Random World Extras: Quick Character Generation for Waywood and the Middle Lands

More backgrounds for use with the Random World: rolling these tables give a Race/Class combination for Basic Fantasy as well as some loose character background for the how or the why someone from that part of the world would be an adventurer or what their skills and talents could be.

The previous posts are link to on the table for ease of navigation. For context on some of these choices, click here.

D20	Origin
1-3	Caldbrygg, the Mystical City
4-6	Cryham, City of Spells
7-9	Middle Lands
10-12	Glanda
13	Waywood
14	Furnace Wastes
15	Orcfen River
16	Jungle of Spears
17	Yarford
18	Cafeld
19	Mavre Woods
20	Scarwood Forest

WAYWOOD
D8	Race	Class and Background
1-2	'Elf'	Warrior of Tradition (Fighter): You are (or at least try to be) more than some soldier. Your creed is one of ancient traditions of nobility and dedication to higher ideals. In spite of this you lack any kind of spiritual power: has you faith been found wanting?
3		Holy Warrior (Cleric or Paladin): As the above but with actual investment of power of spirits. This only mean you have even more responsibilities, however and they sometimes clash with Waywood’s obtuse and antiquated laws.
4		Spirit-Speaker (Cleric or Magi-User): Your task is to act as some form of link between ancient spirits and the mortal realm. More than a few magicians have grown tired, jaded or even corrupt from it which could explain why you’ve struck on your own.
5		Green Priest (Druid): Your sect is ancient and older than even Karnegras itself. The magic you’ve been taught is old and terrifying. You are no tree-hugger, but rather an initiate in bloody mysteries.Having travelled outside of Waywood many times you might have been roped into some adventures.
6-7	Human	Enforcer (Fighter):You could be a lesser noble or simply a commoner soldier. Either way, you’ve spent a sizeable amount of time working as an enforcer of the ancient laws.
8		Shanty-Town Scum (Thief): Whereas others coat themselves in a cloak of nobility and order, you know how things really are and you find no shame in it. Your existence is one of living in the shadows and in the grey areas of the law.

MIDDLE LANDS
D12	Race	Class and Background
1-2	Human	Knight of the Middle Lands (Fighter): You are a lesser noble of some kingdom in the Middle-Lands. Since you are not the first born son you’ve turned to being a knight-errant, with only your sword and armor to live by.
3-4		Bandit (Fighter or Thief): You are one of the many bandits of the Middle Lands. It's worth noting that many Middle-Land bandits are in fact knights and nobles themselves! You simply have a very ‘hands on’ approach to showing your might to neighbors...by pillaging and raiding them.
5-6		Explorer (Ranger or Scout): You are an explorer and traveller by nature and you know many paths around the Middle Lands, such as abandoned Karnegras roads overgrown with thorns or where the border of bandit territories are.
7		Wannabe Sorcerer (Magic-User): Magic is not the strong suit of the Middle Lands as it lack much of the infrastructure and organized magic users. There used to be relics and ancient sites of power of Karnegras in these lands but now they are lost. Maybe you can reclaim them?
8		Priest (Cleric): You are an ordained (and gifted!) priest of some local faith. However, the truth is whatever order or cult you belong to has seen better days and is on its last leg. You venture into the world hoping to make a difference.
9		Green Priest (Druid): Once, ancient traditions held immense power over the lands which were under the rule of Karnegras. You are the inheritor of some mostly-dead branch of the Green Priest’s religion. Waywood’s own Green Priests see you as a backward ‘bumpkin’.
10	Dwarf	Dwarf Exile (Thief or Fighter): You’ve been exiled from your clan and now wander the Middle Lands, fending for yourself.
11	Hobgoblin	Hobgoblin Servant (Fighter or Thief): As a hobgoblin you’ve been trained and/or empowered from the lesser ranks of goblins to work as a warrior, thug or assassin. You could be masterless and in need of sustaining your powers (and thus needing to complete at least one ‘quest’ or ‘adventure’ worth a level of XP) or you could be ‘loaned’ to a party of adventurers by your master.
12	Half-Ogre	Trollblood (Fighter or Barbarian): You have the blood of lesser trolls (known as Ogres) in your vein and it shows in both your stature and demeanor. You are an easily angered giant with a large appetite. You may or may not have a softer side.

"I don't really have 'a style' and that's okay!"

One thing I've noticed with people around this blogosphere is that they all got specific styles and tastes. Which, obviously, goes without saying as we all have our individual likes and dislikes and this include both tastes in what settings they play/write and what type of games they run: some people like their very retro Gygaxian back-to-basics settings, some people like dark fantasy, others like truly gonzo things. Some people are more or less into sandboxing and some people even stray quite a bit from the OSR-styled sacred cows.

Truth be told I like to think my tastes are fairly diverse and I mean that in the sense of being flexible:

• I've defended one of the more maligned 'modern D&D' race, the Dragonborn and think it is a good race with potential. At the very same time I've also expressed a fondness for settings where most, if not all player race options are 'human' or 'almost human'. These are mutually exclusive tastes. The key thing here is some games I like one style and some games I like another.
• Setting-wise I've written extensively about the very high fantasy weirdo transhuman-divine Godbound setting which is very much high powered. I've written a lot about Exalted (and running it using Godbound) but at the same time I'm very fond of low magic, low powered grim and gritty games. Again, very different styles and I can do one of the other.
• My tastes and inspirations have run the gamut from the 'back-to-classics' approach with my newfound fondness of Robert E. Howard, Tolkien and the others and the general sense of understanding the roots of the entire genre. At the same time I've admitted being a filthy fucking weaboo drawing inspiration from anime of all things.
• I've rambled about and praised OSR games to the point people joke I'm a "Born Again Grognard". Yet at the same time I have never dropped the extremely linear, slow-paced, story-driven roleplay I've done on IRC for years. That doesn't mean I don't run high lethality games or sandboxes. I just do both at different times.

