Tag: srlm
Champion of Strength and Darkness
Posted on March 7, 2025 in Steel-Realms
The Champions of Strength and Darkness were a normal part of Orrish Fighting Forces and Tactics, these were feared throughout the new heartlands from about CY 7300 to 7600. They were also a core of the massive Orrish army that sweep into the Fallen East, claiming it as The Dark Lands. For a while, these terrorized the central and southern heartlands mainly. Led by “knights” of the Unholy Trio, these long range raiders were composed of the best warriors of the goblins and led by a single Ork of surpassing viciousness and strength. Every now and then, these appear in the south heartlands and Dark Lands, but they are rarely seen any more.
Organized: The thing that differentiated these raiders was that they were highly organized and could easily stand up 1:1 to most soldiers of the realms, and even better as long as the champion was alive and with them. There were attendants to the champion – goblin champions in their own right, and fueled with the fervor of the dark gods favored champion. They often had a rank of goblins that wore the banners upon their backs on poles – as was the custom in the fallen east. These ‘bannerlings’, while common in their physical attributes, were often overcome with frenzy in their service. Their banners provided morale to the entire group, and they often ignored the first blow that may take them down – so strong was their belief in the champion’s favor by the dark gods. There was also often a couple of goblins who had made minor pacts with the dark gods, to aid in countering mystical threats and assist in making proper sacrifices of victims the group caught.
Favored: The champions were known to attract some of the more unique individuals in the dark lands – their favor providing a safe haven for those powerful humans cursed and shunned due to corruption. These would fight with them.
Sun-Bane Protections: The champions wielded magic that could protect them from the sun bane for a few brief moments. They raided remote settlements deep in the lands of light in the daytime, spreading terror and violence. It is believed that these elite units simply were not feasible to keep up for the Orrish, they took training and time. The violent competition to be part of their composition is also thought to be a detriment.
Single Authority: There were never priests among these groups – the elite champions would be competing with command for the group, so they were eventually removed from the raiding bands. These bands were never used against the Lich Lords. The main goblin contingent was anywhere from 20 to 40, rarely above 50 for the most powerful champions.
Evil’s Aid: Sacrificing one of their anointed minions, they could call forth infernal servants for a short time. The hounds of hell were most common.
i20™ Character Details
Although venerating the whole Church of Darkness, their primary focus is as a Paladin of Sunstealer. These are typically orks.
- @2nd typically Great Weapon Style w/Maul (2d6; 9/14/24 base) – blessed by Sun Stealer at higher levels
- @3rd aura of strength (finesse weapon adjustments negated – must use strength) 20′ radius
- +2 shield of shadows (faith)
- 1/2 any light source in 10′; Ma href=”https://dnd5e.wikidot.com/spell:control-flames”>control flames 120′ (douse only) as a bonus action
- Smite is a darkness smite + force damage (save or -2 strength)
- Any killed with it rise as Shadow in his service
- Shadow can sacrifice itself for protection from daylight!
= Proficiency Bonus in uses – “War Run”: as bonus action – double move, reckless attacks, opportunity attacks get Disadvantage
iCore™ Character Details
The Guards of Maithen Plateau
Posted on March 5, 2025
Part of/Prelude to Disturbance at Spakaya – The Dog Fort of the Riverdans – an Incarna adventure.
TEST: Kelly Berger Music Test
GM Setup: Background/Current State
THIS IS ORIGINALLY PART OF THE ANCIENT BLOOD CAMPAIGN CYCLE OF ADVENTURES.
A force of Histrak Frostmonger‘s Orrish have been sent by some entity named Ushtay (attendant of a Black Herald of Everdark) to The Maithen Plateau to secure the passage to Spakaya – The Dog Fort of the Riverdans against potential threats and ensure that the ancient evil standard can be recovered. They got sidetracked from scouting and securing and have been seeking loot in the earthquake-opened Watch Vault on Kunlay; Going through the rubble and finding bodies of defenders and Orrish swept into the back chamber during flood and crushed/drowned. The way was sealed and warded and these left to rot. The Orrish have been going through and stacking up loot for weeks! The metal they bring back will make them celebrated.
These will follow the typical Steel Realms Orrish Fighting Forces and Tactics.
