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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Sammael99" data-source="post: 433616" data-attributes="member: 1157">Shark,Although I must confess that my campaign world is nowhere near as developed as yours, here's roughly the importance of paladins in my campaign. The campaign is currently set in the Naïmid Baronies, named after the Naïmid river. There are five baronies, and the barons of Llambeth, Razem, Argûnn and Ezkül are all vassals to the baron of Naïm, also called the Ruby Prince.In ages of old, the main order of knights used to be the Knight Protectors, an order dedicated to the benevolent deity Zendâ. During the Second Diabolic War against the city-state of Glass, the Knight Protectors saved the baronies by researching ancient lore and summoning a celestial host to counter the diabolic forces of Glass. However, only a few decades later, the order was declared corrupt by the Ruby Prince and made illegal.Evidence at the time was considered convincing, but historians today agree that, although there may have been a genuine case of demonism within the order, it is very unlikely that the whole order and especially the higher hierarchy was concerned. In light of today's evidence, it is more likely that the Ruby Prince and most of the barons tried to counter the growing influence of the order following its decisive stroke in the war against Glass.Now and again, rumours have emerged of the order having survived in hiding, but it is unlikely that nearly 800 years on, nothing would be known of such a covert order. For several hundred years after the disbanding of the Knight Protectors, no particular order of knighthood had preeminence in the baronies until a few hundred years ago an order dedicated to the sun-god Polonius started gaining importance. It seems that the order, althuogh genuine in its faith, acquired most of its clout through financial dealings and loans to the Ruby Crown at a time when the state coffers were at an all-time low and the Prince faced massive rebellion from a self-proclaimed heir to the throne.Nowadays, the Order of the Sword of Light (for such is its name) indeed wields considerable power, both political and military, although this power has not yet been used on the field of war. With turmoil brewing again at the frontiers between the baronies and the city-state of Glass, this situation could soon change. However, in a masterly political coup, the Order acquired a great privilege several decades back in exchange for erasing the huge debt the crown owned to the Prince : in every barony, the Order possesses lands that are not under the jurisdiction of the baron but only under that of the Prince. In effect, the Order owns a private state within the state.These lands have been strategically chosen. For example, in the Baronny of Llambeth, they are located high into the Ferrous Mounts, and the Knights there exploit the only known Adamantine mine which allows them superior equipment and weaponry. The fact that the nearby dwarven kingdom of Dwargon has claimed ownership of the mines has not deterred the Knights and these lands are heavily guarded. Other domains in other baronnies yield similar benefits. Ultimately, beyond the obvious knightly behaviour and occasional frontier skirmishes or cleansing raids amongst the neighboring orcish tribes, nobody really knows the Order's objectives. It is obvious that the Prince does not control them very closely, but their aims are unknown. Recently, the order has been accused by some of feuding against the Church of Ehrûn, the God of Law over a long-lost artefact called the Ruby of Argûnn. A temple of Ehrûn in Samella was burned to the ground and several fights between the Knights of the Sword of Light and the Monks of Ehrûn ensued, but even though the Ruby Prince himself summoned the leaders of both parties to settle the feud, nobody knows exactly what happened and why...</blockquote>

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