House of Ainsley: Out-of-Character Discussion

You know, I always wondered how well an all-Barbarian party would work out....

In honor of GoldenDrakon's birthday...well, okay, I'm still not quite ready to put the campaign back in motion.  But I'm pretty friggin' close.  Maybe on my next day off....

In the meantime, here's a crappy doodle that I squeezed out in about half an hour to illustrate the idea that even Dungeons & Dragons is not without its Rock-Paper-Scissors triangles.  

Ok all, so following one of our last topics of discussion because F you, why not? Karnoz having possibly been in the army during the Civil War. I believe that it is not only highly plausible but almost guaranteed to have been so....

Karnoz's current age is set at 25 with Karkova being in total anarchy for six years following the end of the war. It is reasonable to assume that the war ended right after or soon after the fall of Karkovgrad and the death of the Tsar. That would make Karnoz 19 at the time. Prime age for a beginning soldier.

Doing some research into the time lines and pre-histories (which may or may not be accurate depending on Ainsley's modifications) The Civil War raged for 34 years. Even if the war only went for a fraction of the time, it is said, and widely accepted in several story arcs, that the Civil war was devastating to Karkova and her allies, but even though victorious, the Empire was also too badly battered to actually occupy and restore Karkova and left the rebel nation to plunge into anarchy.

To have maintained such a war, especially in the later years, Karkova must have had both a huge manpower base to draw from, but also as history shown, must have been drawing more and more of its people to keep up the fight. As things started to turn against Karkova, it surely would have drawn even deeper from its reserves to attempt to stem the tides of defeat. Conscriptions would have been made, then later probably forced, from an ever younger and older population. Karnoz could very well have been conscripted at 15 or even younger to serve...perhaps as a runner or other support unit until he was 'old enough' to be put in the front lines.

Yay, I got my tax return, I'm about to get a raise for being an Armed Forces veteran working for the TDCJ for seven months and I'm not feeling horrible anymore!  So I thought I'd touch up The Cold Womb and add a thing or three while buffing out the rough spots.

For one, I didn't notice that I had ghosts in the Cold Womb twice (and neither did you guys, har har...) and I had the Hooded Pupil listed as an undead creature, when in fact they are quite alive.  So I removed the second Ghost entry, split the Noble Houses into two entries (because there are so frickin' many of them), split the Secret Societies into three entries (same reason), removed the Doom Knight from the "Doom Knight and Death Knight" entry after finally acknowledging that death knights and doom knights are the same thing, and added the following entries:

The Druj (a spectral body part, such as a hand or an eye.  Multiple drujes can unite to form a gestalt monster of sorts.)
The Crypt Thing (a robed, skeletal guardian which, like a mummy, was set in place to defend a crypt, tomb, cemetery or other house of the dead.)
The Penanggalan (a hovering vampire head with various vital organs still dangling from the neck, forced to rejoin its body at dawn.)
The Jiang-Shi (a person who died in disgrace, then returned as a cursed, long-armed vampire capable of leaping great distances.)
The Death Tyrant (a beholder which attained lichdom.  Be afraid!)
The Dirgesingers (Bards whose arcane bardic powers have ventured into the dominion of necromancy.)
The Hooded Pupils (mortals who have been granted tutelage, revelation and preparation for undeath by an undead mentor) and Death's Chosen (mortals who have been empowered by an undead patron, usually in exchange for servitude to — or defense for — that patron.)

I also added the Alhoon to the entry for the Illithilich, the difference being that any mind flayer who defies the Elder Brains of illithid society and pursues lichdom begins as an alhoon and eventually becomes powerful enough to embrace true lichdom and become an illithilich, rather much like how a lich may eventually grow powerful enough to become a demilich.  Both the alhoon and the illithilich retain full use of the psionic powers which they wielded in life, as if liches weren't bad enough news already.

Other appended entries include the Drowned (who are the zombies of people who went to watery graves before being reanimated by the dread sea goddess Umberlee, and are thus bloated with seawater, slower (if you can imagine that) yet tougher than regular zombies), the Lacedon (just as the Drowned are aquatic zombies, lacedons are aquatic ghouls) and the Nosferatu (an alternate, more formidable vampire which drains Constitution instead of Levels and which — unlike the Nosferatu of that other roleplaying game — tends to be more successful at masquerading as a mortal than the more common vampire is. Thanks, Ravenloft setting!).