Ultimately I don't find this to be a bad thing. There's nothing wrong in having multiple, conflicting styles or tastes at once. The key is understanding that different games and different groups can allow a different permutation of my tastes.

Urban Fantasy: On Demons, Part 2

Demons aren't the type of monster that should be used constantly or openly. What I mean by this is that they're (usually) not well suited to being a minion and a lot of their horror and advantages are lost if they just walk around shape shifted in the form of some red dude with horns. Now obviously they can and even will embrace such cartoonish forms of evil but there is a more complex reasoning to this. Last post was a bit too dark, so here's some ever so slightly more lighthearted matters.

As creatures of suffering, torment, corruption and general-purpose-dickery, Demons are notoriously smart and aware. One of their greatest trick is that they understand human nature, our history, our passions and our beliefs. Of course this all make too much sense if one see them as humanity's own dark reflection. Massive portions of demonic psychology can be dedicated to messing with people and leading them down the most destructive path.

Trickster-type demons are basically The Joker.
Any version of the Joker works, really.

This isn't to say every single Demon is like that. Not every single one of them is a trickster. That said, being able to manipulate people is certainly one of the demon strong suit. Raw displays of power, shooting fireballs and skinning people alive with telekinesis might be utterly terrifying but the damages it inflict upon humanity is comparatively low. Consider how much we became blasé after the most recent horrible act that shows up on the news. These things all blur into each others after a while, don't they? But personal suffering? Horrible events that cut deep to our core, our convictions and our very morality? That hurts. Forever.

Basic Demonic Powers

Demons share a lot of abilities with other Spirits in general and (usually) function under the same mechanics. A few key points to keep in mind:

• Demons in their natural form tend toward a Rank C or B in Materialization at best. As creatures of imperfection, corruption and general 'wrongness' they have a difficulty just walking around in their true form made material. Many demons, however, have means to reach a Rank of A when disguised as humans, even if these glamours are short-lived affairs (usually a Scene). There are other work around, such as possession (which is a good way to have a body but unless its brain-dead, there are ways for the person to fight from the inside) or creation of a vessel from filth or waste which is reshaped into a very convincing mimicry of a person.
• Demons, no matter their form, always have a flaw in their disguises. Ever heard of the term 'red right hand'? Its not always that obvious, even if some demons like the classics. Since Demons know they have a metaphysical weakness and imperfection which force them to have a flaw some savvy demons almost take it as a brand or statement. A missing finger, horrible scars somewhere on the body, reddish eyes hidden behind sunglasses, a subtle horrid smell are all classic examples but they're not as easily spotted as one might think. For those who take an unfamiliar form or who lack experience, this wrongness tend to manifest as a failure to properly mimic an individual or a specific look: a beautiful, desirable woman with yellow teeth or a copy of someone else who has a subtle cauliflower ear are examples. Of course some demons might willingly go all-out with glowing red eyes or bleeding black blood if it suit their agenda to be walking caricatures.

Finally, some Demons are immune to certain things. For one thing, most if not all demons lack the ability to recollect their specific origins, how they came to be and why they enact their suffering. Demons just...are.

Demonic Mantles - Tricks of Manipulation

Artist Unknown.

Not every single demon is a trickster, shapeshifter and manipulator but those encountered in human society, actively affecting things, are likely to be. A demon summoned by a warlock as a temporary servant or as a powerful patron or some way to imbue power can certainly act as a mighty monster that is a serious threat in combat but that's not where most demons excel. One major aspect of demonic manipulation is their mantle. Demons willingly shape and reshape their identities to suit their agenda and better blend in their locale. There are generally a few major angles they choose, some mutually exclusive:

• The Dark Muse: Some demons don't like to play their hands. Revealing their supernatural nature can break their slow mind-games and corruption which is better served through a mixture of mundane means and subtle mental manipulation. What they need is someone susceptible to something the Demon represent and slowly corrupt them. This is a trick which works well outside of religious places as it does not require them to play the supernatural angle.
• The False Prophet: The Demon assume the form of a major religious figure, either mortal or immortal. In the former case it will possess or replace a religious figure (note that this doesn't have to be an ordained priest or holy man of any kind, as anyone suitably devout with influence in a community can do just fine) or it will morph its shape to appear as some divine being, either a glowing Angel or perhaps the ghost of a Saint. Or maybe it will appear as an Alien, as this angle has grown in popularity among Demons from the 1980 onward with the rise of UFO hysteria and alien-related cults. The main advantage of this mantle is that inspire confidence and trust in the Demon.
• The True Demon: The opposite of the False Prophet, the True Demon embraces that it is a creature of evil and act like the open force of evil and spite that it is. These are your demons which enter the bodies of children and make them vomit and walk on walls or those who take the form of some dark stranger who push people to evil. These Demons tend to acquire a weakness to holy symbols of the faith it opposes. Now one would think this is such a major and obvious drawback that no Demon would ever willingly assume this mantle. This is wrong. Those who employ this tactic exploit the fear and hatred directed at them by true believers as well as often play upon the self-righteousness of believers. Some even go as far as to fake their destruction following an exorcism. Others still use this mantle to fuel paranoia and send people down a spiral of witch hunts: after all, isn't the best lie the one with a kernel of truth?
• The False God: A variation on both the False Prophet and True Demon is to completely forego picking the local dominant religion and deciding to play the third option. The Demon assumes the mantle of something unrelated to the major local religion and hijack the imagery of an unrelated deity or mythological figure, explaining it is true and not the dominant faith. Where it goes from there varies but particularly clever demons who learned some sorcerous tricks from elsewhere might have enough knowledge to initiate people into magic just enough to convince them. Any more powerful magic, however...now that requires delving into the dark arts. And that require sacrifices and mortals embracing a demonic nature.
• The Strawman: The non-religious equivalent to the True Demon mantle. The Demon embodies what the local community dislikes and use their hatred to grow stronger just as it grow its own power base from those who are marginal to that society. Every place in the world tend to have a general few major ideologies which dominate it, certain ways of life and thinking as well as those who do not fit in. It is oh so easy to give people what they want to hate, not realizing they feed the Demon. Sometimes the Demon doesn't even need to spew lies and nonsense!

