Thinslayer

The Faraway Land: Dragonbound (9 players interested as of 11/23/22)

@Blizz Not much. I was mainly helping some players decide what characters they wanted to play. Currently in the process of making OOC atm; I'll let y'all know when it's up.

Oh, and I need to finish my discussion with one player about his character's origin story.

The Faraway Land: Dragonbound (9 players interested as of 11/23/22)

@Dark Cloud We start soon, tomorrow I'm thinking, if I don't get roped into more all-day house-cleaning, emotional damage, and network trouble like today. Also developing some ideas for integrating player characters into the plot, which should solidify when I post the OOC and CS sections.

@kitramos I think we can do a kitsune. The way this can work is, your character would initially be human, and you'd contract with a fox goddess who can possess you to grant you her powers. If you want to be a natural kitsune, there's two methods available: 1) The foxlike features are mainly cosmetic. You have up to nine tails (depending on the character's age; 1 new tail per 100 years) and two fox ears, with none of the other arcane powers their kind are known for. Lifespan is approximately the same as normal humans, at around 70-120 years. 2) You ascend to demigodhood and become a kitsune, complete with all their usual powers. This may only be achieved with a sufficiently powerful desire and sacrifice during gameplay.
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Now, regarding the matter of game systems, it seems like everyone is relatively neutral about it, with a few expressing preferences for numerical resolution systems. So how about this: We'll try out a few battles using narrative vs numerical systems and decide which one we like better after seeing them for ourselves?

The Faraway Land: Dragonbound (9 players interested as of 11/23/22)

@duskshine749 How about an artificer, then? This planet, Aion, is stuffed with ancient artifacts from a civilization long past, and learning about who they were and how they made these things sounds like precisely the sort of work a knowledge-seeking artificer would seek out. Regret is the only person alive who lived through the ancient era, so striking up a contract with her might appeal to this character.

The Faraway Land: Dragonbound (9 players interested as of 11/23/22)

@Zyx Best of luck to you too!

@kitramos@duskshine749 Now that I finally have a week off to myself, I can focus a bit more. What character ideas are on the table? I can offer some suggestions with a few prompts to work from, if need be.

The Faraway Land: Dragonbound (9 players interested as of 11/23/22)

@Forett To tell you the truth, I've been interested in playing D&D with a group, but never figured out how to get into it. Everything just looks so daunting, including the dedicated websites meant to host it and all the rulebooks stuffed with content. I'd DM a game if I knew how. Most of my experience has been with GMing for narrative RP, which this game operates on. I've toyed with introducing some kind of mechanical system from time to time, but nothing seems to function quite as well in a forum environment as pure narrative systems. I would enjoy either kind of RP.

That said, I would definitely consider trying to implement some sort of D&D-like system if everyone present were on board with it (we'd put it to a vote). Hand-holding would be absolutely necessary, but I'd be more than happy to put in the work.

The Faraway Land: Dragonbound (9 players interested as of 11/23/22)

@Blizz Huh. Oddly enough, half of the listed ideas have canonical lore equivalents in this world.

• The Mercurial Shifters, a.k.a. "voidspawn," are shadowy, shapeshifting monsters from a hellish parallel universe. They are the sworn enemies of humanity, except for a tiny handful that have thought about it for themselves and decided otherwise. They were once more technologically advanced than modern humanity until the Ancients (and then Regret) pummeled them back to the stone age.
• The Wraithkin, so named for being "possessed" by "ghosts in the machine," are sleek, deadly constructs given "life" and built for war against the Voidspawn. Most were destroyed in the conflict.
• Ghosts are very plausible. If one steps into the spiritual plane before their physical body is destroyed, they will be stuck there until a higher spirit comes to claim them. Partial ascension after death from powerful lingering regrets (like how Regret herself ascended) is a common way this can happen. Their anchor would be a suit of armor. Normally it wouldn't be mobile, but we can bend the rules a little.

The Faraway Land: Dragonbound (9 players interested as of 11/23/22)

@Blizz How about a goblin potion vendor? Perhaps Regret saved his life once, maybe granting him a few drops of her blood so he could ascend to mortality, and he now journeys with the protagonists because he owes her a life-debt. He could brew his potions from the strangest materials, yet with God smiling upon him, they still work because he believes in them with all his heart.

The Faraway Land: Dragonbound (9 players interested as of 11/23/22)

@Blizz
Okay, now that I've got a few more of my ducks in a row, I may be able to help you work out what kind of character you want to play. The world is largely medieval fantasy, but with a handful of more modern innovations like steel, manual washing machines, looms and spinning wheels, and trebuchets. Depending on your choices, muskets may become accessible. Regret recruited her Champions from many traditional classes and beyond - you could be a priest/priestess, bowfighter, paladin, even a dungeon porter (whose role is to carry loot). If you have something to contribute to the Hero Party, you can be a Champion.

You can also optionally include support from an auxiliary patron. Your primary, of course, will be either Regret or Yddrog, but you can contract with others to obtain more magic powers. Patrons like Ifrit or Prometheus can offer you fire powers, for example, which you can use to make stuff like flaming swords. Do note, however, that each demi will have their own agenda, and you can only use their powers insofar as you comply with their agendas.

Magecraft is possible without a patron if you appeal to the gods above them (You're a Karen, basically. "I would like to speak to your manager!") using chants, runes, and magic circles, but it requires college-level knowledge in math, chemistry, and physics, on top of fluency in runic languages, in order to execute your spells correctly, and the steep sacrifices required to pay for them are often prohibitive. Basically, you need a patron for anything battle-related unless you're a certified expert - a wizard, in D&D parlance. Naturally, Regret would love to recruit one into her party of Champions.

All that said, considering the genre of this tale, a traditional knight such as would use a sword & shield would be a most likely recruit into the party. They can be either gender, morally upright, and the most badass fighter in their discipline. Talented, experienced veterans would be the first to catch their lady's eye. You're going to be slaying a dragon, remember, and one created to protect the world from foes as capable as you, so your character need to be at the top of their game.

Does that help?

The Faraway Land: Dragonbound (9 players interested as of 11/23/22)

I may have to specifically invite some people at this rate.

The Faraway Land: Dragonbound

The Faraway Land

Dragonbound

Slay the dragon! Bring peace to the land!

Once upon a time, in a faraway land, there lived an evil dragon named Yddrog who was hell-bent on enslaving humanity. In response to this threat, humanity's guardian demigoddess, the Archon of Regret, summoned You, the Heroic Champions, to defend them. No one else could even touch the dragon, for he was of her creation, and only those gifted with her power could stop him. And stop him you did, a thousand years ago, and banished his soul to The Pit, where he was supposed to stay until the end of time to await judgment.

He did not.

A thousand years hence, Yddrog's fanatical worshippers, the Dragon Cultists, recovered the scattered pieces of his flesh and sacrificed one of Regret's descendants, the Princess of Aetherion, to retrieve their deity's soul. The ritual succeeded, and Yddrog was resurrected in the flesh - and brought with him the long-departed souls of Regret's Heroic Champions. Your spirits were anchored into homonculus bodies, your fates now tied by the dragon's blood in your veins to serve the very creature you were once meant to destroy.

Whom will ye choose? Will you return again to the lady you once served, or betray her for your new master? Will you save the World of Men, or condemn it to dust until the End of Days?

The choice rests within your hands. Choose wisely whom you will serve.