In Realms Forgotten & Bloody: The Moon, Lycans, & Boons

The Silvered Marches  are moon-blessed and moon-cursed. It is no coincidence that minted coins are based off of phases of the moon, or that highways are called moonways, or that silver is found in abundance here more so than anywhere else. Nor is the plague of lycans in her forests and hills a wholly natural cruelty.

In this blog post, I'm going to expand the setting of the Silvered Marches in terms of roll tables and luff, as well as some interesting and frequent boons, curses, and lunar magicks.

Three Manifestations of the Moon.
From left to right, the Waxing Child, the Night White Lady, and the Waned Princess

THE MOON & SILVER

In the Forgotten Realms traditional canon, Selune is the Goddess of the moon, also known as Our Lady Silver, the Moonmaiden, Night White Lady, and She Who Guides.

Religion in the Realms Forgotten & Bloody is a bit more complex, but before we get to that, Selune has to be addressed in full.

Selune's original name has long since been forgotten. Her creation story, that her and the goddess of darkness Shar are the first twins and deities, has likewise been lost to time. These ancient tales may not be true at all. But it is known that there is but one true Moon in all the universe; all others are her children, born from prayer itself when the various worlds, planes, and multi-verses were created.

The pronoun her is not truly accurate for Selune. While her manifestations are almost always female, Selune is sexless. Manifestations appear this way due to the creation of the many moons across the cosmos. To many mortals, such a thing appears feminine and motherly. Essentially, it is the cultural beliefs of those that acknowledge her that have shaped her physical form. This is true of all deities.

Selune's identity changes with the waning and waxing of the moon as well. This has in turn birthed a number of quasi-deities and lunar powers, and has led to powerful souls across time joining her and co-opting some of these identities. The Drow moon goddess The Dark Danceri, for example, was a Drow who escaped the curse of Lloth by joining Selune and becoming one of her phases. Likewise, the Raven Queen, known in the Silvered Marches as Quaca, Queen of the Moon joined with Selune's New Moon phase in hopes of one day finding her tragic true identity.

In the Moonwood, the only living animals are wolves.
All others are ghosts that wolves consume.

Because of the multi-identity nature of the Moon, religions, powers, curses, and blessings that manifest from it are as varied as they are many. These many identities congeal in the Silvered Marches--the first place the moon's light ever shone upon. It is, for all intents and purposes, Selune's home, her cradle, her grave, and her prison. Nowhere else in the Realms Forgotten & Bloody does the moon shine as bright, as truly, and no where else does it have such an effect on the Weave.

The Dark Side of the Moon, though unknown to the people of the Silvered Marches, is a colonized place. It is here that drow Matrons build their Celestial Gardens, medusae petrify demons and devils to add to the moon's size, illithid plan secret invasions, and shadar-kai looking for tragedies build grim outposts. This is a setting for another time, however.

LIST OF LUNAR ASPECTS RECOGNIZED IN LUARAR

Below is a list of Lunar Aspects--the various identities the moon takes on--that are recognized in the Silvered Marches. Some are bard's tales, others deities, some are scriptures, and others rumors of supernatural wanderers.

