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[Darvi]

Sorry, no applicable domain D:

However, there is a Darkness domain.


However I heard that there is a book dealing with sexual stuff. You could find something in there.

[Vorthon]

I've heard of it, too. Tvtropes, again.

Also, the Darkness domain is in the SRD, so I've got that. Do you happen to have the Forgottens Realms campaign setting book? I managed to get my hands the Races of the Dragon splatbook a while ago, and in the appendix listing draconic deities, it mention that the domains in [] were detailed in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting sourcebook. Some of those seem like they'd be useful.

[Gorjo MacGrymm]

Kudo's to ya with al the unique races and Dieties.  I have alays been a fan of doing that.  I no longer use the words elf or dwarf in anygame I run.  They are to used up and overly defined to me, to the point they are silly (except DF Dorfs a'course!).  Major warning about doing this tho:  Somehow you have to make the players care.  You might keep saying "Dalor, its called a Dalor" and they will respond with "oh, the gnome thingy?" or you will say "Felins, call them felins" and they will say "what, taht cat-dude?".  Trust me.  Its hard to get them to care.  Gods can be even worse.  Suggestion, if you havent, read DM of the Rings.  link-> http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=612  .  If you are aware of this allready and Im spiining my wheels, sorry, carry on.

I would love to get into a discussion about new races and the ideas behind them.  Any takers?

[Sowelu]

I've found that your average player has room for about one extra race and zero extra gods in their head.  Not counting antagonist deities, of course.  Note that this is 'average' player, but still.  And they've got to fit a new niche, or they won't bother caring at all.  "Rat-people that basically only live in the slums" is one I used, because it added a little bit of unique flavor that was memorable enough while not annoying the players by making them interact with them all the time.  If something is memorable without being "Oh, that's the GM's pet race", then you've done a pretty good job.

[Gorjo MacGrymm]

LOL, i am starting a new game tomorrow with some new players, and I was gonna use something right along the lines of

"Rat-people that basically only live in the slums"

as my starting adventure arc.  Awesome.  Course, they were gonna be were-rats, not a DM pet race, but no one was gonna know that of course.  Now I feel a need to get more creative.  I shouldn't, I came up with the were-rat ideas on my own freely, but, now I feel like a copycat.  Aaargh!   

[GlyphGryph]

My world has quite a few new races, and while some players don't care, some do, and that's all you really need for it to matter.

The biggest problems I've seen is that hosts create races that bring nothing new to the table and expect players to embrace them. Why should they bother?

The custom races I use in Dark Tides are:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Tybral (the most popular) - picture a combination between a gorrilla and an armadillo. The Tybral use to be the nobility of a continent spanning empire, hundreds of years ago before the Upheavel. The Tybral were not popular among their subjects, and since the collapse of the empire they are generally run out of towns, have settlements of any significant size forceable broken up, scorned, insulted, and jailed or even killed at the slightest provocation. Those Tybral who still retained some honour and pride soon found themselves removed from the equation, and those that survive do so by staying quite, laying low, and simply trying to be productive members of society.

Saarpen - If a naga could be considered a human crossed with a python, a Saarpen would be a halfling crossed with a viper. Agile, quick, and with a powerful venom, they are also weak, abrasive, and have a fairly twisted sense of humour. They get along well with other Saarpen, and have a tendency to litter the slums of larger cities engaged in various manners of illegal activity. They tend to be strongly individualistic and have a general contempt for authority, but they are also capable of being quite discrete and subtle about the ways they will show it. While a bit dimmer than most of the other races, and not inclined in the slightest towards book learning, they are quite smart when it comes to matters of figuring out how to get ahead in whatever organization they find themselves.

Chrantlar - picture a combination between a praying mantis, a moth, and a millipede, and you've got a good idea of these guys. They generally keep to themselves, are fairly hard workers but averse to large numbers of their own people, which make them feel uncomfortable. Renowned for their rather vicious tempers, though their agility, dexterity, resistance to injury and amazing work ethic make them sought after laborers wherever they roam, and capable adventurers as well.

Hursk - distant relatives of the Chrantlar, beyond certain similarities in appearance, they are not much alike. More beetlelike than their siblings, Hrusk are incredibly social creatures, whether in their own sizeable societies or with other races. They have a natural gift for languages. As children they have the ability to fly (something they lose as they increase in size). They are not terribly quick or agile, but their thick exoskeleton and fur give them a natural resistance to damage. They make good administrators and organizers, and are generally well liked - they have a reputation for spreading rumours and being terrible at keeping secrets.

[Lord Shonus]

For extensive homebrew help, I'd suggest the Giant in the Playground (home of Order of the Stick comic) forums. That's pretty much the biggest collection of 3.xx junkies left.

[Vorthon]

Basically, the party is approached by a wizard (A very old and somewhat famous wizard, at that), and he wants to hire them to retrieve an artifact from some ruins at the other end of the continent. Ruins that the exact location of is the focus of speculation and rumour. That would be the main quest, but they'd be able to do stuff for other people along the way.

No offense, but that is a textbook adventure set up. In fact, the last major adventure I did started exactly this way.

