Chapter 2: Society & Culture
The Gardens of Eden by Guillermo Martínez
Unlike the other official alternate timelines, the divergence point from conventional history happens much earlier, actually taking place 60 years before the Cataclysm via the appointment of Marwort the Illustrious as the Kingpriest's envoy, with the Wizards of High Sorcery becoming the de facto political power in Ansalon about 100 years later. While there are many recognizable aspects to the original Dragonlance setting, such major changes so long ago doubtlessly result in a very different world. Instead of relegating these changes to individual races and regions in later chapters,
Society & Culture takes a big picture view of Ansalon by covering common topics.
The Caergoth Accords: The Caergoth Accords are a Solamnic legal document widely regarded as one of the most crucial factors in granting mages societal legitimacy post-Cataclysm. In the year 11 Anno Magus, the Knights of Solamnia and Wizards of High Sorcery convened at the port city of Caergoth to form an alliance wrought of necessity to ensure social stability after the Cataclysm. Caergoth was chosen due to its relative proximity to the respective organizations’ strongholds in Palanthas, the Tower of High Sorcery of Wayreth, and Castle Uth Wistan in Sancrist. The Accords are a detailed legal document, but the major edicts are as follows:
- The Art of Wizardry is legally permissible in all territories held by the Knights of Solamnia. Amnesty is granted to wizards persecuted by Istar;
- Wizards receive a monthly stipend to aid in magical research;
- The Orders can appoint representatives as “court magicians” to maintain contact with royal households;
- In exchange for these rights, wizards are obligated to answer the summons of Knights in whose territory they live to aid in public order, including but not limited to dealing with foreign invasions, domestic insurrections, banditry, monstrous assaults upon citizens, plagues, famines, and other natural disasters;
- Wizards cannot mint their own currency or grow their own crops, either by mundane or magical means, without the consent of the reigning Knights of their residing province. Such goods are the primary economic drivers of feudal society, and thus reserved to the nobility;
- Those born into noble lineage or who join the Knights of Solamnia cannot join the Orders of High Sorcery, and vice versa, for to allow otherwise will result in increased concentration of power by one group;
- Failure to abide by these Accords will have the offending wizard tried in court. If found guilty, they become an outlaw in the eyes of the Knights of Solamnia and a renegade in the eyes of the Orders of High Sorcery.
This arrangement was initially amicable for both parties, but gradually the balance of power tipped in favor of the wizards. For example, precluding wizards from becoming knights and nobles became less and less of a sacrifice when mages accrued power and status with their talents. Furthermore, the Knights of Solamnia were very much a patriarchal, humanocentric organization, and women and non-humans pursued arcane magic and made alliances with wizards in greater numbers as a means of climbing the social ladder. The banning of crop-growing was the most controversial law, as horticulture and herbalism was already a common expertise among wizards for growing organic spell components. Mages often bypassed this law by employing non-magical hired laborers and summoned creatures* for harvesting. Creatures who, depending on the species and legal interpretation, can as count intelligent beings contracted for their labor rather than an extension of the wizard’s own abilities. Wizards also grew resentful of having to demonstrate that their gardens were dedicated solely to magical research, and more vindictive rulers played fast and loose with the definition of “crops” to legally raid the towers of wizards who fell out of favor.
A particularly sore sticking point was the Knighthood’s suspicion and hostility towards the Red and Black Robes. While White Robes were the most encouraged Order in Solamnia, they were more willing to work with their “morally-compromised peers,” and the proposal of using the city of Palanthas as the regular meeting spot for the Conclave was repeatedly met with stern refusal by its rulers. Things came to blows in 38 A.M., when a shipment of foreign crops was found to have been grown by undead hands created by Black Robe necromancers. While the White Robes condemned this practice, the extent of their reaction was a promise that they would consider the issue to a vote at the next Conclave. This wasn’t enough to mollify irate Knights, who burned whatever crops they could seize and detained wizards believed to be involved with the shipments regardless of their Order. As said crop shipments were intended to provide aid for famine-stricken Hinterlund, locals of that region swiftly sided with the wizards and against the Knights.
This became the start in a series of growing insurrections and the fracturing of the Knight-Wizard alliance. By 40 A.M., the Caergoth Accords were dissolved as the Knights of Solamnia declared war against the Orders of High Sorcery as a whole. This move was controversial even among the Knights themselves, many of whom fostered ties of fraternity and friendship with wizards. These sympathetic Knights believed that forsaking magic would do more harm than good and split off into their own group, the Knights of Huma. Additionally, the three Orders united, forming the Council of Three which transformed High Sorcery’s leadership from one of scholars to that of warriors and rulers.
Classes of Society: Barring more experimental communities, most societies on Ansalon are made up of distinct social classes related to one’s proficiency with magic and political connections. The names are derived from existing terms among the Orders, and their extension to entire demographics has changed the meaning of some of them from their original definitions. The Untouched are those who have no proficiency with magic at all, and are so named due to the fact that wizardry is a learned and not innate skillset. Some realms opt to call them “commoners” as a colloquial term, particularly those whose cultures still hew to feudal holdovers. Above the Untouched are Initiates, those who mastered a cantrip or two and the most minor of spells, the latter being 1st level. Journeyfolk are those who demonstrate continued skill and proficiency in magic, but aren’t yet deemed powerful enough to merit the attention of the Orders, and attained one or more 2nd level spells. There are also wizards known as Ritualists, those who specialize in casting ritual spells and might not even have a traditional spellbook at all. Such people might know only a few spells at most, but the efficiency of being able to perform such rituals a theoretically endless number of times without mandatory rests make them valued assets in their communities.
By the time a wizard demonstrates the skill to learn and cast mighty spells such as Fireball, a representative of their local Order contacts them, encouraging them to travel to one of the six Towers to take the Test of High Sorcery. Failing the Test means that the person cannot learn magic beyond that of Journeyfolk lest they be branded a renegade and treated as an outlaw. Archmage is a general term for any wizard in a position of fame or political power, be it the reigning ruler of a city or kingdom or even a mage of sufficient fame and renown. Its traditional application to those who mastered only the most powerful spells was changed over time as more and more wizards became rulers, who in turn were loath to admit to their subjects and peers that they were “mere Initiates or Journeyfolk.”
In pre-Cataclysm times, those who failed the Test were executed. All prospective mages were fully warned of the consequences for failure before they made the decision to take it. This tradition has since been done away with save in a few Black Robe territories. This is due a combination of realpolitik in keeping around otherwise-talented initiates and broadening appeal to outsiders. The Cataclysm caused the Orders to relax such penalties to being merely barred from pursuing more powerful magic, as they needed all the magical help they could get in rebuilding and ruling over society.
Distinctions Between Magical Practices: While some universalist scholars might argue in the oneness of magic as a gift from the gods, such a view is a fringe theory and most people understand that there are unique forms of spellcasting traditions. The magic as practiced by wizards is formally known as High Sorcery, itself viewed as a specific form of arcane magic. Arcane magic, also known as Sorcery, is understood to be the raw form of creation that mortals and gods alike can use to shape reality. High Sorcery is regarded as a controlled, refined form of Sorcery making use of the language known as Magius whose very words hold potential. This language and its use was taught by the Gods of Magic to three mortal sorcerers after irresponsible use of such powers caused irrevocable devastation during the Second Dragon War. These mortals would then go on to found the Wizards of High Sorcery, and the use of written Magius for this particular form of casting became colloquially known as wizardry. A High Sorcerer who passes the Test can then attune their magic to the phases of one of Krynn’s three moons, having their spells become more powerful the fuller its phase is in the night sky, and less powerful the more it’s shrouded.
