Kenders are awesome

And you know it.

I mean, look at this gorgeous illustration from Elena Zambelli, and tell me: Who in their right mind would gleefully try to pick-pocket an all-powerful, vindicative undead knight?

A kender.

That's who.

Just imagine the flabbergasted faces of the kender's companions as they try to find where the damn kender went, and then realizing where said kender is, and what they are doing...

Anyway, they seem to be the comic relief of a Dragonlance campaign, in a way, they are.

And this is awesome.

Let me share a true story, happened not two weeks ago, during an online Dragonlance session.

Pathfinder

To train myself in the craft of DM-ing online using the excellent Foundry VTT, I searched for a simple fantasy module, and actually found The Dragon's Demand, from Paizo (actually, the french version, by Black Book Edition, for unrelated reasons).

This is an old, but self-sufficient module, aiming at level 1 characters, and aiming to raise them up to level 7.

It is also a sandbox, where the characters can, at some point, decide where they want to go to solve their problems.

Last but not least, converting it to D&D5 is moderately easy, and bringing it to Ansalon is actually very natural.

Put Belhaim somewhere in Solamnia. Move Tula's life around the Third Dragon War, and the Canteclure reign in the age of despair, and everything's go smoothly.

Tasslehoff's Pouches of Everything

The people at the Dragonlance Nexus (see: https://twitter.com/DLNexus) had been working on a D&D5 port of Dragonlance called Tasslehoff's Pouches of Everything (whose cover is the one above, from Elena Zambelli), and have published extracts here. Among them, the Kender, which enabled me to offer my players the possibility of playing one of the cute handlers.

A somewhat underestimated part is the Kender Pouch Grab: A few times a day, the kender can try to find something useful to the situation by looking inside their pouches, which, in rule terms, means throwing a d100, and look at the following table:

So... yeah.

The Adventure!

First, as per the Dragon's Demand, the party was jailed for suspicion of contraband, but were soon freed as they were innocent. In the mean time, they had met a kender calling himself "Tobin Eclairateur" (which can be roughly translated into "Tobin Scouterer"), who was enjoying a calm rest in the local jail.

Without even realizing it, the party soon found themselves joined by the kender, and went to explore the Witch's Tower of Belhaim.

For those who know the module, at the very beginning of the exploration, you can find two mithral daggers that also happen to be keys to something.

And at the end of the module, you find the keyholes, opening the treasure chamber.

And, between them, enough obstacles so you didn't want to go back and forth just to search for something.

So, at one moment, with the help of a imp/raven familiar with evil and sadistic tendencies, the party realises they need the mythral daggers/keys. And they have no idea where to find them !

The kender to the rescue

The kender frowned, then started rummaging through his pouches.

I asked the player to throw a d100 in the table, and guess which result it was?

Imagine the players' reactions, and the GM's (i.e. myself).

There was only a 2% chance for the kender to roll an entry with a "dagger" in it, and the player did it!

Of course, I jumped on the occasion, and announced something like: "The kender starts rummaging his pouches, and suddenly take out two mithral daggers from his pouches, explaining 'someone must have dropped them!..."

Which prompted a round of applause.

The Rule of Cool

Matt Mercer, of Critical Role fame, once posted a video on his GM Tips series, about the Rule of Cool:

I think the Kender's rummaging through their pouches is a very good example of the Rule of Cool. It doesn't stretch the rules by itself, but it pushes the "luck" factor, and in this, it could be damaging.

But the rule is limited by design (at most, used "dexterity bonus" times between two long rests), and by agreeing that, unless exception, the objects found this way would disappear later (the kender would drop them to make room for newer objects), there's no way for the kender to unbalance the game.

And looking at the reaction we had on the kender's pouches moment, and how it both ended in a great moment for us players and GM (and how it also avoided a tedious search for something in a dungeon), it was clearly a good experience.

Conclusion: Kender Pouch Grab, extended

So I guess I will extend this kender aptitude, in two ways:

First, if the rolled entry has some kind of a connection/relation with something useful in the campaign, then the roll result will be hi-jacked, and the result modified, to adapt the thing to the campaign. In the example above, a "broken dagger with a symbol" became "two mithral daggers/keys that had been hidden in the dungeon". Of course, the consequences could be negative, in some cases, but the Rule of Cool is used there, which means that, if done carefully, it will always make the story progress in a cool, interesting direction.

Second, I recently discovered the Kencyclopedia, from Sean Macdonald. I didn't have time to read it fully, but in page 113, you have the Magical Knick-Knacks:

Magic is not a plaything, and magic is especially not wasted on frivolous games and useless toys. But every novice wizard can not expect to start creating a Staff of Magius on the first day of class. Like all individuals in training they begin small and work their way toward greater items. It is general practice to destroy these items after completion, but on occasion a kender will find that these items have fallen into their pouch quite by accident.

These knick-knacks come in all shapes and sizes and have a variety of minor magical abilities. You can use the table below to create your own magical knick-knacks. All effects are usually temporary or negligible in game terms. To use an item really depends on what it is. For example, a Spatula of Eagle Sight might require you to gaze into the reflection in the Spatula, or a Hat of Glowing will only glow when worn. The exact details will have to be created by the player or DM.

