The Unknown Land

[Blackfridayrule]

The three nations of the continent Tassaren have largely coexisted in peace for as long as anyone can remember. Together, they have collectively charted out all the varying small islands and the open sea beyond to such a degree that nobody thought there was anything more to discover within any reasonable range. Until one day, when a crew of lost seamen spied a land in the distance they did not recognize. The three nations decided with much excitement that this land should be explored, and they would each send their best to do it. Each nation chose their delegate differently, however, in the end three emissaries were chosen, along with a support team of sailors, healers, and laborers to help facilitate the exploration.

The three delegates discover that this land was once inhabited, yet only the ruins of this slightly more advanced society remain. That, and a powerful artifact that is a living source of magic.

___

That's sort of my basic idea of a premise. I figure each of us would create a nation and perhaps a race if we wished. You can decide if your people have magic ability or not at the start of the game, however, any existing magic should be basic and probably elemental in nature, with the idea being that if your character/people do not have magic, your character will be bestowed magical abilities by the artifact, or if they have it, it will be enhanced/boosted/expanded. I figure we can start with that and see where things take us from there. We can discuss specifics of technology level or 'setting vibe' we want for the world as we plan this out, too.

Some guidelines:

--No more than a total of three players. Any more than that gets chaotic.
--If you're interested, please have some level of long term commitment. I see too many 3 player rp's collapse because one person ghosts right as things are getting good.
--Please post with some reasonable frequency. I don't expect posts every day, but once every week or two is ideal.
--Keep things pretty Pg-13. No gratuitous sex and junk like that.
--A discord channel might be nice, but if it's not your thing, that's fine and we can keep OOC discussion here on the forum.

Anyone interested?

[Neianna86]

I'm willing, back from a relatively long break and need something new to get my hands on.
I love worldbuilding so perfectly fine with working with you to make something nice.
A few questions though:
What would be the prefered level of technology? (so are we talking Middle Ages or more advanced?)

How much of a fantasy aspect to you want to keep this in? So are we talking High fantasy/magic or Low with strict rules to them?

Will this be purely centered around the artefact or are we talking ASOIAF level of nation/family scheming?

[Blackfridayrule]

All good questions. For tech level, anything could work really. I’m down for a classic medieval fantasy type, maybe strampunky if you wanted, we could do something a little more modern/urban fantasy I suppose, I’m open to that too.

As far as magic, I’m thinking it’s semi loose in the sense that it’s not like, a learned thing with spells anyone can pick up. Magic is something you either have or don’t. I was thinking my people probably wouldn’t have it (but my character would get it upon finding the artifact) but maybe yours already do. Maybe no one does! I’ll leave that up to you. But I would imagine it’s got some kind of rules to it, something basic like “magic requires energy” but probably nothing too deeply structured. Allows us to kind of have the freedom to build as we go.

I’m thinking that most of the action and whatever is centered around our main heroes as opposed to a focus on the whole nations, though I would also imagine that if magic was gained where once there was none, that’s going to have some implications for the nations as a whole. Probably not looking for the like, ultra complex spider web of important houses like GOT where we’re juggling a bajillion characters though.

[Neianna86]

I see, well I like the idea of it being a living magic kind of thing. Perhaps it is too complex for our societies to comprehend, save from the one thing.
It 'gave' us magic.
Naturally, that would create chaos, especially if the magic differs. A new struggle for control could be an outcome of it. Assuming there is a current tentative peace existing.
What if...and I am just thinking here, if there are as you said three emissaries; our third companion betrays us and steals the artifact. Thus resulting into us working together so we may stop them before they enable their entire people to wield magic or use it for more malignant purposes?

I'd go magic that is either dependant on the wielder (like Gandalf or Merlin) or on its environment (like bending the elements from Avatar).

But I'd put a price on wielding it, if not for drama's sake then for the sake of character building, as I'd like to fiddle around with it and/ or it potentially could be why our third companion betrays us.
I'm starting to bubble with all sorts of ideas here.

I'd prefer medieval-renaissance times as could potentially get your early guns in there should you want to wield those and I can have my swords and castles grin*

[Blackfridayrule]

I like that. Nobody’s got magic but we encounter the artifact and it’s granted to them, and the magic each individual gets is unique to them, but perhaps it has some basis in elemental things. Air, water, force/gravity, light, connections to animals, maybe even shapeshifting, etc rather than like spells/incantations.

