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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Libertad" data-source="post: 6197103" data-attributes="member: 6750502">Limbo <img src="http://i.*****.com/g6xXamC.jpg?1" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" /> Image designed by MystikAngel of Deviantart.    No aspect of Dungeons & Dragons is more prone to argument than the alignment system, especially the Law-Chaos axis.  Many people have explained it and debated it more than I have, but the personality traits associated with one particular alignment can also be applied to another: Lawful Good characters “speak out against social injustice,” yet Chaotic Good characters “hate it when people try to intimidate others and tell them what to do.”  A Chaotic Neutral character can “be free from a society’s restrictions,” while a Lawful Neutral character can be directed by a “personal code” defined by one’s self.  Basically the common personality traits of opposing Law-Chaos alignments are not mutually exclusive, meaning that behavior by an individual can be logically argued to be either lawful or chaotic.If one were to look over the decades of D&D history, Chaotic alignment has been associated with unpredictability, randomness, anarchism, mental instability, social progressivism, and individualism.  Since a lot of these things don’t go well together, I’m going to keep the terrain of Limbo mostly the same, yet have the petitioners and Slaadi be Chaotic in the sense of self-autonomy.Colonization    Despite the highly morphic and volatile nature of the Plane, a large amount of people are drawn to Limbo to create their own societies.  The average person can alter the area’s elemental nature to his own personal whims.  Stronger-willed individuals, or those with Planar Replicators, can accomplish greater feats of change.  Many enterprising souls rightly view this as an amazing planar trait, full of potential for the creation of worlds.  All sorts of people come to Limbo to escape from the flawed societies of other planes to start anew in an isolated environment.  Just about any kind of community can be found on Limbo, from sheltered cultist compounds surrounded by a shield of boiling water, to a floating ball of earth inhabited by an order of druids.  The Githzerai hold the longest record of continuously inhabited visitors to the plane, and their settlements are both the largest and most prominent.  Githzerai cities differ from the isolated monasteries of their more contemplative peers in that they’re highly militarized and ruled by a single authority figure or a council of martial spellcasters known as Gish.    Travel between the habitats is usually accomplished by travel in spherical objects known as “Globes.”  Globes are powered by small Planar Replicators and typically made of transparent solid or liquid material.  All globes contain all four elements: the typical Globe made for humanoid habitation looks like a circular rock with windows at the piloting seat.  It uses air for locomotion and breathing space, fire for heating and self-defense, earth for a solid framework, and water for sanitation and sustenance.  Combat between enemy globes is usually accomplished by using the Replicator as a weapon, throwing elemental energy at the enemy Globe to cancel out its elements and disable the vehicle.  Pirates and raiders hunker down in remote outposts between major settlements and attack passing vessels this way.Planar Replicators    Traditional stabilization and world-building is too slow, dangerous, and limited for all but the smallest of micro-environments.  The secret to successful creation on a large scale involves the use of Planar Replicators.  Made of rare materials and Raw Chaos found only on Limbo, a Planar Replicator draws upon the elemental traits of multiple nearby sections of Limbo and stores them as energy.  The energy can then be altered to another elemental trait or used in the process of matter creation.    Planar Replicators take the shape of small metal rods suspending a glowing ball of multi-colored energy above itself.  Neither solid, liquid, or gas, the energy has a unique state of matter analogous to plasma.  The Replicator can store only a finite amount of elemental energy, although this limit is dependent upon the caster level of the creator and the amount of resources used to create the item.  The possibility of an overload is unlikely except in cases of negligence or abandonment.  The Replicator can be altered to only store energy instead of collecting it, and most communities use the continuing energy supply to create and sustain magical auras, food, water, and raw materials.  The average Planar Replicator can create enough land and resources for a self-sustaining community of 100 humans, while the largest and most powerful Replicators can provide for nearly a million people.    Since a person can use a Replicator to essentially produce materials with minimum loss in profit, the items are never sold for raw gold pieces or non-magical trade materials in legitimate markets.  The black market and Lower Plane bazaars sell them, but only the lower-powered ones and only to travelers who appear totally unprepared to handle Limbo (most of these dealers get rid of used and broken Replicators this way for a quick profit).  They’re specially attuned to the energies of Limbo and cannot work on other planes (they can work in a dimensional breach, although their power is significantly reduced).The Slaadi    The Slaadi are the oldest known inhabitants of Limbo and the “face” of Chaos.  Tales of their societies, capabilities, and behavior are numerous, yet most are full of misconceptions and few people truly understand them.  Almost all Slaadi are individualists in the sense of placing the self higher than that of the group, but even this is a broad generalization.  Many Slaadi have competing ideas of “freedom” and “individualism,” often resulting in more confusion to outsiders.    Chaotic Neutral Slaadi often live solitary lives.  When they deign to be among others of their kind, they gather in groups that are organized in a non-hierarchal, voluntary association.  Every Slaad is considered to have autonomy over its own body and soul, and forced coercion of others is viewed as the domain of oppression and Law.  