To create a magical knick-knack roll percentiles twice, once for the item type and a second time for the magical function. Put the two results from the adjacent table together to create the new item. Refer to the descriptions of the magical function on the next page to help you determine how your magical knick-knack works.

... with two tables to generate magical trinkets like the Chess Piece of Rain Protection, or even the classical Silver Spoon of Turning.

I will be replace entry 98 and 99 of the Kender Pouch Grab by the following: "Roll in the magical Knigh-Knack table".

Of course, as objects found in a kender's pouches, these item tend to disappear, after a bit, as the kender carelessly dispose of them to make room for newer findings...

Strategy & Sorcery: A board game for Dragonlance characters

Inspired by the in-universe tabletop games Khas and Wizards & Warriors, I wanted to provide something chess-like for my players (mostly mage ones).

Thus, Strategy & Sorcery.

Strategy & Sorcery

The game can either be played with two players (each being with their pieces on opposite sides), or three players (each begin with their pieces on sides opposite to the two others --- in other words no player starting side can touch another player's).

The board is a circular one, composed of three outer rings, and one central hexagonal-shaped board of hexagons.

The outer rings correspond to the phases of each moon, Solinari (with 36 boxes), Lunitari (with 28 boxes) and Nuitari (with 8 boxes). Each moon is represented as a colored marble, and will move in their related rings, each time their player starts its turn.

The hexagonal board (currently an hexagon composed of smaller hexagonal boxes, whose side's size is equal to 7 boxes) is the battlemap, where the pieces of the players will be set.

Each player must choose a color, place the marble in its starting point, then its pieces.

Among the pieces, there are two towers, two knights, two priestesses, two enchantresses, two assassins and the strategist, plus a certain number of soldiers. Each piece has its own move, its attack, and its vulnerability. The strategist is the less mobile, and its attack is the weaker, but spells are cast from its position.

The player can also cast spells, spending from a limited pool of ingots (suitably colored), these spells being able to affect either the board, the moons, or even the pieces, as long as the target is within range of the strategist.

A player loses when their strategist is removed from the board.

The last player remaining on the board wins.

It is quite possible to end in a status quo, with either two, or even three, players remaining on the board, if all the remaining players agree on it, or if the same pattern of movement is repeated once by every remaining player.

D&D5 Rules

There's no way I can create a tabletop of fantasy pieces in 5 minutes. But I can write rules that enable a D&D5 characters to play the game:

• Each player starts with a number of board points equal to 5, plus their Intelligence bonus, plus their proficiency bonus
  
• Each round, a player can attack by rolling Investigation or Arcana (player's choice)
  
• The player with the lesser result loses 1 board point, and an additional 1 board point if they scored a natural 1, and an additional one for each 20 rolled by their opponents.
  

A player with zero or less board points loses their strategist.

If at any moment, all the remaining players are at 2 or less hit points, then it is considered a stalemate for the remaining players.

Else, the last player remaining on the board wins the game.

Conclusion

For the Test of one of my mage players, I needed a chess-style game where they would try to win against the "ghost" of an old mage, to get access to specific informatio.

But I needed this to not be chess, and instead being a fantasy/dragonlance-themed chess-like game. And having one with D&D-style fantasy pieces, being biased toward mages, and the moon of Krynn is the way to go, at least for me.

Feel free to use, adapt, comment, and propose alternatives.

I'm actually interested both in real game rules, as well as alternative D&D5 rules for a fast mental combat between characters.

P.S.:

By the way, this is loosely inspired by chess, but also the Khas and the Wizards & Warriors games. If  you want to know more about them, I advise you to read:

	Amber & Ashes (Margaret Weis): Where and Death Knight spends a lot of time over a Khas board, until the heroes arrive to save... a Khas piece.
	Brothers Majere (Kevin Stein): Where Raistlin and a mysterious noblewoman called Shavas, play a game called Wizards & Warriors, while trying to outsmart each other.

😊

My Campaign...

I had wanted to storytell something in the Dragonlance universe for a long time.

For what is worth, personal reasons, plus COVID, re-reading D&D5 rules, and the discovery of an virtual tabletop software called FoundryVTT did the trick.

The idea behind this campaign had been there for years, and now, I get the chance to share it with my players.

But I need to explain a few things first. Because it will still be my vision of Dragonlance.

Core Ideas

This is Dragonlance, of course. So it has to have heroics, sacrifice, romance, and good vs. evil. Also, faith, albeit probably not what you expect.

Indeed, there is a massive cultural difference between the original authors of the Dragonlance stories and adventures (mainly Tracy Hickman and Margaret Weis), and myself and my players.

What's canon (in my campaign)?

Only the two initial trilogies:

• Chronicles
  
• Dragons of Autumn Twilight
• Dragons of Winter Night
• Dragons of Spring Dawning
  
• Legends
• Time of the Twins
• War of the Twins
• Test of the Twins
  

Another thing is that everything that happens up to 358 AC is (mostly) canon. After, the future is undetermined. Also, no Taladas.