I had to do quite a bit of editing and Copy-Pasting in the interest of keeping all the undead listed in The Cold Womb in a rough progression from weakest to most powerful; zombies are a common and easily squashed nuisance, but very few adventurers can trade blows with an entire-village-swallowing dream vestige and live to tell their drinking buddies about it.  This progression isn't an exact science and was mostly judged by the creatures' respective Challenge Ratings; a banshee is actually rather easy to slay if you have the right magic, but it's her instantly fatal voice which makes the banshee a frightfully dangerous enemy.

I'm still torn as to whether or not I should separate the Crypt Thing entry into two halves (Ancestral (which appear on their own, clambering out of their coffins to stand watch over the bones of their descendants) and Summoned (which are created and set to their duties by powerful spellcasters)).  I probably won't, though; I resisted the urge to separate heucuvas into those of Clerics, Druids, Paladins and Monks who forsook their vows and failed to redeem themselves before they croaked; despite the respective powers of their Classes, they're still the same creature with the same general strengths and weaknesses.  Yurel ben Al-Shadan probably wouldn't bother to make such distinctions anyway.  "Here's the critter.  Here's how it came to be.  Here's what it is and does.  Here's how it'll try to kick your ass, and here are your odds of staying dead if it does kick your ass.  Here's how to weaken it, and here's how to kill it.  That's it.  You can do the rest."

(I'm also not sure if I should include a final entry for undead gods and undead godlike beings, such as Vecna and Orcus.  Would an Epic-Level Paladin like Ben Al-Shadan even know how to kill a god?  Or does that even matter?  Perhaps the entry would be limited to "Here's how to get the hell away from Vecna while you're still alive, because your odds of actually killing Vecna are pretty well subatomic.  By the way, he's already killed me twice, and despite being better than the alternative, resurrection is still a tremendous pain in the ass.  So you might want to keep that in mind."  Thoughts?)

Anyway, Drakon has been waiting for a good, long while for an answer to that last post, so let me get on that.  Sorry about the delay, everyone!

Considering that many of the entries are 1) blank and thusly, I skimmed over many of them and  2) of things I have never even heard of, i'm not surprised that I didn't catch any of these discrepancies. Regardless, I bow in acknowledgement that your D&D undead monster knowledge surpasses my own.  :p

Offering my own  $.02, I would say yes to adding the godly chapters of the book. Here's why;

Putting myself into Ben Al-Shadan's head (and yours) it would make sense that he would include them. Everything suggested by his (your) entries so far tell of a paladin who likely dedicated his entire existence learning about and opposing the forces of the undead and their masters, hence the addition of the secret societies and the houses. so wouldn't it stand to reason that this would include the masters of the masters? The very source of many of the abominations he loaths? Surely he would have learned about them through the cultists and minions he likely fought.

Ben Al-Shadan is sharing his wisdom and experience with the reader. Given the vast number of types of undead, it is unlikely that he himself, even through a long life dedicated to hunting and destroying them, actually encountered them all. Already in the few entries shown, Ben has referenced both 'scholars' and his fellow adventurers and companions as source material for what he knows. Surely -someone- was able to divulge -something- worthy for him to pass on.

That he himself may not know how to defeat them is irrelevant. Again, Ben Al-Shadan is sharing what he knows lest it be lost with his passing. Any rumor, insight or theory is worth sharing, if only to have some future prodigy take up the cause. Surely he would state that it is only just his insights and theories, but such an accomplished hunter would be valuable if only to save another precious steps, time or even lives in their own search of the truth. A noble goal for a paladin, even after his death.

As a side note, the collection completionist in me loves the idea of books and the chess set to possibly be put back together. But I have to wonder how/when/if this will actually happen. At this point in time, game wise, only one of us even knows that there are pages to any said book..and who in the end would actually get ti keep it.

GoldenDrakon wrote:

Ok all, so following one of our last topics of discussion because F you, why not? Karnoz having possibly been in the army during the Civil War. I believe that it is not only highly plausible but almost guaranteed to have been so....