Unlike divine magic, High Sorcery in and of itself doesn’t require a wizard to maintain a personal connection with the Lunar Gods in order to be granted spells. The three Gods of Magic are viewed as having roles closer to that of inspirational teachers, who prepare their charges with the knowledge and lessons to go out into the world. The magic of the Forgotten Gods, by contrast, has a more hands-on approach, which the Magocracy uses as evidence of their power-hungry nature and distrust of mortal freedom.
The magic practiced by arcane tricksters and eldritch knights is considered High Sorcery, although their potential of mastering many spells is limited in comparison to their more focused brethren. They make up for this by not having to make use of spellbooks, instead relying upon memory aids and tools to “engrave” the words in their minds and souls. This allows them to still focus on more mundane trades while still commanding respectable talent in High Sorcery. Artificers are a gray area; they use similar principles as Arcane Tricksters and Eldritch Knights, but just as often their magical creations appear to be superbly-crafted mundane inventions. Most artificers are tinker gnomes, who insist that their inventions have no basis in magic. After the destruction of the Tower of Sancrist, the bulk of artificer-related knowledge and inventions is buried in the ruins of Mount Nevermind.
What is known as “sorcery” in other campaign settings is called Primal Sorcery in Krynn. Once common during the Age of Dreams, it fell out of use among the mortal races, both for the prominence of High Sorcery being viewed as a safer route with institutional backing and also due to stigma and persecution of “untrained mages.” Traditionally, most users of Primal Sorcery in the current Age of Magic are naturally magical creatures such as dragons, fey, and the rare mortals who bear ancestry of such entities in their family trees. But an increasingly common higher birthrate of individuals bearing the gift of Primal Sorcery in recent decades came about from the lingering effects of widespread magical use and exposure to their effects across Ansalon. Such people also grow up fluent in Magius as a consequence of their arcane aptitude, their brains intuitively understanding it as they learn their native language during childhood development. A common subdivision of Primal Sorcery developed through the use of song and creative expression, with such mages being dubbed "bards," named after a title for pre-Cataclysm clerics that incorporated music into their religious castings.
As Primal Sorcery requires no formal training or a spellbook, and can be passed on to one’s descendants via lineage, it thus poses a threat to the Orders’ established Magocracy as a less controllable avenue of personal and political power. Children bearing telltale features are quickly adopted by established Order wizards, either encouraged to be voluntarily given up by their parents or forcefully taken if that route doesn’t work. Some archmages have taken up the controversial practice of sterilizing primal sorcerers to prevent them from creating children who can bypass the traditional methods of wizardry. This method is very controversial, and has been abused as a form of punishment by more tyrannical mages on undesirable demographics who they claim are “too uneducated to come upon the Art of magic via study.” Forced sterilizations are most common in Black Robes territories of Abanasinia and Kharolis, although it hasn’t caught on in Daltigoth due to encouraging the propagation of families in order to continually reinforce undead labor. The Red Robes view the practice as abhorrent, comparing it to the excesses of Istar during the reign of the Kingpriests. The White Robes also reject its use, instead using divination magic to closely monitor the offspring of primal sorcerers. Positive confirmations are then given over to be trained by the Knights of Huma or other established institutions.
The magic of warlocks is technically a form of Primal Sorcery, as it involves a mortal accessing spells (and the Magius language) bequeathed onto them by a stronger being known as a patron. This resemblance to divine magic is no coincidence, for the gods indeed are capable of empowering mortals to use arcane magic as well as divine. While primal sorcerers might be a hot-button issue, many Untouched and wizards alike still have a degree of sympathy for them due to their powers being a circumstance of birth.
There is no such sympathy for warlocks. The Lunar Gods are not known to empower warlocks, instead forming connections with wizards via undertaking the Test of High Sorcery. So that leaves a warlock’s power either from the Forgotten Gods, who are vilified for their role in the Cataclysm plus other atrocities depending on the particular deity. Or in the case of non-godly sources, entities who are removed from the mortal plane of existence or considered sufficiently powerful enough to pose a threat to entire kingdoms. Mercurial fey, malevolent fiends, and arrogant genies are some of the most common warlock patrons.
There are some mortal archmages who can channel their magic into a willing vessel to become their warlock, but this task is not taken lightly. If an archmage’s agent cannot learn wizardry to gain a like amount of magical proficiency, then circumstances must be extraordinary for the mortal patron to give them such a quick amount of power. The archmages on the Twilight Council are known for their delving into the dark arts, and their warlocks often use their magic to act as secret police in west and southwest Ansalon.
Divine magic, or magic granted directly to the faithful by the Forgotten Gods, has never been seen since the Cataclysm. Many false prophets claiming a personal connection to deities have been exposed as using arcane magic. While warlocks have made pacts with all sorts of beings, not one has yet demonstrably proven that their patron resides within the cosmic pantheon. As such, most of the feats and particular practices of clerics and their ilk have fallen from memory among the shorter-lived races of Ansalon, becoming facts mixed with fanciful exaggerations and tall tales. What is commonly known is that divine magic had the power to instantly heal all manner of wounds and maladies, and even bring the dead back to true life. Its absence is seen as a terrible loss, of the Forgotten Gods vindictively taking away the ability for mortals to lessen the suffering and toil of life’s many maladies. Many parents, teachers, and other authority figures are fond of pointing to people suffering from incurable illnesses and debilitations, telling children that “this is the world the Forgotten Gods left for us, their punishment for not falling at their feet like beggars.” While more than a few such people don’t like it when they’re reduced to being used as an object lesson, it is an effective propaganda tool in reinforcing antipathy towards the Forgotten Gods and loyalty to the Wizards of High Sorcery.
Druidic Renaissance: Originally drawing their powers from one of the three deities of nature, the druids and rangers of Krynn suffered a loss of divine magic as well as the rapturing of much of their number during the final years of Istar. But unlike most clerical orders, the druids weathered the departure of the gods relatively better. Part of this is that the Druidic language preserved much of their lore, such cas being written on birch bark scrolls, carved into menhirs, and planted in floral arrangements whose petals changed colors during certain seasons to spell out words. Comprehend Languages and Tongues can ascertain these meanings as easily as any other languages, allowing specialists in the Wizards of High Sorcery to learn of their teachings, if not necessarily all their spells. It was through these druidic secrets that Merroc the White and allied archmages were able to bring relief to many places in Ansalon and created the foundation of the Storm Barons.
What was left of druidic culture after the Cataclysm didn’t fade away. Instead, it adapted. While the gods may be silent, nature was not, and the wildlife suffered just as much as the sapient peoples of Ansalon after the fall of Istar. Animals and plants are viewed as innocents by such people due to their limited mental comprehension of mortal sins. The rising Magocracy brought about persecution of druidic remnants due to their association with the Forgotten Gods, but some managed to persevere in isolated regions. The Sylvan Guard is an order active in the woodlands of Abanasinia and Lemish, serving fey patrons such as the Forestmaster and Lord Wilderness by making use of warlock magic and fighting against Black Robes, bandits, and eventually Takhisis’ Dragonarmies from encroaching into their territories. In fact, most “druids” in Ansalon today are actually warlocks whose patron’s ideals line up with safeguarding the natural world.
Some nomads carrying on druidic traditions in the Plains of Dust allied with the Homecomers, passing on teachings of the ecosystem to help guide the archmages into repairing desolate wilderness to a state closer to pre-Cataclysm times. As the Homecomers and the nearby city-state of Tarsis serve as safe bastions from the Wizards of High Sorcery, many druidic successors are active in southern Ansalon.