There are many reasons for this setups, reasons I will elaborate later.

So, what is all this fuss about?

The following items are core inspirations or focus of my campaign:

• Death Knight of Krynn (video game): The idea of the undead raising against the living is an awesome campaign. Of course, Lord Soth will be there. As well as Kitiara, Chemosh, Sylvyana, and a touch of Ravenloft's Domain of Dread's concept.
• DragonStrike (video game): I love air combat video games (e.g. Ace Combat) and DragonStrike really impressed me. I would really love for my players to feel something like that. I may need to build up air combat rules.
  
• Gods of Good vs. Gods of Evil vs. Gods of Balance: The official Dragonlance setting is heavily biased toward the gods of Good, for, in my humble opinion, the wrong reasons. I would to show my players all three pantheons' motivations (and mistakes?) are justifiable, even if one absolutely disagree with them. If my players perceive the gods of Evil is "Muahahah Evil", or the gods of Balance as "fantasy Switzerland", then I will have failed.
• The Kingpriest and the Cataclysm: So many questions for what happened, how it happened, etc.. In particular, the gods of Good won't get a free pass for letting their kingpriest servant conquer inquisition-style all Ansalon and genocide the other races, and then pounding the planet with a meteor to punish the mortals for having followed said servant, and then coming back like "Hey, the mortals are the ones who turned away from us". Everything has a logical explanation, and logical consequences. And the consequences of the Cataclysm are still incomming.
• The Fall of the Ogre Race: Once the most beautiful, they were corrupted. The difference here is that they were not corrupted by their own "evil". They have been cursed, but not because they were evil. There is a very good reason for what happened to the ogre race, a reason to be discovered by the players.
  
• Ansalon is the focus: and the tragic reasons will be apparent as the players will advance in the campaign. It doesn't mean the PCs won't get to explore a bit beyond Ansalon, though.
• Age of Mortals: How fitting for a setting where gods fight each others over Krynn, to end the campaign into an age of mortals? The D&D3.5 mystics will be central to that, and of course, this will enable a lot of D&D5 classes (e.g. the sorcerer)
  

In a way, the campaign might end in something as world-changing as the Cataclysm, but it will be very different, and thus will not mean yet another calendar change.

... also, lots of background information

I need to show my players a world of Krynn that is unlike any other fantasy world.

On way is the "living history" of Krynn, where "scientific" discoveries meant some spells, or some technologies, were not available until some point of history. This means also giving famous past mortals of many races, along with their contribution, beyond the default heroics.

And beyond the new cool playable races (centaurs! minotaurs!), I want to show how each race/civilization comes with their own culture, clothing, and weaponry.

Conclusion

The full campaign is divided in the following parts:

• Prelude of Heroes (level 1-4)
  
• Low level adventures to install the PCs as heroes
  
• Test of Heroes (level 4-5)
• Of course any mage must then pass the Test of High Sorcery... But why not extend it to everyone? The result is solo adventures, focusing on one PC at a time, enabling them meet NPCs like Dalamar, or Silvara, and to change and evolve in power and motivations (similar to the 5 years passed by the innfellows in their search for gods)
  
• War of the Blue Lady (5-6)
• In 358 AC, Kitiara will attack Palanthas. The PCs will be part of the war, alongside Tanis, Dalamar, etc.. The PCs will be inserted in the events described inside the Test of The Twins, and will possibly be able to change some of them. This will actually introduce the next campaign.
  
• Requiem of Heroes (6 - 11)
• Lord Soth and his minions finally emerges from Nightlund to conquer Solamnia in a quest for vengeance... but even this war is hiding something more dreadful, including a new order of renegade nécromancers, dubbed the "purple robes", and the return of Sylvyana and her takeover attempt of the Silvanesti forest before the elves can clean the Nightmare of Lorac away.
  
• Apostasy of Heroes (11+)
• In the previous campaign, the heroes realized something so big, so dreadful and so fundamental about the cosmology of Krynn, they get the opportunity to change that universe for the better, or for worse, with the Gods of Balance moving stealthily to give back mortals their most prized gift: Freedom of Will.
  

We'll see how it goes...

Select Concept: The Cycle of Souls

Select Concepts is a series of blog posts where I will describe concepts specific to my campaign, but which could be reused in other settings. Their point is to explain (lampshade) some RPG Tropes into believable occurrences, or offer alternative sources of conflict/help for our heroes to face/enjoy.

The River of Souls was described  by Tracy Hickman and Margaret Weis in their War of Souls trilogy.

It does leave the universe of Krynn open-ended (the souls go somewhere beyond Krynn and its gods, in the end), which might be want you want. But for me, as a DM, it failed to explain a few basics of a D&D fantasy settings. Also, I don't like it.

So I devised an alternative version called the Cycle of Souls.

Inspiration

Andy Weir wrote in 2009 a small story called The Egg, which is a fascinating story about how every human alive is actually a reincarnation of the same soul, across time.

You can read it here: http://www.galactanet.com/oneoff/theegg_mod.html

... and while I won't reuse it as-is, I find it a marvelous inspiration for a setting's creation myth.