Karnoz's current age is set at 25 with Karkova being in total anarchy for six years following the end of the war. It is reasonable to assume that the war ended right after or soon after the fall of Karkovgrad and the death of the Tsar. That would make Karnoz 19 at the time. Prime age for a beginning soldier.

Doing some research into the time lines and pre-histories (which may or may not be accurate depending on Ainsley's modifications) The Civil War raged for 34 years. Even if the war only went for a fraction of the time, it is said, and widely accepted in several story arcs, that the Civil war was devastating to Karkova and her allies, but even though victorious, the Empire was also too badly battered to actually occupy and restore Karkova and left the rebel nation to plunge into anarchy.

To have maintained such a war, especially in the later years, Karkova must have had both a huge manpower base to draw from, but also as history shown, must have been drawing more and more of its people to keep up the fight. As things started to turn against Karkova, it surely would have drawn even deeper from its reserves to attempt to stem the tides of defeat. Conscriptions would have been made, then later probably forced, from an ever younger and older population. Karnoz could very well have been conscripted at 15 or even younger to serve...perhaps as a runner or other support unit until he was 'old enough' to be put in the front lines.

I promise that I'm done tinkering around with The Timeline (and have been done for some time now).  

As you said, the Imperial Civil War pretty much ended the moment that Tsar Orsek was cut down while making his last stand in his palace, and the war-weary Karkovans — wise enough to know when the cause was lost — threw down their arms.  So from the war's beginning in the year 1335 (Tsar Orsek's declaration of secession and the ensuing rebellion as the Faceless and Eternal Emperor flexes his muscles and tries to goad Karkova back into the fold) to its end in 1371 (Tsar Orsek's death), the war lasted 35 to 36 years, depending on the exact months and days of those events.  I really should come up with those specifics, I suppose....

That's a pretty long stay for a war, and like you said, the longer a war drags on, the more a nation's standards about who is and is not fit for military service slacken.  Karnoz could have been conscripted as early as Age 12 — give or take — as the war would have been a-roiling for about 24 or 25 years by that point.  Or Karnoz could have volunteered on his own, if he were patriotic enough ("I want to defend my great and noble homeland!") and/or bloodthirsty enough ("I want to kill me some Konegheimers, Lebeqis...maybe even those shady-looking, scraggly-looking Bardosylvanians!").  Either way, he may not have even needed to lie about his age; the conscriptors could have said, "Sure, kid, here you go" and sent him off to army training straight away...just not for a combat-focused role, given his tender young age.

Karnoz is nimble, swift and stealthy, and he doesn't know much at all about donning and wearing medium or heavy armors, bearing shields, wielding halberds and battle axes and other martial weapons...he's definitely not a Fighter, which suggests that the Royal Army of Karkova may have trained him to be a scout.  The scout's job is to sneak up on the enemy forces, observe where they are, what they're doing and how many there are of what — preferably without himself being observed by the enemy — then report back to the field marshal leading his unit.  Some gamers might think that stealthing around in the great outdoors is a job best left to Rangers, but that's not necessarily true.  Rogues — having twice the Skill Points that Rangers do — can easily bone up on Hide and Move Silently to lessen, negate or even overwhelm the advantage that a Ranger's Woodland Stride provides.  Besides, Rogues wear the same unarmored clothing and light armors that Rangers do, and the battleground does often drift into settled areas, where Rangers lose their Woodland Stride perk and Rogues can readily take the upper hand in the stealth-and-counterstealth game.  So there's no reason why the conscriptor couldn't have taken one look at a proto-Rogue like young Karnoz and said, "You're a lean and sneaky-looking sort.  I have just the position for you...."

Wars, armies and leaders of nations also rely heavily on messengers, who must deliver correspondence from place to place and from person to person, all without being intercepted by enemy counterintelligence along the way.  Karnoz is not without his social Skills, so there's another way Karnoz's history may have gone.  "Karnoz.  The tsar has agreed to Gramr Karbryti's terms.  Go to the city of Dotsurvand in Hrothjurgan Major and deliver this message to House Karbryti in their Starhall Keep.  Do not run afoul of the Serpentcloaks or other enemy forces!  Now be on your way."  Was it professional courtesy which stayed Karnoz from menacing the former Karkovan messenger Peluko any more horribly than he did, or was Karnoz's gruff treatment of Peluko perhaps fueled by bad memories from their mutual profession?

