Fantasy NES: Sekai

[kkmo]

I just added several rules to the first post. Anyone, please tell me if you have any questions.

I will start doing some random generating for what people have requested.

 

[Angst]

Well, the rules need a tiny bit of final formatting (There are a few typos)

But a true question would be regarding technology. What benefits would parties and single characters have from developing techs?

 

[kkmo]

Party/Character Technologies (if the party or character has a host, you obtain the bonuses from their technology)
- Magick (required to research tier 1 and 2 magicks): *
- Scouting (+1 movement in all terrain): ***
- Camaraderie (+1 attack/defense): ***
-- Education (required to research tier 3 and 4 magicks): *** (only requires Magick)
-- Environmentalism (+1 movement in all terrain): ***** (only requires Scouting)
-- Weapon Repair (+1 attack/defense): ***** (only requires Camaraderie)
--- Divinity (required to research tier 5 and 6 magicks): ***** (only requires Education)
--- Ecology (+1 movement in all terrain): ******* (only requires Environmentalism)
--- Martial Arts (+1 attack/defense): ******* (only requires Weapon Repair)

Those are the benefits. There will be others, but I have yet to create definitive character rules.

 

[kkmo]

An updated backstory.

Spoiler Backstory :

1. Backstory

The world, as we know it, is an interesting place. Forests, swamps, deserts, high peaks and flatlands that stretch as far as the eye can see. And for a long time, this world has been inhabited by several types of beings, those that have formed groups to support one another, and others that ravage the world without conscience. There is a dark and complicated history behind this world, a history that is still fairly unknown to even the most intelligent scholars in Sekai. Still, many artifacts have been found over the years, proof of ancient wars that shaped the landscapes and powerful mages that formed the mountains.

The First Age was mostly an age of creation. This is when various gods, no one knows how many, arranged the creation of this realm so they could create physical manifestations of themselves and their ideas and ideologies, and subsequently create subjects to work with them. Many races were created during this time, but it was not until the Third Age that these races had completed their evolution processes. The First Age was violent in its creation, massive blizzards and meteor showers from the heavens rained on Sekai and shaped its lands. Many of these gods manifested themselves in the bodies of powerful mages that roamed and altered the landscape. It was during the First Age that some sort of rift between the gods was becoming noticeable. This rift began with Arc'a, a powerful god who dabbled in the afterlife. It was said that even the gods were not in control of the death of creatures, but Arc'a took it upon himself to cheat death and raise the dead, effectively making an army for himself. This angered many of the other gods, who in turn began to gather many creatures together from the lands they had created, creatures that were primitive forms of the races, and then other less intelligent beings such as centaurs and gnolls. The result was a violent and epic war that lasted centuries, and left the ground buried with bodies and skeletons, weapons and claws, and ancient destructive spells. The end result of the war was a victory for those who opposed Arc'a, and he was sent to permanently reside in his physical manifestation in a prison constructed under ground, unable to use his magic. To this day, it is said that somewhere in Sekai this underground prison still holds Arc'a. This would not be the end of war sponsored by deities in Sekai.