Urban Fantasy: On Demons, Part 1

Disclaimer: Ooooh boy, I'm going to get some crap trying to 'define evil' here. And probably butcher so many religious concepts in the process. This is all fiction material for my Urban Fantasy game and does not represent my views on good, evil and the nature of humanity and the cosmos. *Breathe In* All right, here we go...

On Demons

Demons: the word conjure up quite a bit of imagery, from the fallen Angels of Judeo-Christianity to the creatures of other mythologies such as Rakshasa and Oni. Trying to define a 'demon' in a shameless mythological mash-up setting would seem a bit pointless or run into the problem of making one mythology more true than the other, which would creature many problems (See Supernatural on why this is a bad idea for a setting built on using as many monsters from myths as possible). So what is a demon? Fundamentally, most (but not all!) Demons are a type of Spirit and thus have the same abilities, nature and limitations.

The world is imperfect, at least in so much as it is not an utopia where all the possibilities are available to all individuals at all times. Sometimes the weather is bad and sometimes it turns into cataclysmic droughts. Sometimes you have a bad day at work (at a crappy diner) and get pissed easily and sometimes you have the worst day of your already-terrible life and you end up murdering your husband while he sleep. Sometimes you get sick and sometimes you give birth to a sickly, deformed child. The world is not kind. In fact sometimes it seems the world is out to get you. At other times, its not the forces of nature and misfortune that gets to you but the pettiness of other humans: your boss is an asshole (and you don't know it, but his wife is an even bigger bitch while his son is a drug addict) or maybe you have to deal with political tension, religious conflict and other horrible things which can escalate into civil war or genocide. Or sometimes you just meet people who want to see the world burn.

But mostly? They're just people, like you and me. We all have our problems, our inner demons. In fact you could say humanity, as a whole, has a buttload of inner demons and...maybe...sometimes they're a little more literally manifested.

Artist Unknown.

Are Demons fallen Angels who sided with Lucifer? Are they just psychic echoes of humanity's own corruption and weakness? Then it begs the question of why we have this in the first place, which might also lead one to the Problem of Evil. There's a gigantic can of worm on the how and why of demons. Of course, these assholes won't tell us: Demons lie all the time, taking a million faces and a million names. Some will claim to be from Hell and others will claim to be deposed Gods. Others will appear as radiant angel or some alien guy in a robe and tell someone he's the next Messiah as foretold by the prophecy of the planet Xurgan.

Demonic Purpose

Why do demons do this? Why do they lie and torment mankind? Because its their function. At their core, demons are a phenomena, a concept or a series of interconnected concepts. Demons represent suffering. They are the pain we inflict on ourselves and on others made manifest. There are demons of everything: Demons of the classic deadly sin (I mean, if you think about it none of the Deadly Sin are a good thing. People are quick to crap on the 'Lust' part as antiquated thinking but truth is there is nothing healthy in being a sex-crazed maniac!) but also other concepts such as bad luck, general misfortune, frustration. There are demons of rape, of murder, of genocide, of infanticide, of emotional/mental/physical abuse.

There's also Demons of other things: love, self-satisfaction, tolerance and peace. You'd think these are contradictions but it isn't. Everything in existence, every human concept, can be twisted to dark ends willingly or unwillingly. Our so-called good intentions can have massive repercussions which could ruin the lives of others. Some particularly smart demons can turn the greatest of saints into a mass murderer who like every second of it just as much as they can turn a liar, a cheater and an abuser into a sanctimonious self-righteous asshole.

Whatever a demon does cannot and will not result in any good, except maybe for the person enacting it through the demon's action and even then that person is damned. Ultimately demons are incapable of creating and growing, at least creating or growing things which nurture the good of others. Any 'good' or 'peace' they bring is done through brainwashing, manipulation and oppression. Demons can make you happy but that requires cutting away at your soul, your conscience and maybe the sides of your mouth. You'll be happy. You'll be content. There will be peace. It will only cost you....everything.

Urban Fantasy: Nemeses (For Stars Without Numbers/Scarlet Heroes/'Heroic' Systems)

While this post is primarily notes for my Urban Fantasy-styled game using Stars Without Numbers Revised, there's stuff in there which is usable for Scarlet Heroes and other Sine Nomine games which use the 'Heroic' System.

A Nemesis is a named and/or dangerous foe. They are a step up from simple Worthy Foes. All Nemeses are Worthy Foes but not every Worthy Foe is a Nemesis. Nemeses are those named characters and antagonist (even if their name exist only in production notes or the GM notes) who, when they show up in an action scene, receive actual focus compared to the faceless mooks. Some are just big scary super-mooks, the horrible monster or the big tough bruiser working for the villain with a squad of faceless goons. Others are fully fleshed out characters of their own, with a backstory and motivation. Whatever it is, they are not expendable. They don't go down easy even if they might be weaker than the heroes. And some go beyond that, being main villains. All these are example of a Nemesis.