But Karnoz is also fairly strong with an above-average Strength, so Young Karnoz may have also been conscripted to be a supply runner, another non-combat-intensive role befitting juvenile enlistees and occasionally demanding stealth as well as muscle.  "Private Tellen!  Phoenix Company is out of ballista bolts!  Take this bundle of thirty ballista bolts, bring it up the ravine to Phoenix Company and report to Lieutenant Dorkav.  The ravine is very close to the Konegheimer army's advance, so try not to draw attention to yourself.  Now get moving!"

As to where and how Karnoz learned to Sneak Attack, he may have found himself cornered by snooping enemy soldiers during more than one sortee, and he needed to figure out how to stab a man between his fourth and fifth vertebrae very quickly.  Or he may have run so many successful stealth sortees that a lieutenant took him aside and said, "Hey, for a rookie, you're pretty good at moving about undetected.  How would you like to be trained for precision elimination of enemy leaders?  Here's how to slash an enemy captain's throat before he even knows you're there..."...thus setting the stage for Karnoz to transition into the Assassin prestige class later in life.  Or he may have simply learned that crucial part of his Rogue training while surviving in the increasingly mean streets of Kurvoss after the fall of Karkovagrad forced him to flee the city, losing his father at some point on the way.  That part I leave to you.  What do you think would fit Karnoz, his aptitudes and his character best?

GoldenDrakon wrote:

Considering that many of the entries are 1) blank and thusly, I skimmed over many of them and  2) of things I have never even heard of, i'm not surprised that I didn't catch any of these discrepancies. Regardless, I bow in acknowledgement that your D&D undead monster knowledge surpasses my own.  :p

Credit where it's due, many of my insights and inspirations here come from Libris Mortis.  Pick up a copy if you can find one.  It's well worth adding to your library.  

GoldenDrakon wrote:

Offering my own  $.02, I would say yes to adding the godly chapters of the book. Here's why;

Putting myself into Ben Al-Shadan's head (and yours) it would make sense that he would include them. Everything suggested by his (your) entries so far tell of a paladin who likely dedicated his entire existence learning about and opposing the forces of the undead and their masters, hence the addition of the secret societies and the houses. so wouldn't it stand to reason that this would include the masters of the masters? The very source of many of the abominations he loaths? Surely he would have learned about them through the cultists and minions he likely fought.

Good points, very good points.  Like you said, the fact that Yurel ben Al-Shadan included those extra chapters about living people who associate with the undead is because he acknowledged the fact that mortals quite often do play a role in either bringing the undead into the world or perpetuating their horrid existences.  If you don't like the idea of undead in your neighborhood, and a vengeful necromancer is animating scads of ghouls and sending them at anyone who ticks him off, eventually you're going to have to deal with the necromancer himself and either convince him to knock it off or remove him from the board in some way or another; otherwise, he's just going to keep on making more ghouls.  And taking down an elder vampire is no simple task in itself, but it becomes even harder if he has surrounded himself with several Fighters-turned-Death's-Chosen who can protect him and his coffin during the day, plus there's always the chance that he has several enthralled "Renfields" out and about, serving as his eyes and ears at all hours (and reporting back to him the moment they hear about a party of adventurers who just blew into town looking to hunt vampires).  Just because they're your fellow mortals doesn't mean that they're your friends whenever the undead are involved (and the undead are involved with this campaign quite a bit, just like they were with our campaign about the King of Night 20-odd years ago.  What can I say?  I just love the moldy old cold-blooded bastards...   ).

So true, anyone who devotes his life to researching and confronting the undead probably would go all the way to the fountainhead and include a final chapter — or several — on the gods of undeath, as discerned through encounters with each deity's faithful or perhaps with the avatar or other manifestation of that deity himself/herself/itself.  Maybe Joe Blow Adventurer can't kill a god, but he doesn't really need to; all he really needs to do is kill, cripple, banish or otherwise stop any high priests, cultists, necromancers and undead who are enacting and enforcing the edicts of their god in this world.  If you can't cut off the head of the problem, maybe you can settle for cutting off the hands.