They are led by Ar-etey; Unholy trio Orc/as War Chief and Paladin 5th >
STR 18, CON 17, PER 15 > Health: 35+15 = 50
Champions of Strength and Darkness > w/3 Shadows (can protect from Sun-Bane or deathblow)
Hide Armor (2 Resilience/min 17 STR) and a Maul (2d6; 13/18/28 + 2 resilience)
His friend Osrin: Osrin the cursed cannibal Werewolf guards over Ar-etey directly while he sleeps and the pile of treasure unless the Orrish forces are on alert. He is a Warlock 2 of Sun Stealer (fiend) w/a Token of Chaos – The Butchers Bill (Extraordinary Result on a 18-20 – unhinged jaw)
Cantrips: (2) Booming Blade (snarl) + Lighting Lure
Spells: (3 known – 2 @1st) Armor of Agathys, Hellish Rebuke, Cause Fear
Invocations: (2) Otherworldly Leap (jump at will +d6/3 dmg), Devil’s Sight
Current State: A rare bred formorian giant Colossi of Nihilism, Twistings, and Piercing Depths came with them – protected from the sun-bane by its chaos aura. Drawn to the residual anima energy in White Lake (though the Orrish don’t understand that completely), it climbed to the heights and sunk within the sunless depths of the lake – it sends its fog banks and storms out and senses through them. It leaves the rest of the party sent alone, and they leave it alone – not knowing what else to do at this point. Neither will come to the aid of the other. As long as there is nothing upsetting this balance, the Orrish don’t feel a need to alert their superiors of its disaffection.
The formorian is a creature of chaos and corruption. It does not control its focus and interest, the chaos it generates is random weather checks, unless it is attacked itself.
Getting There
Encounters: It MODIFIES the encounters common to all Places on the Maithean Plateau.
The Road Up
> Read the locale description text.
Onto the PLateau
Unalerted
> Read the locale description text.
Shrieker hidden among the rocks off the north side of the trail where it creates.
Alerted
China White (0-1:10)
The plateau is desolate and bleak. Winds moan, and puddles and rivulets of water are everywhere – the effects of a constant downfall are obvious. Fog banks drift across its expanse. A sense of ruin, death, and cold uncaring presides over it, and the sky is dotted with grey clouds, coming off the southern heights, dissipating as they are cast over the plateau… as if something is trying to provide shelter from the warmth of the sun. You blink against the harsh vision, and try and block out the voices on the wind. The blasts of wind come in pulses, blowing drafts of cold water on your face. Your pulse reflects its driving force in your own ears.
The Champion will have summoned a pair of Blackhounds (Hell Hounds) that will guard the found “treasure” or patrol during the day and night – they need no sleep. Their baying will alert forces on the plateau. Each 10 rounds, there is a 1-4 on d6 chance they will smell the PCs and rush to attack them from their patrol near the road’s entrance.
In the distance, you hear a baying sound. From another direction comes an answer. The baying is deep, and sounds angry. It is definitely not any normal dog you have heard before. In response, rains starts to drizzle, coming down harder, and banks of fog begin to form, obscuring visions beyond 20-30m in all directions except the road.
DC 20 Occult or Religious phenomenology to know its a Hell Hound.
DC 20 Perception (hearing) to know they (multiple) are 5 rounds away and/or what direction they are coming from. Stealth vs. Perception or the 1st round is with surprise for the hounds.
They
The hellish, tortured baying grows to a crescendo. Suddenly, 2 forms burst through the fog, sailing through the air on powerful legs as they jump more than a dozen feet. The Black, red-eyed forms snarling and slavering lay into you.
They will attack where they can give each other advantage, gain a +d6/3 damage from a massive leap, and gain a chance to knowck prone their target(s). Once among the group, they will use their flame breath to maximum effect the following round.
The Plateau of Mists
The anima forces the druids unleashed still ripple in the depths of White Lake. The forces led by the champion of the Unholy Trio witnessed the off-spawn giant crawl into White Lake and have since learned how it communicates via elemental messenger and leave it alone. They have grown confident to leave off their mission to it, and have begun looking to loot the area, having found the recent earthquakes have reopened the entrance to the Wat
Tactics:
Watch Vault of Kayul.
