Gramarie Campaign setting [A feat for the impossible] [WIP]

[Arcanist]

So after reading through the Forged of War, I started thinking. "What exactly would Eberron look like if instead of Artificers, they had Gramarist?" and so I got to thinking about using the Eberron Campaign Setting as a skeleton for what it would look like and I got to work (albiet this was only this morning during coffee).

So far my thoughts are that Warforged would be highly advanced, highly sophisticated Animated Biostructures with Sentience that are created through the use of an amalgam of Principles (I'll post a Blueprint once I have more time). Gramarist being either Freelancers or specifically involved in House Cannith... Idk...

But yeah, this is my blank slate idea that I'll be working on for a little while. At least after Christmas and some input from other Gramarist on the board 

Idea log:

12/26/12 (7:30 PM EST)
So far the general idea is that I (or we) will be using the Eberron Campaign Setting and Dark Sun as a skeleton of the idea for a Story base. I'd like to first create the entire world up to a certain point and have someone create the history of the world from that point onward through actual gameplay (most likely through PbP, I hear Omnicrat has been considering restarting up a Gramarie Campaign that I'd like to Co-DM).

The setting assumes that we have a

• planetary based Cosmology allowing for Space travel making planar travel much more difficult and a highly advanced art
• Magic not being strong enough on it's own thus requiring the interactions and applications of Science to truly let it shine as an Art
• The highest level of Gramarie is Magisterial, with limited access to Doctorate Principles
• An ancient Empire of Gramarie that allows for the discovery and implementation of Ascended Metals as a finite resource
• Highly Psionic as it transcends the limitations of Magic since it comes from another source [Psionics are indeed different in this game]
• Light raw Magical applications due to the nature of how magic works in the world. At some point casters lack the power to cast certain levels of magic, but may cast a lower level of spells without worry.

Due to the nature of how Biome's work research into Sunmetal is Illegal for use (although you may still create it, but just telling you the consequences if you manage to do so) from fear of ruination of an entire city and damaging the finite resource of land. Land cannot be created and as the technology is limited Demiplanes may not be created, without access knowledge from the ancient Empires of old.

The enslavement of Biollurgical chassis is a highly discussed and heated argument that is rivaled only in it's controversy as Resurrection magic. Although the use of Biollurgical Chassis as a work force is legal, it is illegal to forbid a Biollurgical Chassis from choosing it's place of employment. This doesn't stop many Businessmen and Gramarist from arguing that since they created the Chassis, they are allowed to do with them as they please, however the counterargument to that is that since the creature has a Soul, it should be afforded the rights of any creature with enough sentience to know right from wrong. Resurrection magic is illegal due to the fact that it devalues the meaning of life.

All creatures possess a limited amount of Ebbs inside of them, however certain subjects possess a little bit more Ebbs then anything else Inherit Spellcasters for example (i.e. Sorcerers, Favored Souls, Any Spontaneous caster) possesses a supply of Ebbs inside of them that they can use to power the magical power in their blood (I will be making a Casters specific for this campaign) where as Learned Spellcasters (Wizards, Clerics, Druids, Anything that prepares spells) cast their spells by accessing Ebbs that are natural to all creatures. Through prayer and study they learn how to access these pools of ebbs to perform wondrous feats of Arcane/Divine power. These Ebbs, however may never be used to power any Principle of Gramarie save a Silver Input. At most a Caster can only cast up to 6th level spells

Psionics use the same system for Manifesting as before, however they also have a pool of Ebbs in addition to their power points. Psionics is only allowed to Manifest 9th and under powers because of this. All Manifesters effectively have their pool of Power points cut in half and gain a pool of Ebbs that is equal in quantity to the amount of power points the manifester has (which would be half your normal PP total). Manifesting powers now becomes slightly different in that now it requires you to spend points from both of your pools. For example, say you would like to manifest a Psionic Dimension Door. You would need to spend the powers level twice -2 (once in ebbs and once in power points) so it would cost 2 PP and 2 Ebbs. These Ebbs may not be used for any Principle of Gramarie save a Silver Input.

I'm still a little torn on how to regulate the sales of Gramarie Principles. Right now, I'm thinking that maybe I should just make the general sales of Gramarie illegal, but this seems highly unfair... Any thoughts here?

Interplanetary travel is in the Realm of ELDK and YGGD merging together as a principle. Escape Velocity is 11.2km/s on an Earth shaped planet. Due to a lack of knowledge for Astrophysics, I don't feel confident enough to make any bold statements for this field either, but the general idea is to use an Ascending Engine to breach with a Incongruous Pathway set up from Mission Control to the location, but this doesn't exactly present any risk or add a sense of adventure to it also large scale space battles become relatively obsolete. When I picture Gramarie in Space I think of something along the lines of Mass Effect or something...

[Arcanist]

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[Arcanist]

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[Arcanist]

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[Arcanist]

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[Omnicrat]

1) We lost our DM, and don't currently have a new one lined up, so unless you have a friend to help you, it would just be you.  I can't speak for everyone, but I don't see why you DMing would be a problem.

2) How are chassi used in resurrection?  Is that resurrection still illegal?

3) What time frame are you going for?  It sounds like you want a world a little ahead of where the real world is.  If that is the case, how long has the world been like this?  I would say an industrial revolution 100 years or so before the modern era (discovery [or rediscovery] of the baccalaureate principles) which would start at the discovery of magisterial principles 30 or 40 years ago.  The world nears the dawn of a new age, an age where new planes can be made, where the ancient metals can be created, where we can give our machines true life.

4) How many cultures, races, and continents?  Some races I want to see: Human, Elan, Elf, Dwarf, Orc, Sharakim, Goblin, Blue, Hobgoblin, Living Construct Chassis race, a few chassi races, Changeling, Mongrelfolk, Gnome, a homebrew race with a gramatic affinity (possibly a human subspecies).  Also, I would say at least 12 distinct cultures and at least 2 continents.  Basic culture ideas:  Orc druids, Goblinoid military dictatorship, united dwarven holds, Theocracy (OTG theocracy, if possible), Magrocacy (well, Gramocracy, but you get the idea), Free Republic (possibly fresh out of the revolution/rebellion), Communal state (gramarie really helps communists a lot, when you think about it), United Monster Federation, Necrocracy (rule by the undead[or deathless, if you prefer]), Something where doppelgangers, changelings, and puppeteers are the real power (possibly a republic).  Unless I listed a race, they can be of whatever race someone comes up with for them (Communist Gnomes, Elf Republic, whatever).  All these cultures would be on one continent, with the other being a ruined land, full of wights and other horrors of the ancient empire.

5) How do spells work?  I think spellcasters should have an ebb pool (used as spell points) for casting spells, using the ebb count for outputs.  If you do this, you need to curb the use of these ebbs being directly channed into silverins.  I reccomend a 10 to 1 transfer, because it is hard to turn raw ebbs into processed ebbs in this way.  Also, are you creating any spells?  What spells are flat-out restricted?

6) Were all the cultures once united, as Galifar?  I don't really like that idea for this setting.  Maybe the continent these cultures are on were settled by the imperial race(s) and they civilized it, bringing minor technological advancement (didn't send over gramarist, just low-level gramarie).  Before the full colonization plans could get underway, the empire was destroyed in one day.  No one is sure what exactly caused the end of the empire, all they know is it had something to do with sunmetal (explaining the unanimous ban on it).  With the fall of the empire, the colonial governments soon divided, and formed unique cultures of their own.  Over time, native races rose to dominance in some areas and forged completely new nations.  I like that.  Also, I feel like they would have a UN or League of Nations since the advent of gramarie's rediscovery (at least since the magisterial principles, or first [and probably last so far] gramatic war).

7) You need a special license to practice gramarie, another license to work with other gramarists,  a third license to sell gramatic principles beyond baccalaureate, and a fourth license to buy gramatic principles beyond baccalaureate.  Maybe this is part of international law established by the UN parallel?

8) With space travel, remember; you can make your ships fall up .  In fact, controlled falling produces ebb free flight, usually faster than most engines would get you.

[Arcanist]

1) We lost our DM, and don't currently have a new one lined up, so unless you have a friend to help you, it would just be you.  I can't speak for everyone, but I don't see why you DMing would be a problem.

Wondrous. I was going to conscript you to DM (but if you don't want too it's cool) or at least find me where the last game left off so I can use it as a reference material.

2) How are chassi used in resurrection?  Is that resurrection still illegal?

They aren't used for resurrection. Resurrection is illegal because think of it this way: When you can just die and come back the next day, life loses all meaning. Chassi are completely legal (and valid targets for gameplay as such), but using them as a free workforce is flat out illegal (although they wouldn't complain about it if you were their creator).

3) What time frame are you going for?  It sounds like you want a world a little ahead of where the real world is.  If that is the case, how long has the world been like this?  I would say an industrial revolution 100 years or so before the modern era (discovery [or rediscovery] of the baccalaureate principles) which would start at the discovery of magisterial principles 30 or 40 years ago.  The world nears the dawn of a new age, an age where new planes can be made, where the ancient metals can be created, where we can give our machines true life.

Gramarie was rediscovered (or always known, just never really applied) in an era that resembles our worlds WW1 and saw serious progress for military use during the Great War allowing for increased research into stronger principles (The Magisterial Principles). Principles of Gramarie allowed for the operation of Unmaned tanks, Faster modes of travel, Better information networks, more powerful metals and the most important thing: An unlimited supply of soldiers ready to fight and die for "their" country (this would be when Magisterial Principles are starting to be invented).