Plus, perhaps adding such chapters would also accomplish what I had originally intended: Bringing the total number of entries in The Cold Womb to a neat and tidy 100 (and as we stand, there are 81 entries).  It might make randomizing the finds a bit easier that way.  "Hey, Tiger!  Guess what Gustav just found inside that silver scroll case!  Hey, why don't you use that Dice Roll forum doodad to roll your own d%?"  "Okay.  [rolls 52]"  "All right, the page which Gustav tugs out of the scroll case is scribed on both sides and titled 'The Visage.'  Beneath that title lurks a smudged clay sketch of two gaunt, leering, masked fiends, one of which is shaping itself to assume the exact appearance of the man whom they just killed...  [finishes the Cold Womb's entry on visages and adds a link to it in Gustav's thread]"

I'll get on that in a bit.  Thank you, D.  

GoldenDrakon wrote:

Ben Al-Shadan is sharing his wisdom and experience with the reader. Given the vast number of types of undead, it is unlikely that he himself, even through a long life dedicated to hunting and destroying them, actually encountered them all. Already in the few entries shown, Ben has referenced both 'scholars' and his fellow adventurers and companions as source material for what he knows. Surely -someone- was able to divulge -something- worthy for him to pass on.

Spot on.  Not every variety of undead is going to be featured in The Cold Womb.  Most of them are in it, but not quite all of them.  For one, like you said, it's unlikely that Ben Al-Shadan encountered every last undead variant in all the world; the jiang-shi and the penanggalan are but two undead creatures who somehow made their way across the oceans from the rumored Emerald Kingdoms to the far east, and who knows how many other beasties they have over there?  Plus, along with all the undead whom Ben Al-Shadan never even heard about, there are undead variants who simply weren't around during his lifetime; the nighthaunt is a relatively new kind of nightshade (whereas nightcrawlers, nightwalkers and nightwings have been around for centuries, if not millenia), and the Ainsley Zombies (who, like their inspiring Strahd Zombies from the Ravenloft setting, are zombies who keep coming at you no matter how many of their pieces you hack off, so nothing short of the complete obliteration of their bodies will end them) won't come around until after House Ainsley dies and their curse is manifested in earnest.

And for two, I like the layout as it is: 1 page for the prologue, 74 more pages with entries on the undead, and the last 25 or so pages for their non-undead masters, allies and enablers.  It fits Illusion Vale's 25-posts-per-page limit quite nicely, and cramming any more undead entries into the mix might ruin the spread.  Of course, when I can, I do prefer to condense the entries for creatures who are related and/or very well similar (ie. the entry on vampire spawn, vampires and nosferatu), but power levels and other radical differences do count.  Demiliches are so far removed from liches and baelnorns that I saw fit to give the demilich its own entry, and I also saw fit to divide the four undead elementals — dessicators, cinderspawn, necromentals and voidwraiths — into four entries due to the radical differences in their power levels and abilities, with dessicators (undead water elementals) typically being the weakest and voidwraiths (undead air elementals) tending to be the most powerful.

(As you can guess from their names, undead elementals tend to be quite the opposite of what they were and did in life.  How, exactly?  Wait till you unearth those pages of The Cold Womb to find out!   )

GoldenDrakon wrote:

That he himself may not know how to defeat them is irrelevant. Again, Ben Al-Shadan is sharing what he knows lest it be lost with his passing. Any rumor, insight or theory is worth sharing, if only to have some future prodigy take up the cause. Surely he would state that it is only just his insights and theories, but such an accomplished hunter would be valuable if only to save another precious steps, time or even lives in their own search of the truth. A noble goal for a paladin, even after his death.

Considering that Ben Al-Shadan died about a century ago (and, being a paladin of Pelor the undead-hating sun god, was cremated on a Khal-Drogo's-funeral-like pyre in the daylight of noontide, so he's not coming back, undead or otherwise), I suppose that he accomplished his mission of being a mentor for undead hunters everywhere, even from beyond the grave.  He only wrote a handful of copies of The Cold Womb before he shuffled off the mortal coil, and it's through the actions of his enemies — undead and otherwise — that what pages of this book survived their premeditated destruction are scattered around the known world, either having been salvaged and scavenged by others interested in perpetuating Ben Al-Shadan's legacy, or having survived through pure luck simply because whoever was tasked with destroying a copy of The Cold Womb didn't do a very thorough job of it.  There might be one or two complete and intact copies of The Cold Womb left in the world, but you can very well bet that they're under Fort-Knox-like protection from some holy order or benevolent secret society of scholars and undead hunters who are well aware of what happened to all the other copies; good luck getting your hands on one.

