Farelle & Wildlands--New Info

[KingCorn]

While it definitely makes sense to characterize the animals of the Wildlands as agnostic or even outright atheist (as nature is a cruel realm), it helps 'humanize' them and make them a bit more relatable to both DMs and players to see that even the animals of the Wildlands have made their own belief systems.

Yeah, that does make more sense honestly. After all, the animals can literally just give away aspects of themselves, which would put into them some idea of spirits and ability. I also liked your right up of King Crocodile

I just realized something: Usually people want to fit Yuan-Ti into the Wildlands or Sri-Raja. But the story of the Wildlands is that all the serpents, lead by the Pythons, left. And while Yuan-ti could be a perversion of the snake-power, it still seems like it would be violating that part of the rules-of-the-land.

It also brings up the idea of how Sri-Raja relates to the Wildlands. Cause if you have a tied false-history (or true-history) then it would propably be that 'hairless-apes' later went on to found Sri-Raja (after being kicked out of the Wildlands). It could even be that some of the serpents helped them, hence why their might be cults of Yuan-Ti (along with the typical Vishnu bed-of-snakes connection)

[Speedwagon]

While it definitely makes sense to characterize the animals of the Wildlands as agnostic or even outright atheist (as nature is a cruel realm), it helps 'humanize' them and make them a bit more relatable to both DMs and players to see that even the animals of the Wildlands have made their own belief systems.

Yeah, that does make more sense honestly. After all, the animals can literally just give away aspects of themselves, which would put into them some idea of spirits and ability. I also liked your right up of King Crocodile

I just realized something: Usually people want to fit Yuan-Ti into the Wildlands or Sri-Raja. But the story of the Wildlands is that all the serpents, lead by the Pythons, left. And while Yuan-ti could be a perversion of the snake-power, it still seems like it would be violating that part of the rules-of-the-land.

It also brings up the idea of how Sri-Raja relates to the Wildlands. Cause if you have a tied false-history (or true-history) then it would propably be that 'hairless-apes' later went on to found Sri-Raja (after being kicked out of the Wildlands). It could even be that some of the serpents helped them, hence why their might be cults of Yuan-Ti (along with the typical Vishnu bed-of-snakes connection)

Those are all good ideas! I like to think that when Sri Raji and the Wildlands were placed next to each other, a very small group of Yuan-Ti ventured out into the Wildlands and have kept a VERY low profile. Of course, if even a mouse saw them, then every animal in the Wildlands would know and then King Crocodile would know and boom! Every creature in the domain thinks its the end times as the prophecy has been fulfilled. Also, there would definitely be Yuan-Ti in Sri Raji, if only because of the snake imagery that goes well with the Indian mythology that Sri Raji is steeped in (albeit clumsily, as the rather poor design of Web of Illusion can attest to).

[KingCorn]

Those are all good ideas! I like to think that when Sri Raji and the Wildlands were placed next to each other, a very small group of Yuan-Ti ventured out into the Wildlands and have kept a VERY low profile. Of course, if even a mouse saw them, then every animal in the Wildlands would know and then King Crocodile would know and boom! Every creature in the domain thinks its the end times as the prophecy has been fulfilled. Also, there would definitely be Yuan-Ti in Sri Raji, if only because of the snake imagery that goes well with the Indian mythology that Sri Raji is steeped in (albeit clumsily, as the rather poor design of Web of Illusion can attest to).

Since the greatest serpent of Hindu mythology is Shesha/Sheshanga, who is said to be older than this current iteration of the universe, holding Vishnu its coils across endless eons in the Cosmic Sea of Milk. In this way, the snake becomes the ultimate symbol of immortality, not just sheddin its skin to renue but quite literally being the primordial being.
As such, the serpent and the Yuan-Ti could be like a cult of pseudo-holy vampires. In their eyes, they have truely touched the divine. They truely believe (or some do anyway) that they have escaped the cycle of Karma by emulating the being which has always lived outside it. It is as 'holy' as it is utterly alien.

[Jeremy16]

The way I see it, there's 3 ways of handling the “rapid cultural advancement” that was introduced in Naylor's write-up of Jack Karn. It can either be tossed out completely, kept exactly the way it is, or modified in some way.

The problem is if the cultural acceleration continues at the same pace as described in the article it could have very well reached modern times already. Not to say that you can't have horror in a modern setting, but having a society that advanced would make playing in this domain too similar to a Call of Cthulhu or World of Darkness game instead of a Ravenloft one.

