Building a death world.

[Pokonic]

Alright, I need some help. I need help building a relitivly realistic world that is far more dangerus to its inhabitants and its life in general than,say,Arthas. As such, any ideas on wildlife that would evolve, the climate, and what the inhabitants would look like from dealing with all these threats are welcomed.

[Lordof Dorkness]

I need to know why your campaign world is deadly.
For example, if the world is deadly because it has a very hot atmosphere and there is lava every other step, i would give most creatures fire resistance.

[WarKitty]

Remember the principle of natural selection:

There are two ways to handle a deadly world.

One is to adapt so it becomes less deadly, and more of your population survives to reproduce.

The other is to have lots and lots of kids.

[Lordof Dorkness]

oh yes, of course.
in my example, polar bears wouldn't gain fire resistance or protection from elements abilities, they would likely die off.

[Pokonic]

I was thinking of a way to make the climate different than most deadly worlds (ex deserts or tundra), so lets go with a very swampy area with a few large paches of semitropical rainforest.

[WarKitty]

Oooh a swamp world. For an added wrinkle, would you be interested in adding disease as a peril? Some fantasy version of malaria could be a constant menace.

For whatever human or humanoid race you have:

Take a page out of the ancient world when life was more dangerous. People marry very young, probably just after puberty. Couples try to have as many children as possible, although most will not live to adulthood. Weak or sickly children may be abandoned.

For biological changes: Multiple births might be more common. Pregnancy times would be shorter (assuming you keep mamallian patterns), and recovery time very short.

[DiBastet]

Better. Make a radioactive swamp world. The "civilized" races are those who live in the pockets of rainforest and can't stand too much radiation. The savage fauna of the swamps is heavily mutated and somewhat resistant to the radiation, on their own twisted mutatade way.

The fauna of the pocket realms is also stronger so to survive in such a small place, and some can even consume the radioactive creatures, and, don't know, produce magical effects?

The humanoid mostly try to avoid the radiation, except for the evil, mutant races.

Very deadly.

[Pokonic]

Oh yes, disease would be a constant perl, most likely ever present. The forest would be the habitat for the mammels,and is slowly giving away to swamp as the years go by. There is magic, but the magic only lasts as long there is someone to maintain it. The humens are goblins all but in name, being smaller,shorter, and triplets are the norm. The orc equivilent is scattered by the humens,who where able to displace them from there original homes a long time ago,and now wander most of there lives,only rarily meeting another orc besides there own mother, and they are a dieing race that could not adept to the swampland they are now forced to survive in.

Edit: Oh, a radiated world sounds intersting, but I was thinking a bit more fantisity.

[WarKitty]

Why is the world all swampy? Perhaps you could have some sort of gradual rise in sea levels, where the formerly dry land became flooded? In that case you'd have large areas of pond or lake, lots of rivers, etc. Boats would be needed to travel any sort of long distance.

[Science Officer]

Hmmm yes, yes swamps are good.
Stagnant water is an ideal habitat for insects. Mosquitoes, and dragonflies, and all manner of Pterygota. The smaller ones are a nuisance, unless they carry some blood-borne contagion. The larger ones, well, just be glad you don't see to many of them at once.

Water also allows for larger animals. A whale could never support it's own mass on land, but it gets on fine in the water. For the swamp, I think something more like Nessie would be appropriate. I thought of how apatosaurs are depicted walking along lake-beds with their heads poking out the top for air. Of course, there's always gators to watch out for...

Another notable property of swamps, or at least peat bogs, is the capability of tannic acids to preserve dead bodies. This is interesting in the real world for archaeological purposes, but may be more interesting in a fantasy world for necromantic purposes.

But yes, swamps seem a good candidate. To borrow a phrase form Neil Gaiman,
"This wasn't the kind of water that you fell into and got out of again. It was the other kind."

[Lordof Dorkness]

Encounter:
Mosquitoes
CR:?
While in effect you have a 30% arcane failure chance and take 1d3 points of con damage.
will be edited.

will the climate be hot or cold?

[Pokonic]

Okay, I now got a good idea for the timeline for this world.
First of all, this was originaly a primal,verdent world,at least for the dominent race, the Saurials. The wildlife was mainly reptilen in form,and where the main form of life on the planet. Large bodies of saltwater were rare, and as such they where able to settle all but a few places in the world. While doing so, they managed to domesticate all but the smallest of the dinosaurs and reptilions they found, and found ways to controle the swamp and diseases that could harm them and there domestcated cousens where all but unkown. While traveling the world, they discovered races that were near there intelligence,and seeing that they where somehow related to them, took them into there civilisation. These races where the Kolbalds, lizerdfolk, Snakefolk,and the Pterafolk(a carnivoris relitive to the pterrin).

While the Saurials may have been thriving in this swampy landscape, there where mammelin races on the planet, and there lives where brutish and short. The combined total of the humen,goblin,orcish,and gnomish races never went above 2 thousend for each race, dispite the frequent truces between eachother,because disease would kill of any settlement of any good size,or the constant animal attacks wittled down isolated settlements. Finaly, a gnomish elder finaly suggested a way to end the constent attacts and mass killings:alter the land useing magic.After 50 years,a gnomish wizerd led in the first ritual, and two orcish and goblin shamens helped by pouring all there energy into it. The end result was a 20x20 foot circle of dry land. Every member of each of the 4 united races soon learned of this wonderful new spell that will save the united races from the horrors of the swamp.

