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Posts tagged ‘in the shadow of the spire’

Ptolus - In the Shadow of the Spire
IN THE SHADOW OF THE SPIRE

SESSION 22A: RETURN TO PYTHONESS HOUSE

May 18th, 2008
The 10th Day of Kadal in the 790th Year of the Seyrunian Dynasty

Dominic was led inside the cathedral. Tee, seeing him go, quickly followed. Agnarr, Ranthir, and Tor came too. The Order of the Dawn moved to block them at the cathedral’s door. Tee called out to Dominic, but Dominic – nursing his distracted thoughts and worries – didn’t hear her. Fortunately, Tee’s efforts were enough to convince the guard that they could enter.

They caught up to Dominic just as Rehobath’s procession came to a stop in the sacred hall. The newly-anointed Novarch turned to Dominic and smiled, “Thank you, Dominic. Without your guidance this day would not have been possible. Now I feel as if our paths must part, at least for awhile. We must each work for the gods in our own ways, after all.”

This suited Dominic just fine, who had just been trying to figure out how he could get away from Rehobath and his politics without letting him know how he truly felt.

“Now,” Rehobath said. “Is there anything else I can do for you… for any of you?” His gaze took in Tee and the others.

Dominic seemed ready to get out of there, but Tee wasn’t satisfied yet. “Do you think Dominic will be safe?”

“Two members of the Order of the Dawn are already waiting at the Ghostly Minstrel, as you had requested.” Rehobath smiled. “Do you think more guards might be needed?”

“No,” Tee said, glancing towards Dominic. “That should be fine.”

They headed back outside. Dominic leaned towards Tee. “I need to get out of these robes,” he said. “I don’t feel right in them.”

“You can borrow one of my kilts,” Agnarr offered.

Dominic caught a whiff of Agnarr’s unique odor as he leaned in close. “Um…” He shook his head. “No thanks.”

They met up with Elestra, who had spent her time outside circulating through the crowd. “Everyone here seems pretty excited by this. They’re all talking about the dawn of a new age. But I’ve also heard quite a few of them talking about how they knew to be here. I think the crowd was hand-picked.”

“Doesn’t surprise me,” Tee said. “Come on, lets get out of here.”

When they had gotten some distance away from the cathedral, Dominic stopped and pulled off the purple prelate robes that Rehobath had given to him. He turned to the others. “Does anybody else want to go delving for a couple of weeks?” (more…)

IN THE SHADOW OF THE SPIRE

Liquid light in a diamond flask was brought forth. The glowing liquid was poured across Rehobath’s brow, bathing him in its light as it coursed down over his shoulders.

A circlet of elfin gold was produced and placed upon Rehobath’s brow. As it settled into place, the liquid light flowed back up across his body, becoming concentrated in a great glowing bauble that shone forth from his forehead.

About twenty years ago now, I opened a Word document on my computer and saved it as “Fantasy Materials.” It was originally intended to be a magazine article, but it quickly became the sort of project that’s never finished because it can’t be finished. The document became a storehouse for fantastical materials: Not magic items, but rather those strange substances that can only be found where pervasive magic has changed the very substance of mortal reality.

As I wrote in the introduction to the article-that-was-not-to-be:

These are not the common materials of history or the modern world. Items of marvelous grandeur may be forged from gold and silver, but such items lack the spark of the fundamentally fantastic which even a simple blade of mithril possesses. This, then, is a catalog of things which never have been and will never be. Here there are gems which will never sparkle; trees which have never been felled; stones from quarries which will never be mined; metals which will never be forged.

They are the building blocks of a world which can live only in our imagination.

Some of the material in this article was stuff I had created out of wholecloth – like taurum, the true gold which makes common gold naught but a bauble, or wave cypress, a pale blue wood that never rots. Others, following in the grand tradition of mithril, were the result of kitchen-sinking, like Terry Pratchett’s darklight or Fritz Leiber’s snow-diamonds.

This is clearly something that Monte Cook also enjoys, as the Ptolus sourcebook includes a number of unique special materials, too. (Including the liquid light referred to above.)