Of course there is always the opposite that can happen, where the villain is a non physical threat and cannot put up a fight. A good example of an archetype of a non-Nemesis Main Villain and Nemesis right-hand man would be any kind of corrupt executive or politician or even some Bond villain who are weak as wet tissue paper but command heavily-trained minions through loyalty and/or money. These guys aren't Nemesis but their lieutenants are.

The Tough Guy

This type of Nemesis might not have any kind of supernatural powers. Not that he needs it, mind you. These abilities work for any kind of character whose sheer talent in combat make them noticeably more dangerous than the run-of-the-mill thug minions. They could be the hardened Yakuza lieutenant whose sword skills and loyalty make him take on blatantly supernatural foes with a blade or he could be some ex-special force-turned-mercenary who is simply so tough that he just won't go down.

• I Should Be Dead: The Nemesis can Commit Effort for the scene as a reaction and temporarily regain HP equal to twice the number of worthy foes (usually PC but it might include some allied NPC on their side) in battle. These HP stick around for 1d4 rounds and after that they fade, possibly killing the Nemesis as he finally succumb to wounds that should have killed him minutes ago. Multiple use of this ability stack in numbers but not duration.
• Mook Leader: The Nemesis is a lieutenant to a group of unnamed, expendable minions. Either through training, intimidation, great motivation speeches or sheer morale boost from his presence he make these minions all the more dangerous. All minions gain the attack bonus and AC of the Mook Leader as long as he's conscious and within the fight itself.
• Multi-Melee Master: The Nemesis is a monster in melee combat. His Fray Dice affect all enemies within range of his melee weapon as he spin around and constantly attacking all those within range in ludicrous cool choreographed attacks.
• Riposte Blow: The Nemesis Commit Effort for the scene as a reaction and makes an extra attack against a nearby foe at -4. Stronger Nemeses might have this ability but without the penalty.
• Unbreakable Mind: The Nemesis gain a passive +4 to his Saving Throws to resist any kind of mind-affecting effect, power, spell or whatever else screwing with his mind.
• Weapon Master: Even on a miss, the Nemesis still inflicts 1d4 regular damage.

The Monster

These abilities work best for generic dangerous creatures, from a summoned monster to a not-quite-human mook to some form of undead monstrosities. They are strong, tough and possibly pretty big and they command an even bigger presence in combat than the Tough Guy. When the monster shows up only one thing is to be expected: pain.

• Man-Chucks: The Nemesis is not only incredibly strong but has such a powerful (and presumably large) grip that it can grab its foes and use them as improvised nunchaku, This has two use: first, the monster can use its Fray Dice 'action' on its turn to grab a lesser mook and use its unfortunate ally as a weapon, increasing the damage of its regular attack by one dice size. This obviously turn its 'ally' into bloody chunks. The secondary use is that it can choose to deal regular damage but enemies which are hit must make a Save or be thrown 1d10 meters in a random direction.
• Monstrous Fray: The Nemesis Commit Effort to increase its Frat Dice by one size category as it focus its energy on wailing on everything around.
• Monstrous Toughness: Supernatural beings are notoriously tough to put down. The Nemesis take 1 point less of damage except (possibly) against its specific weakness.

The Shin Megami Tensei Franchise and Tabletop RPG

Something I've been wondering now that I've gone on a serious Shin Megami Tensei binge is: why don't we see people in the tabletop RPG circles talk of that franchise? Especially around the OSR this is a bit puzzling as there is a lot in the Shin Megami Tensei that can be ported wholesale or used as inspiration. However it hit me that its very likely a sizable chunk of the OSR blogosphere is a bit too old to have gotten into that franchise. While it is an old JRPG franchise it has only (officially) made its way in the western world in the past decade or so which would explain why grognards who haven't touched a console since the SNES era wouldn't know of it. Which is unfortunate.

The cover to the original game for the
Famicom (NES)

Shin Mega-what?

Now maybe I'm wrong and short-sighted to assume people don't know about it. But my gut tells me that, with its niche status in an already increasingly niche market (classic-styled JRPG aren't really found among AAA productions who tend to favor action-RPG or games-with-RPG-elements) and its rather underground status until relatively recently.

The Shin Megami Tensei franchise is a series of vaguely-connected Japanese RPG produced by Atlus, with the first game in the series, Digital Devil Story: Megami Tensei, being released in 1987. That game was based off a Japanese Cyberpunk/Fantasy novel called Digital Devil Story by Aya Nishitani. There was a direct sequel, a spinoff and a remake/re imagining and these games formed the core of the franchise's identity as a whole. Where (most) JRPG of the time focused on fantasy worlds, Megami Tensei focused on the then-present and near-future, blending science fiction and urban fantasy.

One look at the plot and setting and you can immediately tell why these games never made it to the United States in the 1980: focused on demon summoning, the occult and post apocalyptic themes it was just way too saucy and controversial for the Western World. The fact that God is a recurring antagonist in those games and Satan is sometimes on your side didn't help. With its strong occult themes, darker and more mature themes and tackling of religious and philosophical matters this was just a game that was never going to get  chance outside of Japan. No one wanted to touch and with good reasons.

This is God/YHVH and HE is (usually)
not your friend.

The SMT franchise is also a bit of a predecessor and ancestor to the Pokémon games, as a central game concept is the summoning of Demons to serve you. These demons have a variety of trait, skills, elemental weaknesses and resistances. They can be recruited to your cause by talking to them in combat and negotiating. Demons don't level up as fast your human character(s) and as such must be fused together, sacrificing both of them but creating a new and more powerful demon who can inherit the skills of the demons sacrificed in the fusion. The exact details and mechanics of this has changed a lot over the years.