Once Doctorate level Principles get involved a Utopian society is created, because land loses value since you can just create a Demiplane if you want, Currency becomes worthless since you have almost everything you need and most of the things people fight over become easily and readily available to people for free allowing people to perform better things like discovering themselves, exploring, (like Star Trek) and bettering themselves as a race... THAT! Or this happens

Currently, the only Doctorate level Principles are:

ALCH325
ALCH364 (However creation of Oricalcum is still a fledgling art and use of Sunmetal is outlawed)
ARCD350
ARCD365 (Platinum Transformers are still controversial in there use, but are generally accepted at the behest of the Church)
BIOY381
HEUR302
IMCH334
IMCH388
GEOC374

Everything else is yet to be researched or discovered, however exploration into the ruins of the Old Country might yield some interesting results... The currency of the game functions off the Dollar (Paper money that contains X value) so creating gold with Alchemetry is kind of a moot point.

4) How many cultures, races, and continents?  Some races I want to see: Human, Elan, Elf, Dwarf, Orc, Sharakim, Goblin, Blue, Hobgoblin, Living Construct Chassis race, a few chassi races, Changeling, Mongrelfolk, Gnome, a homebrew race with a gramatic affinity (possibly a human subspecies).  Also, I would say at least 12 distinct cultures and at least 2 continents.  Basic culture ideas:  Orc druids, Goblinoid military dictatorship, united dwarven holds, Theocracy (OTG theocracy, if possible), Magrocacy (well, Gramocracy, but you get the idea), Free Republic (possibly fresh out of the revolution/rebellion), Communal state (gramarie really helps communists a lot, when you think about it), United Monster Federation, Necrocracy (rule by the undead[or deathless, if you prefer]), Something where doppelgangers, changelings, and puppeteers are the real power (possibly a republic).  Unless I listed a race, they can be of whatever race someone comes up with for them (Communist Gnomes, Elf Republic, whatever).  All these cultures would be on one continent, with the other being a ruined land, full of wights and other horrors of the ancient empire.

Whoa! That is a lot of thoughts for races, but for now? I was thinking of keeping it basic at just Humans
I really don't know how to expand the world to allow for more races without giving one particular race a sour deal (I want the Goblin to have a nation, but what is keeping them from over powering another nation? A lack of Gramarie?) A few Magocracies could actually work. Just because Magic is underpowered here, doesn't mean that it lacks a deadly punch as well

I don't want changelings or other shapeshifters to have a nation, I'd rather they remain a band of vagabonds that can live anywhere because of their ability to change appearance at the drop of a hat. Necrocracies would be dandy actually, however they have to not be too significantly advanced in the arts of Gramarie. For example: I don't want a society of Ogre to be as advanced in Gramarie tech as a race of Humans or Elfs or the lot. I'm thinking of just unifying all the Humanoid races as a whole and letting them integrate freely (a society of Elfs, Humans (Elans, Illumians, Azurin, any other Human descended race), Orcs, Goblins, Gnomes, etc. all living together in Harmony against Foreign countries) A melting pot of races here and their a singular race nation over there and everything in between everywhere else.

The remains of the old empire would effectively be dead ruined area that constantly exhibits the effects of a Sunmetal explosion with a few Wights haunting the land. There are no survivors from the old empire (save for a few survivors that lived on in the form of Exotic Intelligences), but to be fair the Old Empire was destroyed thousands of years ago and due to suppression, by the church Principles of Gramarie have been largely forgotten and considered "Heretical".

5) How do spells work?  I think spellcasters should have an ebb pool (used as spell points) for casting spells, using the ebb count for outputs.  If you do this, you need to curb the use of these ebbs being directly channed into silverins.  I reccomend a 10 to 1 transfer, because it is hard to turn raw ebbs into processed ebbs in this way.  Also, are you creating any spells?  What spells are flat-out restricted?

Any spell above 6th level is outright banned (unless of course you use a SilverOut) making all casters use the Psychic Warrior progression for Spells (not to sure about that though, might just use the Vitility system...). The idea is for Casters to have an Ebb Pool (exactly like the Spell point rule). In essence you hit the nail on the head, however for casting spells it uses the same method as always (sort of). Spell level*2-1.

6) Were all the cultures once united, as Galifar?  I don't really like that idea for this setting.  Maybe the continent these cultures are on were settled by the imperial race(s) and they civilized it, bringing minor technological advancement (didn't send over gramarist, just low-level gramarie).  Before the full colonization plans could get underway, the empire was destroyed in one day.  No one is sure what exactly caused the end of the empire, all they know is it had something to do with sunmetal (explaining the unanimous ban on it).  With the fall of the empire, the colonial governments soon divided, and formed unique cultures of their own.  Over time, native races rose to dominance in some areas and forged completely new nations.  I like that.  Also, I feel like they would have a UN or League of Nations since the advent of gramarie's rediscovery (at least since the magisterial principles, or first [and probably last so far] gramatic war).

Not all united as Galifar. I was thinking that as well, they were survivors of the Empire that pioneered the lands, however after an unnamed amount of time the people began to rise up and accuse the Gramarist of destroying the Empire and so they were persecuted and hunted like Witch's and burned as Heretics. Eventually the cultures became more diverse, other races began to integrate themselves into common society, new nations rose, others fell and eventually we became the world we are today. Gramarie was never really forgotten, It was just never commonly practice until the Great War and after. The world does have a League of Nations that doesn't exactly last too long and has limited control. It's fall is a direct result of the Great War and after that a UN is formed with a great desire for peace and prosperity. After the Great War we have all these Military Gramarist returning back home with old blueprints that were never really applied and thus we have a Golden age of Gramarie. The study of Principles begins getting taught in schools (as Physics, Chemistry, etc), special schools are formed to further enhance that knowledge breeding an entirely new generation of Gramarist in a post war setting and for a while, life is pretty awesome. Although the losers of the war were not precisely happy from the results and the fickle finger of fate is slowly moving pieces across the board to begin a new war...

7) You need a special license to practice gramarie, another license to work with other gramarists,  a third license to sell gramatic principles beyond baccalaureate, and a fourth license to buy gramatic principles beyond baccalaureate.  Maybe this is part of international law established by the UN parallel?

I want to make a good way of regulating Gramarie that doesn't limit the players with bureaucratic BS. You receive your first License at your first level. It feels a little unfair to force a player to go through that BS I mentioned early just to be able to sell something. I might just make it so that you can only sell principles below your level of expertise (a 7th level Gramarist can only sell Baccalaureate principles and a 14th level Gramarist can sell either Magisterial and Baccalaureate Principles making it so that you can never sell Doctorate Principles). That seems fair right? 

8) With space travel, remember; you can make your ships fall up .  In fact, controlled falling produces ebb free flight, usually faster than most engines would get you.

Which is why I like YGGD (Polarcane Geometry) and HUER (Nonstatic Instruction)

At Doctorate level you can just use a Submerging Engine to move at an even greater speed (potentially breaking the speed of sound, in a vacuum! ) . Very interesting if you want to travel across space

[Omnicrat]

1) We lost our DM, and don't currently have a new one lined up, so unless you have a friend to help you, it would just be you.  I can't speak for everyone, but I don't see why you DMing would be a problem.

1) Wondrous. I was going to conscript you to DM (but if you don't want too it's cool) or at least find me where the last game left off so I can use it as a reference material.

2) How are chassi used in resurrection?  Is that resurrection still illegal?

2) They aren't used for resurrection. Resurrection is illegal because think of it this way: When you can just die and come back the next day, life loses all meaning. Chassi are completely legal (and valid targets for gameplay as such), but using them as a free workforce is flat out illegal (although they wouldn't complain about it if you were their creator).

3) What time frame are you going for?  It sounds like you want a world a little ahead of where the real world is.  If that is the case, how long has the world been like this?  I would say an industrial revolution 100 years or so before the modern era (discovery [or rediscovery] of the baccalaureate principles) which would start at the discovery of magisterial principles 30 or 40 years ago.  The world nears the dawn of a new age, an age where new planes can be made, where the ancient metals can be created, where we can give our machines true life.

3) Gramarie was rediscovered (or always known, just never really applied) in an era that resembles our worlds WW1 and saw serious progress for military use during the Great War allowing for increased research into stronger principles (The Magisterial Principles). Principles of Gramarie allowed for the operation of Unmaned tanks, Faster modes of travel, Better information networks, more powerful metals and the most important thing: An unlimited supply of soldiers ready to fight and die for "their" country (this would be when Magisterial Principles are starting to be invented).

Once Doctorate level Principles get involved a Utopian society is created, because land loses value since you can just create a Demiplane if you want, Currency becomes worthless since you have almost everything you need and most of the things people fight over become easily and readily available to people for free allowing people to perform better things like discovering themselves, exploring, (like Star Trek) and bettering themselves as a race... THAT! Or this happens

Currently, the only Doctorate level Principles are:

ALCH325
ALCH364 (However creation of Oricalcum is still a fledgling art and use of Sunmetal is outlawed)
ARCD350
ARCD365 (Platinum Transformers are still controversial in there use, but are generally accepted at the behest of the Church)
BIOY381
HEUR302
IMCH334
IMCH388

Everything else is yet to be researched or discovered, however exploration into the ruins of the Old Country might yield some interesting results... The currency of the game functions off the Dollar (Paper money that contains X value) so creating gold with Alchemetry is kind of a moot point.

