Editing The Motley Crew (section)

=Setting =

==Languages==

*There is a '''trade Argot''' , though it doesnt rise above 50% + mod.

*The base language for motley would be '''Gott''', with a lot of people speaking the '''elder tongue'''. 

*'''Low and high Gault''' are the languages of the Empire - Low Gault and Gott are related (half chance to understand the other) 

*'''Islander''' is totally unrelated to any other language nearby.

==The Shallow Seas Ocean Daughter==

The Mother Ocean has many daughters and they are the seas of the world. In the shallow seas they call her daughter The Rainbow Daughter. She is the mother of all the corals and creatures that call the place home.

There are many spirits within her realm, but they define themselves by their relationship to her. Deep ocean has other spirits. Islands each have a spirit and the people who llive there need to acknowledge them.

Rainbow Daughter has two lovers - the sun and the clouds. When she is with one, the other rages. Her many children are the animals and humans that live on or in her. 

==History==

'''The Grand and Terrible Age'''

When the [[Grand and High Powers]] finally fell to arrogance and insane magics in the Great Age, they took much of the Light out of the world.
*Whole peoples, lands, spirits and divine beings became pieces and pawns in their elaborate, ritual wars and amusements. 
*They bent time and space, plane and cosmos to their bidding, summoning Eldritch horrors to their own amusements, stocking and populating grand territories with their own creations.
*They violated ancient and divine precepts and slaughtered their avengers. 
*They began to bring change to the very fibre of reality to accommodate their increasing perversities.

The [[Great Wheel]] finally turned. So much so that the Moon, it’s mother, spun a tear from the sky to finally quell the Grand and High Powers.

The Grand and High Powers, in their arrogance unrepentant, were destroyed in a Light that decimated the Known lands.


'''The Moons Burn.'''

Completely destroyed every Grand or High Power, any offspring, anything that contained any of their essence or fragment of their spirit. It reached across all the known worlds at the same time and even into the infinite. All trace of the Powers ceased to be.

The Tear of the Moon fell on the heart of the Powers Empire and destroyed half the world - leaving behind huge, glassy wastelands surrounded by desert or desolate badlands. 

Only in places like Land Ends, where tall mountain ranges absorbed and deflected the worst of the Moons Burn, did people survive. Even here, great storms boiled overhead, thier rain and lightning seeking out and destroying any trace of the Grand and High Powers.

'''History begins'''

Things that were not part of the Powers survived the Moons Burn if they were not touched by the great burning light directly. This included people. Most of the survivors were servants of the Powers, their pets or slaves, unwitting or otherwise. With all the great wonders and everyday magics of the Powers gone, most peoples fell to barbarism or reverted to more primitive lifestyles. Here and there, cities or estates held on to enough knowledge and civilisation to use metals and mills and keep some of the old skills alive.
Most of these places, like Motley, have a similar history, holding on to enough of a civilization to weather the Storm and the chaos afterwards.

'''Recent history'''
That was a long time ago as the Sages tell it, in the lives of long dead ancestors. Those who count say it's been 442 solar years.

But the world still feels small this side of the mountains that saved the remnant populations of the hundreds of different types of subject peoples, left behind when the Grand and High powers were consumed and used to rebalance the world.

Illis is an isolated citadel and market town and has been for nearly 200 years - although two Kingdoms and three Empires have come and gone, Illis has been Illis through all of it. The same with Odd Arbage, one of several villages and clans owing loyalty to Illis. It is a Cliffside fishing town and deepwater port, home, like Illis, do well over a dozen clans and bloodlines from the last age. It has a small Keep and residing Captain, three shrines and a small collection of houses and homes. It is also home to the adventurers.

The area is ruled by the Illisian Prince, now Governor and Marshall of Eastport - a title that has changed hands more than once. The current Prince hopes to establish a legacy, but then so did the last three.

Between them, the Town and Villages provide shelter for 4 000 souls, and support the surrounding 15 000 who work the land and sea. The province is sheltered between the Saviour Mounts to the East and North and the Karstfells to the West, and has very little flat, open land, except around the rivermouth. Odd Arbage sits East the mouth of the Aird river, which flows North and East through rugged, unnavigable twists and turns, all the way to the Lee Plateaus and the Republic of which Illis is currently a far-flung arm.

Not that it is an ignored subject - the fisherfolk bring in exotic Southern fish and other things, dyes and shells the sell well in the north. The same with the local fruit and root crops - all have a market far away, which means coin and exotic goods, and the folk of Illis grow barley and wheat enough only for their own needs. Even the peasants do well by Republican standards.

Add the small but steady merchant ship traffic that ventures into Odd Arbage from the Border colonies or Manii to the west, and the place is fairly cosmopolitan for a village of 650 odd.

=='''Technology:'''==

'''No Stirrups, no shipboard weapons.'''

'''Mature Bronze Age (Early Iron)'''.