During the Second Age, the evolution of the races was progressing well. Interestingly enough, Humans and Elves began to cross-breed, creating a race of mixture beings. This race angered both Humans and Elves, and persecution within their kingdoms began. They had the sponsorship of many gods to persecute the Half-Elves, but another small group of gods began listening to the prayers of these Half-Elves and granted them powerful magic. What resulted was the rising up and revolution of imprisoned Half-Elves, the use of powerful magics that destroyed entire kingdoms, inflicting vengeance on Humans and Elves alike. When the dust settled, the Half-Elves continued breeding with one another, their own race had been created, and the gods, still experiencing quarrels, let them be. It was also during this time that many new kingdoms and states formed. Many wars occurred, none quite as large in scale as the war that had occurred in the First Age, but still bloody enough to create powerful warriors and sorcerers that marched for their kingdom. One war that is particularly well-known was a war that lasted over 200 years between Elves and Dwarves in the mountain-forest areas. A powerful Dwarvish kingdom desired precious metals, while the Elves were not enjoying the mining of their high-up forest lands. This gave Humans and other races an upper hand after the wars, as they had not been through such turmoil. This was not to last long. Another war began between Humans and Orcs, one that killed thousands of people, as Orcs began to ravage Human villages and completely massacre their civilians. Orcs also began to use the Undead, who had been restricted since the First Age, as their servants. This alliance would later be broken as powerful Humans and Elves became necromancers and made successful attempts to free the Undead and create a new Undead order. The Second Age brewed many hostilities between races. In addition, Gnomes and Goblins began bloody wars that took place entirely within massive caverns in mountains and deep underground cities. Also giving the Elves trouble were their Dark Elf counterparts, living in some of the same forests and often surprise attacking Elvish settlements. The Dark Elves were created in the First Age by a god named Durhuan, a god wishing to take what were evolving into Elves and make sure that he would have minions to counter them in the future. Dark Elves were able to be one of the first races to break themselves completely from their creator during the Second Age, as many Dark Elvish sorcerers operating in secrecy poisoned their ruler Durhuan, rendering him eternally paralyzed and placing his soul into an ancient tree somewhere in a deep Sekai forest.

During the Third Age, the age that Sekai is currently living in (we are at the start of the Third Age), races have evolved and all of the ancient kingdoms have been all but destroyed. There are still some kingdoms and realms around that have been around for hundreds of years, but the old ancient kingdoms that participated in the wars of the Second Age are extinct, and only artifacts of their presence can be found. At this time, the magick from the gods has been inhabiting Sekai for millions of years, brewing and becoming more powerful over this time because of the wars waged and the many sorcerers that broke from the gods, or the physical manifestations of gods that seemingly vanished, their whereabouts a mystery.

Still, there are two empires on either side of Sekai: Kandoran and Tyurial. These two empires have been waging war since the second age, the only two ancient empires that still remain. Fortunately, they stay out of central Sekai, where they consider the races of this region to be primitive and not worthy of contact. Indeed, it would seem that the gods have left Sekai, abandoned it, but leaving behind their magick arts, because these arts could never be erased after the millennia of schooling and training that has engrained itself in the land and its people. So the gods left their powers, and then vanished. Some say that the gods are lurking, preparing to re-enter into the affairs of Sekai, but for now, all that is left are races that worship these gods using magick arts. The gods created these races and creatures and then left. That is the definitive quality of the Third Age.

 

[Neverwonagame3]

About the party technologies:
-About "education", but is this supposed to mean magical education?
-Secondly, while studying the natural environment might help move through it, why should an environmentalist ideology? (As shown by the typical green activist nowadays, probably) Is this supposed to be some fantasy cliche?
-Finally, what is supposed to be meant by purchasing divinity? The only two sensible options I can think of are deals with a God and a ret-con they were all along.

 

[kkmo]

About the party technologies:
-About "education", but is this supposed to mean magical education?
-Secondly, while studying the natural environment might help move through it, why should an environmentalist ideology? (As shown by the typical green activist nowadays, probably) Is this supposed to be some fantasy cliche?
-Finally, what is supposed to be meant by purchasing divinity? The only two sensible options I can think of are deals with a God and a ret-con they were all along.

Yes, it is supposed to mean magical education. Its just a name for your ability to learn new spells. Environmentalism is not necessarily an ideology, it is more knowledge of the land that gives you ability to move through it. Terminology. Movement through terrain, and knowing about it, requires knowledge of the environment, and with knowledge, there comes either respect or disrespect... respect if you are a classical fantasy Ranger of sorts, and disrespect if you are a more chaotic disposition (in which case, you can definitely know a lot about the environment, and not respect it). You are not bound to any ideology. You are not necessarily "purchasing" divinity. You are training yourself to learn difficult spells, and to train yourself, you need to invest some of your gold - its purely a game mechanic. After learning to train yourself in these spells, then you can have powers that only the gods and powerful magic-users used to have.