The emissaries find it, gain magic, and eventually one betrays them and steals the artifact with the intention of using it to gain either personal or national power, and it’s up to the remaining two to get it back. I like it.

What sort of price did you have in mind?

Swords and castles it is! I’m thinking my character is going to be sort of a rogue class. Sneaky, dual wielding two big knives basically, sharp senses. And since it’s easier to have two players rather than three, we could have one of us play our villainous third, or we could sort of share them, whatever works best. Unless you’d prefer a third and we can try and recruit someone.

[Neianna86]

Well I can play more than one, but we can just let him/her escape and be forced to chase after them, so we can delay that particular bit.

Well it would be fun if it was a set back of sorts, like a curse of sorts, like you want to be a rogue, well due to the magicbond you have you now also have an evil double that holds the same powers and strength as you.

Or in the case of elemental magic a certain corruption spreads through the body every time it is used altering the character.

With healing magic it is costly for the characters body and life force as you take on said wounds/poisons ect.

Light or shadow magic result in the spirit leaving the body, thus the body being an easy target.

Psychic or Mental powers you become blind.

Shapeshifting is straining on the memories of the mind and thus risk of losing one's self.

How's that?

[Blackfridayrule]

Hmm, idk, that almost feels too limiting. Like you wouldn't want to use it lest you turn into a monster/lose yourself, etc. Maybe it's more like magic requires a lot of energy and that energy is easiest to pull from yourself (and its taxing, but not so taxing it's impossible to use) but you can pull from other things too, like nearby animals or plants. And you have to be careful when doing that or you can obliterate plants and kill creatures you didn't mean to. Could also be that since this magic is kind of a living source, that maybe when you tap into it, if you're not careful, you can get overwhelmed in a physical and mental sense and sort of lose yourself (temporarily) if you reach in too deep.

[Neianna86]

all right well it was just a thought.

[Blackfridayrule]

Lol fair enough. At what point do we start? Like maybe on the ship right before they make landfall?

Also once we get an OOC up let’s do a quick rundown of our nation/races/characters for reference sake. Doesn’t need to be crazy in depth, I make up a lot as I go, but it will give some point of reference.

[Neianna86]

That would mean they would still be with the three of them.

But the whole journey on the ship is not really necessary and just filler if you ask me. I'd start with them arriving on the island, setting foot on the soil.
Assuming they have stuck to themselves with potential grudges, distrust, prejudices of the others, they'll now have to deal with one another, where as at the ship they might have avoided the others.

But yeah an ooc would be nice, I don't do discord so I would prefer it if we could keep it on site.

[Blackfridayrule]

Yeah that’s basically what I meant, start off with them making landfall. Cool cool. Also do we want this to be like a solo expedition where they drop us off with supplies and leave, or is there a support crew that makes a base camp and kind of runs some of the minutia while our heroes explore?

[Neianna86]

Oh sorry for misunderstanding then.
Well logic wise would dictate that chosen dignitaries never traveled alone, but how about this:
They set up base camp, the three of us enter whatever we enter and after our 'third one' betrays us we can't return the way we came, as he/she might have trapped us or knocked us out/wounded us so we couldn't follow.
Potentially the support group could be lied to by said third party or killed/sacrificed to suit his/her own purposes.
Forcing us to have to work together to brave whatever dangers we encounter.

[Blackfridayrule]

Yeah that works, maybe all of us black out after contact with magic thingy and third one comes to first, locks us up in some kind of improvised prison or a room or something. Maybe they get back to the camp first and tell everyone we’re the traitors and we kind of become semi fugitives, or alternately, maybe they have a faction of support team loyal to them and they take off elsewhere and it’s up to us to go find them. Or they could just kill them too that also works. We’ll get there when we get there.

Cool. Feel like we have enough to start? I can put up an OOC tonight and get a brief overview of my character/nation and maybe I’ll even start us off IC too if I’ve got time.

[Blackfridayrule]

Got an OOC up, I'll work on a first IC post tomorrow when my head doesn't hurt so bad. Headaches are the worst.
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