4) How many cultures, races, and continents?  Some races I want to see: Human, Elan, Elf, Dwarf, Orc, Sharakim, Goblin, Blue, Hobgoblin, Living Construct Chassis race, a few chassi races, Changeling, Mongrelfolk, Gnome, a homebrew race with a gramatic affinity (possibly a human subspecies).  Also, I would say at least 12 distinct cultures and at least 2 continents.  Basic culture ideas:  Orc druids, Goblinoid military dictatorship, united dwarven holds, Theocracy (OTG theocracy, if possible), Magrocacy (well, Gramocracy, but you get the idea), Free Republic (possibly fresh out of the revolution/rebellion), Communal state (gramarie really helps communists a lot, when you think about it), United Monster Federation, Necrocracy (rule by the undead[or deathless, if you prefer]), Something where doppelgangers, changelings, and puppeteers are the real power (possibly a republic).  Unless I listed a race, they can be of whatever race someone comes up with for them (Communist Gnomes, Elf Republic, whatever).  All these cultures would be on one continent, with the other being a ruined land, full of wights and other horrors of the ancient empire.

4) Whoa! That is a lot of thoughts for races, but for now? I was thinking of keeping it basic at just Humans
I really don't know how to expand the world to allow for more races without giving one particular race a sour deal (I want the Goblin to have a nation, but what is keeping them from over powering another nation? A lack of Gramarie?) A few Magocracies could actually work. Just because Magic is underpowered here, doesn't mean that it lacks a deadly punch as well

I don't want changelings or other shapeshifters to have a nation, I'd rather they remain a band of vagabonds that can live anywhere because of their ability to change appearance at the drop of a hat. Necrocracies would be dandy actually, however they have to not be too significantly advanced in the arts of Gramarie. For example: I don't want a society of Ogre to be as advanced in Gramarie tech as a race of Humans or Elfs or the lot. I'm thinking of just unifying all the Humanoid races as a whole and letting them integrate freely (a society of Elfs, Humans (Elans, Illumians, Azurin, any other Human descended race), Orcs, Goblins, Gnomes, etc. all living together in Harmony against Foreign countries) A melting pot of races here and their a singular race nation over there and everything in between everywhere else.

The remains of the old empire would effectively be dead ruined area that constantly exhibits the effects of a Sunmetal explosion with a few Wights haunting the land. There are no survivors from the old empire (save for a few survivors that lived on in the form of Exotic Intelligences), but to be fair the Old Empire was destroyed thousands of years ago and due to suppression, by the church Principles of Gramarie have been largely forgotten and considered "Heretical".

5) How do spells work?  I think spellcasters should have an ebb pool (used as spell points) for casting spells, using the ebb count for outputs.  If you do this, you need to curb the use of these ebbs being directly channed into silverins.  I reccomend a 10 to 1 transfer, because it is hard to turn raw ebbs into processed ebbs in this way.  Also, are you creating any spells?  What spells are flat-out restricted?

5) Any spell above 6th level is outright banned (unless of course you use a SilverOut) making all casters use the Psychic Warrior progression for Spells (not to sure about that though, might just use the Vitility system...). The idea is for Casters to have an Ebb Pool (exactly like the Spell point rule). In essence you hit the nail on the head, however for casting spells it uses the same method as always (sort of). Spell level*2-1.

6) Were all the cultures once united, as Galifar?  I don't really like that idea for this setting.  Maybe the continent these cultures are on were settled by the imperial race(s) and they civilized it, bringing minor technological advancement (didn't send over gramarist, just low-level gramarie).  Before the full colonization plans could get underway, the empire was destroyed in one day.  No one is sure what exactly caused the end of the empire, all they know is it had something to do with sunmetal (explaining the unanimous ban on it).  With the fall of the empire, the colonial governments soon divided, and formed unique cultures of their own.  Over time, native races rose to dominance in some areas and forged completely new nations.  I like that.  Also, I feel like they would have a UN or League of Nations since the advent of gramarie's rediscovery (at least since the magisterial principles, or first [and probably last so far] gramatic war).

6) Not all united as Galifar. I was thinking that as well, they were survivors of the Empire that pioneered the lands, however after an unnamed amount of time the people began to rise up and accuse the Gramarist of destroying the Empire and so they were persecuted and hunted like Witch's and burned as Heretics. Eventually the cultures became more diverse, other races began to integrate themselves into common society, new nations rose, others fell and eventually we became the world we are today. Gramarie was never really forgotten, It was just never commonly practice until the Great War and after. The world does have a League of Nations that doesn't exactly last too long and has limited control. It's fall is a direct result of the Great War and after that a UN is formed with a great desire for peace and prosperity. After the Great War we have all these Military Gramarist returning back home with old blueprints that were never really applied and thus we have a Golden age of Gramarie. The study of Principles begins getting taught in schools (as Physics, Chemistry, etc), special schools are formed to further enhance that knowledge breeding an entirely new generation of Gramarist in a post war setting and for a while, life is pretty awesome. Although the losers of the war were not precisely happy from the results and the fickle finger of fate is slowly moving pieces across the board to begin a new war...

7) You need a special license to practice gramarie, another license to work with other gramarists,  a third license to sell gramatic principles beyond baccalaureate, and a fourth license to buy gramatic principles beyond baccalaureate.  Maybe this is part of international law established by the UN parallel?

7) I want to make a good way of regulating Gramarie that doesn't limit the players with bureaucratic BS. You receive your first License at your first level. It feels a little unfair to force a player to go through that BS I mentioned early just to be able to sell something. I might just make it so that you can only sell principles below your level of expertise (a 7th level Gramarist can only sell Baccalaureate principles and a 14th level Gramarist can sell either Magisterial and Baccalaureate Principles making it so that you can never sell Doctorate Principles). That seems fair right? 

8) With space travel, remember; you can make your ships fall up .  In fact, controlled falling produces ebb free flight, usually faster than most engines would get you.

8) Which is why I like YGGD (Polarcane Geometry) and HUER (Nonstatic Instruction)

At Doctorate level you can just use a Submerging Engine to move at an even greater speed (potentially breaking the speed of sound, in a vacuum! ) . Very interesting if you want to travel across space

Numbered your posts, hope you don't mind.

1) Yeah, as much as I enjoy DMing, I would rather play.  Besides, the current party only has 4 members, including me (new players wanted!:)) so me leaving the group would be bad all around.

2a) One of my players made a counter-point to that in our thread.  I'll repost it below:
I find the ban on resurrection magic plain bizarre, however. From what I can tell the logic is "I value (Substance That Eventually Expires). STEE expires on it's own, but other people can come and break STEE. Fixing STEE is illegal because it devalues STEE. Fixing STEE does not make STEE differ from its state before it was broken."
The original post was was the following url:  http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=14434056#post14434056
2b) Free non-intelligent chassis labor is illegal too, or only sentient chassis labor?  Most people would probably just use circuited chassi controlled by Nonstatic Instruction or a control point for complex stuff.
2c) Once the players get to doctorate level, will we have restricted principles too, or can we argue we've discovered/been researching them and only now fully understand their use?

3a) That's about the timeframe I was expecting.
3b) What's the highest level gramarist?  Any specializations still lost?  Are there any more banned applications of principles?  What PrCs are available?
3c) When you say "the church," does this mean there is only one united faith?

4a) You could always use gramarie prevalence to determine first, second, and third world nations.
4b) So, how many races are you comfortable with having?
4c) My idea for the Changeling/puppeteer/Doppelganger nation is that no one in-universe knows they control the nation.  They pretend to be nobility or elected officials and run the nation with a long view towards world domination, replacing visiting dignitaries and stuff like that.
4d) Why can't a Necrocracy have advanced gramarie?  The barbaric Ogres, I get, but the centuries old undead?  Might even have one or two who date back to the empire...
4e) So, one nation (probably republican, maybe a theocracy) where your race means nothing, one nation where they are all one race, then nothing as extreme as either?  I feel like a one race nation would be part of the axis during the Great War.  Hm... The axis was the imperial coalition of the One Race Nation and their client states, they managed to take a few states before the Free Republic organized the allies, a coalition of 9 nations united against the ORN's expansion (including the Necrocracy? maybe a monster nation or two?), the allies were still no match for the axis so they turned to gramarie, soon after the ORN "acquired" gramarists of their own beginning an arms race, soon long-lost principles of gramarie were rediscovered and the war constantly escalated, the allies maintained a constant gramatic advantage yet were still at a military disadvantage, the allies set off the first sunmetal bomb since the fall of the ancient empire at the ORN's military headquarters, immediately after the ORN axis entered into peace talks with the allies, the ORN empire is dismantled and all formerly conquered nations are reestablished (in one form or another) while the ORN are forbidden from practicing gramarie, the client states are similarly punished (though most have severed all ties with the ORN), to enforce the peace treaty and a variety of other international laws the Federation of Nations is formed. 
Idea: The ressurection ban is part of international law because resurection was one of the main reasons the ORN were able to maintain such military power; they resurected almost all killed soldiers, who were eager to rejoin the glorious conquest.
4f) Sunmetal bombs only leave fallout for 50 years, how are the old empire's sites still barren?

5a) How does a silverout get a 7th or higher level spell in it?  Do they only exist as artifacts?
5b) Spellcasters shouldn't be able to transfer their ebb pool straight to silverins, then.  Maybe their proto-ebbs?

6) Sounds good.

7) Doesn't really seem fair, no.  Also, if your goal is to not let gramarists get TONS of money, a restricion doesn't do that.  All a restriction does is make a black market where they can buy and sell principles at a highly inflated price.  You could just make low-level gramarists so common that one would hire a gramarist like they would hire a sage.  You said gramarie was being taught to the masses, right?