This is a sprawling franchise and talking about each individual game is impossible but I'll try to give quick descriptions of (some of) those legally available in English for those interested:

• Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne: The first mainline SMT available outside of Japan and forever made infamous for featuring Dante from Devil May Cry! The world end, creating a nightmarish post apocalyptic world full of demons. Your character is transformed into a half-Demon and left to puzzle out wtf is going on. The game is fairly low on dialogue and very harsh, creating this foreboding sense of utter loneliness and isolation.
• Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey: A game which should have been the fourth game in the franchise but was eventually called a spinoff. SMT:SJ draws inspiration from American action and horror movies with the classic SMT formula. You play a marine sent to Antarctica  as part of a team hoping to reverse an anomaly which will end the world.
• Shin Megami Tensei IV: After years of spinoffs, SMT IV is released for the Nintendo 3DS. Unlike the other games it take place in a (mostly) peaceful, pastoral medieval-ish world and....yeah obviously ten minutes in you'll notice a suspiciously high amount of technology around indicating things are not what they seem.
• Shin Megami Tensei IV: Apocalypse: A spinoff/side-story/alternate telling of SMT IV.
• Digital Devil Saga: Avatar Tuner 1 and 2: These games are a duology meant to be two games played back to back. More post apocalyptic weirdness which is hard to explain without spoiling quite a bit. This one has no recruitable demons and focus on your party members more like a classical JRPG.
• Devil Summoners: Soul Hackers: You play as a hacker in a near-future (for the '90, anyway) city. This is by far one of the oldest and most 'retro' of the legally-available SMT titles as it is a remake of a 1997 Sega Saturn game for the 3DS.

Those who are already aware of this franchise history know I'm leaving out a very, very famous and popular spinoff series. One which has become so popular it has eclipsed the mainline series all around the world. A series which needs no introduction to anyone vaguely into JRPG and/or anime: Persona. The Persona series is an SMT spinoff but it has become so different in style, tone and concepts that it isn't covered by this basic guide.

Gameable Material

There is a lot to take from the SMT franchise, so here's a few key points I would definitely take note of and make sure to include if I was to run an SMT-inspired game:

• Law vs Chaos (and Neutral) Alignment: With so many cues from tabletop RPG, it is no surprise that SMT features an alignment system in most games which can vary from an actual game mechanic to simply which side you choose which affect your ending and maybe final boss encounter. Law is usually associated with YHVH while Chaos is associated with Satan. The Neutral routes range from anything between balance-of-both-sides to the main character giving the middle finger to both sides and siding with humanity. If one like their Moorcockian-ish cosmic struggle, then the SMT alignment should be appealing.
• Its a monster mash: In SMT, just about every creature from myth and pop culture exist, implied to possibly be made manifest and born from the human psyche. Its the kind of world where Oni, ghosts, angels, Cthulhu and Thor can meet. And most likely fight, too.
• The Setting(s): From modern day Tokyo with demons to the future to the past to post-apocalyptic cybernetic hellscapes the SMT settings are always interesting, especially the post-apoc ones. Good for sandboxing and exploration.
• Reaction Tables and Talking: An SMT-inspired game would definitely benefit from a reaction table, as some demons are more likely to want to have a chat with you while others will want to rip your face off. Sometimes it is a matter of alignment (yours and the demon) and sometimes it depend on other factors. Demon negotiation make for a valid random encounter, as not every encounter is combat-related: some demons will want or give info as well as items. Of course, if something goes poorly then the fight is one.
• Its Hard: The older the SMT the harder it gets. These games have punishing combat and, infamously, quite a bit of Save-or-Die type spells.

Dungeons The Dragoning Redux: Ancient History Of The Wheel

The history of the Great Wheel is a great sprawling tapestry, embroidered in blood and steel and gold, stretching from the furthest reaches of the distant past to the current hour. Near-immortal wizard kings once shaped the Wheel to their will and made it a place of miraculous splendor. Today, men fight with sword and bolter in the ruins of ancient glory. However, the story of the current era cannot be told without a look to the deep past...

Primordial History and the Old Ones

Slann may or may
not be Old Ones.

They have been known by a thousand name by a thousand cultures which were but infants when the age of Gods came to an end. They've been called Precursors, Progenitor, Preservers, Syrne, The Ancients, The Endless. For simplicity sake we will call them The Old Ones. They emerged, the first race to progress in magic and technology enough to become part of the larger universe. They were almost immortal, patient and wise.  Or so the story goes. The Syrne were potent mages who routinely used the powers of the warp for a large variety of applications, constructing the Portal Relays.

But the Syrne were not alone in this young galaxy. While they may have been the first mortal race to ascend to such height, sentience had evolved elsewhere in the galaxy in a completely different form. Vast creatures of great power, with many souls, the Primordials (or Yozi) claimed this young galaxy and took offense at the Syrne’s preposterous idea of supremacy, for the Syrne were at that time still and nowhere near the peak of their power. Nevertheless, the Syrne found allies in the Primordial known as Autochthon, the great Maker (sometimes known as Primus). A thinker, a builder and peerless engineer, Autochthon had more in common with the ambitious and industrious Syrne than his destructive and abusive brethren. The war between the Old Ones and the Primordials was a long one, with both side unleashing powers which at the time were new to the nascent universe but in the end, the Syrne won against the legions of the Primordials: elementals, giants armed by a race of stunted elemental humanoids called Earthen. The Yozi were defeated, imprisoned and in some cases mutilated and altered, the mechanism of their existence laid bare for the young Syrne, which led them to become the mighty Old Ones of legends.

The Deliberative

You could also call them 'Orokin' and it would
still work because of how cliché 'precursors' are.