Anyways...

The needs

These are my needs:

• I need to make "naturally occurring" reincarnation possible
• I need to make resurrection possible, up to a certain point (i.e. if too much time passed, then it becomes impossible
  
• I need mortals to be able to join their gods after their death, if they want it
• I need to explain why ghosts and revenant might linger beyond their "death"
  
• I need to explain how someone with an actual brain would prefer to serve Takhisis and end in some hellish forever, instead of giving flowers to widows and orphans, and join eternal bliss
• I need the gods to need to nurture souls, for some reason. Of course, each god might have their own definition of nurturing
• I need to have Raistlin wait for his twin, after death.
  
• I need to explain why souls are important for gods, all the while gods having a relative interest in any random mortal
• I need to explain why undeath might actually be a viable, if dreadful, alternative (instead of "how can you be so stupid to do the obvious wrong choice?")
• Fistandantilus
  

Also, bonus: 

• No diabolic pact, no demon eating souls. Because, f*ck demons and devils up to Uranus.

 So, with that, let's start...

Souls vs. Spirits

Souls

Souls are supposed to more or less come from the sparks of Reorx striking Chaos to slow it down and enable creation.

But, being free and unconcerned, souls do not "experience". So they evolve very, very slowly, if at all.

Also, souls may, or may not, experience time. It might even be possible they experience time in a distinct way than mortals.

The gods were tasked to nurture them, so they could grow (possibly into some kind of divinity?).

So the gods gave them gifts:

• Gods of Good gave them physical form, so they could affect and experience the physical universe around them
• Gods of Evil gave them suffering and mortality, so they could feel the consequences of their action, and/or need to react to external events, and then die.
• Gods of Balance gave them freedom to choose (and immunity to any kind of soul damage or coercicion)

By giving them these gifts, gods gave the souls a way to experience reality, through a spirit.

Spirit

When a mortal is born, lives and dies, their consciousness, memories, and experiences is the spirit, created mostly blank from a specific soul.

Upon death, as consciousness fades away, these memories and experiences, or variations, will be replayed, again and again in the fading spirit's mind, as if in a dream, to be slowly absorbed into the soul of that mortal.

The spirit thus fades away in a dream-like state, so the soul can grow.

This is the cycle of souls.

Souls vs. Spirits

The same soul can produce very different spirits. For example, the same soul could produce a Lawful Good paragon spirit, then a Chaotic Evil renegade spirit.

In the end, the whole point is for the eternal soul to learn and evolve by experiencing reality from different viewpoints and situations through transient spirits, each one with a distinct identity and personality.

Fun fact: There is an eerie, but coincidental, parallel between the relation soul/spirit in Krynn and the relation player/character in RPGs.

Can a Spirit endure?

Actually, yes, as during some time after its death, while the spirit is slowly fading away, it is still there.

Fading away...

For example, during this time, the spirit can still be brought back to life, in a way or another (e.g. Raise Dead). It can also be contacted, for example, through spells like Speak With the Dead. The "afterlife" so dear to mortals may be nothing more than the spirit blissfully (or not) fading away, perhaps in the home plane of their god, or some kind of demiplane of their own creation...

Undeath...

Also, the spirit can remain willful and/or powerful enough to remain part of the physical reality.

For example, ghosts, or revenants, whose emotional state either enables them to remain there voluntarily, or forces them to remain there despite a desire to move on. On the other hand, magic rituals might tie the spirit down. For example, mummification, or lichdom. Some accidents or contamination might also happen (e.g. ghouls, vampires). Last but not least, curses (mostly divine) can tie a mortal into the material plane as an undead monstrosity, forcing them into a seemingly neverending hellish existence.

In all cases, the spirit remains, albeit altered by the condition it is forced to remain as.

Ascending...

Last but not least, some spirits can endure longer, because their souls have grown enough (*). These might join their gods as agents, or remain outside observers, and free agents (think "ghost", but without the drama).

(*) This could be considered as a transitional state, where the soul has grown enough its spirits will start to share personality, moral and belief similarities... or even strange memories.

Some Caveats

Apart from what is described above, nothing can keep a dead spirit from fading away into its soul, not even divine intervention.

Also, there is no way, even for a god, to identify the soul of a specific spirit. For example, should the soul of Raistlin reincarnate, it could reincarnate as a tinker gnome spirit, with no memories whatsoever of their past lives, and Takhisis would not suspect a thing.

Last, but not least, souls are totally immune to gods, or any other creatures (like, demons, etc.). The only way to affect a soul would be through the experiences and memories of one of its spirits.

Bonus: Tenacious Souls

I don't really like that concept, and won't be using it personally in my campaign, but it remains compatible with what is written in this post.

Gods and Souls

Unless exception, beyond curiosity, gods care little for spirits, for the same reason someone usually care little for most characters of a fiction (even a RPG or LARP one): Most of them are, in the grand scheme of things, interchangeable, forgettable people.

Gods only really care about nurturing souls, i.e. educating them into becoming, potentially, divine servants, or even gods, of similar moral outlooks.