However, the Saurials felt the spell being cast, and soon found the mammals,not noticing them before. They did not care when they found them, however, for they did not seem to have any use to the saurials, and they simply found the dry spot and one simply removed the spell stoping the swamp from overtaking the spot. The gnome,angery with the Saurials, spent the last of his life crafting a far more dangerus spell, one able to eliminate the entire saurial race and everything related to it, The Scaleplague.

The Saurials never had a chance. By the first year more than 25 percent of them where dead, and the servent races,while more resistant to the plague, where still loseing members rapidly. The lizerd and snake-folk could handle it better than there peers, and the Pterafolk unintentely helped spred the plague, being the long distance messingers of the saurals. The Saurials where exinct within 80 years of the casting,along with the Pterafolk.

The mammels soon begain massive mass casting of the swamp-surpressing spell,altho only the three original casters knew it only surpressed the swamp being formed, not actualy eliminating the water and conditions that made it form. The dinosaurs did not adapt to ether the plague or the change in landscape,and became extinct around 250 years A.P.S.

Then many years went by, and the gnomes became the halflings thru a long-term change in eating habits, and a strange racial affliction that perminatly robbed both and your decendents magical capabilitys, and nothing else. This malidy affected all other races exept for the former servents of the Saurials, who where given a small amount of the very small amount of swampland left. This malady finaly stopped haveing any effect on the races,in a way, when the last orcish druid died at the age of 91.This happens around 1200 A.S.P.

After this incident, the races soon go to war, with the Humens and goblens uniting into one empire with the orcs and halflings each uniting the other two factions.The war ends formaly at 1307 A.S.P. when strange reports of trees rotting and water flooding areas begin to be reported sporaticly thruout the world.By this time, all records from 500 A.S.P. and later hv\ave been lost to all but the former servent races,who stayed as under the radar as possable.The world soon became far more hostile within 50 years, and most mammels species soon became exienct due to diseases and a srange race of entitys that call themselves the heirs to the Saurials: the Kenkunu.

1978 A.S.P.
The spells holding back the worlds true form are almost completly undone,and the Kenkunu wipe out villages daliy. The swamp that now cover the world is athema to you kind, wether you be a swift and cunning Hobgoblen, the basterd childern between goblens and men;Orcs, rare and declining,loyal to the end; Halflings, clanish and proud, the first to fight and the last to leave;or Human,the odd one out, the jack of all traids,none of them savory. Its a harsh world,its a losing battle for a victory that can never come, but how great can your story be in a world that was bulit for a kind long gone?


How does it look? If it is well exepted I will give it is own thread detaling it more in deph. Opinons and questons are welcome!

[erictheredd]

From the history given, I am inclined to believe that there is a cycle of war between the reptilians and the mammals. First one gains the advantage and drives the other into hiding in the few areas it doesn't control, then the other attacks and reverses the situation. Of course, this cycle also seems to have a period of hundreds of years, so it probably won't help the characters...

[Pokonic]

From the history given, I am inclined to believe that there is a cycle of war between the reptilians and the mammals. First one gains the advantage and drives the other into hiding in the few areas it doesn't control, then the other attacks and reverses the situation. Of course, this cycle also seems to have a period of hundreds of years, so it probably won't help the characters... Almost, but its more like the individual types (Ex. reptilons,mammels) gaining domanance,than being overthrown. For instance the thriee-kin may have been wiped out before the Saurials could have moved in,around 2500 B.S.P.

[Pokonic]

Races write-up.

Scaled Races

The Saurials where the former rulers of the world and the only race that has peacefully gotten other races to become subjects under anothers rule. They came in may kinds and forms, but all commanded powers over the land that they lived in. This translate as the average Saurial having around 5-6 levels in a spellcasting class. They where the race that was that was the focus of the Scaleplague,and none survive to this day.

The Lizerdfolk are strong and lean, and where the workers and beast-handelers of the Saurial empire. They often lived farther away from citys, prefering the vast swamp of there ancestors to the iron and stone facades of the the city. As such, they where the last of the ser vent races that learned of the empires fall and the plague, but managed to escape the plague due to relitive isolation from the citys that the plague spread the fastest. Also, 1 out of 50 Lizerdfolk are a throback to elder times, with a Huge body and Dr/5.
These 'Dire lizerdfolk' or 'Crocidilfolk' are natural leaders of the tribes they are born in, and tend to be the tribes diplomat to other races, for they tend to get the best education avalible to the tribe.They tend to be freandly with other races,and in fact prefer to work with none-scalykind that with other scalykind, and most whould prefer a orc living among them than a snakefolk.
They have no tendincy to one alingment or another.

TheSnakefolk are the ones with the oldest recorded history with the Saurials,and where advisers and personal serventes to the saurials, useing there natural intelligence to command the servent races to there masters pleasure. As the empire grew, the Saurials let the Snakefolk more power farther away from the citys, which led the snakefolk to govern large forts,which the other servent races where little better than slaves. Many of these stone forts remain today, for the Snakefolk where building them into the 800 A.S.P. Many snake folk still rule there petty kingdomes,and the forts, abandend or still in operation, are prime sights for raiders and adventureres, but than again,whates the difference?The snakefolk are univerially hated by the former servent races for there slavemongering ways, and some who can read the ancient works sometime conclude that they created the magic-sapping plague that removed all magic from the mammelin races,and are hated among the few who know this. In the old days, they tended towordes LN and TN, but now tend towordes LE and young ones tend to lean LN.

In progress, please revew the fluff to see any problemes with it.