I'd like to make a dragon character who leads a pirate based faction
Like a huge dragon in charge of pirates? Probably not.
Faction Name: Burned Earth
Alias: The Untouchables, Crazed Zealots.
Faction Type: Revolutionary group
Faction Specie(s): Human
Species Descriptions: N/A
Location: Series of abandoned buildings and warehouses; the faction is extremely small. Very few are allowed into it’s covert operations.
Faction Description: Led by a man disillusioned by current society, Burned Earth wishes for the utter destruction of society, so that nothing may be rebuilt. Currently working to dismantle the government via strategic attacks
Faction History: Burned Earth started with a message from God. A priest, lowly in the order he represented, was tired of the ideals the higher ups. He figured they had lost the way of the Church, and so left. He had lost his faith, the most important thing in his life. He was about to jump to his certain death, when lightning struck the wooden bridge, rickety in it’s nature, he had been standing on. It was ablaze, but the fires parted when the priest tried to walk. Suddenly filled with a purpose, he went on to create one of the most feared organizations in New Anathagos.
Important Characters: Atlas, founder.
Important Holdings/Territory/Possessions: A sector of the sewage system is currently being used as a base of operations
Relation to other Factions:Hostile
The motivation of these folks seems a little thin atm. I'd want to see more interesting backstory behind one of the most feared anarchist/terrorist groups in the city besides 'disillusioned by current society'. The general concept is okay, and could even be tied into the main plot i have in mind, but this faction needs much more fleshing out. I know its a WIP, so I'll wait to see more, but that's my initial impression.
Can I make a crime group? Something different than what has already been reserved. I was thinking a smaller group that wants to tear down the city government/other organizations. I would like to reserve that aspect, if it is available
So WIP, obviously and I will most likely switch out the all-human cast when some other players drop some races. I also want to attach the Fall of the Estephorian Monarchy to a series of revolutions that led to the Free City of Tripantos-so if you need some help building the lore of that (or any other location) I'm game. Looking forward to this setting alot @Flagg, hope House Zaripov is what your looking for!
Fantastic looking so far- feel free to post in the character tab. I'd love to develop some lore around the Estephorian revolution- and presumably some Free Cities or other new polities that resulted from the collapse of the monarchy. Of the NPC nations I have listed above, Tripantos is the one I had the least planned for, so feel free to flesh out your history and facts about the city as much as you like and let me know where I can be helpful. I'll use what you develop for the OP and post it under the Tripantos tab. House looks amazing! My only question is if they specialize in the trade of any one particular resource. But maybe they dont and are just general merchants.
I will also add this to the OP- the current year is the 1467th Year of Saint Exguin (YSE).
Anyone interested in having prior dealings? Hired Hits, illegal goods that needed to be smuggled in?
Also on that not, Flagg what would you consider to be illegal in New Anathagos?
You have pretty wide latitude on that- basically, if you want to create a crime syndicate, feel free to make up the laws they are breaking.
Example- if you want to deal in illegal substance X, you don't need my permission to say X is illegal. You can just say so. Everyone has pretty wide discretion in making up things about the New Anathagos regime and govt.
One note that I have yet to add to the OP- slavery is semi-legal in New Anathagos, which is also a hub of the international slave trade. Basically, non-human slavery is legal in the city, but slavery of humans is not. To get around the economic downside of that, there is a small island off the coast of Jos that is basically where all the slaves are held and slave trading is done, but it's the only place it's allowed. Will add more details on this to the OP, but everyone is free to come up with stuff like this for the city to carve out niches for your factions.
To Carthage then I came, where there sang all around me in my ears a cauldron of unholy loves. St. Augustine, Confessions Book III
Hello!
This is a faction/character RP in a fantasy setting based in the single, massive, mercantile city-state of New Anathagos. Through designing their characters and factions, players will help to flesh out the city and the wider world together. There will be a central plot that participants are welcome to join or ignore as they wish. People can design any type of faction they wish: crime syndicates, mercantile guilds, noble houses, foreign embassies, assassin brotherhoods, and anything else folks can come up with.
New Anathagos is one of the greatest cities in the world of Phlegethon- and certainly one of the richest. Located on the subtropical island of Jos in the middle of the Sea of Beasts, the maritime power is ideally situated between major nations, and has grown rich over its storied history as a hub of commerce. New Anathagos was founded in forgotten eons by the Vermillion Horde, a group of human refugees fleeing destruction, and has since received many tides of migrants from distant lands over its long existence. As such, and as a commercial center, it is one of the most diverse cities in the entire world, home to practically every race, sentient species, creed and culture that can be found on Phlegethon.