8) I know this is only tangental, but how does the ability to create demiplanes work if the planes are just planets?  Or is it that open portals to other planes exist in space, and their are no planeshift spells?

[Arcanist]

Feel free to number my post 

1) Yeah, as much as I enjoy DMing, I would rather play.  Besides, the current party only has 4 members, including me (new players wanted!:)) so me leaving the group would be bad all around.

You wouldn't have to retire as a player, we just DM different sections of the game at different times  If you really don't want to DM it's cool, I understand

) One of my players made a counter-point to that in our thread.  I'll repost it below:
I find the ban on resurrection magic plain bizarre, however. From what I can tell the logic is "I value (Substance That Eventually Expires). STEE expires on it's own, but other people can come and break STEE. Fixing STEE is illegal because it devalues STEE. Fixing STEE does not make STEE differ from its state before it was broken."
The original post was was the following url:  http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=14434056#post14434056

Actually in your explanation from below that is actually what I was imagining. They also used Resurrection magic to raise important officials that were assassinated and numerous soldiers were raised as Undead Soldiers, so by Resurrection magic, I mean anything that can make a Dead body animated again although the STEE example was actually very accurate to the disclosed reason why it is illegal.

Seeing that thread actually sent a shiver down my spine I had no idea that so many people would be interested in participating (4 is a large number too me...).

) Free non-intelligent chassis labor is illegal too, or only sentient chassis labor?  Most people would probably just use circuited chassi controlled by Nonstatic Instruction or a control point for complex stuff.

Any for of Chassis labor is illegal since potentially the "creature" has a chance at being sentient, for all purposes it is treated as if it were sentient. Most Sentient Chassis are old relics from the War (which explains why they are a playable race for this as long as they don't breach lvl adjustment 1). The Chassis are Immortal (or near Immortal) and thus spend most of their time like the Warforged. On a self-imposed journey of self-discovery.

) Once the players get to doctorate level, will we have restricted principles too, or can we argue we've discovered/been researching them and only now fully understand their use?

Yes, once the players attain 14th level they will be allowed to discover/research any Doctorate level Principles as normal. Hell, once Kellus makes 400-Theories those will be accessible too (when appropriate).

) That's about the timeframe I was expecting.

It's what I had in mind as well 

) What's the highest level gramarist?  Any specializations still lost?  Are there any more banned applications of principles?  What PrCs are available?

The highest level Gramarist was a man named Luthian Rosencroft, also known as The Surgeon of Death. Leveled at 15th level. You may use whatever Principle as you please (that have been discovered), you just have to be ready to face the consequences of your actions and all PrCs are available (the Dual Schooled ones need to be rediscovered from the Old Empire's ruins).

) When you say "the church," does this mean there is only one united faith?

There are many Faiths, however one Faith remains more powerful then all the others. This Organization is a loose reference to the Catholic Church in it's size and power (but nothing else). I haven't entirely thought out the Faiths of Jeral (I'm trying out names for the Campaign world...)

) You could always use gramarie prevalence to determine first, second, and third world nations.

A 1st world country would be at Doctorate level Principles, a 2nd world would be a level lower (Magisterial) and logically 3rd world countries would be barely have discovered Baccalaureate principles, however there are always exceptions to this. Perhaps you are from a 3rd world country, but are the first of your people to learn Magisterial Principles.

) So, how many races are you comfortable with having?

8 races and there subraces (but not environment counterparts like Desert Orc), one of which being Biostructural Chassi (or from now on simply referred to as "The Chassi"... Chassis for singular...)

Human, Orc, Elf, Dwarf, Gnome, Changeling, Halflings and Chassi.

) My idea for the Changeling/puppeteer/Doppelganger nation is that no one in-universe knows they control the nation.  They pretend to be nobility or elected officials and run the nation with a long view towards world domination, replacing visiting dignitaries and stuff like that.

That would be a conspiracy theory and would actually make for a nice attempt at rekindling the flames of War
Although, I don't like the idea of them ruling a nation, having them actually run an Evil Organization just sounds too cool to resist 

) Why can't a Necrocracy have advanced gramarie?  The barbaric Ogres, I get, but the centuries old undead?  Might even have one or two who date back to the empire...

I actually see your point here. The Necrocracy can indeed have advanced Gramarie, but most people from it are living people that use Undead for free labor with the higher ruling class actually being undead. So only the Nobility are Lichs, Vampires, Necropolitans, etc. But the Citizens are all living people.

) So, one nation (probably republican, maybe a theocracy) where your race means nothing, one nation where they are all one race, then nothing as extreme as either?  I feel like a one race nation would be part of the axis during the Great War.  Hm... The axis was the imperial coalition of the One Race Nation and their client states, they managed to take a few states before the Free Republic organized the allies, a coalition of 9 nations united against the ORN's expansion (including the Necrocracy? maybe a monster nation or two?), the allies were still no match for the axis so they turned to gramarie, soon after the ORN "acquired" gramarists of their own beginning an arms race, soon long-lost principles of gramarie were rediscovered and the war constantly escalated, the allies maintained a constant gramatic advantage yet were still at a military disadvantage, the allies set off the first sunmetal bomb since the fall of the ancient empire at the ORN's military headquarters, immediately after the ORN axis entered into peace talks with the allies, the ORN empire is dismantled and all formerly conquered nations are reestablished (in one form or another) while the ORN are forbidden from practicing gramarie, the client states are similarly punished (though most have severed all ties with the ORN), to enforce the peace treaty and a variety of other international laws the Federation of Nations is formed. 
Idea: The Resurrection ban is part of international law because resurection was one of the main reasons the ORN were able to maintain such military power; they resurected almost all killed soldiers, who were eager to rejoin the glorious conquest.

As stated before, I love that Idea I'm just going to make a note here and say that when I read setting off the Sunmetal Bomb at the ORN headquarters I get a vague feeling you are referencing something I know...

When I'm able to talk to you on Skype, I'd like to discuss the history of the world of Jeral with you and probably Sir since he wants in as well 

) Sunmetal bombs only leave fallout for 50 years, how are the old empire's sites still barren?

It's a mystery. Like the Mournlands in Eberron

) How does a silverout get a 7th or higher level spell in it?  Do they only exist as artifacts?

I'm going to make a reference to the Artificer's ability for Use Magic Device for the sake of Transformer and Item creation. I'm still torn on waiting for Kellus to make the Artifacts or to just make the relevant ones myself. Infinite power generators exist as Artifacts from the age of the old Empire, however.

) Spellcasters shouldn't be able to transfer their ebb pool straight to silverins, then.  Maybe their proto-ebbs?

Spellcasters can transfer their ebbs into SilverOuts to generate the effects of the spell inside of the Transformer.

6) Sounds good.

Wondrous

7) Doesn't really seem fair, no.  Also, if your goal is to not let gramarists get TONS of money, a restricion doesn't do that.  All a restriction does is make a black market where they can buy and sell principles at a highly inflated price.  You could just make low-level gramarists so common that one would hire a gramarist like they would hire a sage.  You said gramarie was being taught to the masses, right?

That is actually a good way to do it. You wouldn't hire a student to do an experts job ALL RIGHT! I got it now 

Depending on the level of technology in the Society, Gramarie fetches a price as detailed in the rules here, however all instances where the principles level (2 levels to be precise) is below your countries grade you cannot sell it. For Example: A Gramarist with access only to Baccalaureate principles cannot sell principles in a Society with Doctorate level principles.

In a Doctorate Setting, you can only sell Magisterial and up
In a Magisterial setting, you can sell Baccalaureate and up
in a Baccalaureate you can sell any type of Gramarie.

 

8) I know this is only tangental, but how does the ability to create demiplanes work if the planes are just planets?  Or is it that open portals to other planes exist in space, and their are no planeshift spells?

Demiplanes are treated as Space Stations (think Omega from the Mass Effect series). The Plane Shift spells is inert for this game since... WELL this is bad world building on my part, but I can't think of any reason to use it since I really don't want mass scale teleportation.

[sirpercival]

Can I play??

[Arcanist]

Can I play??

No, because your fat~ 

But seriously, yeah you can play as well if you want

[Omnicrat]

1) Feel free to number my post 

1) Yeah, as much as I enjoy DMing, I would rather play.  Besides, the current party only has 4 members, including me (new players wanted!:)) so me leaving the group would be bad all around.

2) You wouldn't have to retire as a player, we just DM different sections of the game at different times  If you really don't want to DM it's cool, I understand

) One of my players made a counter-point to that in our thread.  I'll repost it below:
I find the ban on resurrection magic plain bizarre, however. From what I can tell the logic is "I value (Substance That Eventually Expires). STEE expires on it's own, but other people can come and break STEE. Fixing STEE is illegal because it devalues STEE. Fixing STEE does not make STEE differ from its state before it was broken."
The original post was was the following url:  http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=14434056#post14434056

3) Actually in your explanation from below that is actually what I was imagining. They also used Resurrection magic to raise important officials that were assassinated and numerous soldiers were raised as Undead Soldiers, so by Resurrection magic, I mean anything that can make a Dead body animated again although the STEE example was actually very accurate to the disclosed reason why it is illegal.

Seeing that thread actually sent a shiver down my spine I had no idea that so many people would be interested in participating (4 is a large number too me...).

) Free non-intelligent chassis labor is illegal too, or only sentient chassis labor?  Most people would probably just use circuited chassi controlled by Nonstatic Instruction or a control point for complex stuff.