Duskmen: During the reign of Istar, worshipers of the Gods of Balance and Darkness had their traditions driven into hiding, adapting elaborate methods of covert communications and movement to maintain their power. Worshipers of Hiddukel, god of avarice and treachery, were the most suited to operating in the shadows of the empire. Evolving into an expansive organized crime network known as the Duskmen, devotees of the Prince of Tarnished Gold prospered as the Kingpriest’s government strayed further from the light. They infiltrated high positions of government and lived rich off of exploiting others, all the while preaching virtues of selflessness. While many Istaran priests held no allegiance to Hiddukel, they were corrupted by earthly pleasures all the same and the line between them became less and less distinct.
As Hiddukel has a reputation as a fairweather friend even among his clerics, the Duskmen managed to survive the Cataclysm by preparing for the worst. Much of their numbers were slain by the fiery mountain falling upon Istar, but independent cells in outlying provinces and neighboring realms found new lands full of suffering, desperate people ready to be taken advantage of.
The Duskmen are headquartered out of Port Balifor, with cults across central and eastern Ansalon. The decentralized nature of eastern Ansalon’s city-states left a power vacuum in the more isolated and rural regions, which was gradually filled in by the Duskmen. The organization specializes in the trade of poisons and addictive drugs, banditry, protection rackets of local businesses, using legitimate businesses as money laundering fronts, and the smuggling of rare magical items out of Silvanesti and the sunken ruins of Istar. After the Thon-Karr Riots increased emigration of low-caste Silvanesti, the Duskmen set up people smuggling and humanoid trafficking routes out of the forest kingdom. While some Duskmen cells operate with a certain degree of voluntarism by delivering refugees to desired destinations in exchange for a hefty fee, other cells force the Silvanesti into forced labor, particularly for the development of elven magical items, agricultural labor in bandit-run villages, and subjects of dangerous magical experimentation by wicked archmages.
When the Dragonarmies eventually invade the Goodlund Peninsula, the Duskmen attempt to play off both them and the local Red Robe city-states. Any alliance between Takhisis and Hiddukel’s spiritual successors is short-lived, as the Dark Queen has no intention of sharing power. In fact, the Dragonarmies initially gain goodwill in the rural provinces by driving off Duskmen banditry, a problem that the Red Robes have long been unable to adequately deal with.
Artwork taken from the Witch + Craft sourcebook
Everyday Magic: From merchants conjuring floating disks to carry their wares, to guards using divination to detect poison at banquets, the ubiquity and scope of wizardry has never been more accessible to the average person than at any time in Krynn’s history. While the majority of the public aren’t spellcasters, the Orders of High Sorcery spared no expense in ensuring that the benefits and power of magic persisted in the eyes of the public. Wizardry is now regarded as a valuable trade for the educated, and all but mandatory for those seeking political power. However, the common folkloric image of the adventuring hedge wizard or godlike archmage is far removed from the reality of most arcane casters in Ansalon. Most mages know just enough spells to aid them in their daily lives, usually ones related to their primary occupation. The financial cost of scribing spells into spellbooks, combined with the precious nature of books in general, means that training and advancing in the art of wizardry is an expensive proposition. The sharing of spells via books and scrolls for expanding one’s personal options is most commonly done at guilds who have centralized structures and standardized procedures for their respective trades. It is also commonly done at academic institutions which typically have basic magical theory as part of their curriculum. The concept of an all-purpose Mage’s Guild doesn’t really exist in most of Ansalon; the closest would be in very poor and isolated regions, where such communities have a small concentration of spellcasters whose spellbooks and magic items are whatever is on hand.
For low-level magic, the Prestidigitation spell is one of the most versatile, and therefore popular, cantrips. Said spell is often used to start and snuff small fires, and its ability to clean a cubic foot of material improved personal hygiene. Mage Hand, Mold Earth, and Tenser’s Floating Disk are heavily employed in mining and construction projects to move heavy material as well as objects dangerous to physically touch. Shatter is used for strategic demolishing of objects and structures much like dynamite is used in the real world. Feather Fall is used by people working on scaffoldings, tall buildings, and the like in order to reduce fatalities.
Galder’s Tower, Leomund’s Tiny Hut, and Water Breathing are vital spells for explorers charting courses into hostile climates. Skywrite is useful for public service announcements in major population centers, often used by town criers to share important news, and many population centers have restrictions on when it can be cast so as to avoid false and frivolous alarms. Sending is one of the most commonly-taught spells to Order members, and Towers use it to keep in touch with each other as well as their subordinate rulers, while guilds and merchant fleets use the spell for record-keeping of assets and economic fluctuations. As the Sending spell is limited to 25 words or less per casting, languages which make heavy use of compound words are commonly used to convey more information per casting. Dwarven is the most popular, as its traditional use being chiseled onto stone and metal surfaces necessitated frequent use of compounds as a labor-saving device.
Darkvision allows humans, kender, and other races unable to see at night the ability to do so, and Continual Flames placed in shuttered lamps are a common fixture in all but the most impoverished cities. On a more controversial and grim note, the Black Robes of western Ansalon control vast legions of undead as soldiers and laborers. Their inexhaustible endurance expanded Ergoth’s relatively small land area into labor-efficient farms as well as forming the continent’s largest standing army pre-War of the Lance. The Ray of Frost and Gust cantrips when used in combination make for effective, if labor-inefficient, air-conditioning. More powerful wizards instead use Control Winds for a much greater effect, and many manors and estates in warmer climates have strategic use of vents connecting to subterranean cold storage to take advantage of this spell. Various forms of “minion creation” spells, ranging from traditional summoning to Tiny Servants and Animate Objects, were traditionally used in pre-Cataclysm times for additional hands in magical experiments and guard duty. They have since been expanded to aid in more exotic labor, such as mud mephits using their breath weapons to generate wet earth to mold into clay.
Although far out of reach of most mages, the Control Weather spell proved revolutionary during the chaotic first few decades after the Cataclysm, when Merroc the White and a circle of fellow archmages ventured to major population centers in order to ensure reliable harvests and keeping the weather to a relative degree of normalcy. This worked to great effect in western Ansalon, preserving Solamnia’s status as the continent’s breadbasket. They further used the surplus of magical crops to avert famine and earn the goodwill of the populace. It wasn’t long before the same spell was tried on various islands in the newly-formed Blood Sea, helping the now-isolated settlements connect with each other due to the lessened threats of monsoons and tidal waves. The Red Robes, who long led the charge in research of transmutation magic, proved the most adept at modifying the spell to new environments. Combined with the scattered islands and port cities proving an ideal fit for their individualist ideology, the devotees of Lunitari became an accepted fixture in eastern Ansalon and did much to shape its governments and economies.
In addition to personal knowledge and spells, society has been transformed by magic items, architecture, and even certain creatures. Rechargeable wands proved to be efficient ways of granting access to particular spells without the risky and expensive process of scribing scrolls, while items with indefinite, long-lasting, or area-encompassing effects are the favored projects of rulers, inventors, and visionaries. Strategic placement of Decanters of Endless Water in the Plains of Dust and Blood Sea Isles revolutionized trade routes and were responsible for turning desolate areas into habitable farmland. Magic items of Common rarity that help increase the standard of living or aid in daily chores, such as Clothes of Mending and Orbs of Time, can be found for sale in even rural hamlets and are instrumentable in cutting down on labor time. Every merchant caravan of note has at least a few Bags of Holding in its assets, while Amulets of Proof Against Detection and Location and Hats of Disguise are prized possessions of assassins, spies, and thieves. Sanitation is further improved via the production of
Cleaning Cubes, oozelike sentient items designed to clean surfaces it covers. Some more enterprising wizards breed oozes to regularly clean the sewers of cities of filth and pests. While not magic items per se, containers built with widened bases with grooves at the bottom are designed to latch onto the edges of a Tenser’s Floating Disk for secure transportation. Such items are nicknamed “contensers” as a play on words of the spell’s inventor.