Mighty in power and unchallenged, the Old Ones ruled all of creation, for a time, even if that time was eons. The greatest of the Old Ones were God-Kings who ruled entire crystal spheres, warriors leading armies pushing back creatures of primordial darkness and scientists and mages who controlled existence on a level unmatched even to this day. Countless races were created in this era to serve the Old Ones. The Dragons were forged from the essence of an elemental Primordial known as Gaia, while countless mortal races were designed to populate the Great Wheel. Some say the oldest deities in the cosmos were creations of the Old Ones or members of that race which ascended to a level of power to transcend mortality. No one knows for certain.

Progenitor Races

How did the great wheel develop so many forms of life...and why do so many share an eerie similarity between each others despite being light years apart? The Old Ones did it, of course! This is the current, leading theory on the origin of so many vaguely-similar life forms across the galaxy. The Old Ones created and uplifted many life forms, that much is known but some believe that beside the ancestors of all Elvenoid (The Eldarin) and Orkoids (The Krork) there were other progenitor races such as the Aeree (ancestors of Avian sapients), Sarrukh (ancestors of reptilian Sapients) or even the potential ancestors of Humans the Archaen.

The War In Heaven

The War In Heaven....pretty much unchanged.

Eventually, a great conflict later known to the Eldarin as the War in Heaven arose between the C'tan, immensely powerful, incorporeal beings composed of pure energy who existed solely in the material universe, and the Old Ones. At that point, the Old Ones had grown somewhat complacent and some say, weak. The Old Ones, physically weak and few in number, uplifted the Eldarin to serve as their soldiers. In response, the C'tan enslaved the Modrons, almost elemental creatures of pure order, bonding them within geometrical armored shells of a living metal called necrodermis. The C'tan directed the Modrons into Great Marches of all intelligent life. In response to this threat, the Old Ones created the Orks (or rather their ancestors, the Krork) to wage what would seem like an eternal war. How the war ended isn't known. The Modrons were forced into stasis in Mechanus and other forgotten clockwork worlds. The C'tan were put into hibernation.

The Usurpation

The remaining Old Ones were not the same creatures as they had been before the War in Heaven. Some stories speak of a curse, one last act of vengeance from the defeated C’tan. Others say the curse was given to the Old Ones by the Primordials, having taken eons to mature. A third version of the story claim that the Primordials and C’Tan were, somehow, one and the same as a species. Whatever the case was, the remaining Old Ones were a dying, paranoid and misguided breed. The Dragons, greatest of the creations of the Old Ones, slew their masters and assumed their place as the rulers of the known universe, forming a Draconic Shogunate. The Old Ones were rendered completely extinct, the Portal Network shut down while the Webway began its long decay.

When the Old Ones were lost, their other creations were left to their own devices. The Orks immediately turned on themselves, the joy of combat all they desired in life. Some of the Eldarin escaped their Crystal Spheres and constructed giant worldships, Craftworlds, to sail through the astral sea. They repaired and opened many Portal Relays, and found the city of Sigil. The Lady of Pain was, even then, the ruler of the city, already sitting on the throne of blades before the Eldarin arrived. Scattered across the Great Wheel were the Hedron, ancient monoliths of great power designed to help bind the fabric of reality and ensure nothing from the Far Realms entered the galaxy. With most of the Old Ones presumed dead, these constructs begin shutting down, weakening the barrier, allowing something from the outside to slowly make it’s way toward the Great Wheel.

The Corruption of Chaos

Prior to this, there had only been the Realm of Souls. However all the cosmos-shattering conflict which had occurred from the rise of the Old Ones to the Usurpation began to take its toll upon the Immaterium. Negative thoughts and ideas had a bad habit of sticking to together like space magic psychic bullshit being pulled together like atoms, slowly coalescing into increasingly complex singularities of pure spite and madness. These imbalances corrupted and twisted it with all the ill will, fears and general lack of common fucking decency that life now collectively experienced. This is what spawned the Gods of Chaos, living embodiment of all the nasty things that ever existed.

Ancient History and the Draconic Shogunate

An ancient, shiny dragon looking smug.

The first dragons were not natural creatures: they were the result of complex techno-arcane biological and spiritual manipulation. The ancient dragons (or Elder Dragons) were near-immortal creatures of vast power, a power which would only increase with age. Unfortunately, with the death of their Old Ones creator, the dragons were quickly met with the problem that they could not create more of their kind directly through such ancient science. They had to resort to naturally reproducing, which immediately began the dilution of their blood and power, which account for the variety in draconic shape, appearance and abilities in this day and age, from the noble and pure (but rare) gold dragons to the bizarre and degenerate Howling Dragon to even more obscure breed of dragons which exist only on a single world.

To fill their ranks and build an empire worthy of their might, the dragons began experimenting on various saurian life forms, leading to the creation of races such as the Kobold and Dragonborn, amongst others. These mortal races carry within them the gene of the dragons. The shogun of the dragons was Bahamut, the Platinum Dragon. Powerful, wise, noble and perhaps a tad bit too haughty, Bahamut held his rivals in check. That is until he was betrayed by a fellow warlord: Tiamat, the Five-Headed-Dragon. Tiamat waged war on Bahamut, nearly half of the living dragons siding with her. The two armies clashed, and on the slopes of Mount Celestia itself, Tiamat was struck down. But the Draconic empire was shattered. Several of the immortal Elder Dragons fled to Sigil.

The First Hive-Fleet

Omnomnom...