4) Any for of Chassis labor is illegal since potentially the "creature" has a chance at being sentient, for all purposes it is treated as if it were sentient. Most Sentient Chassis are old relics from the War (which explains why they are a playable race for this as long as they don't breach lvl adjustment 1). The Chassis are Immortal (or near Immortal) and thus spend most of their time like the Warforged. On a self-imposed journey of self-discovery.

) Once the players get to doctorate level, will we have restricted principles too, or can we argue we've discovered/been researching them and only now fully understand their use?

5) Yes, once the players attain 14th level they will be allowed to discover/research any Doctorate level Principles as normal. Hell, once Kellus makes 400-Theories those will be accessible too (when appropriate).

) That's about the timeframe I was expecting.

6) It's what I had in mind as well 

) What's the highest level gramarist?  Any specializations still lost?  Are there any more banned applications of principles?  What PrCs are available?

7) The highest level Gramarist was a man named Luthian Rosencroft, also known as The Surgeon of Death. Leveled at 15th level. You may use whatever Principle as you please (that have been discovered), you just have to be ready to face the consequences of your actions and all PrCs are available (the Dual Schooled ones need to be rediscovered from the Old Empire's ruins).

) When you say "the church," does this mean there is only one united faith?

8) There are many Faiths, however one Faith remains more powerful then all the others. This Organization is a loose reference to the Catholic Church in it's size and power (but nothing else). I haven't entirely thought out the Faiths of Jeral (I'm trying out names for the Campaign world...)

) You could always use gramarie prevalence to determine first, second, and third world nations.

9) A 1st world country would be at Doctorate level Principles, a 2nd world would be a level lower (Magisterial) and logically 3rd world countries would be barely have discovered Baccalaureate principles, however there are always exceptions to this. Perhaps you are from a 3rd world country, but are the first of your people to learn Magisterial Principles.

) So, how many races are you comfortable with having?

10) 8 races and there subraces (but not environment counterparts like Desert Orc), one of which being Biostructural Chassi (or from now on simply referred to as "The Chassi"... Chassis for singular...)

Human, Orc, Elf, Dwarf, Gnome, Changeling, Halflings and Chassi.

) My idea for the Changeling/puppeteer/Doppelganger nation is that no one in-universe knows they control the nation.  They pretend to be nobility or elected officials and run the nation with a long view towards world domination, replacing visiting dignitaries and stuff like that.

11) That would be a conspiracy theory and would actually make for a nice attempt at rekindling the flames of War
Although, I don't like the idea of them ruling a nation, having them actually run an Evil Organization just sounds too cool to resist 

) Why can't a Necrocracy have advanced gramarie?  The barbaric Ogres, I get, but the centuries old undead?  Might even have one or two who date back to the empire...

12) I actually see your point here. The Necrocracy can indeed have advanced Gramarie, but most people from it are living people that use Undead for free labor with the higher ruling class actually being undead. So only the Nobility are Lichs, Vampires, Necropolitans, etc. But the Citizens are all living people.

) So, one nation (probably republican, maybe a theocracy) where your race means nothing, one nation where they are all one race, then nothing as extreme as either?  I feel like a one race nation would be part of the axis during the Great War.  Hm... The axis was the imperial coalition of the One Race Nation and their client states, they managed to take a few states before the Free Republic organized the allies, a coalition of 9 nations united against the ORN's expansion (including the Necrocracy? maybe a monster nation or two?), the allies were still no match for the axis so they turned to gramarie, soon after the ORN "acquired" gramarists of their own beginning an arms race, soon long-lost principles of gramarie were rediscovered and the war constantly escalated, the allies maintained a constant gramatic advantage yet were still at a military disadvantage, the allies set off the first sunmetal bomb since the fall of the ancient empire at the ORN's military headquarters, immediately after the ORN axis entered into peace talks with the allies, the ORN empire is dismantled and all formerly conquered nations are reestablished (in one form or another) while the ORN are forbidden from practicing gramarie, the client states are similarly punished (though most have severed all ties with the ORN), to enforce the peace treaty and a variety of other international laws the Federation of Nations is formed. 
Idea: The Resurrection ban is part of international law because resurection was one of the main reasons the ORN were able to maintain such military power; they resurected almost all killed soldiers, who were eager to rejoin the glorious conquest.

13) As stated before, I love that Idea I'm just going to make a note here and say that when I read setting off the Sunmetal Bomb at the ORN headquarters I get a vague feeling you are referencing something I know...

When I'm able to talk to you on Skype, I'd like to discuss the history of the world of Jeral with you and probably Sir since he wants in as well 

) Sunmetal bombs only leave fallout for 50 years, how are the old empire's sites still barren?

14) It's a mystery. Like the Mournlands in Eberron

) How does a silverout get a 7th or higher level spell in it?  Do they only exist as artifacts?

15) I'm going to make a reference to the Artificer's ability for Use Magic Device for the sake of Transformer and Item creation. I'm still torn on waiting for Kellus to make the Artifacts or to just make the relevant ones myself. Infinite power generators exist as Artifacts from the age of the old Empire, however.

) Spellcasters shouldn't be able to transfer their ebb pool straight to silverins, then.  Maybe their proto-ebbs?

16) Spellcasters can transfer their ebbs into SilverOuts to generate the effects of the spell inside of the Transformer.

6) Sounds good.

17) Wondrous

7) Doesn't really seem fair, no.  Also, if your goal is to not let gramarists get TONS of money, a restricion doesn't do that.  All a restriction does is make a black market where they can buy and sell principles at a highly inflated price.  You could just make low-level gramarists so common that one would hire a gramarist like they would hire a sage.  You said gramarie was being taught to the masses, right?

18) That is actually a good way to do it. You wouldn't hire a student to do an experts job ALL RIGHT! I got it now 

Depending on the level of technology in the Society, Gramarie fetches a price as detailed in the rules here, however all instances where the principles level (2 levels to be precise) is below your countries grade you cannot sell it. For Example: A Gramarist with access only to Baccalaureate principles cannot sell principles in a Society with Doctorate level principles.

In a Doctorate Setting, you can only sell Magisterial and up
In a Magisterial setting, you can sell Baccalaureate and up
in a Baccalaureate you can sell any type of Gramarie.

 

8) I know this is only tangental, but how does the ability to create demiplanes work if the planes are just planets?  Or is it that open portals to other planes exist in space, and their are no planeshift spells?

19) Demiplanes are treated as Space Stations (think Omega from the Mass Effect series). The Plane Shift spells is inert for this game since... WELL this is bad world building on my part, but I can't think of any reason to use it since I really don't want mass scale teleportation.

Based on your post in the campaign thread on Gitp, have you gotten rid of the Necrocracy or do they have a patial exemption against using necromancy?  If they were on the side of the allies I could see a special exemption made for them.
1) Good to know!

2) I'm not sure how that would work,  best I remain just a player for now.

3) Based on your post in the campaign thread on Gitp and this, have you gotten rid of the Necrocracy or do they have a patial exemption against using necromancy?  If they were on the side of the allies I could see a special exemption made for them.

4) What about construct chassi with cockpits built by graughtsmen?  Those can never ever be sentient.

5) Hm... being the first to bring principles back to the world could be fun...

7a) What happened to him?  Did he design the sunmetal bomb or was he part of the axis?
7b) So, every nation only has one or two gramarists capable of preparing doctorate level principles?

8a) Is this the Silver Flame, modified to be even more racist and OTGy?
8b) You could make the gods unknown; people say these gods exist, but there is no communication with them, no interaction in the after life, nothing.  The only "god" with a real presence in the world could be the silver flame itself.  Maybe your silver flame thinks the "divine" power granted from other sources is actually provided by demons and/or devils to drive the faithful away from the true faith.

9) I would rather start in the republic, but where ever you start us is fine.

10a) Any way you'll add goblinoids?  I always like militaristic (not necessarily evil) goblinoid nations.
10b) How is Chassis one race?  Shouldn't it be a lot of different races?

11) Well, it would be an evil organization that took over a government or two.  At least as my idea.

12) Necrocracy hierarchy idea:  Lower class: low-hd undead (possibly mindless, at least common), middle class: living life.  they don't have a say in government, but live in service of the Necrotic Court in the hope that they will be made a mindful undead when they die/near the end of their life, upper-middle class: intellegent undead who run the day to day affairs of socioty.  Guard captains, city councilors, diplomats, meritocrats, ect., Ruleing class:  Powerful intelligent undead, many (some?) of which are ancient.  They run the necrocracy's long-term goals and make the major decisions for the nation.

13a) I know, I know.  Wrong war.  But it just made sense.
13b) I'm going on vacation till monday, so probably won't be able to communicate via skype till then.

14) Is it also radioactive radiomatic?

15) So, something like gramarists can use architecture and engineering checks to simulate spells?

16)  Ah.  That makes sense.  A neat thing would be to let spell casters be more efficient than a traditional silverout and let them use their typical ebb cost for spellcasting rather than the standard.

18) I don't think it should be against the law to sell, just common to the point of being virtually worthless.  something like 1/100 the normal price?  commoner labor, basically.  The other side of the coin is now its very easy for the party to purchase lower level gramarie, but thats really not that big of a problem.

19a) Planeshift spells don't work because its all one plane, just differant planets in that one plane.  Exceptions could be astral, ethereal, and shadow, but we could work those out later.
19b) Wait, if you don't want teleporting to be common, how are you dealing with portals?

[Arcanist]

Before I start here, I'm interested in adding Dragonmarks to this campaign as a character option. Would anyone have a particular problem for this?

