Author Topic: Valdor, the Forgotten Land [supplemental]  (Read 2178 times)

Offline TheGeometer

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Valdor, the Forgotten Land [supplemental]
« on: June 07, 2014, 12:36:46 AM »
Valdor

Ages ago, before spellbooks and daily spell limitations, there was very little structure to magic. Anyone with a trace of the arcane in their blood or the divine in their souls could conjure up nearly endless power on a whim. The conflicts were inevitable, global, and devastating, with hundreds at a time being ripped from their souls or vaporized in titanic explosions. They were over trivial matters, but given enough power, people will see anything as cause for war.

When the casualties became too great to ignore, the gods stepped in to restore balance. They formed rules governing the use of their gift, the magic of the world, and made the amount of power that one could attain a direct consequence of the time one spends learning the art. And so the world achieved the relative stability that it maintains to this day. To discourage the idea of such catastrophic war in the future, the gods drew attention away from the epicenter of the most brutal of these ancient battles, a small region called Valdor.

Valdor is covered in trenches hastily carved by magic, half-demolished walls of solid stone, and shallow craters, some miles wide, but a dense layer of soil, grass, and trees makes these features difficult to discern (DC 20 Survival or Knowledge (Geography) check). To the west lies a lake surrounded by fertile soil and wide plains. A forest stretches out from there to the east, and rivers run between the trees there to fill the western lake.

What makes Valdor special, however, is the magic that hangs around it, remnants of those epic battles that have been cast and recast since the ancient war that brought them there. So many magical remnants pervade the air in Valdor that even the most feeble or clumsy of outstretched thoughts can shift a few of them. The people that settled in this land, unaware of the history of the magic that surrounded them, eventually learned to control it and use it for themselves, both for warfare and for the ease that it gave to their daily lives. Thus, Valdor became the birthplace of remnant magic.

Races of Valdor

To the west live the Ornak, a proud, strong race related to humans and, distantly, titans. Their increased reliance on the readily-available magic around them for such purposes as harvesting crops has made them a bit physically weaker than most creatures with a titan bloodline, but they make up for that with a seamless adaptation of magic into their battle style. While they are more warlike than humans, they emphasize education, especially in remnant magic, much more in their society. Villages of stone Ornak houses dominate the lakeside plains.

The Ornak's counterparts in the eastern side of Valdor are the Erudari. Each Erudar is far weaker than even a human, let alone the nearby Ornak, but their expertise with magic is unparalleled. From a young age, Erudari are able to manipulate the spell remnants around them, and as such, they have fully integrated magic into their way of life. Erudari live in the dense forest where growing food would be impossible, but these people need not grow nor gather any food, as they can easily conjure enough food magically to feed their numbers. They form a tight-knit order of mages and clerics that defends itself by surrounding the forest with a web of abjurations and illusions.

The Temple

At the center of the eastern forest of Valdor is a large pyramidal temple constructed by the Erudari. It stands upon a site of intense magical energy, an arcane aura so strong that it pulses, faintly yet tangibly, along every surface in the area. Within its depths lie a multitude of treasures, as well as magical defenses protecting them. Its outer surface is covered with what appear at first glance to be vines of ivy but are actually intricate bronze carvings of natural curves and spirals. These decorations frame countless doorways, balconies and arching walkways that jut outward, seemingly at random, from the smooth surface of the pyramid. At its peak is an elaborate zigzagging spire that extends noticeably above the tree line.

Just outside the temple is a clearing where a devoted order of monks train, learning a unique martial art that combines traditional unarmed combat forms with remnant magic. These monks live in the lower floors of the temple, while only the most trusted clerics and mages venture near the top. They zealously defend the temple from any perceived threats, though such threats are rare, and their lives are primarily devoted to peaceful contemplation and meditative training.
« Last Edit: July 15, 2014, 02:33:15 PM by TheGeometer »

Offline TheGeometer

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Valdor in Your Campaign
« Reply #1 on: June 08, 2014, 03:31:00 PM »
Valdor in Your Campaign

There's no denying that a region like Valdor ties a lot of the concepts of remnant magic together. It explains the new races that favor remnant magic, and it also lends a lot of description to the prestige class of monks that train in its temple, the Valdoran Spellmonk. That said, as the [supplemental] descriptor of this section would suggest, it is not necessary to incorporate any aspect of the Valdor region into a campaign for remnant magic to be used in it. The races of Valdor could have developed elsewhere, and the Spellmonks could train in another location that has strong ties to magic.

For campaigns that want to use Valdor directly, any vagueness in the above description of the region can be filled as the GM sees fit. Even the layout that was described above, with the lake to the west and forest to the east, was just a suggestion that can be altered should the campaign require it.

Magic in Valdor

The most important characteristic of Valdor, should a campaign make use of it, is the high concentration of spell remnants that permeate its air, water, and ground. This causes remnant magic to be unusually powerful there, but it can affect regular magic as well. Valdor provides a good reason to experiment with some of the effects of magical planes: the remnants in Valdor might add their magical energy to any spells cast, Heightening them by one level or Empowering them. Alternatively, the fragments of so many different spells might interfere with spellcasting, making all of Valdor an area of wild magic.

Regardless of how the GM chooses regular magic to behave in Valdor, remnant magic is undoubtedly made stronger there. Since there are so many additional remnants to cast, remnant casters gain access to an additional pool of RP each turn (which does not detract from their RP/day, if applicable) for their highest-level remnant casting class equal to half the amount of RP/turn they could normally cast. They can use the bonus RP pool to cast any remnants they could cast with their highest-level remnant casting class, but remnants from the bonus pool cannot be cast as part of the same group as remnants from the class. Thus, for example, a 20th-level Remnant Mage in Valdor could cast 60 Flare remnants from his class and 30 Flare remnants from the bonus pool that Valdor provides, but they would require separate saves, rather than a single save for a 90-Flare group.
« Last Edit: July 17, 2014, 01:31:03 PM by TheGeometer »