The arrival of the Great Devourer in the Great Wheel is quite ancient but only recently has it been understood. Where they came from, none can say, but these creatures infested every corner of the galaxy, falling upon the weakened Draconic Shogunate like hungry locust. Fortunately for the galaxy, this was a small hive fleet, seemingly only scouts and ill-prepared ones at that, but their impact upon the galaxy is one which is still felt today. Like a cancer, these organism would develop into the countless Aberrations. Separated from the hive mind, the confused aliens which had remained on countless worlds were forced to adapt. Some became lone predators, such as the dreaded Fenrisian Kraken, others reformed a primitive hive society, such as the weak Kruthik. Countless species of alien monstrosities can trace their ancestry to those early invaders of the Great Devourer. On the moon of Ymgarl, however, something different was biding its time… 

Formation of the Realm of Arkhosia

Using a forgotten Old Ones weapon known as the Sword of Creation, one dragon disrupted the hive mind of the alien invaders. This dragon then went and crowned herself the Scarlet Empress, forming her own empire of dragon blooded creatures. The Realm, while powerful, was a shadow of the Shogunate and a mere speck of dust compared to the Old Ones Deliberative. The Great Devourer had, in many ways, somewhat wiped the slate clean. For the first time in untold eons, the hand of the Old Ones was missing. The dragons were still around and the Realm was slowly and carefully building its power but nonetheless, this era was marked by the emergence of many new forms of life who began leaving their homeworlds and spreading across the Great Wheel.

Bael Turath and Asmodeus

Lord Douchebag McAsshole
the First! aka Asmodeus.

In those times a race of humanoids, possibly distant relatives to Humans, had developed into a small but extremely ambitious empire on the planet Korriban which started to clash with the much more powerful Realm. While genocide is never a good thing, one could argue that had everyone known what would happen next in their centuries of war then everyone involved would have rooted for the dragons and their servants to wipe these upstarts off the face of the galaxy.

The God-Kings and sorcerers nobles of that realm, Bael Turath, were powerful and dreamed of complete galactic conquest. Something which would obviously never happen. Inside their twisted minds, dark desires festered until they began to hear the call of a power which had been growing stronger and stronger with each century: the power of Chaos. The mightiest of Bael Turath's God-King slew his brother Ihys and took absolute control over their council, setting himself as the Lord of the Nine. His name was Asmodeus.

The war between Arkhosia and Bael Turath lasted centuries and had untold casualties on both side. In time, Bael Turath's tyrannical rulers lost more and more their grasp on their people until a single Crystal Sphere remained under their power, known as Baator. In the final days, Asmodeus chose to damn his entire people and utterly dedicate each and every single one of them to the power of Chaos but not before betraying Chaos itself by choosing to align with a renegade Chaos God known as Malal, god of trolling, backstabbing and general team-killing fuckery. It was thus that the Baatezu, or Devils, became creatures of (twisted) Order as one last middle finger to their benefactor, wielding the power of Chaos to enforce an iron rule, because Asmodeus is just that much of a dick.

Worldbuilding Resources: Youtube Channels

Just figured I'd post some of the Youtube-related resources which have helped me flesh out things for games. Some of these are fairly obvious and well know, others maybe a little less so. Keep in mind quite a few of these include writing advice, which isn't quite relevant to Tabletop RPG but they are here on this list because they discuss matters of world building in some shape or form or because they include information on the how and why of reality. These are put in no particular order.

• Stoneworks World Building: General purpose world building and history.
• James Tullos: Worldbuilding and literary critiques. Good to see the glaring worldbuilding pitfalls before crashing right into them.
• Artifexan: Include not just world building and science fiction but also Conlang.
• Invicta: Lot of good historical information about the lives of ordinary people and how it worked.
• Kings and Generals: More historical matters.
• Terrible Writing Advice: A self explanatory name using sarcasm and self-deprecation to explain the do and don't.
• Isaac Arthur: In depth, but very approachable and easy to understand discussion of plausible hard science fiction concepts.
• Kurzgesagt - In a Nutshell: More science-related videos.
• PBS Eon: Videos about prehistoric life and evolution. Good if you want ideas for plausible creatures to throw at the player which would still come off as strange, like a crocodile with hooves.
• Ben G Thomas: More videos about paleontology as well as some related to speculative biology.
• Trey The Explainer: Even more paleontology, anthropology as well as more odds and ends including discussions about mythology in relation to their history and development.

Dungeons The Dragoning Redux: Remaking The Clusterfuck

If you are confused by this insanity of a crossover, I've written about Dungeons: The Dragoning 40 000 7th Edition here. Its a brief intro but it should explain what this insane mess of a game is.

Getting Back To More Solid Roots

Dungeons The Dragoning is a ridiculous concept. Its 'official' releases (if we can even call them that!) consist of only two books, the core book and the expansion called 'For A Few Subtitles More'. This would be the end of the publication of this monstrosity of a game but homebrew beget more homebrew: as a result, a game that itself is a mash up homebrew of references had a very active community which added an utterly humongous amount of homebrew races, exaltations and more to the setting. While this is all fine and dandy it made the game, at least in my opinion, lose its identity. This may seem contradictory but the original game was clearly based off a few major IP with references to others added in there. The homebrew crowd for all the good it did basically went and crammed every single thing under the sun.

This made the game lose its identity.