The civilized nations of Land Ends (and a few less civil) have built themselves around Bronze. Both Tin and Copper can be found locally and traded for fairly easily.
Iron is available but until recently has been hard to find...many Powers had Iron mines that are now unstable or unworkable and any readily available source was too poor in quality. The Empire of the Lee Plateau (which has no name at present and only a vague political structure) has recently begun producing more Iron, mainly for infantry and heavy Cavalry.

The many, many barbarian and nomad tribes are generally able to buy or make some bronze, but a lot of it is acquired through trophy.

Some more primitive cultures don't use metal at all, especially ones isolated from general cultural contact.

'''Ships'''

As far as ships go, you are looking at single masted square rigged galleys, smaller lateen rigged coastal traders and single mast fishing boats as your most advanced ships. No wheel and rudder mechanisms and oars rule for speed. You'd rarely spend more than a night away from shore and most ships beach or layover at night. well known trade routes are the exception to this.


'''Magic use.'''

*Must always have a '''POW of 15''' - it it drops below this, magic ties are lost.

*'''Iron effects all magic''' - a human can have contact with only a limited amount before it begins to disrupt it.

*There is '''Spirit (or Common or Hedge) magic''', but it is restricted to Members of Magical or Spiritual orders, commonly known as Low Magic.
This is the magic of Craft Guilds, Religious Orders, Barbarian warrior Lodges, witches and Warlocks, apothecary and Herbalist. Bards and initiates gain this sort of magic.

In the past it was more common. Part of its decline may be attributed to increased Iron usage.

*'''Divine Magic''' is gained through the worship of and bargaining with divine forces. Only priests and champions may wield it. Druid types, too.

*'''Spirit Magic''' is obtained through bargaining with spirits and only occasionally involves learning spells. More often, you have allied or bound spirits. 

*'''Sorcery''' Confined to the literate, must be learned from Grimoires.
I'll decide which books magic to use once people start creating their PC's.

'''Non Humans'''.
Humans make up the peoples of Land Ends. There are many different kinds of people, some altered by powers in the past to be servants, pieces of Art or pets.

There are, however, many, many other sentient folk, though non human.
Most are hybrids, like Centaurs and Satyrs - a mixture of human and animal forms.

There are Sauri, however - sentient creatures descended from the dragons. The two most common types are Saurians (lizardfolk), a generally savage people who inhabit warm, desert lands and Newtlings, who live along rivers and in swamps.

There are the giants and their descendents, too. They were common as the brute force component of a Powers lands or holdings, and their descendants plague the less hospitable parts of the world.

Most other sentients fall into the category of embodied forces from other planes of existence, from elementals to The Kind Folk to Gods and their servants.

These many, many races tend to exist away from human society or on its fringes - most have learned that humans make poor neighbours.

==Themes==



===The Coming of Iron.===
Iron has previously been a scarce metal, found either as relics of the great Age [in various forms of steel] or as bloom iron, pounded into wrought iron or layered steel. The Powers had Many uses for Iron in the past and have mined all but the meanest sources.

Iron affects magic. A little makes it unstable, a lot disrupts it entirely.
Steel can be the same, but is sometimes a conduit for magic force instead. The hows and whys of this were known to the Powers, but that knowledge is yet to be regained.

I'd like to have a variety of different magic types in the game, based around systems from BRP, Legend and Runequest Three. Their relative rarity is up to you.


==Magic Types== 
Possible magic types are:

'''Innate Magic'''

These are the inner magics of true skill that set heroes apart without them being spellcasters.

*'''Natural Magic - Talented (skill % based)'''. 

Talents are skill based and each skill has a talent. Some people are born with a Talent, even before they master it and these are known as Birth talents. Some people develop a talent for a skill after years of practice (95%+ in the skill) These are known as Masteries.

*'''Gifted Attribute'''. 

Similarly, some people have Gifted Attributes - the warrior who always pulls off feats of strength, the scholar who can will an obscure piece of knowledge out of their memory, the tracker who can run all night. Each attribute can be taken as gifted.

*'''Maximum umber of Talents and Gifted Attributes'''.

Each Gift/Talent takes up a point of your Int, in the same way spirit magic or Sorcery does. The three aren't eclusive, So a PC with Int 15, three talents and two gifted attributes has ten points available to memorise Low magic or Sorcery spells.

*'''How to use Talents and Gifts'''

'''Talents/Gifts''' consume 1MP per 10% difference between a skill roll (or attribute test) and a desired result. Adding a special success (or a x 1 result for an attribute check) costs +3 pts over and above the % cost to reduce the roll to that level of success. Adding a critical success coss +6 pts.
*Talents are used before a roll is made. MP cost is worked out after the roll is made.

For '''Gifted attributes''':
Attribute Tests fall into two types, Resistance rolls (Att vs some other force) and Characteristic rolls (Attribute x One to five gives degree of success)

MP's are consumed at the rate of 1 per 5% change on the resistance table or 1 per 10% reduction in a characteristic roll, +3MP for Attribute x1

'''Note''': Talents and gifts are not considered magical, so magic hating types can still have them.