Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 8864025" data-attributes="member: 27780">Polyhedron Issue 128: February 1998part 2/5Elminster's Everwinking Eye: Ed is not embracing the digital world, preferring to keep his communiques strictly to letter or irl, which co-incidentally is also the name of this month's spotlighted village. They're particularly notable for being a hotbed for gem mining, including lots of ioun stones and other magical sparklies. While not every family there is rich, there are many that are very rich indeed. This leads to lots of conspiracy theories about what they actually do with all that money, why they stick to small-town life instead of constructing massive mansions or moving away, as well as why the place itself isn't larger. I guess they must like it that way. Once you reach a certain level of wealth that you and your family can be comfortable and secure in perpetuity, why waste it on flashy stuff that won't make you any happier? Anyone who's in thrall to the capitalist ideals of constant growth and ostentatious consumption simply wouldn't understand that mindset. So this is one that almost seems too nice, particularly in the rough and tumble border kingdoms. Until some sucker sends an army to conquer it, at which point they break out the laser shooting floating jewels and hordes of ultrapowerful golems, kick the asses of the invaders and use the more subtle levers of wealth to economically cripple the offending country for decades. It's like Ian M Banks's The Algebraist all over again. This definitely seems like a place where a more sneaky group of adventurers could pull off a heist and come away with a nice profit, but doing so repeatedly would rapidly increase the odds of picking a target out of your league and facing the consequences, because they have a lot of resources that they can bring to bear to protect their relaxed communal lifestyle. Another example of the things only he can manage, making a place nice without being weak or boring. I wish more of the adventures in here & Dungeon would at least try to thread that needle.City Stories: The irregular series on temples continues by looking at Tyr, god of justice. In a world like this, justice is meaningless without the strength to back it up, so this is another temple that has it's own armory, training grounds and all the other stuff needed to train and equip paladins to go out and fight for what's right. But once caught, they also need to be able to properly assess guilt or innocence and proper punishment, so there's also more emphasis on book learning than Tempus or Helm, with writings by various notables stretching back a good 600 years. As usual, they have a nice full-page map of the temple, a description of the most important NPC's, and some stuff on their customs and day-to-day life there. It all presents a picture of a stable place that's been doing this for a long time and is well integrated into the community. There's just one big problem with this, as they made a big deal in the Trumpeter a couple of months ago about how the high priest had been possessed and the whole thing was infiltrated by Mask worshippers, forcing them to tear down, rebuild and reconsecrate the temple when it was uncovered. So this is an instance where the two articles are both decent enough on their own, but put together are a big editorial fail, showing that they aren't checking and co-ordinating what's being published in polyhedron and the online newsletter. If people aren't aware of the big metaplot developments, they might as well have not happened. Put so closely together, it all seems very sloppy. That should inspire some complaining letters in the near future.Welcome to Star*Drive: The era of Alternity is upon us again. No surprise that they're trying to promote it here as well, hopefully get a Living setting going if they can get you guys to actually contribute. So here's one of your system free setting synopses to get interest up. The Year is 2501. Humanity has spread to the stars, which is a ridiculously vast area to explore, so we'll focus on a particular region with half a dozen PC-suitable species called the Verge. There's a high ratio of inhabitable planets here, which we get a whistle-stop tour of. Do you want to settle a garden world, terraform a barren one, seek your fortune, get involved in politics, or just pack off to fight in one of the simmering little wars that threaten to break out as soon as people have recovered from the last big one. It's all very colonial era writ large, as galactic civilisation isn't joined up at all and there's lots of competition for the best currently unsettled bits. Unlike their previous attempts at sci-fi, this is very much designed so you can play D&D IIIIINNNN SPAAAAACEEEE!!!!!, complete with lots of opportunity for killing and taking of stuff if that's your bag. We shall have to see if the Living adventures stick to that formula or anyone tries something a little more progressive with them.</blockquote>

Verification