500 word challenge

[Username17]

But the leShay also have the duel-wielding bastard swords bullshit and the albino bullshit. They are the work of a fucking 12 year-old.

Are you trying to tell me that it's a problem if the King of Fairykind happens to look like this:



?

-Username17

[virgil]

Fundamentally, Oberon and Titania have be something, and that something could just as easily be called a "leShay" as anything else, and then you're done.

True, guess I jumped ahead of myself on that.

The Kna are just giant Locathah, and probably merit mention in a paragraph about how some Locathah are giants and they are called "Kna."...N'djatwa probably merit a sentence or two in the Half-Ogre entry.

In light of your challenge's goals, it seems a bit of a cop-out to hand-wave those races as just another synonym for an established race.

[TiaC]

But the leShay also have the duel-wielding bastard swords bullshit and the albino bullshit. They are the work of a fucking 12 year-old.

Are you trying to tell me that it's a problem if the King of Fairykind happens to look like this:



?

-Username17

The leShay take it a bit too far. He still has some contrast, they don't.

It's less of a problem for fey, but if I tried describing them to my players, they would think it was was a bad DMPC.

[Username17]

The Kna are just giant Locathah, and probably merit mention in a paragraph about how some Locathah are giants and they are called "Kna."...N'djatwa probably merit a sentence or two in the Half-Ogre entry.

In light of your challenge's goals, it seems a bit of a cop-out to hand-wave those races as just another synonym for an established race.

Well, the N'djatwa are literally a synonym for an established race. That's the Mystaran word for Half-Ogre. It's like how Wild Elves in Krynn are called "Kagonesti." Maybe it warrants a sentence under Wild Elves to explain that the Krynnish word for them is Kagonesti, but honestly maybe it doesn't.

I'd do a piece on Half Ogres, but separate writeups for the specific setting in-character names for races is not going to happen.

-Username17

[virgil]

N'djatwa are half-elf as well, which is nominally different from typical half-ogre. Kna are goldfish and giant, which makes them distinct from typical Locathah. They can get as much of a separate entry as Bullywugs/Grippli, or Goblin from whatever subspecies of goblin is floating around. And if you make Wallara just a paragraph in the Lizardfolk entry, then Water Orcs shouldn't be a full entry either.

There remains the Baldanar, Phanaton, potentially Shark-kin; and I'm throwing in a request for an entry on Kopru as well.

[RobbyPants]

So, do the needlefolk (MM2 plant creatures) get rolled into the wilden rewrite, or would they warrant their own rewrite?

[Cynic]

speaking of the planes, What about moigno? I think they deserve a more distinctive write-up.

[schpeelah]

I wouldn't count the Moigno as a people. Sure, they are intelligent, but they are also can't touch things, are narrowly focused on one concept and don't actually interact with anything beyond providing calculation services to those who ask. The Mechanus Math Spirits getting a better writeup by someone not suffering from weird misconceptions about what math is would certainly be nice, but I don't think that's what this thread is for.

[Cynic]

Yeah, that's my mistake. I totally forgot that they weren't intelligent. That's what happens when you haven't really touched a rpg book in ages.

[schpeelah]

They are as intelligent as gnolls (Moigno 6 except for matters of mathematics, Gnoll 5-7), but their existence is so limited they are basically wildlife.

[Krusk]

Reworking the 3.5 planes for my own home games, and this seems like a decent place to question. What is the difference between the Plane of Shadow and the Ethereal Plane?

Both seem like dark twisted material world analogies. Both have incorporeal dudes who fly around and are jerks. Both have undead just chilling. Both are coexistant with the material. Can someone do 500 words on both, and make them seem not the same?

[name_here]

The Ethereal plane is overlaid with the Material and you can see things in the Material and interact with them to an extent. It is where guys who screw with you and cannot be readily stabbed hang out.

Shadow is an alternate reality which looks like a dark copy of the Material and is inhabited by darkness-themed monsters. It's easy to travel between corresponding points, but you can only see and interact through portals.

[Username17]

The Etheral Plane is just Incorporeality+. It comes with invisibility, and it makes you 100% immune to "normal" magic weapons, but all the specific anti-incorporeal tricks like Ghost Touch and Force Weapons still affect you. The invisibility it offers isn't even special - see invisible and shit still reveal your presence.

The Shadow Plane is completely interchangeable with the Mirror Realm. It's a world with its own stuff in it that happens to have a non 1:1 correspondence to the material world so that you can use it for long distance travel by portaling in and portaling out again after having a mini adventure.

If it were up to me, the entire Ethereal Plane would just be scrapped entirely. Ethereal can just be state that's a little better than simple Incorporeal. While the Shadow Plane and the Mirror Realm are pretty much redundant conceptually, I'd still keep both of them, because they have different flora and fauna and transitive planes are fun.

-Username17

[Krusk]

If it were up to me, the entire Ethereal Plane would just be scrapped entirely. Ethereal can just be state that's a little better than simple Incorporeal. While the Shadow Plane and the Mirror Realm are pretty much redundant conceptually, I'd still keep both of them, because they have different flora and fauna and transitive planes are fun.

This is what I'm really trying not to do, but having a hard time doing anything else. My hurdle is I'm trying to keep as much of the core setting in tact as I can, even if its mind numbingly dumb.

I guess my hurdle is "Invisible and can pass through walls" isn't particularly different than "Ghostly and shadowy" to me.

