Tag: srlm
Places, Locales and Features of Glois (Riverdan)
Posted on October 31, 2024 in Steel-Realms
There are many Places, Locales and Features of Glois that cover the notable territorial and geographical areas of the Riverdan. Most were built for much larger populations, though now settlements are small and have ruins or areas left uninhabited. There are ruins to explore, though most have been so many times before and little remains in the way of “plunder” or loot that is not dangerously precarious or buried.
Common Experience
Characters coming of age in/from this locale will shape their perspective to the primary experience of Cultural Experience of the Riverdans.
Hawktail Hills Reach: The Hawktail Hills are part of a large uplifting that the Nanford River used to flow south of. They span multiple territories in the Riverdans that include Cerran’s Grant, Tuflim, and Glois, but are primarily located in Pelmon.
Hawktail Hills
Posted on October 31, 2024 in Steel-Realms
The Hawktail Hills are part of a large uplifting that the Nanford River used to flow south of. They span multiple territories in the Riverdans that include Cerran’s Grant, Tuflim, and Glois, but are primarily located in Pelmon. They are named for the vicious Bloodhawks that inhabit the hill region. On the far side of the hills, in Glois, is the famous The Shrine to Haedorn the Vigilant.
Characters coming of age in/from this locale will shape their perspective to the primary experience of Cultural Experience of the Riverdans.
On the border where Glois, Cerran’s Grant and Pelmon meet is the Haedorn Uplands that watches one of the only entry points to enter the hills and navigate through them to the Blue Willow Basin.
The Athla Hound
Posted on October 31, 2024
The Athla Hound is a loosely defined breed of dog derived from domestic animals left behind during the inception of the Curse of the Grimm of the Athla Hill Country and subsequent abandonment of those lands.
A n c i e n t Blood – A Living World storyline Set in the Grand Duchy of Dunstrand of the [Fantasy] Steel Realms.
All manner of domestic canids, from ratters to herding dogs to hunting animals, were left behind during the frantic evacuations or fled on their own due to fear and confusion of the ‘Grimm Effects’. Pack instinct eventually led these animals to band together in small groups, and interbreeding led to a generally medium sized build with good hunting and survival instincts.
Generations of dogs surviving in the Grim Effect, subject to effects from the Feywyld and surviving among the unnatural creatures it introduced, led to some unique traits in the Athla Hound. About 1 in 5 are very sensitive to Fey phenomena: creatures, portals, effects, etc. They are able to detect these things at a range of up to 100’ and are advantaged when tracking them. All Athla Hounds gain a +1 bonus to rolls (attack, damage, tracking, etc.) versus Fey creatures. These traits diminish if interbred with other dogs, but a group of breeders has been able to maintain a pure strain from a pool of hundreds of these animals, mostly around Bondeu.
Places of the Athla Hills
Posted on October 31, 2024 in Steel-Realms
There are many Places of the Athla Hills.
The Calamitous History of The Steel Realms
Posted on October 29, 2024 in Steel-Realms
The impact of the The Calamitous History of The Steel Realms is generally understood; Prevalent recorded knowledge.
The calamitous history is the direct cause of its lack of progress (especially in Science and Technology on Helca) and unity. Forces have aligned against the living and Lands of Light to constantly besiege it. This has resulted in the once united species and nations of the realms seeing large areas of the eastern continent as The Broken Lands. In recent memory, the The Long Summer of Elancil in CY 9000 provided a small respite in the constant string of calamities. This string of calamity includes large-scale deaths, massive threats and setbacks that have forced the population to rely on direct ties of religion and occult ideas rather than the slow progress of discovery and science.
A State Purposefully Maintained?
Some sages and those of great wisdom believe the pace of progress as been forcibly manipulated.
An Unsolved Problem: All things being even, the minor manifestations of divine power can be countered when the followers are leveraging them to attain political goals. A divine principal and their followers may have overall goals, but every ounce of energy isn’t focused on a single goal to which all all others are subverted. That is a global crusade, and only the Orrish and the Unholy Trio yet practice it – it is their sole purpose and it has become that for their Followers. The Godspeak Accord has limited the amount of crusades because principals have agreed not to manifest directly or by Avatar in order to preserve the planet from destruction that was wrought in the Valley of Sighs. Trampled terrain, sundered Earth, clouds of disease and malaise that roll across the countryside. Geysers of foul muck and mud and blood. Storms that come into being rage and fizzle out sometimes last for years and sometimes only moments. Some of them gather and fling magic, corrupt auras, and manifest spirits that still haunt the location and rip apart the surroundings with a magical rending that blasts bare down to rock and strips flesh from bones or changes flesh on the bone or the bones within. This tenuous balance remains in place, waiting for a solution or for the Godspeak Accord to be cast aside and global armageddon to begin.
Inhibited Scientific Progress: In some cases those responsible or foreseen by the gods as having a pivotal part have been killed. They are nameless and their lives would have come to mean something had they been allowed to flourish. There is the problem with the Orrish followers of the Church of Darkness in regards to progress. Progress of science would undermine their ultimate crusade from within. So they themselves cannot have progress. But progress within the greater realms can be leveraged by them, controlled by their clergy and those few they allow to understand such things. In reality, it is the gods of light who have controlled or smashed progress to control its pace. Balthazar is the only exception and he is within a constant struggle to advance the ideas of technology in progress and the reliance that within such an order, a solution to the orish problem can be found. The forces of nature are without an actual side. An ebb and flow is natural, and they see things on a longer time scale and tend to side with the view of awakened Helca itself. In that eventually the Orrish problem will be resolved and they will leave Helca and it will be allowed to develop without such a vile intent and torturous influence.