The utility of this storehouse is manifold:

  • It’s an easy resource to tap when you want to put magic in the set dressing.
  • Any time you want to infuse an element of the game world with the fantastical, you can reach for this list and do so. For example, the ritual of the novarch’s inauguration is studded with liquid light (what it says on the tin), godwood (a pale white wood that glows in the presence of divine magic), and elfin gold (an alchemical admixture of gold and ruby dust with tremendous flexibility).
  • It allows you to craft structures and vistas impossible in the mundane world. For example, the lighter-than-air stone known as heliothil which makes floating towers and flying ships possible. Or the sheets of ruby crystal which can be used to create literal gemstone rooms.
  • It can be used to create fantastical challenges for high level characters. Ironwood, for example, requires adamantine axes to fell and can be used to construct incredibly sturdy doors and other structures. Or locks made of cortosis that resist magical knock spells.
  • It can provide memorable and noteworthy treasures (much like Bilbo’s original mithril shirt). For example, abyssopelagic gems that are fused in the depths of the ocean and melt at the pressures of sea level unless preserved with magical stasis fields. Or the lens of phantomglass that allows you perceive invisible spirits. Or the woven shirt of ghost grass which has the protective properties of chain.

It would be a mistake, though, to constantly fill your world with novel, never-before-seen material. The reason “mithril” resonates with meaning when I say it to you is because you have been exposed to it countless times; its redolent with lore. So the new fantastical materials you introduce to your campaigns will gain meaning over time as you reincorporate them into new contexts: The PCs encounter a statue of elfin gold, the individual strands of its metallic hair impossibly blowing in the wind. They see it used as magical circlet by Rehobath. They discover small craft-ingots of it in the alchemical laboratory of a dark elf. And so forth.

It’s great when the players recognize and truly know these fantastical materials. It’s even better when they’ve internalized them and start seeking them out: “You know what would be useful for this? Some shadow-veined rock.”

IN THE SHADOW OF THE SPIRE

The doors of the cathedral opened again. The holy symbols of the nine gods – each crafted from glowing godwood – were brought forth. As they passed Dominic, each symbol pulsed with scintillating brilliance, prompting a fresh cheer from the crowd. The symbols were placed in a circle around Rehobath, who kneeled in the center of them and lowered his head in prayer. After a few moments he raised his face to heaven.

One of the things that I think can add a lot of depth to the world is populating it with specific rituals: Not just, “I say a prayer to my god.” But, “How, specifically, do Imperial priests say their prayers?”

Invoking the rites of smart prep, it’s probably best to only prep rituals that are of particular significance to the PCs: Either rituals that they’re going to participate in, or which are part of events which have particular significance to them. (As, for example, in this session of In the Shadow of the Spire.) Particularly large and complex rituals can also be used as the basis for entire scenarios. (For example, I have not infrequently used them as the backbone of a party-planning scenario.)

When it comes to creating these rituals, it’s a little too easy to just say, “Become familiar with lots and lots of real world rituals.” For example, when designing this particular ritual — the inauguration of a Novarch — I’m pretty sure I just spun it up without additional reference; I was drawing on a lifetime of familiarizing myself with different religious traditions. I don’t say that to pat myself on the back, but to point out that studying the real world is the best way to improve your fictional creations. As the old saying goes, if you want to write better fantasy, you’ve got to read more stuff than just fantasy.

The important thing, though, is that you want the traditions and rituals of your world to be more than just thinly veiled copies of some real world tradition or ritual. There’s a ton of mediocre D&D worldbuilding you can find out there, for example, that’s based around people only familiar with the Christian traditions they grew up with basically trying to map those traditions directly onto fantasy pantheons.

So as you’re broadening your studies of real world history and culture, it’s not just about increasing the number of sources you can copy-and-paste from. Rather, it’s about seeing how different cultures took meaning (often similar meanings) and turned them into symbols. And as you come to understand the breadth and variety of that process, you’ll be arming yourself to duplicate the process rather than just pasting in various bits.

REAL-WORLD ANALOGS

For example, if I had been faced with creating a ritual for inaugurating the novarch when I was just starting out as a DM in the early ‘90s, my instinct would have been to look at a real-world analog (say, the coronation of the Christian pope). And then I would have basically taken that ritual, reskinned each step of the ritual with some fantasy equivalent, and been happy with the result.

If you’re in the position of wanting a real-world analog to work from, though, the first thing I’d suggest is to look for a real-world equivalent that is more distant from the fictional ritual you’re trying to create. For example, maybe you’d want to look at the rituals by which a British monarch is crowned. The reason for this is that the greater distance between the real-world analog and the fictional reality will force you to make larger creative decisions, transforming the ritual into something truly unique to your world.

You can do this with other elements of the game world, too. For example, let’s say that you’re looking for inspiration to fill in the history of a kingdom in your world that looks a lot like medieval France. Your first instinct would be to look at the actual history of medieval France, right?

What I would do instead is reach for the history of Japan. Using the cool bits of Japanese history that resonate with you in a medieval European-esque kingdom will force you to translate them — politically, culturally, geographically — in such radical ways that the result will necessarily be infused with a healthy amount of your own creativity.