Geography and Commerce The secret to the city's commercial success lies in its location in the Sea of Beasts. The Isle of Jos is located along the spine of an underwater mountain chain that provides a channel of relatively shallow water across the sea known as the Anathagos Route. The Route is important because the Sea of Beasts lives up to its name- it's depths are infested with a huge array of monstrous creatures that make regular passage treacherous at best. The relative shallows of the Route provides (relatively) safe passage across the sea, without which trade vessels would need to hug the coasts of the sea or risk passage over the monster-haunted Deeps. Ships passing through the Route enjoy the protection of the New Anathagos Navy from pirates and the lesser sea-beasts of the shallows, in exchange for which they pay the Passage Toll.
New Anathagos itself is heavily engaged in maritime pursuits. Fishing, whaling, sea-beast hunting are all specialties of the city's seamen. Whale oil, leviathan bone, sea-serpent skin and other fruits of the world's most dangerous sea are all major exports of city.
[players should feel free to make up other exports (and sea monsters!) as it suits their factions]
Outside the outskirts of New Anathagos, the rocky hills of the island of Jos are dominated by plantations and terrace-farms that provide the food for the city and other exotic goods for export and trade.
Major imports include gunpowder, lumber for ships, foodstuffs, metals, and spices.
[players should feel free to make up other imports as it suits their factions, and are free to have their factions operate in the agriculture hinterland on the island around the city as well as within the city itself]
New Anathagos' major trading partners (NPC nations) include:
WIP
A loose confederation of desert city states along the River Velym, mostly ruled by mage-lords (many rumored to be vampires and liches). The greatest of these cities is the vast port of Zar Dratha, located East of New Anathagos along the Bay of Teeth. The Union is a powerful but backwards place, usually aloof to concerns beyond its borders and protected by the vast deserts that isolate it from most other nations. Among important Union exports are crocodile skins, enchanted and magical goods, educated or trained slaves, and foodstuffs from the hyperfertile river valleys of the desert. It imports gunpowder, metals, maritime products and, above all, slaves of every kind.
WIP
[players should feel free to make up other trading partners/NPC nations as it suits their faction. I will add them here as players create them.]
Politics
Ruled by a bicameral Parliament divided between an aristocratic upper house known as the House of Wisdom (that serves as a sort of collective executive branch and supreme court) and the popularly elected (by male humans) lower house that acts as a legislature known as the Chamber of Noise, in practice New Anathagos is a fairly anarchic place, with its myriad districts de facto governed by influential factions, syndicates, noble houses, religious orders and other centers of authority. Popular political parties in the Chamber of Noise include: the Monists, who advocate for human supremacy and the more extreme elements of which wish to expel the non-human species from the city, the Ecumenicals who want to extend the franchise to all sentient species within the city, the Anarchs, reactionaries who wish to dissolve parliament and return rule directly to the Great Houses, Guilds and other factions who control different parts of the city, and the Autarchs, factions of which are divided over whether to institute a constitutional or absolutist monarchy instead of or alongside Parliament. There are many other political parties [players are free to invent some or control any of the above as they wish] as well who vie for influence over the city.
The current Prime Minister of New Anathagos is Sir Garyn Gwent, elected from the House of Wisdom. Gwent is unaffiliated with a political party and is widely regarded as a competent, pragmatic champion of the status quo. He is aided in this regard by the feared officers of the House of Questions an inquisitorial secret police that administer's the Anathagos City Guard. Gwent is often criticized by deputies from the populist parties of the lower house for relying on the secret police and on the vast personal resources of House Gwent in lieu of normal political channels order to further his agenda.
History & Mythology
New Anathagos is said to have been founded in ages long past by St. Exguin the Sealord, who led the nomadic tribes of Thag to safety from the fabled Devourer Clans across a landbridge into the heart of the Sea of Beasts. As the Clans attempted to follow, Exguin is said to have made a compact with the fell gods of the Deep, and the landbridge was flooded, leaving only the Isle of Jos above the sea.
Rumor has it that the spirits of the Devourers still haunt the oceans as Goblin Fish and Snatchers that plague the bays and harbors of New Anathagos.
