World of Alidor » Jelling

How to train your dragon to be a lethal weapon

shent_lodge — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 21:06:33 +0000

I have been looking at the spells in the Pathfinder RPG Core Rulebook, and I noticed that a couple of them really work well with my game world of Alidor. In Alidor, dragons are top dog, and tortoises are man’s only hope. I have told players that there have been many wars between the people of Alidor, and the Dragons. Most notably was the Second War, where people had figured out how to sway the will of the mountainous tortoises, and used this ability to move them wherever they wanted, even across the open sea to the island of the greatest dragon of them all, Surma. The attack against Surma ultimately failed, leaving Ingersol stuck in a valley between two mountains, Jelling drowned at sea and Darra and Alice wandering the eastern lands of the Brunari leaderless.

The attack on their homeland, and the island now called Jelling, spurred the brunari people to design a new strategy to get back at the Children of the Slaves, as those who were free of dragon rule were called. A great forge was built just outside the cave mouth of Surma’s home.

Dragons stepped forth and volunteered to be transformed by the brunari spell smiths working in conjunction with the Daughters of Delarendel and the dragon Surma to create the ultimate weapon, essentially, common weapons that held the spirit of a dragon. If such a weapon was tossed into the air while speaking a word of summoning it would turn into a dragon and attack on its own. If the beast was slain in battle, it would return back to weapon shape and if the rite of ultimate death was not performed, the dragon would regenerate and be ready to fight again at a later day. All weapons forged this way bare Surma’s forge emblem on them.

There was one weapon found on a would be brunari assassin, that until recently, existed in the great hall in the tortoise city of Tudd, called Kingslayer, a long sword of remarkable quality. It was used in an attempt to kill Ian Russerson, the leader of the Children of the Slaves.

What inspired was the spell “Form of the Dragon I” from the Pathfinder RPG Core Rulebook. This spell and another called Beast Shape provide an excellent way to make cool artifacts for players to find while exploring. Plus, as you adventure in Pathfinder RPG there may come a time when you need a mount and Form of the Dragon cast integrated into a melee weapon could be one possibility. Of course, first you would have to train your dragon to let you ride it. But how do you train a dragon? One way, in my game, is that you befriend it, say with Diplomacy, and have some ranks in Fly and probably Handle Animal to help get you where you want to go. Dragon weapons can be the whole gamut of alignments, so maybe you get lucky, and find a dragon sword that is closely aligned to you. If you are not lucky, then maybe bribery will work, say, by letting the dragon start a hoard, and placing the weapon on a small pile of coins from time to time. Another might be to threaten the dragon blade with the rite of ultimate death.

The Rite of Ultimate Death

Over time, the knowledge of creating weapons with spirits in them faded. What is now known, is just tidbits gleaned from ledgers and journals that speak in particular of the dragons. To get a dragon to volunteer to have it’s life force encased in a weapon for all eternity is a difficult task to start with, but to have them give up their first item they ever hoarded to complete the spell, is even harder. The ones that did, never knew of the rite of ultimate death, where, according to the ritual, if you touched that single first hoarded item, be it a trinket, gem or a king’s crown, to the weapon that contained the dragon that originally gave it up, it would instantly snuff out the beast, rendering it and the weapon to ash. Of course at the time, this was a valiant thing to do during the war, and if the dragons had known of the rite, they would have had little to fear, because the brunary spell smiths kept the lists of the weapons, the dragons and the hoard items all safe and the brunari culture was here to stay, until oh, about 600 years ago, when that last bastion of their great culture finally crumbled. Scattered throughout Alidor are great treasures and odd little books with cryptic notes and dragon blades, there are 19 known to still exist or are unaccounted for.

I think I will have to make a dungeon using this theme…. Evil GM laugh.

Some fun things I thought of: If a player confirmed a critical with a natural 20, the weapon would release a breath weapon attack that the wielder is immune to. If it were a bow or crossbow the bolt would explode into a breath weapon attack. The number of levels that the player had carrying the weapon could be used to control this effect to avoid unwanted breath weapon attacks, or to spur one on. Say, if a fighter had the weapon for 3 levels, if she rolled a natural 20 to confirm, and did not want the breath weapon, because it may kill innocents, then she could reduce the score to less than 20, and do normal critical damage for the weapon. If her confirmation roll was less than 20, say 19, and she wanted the breath weapon to be released, then she could add to adjust her role to get a twenty. The player could only control this the number of times a day equal to the number of levels they had the weapon in their possession. The fighter in this example had the weapon for three levels, so she could use this ability three times a day.

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A Giants Den

shent_lodge — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 17:58:23 +0000

Now for my giants den. This a image I built from stock photos in Photoshop. It is for another quick Pathfinder RPG adventure I am creating for Winter War. I needed a den out in the swamp, by the town of Kingleaf, so I drew this out from some Images I pulled together from Ireland. An old castle (left) and a rock shelter (right). I think every giant den should have a front door and a back door. The rock shelter is the back door in the final image.