Layering is also good: Go through the history of Japan and pull out the cool stuff you like. And then go through the history of, say, Russia and do the same thing. Now you’ve got a whole gestalt of influences and the kingdom you’ll end up with will feel unique and rich; and not just a cheap copy of Charlemagne.

PRACTICE SESSIONS & SIMPLE RITUALS

Bringing it back to rituals, the key thing to understand is that all ritual is fundamentally about symbolic equations. In order to make a cool ritual, you need to figure out what the ritual is trying to say or do and then symbolically realize that.

Using the novarch’s inauguration, for example, the ritual is about indicating that this person is now in charge of the Imperial Church of the Nine Gods. So:

  • They have the approval/blessing of the Nine Gods. (The holy symbols of the Nine Gods are placed in a circle around them. Over time, these symbols are likely to be made out of a special material. Godwood makes sense.)
  • They are symbolically transitioning from a mortal life to one divinely chosen. (Liquid light washes their former life away.)
  • They are given a symbol of their new authority. (The liquid light is drawn up into a circlet of elfin gold. They are dressed in the crimson robes of their new office.)

At the other end of the spectrum, there are the daily, simple rituals that are part of everyone’s life in the world. When you’re designing these, you don’t want to overcomplicate them. Look at the daily rituals people do in the real world. Generally speaking, they are not ornate or overwrought.

One of the reasons for this, of course, is that any daily ritual that starts out as particularly complicated will simplify itself over time. Think about how, for example, the complexities of Christian prayer have generally simplified down to “put your hands together.”

You can actually duplicate this process in developing your own rituals. (This is also really good practice for getting a gut instinct for how these symbolic representations work.) For example, you worship the God of War and you want to request their blessing for a battle. What is it you’re asking for? To be better at killing your foes, right? And what’s the most literal way you could do that? Kill a foe.

So, asking for this blessing from the God of War would have originally consisted of plunging your blade into the heart of a captured foe.

But that’s obviously really complicated and difficult. So how could it be simplified?

  • Instead of needing to kill a human foe, you can symbolically use an animal sacrifice instead.
  • Killing one animal for every single person in your army is inconvenient, so everyone just needs to get their blade bloody from a single common sacrifice.
  • What if there’s no animal handy? Well, cut your thumb on the edge of your blade. Blood is blood, right?
  • What if you’re not using a bladed weapon? Could you could instead prick your thumb on the sharp point of the God’s holy symbol instead?

And there’s your simple ritual: Followers of the God of War prick their fingers with their god’s bladed holy symbol before going into battle.

You could also look back over this progression and find interesting variations or combinations:

  • A feudal lord cuts himself with the God’s holy symbol and holds out his hand so that the knights he is leading into battle can each receive a drop of his blood on their blades.
  • It’s not unusual for followers of the God of War to incorporate the God’s holy symbol into the hilt of their blade. A hidden catch or similar device that can provide a sharp edge allows them to knick themselves for their before-battle prayer.

And so forth.

You can see how a similar process, in the real world, leads to “hold your sword up in front of you as if it were a cross and ask for the Christian God’s blessing,” but because we started with a different symbolic base we ended up in a distinct and interesting place.

It should be noted, of course, that there’s not a single right answer here. This is the progression that occurred to me. You could start with a completely different initial ritual (breaking a weapon captured from a foe) and end up in a symbolically different place (you bend the blade of your holy symbol, representing the broken blades of your enemies). Or you could start in the same place and end up in a symbolically different place. (When the priest of a god of war provides a blessing – i.e., casting a buff spell like bull’s strength – it actually creates a small, illusory animal that the recipient of the spell must “sacrifice” in order to receive the god’s boon.)

Ptolus - In the Shadow of the Spire
IN THE SHADOW OF THE SPIRE

SESSION 21: THE SAINT’S SCHISM

May 11th, 2008
The 9th Day of Kadal in the 790th Year of the Seyrunian Dynasty

Tee turned around. “Ranthir?”

Ranthir muttered a few words of magic and then carefully examined the invisible barrier. “It’s completely impenetrable. And beyond my ability to dispel.”

“I thought we got rid of the ghost.”

“Apparently not,” Agnarr said.

“Or there’s more than one ghost haunting this place,” Tor said.

Tee grimaced. “Let’s hope that’s not the case.” She paused for a moment and thought things over. “All right. We can’t get out this way, but we can always climb down the walls. Let’s head back up to that collapsed balcony. I think that’ll be easiest.”

