South Pacific Islands-flavored Campaign

[Dannyalcatraz]

If you check out the Diagram Group's Encyclopedia of Weapons, you'll find some nice illustrations of things like the shark-toothed sword/axes of the region.

4. Armor better than hide is nearly impossible to find, because metal is relatively rare.

OTOH, with the number of oversized critters in D&D, extra tough hides from dinos and extra thick turtle and mollusc shells would be more common. That would get you stuff equivalent to what you'd find in the Dark Sun setting. Check out Athas.org (http://athas.org/releases/) or that update Paizo did. Dragon Magazine #319 (the May 2004 issue) and Dungeon Magazine #110 provide an alternate interpretation of the setting for the revised Third Edition (3.5) Dungeons and Dragons game. (The rules for defiler wizards appear in Dragon #315, and additional monsters in Dungeon #111.)

For variety, Oriental Adventures has some armors that could be made in a Polynesian setting, such as Cord armor, which could be made with carefully woven creepers.

6. Spell-casters are druids and shamans, very few traditional wizards.

What about Sorcerers?

Some resources on ENWorld you might find useful:

Magical Tattoos:
http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=195401

Water Spells:
http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=191621

Critters:
http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=185243
http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=179818
http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=179402
http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=194546

 

[Zzyzx]

These are all really good suggestions!

I had not thought to look into Darksun to steal ideas, that's really smart.

And the flavor-text for each of the classes is invaluable. Thanks!

The core reason for this setting is to give one of my players the opportunity to make use of a porpoise animal companion, since she played a druid with one years ago in an "Arrgh! Pirates!" campaign, but the animal rarely could join the action because it was all on ships.

Oh, and she's my longest running player, and my wife, so even more motivational to make a more amphibious campaign work out.

 

[Tonguez]

The friendliness I referenced comes from everything I've heard from my wife, who is Micronesian, form one of the outer islands of Yap. From Yap in the west to Kosrae in the east, journeys for no other purpose than to just socialize and trade trinkets were common; an arriving group from just about any other island, excepting some specific cause for antipathy, was pretty much an excuse to have a good ol' time. A single trip might encompass visits to a dozen or more islands, and given the limited ability to carry provisions for the journey, the trips were pretty much always undertaken with the expectation that they would be welcomed at each stop.
Intermarriage between islands was also common and necessary, given some of the extremely low (<100) populations involved. Even today, it's not uncommon for a husband and wife to speak what are technically different languages; marrying someone from the same island as you is more the exception than the rule.

Yeah the long range trading of Yap is really interesting from an Anthropological stand point and shows one of the huge multitude of variations between the many islands groups. Really it simply shows that is not possible to generalise too much about the 'South Sea Islands' from looking at one group as depending on environment and population details practically anything is possible

 

[Herobizkit]

Grippli!

Ya just don't see enough Grippli...

 

[STARP_Social_Officer]

Groups of sailors going around singing "Nothing Like a Dame"

Just a thought.

"Uruk Ha'i"?
"Some Enchanter Evening?"

(cough cough)

::sheepishly sidles offstage::

 

[phindar]

Grippli, and Bullywugs. Why have once race of frog-like humanoids when you can have two races of frog-like humanoids? Why, that's almost twice as many!

Also crabmen, kuo-toa, sahaguin, locanth... and kraken. (I know kraken tend to be cold water types, but they make such a good apex predator for an aquatic game.)

 

[Zzyzx]

Grippli, and Bullywugs. Why have once race of frog-like humanoids when you can have two races of frog-like humanoids? Why, that's almost twice as many!

Also crabmen, kuo-toa, sahaguin, locanth... and kraken. (I know kraken tend to be cold water types, but they make such a good apex predator for an aquatic game.)

I thought having a kraken was a given, so I didn't even mention it.

Also that gigantic turtle that people think is an island. That is a standard as well.

I like the idea of the froggy guys, thanks.

Using islands gives me more excuses to have lots of weird humanoid races, since i don't have to explain why the grippli and the lizardfolk haven't killed each other off. They just aren't in the same neighborhood.

 

[Zzyzx]

Groups of sailors going around singing "Nothing Like a Dame"

Just a thought.

"Uruk Ha'i"?
"Some Enchanter Evening?"

(cough cough)

::sheepishly sidles offstage::

You're lucky I don't flag this as an offensive post, but my wife likes show tunes so I'll give it a pass. This time.

 

[Stormrunner]

Groups of sailors going around singing "Nothing Like a Dame"

Just a thought.

"Uruk Ha'i"?
"Some Enchanter Evening?"

(cough cough)

::sheepishly sidles offstage::

Uruk Ha'i ... will kill you ...
It's no use ... to try and flee...
Here am I ... your last encounter...
Come to me... come to me...

 

[STARP_Social_Officer]

Ha!