So, here's the salient points about the domain that I picked out from Naylor's article:

1) Rapid advancement in cultural levels
2) High influx of immigrants
3) High fertility rate amongst populace
4) Forests being cut down to make room for more people
5) Wild dogs roam the countryside
6) People are generally friendly and inviting

Now, most, if not all, of these events have developed in order to fulfill the original Jack Karn's dying curse. I think this is an important point, because if you toss out any of these items you will also have to throw out or significantly rework the curse as well. And it's for that reason that I think it's worthwhile to see if this “rapid cultural advancement” concept can be integrated into the new Farelle survey.

So, enough with all the preamble, here's my suggestions on how to handle Farelle's unique civilization growth:

1) The Modular Approach

This is what I think should be used if you keep the timeline advancing. Essentially, you would have to describe one site at least three times (one in the past, one in the present, and one in the future). These don't have to be in-depth descriptions... it can be as easy as outlining the appearance of the town's buildings, the types of clothes people wear and how they talk, and whatever technology is in common use. Obviously, that involves a lot of effort on the writer's part, which is why I wouldn't recommend this one.

2) The Plateau Approach

The idea here is that the “rapid cultural advancement” was active in the past but in the current day it has slowed down significantly or stopped altogether. The reason behind this could be that it stalled out once the land reached the cultural level of the society that the original Jack Karn was inhabiting. Since Naylor's article was vague on that front it gives us more leeway to use a 16th, 17th, or 18th century European culture as the basis for the domain. My personal preference (and to keep open some future Dread Possibilities) would be to cap it at about the same time era as Dementlieu or maybe even Lamordia. I would definitely stay away from higher level domains such as Nosos or Zheresia.

Perhaps, compared to the Wildlands where Darklord Jack comes from the culture of the original Jack Karn IS the pinnacle of societal development, so the soceity doesn't have to advance any more.

3) The Cyclical Approach

This option keeps the cultural advancement phenomenon in play, but creates an opposing force that stops it from functioning as it should. Instead of a straight line going forward, the timeline would be cyclical. Here's an example of how that would look...

In this domain are the two main cities and the open country beyond. Kaynis and Mortilis are considered the bastions of civilization and civility. If you're looking for illicit activies, you have to move to the frontier towns. These places are a law unto themselves and it's dog eat dog. Out beyond these frontier towns lies the true wilderness – the deep dark forests that are inhabited by freaks, loners, crazy hermits... and worse.

Eventually, the frontier towns become more organized and grow even larger as more and more merchants and working families arrive. This influx pushes the more solitary minded individuals out into the untamed lands. Eventually enough humana enter the forest that the creatures that live there mount an offensive and try to push them out. (For example, these creatures could be fey, gnolls, or even errant jackalweres.)

But, the men have technology on their side and the forest creatures are driven even deeper into the wilderness to lick their wounds. Then, the victors go on to exploit the resources of the land and build yet another town on the new frontier and the cycle starts all over again. Still, since all of the society's energy is focused on this warfare, they don't have time to research more advanced technology, so the creatures of the forest do get to enjoy a small victory.

I like this approach because it introduces an extra “bogeyman” for locals to unite against and also keeps the dichotomy between city and country folk. It also plays into Jack Karn's curse, because eventually the wilderness will be entirely developed and then Darklord Jack's time will finally be up.

What do you all think?

[IanFordam]

3) The Cyclical Approach

This option keeps the cultural advancement phenomenon in play, but creates an opposing force that stops it from functioning as it should. Instead of a straight line going forward, the timeline would be cyclical. Here's an example of how that would look...

In this domain are the two main cities and the open country beyond. Kaynis and Mortilis are considered the bastions of civilization and civility. If you're looking for illicit activies, you have to move to the frontier towns. These places are a law unto themselves and it's dog eat dog. Out beyond these frontier towns lies the true wilderness – the deep dark forests that are inhabited by freaks, loners, crazy hermits... and worse.

Eventually, the frontier towns become more organized and grow even larger as more and more merchants and working families arrive. This influx pushes the more solitary minded individuals out into the untamed lands. Eventually enough humana enter the forest that the creatures that live there mount an offensive and try to push them out. (For example, these creatures could be fey, gnolls, or even errant jackalweres.)

But, the men have technology on their side and the forest creatures are driven even deeper into the wilderness to lick their wounds. Then, the victors go on to exploit the resources of the land and build yet another town on the new frontier and the cycle starts all over again. Still, since all of the society's energy is focused on this warfare, they don't have time to research more advanced technology, so the creatures of the forest do get to enjoy a small victory.

