Everything D&D Ever - Temple of the Frog

One of the reasons for the misinterpretation is a language shift. Magic suffused everything and the "primal languages" influenced the common tongues to such an extent that old surviving written texts aren't really readable anymore. Its also been a thousand years, so natural language shifts have occurred as well.

Sweet!

Spells: Entangle, Charm Person, Shield, Find Familiar, Sleep, Chromatic Orb
Cantrips: Ray of Frost, Mage Hand, Firebolt

For my Familiar, I'd like either an owl or, if possible, a monkey with wings that could use the same stats.

Welp, looks like Poetry is going to be an Archaeologist trying to piece together lost languages and re-create history.

Regarding familiars, go with something we have stats for (in the PHB Appendix D) and reflavor as desired (so, a miniature winged monkey would use a hawk's stats).

Everyone, let's go with a tentative IC start date of 9/15. So, please have your characters ready to go before then.

I'll be posting a Rogues Gallery thread in the next couple of days.

Is it a FACT that there are no God/desses in the world?

As I understand your world's state of affairs, we're dealing with a real-world Earth scenario that collapsed and is now D&D Fantasy-land.

Is there a Truth About Religion that you might like to explore as part of your world's cosmology, or are we really just focusing on module-busting? I thought about making Poetry a Sage (or Acolyte) and looking specifically for Religious artifacts as a possible focus.

I'm still bouncing around ideas.

Also, are you comfortable with a Tiefling as one of your world's races?

Tieflings are more than fine. There are many demon and devil worshipping cults in Blackmoor and they've been around long enough that tieflings are, while not common, a known phenomena (their origin being more along the lines of 2E's tieflings, which also means you can vary the appearance as you like).

As for the "truth" about gods, there is definitely more to that, which we will be exploring later on (though not in this adventure).

The "Truth" (don't read unless your curiosity gets the better of you )- [sblock]During the ancient war between Atlantis and the dragons, Atlantis sought to even the playing field by enhancing themselves with magic. Their first results spawned demon lords and devil princes, which they locked away in the lower planes. Their second attempt created the first gods - the pantheons ancient civilizations worshipped. The dragons created the crystal prison to seal magic away from Atlantis and waited for the ancient pantheons to die off due to lack of contact with their worshippers. Because of the threat gods posed to their power at the time, the dragons used the Atlantean method of ascension to create a council of Elder Dragons, led by Bahamut and Tiamat, who watched over the humanoid races within the Dragon Empire and ensured that no mortal ever ascended to godhood again. They ignored Earth, believing that the Crystal Prison was sufficient. A crack in the crystal allowed the occasional miracle but that was all. After the second war that destroyed modern civilization, the Elder Dragons extended their vigil to Earth, though there are stirrings of dissent among some members of the council. We won't be touching on that storyline until the Dragonlance modules, much later on.[/sblock]

Hey! There's lots of cool ideas here. Is there room for one more? I'd be interested in playing a gnome fighter. I've just been playing around and I think I can build a viable front-front liner, and it looks like you need some hitting power!

Absolutely!

Some world info on gnomes...

They don't exist in the traditional way other races exist. A gnome is a fey spirit wrapped in mortal flesh, drawn from the feywild into places in the mortal world of high magical concentration. Thus, there are no gnome children and no gnome communities. Each gnome is a unique and magical individual. Gnomes are often curious, inquisitive, and more than a little mischievous, yet also naïve and easily manipulated. Gnome names are either a string of syllables that the gnome thinks is fun to say or an emotion that the gnome most identifies with (or enjoys creating in others), like Joy, Avarice, Elation, or Sorrow.

Okay, I am looking at being a human with the bonus feat to start, and I'm trying to decide which way to go with that. It'd help if I had a quick summary of who was in the game already. I could easily go with a ranged attack focus or a melee attack focus...not sure which would work better with this team so far.