Your recommendation would be to take the ethereal world out, then make a Shadow World and Mirror World, both of which reflect the real world. One in darkness, and one in oppositeness (like beard spock, or something?) I'm probably not going to do this, due to the goal of compatability, but I'd be interested to hear it out.

[schpeelah]

If ethereal beings can see and touch other ethereal beings and have a limited visual range, declaring the Border Ethereal to not be a thing is literally just a change in perspective. Deep Ethereal, if you are using it in the first place, is only cosmetically different from the Astral - both are hospitable voids you can move through by thinking about it to get places, with stuff floating in them with an undefined and changing spatial relationship to other stuff. The Astral has a different color and different stuff floating other than portals, but that's basically it.

I really don't see why you think it's like the Shadow plane. Shadow has its own terrain that merely resembles the Material on a large scale - if you enter in a mountainous area, you'll be in a mountainous area but none of the mountains will be in the same places. Ethereal is mostly empty, but you can see the Material from there.

Mirror planes were introduced in the Third Edition Manual of the Planes as an optional group of transitive planes. They are small planes that each connect to a group of mirrors that can be located in any other planes throughout the multiverse. A mirror plane takes the form of a long, winding corridor with the mirrors it attaches to hanging like windows along the walls. Mirror planes allow quick travel between the various mirrors that are linked to each, but each plane contains a mirror version of any traveler that enters it. This mirror version has an opposite alignment and will seek to slay his real self to take his place. All mirrors connect to a mirror plane, though each mirror plane usually has only five to twenty mirrors connecting to it.

In other words:

But with mirrors.

[tussock]

The mists of the Etherial plane are really good. Thematically. If you just stick everything with mist or fog in the name in there, along with all the little pocket dimensions that fit there like your Rope Tricks and Portable Holes and Ravenloft, that's sufficient. Fog Gaints, Mist Dragons, the inside of the Tardis (or Wizard towers), and so on. Solid Fog, you're just summoning some of the Etherial plane that borders on the Elemental Earth.

Not just ghosts and phase spiders and dead platypus and lost elementals, all sorts of monsters that appear in a puff of concealment and have a good retreat option. It's full of stalkers and spies and creepy things that wreck you just for looking at them, sometimes bleed you from beyond sight like a disease metaphor. Metaphors abound.

It's the tentacles that reach of the mist before the gates of Moria. Only you can go there, and carve out a safe little home that only you can find. Maybe it'll even let you leave.

[Night Goat]

Speaking of the Mirror World: how about a writeup on Nerras? The Fiend Folio says they kidnap people and may be planning an invasion, but doesn't give us any ideas as to why they would do these things.

[Username17]

Speaking of the Mirror World: how about a writeup on Nerras? The Fiend Folio says they kidnap people and may be planning an invasion, but doesn't give us any ideas as to why they would do these things.

Sure.


Nerra

The Mirror Realm is a transitive world which connects to all reflective surfaces. Its hallways and expanses are littered with windows into every realm where a reflection is cast, and with the correct knowledge, these windows can be made into doors. The density of such screens is approximately invariant throughout, and so it is theorized that there simply is more Mirror Realm when there are more reflective surfaces and less of it when there are less. When a pond stills enough to cast a reflection, the Mirror Realm grows, and when a wind disrupts it, the Mirror Realm shrinks again.

The creation of painted glass mirrors has created unprecedented growth and stability of the Mirror Realm. Not only are the Gnomes creating mirrors by the hundred lots, but these mirrors largely remain reflective and stable for years at a time. The Mirror Realm itself has had portions stabilize from being a constantly shifting maze to being simple black and white spaces. And the life of that world has begun to change from transient, formless spheres of quicksilver to stable forms. Some of these creatures are humanoid in shape and thought, and they are called the Nerra.

Nerra are usually approximately the size of a Human, and have smooth, mirrored skin. Some are very large, like an Ogre and are called “Karaleem.” Most Nerra do not wear clothing, but the highest ranked Nerra (called “Sillit”) generally affect the clothes of wizards, priests, or lords from the material world. Newly formed Nerra are called “Varoot” until they establish themselves. Like the reflections that give rise to them, Nerra come into being whole with knowledge but not memories. The Mirror Realm is a source of power for the magic of illusion, and all Nerra can wrap themselves in glamers to appear to be different than they are.

The Nerra are aware that their world and personal existence is dependent upon and can be sculpted by the creation and placement of reflective surfaces in other worlds. Nerra frequently jump through the reflecting pools and hanging glasses of their world to enter others in order to affect redecoration in other worlds. Sometimes it is as simple as moving a looking glass or draining a pond, and other times it is far more elaborate, such as commissioning the cutting and setting of precious stones or the acquisition of cartloads of hand mirrors. The Sillit have a grand plan to create a connection within the Mirror Realm to a source of great power that they know exists, that they knew of before they opened their eyes for the first time.

Many people from other worlds are kidnapped and interrogated by the Nerra. Since they can see nothing that is not in sight of a mirror, their information is impressive but patchy. The great undertaking needs more, and the Nerra will stop at nothing to find out what.

-481 words

[Night Goat]

Somehow I missed this back when it was posted, but it's a good write-up. I want to use Nerra in a campaign now.

[...You Lost Me]

Yeah that is an awesome setting for a campaign arc.