I like this approach because it introduces an extra “bogeyman” for locals to unite against and also keeps the dichotomy between city and country folk. It also plays into Jack Karn's curse, because eventually the wilderness will be entirely developed and then Darklord Jack's time will finally be up.

What do you all think?

I like the cyclic approach. Perhaps Jack Karn strives to destabilize each frontier town's rapid growth, hoping to collapse society on a place by place basis. The periodic invention of gunpowder gives me a wonderful (if nearly desperate) opportunity to trick all of the humans into killing each other. Where he succeeds, civilization collapses. Where he fails, he loses territory.

[Speedwagon]

I like both the cyclical style of advancement and the plateau, personally. I wonder if there's some way to maybe merge the two? The thing about the cyclical style is that, once the wilderness has been fully developed and Jack's time runs out, I feel like the domain would either cease to exist (which is unfortunate and boring, or (if there's a new Darklord) that the cultural advancement plateaus at around between Dementlieu and Lamordia level. So I guess it would be the idea of Farelle advancing in that cyclical style (which would still be a rapid advancement in the eyes of other natives of Ravenloft) until the wilderness goes away completely, in which case it finally plateaus like in the second style. Maybe that might work? If it can't or doesn't, then I'll take the cyclical style, as it allows for more options with the domain as a whole.

[IanFordam]

Unless the domain just... expands. We've already discussed the original size of Farelle as shown on the "Black Box" maps. Clearly it has grown since then... and maybe that's part of its continual evolution under the plateau model.

[Baron Von Stanton]

So I figured, why not have Jack Karn evolve in some fashion as well? Jackals in mythology and folklore tend to be associated with trickery, cheating, cowardly deceit, and magic. Maybe Jack Karn, the Jackal Who Would Not be a Coward, managed to either learn magic somehow or get his hands on a magic item, and that somehow managed to change Farelle from its original Book of Sacrifices sketch to its current "Old Weird West with slashers and folk horror elements" sketch. Such a thing can definitely be tied to the Grand Conjunction, as Farelle disappeared from official canon mention after that with the only indication it was still around being that it was going to be covered in one of the later Doomsday Gazetteers.

Or, perhaps Jack Karn would try to accept or embrace his human side, thereby causing him and Farelle to evolve further?

That's admittedly also possible, though it's an avenue that I hadn't really considered and I don't know if I want to go down that route completely. Reason being that there's already a beastwere Darklord that has been trying to embrace his human side (in vain) and that's Urik von Kharkov. I like the idea of Kharkov and Karn being foils to one another in some fashion, as opposed to Karn doing what Kharkov is doing but as a jackal instead of as a panther. But what would you think of how Farelle would evolve further via Jack Karn accepting or embracing his human side?

Rather than like von Kharkov embracing his humanity while trying to be a man who rules over others, Karn would embrace his humanity in order to better adapt to his prey. Like, he could alternate between making suggestions to communities and then returning to use these suggestions as a fatal advantage, or simply immersing himself in a community to "go native" until the time was right to strike.
And Farelle would respond to this by either the human communities take Karn's suggestions to expand until they consume the entire domain, collapse, and then Karn has to bear witness to the ruins until more humans come/are brought to the domain as replenishment, or Karn destroys all of the human communities, and he's left with nothing until the Mists see fit to restart the cycle.

[Speedwagon]

Or, perhaps Jack Karn would try to accept or embrace his human side, thereby causing him and Farelle to evolve further?

That's admittedly also possible, though it's an avenue that I hadn't really considered and I don't know if I want to go down that route completely. Reason being that there's already a beastwere Darklord that has been trying to embrace his human side (in vain) and that's Urik von Kharkov. I like the idea of Kharkov and Karn being foils to one another in some fashion, as opposed to Karn doing what Kharkov is doing but as a jackal instead of as a panther. But what would you think of how Farelle would evolve further via Jack Karn accepting or embracing his human side?

Rather than like von Kharkov embracing his humanity while trying to be a man who rules over others, Karn would embrace his humanity in order to better adapt to his prey. Like, he could alternate between making suggestions to communities and then returning to use these suggestions as a fatal advantage, or simply immersing himself in a community to "go native" until the time was right to strike.
And Farelle would respond to this by either the human communities take Karn's suggestions to expand until they consume the entire domain, collapse, and then Karn has to bear witness to the ruins until more humans come/are brought to the domain as replenishment, or Karn destroys all of the human communities, and he's left with nothing until the Mists see fit to restart the cycle.

