
     
The Oaken House (tavern)
Alignment: lawful good, Possessions: above average
Age: mature, General: non-descript, Sanity: normal
General Tendencies: pessimist, Personality: Average: , Disposition: ,
Nature: hard-hearted, Honesty: deceitful, Energy: normal, Morals: lustful, Intellect: scheming,
Materialism: average, Bravery: normal, Thrift: spendthrift, Piety: pious, Interests: community service
Background: Left at the altar, Goal: Solve a murder, Physical: Moustache,
Personality: Says everything in a profound way,
Secrets: Knows why no one in the village eats meat anymore., Reward: Spy on your behalf

Weaponsmith
Alignment: neutral, Possessions: none
Age: young, General: clean, Sanity: unstable
General Tendencies: trusting, Personality: Extroverted: friendly, Disposition: proud/haughty,
Nature: jealous, Honesty: scrupulous, Energy: slothful, Morals: lusty, Intellect: dull,
Materialism: covetous, Bravery: brave, Thrift: miserly, Piety: irreverent, Interests: husbandry
Background: Pledged to keep a fantastic secret, Goal: Learn to gamble, Physical: Bald,
Personality: Complains about smells no one else notices,
Secrets: Knows where a magic item is buried, Reward: Tend your mount

Weaver*
Alignment: neutral, Possessions: scant
Age: ancient, General: ragged, Sanity: normal
General Tendencies: sober, Personality: Average: aloof, Disposition: hot tempered,
Nature: forgiving, Honesty: deceitful, Energy: slothful, Morals: aesthetic, Intellect: anti-intellectual,
Materialism: avaricious, Bravery: fearless, Thrift: mean, Piety: saintly, Interests: none
Background: Killed someone in self-defense, Goal: Find a better job, Physical: One eye,
Personality: Makes up seemingly arbitrary rules etiquette.,
Secrets: Is a paladin working undercover, Reward: Compose a poem praising your prowess

That it for part XIX next is Part XX where I translate the raw work above into actual details.

Majestic Stars Update

Back in the early 90's I would hand out updates before each session. Updates were one page documents covering various aspect of the Majestic Wilderlands. They were meant as easily digestible chunks of the back story of the setting. Some were pretty broad while other were specific.

So I am going to revive the tradition for the Majestic Stars.

Majestic Stars Update #1

What year it is?
The year is 2425.

Where is the campaign located at?
The Artemis Space Station located in the HiP 38392 system. The main star classification is G7V, slightly cooler than Earth’ Sun which is G2V.

What is the Artemis Station?
It is a commercial station built by the Selene Republic with aid from all of the major powers to handle trade and culture exchange with the Saurian Commonwealth. It is in the L5 point between the planet Selene and its Sun. There is small but rich asteroid field at the L5 point that is known as the Outback. It is actively mined by Belters to provide the station with resources.

The station can support a permanent population of up to 35,000 sentient beings. There are currently 30,000 humans, 2,000 Saurians, and 1,000 Kang’rits resident on the station. The station has been in operation for two years.

Who runs the Station?
The Astroguard handles the day to day administration of the station. The Selene Republic supplies magistrates and ombudsmen to handle judicial affairs. Overall station policy and contact with the Saurian Commonwealth is handled by a United Colony advisory council with representatives from all the major human powers and headed by a governor appointed by the Selene Republic.

The current governor is Rosette Alcantar who works with the Station’s commander, Captain Anton Pikova of the Astroguard.

What is the Outback?
It is a small asteroid field circling the L5 point between Selene and its sun. It is home to one thousand belters mining volatiles and metals for processing at the station. The main station is buried in the asteroid Perth with 200 permanent residents and up to 300 transits at any one time.

What are the United Colonies?
The United Colonies are a loose association of major and minor powers. It is similar to the 20th/21st century United Nations however it is more focused on managing certain interstellar organizations than being a diplomatic forum.

The two most important organizations it manages are the Astroguard and the Interstellar Astronomical Union (IAU). The Astroguard are a multi-national military dedicated to exploration, search & rescue, and anti-piracy patrols. They function as an interstellar Coast Guard. The Interstellar Astronomical Union registers space claims and acts as investigation agency of human right abuses.

Who are the major powers?
They are the Earth Union, the United States centered on Alpha Centauri. The United Kingdom, the French Union, and the German Federation centered on Epsilon Eridani. And the People’s Republic of the Chinese centered on Epsilon Indi.

There are numerous smaller independent powers as result of the human diaspora. It is not uncommon for worlds and star systems to be divided into multiple independent nations, colonies, etc.

Who are the Saurians?
The Saurians are not the ancient race sentient dinosaurs but more recently evolved. First contact was 50 years ago and it was with a group of Saurians calling themselves the Commonwealth. It appears that the dominant Saurian culture is a single empire ruled by an immortal emperor. The Commonwealth are comprised of dissidents and refugees who have fled beyond the borders of imperial space. The Saurians appears to be a century ahead of humanity in technology.

Current News, January 3rd 2425

The Barron Consulate has petitioned the United Colonies for a seat on the Artemis Station’s advisory council.

Ellena Bucanan dies in from an illegal firework display occurring during the New Year Festival held by the Mesic Dockworkers Coop.

Protein output triples in 2424 over 2423. Agriculture Commissioner Arios Koviria is to receive this year’s Disheva Award of Excellence.

Newton Kader is to be sentenced next Friday, the 10th, after being found guilty of embezzling funds from the Four Stars Credit Union.

Arguments continues after last week’s heated exchange at the Station Round Table over the rising transport fees to the Outback and Selene.

New stationwide update to fabricators is being posted on the 4th to censor the manufacture of Strokon and Waxet, two drugs that were found to be highly addictive to Saurians.

The Station Maintenance schedule has been posted. Click to find scheduled shutdowns and service reductions.

Diturisaurs were found to be the cause of the power outage on Level 4’s Block E-4. Residents are advised to call 811 to report any sightings.

On Monday the 6th, the Commonwealth-Selene Cultural Exchange will make the works of K’Sudai, A’Morko, and K’Tipa available on the Omninet. The three are noted historical fiction authors in Saurian literature. February’s drop will be focused on the romance genre.