It is considered acceptable to use force in the case of self-defense, although the line between “self-defense” and “violating another’s freedom” is quite blurry and arbitrary even to the Slaadi.  Additionally, the individual power of a Slaadi is not seen as a privilege; a green Slaad may be capable of out-thinking and out-fighting a red Slaad, but this does not give it the “right” to enslave and oppress weaker Slaadi.  Such Slaadi are also opposed to the use of imposing mind-affecting magic on the unwilling; to them it’s one of the worst violations of individual autonomy.    Chaotic Evil Slaadi follow a mindset closest to that of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egoist_anarchism" target="_blank">Egoist Anarchism</a>.  Basically, such a Slaad believes that it has the right to live out its own existence as it wishes, with no regard to the rights or dignity of others, Slaadi and non-Slaadi alike.  They care only for their own freedoms and nobody else’s.  These Slaadi are far more likely to be solitary and the more powerful among their kind; weaker Slaadi of this mentality usually get destroyed by more powerful ones or live a life of banditry, attacking those too weak to defend themselves.    Chaotic Good Slaadi share much in common with their Neutral counterparts, except that they are more proactive in extraplanar affairs and take a “threat to justice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere” mentality.  They spend the most time off-plane, railing against the soul trade of Lower Planes fiends and the forced assimilation policies of Elysium.  These Slaadi believe that no law, organization, or individual has the right to deprive others of freedom, the pursuit of happiness, or dignity.  To them, the “right” to own and abuse slaves or bully others into obedience is no right at all.  They also continuously engage in battle against the Chaotic Evil Slaadi as both groups’ ideologies are at extreme ends.Ssendam and Ygorl    The term “Slaad Lord” is a misnomer in that the Slaadi do not have a proper societal hierarchy and are not beholden to any member of their species beyond “hey, let’s work together for a short while.”  Since most visitors associate power with authority, and Ssendam and Ygorl are the two most powerful known Slaadi, they became known on the other Planes as the “Lords of Slaadi.”    Ssendam doesn’t really much care for the affairs of his people beyond how it personally affects him, but Ygorl’s a bully who views all other Slaadi as pawns to be used for his own leisure.  This has led Ygorl to have a more prominent presence on other planes and in the affairs of others, even coming into conflict with other Slaadi.  He was the one who altered the Spawning Stone and put limits on the mutability of his own race.  He hoped that no Slaadi can eclipse his power through accident of birth so that he remains among the strongest.    This action earned Ygorl a lot of enemies who want to see him dead or stripped of all influence.  Many Slaadi have even accused him of being a Slaad in name only, an agent of Law sent to bring destruction to Limbo.  But Ygorl didn’t get to where he was by being stupid; he’s got a lot of favors and magical protection, and his citadel’s full of traps, planar bound entities, controlled undead, and contingency spells for all manner of doomsday scenarios.  Adventurers who go against him can expect to contend with Slaadi promised power by Ygorl, minions of a demonic prince who owes him favors, and sympathetic Xaositects (Chaotic Planescape faction).Slaadi Alternative: AscensionFavored petitioners, Clerics of Chaotic deities, and people who've championed the principles of freedom and individuality are granted the opportunity to become a Slaad.  The Slaad implants a circular object into the host; it's not an "egg" in the biological sense, but a fragment of the Slaadi's form and a powerful receptacle for Chaos.  If the host stays on Limbo or exposed to Chaos for a long enough period of time, he'll change into a Slaadi.  The process slows down slightly on mildly-Chaotic Planes, a significant amount on Neutral-aligned Planes, and stops on Lawfully-aligned Planes.  Secondary exposure to Chaos via something other than planar energy is possible, although the process is as slow as it is on a mildly-Chaotic Plane.This makes the creation process a cause for celebration among the Slaadi.  The "parent," along with friendly Slaadi, hosts a festival for the newest member of their race.  The Slaadi use their their powers to manipulate the energy of Limbo and create stunning spectacles of elemental artwork.  A flaming geyser of fire which transforms into a sea of liquid bubbles; a glittering transparent rock with pockets of air containing miniature forests; all of these represent the raw beauty of Chaos and help new Slaadi understand the nature of the Plane.Adventure Hooks in Limbo:•    A monk, spellcaster, or martial adept character has to undergo a trial on the plane of Limbo in order to attain a higher state of being/master a magical discipline/progress among the Sublime Way.  They must seek out the Monastery of Zerth’Ad’Iun and enter into a strict training regimen under the head Sensei.  They will be exposed to the elements of the plane, tasked with creating life out of controlling the planar essence, and through ritualized combat against superior opponents.  Is your PC ready for the Training Regimen from Hell?•    The PCs need to deliver a new Planar Replicator to a settlement before the ball of earth collapses under an elemental onslaught.  A raiding party of evil Slaadi assault the habitat, intent on destroying both Replicators.  The PCs must drive them off or kill the Slaadi, otherwise they’ll be stranded on a crumbling rock and exposed to the churning chaos of the plane.•    Ygorl has gone too far; his latest necromantic experiment involved the imprisonment of an entire community of Slaadi souls, and he’s building a portal to the Negative Energy Plane to overflow Limbo!  If he’s not stopped, countless more Slaadi, petitioners, and colonists will turn into undead creations under his control.  The PCs must break into his citadel and destroy the portal before it’s too late!</blockquote>

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