But, as noted above, the only way to affect a soul is through their spirits, which means creating societies and civilizations to educate them en masse. This explains why the gods of Krynn are warring over mortals: Mortal spirits living in the middle of a civilization that follow that god's teaching is a good way for converting souls into their ways: If Takhisis succeeds in conquering Ansalon, then every mortal on Ansalon will only thrive by becoming more like Takhisis herself (the others will be dealt with later, and serve as fodder in the mean time).

Some spirits, though, might be noteworthy (usually because of their capacity to have faith), and gods sometimes enjoy observing their existence, possibly even discreetly affect it. Sometimes, a god might suspect and interesting spirit might be from the same soul that spawned an interesting spirit in the past, and might see it as a recurring investment (or danger).

Gods of Good

The gods of Good are mostly concerned with nurturing souls into communities of equals, where everyone is caring for everyone else. In this, "together we are stronger" might be their motto.

Of course, for all their care and loving, like overbearing parents, Gods of Good are convinced they know much better than the souls and mortals they are nurturing about what is good for them, which sometimes lead them to be overly possessive of their flocks, sometimes even against their flocks' wishes.

Gods of Evil

The Gods of Evil believe that not all souls are equals, and that some will ascend much faster than others, if correctly nurtured. They favor ambition over everything else, and see caring as something that should not be overly sanctified, as it inevitably leads to the weakening of the souls, as well as squandering resources over many unworthy souls, while they could have been focused on worthier ones.

In other worlds, war and challenges are there to help the best of the souls to ascend, usually by exploiting others, less talented ones, or at the very least, by not being weighed down by them.

Gods of Balance

The gods of Balance have always worked to let souls grow at their natural speed, trying to not affect them too much, to avoid biasing them in any way of another, and working to make sure the influence of the other gods does not smother down the souls into a mold.

This, until the Age of Despair, have led them to some kind of balancing-through-alliance, joining one or another side to keep everyone from becoming too powerful. As this has not prevented the causes for the Cataclysm, some of the gods of Balance are now arguing against that doctrine.

Cheating The Cycle of Souls

The Cycle of Souls is a tedious, but necessary step for the souls to evolve into a higher divine form.

Chemosh

One god, though, believes the process is flawed and inefficient: Too much time is spent by the soul "absorbing" the spirit, and even this "absorption" loses too much information.

The god of death believes he can nurture more souls for his own side, by offering a few select ones a way out of this cycle: By giving them a specific kind of immortality, he is now sure some souls will thrive, and evolve faster through one's spirit's experience.

This is why Chemosh had been researching, and sponsoring research on necromancy and undeath. In theory, every lich, every mummy, every vampire, has the potential to grow ten times faster than regular souls in the same time frame. In practice, this doesn't happens enough, which means more research is needed.

The other gods have misinterpreted Chemosh's obsession for undeath into some kind of morbid fetish, which is, as far as he is concerned, how he likes it. Some barely care, as long as the undead don't overwhelm the living, but others oppose any tampering with the Cycle of Souls, on principle.

The Bloodstone Pendant

The bloodstone pendant enables its wielder to absorb al the experiences of the victim into the wielder. In addition to the life span increase of the wielder, its practical effect is that the victim's experience is absorbed and digested by the wielder's.

Thus, the victim's soul lost an opportunity to grow, while the wielder's spirit instantly accumulates experience by absorbing the victim's soul, which, in the end, will be absorbed back by the wielder's soul.

As Raistlin was the last one to use the pendant, absorbing Fistandantilus in the process, one might say Fistandantilus soul lost the potential of thousands of years of experience. Raistlin's soul, on the other hand...

What about Raistlin and Fistandantilus challenging the gods?

By trying to become gods, Raistlin and Fistandantilus weren't just challenging gods. They were challenging some very fundamental laws of creation.

As spiritss, they had tried to circumvent the Cycle of Souls, and ascend by themselves. In some way, it's like a character taking over their actor, and suddenly controlling their destiny. This was, at best, madness, an aberration.

Why weren't they stopped? For many reasons, but the main ones being gods being divided, even within the same pantheon. The points of discussions go from the necessity or even legitimacy of such an intervention, to what to do exactly to solve the problem, all the while taking each god's personal interest in these specific spirits' growing power.

And, as in the end, Fistandantilus simply screwed up, and Raistlin sacrificed himself, the non-intervention angle seems to have been the right one...

In game terms, how does all of this changes everything so far?

That's the beauty of it: It doesn't change anything in any measurable way.

In the original setting, each soul passes the Gate of Souls and is out of reach for all concerned in Krynn.

In this variant, the spirit is dissolved into the soul, and is out of reach for all concerned in Krynn.

The important difference is one I wanted from the start: Every god has a vested interest in nurturing eternal souls, and yet, remains aloof of transient spirits.

What about Crysania's Death and Resurrection?

The only problem might be Crysania, who died in the present, to be raised back to life in the past by the Kingpriest. The relation of the gods and characters of Krynn with time is strange indeed, and the same goes for souls. In the books, it was as if the soul of Crysania remained attached to her body, and thus, was sent back in time with it. Weird, but why not?