Based on your post in the campaign thread on Gitp, have you gotten rid of the Necrocracy or do they have a patial exemption against using necromancy?  If they were on the side of the allies I could see a special exemption made for them.

The Necrocracy originally approached the Allied nation with the ability to animate an endless Army which allowed them to stay in the war as long as they did. In a way, because of them Gramarie is the way it is today. Most of them, however shun away from the world because, honestly, what can it offer them that they can't replace with Magic? (The Undead in this campaign aren't default evil) All they wish from the world is to be left alone (note: Not all Necropolitans share this ideal), which explains why they never signed the Treaty of Strovencait and never joined the Consortium of Nations. If they were to join the Consortium, however they might have to face reprehension for there very culture. When the Theocratic Republic joined the Consortium of Nation it was no surprise when there Ambassador made multiple request to subjugate the Necrocracy for "Crimes against Nature". Most of these request were of course denied as they cannot legally subjugate a non-anointed Nation for Crimes it is not bound too.

1) Good to know!

Lol quite...

2) I'm not sure how that would work,  best I remain just a player for now.

Quite right

3) Based on your post in the campaign thread on Gitp and this, have you gotten rid of the Necrocracy or do they have a patial exemption against using necromancy?  If they were on the side of the allies I could see a special exemption made for them.

I have not gotten rid of the Necrocracy, I just felt no need to mention them

4) What about construct chassi with cockpits built by graughtsmen?  Those can never ever be sentient.

Precisely, meaning that legal ownership of them is perfectly legal under the letter of the law

5) Hm... being the first to bring principles back to the world could be fun...

Mostly this world is to create in an environment with a base too it, instead of the idea that scares me the most. A blank world for a Gramarist, why this scares me is because you are effectively creating things for nothing to interact with  ... Such wasted potential...

7a) What happened to him?  Did he design the sunmetal bomb or was he part of the axis?

He introduced the idea that it was possible to grant full Sentience and allow a Chassis to reproduce as if it were a true creature. He offered the Republic an infinite supply of troops that could be adjusted and modified to endure the harshness of war, Soldiers that could be adjusted to different shapes and sizes pending the Mission, and at the rate the war was going have them maintain peak physical efficiency for years to come. Due to him and the Undead Soldiers created by the Necrocracy of Thanatos it allowed the Allied forces to push deep enough into Iggwilv to make them consider a ceasefire and the rest, is as they say, "history".

He is still alive and well despite living to the tender age of 112 (Carmot is now sold in pill form to those who can afford it). The woman who made the Sunmetal bomb was sadly put to death shortly after (it was a condition for the peace treaty). Laura Kurbillion, which explains why the act of channeling Puissance through a piece of Sunmetal to generate an explosion is called The Kurbillion Effect.

7b) So, every nation only has one or two gramarists capable of preparing doctorate level principles?

At least one. Whether that Gramarist uses his Gramarie for good is up to them.

8a) Is this the Silver Flame, modified to be even more racist and OTGy?

Hmm... This Silver Flame is more about Purifying the world as a whole and having everyone devote themselves to the Flame of Purity. They aren't evil per say, they are more... Well have you ever met a person on a street corner preaching the Gospel to you? Think of it as being around that guy every day; He means well, but he is going about it the wrong way... At first the Silver Flame preached kindness and understanding of others differences, but after the 1st Inquisition against Gramarie they became increasingly more overzealous... In public, you will meet more sane and reasonable ones, just remember that for every 5 sane ones you meet a crazy one is right around the corner.

8b) You could make the gods unknown; people say these gods exist, but there is no communication with them, no interaction in the after life, nothing.  The only "god" with a real presence in the world could be the silver flame itself.  Maybe your silver flame thinks the "divine" power granted from other sources is actually provided by demons and/or devils to drive the faithful away from the true faith.

Actually there are plenty of Cults that worship people (Yes, the Blood of Vol is in this campaign, in fact all the Eberron Religions are seeing as how I am allowing the players to worship ideals if they choose). To be fair, nobody really knows that a God or Goddess exist in this world since they generally don't interact with the world (it's called "Faith" for a reason). Also false idols are a major point for the Silver Flame. These Heretics worship and steal power that belongs to the Silver Flame and call it off as the gifts of another Deity or perhaps Demon Lord.

The point here is that nobody has absolute knowledge that these deities exist or know if anyone is actually answering their prayers, that is why they rely on Faith to see them through to the next day... I will note that placing a PlatinumInt in a Silver Flame church, while in the Theocratic Republic is considered a Crime and punishable by imprisonment or re-education (long story).

9) I would rather start in the republic, but where ever you start us is fine.

You can start wherever you want, you guys are adventurers. You travel the world creating wondrous inventions of Gramarie. As the plot demands you guys will meet up where ever... I will make note that this isn't a Gestalt game like the previous game since I hate Gestalt... It makes CR a nightmare for me

10a) Any way you'll add goblinoids?  I always like militaristic (not necessarily evil) goblinoid nations.

I've considered a Goblinoid nation, but scraped the idea because in my experience when my players encounter a Goblin they aren't so much as listening to what he says as they are planning for how the 1st round of combat will go

10b) How is Chassis one race?  Shouldn't it be a lot of different races?

In a way it is. More or less its the "Build your own race option"

11) Well, it would be an evil organization that took over a government or two.  At least as my idea.

The Evil Organization is a fine idea

12) Necrocracy hierarchy idea:  Lower class: low-hd undead (possibly mindless, at least common), middle class: living life.  they don't have a say in government, but live in service of the Necrotic Court in the hope that they will be made a mindful undead when they die/near the end of their life, upper-middle class: intellegent undead who run the day to day affairs of socioty.  Guard captains, city councilors, diplomats, meritocrats, ect., Ruleing class:  Powerful intelligent undead, many (some?) of which are ancient.  They run the necrocracy's long-term goals and make the major decisions for the nation.

Precisely how I imagined it myself 

13a) I know, I know.  Wrong war.  But it just made sense.

WELL I was actually referencing the Treaty of Coruscant from the Old Republic game

13b) I'm going on vacation till monday, so probably won't be able to communicate via skype till then.

Tragic... Have fun

14) Is it also radioactive radiomatic?

Yes it is. Constantly in fact. Dr. Kurbillion was working on creating a method for safely traveling through a Radiomantic field along with another Gramarist named Alfred McMullen who was interested in using a Lead Transformer outside of an Aircraft to swiftly travel along the lands of a constantly Radiomantic terrain (Like the Lost Grounds of Faelorian... Yes that is a reference to the name of the old campaigns name). This was researched and published after the war, but due to the ban on Sunmetal testing and nobody willing to sponsor it after the War the idea remained untested.

15) So, something like gramarists can use architecture and engineering checks to simulate spells?

Or a Use Magic Device check. I'll discuss it more freely another time.

16)  Ah.  That makes sense.  A neat thing would be to let spell casters be more efficient than a traditional silverout and let them use their typical ebb cost for spellcasting rather than the standard.

I'm not sure what you mean for "typical ebb cost". Do you mean the exact cost as detailed in the SilverOut?

18) I don't think it should be against the law to sell, just common to the point of being virtually worthless.  something like 1/100 the normal price?  commoner labor, basically.  The other side of the coin is now its very easy for the party to purchase lower level gramarie, but thats really not that big of a problem.

Alright that works actually I'll make that a formal rule in one of the reserve post after this.

19a) Planeshift spells don't work because its all one plane, just different planets in that one plane.  Exceptions could be astral, ethereal, and shadow, but we could work those out later.

YES! I love it! and Astral, Ethereal and Shadow are transitive planes meaning that they can be interacted with. In fact during the war it was common to use a Shadow Walk spell to transport Assassins across boarders into the right position to assassinate a subject, because of this a lot of Wealthy Houses have an array of Filters (all up to Magisterial) planted around their houses location on the Plane of Shadow.

19b) Wait, if you don't want teleporting to be common, how are you dealing with portals?

Folding space to lead to another destination, isn't magical teleportation... IT'S SCIENCE!

[sirpercival]

I like dragonmarks, so go for it.

Now, there are a lot of back/forths here that are wallotexting me.  What specific areas of the OP would you like comments on/ideas for?

[Arcanist]

I like dragonmarks, so go for it.

Now, there are a lot of back/forths here that are wallotexting me.  What specific areas of the OP would you like comments on/ideas for?

I mostly need help generating a world map for everyone to access and use freely. The problem I keep coming across is the use of Geoccultism Biomes being used to change the terrain of an entire area at the drop of a hat. For example a Biome made of desert being changed into a rain forest, then into a tundra, then into ocean and then back into a desert would be fairly noticeable effects on the map. so I'd like some help creating a skeleton for the map (and maybe some national boarders for each country)

Most important of all, I (or someone else) needs to keep track of the World History that I release since I am more or less making this up as I go along (going in from heavy references to Eberron, Dark Sun, FR and the time of WW1 and the slow approach of WW2 to things merely made up on the spot in an attempt to add more depth to the campaign) and I'd like for it to be a little bit more organized then that. Sir, would you be cool if I shared a Google Doc with you and you wrote out the history that could be easily referenced? I don't want to push to much work on you so I'll just make a list of task that I'll need to be done (this can be taken up by anyone and are not to be strictly assigned to anyone, I don't want one person working on all of these unless they're me).

