Marth Ice World Revision

[knight of frost]

I've been telling myself that I will revise my Marth Ice World Setting, but I keep putting it off.

After GaspCon7, I plan to cut down on my forum postings (these things are addictive) and focus on my setting more.  (I will still be doing the Play By Posts, so don't worry PBP players).

If there is constructive, or harsh criticism out there, I would like to hear it.

Or if you have an idea that you think would be cool to incorporate into the setting, feel free to shout it out.

I think I am going to change the color scheme as well, as some have complained that the red links are too dark.

Here is the link:

http://marth.bravehost.com

Let me know what you think.

[Sam T]

I really enjoyed Marth when you ran it the last time ... 

I think the world is great ,,,  lots of detail ,,  even the cities and the character in the cities .... 

i do not see other adds  then addition points of interest  for characters to explore ...

[knight of frost]

Glad you enjoyed it when I ran it.  I will probably run it again, but for now, I want to add more detail, and correct all of my spelling errors, hehe. 

[Baron Von Harper]

I've been thinking about a concept for my Marth setting and I figured I would run it past you guys first.

The idea is about the Gods of Marth.

The original Marth pantheon of Gods is dead.  The setting is one that has a lack of any divinity, which is part of the thing that makes it unique I think.

What I was wondering is do you think I should introduce new Gods to the setting?  If I do, I might do it as a DM option so they can play without the Gods as it was originally designed, or with new Gods showing up recently. 

The idea I had was that their is a power vacuum and that other Pantheons in the universe have taken notice of the frozen world and the hopeless cries, especially those pantheons that like cold.

Instead of having just one pantheon take an interest however, the idea came to me that there would be 2 new pantheons of Gods wanting to take control of the world.

Here is what I have so far, looking through Frost & Fur, and Frostburn, for ideas.  It's a basic outline so far.


New Marth Pantheon #1
---------------------
CG - Chaos, Cold, Good, Luck, Magic
NG - Fire, Good, Strength, Sun, War
N - Animal, Earth, Knowledge, Healing, Plant
N - Luck, Travel, Trickery, War, Winter
CN - Air, Cold, Chaos, Trickery, Weather
LN - Death, Law, Protection, Water, Winter
NE - Cold, Evil, Darkness, Destruction, War


New Marth Pantheon #2 (notice only 1 good deity)
---------------------
LN - Fire, Law, Protection, War, Winter
NE - Air, Cold, Evil, Water, Weather
NG - Animal, Good, Healing, Knowledge, Winter
CE - Chaos, Cold, Death, Destruction, War
LE - Cold, Darkness, Evil, Winter, Trickery
CN - Air, Chaos, Magic, Travel, Winter
CE - Chaos, Cold, Earth, Evil, Strength, War
LN - Animal, Law, Protection, Strength, Water
CN - Air, Animal, Chaos, Destruction, Luck

Cold and Winter are found in Frostburn.
Weather and Darkness are found in Deities and Demigods.

[TheAce419]

I read the marth site a couple of times.
I like all the races and sub races, all but the humans.
Just have one.

[Baron Von Harper]

I think if I would totally redo the setting I would not even include humans.

I might just have to do that some day.

Thanks for the suggestion.

[DaBard]

I always toyed with the idea of living gods in my world creations and it might fit well into Marth. In a world devoid of gods mortals my fill the gap. If a mortal was able to reach certain power levels he/she may be considered a god and be worshiped as one. You might have to work out the logistics of how such a mortal would transfer its powers to his followers. One idea I had was to allow these mortal gods to transfer power to other but at a risk to themselves. They would in sense lend some of their strength others. Until the god withdrew those power they would be that much weaker and thus open to attack from other mortal gods or even the mortals themselves. I never flushed the idea completely out but if you like it feel free to run with it.

-Dan

[Baron Von Harper]

I've thought about cults worshiping dragons and other powerful monsters, but I never really fleshed it out all that well.

I also thought about making false religions with no Gods to back any of it up, but still be a powerful social organization.

Mortal Gods is interesting, not something I had thought of.  But I guess old D&D sometimes brought up ideas of killing Gods and becoming one yourself, which is similar.

Thanks.

[TheAce419]

Honestly what else besides dragons could be worshiped?

Forgot to mention this earlier but i'm a really big fan of your dwarf sub races. &Wolfen
I would love to play another marth game, only played one  and i was the Yetti

I dont really understand the complete story, all i know are gods are dead and you have to kill everything twice?