But perhaps the most revolutionary magical innovation besides Control Weather and Sending was the increased proliferation of Teleportation Circles. Although extremely costly,* reliable instantaneous travel paid off in the long-term, which combined with the Sending spell allowed Wizards to coordinate and convene in mere hours and days with what would take weeks and months without magic. Besides bringing the existence of time zones to the general public, it also provided a great boon to trade. Tropical Blood Sea Isles fruits, Kharolian glasswork, and Silvanesti leaf armor can be purchased fresh and cheap in marketplaces in the far corners of Ansalon. The restriction of a Circle’s access via a sigil sequence password allowed for society to provide layers of tiered security. For example, ones in manors and major guildhalls are restricted to respective members and residents, and more public ones are placed in monitored buildings known as “Circle Gates,” not unlike the docks of a shipyard or tollbooths at city gates.
*18,250 steel pieces’ worth of consumable precious gems per permanent circle.
Each of the six cities home to a Tower of High Sorcery has at least one Circle Gate, and there’s also gates in the cities of Lacynos, Kalaman, and Solanthus. A Teleportation Circle was built on Sancrist to grant close connection to its Tower of High Sorcery, but a magical disaster rendered it nonfunctional. Due to the practical and economic incentives, it is very rare for population centers to refuse the building of a Teleportation Circle. The most notable exception was the dwarven kingdom of Thorbardin, who found the practice of destroying precious metals and gems for particular spells and rituals (Teleportation Circle being one of them) anathema. While they still trade with the outside world, they don’t want to make it any easier for the wizards to “ravage the earth’s bounty.”
One side effect of the increased use of Teleportation Circles was that trade routes no longer had to contend with crossing through the inhospitable lands of central Ansalon, such as the desolate Plains of Dust and monster-ridden Khalkist Mountains. Already sparsely-populated and a haven for exiles and outlaws, this increased isolation has allowed Takhisis’ Gray Robes to build up their forces with less outside scrutiny.
For more inspiration for the kinds of inventive applications that would be wrought in a world where wizardry is common,
consider checking out the Griffon’s Saddlebag subreddit. It has near-daily updates and original art for all kinds of nifty magic items!
Servants to the Crown by Denman Rooke
Forms of Government: The collective Wizards of High Sorcery and the lands they rule are called the Magocracy, a term which means “rule by mages.” This in and of itself is simple enough to understand. But with the many intricacies of rulership, this can take a variety of forms. Some lands have wizards as the effective continuation of feudal lords, where knowledge of the Art is kept close among ruling familial dynasties. Others have a more republican council, where mages are given seats in government as demonstrated by their ability, but the privilege of literacy still keeps this membership out of the commoner majority. More radical and experimental communities might be made up entirely of wizards, using familiars and conjured servants for labor and their daily needs. Some Utopian communities seek to place magic in the hands of as many people as possible…responsible people, hopefully!
Before the Cataclysm, there was a distinct separation of Tower and State, where wizards were more scholars than politicians and usually consulted as magical specialists in noble courts. The more ambitious wizards who sought to attain seats of rulership often met heavy resistance, with their declarations of foremost loyalty to the Orders made it easy for others to question their legitimacy to crown and country.
After the Cataclysm, the Wizards of High Sorcery seized upon the power vacuum left by the destruction of Istar and the disappearance of the gods besides their own. Mages found it easier to establish footholds in regions without the Kingpriest breathing down their necks, and many local communities and rulers were happy to get what help that they could. Even the wizards who continued to serve their role as scholarly advisors accumulated political connections, even marrying into noble families. Wizards who took leadership positions overtly and through force of arms proved that magic was a potent force multiplier, and thus found it easier to conquer and eclipse rival kingdoms who rebuffed the aid of mages.
The particulars of wizard spellcasting, as well as the long-honored practice of taking apprentices from all social stations, resulted in a more fluid and open access to the reigns of power in comparison to traditional aristocratic and theocratic governments. Merchants, scribes, and other well-to-do commoners encouraged the teaching of literacy to their children, for one needed to know how to read and write in order to make use of spellbooks and understand the language of Magius. Additionally, the ideologies of Solinari and Lunitari encouraged different, yet comparatively progressive, societal reforms. In the case of the Solamnic White Robes, their promotion of the common good was emphasized over that of the blue-blooded few, while Red Robes promoted individual liberty and for its wizards to act as distant-yet-helpful guides to the people. The Black Robes are perhaps the ones closest to the old feudal model, their lands ruled over by the mostly-undead Twilight Council who apportion the gift of wizardry to molded proteges and pawns. But even their shadowy god encourages the low-born to rise above their station should they sense opportunity in the weakness of others. The Black Robes, the Silvanesti elves, as well as other lands where wizards more or less replicate the form and function of ruling noble families, are often referred to as
Dynasts among political theorists, short for “dynasty.”
In terms of ideologies, White Robe wizards are strongly inspired by the
Societas Caelestis, or Heavenly Society, a treatise written by Merroc the White. It was a rejection of the Istaran doctrine that an ideal world could only be attained in the afterlife, instead encouraging mages to focus on spells that reduce the hardship of daily living. Ideally, such visionaries would uplift non-mages in being taught the magical arts, gradually transforming society into one virtually free of toil. With the departure of most of the gods of Krynn, the desire to find heaven in the here and now became a strong motivator, as opposed to waiting for it from gods who abandoned them. Merroc’s teachings became the predominant ethos in Solamnia, often shortened to
Utopianism, with the Qualinesti and a handful of other White Robes practicing an ideology called
Solinism. Solinism shares many traits of the Societas Caelestis, although it encourages people to focus on good works in the here and now without extending altruism towards futuristic theory-crafting. Silvanesti White Robes are also Solinists, although in practice their government is closer to the feudal model where House Royal are perpetual stewards of the majority.
The Orders of High Sorcery are the chief governing bodies of Ansalon. The White Robes hold territory in Solamnia and Silvanesti, the Black Robes in Ergoth and southwestern Ansalon, and the Red Robes across the Blood Sea Isles and the Goodlund peninsula. Each aforementioned region is governed by a Tower which has its own Tower Master responsible for the administration and oversight of said lands. For affairs that affect the Orders (and Ansalon) as a whole, the Conclave is the highest law of the land during peacetime, made up of 7 wizards from each order who convene once every 10 years in Palanthas, with a designated Head who steps in only to resolve decisions at an impasse. During times of continental crisis, The Council of Three uplifts three pre-selected Conclave members with emergency powers to act independently of the rest of the Conclave. This Council’s powers have rarely been invoked, the last time being during the year 184 A.M. during the final war against the remnants of the Knights of Solamnia. While one’s appointment of Tower Master and Conclave member is in theory meant to apply to the most magically-proficient wizards and those who best exemplify their Order’s ideology, in reality political connections and capital are equally important. There are many visionaries among Ansalon’s archmages who are technically low-ranking members, shunning the power offered or forcefully precluded from it.
Some Towers and realms are
Constitutional Magocracies, where a constitution serves as a legal restraint on the reigning mages’ powers. The Tower of Palanthas applies this to all of their administered lands in Solamnia, based on the Utopian principles of Merroc the White. Several city-states in Losarcum and New Istar, notably Balifor and Flotsam, also have their own individual Constitutions, where the archmages are encouraged to take more hands-off approaches to government and intervene only where necessary. In practice, this has let various non-governmental oligarchs and guilds fill in the power vacuum. No Black Robe Towers have Constitutional limits as can be expected. But they do have a concept known as
Nuitari’s Withdrawal, where archmages incapable of holding onto power are deemed unworthy due to their failure. This is more a tool of propaganda than a law, chiefly a means to absolve responsibility of connections to incompetent dethroned rulers and to reinforce social divisions between commoners and mages.