The first thing that happened was the PCs immediately realized the Wizard was taking them for a ride. Not that he was screwing them over per se, but that he wasn't being 100% clear about what they were after or his reasons for wanting it. Whenever you give the players less information than they feel they should have (aka "mysterious artifact"), they're betrayal sensors start going off. Add an NPC (a wizard no less) wanting this magical artifact, and players will rightly assume that they're only getting 1/2 the story.

It's not a bad set up....and general plot outlines are general, but it has to go farther than that. If the Wizard is indeed going to use this artifact to become a bad buy the players have to take out....be prepared for them to not be surprised at all, unless you have done an exceptional job of misdirection. Basically, never ever make your "quest givers" two dimensional, because the lack of motive shows at the end of the adventure when they hand the thing over and the guy either goes "muwhahaha, fools!" or you simply hand out exp for a delivery well done.

I don't have a real point with this post, it's just your setup was 1:1 for the last adventure I ran, and PCs basically smelled 1/2 the plot coming before it even arrived. Wizards with tasks tend to have that effect on players.

Flip the idea over then: The wizard (who himself may or may not be evil) is trying to keep the artifact out of the hands of the real big bad and has to keep a low profile because of that. At some point have the big bad hand them some information painting the wizard as the big bad. Watch the surprise on their faces as they realize the rebel movement they were helping to overthrow the evil magocracy was nothing less then a magical version of the RAF. Bonus points if the campaign becomes Xanathos speed-chess between the wizard, the big bad and the PC party...

I am so incorporating that...

Also, does anyone know the physical, elemental, energy, alignment, and magic traits of the various planes in the D&D cosmology? (The SRD provides the traits for the Plane of Shadow, the Astral Plane, the Ethereal Plane, the various Elemental Planes, and the Positive and Negative Energy Planes. I can guess at the alignment traits for Limbo, The Abyss, The Nine Hells, and Mechanus, but that's about it. I was going to create my own cosmology, but it's proving to be headache.)

[nenjin]

Also, does anyone know the physical, elemental, energy, alignment, and magic traits of the various planes in the D&D cosmology?

Without going straight to my manuals and copy and pasting, that's really hard to say. The 2e cosmology was an epic work spanning like a decade, there's a lot of philosophical and mechanical details to remember.

Your best bet would be searching for a PDF of the Manual of the Planes. Planescape resources also do quite a bit in describing the outer realms in more detail.

[Vorthon]

Hey, it turns out wikipedia provides fairly good descriptions of the outer planes, and even shows where they lie on the alignment axis. Thank you Wikimedia Foundation!

[nenjin]

That's a decent page, although that's about 1 page from the Manual of the Planes. You may or may not want all that material....but personally, one of the BEST reads for me from my days playing 2e was the Manual of the Planes and other associated stuff. Some of the best stuff they ever wrote. Tons of detail and rules for every plane, and a metaplot to setup most of the outer planes stuff. (The Blood War, Sigil, all that Jazz.)

Follow the links under "AD&D First Edition." They'll go into quite a bit of detail about each plane. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manual_of_the_Planes

[Truean]

Concept map first; then draw things out.

Answer the questions of why things matter both generally and to your player's characters, and to your players.

[Vorthon]

That's a decent page, although that's about 1 page from the Manual of the Planes. You may or may not want all that material....but personally, one of the BEST reads for me from my days playing 2e was the Manual of the Planes and other associated stuff. Some of the best stuff they ever wrote. Tons of detail and rules for every plane, and a metaplot to setup most of the outer planes stuff. (The Blood War, Sigil, all that Jazz.)

Follow the links under "AD&D First Edition." They'll go into quite a bit of detail about each plane. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manual_of_the_Planes

Umm...

What Links?

[nenjin]

The book describes various planes of existence, and what creatures characters might encounter there, covering the astral and ethereal planes, the elemental places, and the outer planes.[3] The book also details how to survive in the planes, and how combat and magic differ under the plane's special conditions. The Ethereal Plane, The Inner Planes -- including the Plane of Elemental Air, the Plane of Elemental Fire, the Plane of Elemental Earth, and the Plane of Elemental Water, the Para-Elemental Planes (Smoke, Magma, Ooze, and Ice), the Energy Planes (Positive Energy and Negative Energy), and the Quasi-Elemental Planes (Lightning, Radiance, Minerals, Steam, Vacuum, Ash, Dust, and Salt) -- and the Astral Plane. After these planes, the Outer Planes are briefly described, including Nirvana, Arcadia, Seven Heavens, Twin Paradises, Elysium, Happy Hunting Grounds, Olympus, Gladsheim, Limbo, Pandemonium, The Abyss, Tarterus, Hades, Gehenna, The Nine Hells, Acheron, and Concordant Opposition. Manual of the Planes explains how each of the outer planes is related to each of the character alignments. For example, "The Seven Heavens" is the final resting place for characters of Lawful Good alignment.

All the links up in there.

[Vorthon]

I thought you meant 'external links'. I've already visited (some of) the individual pages for the planes.

Man, misunderstandings are a pain in the arse, aren't they?