[quote=@Ashgan]
In the meanwhile, there's a few more things on my mind I'd like to task about.

First, since this is a setting of your making, do you permit some amount of world building from your players? If yes, to what degree? Can a player, for example, make up a given organization, band, noble house or other such body as part of their background lore?[/quote]

I do allow world building, though it's constrained (by and large) to simply adding more details to already existing settlements (a lot of which are largely undefined) OR to adding new markers on the map. I vet anything my players wish to add, but yes, I'm very open to people making the world more of their own thing. I can post the map here for your perusal.

[img]https://i.imgur.com/8tR00px.png[/img]

[quote]I understand you have typical high fantasy elements/creatures in the setting, even if players themselves cannot play as such. Still, do you have a rough estimate on how much we'll be seeing these things, i.e. how on the nose the fantasy will be? Are orcs, wizards, undead so common that our reaction would be closer to gruff annoyance, or so rare that we should be frightened and shocked to witness such a thing? Or anywhere in between?[/quote]

Hmm... Let me think of the best way to explain it.

Monsters are very real, though not everyone sees them in their lives. For instance, orcs (also called Jotun) are known to foray out from the northlands, and they have destroyed kingdoms of northmen (also called Reavers) in the past. Not everyone faces them, but you never get entirely used to them so much as you dull yourself to their presence. They behave in an entirely alien fashion, and do the most despicable of things.

Goblins exist, too, and they're far more widespread than Jotun. If there is any monster people are most likely to see, it's these creatures. However, they're still less common than bandits and highwaymen, and you shouldn't underestimate them due to their size. They're surprisingly tough little creatures.

Most people consider the undead to be campfire stories. A few know better, especially scholars or those that have suffered at their hands in the past. However, for the most part, nobody has seen such things in... a very long time.

As for the Fey, they're something that exists, but people don't generally [i]see[/i] them. Generally. Sometimes children go missing, or sometimes weird happenings hint at their presence, but by and large people are able to avoid their ire... if they do what the old stories say they should. Their goals and their thoughts and what they really are, all of that is something not even the scholars can say. They are, however, incredibly dangerous when upset, and you'd be a fool to think them benign.

Spellcasters are rare enough, and thankfully so. Magic is illegal throughout all the realms, no questions asked, because magic invariably twists and corrupts those that use it. The law doesn't stop orcs and goblins from wielding it, of course, and there [i]is[/i] the occasional wizard that plies his trade in the company of bandits, or tries to resurrect the dead to serve his bidding. There are druids and witches, too, the sorts of backwards people that lurk in the woods and prey on passersby. Those sorts in particular are the death throes of the Old Faith. They won't linger much longer in this world, surely.

As for other monsters... There are tales of giants, though they are definitely rare, and it's known that things like dragons, manticores, and hydras exist. However, they have by-and-large been wiped out from the region in the years that man has tamed it. Nevertheless, you occasionally do hear tales of such monsters rampaging through the countryside, especially near the Wildwood. Sometimes it's actually just a band of clever brigands. It's hard to tell truth from fiction these days.

[quote]You say faith cannot be proven in the setting, and belief is a personal choice; but nonetheless, is there a central church? If yes, can you describe it more in the ooc?[/quote]

I certainly can and will! For the quickest possible summary: imagine if Christianity had sprouted up among a warrior culture that was something of a mix between Berber and Steppe, and then this warrior culture came and integrated itself into medieval Europe, bringing its religion with it. That's basically what we're looking at.

The most common church is the Celestial Church. More on that in the OOC. Lithenia, similarly, has its own church. Also more on that later.

[quote]Lastly, can I ask what tabletop system you're using and if you play online or IRL? I'm rather fresh when it comes to tabletop rpg, but I do wish I had more people to play with on occasion. Being on this forum, it's clear you value storytelling, so the interests align to a reasonble extent already.
[/quote]

I originally was trying to hack Pathfinder into working for a magicless party while still throwing magical threats at them. That, uh, required too much tearing apart of the system to make it work. I ended up not pursuing that option.

The truth is, I haven't been able to find a tabletop system that I thought fit Men-at-Arms well enough to actually start running games for it. I had a couple campaign ideas I'd worked out; I had the plot and several important scenes, and places where players would be able to really change the face of the world. However, I just didn't have a good medium through which to play this out on. So, Men-at-Arms went on the backburner, and I started running Dungeon World in a different setting.

However, I recently came upon the idea of just running Men-at-Arms on a forum. I figured it might be worth trying out, since even though I didn't have a firm ruleset I wanted to use, the stories were still there. So, here we are. Blackmire Keep is me getting this setting's feet wet online before I dedicate myself to trying the more daunting task of an open world campaign on RPGuild.

Also, I run games online via Discord. I've also played via Roll20 in the past.