Ahh, that's what you meant! Yeah I could see Jack Karn doing that, though I believe it would take Karn some time to actually get over his disgust of humanity (beyond seeing them as a food source) to think a bit farther ahead like that. And your approach kind of fits into what Jeremy16 was talking about regarding cyclical advancement, though a bit too extreme for my tastes. I like cyclical but not too cyclical like a time loop, unless it was baked into the domain from the start (like the netbook domains Ixcapa and Romagna). But I can see Karn going to a community and acting like a 'pillar of the community', the kind of guy you trust your kids with to learn life lessons, except Karn uses his influence to tell the kids things like "It's ok to disobey your parents and go out into the woods at night, after all you're just exercising your independence and not being cowards, no one wants to be a coward right?" and then sows distrust in communities through that manner.

[Speedwagon]

Unless the domain just... expands. We've already discussed the original size of Farelle as shown on the "Black Box" maps. Clearly it has grown since then... and maybe that's part of its continual evolution under the plateau model.

That's also something to consider. Perhaps Farelle just keeps getting bigger and bigger, hence allowing for more immigration but also for nature to recover simply by the Mists receding whenever one side or the other (in the nature vs civilization struggle) gets an advantage. If the land is running out of wilderness, Mists recede and there's more wilderness, and if there's not enough civilization, then Mists recede and there's a new town to settle over there (optionally filled with people or just straight-up abandoned). That can also justify its status as an Island of Terror, as it would be difficult to have it as part of a Cluster or the Core under that model.

[Jeremy16]

I like both the cyclical style of advancement and the plateau, personally. I wonder if there's some way to maybe merge the two? The thing about the cyclical style is that, once the wilderness has been fully developed and Jack's time runs out, I feel like the domain would either cease to exist (which is unfortunate and boring, or (if there's a new Darklord) that the cultural advancement plateaus at around between Dementlieu and Lamordia level. So I guess it would be the idea of Farelle advancing in that cyclical style (which would still be a rapid advancement in the eyes of other natives of Ravenloft) until the wilderness goes away completely, in which case it finally plateaus like in the second style. Maybe that might work? If it can't or doesn't, then I'll take the cyclical style, as it allows for more options with the domain as a whole.

I didn't think about this while I was writing it up, but upon reviewing your comments, it might be a better fit for the cyclical approach if the humans LOST their fight with the wilderness (or at least have a more back and forth result where sometimes the humans win, sometimes nature's forces win).

This way, after the final confrontation and the frontier town is decimated (it can either be abandoned with the buildings intact or completely razed to the ground) new immigrants can move in after a few years pass and start the cycle all over again.

Is that enough of a melding of the two approaches?

(Although, I must say I like IanFordam's idea of the domain just eternally expanding as well. That would be one way for the DPs to keep Karn alive and tormented indefinitely but also honor the parameters of his curse as. And, they're just the type of bastards that would do it!)

[Jeremy16]

That's admittedly also possible, though it's an avenue that I hadn't really considered and I don't know if I want to go down that route completely. Reason being that there's already a beastwere Darklord that has been trying to embrace his human side (in vain) and that's Urik von Kharkov. I like the idea of Kharkov and Karn being foils to one another in some fashion, as opposed to Karn doing what Kharkov is doing but as a jackal instead of as a panther. But what would you think of how Farelle would evolve further via Jack Karn accepting or embracing his human side?

Rather than like von Kharkov embracing his humanity while trying to be a man who rules over others, Karn would embrace his humanity in order to better adapt to his prey. Like, he could alternate between making suggestions to communities and then returning to use these suggestions as a fatal advantage, or simply immersing himself in a community to "go native" until the time was right to strike.
And Farelle would respond to this by either the human communities take Karn's suggestions to expand until they consume the entire domain, collapse, and then Karn has to bear witness to the ruins until more humans come/are brought to the domain as replenishment, or Karn destroys all of the human communities, and he's left with nothing until the Mists see fit to restart the cycle.

Ahh, that's what you meant! Yeah I could see Jack Karn doing that, though I believe it would take Karn some time to actually get over his disgust of humanity (beyond seeing them as a food source) to think a bit farther ahead like that. And your approach kind of fits into what Jeremy16 was talking about regarding cyclical advancement, though a bit too extreme for my tastes. I like cyclical but not too cyclical like a time loop, unless it was baked into the domain from the start (like the netbook domains Ixcapa and Romagna). But I can see Karn going to a community and acting like a 'pillar of the community', the kind of guy you trust your kids with to learn life lessons, except Karn uses his influence to tell the kids things like "It's ok to disobey your parents and go out into the woods at night, after all you're just exercising your independence and not being cowards, no one wants to be a coward right?" and then sows distrust in communities through that manner.