So if our party here ever does manage to cobble together a complete work of The Cold Womb, it'll be a pretty remarkable accomplishment.  Will all of those pages have come from the same original copy?  Probably not.  Will they ever find duplicate entries?  Yes, statistically speaking, they probably will.  Will they ever find out which of Ben Al-Shadan's many nemeses ordered the destruction of all copies of The Cold Womb — if indeed there was only one nemesis who ordered their destruction — or if that person, creature or mysterious entity is still around?  Well...that's a quest for another day, isn't it?  

(I've also been tossing around the idea of one of Ben Al-Shadan's nemeses authoring a false Cold Womb filled with misinformation on the undead, whether to sully Ben Al-Shadan's reputation, credibility and legacy or to deceive would-be hunters of the undead and trick them into dying at the teeth, claws and chilling spectral grasps of the selfsame creatures whom they sought.  "A wicker jacket?  Who in the world told you that a jacket made of wicker would repel vampires?  Someone really needs to...you know what?  Nevermind, I don't really care." *CHOMP!*  But that might make things a bit too muddled and confusing in this campaign, wouldn't it?)

GoldenDrakon wrote:

As a side note, the collection completionist in me loves the idea of books and the chess set to possibly be put back together. But I have to wonder how/when/if this will actually happen. At this point in time, game wise, only one of us even knows that there are pages to any said book..and who in the end would actually get ti keep it.

Card games.  When in doubt over who gets to keep what, there's always card games.  Do people cheat at card games?  Of course they do.  But that's half the fun!  

There's also good old-fashioned deception.  "Hey, Karnoz!  That torn-out book page is worthless rubbish.  Mind if I use it to kindle our campfire?"  "Sure, Keitha.  Here you go."  "Thanks!  [furtively slips the Cold Womb's page on alhoons and illithiliches down into the shaft of her boot, to be read and added to her collection when it's her turn to take watch]"  

Anyway, I need to shut up about "Oh, I'm reigniting this campaign soon, guys!" and just do it.  Talk is cheap, right?  I just need to shut up, finish setting up my new computer station, get my books out and make it happen.  Karnoz will get his Cold Womb pages and his Black King of Marbol's chess set yet!  

Don't mind me. I'm just testing to see if this forum dice feature still works.

The member 'The House of Ainsley' has done the following action : Dice roll

---

'100 Dice' : 38

That's weird. I rolled a forum-ish d%, but it mentioned that under GD's avatar. Does it always do that?

(By the way, Cold Womb Entry #38 is The Mummy. And mummies are awesome, right? )

The House of Ainsley wrote:

That's weird.  I rolled a forum-ish d%, but it mentioned that under GD's avatar.  Does it always do that?

Yes. If I remember correctly, it does that because I was the one the enabled the dice roll function.

Oh, okay.  So you are the Ultimate Dicemaster of Illusion Vale.  

Also, the campaign's "present day" year is 1377.  Yurel ben al-Shadan was obviously still alive when he authored The Cold Womb in 1302.  So...not quite a century since his (final) death.

I can't math tonight.  

Yay me!

No big deal. I could make you and admin too if you wanted. Hell, there's only 3 of us left...

Anyway. It would be great to see the game restart. I mentioned that I have a page and a half of side quests, right...

And the more I think on it, the more i want to be a revolutionary and tweak the Emperor's tail (he kinds seems like a dick anyway)

Yeah, he is.  The Faceless and Eternal Emperor is also some kind of cloud giant, he always wears a fully concealing mask, helmet or veil, and he has (supposedly) been around for many centuries longer than cloud giants normally live.  Wouldn't it be nice to unmask the Emperor and see who or what he really is?  

I can also pad The Cold Womb by adding chapters on the lands well-populated by undead...cities, islands, small nations, perhaps even a sea or two.  Imagine if this world has its own analogue of the Bermuda Triangle, complete with fleets of ghost ships plying the waves.  Surely Al-Shadan wouldn't neglect to include a mention of that, would he?  