• Easy to adjust map of the world of Jeral. It is roughly the shape and size of Earth as a reference point with two continental masses. A Large western nation that has several naturally created mountains around the eastern coast, a small desert in the southern section, and the north to be cold as a winter in the East Coast of North America. the western nation should be roughly the size and mass of a combination the United States and Mexico with Australia the Western Continent is a highly industrialized nation with most of it's cities being on it's Western Coast (mostly Platinum Biomes, 70:30) away from the mountains with several cities spread through out (imagine a reverse china) . The Eastern Continent are much more old and decrepit. They are filled almost entirely with Cities (not all of them Platinum Biomes, 30:70) and ruins of old cultures. More or less the Eastern Continent is Eurasia and the African continent, these Continents are separated by a small Ocean (more like a river on a map to be more precise) allowing for travel between these two continents fairly quick without the use of Yggdratecture.
• Catalog everything stated and released on both MMB (this thread) and Gtitp (11th page and beyond) to create a complete history of events as they are developed.
• Adjustments for Houses (Altered names) (yes, they have them because of the Dragonmarks being implemented).
• A 9 Planetary system (Similar to our Solar System) with Eldritch creatures inhabiting those sections of our universe
• Giving the Casters a PP system (Erudite (Unique Spells/day) and PP (Psion) for Prepared caster, Psion (powers known) and PP (Wilder) for Spontaneous caster) that advances along the Psy Warrior progression (only going up to 6th level)
• Complete Dual specialization prestige classes for each possible variation as they are significant to the Lost Grounds of Faelorian (Old Empire).
• Develop Blueprints for basic things like cars, lightbulbs, snowplows, airplanes, guns, trafic lights, etc. (anything that you might see looking out a window in a suburban area and your room, assume you only have access to Magisterial Principles and under)
• A random city generator would be absolutely lovely
• 2 Tylenol (or 1 Alieve) 

[sirpercival]

I mostly need help generating a world map for everyone to access and use freely. The problem I keep coming across is the use of Geoccultism Biomes being used to change the terrain of an entire area at the drop of a hat. For example a Biome made of desert being changed into a rain forest, then into a tundra, then into ocean and then back into a desert would be fairly noticeable effects on the map. so I'd like some help creating a skeleton for the map (and maybe some national boarders for each country)

This is going to be a problem.  I don't use mapmaking tools... I can't help much there, sorry

Sir, would you be cool if I shared a Google Doc with you and you wrote out the history that could be easily referenced? I don't want to push to much work on you so I'll just make a list of task that I'll need to be done (this can be taken up by anyone and are not to be strictly assigned to anyone, I don't want one person working on all of these unless they're me).

Go for it!

Catalog everything stated and released on both MMB (this thread) and Gtitp (11th page and beyond) to create a complete history of events as they are developed.

I'm not great at things like this -- I'm better at brainstorming and coming up with stories for things.  And names.

Adjustments for Houses (Altered names) (yes, they have them because of the Dragonmarks being implemented).

Hmm... what if we take the skeleton of dragonmarks and come up with new houses & marks?  We can leave them as SLAs because Gramarist already has one (EB), so it's built into the system already.

A 9 Planetary system (Similar to our Solar System) with Eldritch creatures inhabiting those sections of our universe

How did you know I was an astrophysicist?  (Seriously, lol.)  I can do this one.

Giving the Casters a PP system (Erudite (Unique Spells/day) and PP (Psion) for Prepared caster, Psion (powers known) and PP (Wilder) for Spontaneous caster) that advances along the Psy Warrior progression (only going up to 6th level)

I have a better idea: scrap vancian or pp or spell point or whatever casting completely.  The only types of magic are Gramarie and SLAs, so we keep invoking classes and replace spellcasting classes with invokers and factotum variants.  I have a few invokers already, and we can write some more if we need them.  (The only exception will be gramarie prcs which grant their own spellcasting, like the Dreamason). That way we (a) don't have to worry as much about silverOut abuse, and it ties Dragonmarks in more significantly -- anyone can have magic.

Complete Dual specialization prestige classes for each possible variation as they are significant to the Lost Grounds of Faelorian (Old Empire).

This could change based on my suggestion above.

Develop Blueprints for basic things like cars, lightbulbs, snowplows, airplanes, guns, trafic lights, etc. (anything that you might see looking out a window in a suburban area and your room, assume you only have access to Magisterial Principles and under)

Oh, I can do this!  Give me a list of blueprints to make, and I'll work them out.

A random city generator would be absolutely lovely

What kinds of things would you like it to generate?

2 Tylenol (or 1 Alieve) 

That emoticon there might be part of the problem... 

I'd also suggest that you request a board in the "Campaign Settings & World Building" subforum, to give you more room to work things out, and homebrew up whatever you/I like. 

[Arcanist]

This is going to be a problem.  I don't use mapmaking tools... I can't help much there, sorry

Tis cool, I obtained one. It's not quite as evolving, but it certainly has a detail of it. I did think of a special trick the Cartographers could use to rule for Biomes interacting with a terrain.

The Cartographer simply constantly keeps note of the Biome in question and on the map attaches a date for when the Biome was established for when it is set to expire. This is magitech, we can have maps that are constantly updated to this point (if the Biomes duration is extended that is). Platinum Biomes are special in that it is assumed that they will endure for as long as there is a Gramarist to increase the density of the objects being fed into the Biome.

Go for it!

Excellent PM your email so I can grant you access (and send you SOOO MUCH PRONZ~)

I'm not great at things like this -- I'm better at brainstorming and coming up with stories for things.  And names.

Ah, an idea man! (I need those) especially ones that can offer constructive criticism to pre-existing material

I can record everything I say from these threads on my tablet

Hmm... what if we take the skeleton of dragonmarks and come up with new houses & marks?  We can leave them as SLAs because Gramarist already has one (EB), so it's built into the system already.

That would be fine. Homebrewing an entirely new series of Dragonmarks sounds... exciting 

How did you know I was an astrophysicist?  (Seriously, lol.)  I can do this one.

... I didn't... It was a happy accident

I have a better idea: scrap vancian or pp or spell point or whatever casting completely.  The only types of magic are Gramarie and SLAs, so we keep invoking classes and replace spellcasting classes with invokers and factotum variants.  I have a few invokers already, and we can write some more if we need them.  (The only exception will be gramarie prcs which grant their own spellcasting, like the Dreamason). That way we (a) don't have to worry as much about silverOut abuse, and it ties Dragonmarks in more significantly -- anyone can have magic.

AUGH! LIKE! LIKE!!!!11!!!

I heard Kellus was planning to do something with the Gramarist that granted them Invocations. I loved that idea because it made the world MUCH more interactive. Creating a world is only half the fun of being a Gramarist (the other one is interacting with it which includes fighting monsters, adventuring and solving problems.) I must admit that I am torn as to what list of Invocations the Gramarist (Least, Lesser, Greater, Revolutionary) would obtain... Would you have a problem making something up? Kellus' original idea was using spells that could be used for construction as a basis... Hope that helps

Oh, I can do this!  Give me a list of blueprints to make, and I'll work them out.

As I said before, anything you can see outside of your house (assuming you are living in a suburban area) and anything that you often use around your house that can't be easily replicated by a mundane equipment found in D&D

What kinds of things would you like it to generate?

Non-Magic shops, housing, streets, etc.

I'd also suggest that you request a board in the "Campaign Settings & World Building" subforum, to give you more room to work things out, and homebrew up whatever you/I like.

I have to many ideas in my head at the moment and getting them out so that they sound coherent is the hardest part of setting all this  up

I'll post up on that subforum when I have a completed setting, not necessarily the history of the world, but the major crunch of it all.

... I'm still trying to get used to the lay out of messages on MMB 

[sirpercival]

This is going to be a problem.  I don't use mapmaking tools... I can't help much there, sorry

Tis cool, I obtained one. It's not quite as evolving, but it certainly has a detail of it. I did think of a special trick the Cartographers could use to rule for Biomes interacting with a terrain.

The Cartographer simply constantly keeps note of the Biome in question and on the map attaches a date for when the Biome was established for when it is set to expire. This is magitech, we can have maps that are constantly updated to this point (if the Biomes duration is extended that is). Platinum Biomes are special in that it is assumed that they will endure for as long as there is a Gramarist to increase the density of the objects being fed into the Biome.

Go for it!

Excellent PM your email so I can grant you access (and send you SOOO MUCH PRONZ~)

I'm not great at things like this -- I'm better at brainstorming and coming up with stories for things.  And names.

Ah, an idea man! (I need those) especially ones that can offer constructive criticism to pre-existing material

I can record everything I say from these threads on my tablet

Hmm... what if we take the skeleton of dragonmarks and come up with new houses & marks?  We can leave them as SLAs because Gramarist already has one (EB), so it's built into the system already.

That would be fine. Homebrewing an entirely new series of Dragonmarks sounds... exciting 

How did you know I was an astrophysicist?  (Seriously, lol.)  I can do this one.

... I didn't... It was a happy accident

I have a better idea: scrap vancian or pp or spell point or whatever casting completely.  The only types of magic are Gramarie and SLAs, so we keep invoking classes and replace spellcasting classes with invokers and factotum variants.  I have a few invokers already, and we can write some more if we need them.  (The only exception will be gramarie prcs which grant their own spellcasting, like the Dreamason). That way we (a) don't have to worry as much about silverOut abuse, and it ties Dragonmarks in more significantly -- anyone can have magic.

AUGH! LIKE! LIKE!!!!11!!!

I heard Kellus was planning to do something with the Gramarist that granted them Invocations. I loved that idea because it made the world MUCH more interactive. Creating a world is only half the fun of being a Gramarist (the other one is interacting with it which includes fighting monsters, adventuring and solving problems.) I must admit that I am torn as to what list of Invocations the Gramarist (Least, Lesser, Greater, Revolutionary) would obtain... Would you have a problem making something up? Kellus' original idea was using spells that could be used for construction as a basis... Hope that helps

Oh, I can do this!  Give me a list of blueprints to make, and I'll work them out.