I think you are thinking too much about the game mechanics. These are names of things you have to spend points on ("money" even or "gold" are terms that are susceptible to interpretation... I don't think the Undead, for example, carry gold). Just names, to make things easier for all of us, and they have effects when you spend the available points. Would it help if I changed "gold" for characters to "experience points" or something?

 

[Cannae]

Are the races characteristics uniform or can there be some deviation from the norm of that group?

 

[Angst]

Just use gold for characters instead of xp

 

[kkmo]

Are the races characteristics uniform or can there be some deviation from the norm of that group?

It depends, I suppose. Nothing that makes your race too powerful, obviously. I could arrange a list of possible advantages, and then players could just choose from them instead of having racial advantages like I do now. That might make things a bit more flexible.

EDIT: Okay, I thought it over and I decided to eliminate racial advantages, and let you guys choose your advantages under certain guidelines (see the rules). That way we will have more unique kingdoms.

EDIT 2: Here is a list of players thus far. I rolled for Ninja Dude and for das at this point.

Ninja Dude: Goblin kingdom (receives 3200 gold economy, 9 territories to start)
Lord Iggy: ?
Yui108: ?
Neverwonagame3: Group of 4 adventurers
Abaddon: Human rogue
Haseri: ?
das: Half-Elven kingdom (receives 6200 gold economy, 4 territories to start)
lord joakim: Human mage
Fuschia: ?
Slavic Sioux: ?
Justo: Human city-state (600 gold economy)
Massive Attack: ?
dldnjstjrp: Human priest​

 

[Justo]

I'm interested in this. I'll probably go with a Human, Elf or Dwarven City State will decide on it later. Leaning more towards Human atm.

 

[kkmo]

Ok, character rules added. That should be everything, for now. More character skills (technology) will be added eventually. And I changed "gold" to "spending points" for them.

 

[Angst]

'Spending points' is a fine name for it. Then gold will also be usable for other stuff (Like, say, buying a horse or even an apple) in character-perspective.

 

[Ninja Dude]

What do the colors on the map mean? I'm guessing brown means mountains but that dark green looks like elevated land also. Are my assumptions correct or am I wrong and they mean something elese?

 

[kkmo]

Green = flatlands
Dark Green = forests, the darker, the denser
Brown = mountains, the darker, the higher
Yellow = desert
Blue = water

 

[Massive Attack]

I'm interested.

So organizations can only be in one other faction, and not multiple factions? Gah. What about how organizations interact with the race rules (and their sponsers)?

 

[Angst]

@Massive Attack
das asked the same questions on p one. Check it out.

@kkmo
Would we be able to choose bonuses now?

 

[Lord_Iggy]

Gah, I still can't make up my mind between Goblins and Dwarves. I suppose the lack of Dwarves means that it would be best for me to found a dwarven nation.

 

[kkmo]

I'm interested.

So organizations can only be in one other faction, and not multiple factions? Gah. What about how organizations interact with the race rules (and their sponsers)?

I'm glad you asked. Here is what I wrote for them:

-- Tradition (guild can spread into another kingdom or city-state, not just one): *****

This is a technology available to guilds. It is costly, but it is worth it. This will give your guild the ability to spread amidst several city-states, making your guild absorb any tech they already know (but not spells, and the advs of techs cannot be piled on each other).

I hope this helps.

Yes, you can choose bonuses now, of course! Go ahead and run them by me and I will look them over. Let me know what you want to be so I can do your random die rolls. In case you guys want to know what program I use, I use Random.org's die roller. I feel that random rolls are the best for starting up a fantasy game. I hope everyone is okay with this.

Also you can go ahead, and after I post your random die roll that tells you how many territories you want, its first-come first-serve posting your claims here after I give you your stats.

Guild players, you can choose your hosts now, talk to them - you do not necessary need their consent, but it is preferred. If you cannot find one you prefer, I will have NPC kingdoms at this point, I am thinking, so you can base yourself there.

 

[Neverwonagame3]

I've decided to play a group of adventurers who want military glory. Can their number be rolled up so I can choose bonuses, please?

 

[dldnjstjr]

I shall join as human priest