Beyond the Towers and Conclave, leadership and authority positions differ wildly on the more local levels. The White Robes of Solamnia have a bureaucratic government where various exams, trials, and the Test is used to determine one’s worthiness for status, and while there’s multitude of checks and balances to spread power across institutions to prevent a monopoly of force at the lower levels, the upper levels of government hold a disproportionate amount of influence in setting policies for Solamnia as a whole. Although society still prioritizes spellcasters, public schooling and communal focus on elevating one’s fellow mortal is designed to ensure that as many potential wizards can learn the Art as possible, although the strictures of the Test proper means that anyone with a position of influence in policy most often come from advantageous backgrounds. White Robe rulers in these land use titles that hearken back to the pre-Cataclysm ideal of wizards as helpful court mages, such as Advisor (mayor of a town or rural county), Councillor (governor of a major city or kingdom), and Secretarius (Conclave member). While this government has its strengths in ensuring public stability and helping out the less fortunate, the sheer size of Solamnia and the bureaucracy’s checks and balances makes the government slow-moving, and smaller communities can find their own goals and self-decisions subsided in the name of the public good. The concentration of political power in the city Palanthas has caused resentment between Palanthians and other Solamnics, with the latter viewing the former as privileged and out of touch with the rest of Solamnia.
Silvanesti, being one of the last kingdoms to acquiesce to wizardly rule, preserve much of their original caste-based system, with House Mystic now on par with House Royal in power. Being more authoritarian and elitist, Silvanesti White Robes sorely test Solinari’s ideals of using magic for the common good, and those trying to buck the system are often pressured to relocate to Solamnia or the Tower territories of Losarcum and New Istar.
The Red Robe territories of New Istar and Losarcum are arranged into semi-autonomous city-states, being allowed to rule as they see fit yet subject to the binding decisions of the Conclave. As the most individualist and anti-authoritarian of the Orders, Red Robe cities adopt laissez-faire attitudes towards rulership and are more tolerant of novel forms of government. The city-state of Flotsam is particularly infamous for its Forum, an open-air public space made from the detritus of Istaran ruins, where any citizen can publicly address their grievances to the mayor without fear of sanction or censure.
Meritocracism is the closest thing to an encompassing ethos, which can briefly be summed up as determining social status by labor and skill regardless of background (in theory).
Democratism is a more fringe ideology, found on a couple islands and Homecomer garden-towns in the Plains of Dust, where a small community of people seek to found their own societies where major decisions are determined by majority vote.
The Black Robe territories of Daltigoth and more recently Wayreth encompass much of western Ansalon. While Nuitari’s ideology encourages selfish ambition via a vaunted meritocracy, power has solidified into the hands of a privileged few wizarding families. They function little differently than feudal nobility, but as most of their number are undead they need not worry as much about finding or breeding successors to their thrones. The Twilight Council is made up of heads of each major Black Robe dynasty, who are also Tower Masters and Conclave members for their Order. The replacement of a Council member is almost always the result of a violent coup, and while overall rare the few times it’s happened resulted in death and misery for the subjects of both sides.
Healing and Medicine: While arcane magic can reshape reality in countless ways, the most well-known and coveted restriction is using magic to heal injuries and afflictions. Some arcane magic comes close, albeit in a flawed manner or with a cost. Vampiric Touch can heal the caster’s injuries, but at the expense of another’s life force. The dead can rise again as zombies and other monsters, but are usually enthralled to their creator and possessed of malign urges. It is taught that the Forgotten Gods held the secrets to healing magic, but took it away from mortals after the Cataclysm. It is the goal of many ambitious wizards to find a way to harness this long-lost power, ideally without having to shackle themselves to the dogma and taboos of such deities.
But mages are nothing if not inventive, and created various workarounds to make do in a world without such miracles. For example, the Bear’s Endurance application Enhance Ability is often cast to make the sick better able to recover from illnesses, while Calm Emotions can help bring peace of mind to someone suffering a mental breakdown or traumatic flashback. Plant Growth, capable of being cast by bards and the wizard school of Skyshaping, can be used to multiply the amount of medicinal herbs (and dangerous poisons) in gardens, and using Polymorph to transform someone into an animal immune to particular maladies can be a temporary reprieve from immediate suffering. Oozes are grown in labs to scrub buildings, sewers, and streets of filth and the Prestidigitation spell for personal hygiene greatly cut down on the rate of filth-borne illnesses. Summoning fire elementals during cold winter nights, Wind Walls for air-conditioning, and Darkness spells while under the hot sun are helpful means of avoiding hypothermia and heatstroke. Magical Prosthetic Limbs are both widespread and relatively easy to produce, made from a wide variety of materials and their animating forces controlled by the user’s mind as a form of telekinesis.
And given their penchant for gathering material components from natural resources as well as general academic knowledge, wizards are much more likely than the average person to know what combination of organic parts and chemical admixtures can be used to save (and end) lives. Clerics, druids, and their ilk might be gone from Krynn, but wizards have proved worthy contenders in taking on the role of healer.
Holiday, Festivals, & Traditions: Events that the people of Ansalon judge worthy of commemoration are quite different from their counterparts in the main timeline. While most history is the same pre-Cataclysm, the 4th Age was marked by a rising standard of living with magic, increased political unity under the Towers, and in some lands a move away from entrenched feudal systems to more promising modes of government. Life is still difficult for many, but there’s a common sentiment that the recent centuries are the most drastic and innovative in Krynn’s history.
Kingsbreak (8th of Thirdmonth) is a popular holiday across Ansalon. It commemorates the overthrowing of traditional aristocracy in many lands to make way for wizardly rule. In lands and culture that suffered under Istar’s rule, it also extends to the celebration of that Empire’s fall, with effigies of the Kingpriest pelted with glowing stones representing shards of the falling mountain raining upon the capital city. A common tradition in northern and western Ansalon is to have the “meekest citizen” of a community (usually a child) dress in wizardly garb and take part in a theatrical performance where they persevere against some figure associated with tyranny. Such a character is most often an infamous king, but can just as easily be any archetype representing unjust authority. In the Black Robe lands, festival-goers often use double-meanings and absurd satire to make subtle jabs at the ruling mages, which is surprisingly tolerated as long as the “rebellion” remains symbolic and doesn’t name names.
Foundation Day (14th of Eighthmonth) is an annual commemoration dating back to 48 A.M., where Ansalon’s most prominent kingdoms and empires-in-name-only recognized the Wizards of High Sorcery as the de facto rulers of the land. Celebrations commonly take on the atmosphere of festival fairs, where entertainers stage plays and games to honor the accomplishments of famous wizards who contributed to rebuilding society after the Cataclysm. One such game, called Frozenthaw, involves using a Wand of Fire Bolt or similar cantrip to melt off the tops of ice-covered barrels filled with water. Most barrels are empty, but a few contain prizes. The game is modeled off of Lathelas Shoalbreath, a Dimernesti half-elf who trained a team of wizards with Water Breathing spells in order to dive to sunken Istaran ruins five years after the Cataclysm. While they were initially treasure hunters, the discovery of magically-sealed buildings holding frightened survivors quickly turned their efforts into a continuing rescue operation. The ice represents magical seals, and the prizes in the barrels represent treasure or survivors. Some barrels are filled with a shallow layer of water for someone to kneel inside as part of the contest.