Encounters on the Plateau
Encounters: It MODIFIES the encounters common to all Places on the Maithean Plateau.
Vapors of Death
1-2 on d6 per hour > Fecund remains are revitalized Earth in their path erupts like boils. Too late it’s all around, they must navigate the emergent ooze field!
Around you the ground becomes soft, green vapors rise up under your feet and all around you. The smell of rotting bodies fills the air, and the thick green tendrils grasp at your legs, trying to slow you and twine about you.
DC 15 Dexterity (Athletics) to avoid the d4-1 tendrils in an area or 1 malaise Disease on each hit (must heal only with time/natural healing)
If the characters fight back – strike the tendrils (AC 12/Health =1)
class=”know-more”>The tendril is smashed out of the way, leaving your path clear. As it dissipates, you hear the screams of the animals that died on the scouring of the plateau.
DC 12 Sanity > d3: Chance to blind, deaf, or mute for 1 Short Rest Cycle.
Weather on the Plateau
The formorian can summon elemental Spiritus Entities if the champion sacrifices to it after the plateau is attacked and as long as 24 hours can pass for the Orrish to perform the rite.
- Earth Walker Spiritus
- Water Walker Spiritus
- Fog Walker Spiritus
DC 15 religion check > Green Church Conviction to recognize them and the chant to dissipate the fog of memory.
Normal visions chance % +
1d12
- 1-6 normal
- 7 = cloudy, fog banks roll out of hills onto the plateau intermittently
- 8 = overcast, foggy, and rainy (50% thunderous)
- 9 = overcast, rainy, and sharp wind gusts of 50kmph (75% thunderous)
- 10 = Substantial downdrafts, buffeting winds, rain off and on, spontaneous mists, thunder and lighting.
> Movement halved; large fog banks roll out of hills enveloping travelers until wind lashes it away - 11 = Dark storm clouds, rainy, thunderous, wind gusts of 90kmph
> Movement halved; freezing mists that form intermittently – encrusting ground and whatever it touches in frost - 12 = Lightning storms, cloud river deluge can sweep characters away in wash outs,
> Movement halved; freezing mists that form intermittently – encrusting ground and whatever it touches in frost, thunder causes a vacuum after – sucking the wind out of characters and living things
deluge = 4d6 force; freezing mist d6 (items cannot be held), ground freeze = d4 + -5′ move, thunder = 3d6 deafness (1 hour/1 day/1 week)
= Chance to understand its all coming from the high lake!
Settlement #1
Next to any settlement is a chance to encounter an Earth Wight – from the bones in the earth of dead Riverdanfolk, killed by the druid’s scouring and under loose earth.
Settlement #2
Next to any settlement is a chance to encounter an Earth Wight – from the bones in the earth of dead Riverdanfolk, killed by the druid’s scouring and under loose earth.
NPCs’ Bestiary, and Events
Earth Wight
A high, whistling wind comes at you from the left and races past you. It leaves you light headed as it pulls the air away from you. It stops about 200 feet away and eddies into a whirlwind, lifting the loose topsoil at first, then digging down as if into a grave. Suddenly bones fly about in the whirlwind. They knit together to form three human sized skeletons, and then the earth is pulled onto the bones. Dust and grass float about the three forms and a sharp red light blossoms in their eyes. The wind subsides and the figures walk towards you, fists balled and ready to spring and attack.
They are angry they have to relive their deaths and the living must pay – they see the PCs as the druids. They disintegrate when they die – not truly permanent undead.
1 on d6 = See the broken remains of Hornbreaker, sword of the Riverlands.
In the dirt you see a flash of yellow, perhaps a valuable gem. Looking closer, it is embedded in a metal fitting, which turns out to be the end of a pommel of a blade. It was obviously once a fine long sword, but it was shattered and broken.
It is still sharp, and the dirt seems eager to fall from it as you pick it up. The blade is silvered. Though broken, it is still usable as a dagger.
It cannot be repaired, that would break the magic barely holding on except the light amplification of the gem.