*sigh* Now I wanna play deg nebbit!

I've been feeling the urges myself.

So how would Karnoz go about taking down a cloud giant, anyway?

At his current level and power? The best he could hope for is that the giant might slip and fall on the bloodsplatter Karnoz would make after he got stepped on...

that being said, karnoz is not fool enough to challenge the Emperor right off.... besides, Karnoz is an unknown, little flea....and he'd like to keep it that way for as long as possible while he bites the jackal's ear and drives him mad.

Shrewd, very shrewd.  Just keep biding your time, Karnoz.  

I think I need another leaf from my Stick-It pad.  I'm still putting together what entries I should add to The Cold Womb to top it all off.

If I can get the campaign rolling again, bringing Tiger (who's just a phone call away) and Jazman (who's even closer than that) back to the table shouldn't be a problem.  As for Wraith, you still have her Facebook page and email, right?

If the story gets going again, then Jaz is just as anxious, and patiently waiting, as I am. Goob is likewise interested and yes, I can ping Wraith via Facebook still.

I also have a handful of people who have expressed interest in joining, but that is all unconfirmed.

As for the Cold Womb, don't forget to add St. Kargoth, King of Death Knights. (a personal favorite of mine)

Actually, Saint Kargoth is going under the Death Knight entry, perhaps even as part of the personal anecdote which Al-Shadan includes in each entry.  Thank you for reminding me of him!  

It wouldn't be too cheesy if I brought back the old Land of Eternal Winter from that old Willard-and-Wolflen campaign, would it?  That or some other analogue for Antarctica would just be crawling with bleakborn, I imagine.  

It's your world boss, if it makes you feel good, do it.

A personal suggestion however, unless you plan on handing out entries like candy, I would't spend -too- much time on them right now with so many players chomping at the bit, anxiously waiting for a turn. Besides, Without game posts, no one is going to find them anyway.

True. I do have time enough to knock the book together. That and I can always use the mighty Edit button to add new entries and shuffle them around until I get it all perfect. Too bad there's that kind-of-annoying "You putzed around with this post X many times in total" blurb if you edit anything but the very last post in a thread.

Also, it's past midnight here, so I should probably go to bed soon. Have you thought about that post back there and what Comrade Karnoz may have done in service to the glorious tsardom of Karkova?

*chuckles* I have had ample time to consider what Karnoz did back in his service days. I was even hoping to make a play with General Hurinog at some point.... I didn't want him to be a part of the battle for Zelenzo Ford, figuring by this time, Karnoz was probably deserting with his father by the time the capitol was being surrounded. There must have been other generals and theaters, maybe Karnoz was a survivor from a failed campaign or overrun theater and made his way back on his own?

But I figured Karnos was first conscripted as a runner/messenger, then later as a scout. In desperate times, he was occasionally employed as a bowman, but he never saw direct action as a front line swordsman.

Hmm.  The failed campaign idea could very well work if Karnoz and Deitrich were back home in Karkovagrad in time for the Imperial Army to come marching on it.  "Well, our unit has been routed.  We failed to stop those damned Konegheimers and their Bardosylvanian lackeys from plowing through the scraps left of our infantry and marching straight to our capital. The company at the Zelezo River might stop them, but I doubt it.  Better run home to your family now, Tellen.  Grab your stuff, grab your family and get out before the Imperials have a chance to sack your house."

(Are you paying attention, Tiger?  Oh, no reason.  Just asking.   )

I'll grab my map and my timeline and come up with a list of battles and a general idea of who fought what.  We'll see what works best for you and Karnoz.  

(Also, too bad, you get more Cold Womb placeholders because why the fork not?   )

That would be good. I have always been interested in the civil war history and timeline anyway. In the meantime, I'm sure you want to get to sleep. I'll be here tomorrow is you wanted to continue.

Ha ha, I suck at speedy edits sometimes. I just forgot to toss in that little reference about the Battle of Zelezo Ford, that's all.

I should probably populate the map with villages, towns and cities anyway...a lot more settlements. I have a chapter of the Dungeon Master's Guide to help me with that, and I think the Seventh Sanctum site has something to help generate settlements too, don't they?