The end of Foundation Day is marked with more formal, serious ceremonies undertaken by Order members and community leaders. This usually consists of a speech given by such figures extolling societal virtues and ideals, and in some lands is marked with the official relieving of debt and obligations to represent the transition from pre-Cataclysm times to the new era of Magocracy.
The Great Silence (3rd day of Firstmonth) takes place on the same day as the Cataclysm, marking the destruction of Istar, the silence of the Forgotten Gods, and the widespread death and destruction across Ansalon. As people grieve in very different ways, this holiday’s ceremonies and rituals take a variety of forms from culture to culture. For example, in the Blood Sea Isles, people build rowboats filled with trinkets, toys, and other personal items to push out to sea. This symbolizes not forgetting the people who died, including Istar’s victims, and giving things to their spirits to enjoy in the afterlife. It’s common for people to include letters addressed to dearly-departed loved ones, either out of genuine belief that their spirits will read it or out of a sentimental sense of keeping them alive in ones’ memories. The people of Nordmaar and Estwilde have ceremonies where they disguise themselves as the Forgotten Gods, serving as stand-ins for the gods who left them by symbolically speaking to the past centuries’ worth of dead souls and helping shepherd them to the next life. In Solamnia, people dress in dark clothes with veils, bringing bouquets of roses colored black via Prestidigitation to lay down in graveyards, at the feet of statues, and other ancient structures from prior Ages. The kender of Hylo put on plays of famous individuals and popular story archetypes from the Age of Might, commemorating the past by living through beloved and vilified figures. The dwarves have a more personal holiday, where they stay home and put pen to ink (or chisel to rune) to their personal regrets and missed opportunities, and ask themselves how they’ll do better in the new year. The paper or slab is then torn apart or broken by a hammer, representing letting go of the past to build something anew.
The Rite of Rebuilding (no specific day) is a popular tradition for a person who successfully completes the Test of High Sorcery. The wizard dips one or both hands in a specially-prepared basin of red clay obtained, and then leaves a handprint on a sprawling mural dedicated to just such a purpose. The mural’s artwork differs depending on local history and culture, but a common theme is the representation of the hands collectively lifting some great object, group of people, or burden. The red represents the Blood Sea, said to be the blood of Istarans killed by the gods during the Cataclysm. The application of clay to the hands indicates how the Orders of High Sorcery rebuilt society after the gods destroyed it, with the handprints and mural artwork showing how the collective work of people can accomplish deeds impossible for individuals. The practice originated among the Blood Sea Isles, but has since spread across the continent. Handprint murals can be found at every Tower of High Sorcery, along with lesser academies, guild halls, and other places who incorporate the practice into their membership/graduation ceremonies.
Homecomers: The Plains of Dust are a prominent feature of southern Ansalon, a once-fertile region before the Cataclysm and now an inhospitable wasteland of utter cold. The few nomadic tribes and small villages are self-sufficient and isolated from the rest of the world, its most significant neighbors the city-state of Tarsis and the elven kingdom of Silvanesti.
The Homecomers is a movement originating among the Order of Red Robes, which criticized the Wizards of High Sorcery for being too enmeshed in the political affairs of Ansalon. Their grievances run the gamut, from relaxed standards of the Test, Wayreth’s failed invasion of Thorbardin to control the precious mineral trade, and even the devaluing of the term “archmage” to refer to any mage in a senior authority position. Even their parent Red Robes were viewed as not doing enough, for they too were bound by the whims of the Conclave’s majority and thus subservient to the system.
As it was not in their ideology’s nature to force change upon the Magocracy, the Homecomers sought to found their own societal retreats where they could return to the wizardly ideals of prior Ages: dedicating themselves first and foremost to the study of magic.
The Plains of Dust were chosen as the ideal territory: first for being sufficiently isolated from the rest of Ansalon; second for the unspoken value it holds as a buffer zone between Wayreth and Silvanesti, who wish to keep the other at arms’ length; third for already being a popular destination for those seeking to escape the Magocracy’s rule; and fourth for the presence of the King’s Road, which could in theory be repaired to allow for reliable travel across the region.
With the guidance of the Homecomer’s most talented mage, Aurelio De Luca, the movement set up frontier towns across the plains, using Storm Baron rituals to terraform the badlands and tundras into verdant territories. Aided by the use of Decanters of Endless Water, these towns quickly became known as the Southern Sanctuaries, so named for serving as oases of safety from the harshness of nature.
Most Sanctuaries are effectively ruled by the reigning Storm Baron, whose weather-controlling magic is a necessity for the town’s continued existence. Some Sanctuaries take in permanent residents of like-minded values, with a notable number of Blood Elves (low-caste refugees) from Silvanesti and local nomads who formed alliances with the Homecomers. Some Sanctuaries are effective one-person operations, consisting of little more than the stereotypical mage’s tower filled with conjured and constructed servants. It’s these lonesome Sanctuaries that are threatened the least by monsters and raiders, for it’s accepted wisdom that a wizard who can survive on their own in such a harsh realm is a force to be reckoned with.
While the Homecomers may claim to not care about politics, politics cares about their Sanctuaries. Silvanesti doesn’t want to see the King’s Road repaired, for they don’t want to make it easier for travelers to enter (and leave) their country, while Par-Salian doesn’t want powerful mages and potential rivals on Wayreth’s doorstep. Additionally, the people of Tarsis, who prize independence from Conclave rule, are of mixed feelings towards the Homecomers. Some believe that they could be like-minded brethren and provide them with a powerful magical counter against the Orders, while others fear that they’ll be another set of tyrants. While most Blood Elves are content with founding new lives in the Southern Sanctuaries, there is a growing movement of revolutionaries who wish to overthrow the caste system of their home kingdom. And then there’s the growing power of the Gray Robes in central Ansalon, who will view the isolated Sanctuaries as valuable supply lines between Abanasinia and Silvanesti. And even good “test material” for their planned invasion of eastern Ansalon, should individual Sanctuaries prove resistant to accepting their arrival.
Istaran Revisionists: In most lands of the Magocracy, history casts both the Empire of Istar and the Forgotten Gods in a negative light. Istar is portrayed as a regressive, power-hungry regime that engaged in genocide, slavery, imprisonment and torture of anyone suspected of being disloyal to the regime, and other evils in the name of doing good. The last Kingpriests’ purges of the Wizards of High Sorcery, and having the traitorous archmage Fistandantilus as a close advisor, ensured the Empire would go down in villainy once the wizards attained power.
While the Forgotten Gods are credited for dethroning Istar via the fiery mountain, they are not regarded positively for this. No matter their role or rationale, the damage wrought by the Cataclysm was too widespread, too indiscriminate to be viewed as poetic justice, and their leaving the world at a time of widespread death when their powers were most needed engendered a loss of belief and respect among the public. The most common interpretations and theories by scholars is that either the Forgotten Gods departed the world out of anger at what Istar had become, fear of the Kingpriest’s challenge to their power, or alternatively died fighting each other and/or the Kingpriest as part of a “War in the Heavens.” The three Lunar Gods of Magic, who still ascend to the night sky as surely as the sun rises tomorrow, are still here, and thus it is taught that they’re the only gods deemed worthy of worship. Any inferences that these three gods had a hand in the Cataclysm is suppressed, with most Ansalonians unwilling to lay blame on the most powerful forces remaining in the world. And even if they did believe so, they wouldn’t want to speak of that too openly, out of fear of heavenly wrath.
