Arx
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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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word.
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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.
while it might not be disruptive in theory, i would definitely expect this to become a very popular request if it’s made to be possible, and people are gonna have quiet expectations to maybe someday hopefully get memories back. it may not provide mechanical benefit in your head, but i wouldn’t underestimate the sense of, like – caché? that people might lean into with it. my initial instinct is to say “nooooooo don’t let people do that, they’re gonna be weird about it even if you know there’ll be no benefit from your end.”
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@Roz not to mention the disruption to my eyes from rolling so hard at the inevitable max cringe attempts of returning players to struggle-bus their old characters through amnesia.
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I don’t mind amnesiac characters or stories about them, but I do personally agree that allowing people to play their old characters would probably create a bit of a weird dynamic on the game that would be pretty hard to avoid.
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bet I could do it decent. tho, that takes the fun away from creating an OC.
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@ten there’ll always be good players who can handle a tricky thing well! but. it’s a matter of what you get out of allowing the option versus the risks of the plenty of folks who will be weird about it. to me, there’s little benefit to it, no necessity, and it’ll just muddy the waters between the games.
she/her | playlist
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yeap, I understand your viewpoint better on it now. appreciate your explanation.
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I think the main reason not to do it is to keep the game feeling super accessible to people who never touched the first one. I’d love to find easter eggs of my blorbos in the lore, but I actually would prefer folks who played the first one to not have any special cookies at all. Maybe I’m just gunshy of people getting mad at me for rping, but…
let it be a challenge to you
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boo to the idea of any characters from the first game being player characters in the second. big boo
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@hellfrog agreed fresh start is the way to go.
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ngl, 10/10 would play Norwood again.
But I agree, it would feel
if some people could play their characters again and others could.Am very interested in old men.
Not like that you freaking weirdos.
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ngl, 10/10 would play Norwood again.
a rose by any other name would smell as sweet
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I actually would prefer folks who played the first one to not have any special cookies at all.
yeah, this is def what I meant specifically by “weird dynamic.” doesn’t even matter if it’s true or not, there would probably be a perception that old players are being favored in ways newer players couldn’t have access to, which breeds resentment and bad feels all around. like, I get that you’re not going to avoid that being a thing anyway to whatever degree no matter what you do, but imho it’s better to head the visible stuff off at the pass.
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Not to be that guy but I wonder whether this would not be better placed in the Game Gab section rather than the advertising section.
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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.
I like that no PCs are in charge of any of the states. Leave room for people to be movers and shakers, but don’t create a reliance on waiting for a PC to make a decision that impacts an entire nation. Big
from me here. -
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All this talk about connections between Arx 1 and Arx 2 makes me wonder if an archaeologist type character would work in Arx 2.
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