The devil is in the details: I wrote above:

"Also, souls may, or may not, experience time. It might even be possible they experience time in a distinct way than mortals."

And by distinct, I really mean distinct.

Having gods and souls experience time in a distinct way than mortals/spirits enables such time-traveling events. This might be the subject for another post...

Conclusion

By defining souls and spirits, as done here, we can explain a lot of what seems illogical: How resurrection really works, how undeath relate to souls, and why gods can seem detached from mortals, all the while caring about their souls.

P.S.: Test of the Twins

What if Caramon and Raistlin were actually two spirits of the same soul?..

🤯

Food for thoughts...

😋

About axes and triangles

How about a simple dissatisfaction with the use of the two axes-alignment system for D&D cosmology leads to an explosion of triangles, and a description of a more fundamental conflict that could remain hidden behind the Good vs. Evil conflict we know and love for our Dragonlance campaigns...

Alignment in D&D

Any D&D setting comes up with an alignment system, even if the 4th Edition's version was very broken, and the 5th Edition actually greatly reduces its importance.

(I will ignore the original AD&D1's alignment drawing inspired by the templar cross, because its artsy details are nonsensical)

You usually have two axes, the "good vs. evil" axis, and the "law vs. chaos" axis, which combine into a 2-dimensional space of alignment that usually represented as the following array of squares:

This diagram is interestingly simple, but the truth is that it does nothing to represent "distance", as in: "Let's say I'm in the middle between lawful good and neutral, does it means I'm also in the middle between lawful neutral and neutral good?".

This is why I prefer the circular diagram:

This is a more accurate description (IMHO) of a typical D&D alignment system. It also gives back "pure goodness" (or even "pure evil", "pure chaos" or "pure law") its rightful place, without diminishing combination extremes like "lawful good"): Someone who is "pure good" is not some kind of "lawful good light" philosopher.

I am not the only one who thought about that: Already, the alignment in the 1st Edition of AD&D Deities & Demigods, used a round (but still templar-crossed and non-sensical) diagram:

Nearest to the 21th Century, the video game Pathfinder: Kingmaker actually measures one's character alignment with a similar (but more finely graduated) graph...

... where the progression of your character's alignment can be tracked as a path of successive points, moving in directions depending on specific choices you made.

Alignment in Dragonlance

Dragonlance is clearly colored by a "good vs. evil" theme. And it even shows in its custom alignment system, in the AD&D1 Dragonlance Adventures rulebook:

... which was one of the many innovations the Dragonlance setting proposed on top of the D&D system (the best among them being, IMHO, clerical spheres/domains).

There are (at least) two remarkable things, here:

• The alignment chart is graduated, as is the Pathfinder Kingmaker video game alignment did, much later.
• There is no mention of law/chaos. I mean, not even a single suggestion of using a similar chart for lawful/neutral/chaotic alignment axis. Nothing. Nada.
  

My guess is that the "good vs. evil" conflict overshadowed the "order vs. chaos" conflict, and thus, that such "moral conflicts" were not deemed worthy of a dedicated chart, even if all NPCs were described with a full, two-axes, alignment rating.

Triangles Incoming!

There's one thing that's missing, there.

It's a bit of information that I've read years (decades?) ago, and that is hard to find now, but remains hinted everywhere Dragonlance.

The fact that any "conflict" in Dragonlance is not described with a axis, but a triangle.

For example, take the mythos of creation of Krynn. In the same AD&D1 Dragonlance Adventures rulebook, p8, we find the following:

Three were the pillars upon which this universe was forged: Good, Evil, and Neutrality. This was the great triangle upon which all the universe was brought to be.

Isn't that interesting?

But it continues further, later, in the same page:

The Alignments of the Gods

All of the universe stands upon the Great Triangle. This foundation has always existed and will exist down through the ages of time and until the end of the world.

At the apexes of the triangles stand the three anchors upon which the universe is built. These are known among men as Good, Evil, and Neutrality. It is into these positions that the gods align themselves in their effort to maintain progress in the universe they have brought into being.

The whole thing is how everything is described as a triangle whose points are forces, and a pendulum oscillate (more or less) freely between those extremes. The axis "good vs. evil" would become "good vs. evil vs. balance", as in the following diagram:

I use "Balance" instead of "Neutrality" for obvious reasons: The main takeway is not that "neutrality" is some kind of passive state (think "Switzerland"), but a more active force trying to balance the two others.

It is telling that the main contribution of the Gods of Balance to the mortal souls of Krynn was free will:

The Gods of Neutrality gave the spirits the gift of free will, to choose freely between Good and Evil. Thus did they preserve the Balance.

... but this is the subject of another, later discussion...

So what?