As I said before, anything you can see outside of your house (assuming you are living in a suburban area) and anything that you often use around your house that can't be easily replicated by a mundane equipment found in D&D

What kinds of things would you like it to generate?

Non-Magic shops, housing, streets, etc.

I'd also suggest that you request a board in the "Campaign Settings & World Building" subforum, to give you more room to work things out, and homebrew up whatever you/I like.

I have to many ideas in my head at the moment and getting them out so that they sound coherent is the hardest part of setting all this  up

I'll post up on that subforum when I have a completed setting, not necessarily the history of the world, but the major crunch of it all.

... I'm still trying to get used to the lay out of messages on MMB 

Fixed your tags -- you need to include a / in the closing tag, or it starts a new quote.  I'll respond in the next one.

[sirpercival]

This is going to be a problem.  I don't use mapmaking tools... I can't help much there, sorry

Tis cool, I obtained one. It's not quite as evolving, but it certainly has a detail of it. I did think of a special trick the Cartographers could use to rule for Biomes interacting with a terrain.

The Cartographer simply constantly keeps note of the Biome in question and on the map attaches a date for when the Biome was established for when it is set to expire. This is magitech, we can have maps that are constantly updated to this point (if the Biomes duration is extended that is). Platinum Biomes are special in that it is assumed that they will endure for as long as there is a Gramarist to increase the density of the objects being fed into the Biome.

That's pretty cool, I like it!

Go for it!

Excellent PM your email so I can grant you access (and send you SOOO MUCH PRONZ~)

It's actually on my profile.

I'm not great at things like this -- I'm better at brainstorming and coming up with stories for things.  And names.

Ah, an idea man! (I need those) especially ones that can offer constructive criticism to pre-existing material

I can record everything I say from these threads on my tablet

Rock on.

Hmm... what if we take the skeleton of dragonmarks and come up with new houses & marks?  We can leave them as SLAs because Gramarist already has one (EB), so it's built into the system already.

That would be fine. Homebrewing an entirely new series of Dragonmarks sounds... exciting 

Well then let's do that.  We could make affiliations for them too, I have some practice writing those for my High Arcana campaign.

How did you know I was an astrophysicist?  (Seriously, lol.)  I can do this one.

... I didn't... It was a happy accident

Lol.  I figured.  I can construct a solar system for you.    Do note, though, that with ELDK spaceships, migration habitats, and biomes, colonization of the rest of the solar system is likely.  We'd have to figure out a communication system for the planets, though it might be as simple as a silverOut of Sending, or as slow as inter-system messenger drones.

I have a better idea: scrap vancian or pp or spell point or whatever casting completely.  The only types of magic are Gramarie and SLAs, so we keep invoking classes and replace spellcasting classes with invokers and factotum variants.  I have a few invokers already, and we can write some more if we need them.  (The only exception will be gramarie prcs which grant their own spellcasting, like the Dreamason). That way we (a) don't have to worry as much about silverOut abuse, and it ties Dragonmarks in more significantly -- anyone can have magic.

AUGH! LIKE! LIKE!!!!11!!!

I heard Kellus was planning to do something with the Gramarist that granted them Invocations. I loved that idea because it made the world MUCH more interactive. Creating a world is only half the fun of being a Gramarist (the other one is interacting with it which includes fighting monsters, adventuring and solving problems.) I must admit that I am torn as to what list of Invocations the Gramarist (Least, Lesser, Greater, Revolutionary) would obtain... Would you have a problem making something up? Kellus' original idea was using spells that could be used for construction as a basis... Hope that helps

Well, I dunno.  If Kellus wants to add invocations to the Gramarist, he's welcome to do so -- I don't really want to mess with it.  I was talking about the characters that aren't gramarists.  I have a few invokers, Garryl as a few more, etc.  We should probably come up with a consistent set of base classes for the setting, including invokers and non-invokers, as well as expanding on the Dragonmark mechanics... maybe an invoking class derives directly from power of Dragonmarks?  I dunno, just spitballing here.

Oh, I can do this!  Give me a list of blueprints to make, and I'll work them out.

As I said before, anything you can see outside of your house (assuming you are living in a suburban area) and anything that you often use around your house that can't be easily replicated by a mundane equipment found in D&D

Gotcha.  I was thinking that once you request a forum for this setting, I could make a blueprints thread.

What kinds of things would you like it to generate?

Non-Magic shops, housing, streets, etc.

Gotcha.  How about this and/or this?

I'd also suggest that you request a board in the "Campaign Settings & World Building" subforum, to give you more room to work things out, and homebrew up whatever you/I like.

I have to many ideas in my head at the moment and getting them out so that they sound coherent is the hardest part of setting all this  up

I'll post up on that subforum when I have a completed setting, not necessarily the history of the world, but the major crunch of it all.

... I'm still trying to get used to the lay out of messages on MMB 

No, that's not the point of the subforum -- the point is to be able to make a bunch of threads dedicated to different aspects, so you can have focused discussion, rather than having everything all on one thread and getting multiple conversations going at once.   

[Arcanist]

That's pretty cool, I like it!

Excellent.

Blueprint: Geoccultism Omni-Map
Principles Necessary: HEUR 101, HEUR 266, YGGD 101, YGGD 241, IMCH 101, IMCH 295
Prestige Classes: Dreamason [Rabbit Hole] & Transcholar [Dual Specialization]
Explaination: A Cartographer's job in the world of Gramaire is never finished. How could it? In a world where you have men and women performing acts that can very well change an entire layout of a map in mere hours, any map's worth can easily become short lived... So the GEO (Global Environment Organization) developed a unique tool that allows for a traveler to safely travel the world unopposed by work of Biomes that seemingly crop up over night.

• The first part of this map is getting a frame. Most Omni-maps come in the form of maps. The Gramarist creating this first needs to designate two Semi-Spaces that are then connected to each other resulting in a portal to a location that is too small to travel through.
• Then you travel to the designated location and set up an illusion of an object (a blade of grass is fine) and set it to adapt to it's environment and then link that illusion back to the map and connect to to that section of the map causing it to project an image of whatever the object is (for example, grassland would have a blade of grass and snowland would be... snow... >_>)
• Upon opening the map, it details the environment of the map for the selected location.

Not exactly a perfect method, but overall, it gets the job done

It's actually on my profile.

To quote C3PO: "WONDERFUL!"

Rock on.

INDEED

Well then let's do that.  We could make affiliations for them too, I have some practice writing those for my High Arcana campaign.

Alrighty then, how do I request a Subforum? or do I just make one?

Lol.  I figured.  I can construct a solar system for you.    Do note, though, that with ELDK spaceships, migration habitats, and biomes, colonization of the rest of the solar system is likely.  We'd have to figure out a communication system for the planets, though it might be as simple as a silverOut of Sending, or as slow as inter-system messenger drones.

I was thinking of using ARCD Satellites that are powered by the Sun (a golden transformer) and a few rocks. Even with Magisterial Principles alone, you can create a Spacefaring Empire, with potentially infinite power I've well thought out and planned for Interplanetary interaction If I may add, instead of Pseudonatural abominations, from beyond the Stars can we have it so that they are extra races that we can't exactly fit in (like Goblins and Mindflayers and Demons and Devils and Angels and anything else you can think of that just "doesn't make sense interacting with Humanoids") I don't want any of these creatures (excluding Demons and Devils) to exhibit there normal (KILL THE PC) tendencies. For all purposes assume that a creature is True Neutral unless it has an Alignment subtype. Make one planet where Demons and Devils interact and are effectively two warring sides of the same planet (and that is the blood wars ladies and gentlemen!) and have Mindflayer's and other inhabitants of the Far Realm and Astral Plane live on the rings of a Saturn like planet (Yes, I am starting to drool...) UGH! This is just soooo awesome! Countless ideas! Endless possibilities! SCIENCE!

Well, I dunno.  If Kellus wants to add invocations to the Gramarist, he's welcome to do so -- I don't really want to mess with it.  I was talking about the characters that aren't gramarists.  I have a few invokers, Garryl as a few more, etc.  We should probably come up with a consistent set of base classes for the setting, including invokers and non-invokers, as well as expanding on the Dragonmark mechanics... maybe an invoking class derives directly from power of Dragonmarks?  I dunno, just spitballing here.

Well on the world of Jeral there is a special effect created by it's Two Moons. The effects that allow certain subjects to exhibit certain abilities such as the ability to read minds or move things with their minds (Psionics) or creates a Tattoo like symbol to appear along the body of a subject that allows them the use of certain mystical abilities (I basically described the Crystal Moon and the Moons of Eberron using just 2 moons... AND I DIDN'T EVEN REFERENCE DRAGONMARKS ONCE!)

Regardless, I believe that these in addition to Invocations will make for a mega performance in the campaign.

Gotcha.  I was thinking that once you request a forum for this setting, I could make a blueprints thread.

Now where would I do that again?

Gotcha.  How aboutthis and/or this?

Perfection, thy name is Sirpercival

No, that's not the point of the subforum -- the point is to be able to make a bunch of threads dedicated to different aspects, so you can have focused discussion, rather than having everything all on one thread and getting multiple conversations going at once.   

I wonder if I can get in contact with Kellus for this (He's been AFK for a while for the Holidays). I'd really rather not step on any toes here