I looked at your feats page.....wow thats alot, maybe put that information into a table format?

ok so your house rules
LOVE extra skill points, good idea
you must have added the 2d10 after i played or something but, haven't seen or used it so cant really make an opinion on that, it sounds good


thats all i got hope it helps

[Yoodle]

Mortal Gods is interesting, not something I had thought of. But I guess old D&D sometimes brought up ideas of killing Gods and becoming one yourself, which is similar.

I was thinking something along those lines too.  It would be kinda cool to run a campaign starting at first level and ending up where the characters eventually become the Gods of the Marth Pantheon.  That way the players will develop the personalities of the pantheon as they progress.  Tough part would be actually keeping a party together for that long.  Plus, you would probably need a half evil, half good party to round things out for the pantheon.  It might be tough to find motivations for both sides for a campaign that long.  Might be fun to try though!

[Baron Von Harper]

I dont really understand the complete story, all i know are gods are dead and you have to kill everything twice?

Well I tried to write it so that there are several theories why things are why they are.  Some blame a wizard war that happened before the perpetual winter, and others blame the death of the gods for how things are.  There are still some hold outs that believe that maybe some of the gods are just sleeping, but many believe now that they are no more.  Behind the scenes, I always thought both the war and the deaths of gods were causes of the perpetual winter. 

The main idea of humanoids (things with souls) needing to be killed, and then destroyed when they rise up as Undead came from the idea that the God of Death (Mwerkef) is in fact no more.  The "laws of death" were broken, and simply put there is no afterlife anymore.  Bodies rise up of their own free will, and souls wander the barren snow fields waiting for the world to end.  That is why I put the line, "Even death does not free you from the cold" as spirits wander the ice and snow bereft of bodily form.

In one campaign I had the party resurrect Mwerkef the God of Death and that stopped the need to kill everything twice.

Another thing I thought was cool, is that all of the bodies of the Gods fell from the skies and are buried somewhere on Marth.  So the possibility of stumbling on the body of a dead God was always there, and I did that a few times.   

I looked at your feats page.....wow thats alot, maybe put that information into a table format?

Yeah I got carried away with feats... never again.  Many were broken beyond belief.  I've thought of scrapping them all, but I figure I better just leave them up there.


Having player characters turning out to be the next pantheon might be an interesting thing, but your right it would be tough, especially since I hate high level games... hehe.


Any thoughts on the 2 rival pantheon idea?  Is it good, bad, just okay?

[Random]

Two rival pantheons is one approach that works (I've seen it done before in campaigns), but have you considered three?  With three you'll have two ganging up on the third, then switching alliances again with each other.  You can get more dynamic diety interplay going that way and more opportunities to pull the characters and the world into their little conflict.

Or maybe gods from one pantheon are still recruiting new gods and new god-mortals?  Or better yet, recruiting from each other's pantheons (wait, did the God of Destruction just defect?)

[Baron Von Harper]

I thought about 3 pantheons, but figured it was too much work. 

I also thought maybe some of them would resurrect some of the old Gods to their cause, but then again, maybe they don't want to share the power.

Actually with 2 new pantheons, there would be 3 pantheons.  Those that don't want to anger the old gods would worship them, and the 2 upstart religions.

I guess I'm just not sure if I want to bring divinity back to Marth or not.  But maybe if I did, Marth might not be as grim, as some new Gods would bring some hope.

[Sam T]

i really enjoy the no gods in the campaign it made it easier and darker ...  and killing twice was nice ....  if anything to bring gods in ....  I would plane shift some lessor gods out of another plane to Marth ....   

think of as the greek Norce gods....when they throw Loki out of there kingdom...  he land in Marth...  with no gods to stop Loki he could quickly take over the world ....

or a greyhawk lessor god goes walking 1 day thru the planes and lands in Marth....   or a series of gods walk thru marth over time ......

i always thought with the complete vacuum of gods ...  something or someome would fill the job ...

[Baron Von Harper]

It might be best to introduce new gods as a campaign starts, and have them roleplay through the changes in the setting.  I know I enjoyed Dan's campaign, when I introduced the old Dwarven (Norse) Gods to new people.

Maybe that would be the start of the campaign, either meeting, or have all of the party members start having dreams.  Perhaps they don't have much power at all until people start worshiping them.

I'm with you Sam, I always kind of figured that something would rise to fill the vacuum, I just wasn't sure what.

Thanks for all the suggestions.