But the gods’ role in the Cataclysm also inspired a more radical interpretation of historical revisionism. Some surviving records revealed that the Kingpriest’s intentions of gaining authority over the gods was due to his belief that they were insufficiently willing to defeat evil, which forms the basis for this challenge to the historical record. Revisionists assert that the Empire of Istar was a flawed yet ultimately prosperous society, where loyal citizens were guaranteed safety and a high standard of living. That the Forgotten Gods reacted to the Kingpriest’s challenge in such an overbearing way, along with how widespread chaos and suffering in the early decades of the Cataclysm merely strengthened evil rather than mitigating it, is used as evidence by the Revisionists of the Kingpriest as being in the right.
This is not a well-received theory among the Orders of High Sorcery, for obvious reasons, and Revisionist writings are banned as subversive material. Istaran Revisionist movements are still fringe, yet have a small following in eastern Ansalon. Geographical proximity to Istaran ruins, superstitious beliefs about the Blood Sea’s color being taken from those slain during the Cataclysm, and the relatively libertine and decentralized nature of the governments of New Istar and Losarcum provide fertile ground for the flowering of such ideas.
13 Knights by ArtNotHearts
Knights of Huma: In modern times, the Knights of Huma fulfill a similar role to the Knights of Solamnia, complete with their own Oath and Measure in line with their new administration and ideology. They serve as a professional warrior class in the Magocracy’s lands, being separate from the Orders of High Sorcery proper but also proficient with arcane magic. Unlike the Knights of Solamnia, their social standing was rarely that of the higher ranks of society, being equivalent to the petty nobility of feudalism. However, some senior Knights have enough pull to informally command respect beyond their station.
The Knights of Huma are an international organization, with individual chapterhouses acting semi-autonomously throughout Ansalon. They serve under the local wizard rulers, and have the greatest numbers and prestige in the Palanthas Tower lands. Silvanesti has long had its own elite warrior society, the Kirath, so they have little need to rely on the Knights. While the Knights can be found in the Red Robe city-states of eastern Ansalon, such places highly prize their independence and thus they are only called for during major unrest and disasters. The Black Robe Towers of western Ansalon prefer more unquestioning soldiers in the form of undead thralls. For this reason, the Knights of Huma still have a distinctly Solamnic flavor and, some would say, bias.
Religion: Unlike Dragonlance’s major timeline during the 4th Age, the Magocracy of Ansalon remains a deeply religious land, although the people instead pay homage to the Gods of Magic. Also known as the Lunar Gods, these three deities are viewed as benevolent entities who opted to remain behind during the Cataclysm and help rebuild mortal society. The rest of the true gods are known as the Forgotten Gods, so named for their disappearance from Krynn three and a half centuries ago. And also named so in a derisive way, as many believe that gods who inflicted such devastation and turned their backs on the suffering aren’t worthy of being honored and remembered.
Due to the loss of divine magic, magic in general is viewed as the province of Solinari, Lunitari, and Nuitari. That one doesn’t need to honor or worship them to use arcane magic is interpreted by the common folk as magic being a gift or tool that can in theory be used even to work against them. But all acknowledge that were it not for their examples, then mortals would never have learned to master it in the first place.
Worship of the gods of magic takes many forms across cultures. Some, such as the nomads of Estwilde and the humans and minotaurs of the Blood Sea Isles, believe that the moons are actually the physical embodiment of the Lunar Gods. In contrast, the people of Solamnia believe that said gods built and shaped the moons so that they can rule from magnificent palaces on their respective celestial bodies. People acknowledge that the world is full of magic that can express itself in various ways, and believe that wizards and other learned folk are better suited to learning cosmic mysteries.
The Gods of Magic do not have temples in the traditional Age of Might style, where worshipers congregate in a building to receive blessings and guidance from a priest. The closest equivalent are Houses of Enlightenment, repositories of tomes dedicated to various subjects such as magic, history, philosophy, and fables whose lessons are in line with the predominant Order’s ideology. Houses serve as schools for children before they’re old enough to learn a trade, and those who display aptitude for magic are taken as apprentices by resident wizards. The people in charge of a House’s maintenance are known as Housekeepers, and receive funding from one of the six Towers depending on location. In White Robe lands, Houses of Enlightenment are funded by taxes, open to the public, and their services free of charge. Red Robe Lands have a mixture of public and privately funded Houses, with the latter typically catering to wizards and affluent citizens and thus are generally higher-quality. Black Robe Houses are little more than indoctrination centers, with teachers magically shaping young and impressionable minds into serving the Twilight Council.
It’s believed that speaking under the light of a moon makes the speaker’s presence known to that particular god, so people often make promises and oaths under the light of one of the full moons. People prefer to do so under a moon reflecting their society’s dominant Order or their personal morality, but the Night of the Eye is regarded as a particularly sacred occasion across Ansalon. And while not deified as actual gods, famous mages throughout history are often held up as exemplars of ideal people, with Magius being the most venerated and Merroc the White a close second.
Wizards and non-wizards alike often incorporate the iconography of the Lunar Gods into personal possessions and buildings. Red, white, and black are thus common colors, and there’s an entire style of art known as Celestial Symbolism that uses fictionalized arrangements of stars and planets to form images. Conversely, cultures who still remember the names and histories of the Forgotten Gods recast them as cruel, uncaring figures. The Gods of Darkness are perhaps the most authentically-portrayed, but even the Gods of Light and Balance take on villainized roles. Paladine in particular is demonized as a tyrant, most often cast as someone willing to let the Empire of Istar do evil in his name, only moving against them when the Kingpriest sought to elevate himself above the gods. Or alternatively as a jealous figure who resented the progress and prosperity in the Age of Might and enacted the Cataclysm to take away such mortal accomplishments.
Worship of the Forgotten Gods is rare, but is a strong taboo in most of Ansalon. As such figures are taught to be responsible for the Cataclysm, and in some cases Istar’s tyranny, those who are known to revere such figures face social ostracism at best, imprisonment and “re-education” at worst. The strongest concentration of such worshipers are in Tarsis, which has long been a haven for outcasts and those seeking to live outside the laws of the Conclave. There’s a growing presence of them in central Ansalon, where Takhisis’ Gray Robes are making inroads among the tribes and kingdoms.
Spycraft: Magic is such an asset to learning secret things that people in power frequently made use of wizards throughout history for such purposes. Even during Istar’s purges, the Kingpriest kept the archmage Fistandantilus on as an advisor, and there were many folkloric tales of lords and ladies visiting witches in the woods to obtain some goal or object of desire. In the Age of Magic, the use of magic for espionage has evolved in form and function to the point that each Tower and Order has its own intricate spy network.
Given their specializations in different schools, the three Orders developed innovative systems of information-gathering. In the city of Palanthas, several salons and barbers have ties to the Knights of Huma, supplying fingernails and hair of suspected people for scrying purposes. The city’s role as a diplomatic hub for the Conclave makes it heavily-surveilled, and imp familiars are tolerated by the White Robes as a necessary evil for keeping covert watch during important ceremonies and visitations.
The Red Robes are the foremost practitioners of illusion magic, but their skill with transmutation spells is useful for transporting contraband and suspicious objects by having them take other forms. The Duskmen have gangsters on the payroll of various governors of city-states to smuggle goods and people in and out of Silvanesti. Relationships with the elven kingdom have been poor due to the immigration of low-caste elves to Red Robe territories, and some of these Blood Elves serve as go-betweens who know the territory of both sides of the forest.
The Black Robes, with their mastery over enchantment and necromancy, are known for having the most direct and brutal spy networks. The Gravetongues are necromancers in the service of Daltigoth, infamous for turning dissidents and Kagonesti elves into enthralled undead, and their assassination attempts are done in semi-public ways with calling cards that leave little doubt as to the guilty party. As the Black Robes intentionally engender a fearsome reputation, they have less to lose from such direct methods and rely on intimidation from their reputation to curtail retaliation.