The final comp looks like this:

I will let you know how things go next Saturday with this one. Giant encounters are always kinda tough, but I hope to make this one fun and scary at the same time.

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A Map from the Past

shent_lodge — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 04:53:54 +0000

I was digging through my old game notes and I found one of my early campaign maps. This is from 1999-2000, it shows my Forgotten Realms and Warcraft 2 influences in my earlier games. Lake Surma is there and my tortoises wandered in the fog of the marsh, named The Marsh, before I created Jerren. Dalaran eventually became Port Headland and the River Surma got longer and a more North South flow. I used this map until about 2002 and it was all I needed for about 30 adventures.

The Great Sea, funny, I still don’t have a cool name for my oceans. Back then it was the Great Sea.

If you are creating a game world from scratch you don’t need a map with a lot of detail. You can always add more at a later date. like I did here.

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A cool Unicorn Pic

shent_lodge — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 19:18:19 +0000

Unicorn Knights of Jelling use this symbol.

Watch out for these guys.

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Village of Kingleaf

shent_lodge — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 02:43:37 +0000

Officially founded in JY 905, Kingleaf was an old Brunari fort on the northern edge of the Green Forest. The name of the original fort is now forgotten and the forest is has receded miles to the south. People say the dragon, Surma, just looked at the forest and it started backing away from the lake.

Many of the original barracks used while the people of Jelling set out to create the largest naval force in history for one purpose only, to take the battle for all of Jelling straight the source, the dragon of the lake. It took ten years to build the canal and all the ships needed for the invasion of the dragons island and Kingleaf was hub for all this activity. The great four story barracks still stand. Built to withstand the fiery breath of Surma, they held the marines and sailors while their ships where being built. The attack on the dragon Surma in JY 915 failed miserably. The village was not officially resettled again until JY 1300 as the population of all of Jelling exploded. The people who lived in and near Kingleaf between the years 915 and 1300 were frontiers men hunters trappers and fishermen. Some say those folk were wild men who venerated the moon. Most of that craziness drifted away as civil folk from Portheadland and Yatton moved in. Farming became a popular way of life and cranberries became the most lucrative crop.

Today JY1660, most of the old barracks have been converted to house shops on the first flour, residences for the shop keepers on the second and rental properties and storage on the third and fourth floors. The two inns in town, The Cat & King, and The Blue Bell, both have stables on the first floor and dining on the second. Private rooms are on the third and open bay beds are on the fourth. People are allowed to tent camp by the Church of Jelling on the west side of town.

Village of Kingleaf
Population 512
GP Limit 162
Wealth 8,343
Authority Class Warrior Level 7
Authority Title Sheriff
Full Time Guards 5
Conscriptable 25

Leader magical sorcerer Alignment: lawful good

Goods & Services in town
Baker: The Betting Priest also local healer
Brewer: The Tapper‘s Mash
Butcher: Blood and Blood
Grocer: The Sweating Apple
Hostel: Snooze and Bunk
Inn: The Cat and the King and The Blue Bell
Provisioner: The Betting Leprechaun
Tavern: The Boiled Toe
Blacksmith: The Eagle’s Blacksmith
Cobbler: The Boiled Toe
Coopers: 2 available
Bottle and Barrel
The Brownie‘s Pitcher
Leatherworker: The Royal Tapper
Mason: The Dirty Minatour
Miller: 2 available
The Paladin‘s Pestle
The Grind and Grind
Potter: The Kiln
Tanner: The Silent Messenger
Weaver: The Begger‘s Weft
Woodworkers: 2 available
The Suggestive Oak
Leaf and Stairs
Apothecary: The Toad‘s Senser
Armorer: The Chimera‘s Scales
Bookbinder: The Lost Manuscript
Bowyer: 2 available
•The Second Pull
•The Hag‘s Quiver
Dyer: The Strange Wash
Locksmith: The Bolt
Specialty Smith: The Vampire‘s Caldron
Weaponsmith: The Doppleganger‘s Bellows
Boat for Hire: 4 available
•The Clean Galley
•The Broken Bait
•The Bugbear‘s Keelboat
•The Bashing Ogre
•The Boat
Carter: The Singing Tarrasque
Cartwright: The Baneful Rail
Porter: Sled and Wagon
Shipwright: The Plumed Jib
Stable: The Fifth Griffon
Barber: The Handsome Goblin
Barrister: The Vengeful Sorcerer
Dragoman: The Gorged Tracks
Engineer: The Suspicious Spring
Fence: The Passionate Ale “Steve”
Laborer: The Diggers

Kingleaf is a village in the island nation of Jelling.

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