I'm writing a Dragonlance campaign, so I went deeper in the rabbit hole. In summary, the current creation of Krynn is something like:

• At the beginning, everything was chaos
• The High God called the gods of Good, Evil and Balance, to build his idea of Krynn.
• Reorx, one of these gods, using is mighty hammer to stike the chaos, and thus slow it down, so Krynn could be built
• From the sparks of Reorx' strike, stars and souls were born
  

... and later in the chronology, we had:

• Chaos was not really happy about what had happened
• Reorx was tricked to create a wondrous gem, and he used a tiny bit of chaos to empower it
• Bad move: He actually locked up Chaos itself in that "gray gem", but no one will realize that until too late
• The gray gem brought chaos into Krynn, causing mutations and wild magic to appear (if you wonder at how a pegasus might be born, think about the centaurs and the minotaurs!)
  

In the end, what we have is another conflict, beyond "good and evil".

In the next main book, Dragons of a Summer Flame, this conflict is explored, with the gods of Good, Evil and Balance coming together to fight against Chaos, who had been freed from the gray gem. The conflict was so destructive that, in the end, the gods and Chaos were banished, leaving the mortals to fend for themselves in a new age called: Age of Mortals (this is also a discussion for later...).

Do you see something wrong here?

I'm not talking about the fact Dragons of a Summer Flame is not a trilogy, but a single book (which might explain why things seemed a bit rushed), nor the fact the end of that book was essentially killing Dragonlance as a fantasy RPG setting (IMHO), as everything "magic" was now gone.

It took me a while to put words on it, so I won't blame you for not finding immediately: I'm talking about the fact that, unlike the triangles powering everything when designing Dragonlance until now, here, all we had were two sides.

The Return of the Triangle

I am writing (and DM-ing) a Dragonlance campaign right now, and in my canon, only the two trilogies are "true". Everything else is either bards' tales (e.g. the Lost Chronicles, for different reasons), or will never come to pass (e.g., Dragons of a Summer Flame and The War of Souls Trilogy).

Yet, Chaos and the High God are part of the original lore of Dragonlance, so, where do they stand?

My guess is: We need another Triangle:

These are three forces powering the physical creation of Krynn (note: "physical" in the sense of "physics", not in the sense of "you can touch it"... Yeah, I'm a physics nerd...).

These three fundamental forces are:

• Order:
• Order is organization. A minimum of organization is needed from something to exist. Indeed, it is needed for causality, which naturally leads to predictability, intelligence, but also the passing of time (as before is the cause of now, which is the cause of after)
• But too much order means everything becomes more rigid, everything crystalizes into something that will smother down anything that doesn't perfectly fit. At its most powerful, time loses its meaning, as everything is fossilized, becomes cyclic, or becomes perfectly predictable with no way out.., as would be a perfect clock.
• Chaos:
• Chaos is energy. Experiment, tries, changes and evolution need energy to happen, as do randomness and surprises. Chaos challenges a status quo, chaos gives power out of nothing.
• But too much energy, and no structure has a meaning anymore, nothing is stable, so creation is fleeting, at best. In the end, this is a universe where time loses its meaning, too, as there's no causality, meaning, each instant is totally independent from the previous one, as each moment can lead to any of the infinite possibilities with no logic remaining to predict anything. This is a universe where one can't remember the past, nor predict the future.
  
• Entropy:
• Entropy is decay (in the physical sense), and coldness. Entropy will make sure no structure, nor organization, will remain crystalized, unless there's an outside constant effort to repair decay damage. Entropy will also calm down the most explosive expressions of chaos. In this way, Entropy is a moderating factor of the two other creation forces.
• And yet, unchecked, Entropy will erode structure and organization to nothingness. Entropy will smother down energy and creativity. In the end, Entropy unchecked naturally leads to a single singularity of nothing, a single state where time itself stops passing for those experiencing such an entropic universe.

As you can see, all these forces are necessary for creation, and yet, each force could, if unchecked, lead to destruction.

(If we were to make link between these RPG-based fantasy creation forces and real universe physics, you might think of chaos as the age of big bang/inflation, order as the current age of the universe, with stars, planets, and all, and entropy as the age of heat death of the universe. In this, "rpg chaos" is not the pure "physics/mathematics chaos"... Enjoy your wikipedia research...)

(Bonus: If you add a subtle notion of uncertainty you could then postulate than no force would be completely smothered, and that with enough "time" and "chance", entropy might be suddenly overwhelmed by order and chaos once more, leading to another cycle of creation. But (and this will blow out your mind) each creation is unable to communicate/affect another creation across cycles causally, as each creation would always come from, and lead to, a single state of entropy.)

Conclusion: Triangles! Triangles Everywhere!

 I like this existence of at least two fundamental triangles:

The first (Good vs. Evil vs. Balance) being about moral choice for souls, and the second (Order vs. Chaos vs. Entropy) being about fundamental forces of creation. In alignment terms, one character's alignment might be measure as a point in the first triangle plus another point in the second triangle.

But as I don't plan to use alignment much, this idea won't be tested. (if only because D&D5e doesn't really care for alignment anymore)

Dragonlance is a fantasy world about Good vs. Evil, but also gods... lots of meddling gods who rarely shy away from orbital-bombing when not happy with how their plans unravel...

So, what will be tested, instead, is the signification of the first, and of the second triangle, by mortal characters, potentially putting them at odds with their own gods.

But who said the coming of the Age of Mortals would be a cakewalk?