Storm Barons: With widespread devastation in the wake of the Cataclysm, one of the top priorities of the Wizards of High Sorcery was to bring a sense of normalcy to the many territories affected by seismic changes and permanently-altered weather patterns. Common spells such as Gust of Wind and Control Water were effective for individuals, but entire settlements and ecosystems required powers of much greater magnitude. There was such a spell capable of this, Control Weather. However, it numbered among the most powerful of magic, and even during the Ages of Dreams and Might the amount of wizards who could cast such a spell were only enough to fit in a small room.
The wizards knew that they would need to look for easier means of supernatural climate engineering. Merroc the White, the Silvanesti Speaker of the Stars Lorac Caladon, and Qualinesti Speaker of the Sun Paladithel Kanan gathered research notes from their respective Orders and kingdoms of a means of healing the damage wrought by the Cataclysm. Their answers lead them to the same conclusion: the secrets of the druids.
All druids capable of divine magic had long since departed Krynn with the Forgotten Gods, but their legacy remained. Their language was taught to confidants and inscribed in hidden corners of the wilderness, their fey and awakened animal allies learned in their ways. Many mourned the scouring of the land, viewing its wildlife as blameless for the crimes of the Kingpriest and his supporters, and found allies in Merroc. Others were suspicious of the wizards and kept their distance, some even thwarting them. The secrets of these last groups were taken by force, a history of the Orders of which not all are proud. Through druidic messages, Control Weather scrolls given to lesser mages, and strategic placement of those few talented archmages able to cast it themselves, the Wizards of High Sorcery undertook a decades-long project to alter and manipulate the weather around Ansalon’s largest population centers. These events would soon become known as the Salvation of Rains in the history books, and the archmages capable of these feats called the Storm Barons.
Knowing that their legacy wouldn’t last forever, some undertook extensive rituals to ensure the passage of their spells to the next generation of wizards. These modified forms of Control Weather are capable of being cast by less-powerful mages, but often impose steeper requirements or costs of some kind. While valuable anywhere, the Storm Barons’ legacy was strongest in eastern Ansalon, where the formation of a new Blood Sea and the reduction of many civilizations to smaller islands and peninsulas made their spells even more vital and effective per capita. While Storm Barons can be found among all three Orders, the Red Robes are regarded as the most talented and have the highest number of such archmages. Thus, many people incorrectly associate this magical practice with the Red Robes in general.
While not all Storm Barons had intentions of serving as rulers nor desired political office, their powers and abilities inevitably enmeshed them in the political and economic network of Ansalon, thus earning the name. Beyond the obvious uses in warfare and regional defense, weather manipulation ensured the maximization of bountiful harvests and minimization of natural disasters and famines. Surplus crops were exported to other regions, regular pleasant weather made their lands ideal places to visit, and the mitigation of dangerous weather helped keep trade routes open.
Ironically, it was this buildup of soft and hard power that allowed several of these archmages to defect from the Wizards of High Sorcery with minimal risk. Aurelio De Luca, a half-elf Red Robe Conclave member and frequent critic of the increasing politicization of the Wizards of High Sorcery, announced his intentions in the city of Palanthas to leave the Order and form a new society closer to the original ideals of High Sorcery. His decades of pro bono work of climate engineering in risky regions, to say nothing of his personal magical prowess, made him more politically untouchable than the average renegade mage. But this wasn’t without controversy of retribution. Although Aurelio had most of his assets seized and is a wanted man in most of Ansalon, he gathered enough allies to found the Homecomer movement of settlements in the Plains of Dust. These communities are remote and rural, but affect the stereotype of isolated wizard havens. They range from spiral towers surrounded by magically-transformed terrain, dark fortresses teaming with clockwork constructs, and even idyllic rural farmsteads home to pixie gardeners and refugee Silvanesti.
Test of High Sorcery: Traditionally, the Test of High Sorcery was dispensed to arcane spellcasters who demonstrated talent for magic beyond a specific tier of power. They were contacted as soon as convenient with an offer to travel to the nearest Tower of High Sorcery, with travel expenditures paid by the resident wizards. Upon arrival, they would undertake the Test by themselves. Secret magic known only to the Tower’s Master was administered, creating a series of illusory realities to judge the Test-taker’s skill and moral inclinations, making each Test unique to that individual. Should they succeed, they are inducted into one of the three Orders of High Sorcery, receive the institutional privileges that come with membership, and their magical power is forever attuned to the phases of their Order’s lunar deity.
But should they fail, the Test-taker was then executed. The consequences for failure were always given before the Test was taken, and the mage had the opportunity to decline taking the Test, but must give up the use of magic beyond 3rd level. The end of the Test also had two questions asked to the initiate, direct or indirect: whether there was anything in life they prized greater than the pursuit of magic; and when the time comes, would they sacrifice those things for the gift of magic?
This method was effective for when the Wizards of High Sorcery were primarily an academic organization who desired only the most talented and driven to wield magic. But it soon proved impractical when it became a political order tasked with governing Ansalon and rebuilding society after the Cataclysm. Mages could not afford to kill off talented Journeyfolk when both literacy and magical aptitude was already a precious commodity, so failure on the Test initially gave the same penalty as turning down the opportunity to take it. In times of war, coups, and tragedies that saw the deaths of multiple Order members, standards were relaxed to allow failed Test-takers to take the Test again. Restrictions were placed so that a new Test could be taken only after a period of years equal to 5% of their race’s average natural lifespan. Tests were also given a greater degree of anonymity, only showing whether the Test-taker passed or failed at its end but otherwise obscuring the details to everyone else. This was done after several cases of Masters of the Tower blackmailing newcomers to the Orders after learning intimate details and shames reflected in their Tests.
Lastly, the two questions at the end of the Test were either changed or removed, as said questions were heavily biased in favor of the Black Robes and selfish elements among the Red Robes. That, and it was increasingly clear that during the 4th Age the Wizards of High Sorcery as a whole were motivated by greater ideals than magic as an end in and of itself. Even Merroc the White, celebrated as the Magocracy’s spiritual founder, had the ultimate goal of using the Magocracy in the hope of turning Krynn into an eventual utopia.
Each and every change to the Test of High Sorcery was the result of much debate among the Conclave, always argumentative and passionate, with some even veering into the vulgar and vindictive. The most conservative hardliners were given a voice when a prominent Conclave member, the Red Robe Aurelio De Luca, quit in disgust, giving rise to the Homecomer movement.
One factor hasn’t changed since the rise of the Magocracy: the Soulforge, a permanent physical transformation placed on the successful Test-taker. Its purpose is to reflect something about the mage via highlighting some personal flaw. They range from harmless cosmetic effects to debilitations that can cause minor difficulties in daily living, but aren’t lethal. For example, a wizard who feels the need to get the last word in every conversation might find themselves tripping over their own words whenever they get frustrated and agitated, while one who is a spendthrift might find that touching gold and silver always causes an instantaneous buildup of a static shock.
While wizardry is more common than ever, full members of the Orders of High Sorcery are still rare enough that the Soulforge is still a mark of distinction. What changed is that people in general are more aware of and less surprised by mages with odd physical traits and quirks, as the Soulforge is a handy means of explaining away such things. Personal views of the Soulforge vary based on the mage’s personality and worldview: many are self-conscious, reminded forevermore of a personal character flaw. Others accept it as a necessary price to pay for the power and privilege that comes with joining Ansalon’s mightiest figures. Some even flaunt their Soulforge traits, demonstrating it as evidence of their personal power.