Without the 'core' fusion of Dungeons & Dragons, Warhammer, World of Darkness and Exalted it seems to me the setting lose what makes it a silly, funny crossover in the first place. D&D alone has had so many settings and re imagining under its brand that there is a massive wealth of content to base a silly, crossover space fantasy setting around it. The rest still has room to exist as dumb in-jokes or genuine (as much as such a silly game can be genuine) setting elements. As such the key settings here are:

• Dungeons & Dragons 4th and 5th Edition: Yes, really. The 3e era is arguably so much like a poor man's Planescape in some aspects that by comparison 4th and 5th stand more as their own thing.
• Planescape: The massive universe, the factions and of course Sigil.
• Spelljammer: The concept of fantasy+spaceships and the Crystal Spheres model is used here, albeit with ships looking more like spaceships than whatever the hell Spelljammer vessels were.
• Star Wars D6: The Star Wars of the early days of the Expanded Universe, before it was all defined and then thrown away to be defined again.
• Warhammer 40 000: Forms a massive portion of the lore and setting metaphysics as well as the setting history. Most of the setting's scifi window dressing take heavy inspiration from Warhammer. However, rather than the 'grimderp' Warhammer of modern times I'd rather take as many cues from the sillier Rogue Trader era.
• Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Oooh this one is going to get so much crap! That said, while it came after DTD was released there are a few elements of AoS which seems like they came out more of the space fantasy DTD than the grim fantasy world of the classic Warhammer.
• World of Darkness and Exalted: Much like how Warhammer Fantasy and 40 000 were connected, these two settings share a common root, a common publisher and many setting elements in common despite being separate. Quite a bit of the setting history and metaphysics take from these two.

The Materium

The name Great Wheel is the modern name of the known universe. It has had many other names for every culture, every species has called it something or other throughout their history as soon as they glanced upward and saw an endless sea of blinking lights where the Gods were said to live. In term of size it is massive, dwarfing our own Milky Way and is said to hold so many worlds as for them to be uncountable. The Great Wheel is also said to have four poles, based on the outdated model developed by ancient Dragons. There is some truth to this elemental models, however. The 'south' of the Great Wheel (its all a bit relative) is in fact home to much warmer crystal spheres and burning stars which can tear even shielded spelljammer vessels, for example.

Most worlds are found inside Crystal Spheres, which usually house a sun (or some close analogue) and has one or more habitable worlds inside. I'd say orbiting but that implies that a heliocentric model would always be accurate: it isn't. It is not unknown for some of these spheres to have their own oddities when it come to the laws of reality but the vast majority of them are considered to be stable and non-hostile to most known forms of life. Some spheres have air inside them, allowing people to breathe in space beyond the confine of a planet inside it. Most don't, however. Beyond this is nothing but airless void but this is hardly the end of our exploration of that universe.

There exist a massive, impossibly vast network once built and inhabited by the Old Ones and later the Eldars. It is called the Webway and sometimes the First World or Feywild. Some parts of it are small enough to exist as passages for individuals while others are impossibly vast caverns filled with glowing, alien life and some other parts are so larger as to be able to hold entire Crystal Spheres. Most of it is unexplored and dangerous, filled with fickle and ageless creatures engineered by the Old Ones. Even the passages explored and used by the ancient Eldarin have crumbled and those that remain are jealously guarded by them.

Like this but bigger.

The Immaterium

When people speak of the Immaterium, in hushed tones I should add, they usually speak of The Warp:the hellish dimension of Chaos where Daemon dwells. However this is not the only part of the Immaterium, the realm of thought, souls and ideas. In ancient times it was the Realm of Souls, the Supernal Realms or The Wyld: an endless expanse of possibility and thoughts. The growth of Chaos and its ravenous powers has tainted the Immaterium.

The shallows of the Immaterium are called the Umbra or the Ethereal Plane: it is a reality which exist overlaid the Materium and is where lesser spirits, daemon and ghosts exist. This reality can be entered through astral projection or the use of spells. Deeper in the Umbra still exist certain domains of powerful beings which might be entire Planes of their own. A domain which exist parallel to the material world is the Underworld also known as The Shadowfell.

The Abyss is a massive rift in the Materium where the Immaterium (especially all the Chaos-ey and tentacle-ey parts!) is leaking. The worlds trapped inside this anomaly exist in both the material and immaterial and they are terrifying places where  Daemons roam free, chaos cult is the only law and madness and mutation are a constant.

"I feel the Warp overtaking me!"

Magic, The Warp and Trying Not To Explode

Most forms of Magic derive from the Warp (or rather, the Immaterium as a whole) in some form or another. This is both extremely useful, as it allow to bend the material world to one's will but it is also extremely dangerous. Psychic abilities have existed in most lifeforms in some shape or another and that power is both feared and revered in equal measure. The four most common forms of Magical powers are as such:

• Wizards, sometimes called Thaumaturge, Arcanist or Magisters rely on complex and ancient formula developed by the Old Ones (and later Eldarin and other races) which allow one to bend the forces of the Warp (sometimes called Winds of Magic) in a mostly safe and non-corrupting way. While the method itself is extremely safe and clean learning it is a whole different ordeal and requires keen intellect and solid memory.
• Sorcerers, sometimes called Psykers or Witches rely on pure will and desire alone to channel raw Warp energy. This make them the magic-users most apt at utterly spamming their powers to no end. Obviously this has a major drawback: their innate power is exceedingly volatile and an unprepared mind will find itself consume by the powers of Chaos. Having an innate connection to the Warp is a dangerous thing and often seen as a sign of mutation.
• The third major category is the one with the most names: some are called Clerics while others are called Shamans, Druids or even Warlocks. Rather than learning to channel the Warp through complex multi-dimensional formula or through innate ability they acquire their ability through some patron and higher power. This power is given and further augmented and sustained by belief and some form of code or behavior. Their abilities vary immensely depending on this outside power source.
• Finally there are Adepts: they channel the energies of the Immaterium through their bodies and mind in a more esoteric way which is both simpler and strange than the spell formula of the Wizards or the surge of power of the Sorcerer. These include the likes of the Monks, the Psion and the Paladins among others.

Most spellcaster classes are mechanically a form of Magister with the exception of most type of Wizards. There are possibly classes which, lore-wise, are Wizards but mechanically function like an Magister. The War Mage of the Codex of the Black Sun is an example which fit right in unchanged in lore or mechanics.