Tee headed back into the courtyard. A flash of lightning drew her eye upwards… and she suddenly caught sight of a large, hunched figure leaning over the edge of a walkway that stretched between two of the keep’s towers. Instinctively she whipped out her dragon pistol and fired.

The blast of energy struck the edge of the bridge. The figure jerked back and then shambled off towards one of the towers – disappearing from sight.

“What was it?” Elestra asked.

“I don’t know,” Tee said, slowly holstering the pistol. “I couldn’t see it clearly.” (more…)

IN THE SHADOW OF THE SPIRE

Session 20F: The Ghost Appears

From here Tee could look down onto an outdoor terrace surrounding three-quarters of the courtyard. Half of this terrace had, at some point in the past, been turned into a rooftop garden. Various boxes and pots – most in disrepair and many spilling their dirt out onto the stone roof – lay here and there. Many of the plants were still alive, although most of the garden had been overrun with weeds.

Almost directly across from Tee – on the wall near the door leading to this terrace – she could see a strange face that had been carved into the wall. Something glinted in the eyesocket of the carving, glittering like a gemstone.

The “Pythoness House” adventure comes from The Night of Dissolution, a campaign supplement for Ptolus written by Monte Cook. It’s a fantastic little haunted house scenario that’s greatly enhanced by the convoluted, heavily xandered design of Pythoness House itself.

As with many of the Ptolus scenarios, SkeletonKey Games designed absolutely gorgeous battlemaps for the whole keep:

Ptolus: Night of Dissolution - Pythoness House (Maps by SkeletonKey Games)

If you’re thinking about running Night of Dissolution on a digital tabletop, these maps are absolutely perfect. You can buy them in PDF here.

I, however, was no longer running the campaign on a digital tabletop at this point, and so I was faced with a choice:

First, I could follow my standard operating procedure of chicken-scratching out the map onto a Chessex battlemap. This would be both time-consuming (due to intricate, overlapping complexity of the maps) and force me to sacrifice the awesome visuals of the SkeletonKey maps.

Second, I could print out a copy of the maps and lay them down on the table. But this would almost certainly compromise the fun of actually exploring the castle.

In many cases, you can mitigate this by laying out sheets of paper or notecards in order to block sections of the map and then only reveal them as they’re explored. But this tends to be finicky and unreliable (as papers get nudged or blown around). It was also a poor fit for these particular maps because of their claustrophobic, interwoven design.

So I used another technique that I’m going to refer to as Post-It mapping:

As you can see here, I cut out each individual room and labeled the back of each room with its keyed number (to make it easier to find the correct rooms during play). As the PCs explored, I could pull out each room one at a time and attach it to the neighboring rooms using Post-It notes.

If you’re familiar with digital tabletops, this is basically an effective way of creating an analog fog-of-war effect.

USING THE POST-IT NOTES

Post-It notes are ideal for this method because the temporary adhesive makes it easy to correct mistakes and rearrange room tiles as necessary. As the map begins to grow on the table, you can easily slide a Post-It note partially under edge of the map (without needing to pick the map up) and press the edge of the map down to adhere it to the Post-It note. You can then position the new room tile and press it firmly down to easily attach it to the map.

What you end up with looks like this on the backside:

But the front side, as you can see here, is very clean and gives a great presentation:

(click for larger image)

In practice, it will actually look a little better than this: These are photos of the maps I used when running “Pythoness House” back in 2008. They’ve seen a lot of use over the last eleven years and have bounced around any number of storage solutions (some of them quite poor).

And although they have gotten a little ragged around the edges here and there, I think this is also a testament to just how durable Post-It mapping can be in practice: These are also the original Post-It notes. So, despite all the abuse these maps have received over the years, they’ve held together almost as well as a flat print out would have done.

The drawback of this technique, obviously, is that it does require a fair amount of prep work to set it up. So is it appropriate for every dungeon? I wouldn’t say so. (Although there are plenty of people who build out 3D terrain for every single dungeon they run, so your mileage may definitely vary here.) But I do use it from time to time when I want to be able to share a particularly awesome piece of cartography with the players.

This, of course, also requires a module’s publisher to actually present their maps in a format and resolution that makes printing them out as battlemaps viable. Over the years I have seen so many incredibly gorgeous pieces of cartography and been immensely saddened by the fact that it was all so much wasted effort that the players would never get to enjoy.

Thankfully, the rise of digital tabletops seems to be changing this, with more and more publishers recognizing that if they’re going to spend hundreds of dollars on great cartography, then it’s in their best interest to make that cartography accessible at the actual gaming table.

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