Saint Exguin and his band of Companions and other heroes from the Anathagan past are venerated by many in New Anathagos, especially among the older aristocratic houses. Temples to the Ancestors are scattered throughout the city, but the greatest are found in the Ancestral Precinct. There, the great Shrine of Exguin, also known as the Skull Shrine, since is fashioned from the head of a great sea-monster supposedly defeated by the saint, towers over a thousand lesser temples to various ancestral heroes and venerated wise men of Thagan legend.
[players should feel free to make up other saints and heroes and to expand on the ancestor worship of many Anathagans, and add episodes in the city's history]
Sentient Races of New Anathagos and their Cultures
WIP
- It is a character-centric faction RP. Players will design and write as the different factions of New Anathagos, but the focus of the RP will be on the characters. -It is dark fantasy set in a bustling renaissance era city state. -This to be an exercise in collaborative world building. That means that we want factions and characters that feel like they inhabit a shared world. Players should collaborate heavily in designing their factions and characters. -It is low-medium fantasy: magic exists. It is powerful, dangerous, and uncommon.
A note on Magic: I am not a big fan on fixed magic rules or magic systems. I do want to stress that this is low(ish) fantasy. That means no armies of reanimated dead or golems, no legions of fireball casters, balrogs, etc. We're going to err on the side of how the LotR handled magic rather than say, D&D. Meaning, it is present and powerful, but mysterious and often indirect.
I prefer what I call the Tolkien/GRR Martin approach to magic and religion. Magic is real, mysterious, and powerful, but for the most part takes place 'off-screen', and is for aesthetic purposes somewhat subdued or indirect (eg- no undead armies or mages throwing fireballs around). Likewise, the RP will take the GRR Martin approach to religion: there are as many religions as we can come up with here, but we will leave it an open question as to whether any of them are true. Conflicting mythos and cosmologies and visions of god(s) are encouraged.
-It is vaguely Renaissance tech. Cannons and arquebus are new military technology. There are a few exceptions to this. -It has original fantasy races. We're going to try to stay away from orcs/dwarves/elves/halflings. If you want a version of a classic fantasy race, try to give it a unique spin. -It is inspired by Tolkien, Dune, Warhammer fantasy, Lovecraft, China Mieville, & Morrowind.
RULES - Writing standards are advanced - Have fun, act like a human being, and remember this is a vehicle for story telling and world building and not a competitive strategy game. If you want that, try Civ or Total War. They're fun. - Respect the judgment of the GMs. - Please try to post once a week. If you can't, that's no big deal at all, but check in here to let the GMs know you're still with us. - One more note on posting: everybody gets writers block, or burned out, or is unsure how to proceed once in awhile. If that happens, nbd- but maybe try to find other ways to stay active? Help flesh out the history of the world, or invent a new subfaction or religion. Worldbuilding might prompt a solid IC post. Let's keep this alive and awesome.
Faction Sheet:
Fill out as much as the below form as you think necessary to give a succinct overview of your faction. No need to fill in all headings if they do not apply.
A note on factions: if a player goes inactive, a faction may revert to NPC status, to be controlled by the GM and other players until the original player returns. Faction Name: Alias: Faction Type: {noble house, merchant guild, crime syndicate, religious order, political party, etc. Sky is the limit here.} Faction Specie(s): {Sentient species that make up your faction. Please keep in mind how we're handling standard fantasy races (elves, dwarves, halflings). Also, your faction can include races created by other players, and you can create races to populate the city that are not nec affiliated with your faction!} Species Descriptions: Location: {which area of the city is your faction based, if any? We're not starting with a map, so feel free to make up areas of the city to suit your purposes! Once we reach critical mass of players, we'll design a rough map based on people's CSes} Faction Religion/Ideology: Faction Description: Faction History: Important Characters: Important Holdings/Territory/Possessions: Relation to other Factions:
Please use this template if you'd like to create NPC nations outside of New Anathagos!
Not sure if I want to do a King-in-exile thing or a religious cult. Btw, what are the commodities of the city? New Anathagos is a major commercial center, but why? Also, was there an original Anathagos? What happened to it?
Some of this will be spelled out in the OOC (Coming Soon to Theatres Near You!) & some will be developed ICly as background info. The OOC will have plenty more setting details and opportunities for players to add to the lore.