The most interesting thing I found about Jack's origin in Naylor's article is that he was set up as an anti-Harkon Lukas. Whereas Harkon is a monster, that wants be loved by humans, Jack is an animal who hates humans but is forced to fit in with them. Whereas Harkon is in his element when in human form, Jack hates it and feels more at home in his animal form. Whereras Harkon desires be a great ruler of man but lives in a cultural backwater, Jack wants to eliminate humans from his domain and rule over his animal brethren.

I believe this was done deliberately to draw a distinction between the only two “animal-were” creatures mentioned in the Black Box. And that's why I wanted to keep his curse in play, because it does a really good job of that.

Now, that's not to say I don't think some improvements can be made to help facilitate his interactions with the people of his domain. I find that there's too many artifical barriers and handwaving put in place (people love him no matter how caustic he is, he gets sick whenever he tries to attack people, etc.) to keep his true nature hidden and maintain the status quo. I have some ideas that may help modify his abilities in a way that makes better sense, but will post them later...

[Speedwagon]

Well there's been lots of discussion on Farelle, which has been nice! How about the Wildlands, huh? We've had some ideas on it, not just from Naylor (thanks Baron Stanton and KingCorn in particular) but I feel like, as I said before, whatever didn't really make the cut for Markovia can definitely be used for the Wildlands. But that brings up another question:

What kind of biomes does the Wildlands have? Is it just savannah, jungle and swamp, or is it truly wild and you can find a piece of every biome known to planet Earth there, if you just look hard enough?

[Baron Von Stanton]

What kind of biomes does the Wildlands have? Is it just savannah, jungle and swamp, or is it truly wild and you can find a piece of every biome known to planet Earth there, if you just look hard enough?

The Wildlands would contain any and or all terrestrial environments known to Earth, with the caveat that all of the regions of the Wildlands contain waterways that directly connect/feed into King Crocodile's swamp, so that, if His Majesties so chooses, he can go anywhere.

[Speedwagon]

What kind of biomes does the Wildlands have? Is it just savannah, jungle and swamp, or is it truly wild and you can find a piece of every biome known to planet Earth there, if you just look hard enough?

The Wildlands would contain any and or all terrestrial environments known to Earth, with the caveat that all of the regions of the Wildlands contain waterways that directly connect/feed into King Crocodile's swamp, so that, if His Majesties so chooses, he can go anywhere.

Ooh, I like that! No matter where the animals way go, every watering hole carries the risk of King Crocodile preying upon them. It certainly helps make him a much more active Darklord within his domain, as opposed to simply staying in his swamp and being as stagnant as the water around him.

The idea of the Wildlands having all types of terrestrial environments I think really fits into the idea of the Wildlands being truly wild, though I suppose that pre-existing maps of the Steaming Lands Cluster would be left somewhat inaccurate by that metric. But honestly, given how fraught with errors pre-20th century map-making has been historically speaking, I wouldn't let something like that stop such a good idea. In which case, it might be worth looking at the various different types of biomes/ecoregions that exist on Earth and seeing where they might correspond to the Wildlands. If anything, the Wildlands might be even more of a patchwork than most domains in terms of its ecology, but I feel like that might also be stepping on Markovia's toes (especially with the efforts taken by Mephisto to square the prior Markovian geography with its current position and how that ties into the stitched-together nature of both the Broken Ones made by Dr. Markov and Dr. Markov himself.

Here are a few biomes that might spark ideas, and I tried to highlight the ones that I believe are already present in the Wildlands-as-written:

• Desert and Xeric Shrublands

• Tropical and Subtropical Moist Broadleaf Forests

• Tropical and Subtropical Dry Broadleaf Forests

• Tropical and Subtropical Coniferous Forests

• Temperate and Broadleaf Mixed Forests

• Temperate Coniferous Forests

• Boreal Forests and Taiga

• Tropical and Subtropical Grasslands, Savannas, and Shrublands

• Temperate Grasslands, Savannas, and Shrublands

• Flooded Grasslands and Savannas

• Montane Grasslands and Shrublands

• Tundra

• Mediterranean Forests, Woodlands, and Shrubs

• Mangroves

• Large Rivers

• Large River Headwaters

• Large River Deltas

• Small Rivers

• Large Lakes

• Small Lake Ecosystems

• Xeric Basins

Any thoughts on flora, fauna, and native horrors that might be found in either the regions that are probably canon or the ones that might be added onto the Wildlands?