Arx
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Did the great famine in the 7th age lead to the toppling of the monarchy or are we still lords and ladies-ing it up?
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Gates of Arx open and a bunch of Humvees and Helicopters are waiting outside. Or like laser swords. Do it. Be brave!
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Maybe I’m slow right now, but are we starting at some point after the Arx bubble burst and people set up enclaves elsewhere? I’m a bit confused.
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@InkGolem i think the other areas have just been existing/surviving outside of the arx bubble this whole time. it’s just that arx was isolated and protected
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@Roz That was my interpretation as well.
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Gates of Arx open and a bunch of Humvees and Helicopters are waiting outside. Or like laser swords. Do it. Be brave!
Arx: Isekai Version
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what’s the polytheistic sitch like?
Much broader. So Arx 1 had the Faith of the Pantheon as having clear allegorical nods towards religion in medieval Europe, and while I was happy with a lot of the stories based on that, I found there was some parts of world building that were counterintuitive and very restrictive, and that made me lean another way.
It’s a very wide polytheistic pantheon, with relatively few extremely strong institutional faiths (notable exception inside Luxen), and the gods and goddesses being worshipped individually. Much closer to hellenistic polytheism with a significant number of major gods, and then a much larger number of minor gods and deity gods. (ie Ares vs say, Hypnos. Sorry sleepy bro). Player characters can have a chosen faith as a declared outward worship on their sheets, and some institutions (like noble houses in Umbros), have chosen patron deities. The main difference is it would be more like Arx 1 discipleships of being focused on a single deity than a broader unified religion. I found most PCs generally wanted to RP that even when it wasn’t the case, and it’s easier conceptually for people to latch onto.
Did the great famine in the 7th age lead to the toppling of the monarchy or are we still lords and ladies-ing it up?
Depends on the region. Arx doesn’t have nobility any longer, and hasn’t for quite a long time. Luxen is a republic, and recently overthrew their nobility as a counter-revolution to a coup attempt. One very significant NPC polity is a mercantile oligarchy. Arx 1 was the entire PC population underneath a single crown, which was held by a PC. This is very much not the case here, as the different regions are very much divided and separate states, and no PCs are in control of them. But even for the feudal other states, they each have some quirks that probably aren’t quite how people would think of feudal, like in terms of succession.
Umbros: the imperial title is done by tannistry succession, a weighted election done by the magically powerful voting for the strongest noble. While the lower titles have their own succession, but usually strongest enatic-cognatic child.
Inferna: Enatic succession by strongest gifted among daughters.
Aythirmok: Strongest child, no formal gender preference.
Pre-revolutionary Luxen: Primogeniture.
Ariwn: Succession? What’s that?
Maybe I’m slow right now, but are we starting at some point after the Arx bubble burst and people set up enclaves elsewhere? I’m a bit confused.
So yeah, these civilizations have been going on outside of Arx for a long, long time, meaning some PCs are coming from Arx and emerging into a world that’s not very post apocalyptic at all, and others are starting in societies that have been going for a long time. It is very unclear to all PCs, whether they came from Arx or another starting region, why Arx was under the Shroud if the world was going on seemingly just fine for many generations and why it’s dropped now, and what that means for everyone. Maybe a good time to mention that the popularity of the clues system in Arx 1 caught me by surprise, and I’ve made that more of a focus from the start this time.
so is the implication that these are possibly characters from Arx 1 that survived the finale? or is it pretty firmly not anybody who was ever on screen?
The latter and I hadn’t really thought too much about someone wanting to do the former, but with how separate the stories are, and how every Sleeper has no memories, I don’t think it would be that disruptive, frankly.
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The Kingdom of Aythirmok
“One stands before us in Durance. Speak thy name and testament.”
The question you hear the most is how we can stand the cold. It’s true, you can freeze to death if you aren’t careful. Only the foolhardy are out during the peak of winter during a storm, or brave the wilds without ample provision. But it’s almost an old friend, the cold. You get accustomed to the silences in the dead of winter, of places so still that even one doesn’t even need a Gift to hear spirits talking on the wind. Our lodges are built for it, our holds can stand the worst of it, and there are far worse things than waiting out a storm by a hearth. Better than the spring, for certain, as we’re reminded all too often. Because as bad as the cold can be, we’re always warmed by one simple fact:
The armies of the dead freeze in the cold.
“Salt and steel guard us well, ere the dead march from hell.”
Life in Aythirmok is in tension with those two facts, then. We can’t sow on frozen ground, and that same thaw means the dead may come. It’s a real pickle. Everyone always hopes it won’t be this spring- the scouts are always watching, we ask spirits for predictions of dubious use. But we always need to be prepared as if it will. The southern barriers to the Deadlands have been rebuilt on every incursion, and those without a Gift do their best, but you always know it’s counterproductive to even try melees to stall them, as much as the berserkers wish to be unleashed. Some bites and you just grow their numbers, and you can hardly count on them to stay dead even if you drop them, however much the dead are begging you to help end their torment. But what choice do we have, really? It isn’t as if only we would starve if we give up the thawed grazelands, they’d be eating each other in the cities of Salvation or Tenebrum without our shipments before too long.
That’s also the answer to ‘why would anyone live in a land that is attacked by armies of the dead every few years’, too. Hardly any choice. Best farmlands in all of the continent after a thaw, a number of the richest mines, and that’s more than enough for some. For most though, it’s home, and someone has got to do it, and some day we’ll end the Deadlands for good and all.
Some day.
“Winter is the kind season.”
We’ve held our own for the better part of a thousand years. Some Harvests are far worse than others, mind. We face down the greatest Affliction in all the world, and the spirits have long been in our allies in this. Maybe not as helpful or easy to understand as you might hope, but still, we’ll take what we can get. Now don’t get me wrong, it would be nice if we knew why we had to have a geas, or if they even made a little bit of sense. What does never refusing a drink if offered, or you can never eat with a stone fork, or any of these have to do with anything?
Spirits, as a rule, are very odd. But some help is better than none.
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