• The Waxing Child, a cultural hero who is said to go on adventures at night. Many children play pretend as her, and she is a loved protagonist in many plays.
• Our Night White Lady, a woman of power invoked by lovers and women in labor at night. Midwives pray that she does not take women away from their children during birth.
• The Waned Queen, a tragic figure whose stories represent the dangers of silver-healing. The story goes that she practiced silver-healing to save her wife, and in doing so turned her into a werewolf.
• Quaca, Queen of the Moon, a raven-masked aspect of the New Moon, central deity in Moondancing, and thought to create tragedies during the new moon.
• Silver Scriptures, a central tenant in Weavism focused on silver-healing and silver-based rituals. Teaches that silver is where all arcane knowledge originates.
• Fenris, Eater of Hope, an aspect of the waning moon and believed by Moon Druids to be the moon's central aspect; father of all wolves, mother to all lycans.
• The Moonmaiden, a crying, wandering woman of pale silver. It is said that whoever shows her love becomes a great leader, but inevitably dies a tragic death.
• Our Lady of Silver, a mythological avatar of the moon that represents the aristocracy's arcane right to rule. Merchants carry statues of her wherever they go.
• Sariel, Course of the Moon, the chief servant of all phases of the moon, guider of silver light, brother-friend to owls, and hope's shepherd. Tattoos and pendants of him are worn, and offerings made to owls in search of greater wisdom. Believed to be the one who taught humanity how to chart the course of the moon and learn many of its secrets.
• Elah, a war-deity whose lances of moonlight and falling stars are worshiped by the Bedine nomads of Desert Anauroch.
• Innkeeper Luna, a mythic innkeeper whose inn, the Sweet Dream is said to appear before those who need respite desperately.
• Dannan, Who Hunts Cities, an ancient archdruid and the first to become a lycan and ascend to his palace on the Dark Side of the Moon.
• Silvadin, Who Wanes and Waxes, the god of rebirth in Lunagricultism. Said to be he who first turned the moon, and he that guides all souls back to the Silvered Marches.
• Miada, Mother of Moonrises, avatar of the rising moon and goddess of agriculuture in Lunagricultism. Said that it is her light that enriches the soil of the southern parishes.
• Selune, the First Moon, believed by those who worship old faiths to be the true identity of the Moon, and warrior-goddess who wages an endless battle against the night sky.
• The Dark Dancer, guiding patron of surface-living drow and half-drow who is said to inspired song, dance, and to create masks needed.



Sariel, Course of the Moon.

• Argentilunacies, Silver Dragon of the Citadel, a legendary silver dragon who once fought alongside the dwarves of the now empty citadels. Disappeared hundreds of years ago, believed to have joined the moon out of despair for losing so many friends. Prophecized to one day return and smite the Nether Mountains with moonlight flame.

Silver: The Moon's Gifts to the Silvered Marches

Silver is literally the physical body of the moon. When melted, it is the moon's blood. When solid, it is the moon's bones. Thus, silver has a number of magical properties well-known by the educated.

That being said, note this: silver is not the end-all be-all. Though a cornerstone of the Silvered Marches and a cultural power, its true strength lies in the hands of the upper castes; the wealthy and aristocrats control 99% of silver flow. Rare is it that peasants gain access to the benefits of silver not provided by clerical temples, the Conclave of Silvermoon, or the governments themselves. Mining silver, because of its importance, is also a vert respectable job. While many poor do it, the money they make it but a sliver (sometimes literally) of what the powers that be do.

Because of this, cultural belief has expanded to value more than just the Moon. The warsmithing, agriculture, hunting, and arcane study are other important cultural artifacts in the Silvered Marches.

Argentilunascies is said to have breathed a
 storm of silver blades upon his foes.

Supernatural Properties of Silver

• Silver is receptive to enchantments. Most magical artifacts found in the Silvered Marches are made of silver, or contain silver portions.
• Undead cannot stay corporeal in its presence, and must flee or be destroyed. For every 10 minutes an undead is exposed to silver within 5 feet, their maximum and current hit points decrease by 10.
• Cursed creatures, including undead and lycans, are purified when silver touches them. Creatures that are cursed, are undead, or are lycans are vulnerable (take double damage) from silver weapons.
• Silver can be used as an arcane focus for arcane magic, and a divine focus for divine magic.
• 100% purified silver can be consumed. It extends one's life, makes them more magically inclined, and positively improves mood.
• Working with silver can infect one with supernatural abilities. Many sorcerers owe their power to a life working as a silver miner.
• Suits of armor made of silver grant advantage on rolls to withstand spells.
• Polished silver mirrors are not only integral scrying tools, but serve as prophetic tools if the right rituals are done.

Character Benefits of Carrying Silver

• For every 10 pounds of silver you carry, gain +1 additional hit points.
• Consuming 1mg drop of 100% purified silver (worth 1 full) restores 1 expended spell slot.
• Silver jewelry grants advantage on being possessed.
• Charms made of silver and given the proper rituals provide advantage on saving throws against being cursed.

Using Silver in Rituals

• Using silver in rituals that require expensive material components halves the price of the ritual.
• Rituals using silver done on the Full Moon are completed in half the time they normally require.

