Sunchaser

[Ferretz]

Just curious after reading the teaser for the Sunchaser setting. Is this more of a Tolkien-ish setting, or are we talking more high magic D&D stuff here?

E.

[Morgenstern]

Somewhat selectable, but probably more wizards than in middle earth. The College of Riddles turn out educated folks, including some spell casters. How many is somewhat a matter of GC taste. Default assumtion probably puts it between Greyhawk and middle earth, but much less magic than Forgotten Realms.

[Ferretz]

Good, good. And will Sunchaser use all the races included in Fantasy Craft?

E.

[Morgenstern]

Sunchaser includes all the races and has a specific logic window through which you could add just about anything the GC is ok with. It focuses on maybe a little more than half of them, with humans all along the valley, drakes in the southern region, a handful of elves and pech in Anmai, saurians and rootwalkers in the Ver, and dwarves out in the reaches. Anmai may actually have more half-elves than humans. That's pretty much the core PC range.

Giants, Ogres, Orcs, and Unborn put in occasional appearances (mostly comming in off the Anvil or out of ruins), and goblins are on both sides of the big plot.

[Ferretz]

Cool. The setting is the Thousand River Valley, right? Will there be a map of this region? It looks like a very interesting, and playable setting.

E.

[Morgenstern]

Yes, there will be a map. Classic fantasy does love its maps . I'm hoping it will be a very easy setting to slip into.

[Ferretz]

Excellent. It really looks like I have to show the teaser for Sunchaser to some of my players soon

E.

[Morgenstern]

You know, I just realized that rootwalkers are more fun when they have an evil living god that renders an entire region uninhabitable by its mere exisitence.

The Ashenad valley in the Gron Ver is starting to look like some serious high-level fun .

[Forcegypsy]

That evil, living god, should be named...Morgenstern, bastard. Your teasers always kill me, namely because I know you'll back up story with some ridiculously interesting rule effect. Btw, very much looking forward to root-walkers.

[Morgenstern]

I'm just starting to seed my setting with the little bits and spots that should build up to a tapestry of plot chains. A good place name is worth a lot to me, so I'm trying out and discarding them pretty fast to build up a pool of keepers.

In my light reading pile for the month, I've spent some time going through WotC's probably last big release for 3.5 - Elder Evils. I'm a total sucker for a 1st edition module B4 reference . Total. Sucker. Some of the introductions for the elder evils are painfully bombastic, but overall I like the idea of bringing in a world-smashing evil and the handling of the stages is genrally good reading (I've always liked Robert's setting work, he did Grimm and the Black Company). The Leviathan concept could have been better, but the plotline was fun. With a bar like that to compare against, I think Sunchaser's "Comming of the Crone" will make for a good endgame scenario in the Thousand-River Valley. And the 99 knights are sort of fleshing themselves out as the baddies you love to hate along the way .

[Morgenstern]

That evil, living god, should be named...Morgenstern, bastard. Your teasers always kill me, namely because I know you'll back up story with some ridiculously interesting rule effect. Btw, very much looking forward to root-walkers.

Well, partially what got me started was the realiztion that "treants" are always such an unmitigated force for good. Giving them a skeleton in the closet of such epicly nasty proportions seemed to sort of put them back on the map as a real people rather than just a backdrop group of vaguely good guys. These are the treants that migrated back and forth across the Ver ripping the Vessa into small bloody hunks for the hell of it. The Vessa ain't saints, but they hadn't really deserved that sort of abuse for a couple of (their) generations at least...

As for a mechanic, I think a few tweaks to some existing terrain rules and an entry or 3 on the poisons and contagions tables should make the Ashenad fairly... unpleasant... (mmm, poison that inflicts divine damage - now thats just good clean fun)

[Forcegypsy]

Aargghh!!! See! Must buy. I really hope you guys are able to get this out before the 3000 lbs gorilla lands in the Summer. I can guarantee players for this beyond even my regular group.

[Golden Dragon]

As for a mechanic, I think a few tweaks to some existing terrain rules and an entry or 3 on the poisons and contagions tables should make the Ashenad fairly... unpleasant... (mmm, poison that inflicts divine damage - now thats just good clean fun)

Morgenstern, why don't you get back to work and leave the bad puns to us. 

That is a good idea....

[Morgenstern]

Puns?

(I've got a fierce tooth ache going, so while I was able to beat the Seer class into submission last week, I'm kinda woozy and was sticking to the less mechanical stuff like the Sunchaser locations write ups.)

[Toccata]

I've liked the idea of the angry, blood-soaked tree men ever since I played Dominions II.
I had a lot of fun playing as Pangaea, especially the Carrion Woods version. Nothing like an army of skeletons animated by magical vines