Bounty on the OrrishThe Ruins of the Watch Vault of Kunlay
Posted on March 4, 2025 in Steel-Realms
The The Ruins of the Watch Vault of Kunlay are known to lay somewhere on The Maithen Plateau. This Watch Vault of the Underlands was flooded and sealed up long ago in CY 8802 (see the history of the plateau for more details) by the druids. It has been shut since, and the plateau itself was abandoned soon after. The plateau was scoured and flooded, and the breach the Orrish used was completely choked with the debris and bodies of the war on the plateau. Rumors of the dead spirits still prowling its environs persist.
The north fork of the High Mathien Road runs from Angan Rock, through Treste, and on to the Watch Vault of Kunlay, Blaekpit Mine and finally to Tunnlin Hamlet.
This location has a World Watcher Edifice, though it is smashed and somewhat broken – but is still functional.
Encounters: It has the encounters common to all Places on the Maithean Plateau.
History: Riverdans (History of Dovender Valley and The Dog Fort)
The Sealed Entrance of Kunlay
The entrance to “The Vault” is a typical Orrish tunnel of about 5m high and 7m wide. It is rough-hewn and craggy – though it’s been smoothed by the flooding that sealed up the vault. Above it is a huge crack that collapsed the entrance. A stone slab leans up, engraved in the languages of Gladnorian, Dundarian, Feyloise and Orrish: “Nature’s wrath has sealed the way. Only nature can break the seal without the wrath of a thousand storms.”
Watch Vaults of the Underlands
Posted on March 4, 2025 in Steel-Realms
The Watch Vaults of the Underlands were a one-time solution to guarding Underland breaches from the Orrish into the lands of light. Few of these were made, they were expensive and dangerous. Located inside the exit points for the breaches, they were super fortified and those who manned them were paid well to essentially be bait.
These locations have a World Watcher Edifice as a standard part of their functioning.
Vault Effects
- Confusing Echoes
- Traps
- Shifting Floor
- Shifting Wall
- Mirror Beam
- Shadowed Edges
List of Known Watch Vault Ruins
Facts/Chronicle of Watch Vaults
Knowledge is broken down by ease of discovery/availability; Any attempt to know more than what's Pervasive will require a reference, source, knowledge, check, or access to someone who can get or provide either of these.
Pervasive Knowledge / Very Easy Difficulty
Information Sources: Mundane Reference | Associated Phenomenology Only | Specific Lore
The Watch Vaults of the Underlands were a one-time solution to guarding Underland breaches from the Orrish into the lands of light. Few of these were made, they were expensive and dangerous. Located inside the exit points for the breaches, they were super fortified and those who manned them were paid well to essentially be bait.
Expensive to make, Druids had to be used to find water sources, and engineers build walls and buttresses inside the large exit points for the breaches. Advanced stone working and summoned elementals were put to work making these.
Common Knowledge / Easy Difficulty
Trapped Stonework: These employed Ducateon and dwarven traps and shifting passages and floors. Even drop and swing stones with return cranks were employed to stop and isolate broken access point or squash scouts as they moved through the area. The buttresses were warded to provide protection against sappers and miners trying to tunnel under. Single individuals would not trigger them, but they were meant to slow down or trap large numbers.
When they worked, they were able to contain thousands of raiders with only a couple hundred soldiers for weeks at a time. Some even suffered multi-month sieges, creating time for a large defense force to be brought up.
Uncommon Knowledge / Average Difficulty
These employed Light traps to bring daylight in. Polished mirrors on swivels channeled and amplified daylight from the outside into entry points to prevent easy overruns through the entry portals to the defenses. Sometimes they had mechanisms to even bounce it into the caverns where the Orrish were.
Trapped Stonework: The ledges holding ranged combatants behind the interior walls were often bobby-trapped to collapse if overrun. The stairs up to them were also known to be warded and trapped.
Scarce Knowledge / Hard Difficulty
Trapped Stonework: Escape holes into the celing were said to lead to stones that could be dropped on masses moving below. These were concealed to look like a rough part of the celling and operated from holdout positions.
Night Lantern
Posted on February 25, 2025 in Steel-Realms
The Night Lantern is a device used by advance groups of Orrish raiders traveling overland. They are way-marker points for traveling at night. These are consecrated items of the Unholy Trio. They can be seen from 5 miles away. Their light is only visible to those dark-spawn with Dark vision.
These are not technically weapons, but they can be broken, releasing a sickening ring in a 30m radius that does not affect anything that can normally see its light.