Custom Vocations for the Priest Archetype

Note: The application to Krynn of these custom rules is described in the following post: Priest Vocations for the Holy Orders of the Stars.

Following the previous post, where the Priest Archetype was defined as an alternative Cleric Domain, and Vocations were introduced, we can now introduce custom priest vocations.

These were usually inspired by either the domains defined in various Dragonlance D&D3.5 rulebooks (mostly the excellent Holy Orders of the Stars), as well as some homebrew or unearthed arcana D&D5 domains.

Custom Priest Vocations

 

Commerce

Cleric Level	Spells
1	comprehend languages
3	zone of truth
5	tongues
7	secret chest
9	telepathic bond

Divine Energy Channel: Glibness

For one hour, when you roll Charisma Ability, you can replace the dice result with 15.

 

Cure

Cleric Level	Spells
1	healing word
3	prayer of healing
5	mass healing word
7	halo of benevolence (see Custom Spells for the Priest Archetype)
9	mass cure wounds

Divine Energy Channel: Purification

You can end either one disease or one condition (among blinded, deafened, paralyzed, or poisoned) affecting you and up to 5 allies you can see within 9 meters (30 feet).

 

Devotion

Cleric Level	Spells
1	shield of faith
3	aid
5	beacon of hope
7	divination
9	commune

Divine Energy Channel: Armor of Faith

As mage armor, but with a "self" range/area.

 

Forge

Cleric Level	Spells
1	identify
3	magic weapon
5	elemental weapon
7	fabricate
9	creation

Divine Energy Channel: Blessing of the Craftman

At the 2nd level, you can use your Divine Channel to create simple items.

You conduct a one-hour ritual that makes a non-magical item that must include metal: a simple or martial weapon, armor, ten pieces of ammo, a set of tools, or another metallic object (see Chapter 5, "Equipment" in the Player's Handbook for examples of these items).

Creation is complete at the end of the hour, merging into an unoccupied space of your choice on an area within 1.5 meters of you.

The thing you create can be anything whose price is no higher than 100gp. As part of this ritual, you must dispose of the metal, which can include coins, of equal value at creation. The metal fuses irreparably and transforms into the creation at the end of the ritual, magically forming even the non-metallic parts of the creation.

The ritual can create a copy of a non-magical item that contains metal, such as a key, if you own the original during the ritual.

 

Meditation

Cleric Level	Spells
1	comprehend languages
3	enhance ability
5	tongues
7	freedom of movement
9	telepathic bond

Divine Energy Channel: Empower Spell

You can use Metamagic options on a spell you are casting as if you were a Sorcerer with 3 Sorcery points, with the same limitations. Unused Sorcery Points are lost.

 

Rune

Cleric Level	Spells
1	erase (see Custom Spells for the Priest Archetype)
3	secret page (see Custom Spells for the Priest Archetype)
5	glyph of warding
7	???
9	planar binding

Divine Energy Channel: ???

???

 

Tyranny

Cleric Level	Spells
1	command
3	enthrall
5	fear
7	compulsion
9	dominate person

Divine Energy Channel: Divine Majesty

Select up to one target of your choice per Proficiency bonus points, located within 30 feet of you and in your line of sight.

Each target must succeed on a Wisdom saving throw, otherwise it is restrained for 1 minute. At the end of each of your turns, each target gets a new Wisdom saving throw. If she succeeds, the effects of the Divine Energy Channel end on her.

 

Undeath

Cleric Level	Spells
1	false life
3	ray of enfeeblement
5	vampiric touch
8	grasping zombies (as black tentacles, but with zombie arms)
11	circle of death

Divine Energy Channel: Control the Undead

You automatically gain the Command Undead feat (see below) and the Undead Master feat (see below).

 

Feats

Command Undead

Inspirations:

• https://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/general-feats/command-undead/ (Pathfinder 1e SRD)
• https://www.5esrd.com/database/feats/command-undead/ (D&D5e SRD)
  

Using foul powers of necromancy, you can command undead creatures, making them into your servants.

Prerequisites: Channel Divinity class feature.

Benefit: As an action, you can use one of your uses of Channel Divinity to mentally enslave undead within 9 metres (30 feet). You make a Turn Undead check as normal. Those undead that would be destroyed fall under your control, obeying your commands to the best of their ability.

Intelligent undead receive a new saving throw each day to resist your command.

Controlled undead can have their will usurped by other clerics with this ability. When attempting to maintain control, each cleric makes a spellcasting check and the highest roll takes control.

You can control a number of undead whose combined CR is equal or less than your cleric level divided by 4.

The duration is permanent, or until said undead is released, destroyed or makes the save.

 

Undead Master

Inspirations:

• https://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/general-feats/undead-master (Pathfinder 1e SRD)

You can marshal vast armies of the undead to serve you.

Prerequisites: the ability to cast animate dead or command undead.

Benefit: When you cast animate dead, create undead, or use the command undead feat, you are considered to be four levels higher when determining the number of undead, or the amount of CR you animate/control.

 

Conclusion

Now that we have missing vocations, we can summarize which the Krynn's deities offer which vocations...