Silver-Healing

Silver-healing is an age-old tradition in the Silvered Marches, now taboo. By using silver in medicine, a host of diseases can be cleansed, the mind can be focused and made stable, magical potential can increase, and physical abilities are heightened. However, silver is horribly addictive when used in this way, and addiction leads to lycanthropy. Those who provide silver-healing are called silver-doctors, the silver-gilt, moonmen, or shades.

Finding a silver-doctor requires spending at least 5 fulls in Silvermoon. This amount of money will earn their attention. Likewise, one must sign a waiver stating that if they grow addicted, they are liable for immediate, unquestioned execution. Because of these reasons, only foreign powers and the absolute rich can ever afford silver-healing of any form.

A silver-doctor will provide healing that takes 8 hours of time. The process is strange; a drip of molten silver, cooled through spells, is set up as an IV drip into the arm of the recipient. Prayers to the moon and arcane spells are written onto the body in silver ink. Over the course of the 8 hours, miraculous healing can be done.

For every session of silver-healing done, make a saving throw (Wisdom DC 15 or vs poison). On a failure, you have the seed of addiction. Make another saving throw for the next 10 days when the moon rises if you do not receive additional silver healing. If you fail more than you succeed, you are addicted and will pay any amount to receive more silver-healing. After a month, make one last saving throw (Wisdom DC 20 or vs death). On a failure, you become a lycan. On a success, make another 10 days of saving throws, as per the above rules. If you ever succeed on more saving throws than you've failed during these 10 day periods, you break your addiction.

Silver-healing is how resurrection is done in the Silvered Marches. If you are brought back to life, you have an automatic addiction to silver-healing until broken.

 Cooled silver kept liquid is famed across Faerun.

Services Provided through Silver-Healing

Additional fulles are added to the initial 5

• Restore all HP (including putting maximum HP back at its normal amount) - 2 additional fulles.
• Restore a lost limb - 1 additional full per lost limb.
• Cleanse or restore mind to sanity - standard price.
• Enhance mind (gain +1 Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma modifier) - 3 additional fulles.
• Enhance body (gain +1 Strength, Dexterity, and Constiution) - 3 additional fulles.
• Enhance magical ability (gain an additional spell slot at a level you can cast) - 2 additional fulles per spell slot level.
• Polish magical ability (learn a cantrip) - standard price.
• Gain magical ability (gain 1 level in magic-user or sorcerer) - 5 additional fulles.
• Become powerful (gain +1 class level) - 100 additional fulles.
• Break curse - 2 additional fulles.
• Resurrect - 100 additional fulles.
• Become hearty (immunity to disease/poison for 6 months + gain 30 hit points) - 10 additional fulles.

New Magical Item: Silvered Spellbooks

Wondrous item, rare (attunement required by wizards or other spellbook-using classes)

A Silvered Spellbook.

A Silvered Spellbook is given to the Silverhands of the Conclave of Silvermoon, as well as to adventurers who prove themselves as positive impacts on the Silvered Marches. It is a spellbook bound in silver, whose pages made of liquid silver that become stable when read or written upon.

When attuned to a Silvered Spellbook, it serves as an arcane focus. Spells cast while using the Silvered Spellbook have advantage on spell attack rolls against undead, lycans, or cursed creatures, who also have disadvantage on saving throws against these same spells. The Silvered Spellbook also counts as 40 pounds of silver and grants the various properties mentioned above when used, save for the suit of armor property.

LYCANS

It is peasants that bare the brunt
Of lycan cruelty.

Lycans, known regionally as the moon-kissed or moon-hated, are shapeshifters born from the moon itself. Or, to be more accurate, their obsession and interaction with the moon.

The first moon-kissed are recorded as having appeared nearly 2,000 years ago. Strange rituals were done to consume the moon's light, leading to a bodily change into that of a wolf--the beast that first worshiped the moon and her first champions. These rituals are known now, but forbidden in all cities as taboo. It is simple: by imbibing large amounts of silver, the shift begins to happen.

It is akin to possession, this shift. With the waning and waxing of the moon, your mind grows erratic. Predatory instincts blossom in your chest, your sense of who you are ebbs and flows, as does your memory, your love, your respect for others. At the peak, when the moon is full, the wolf erupts from within. Your skin breaks apart, hair grows through, your teeth elongate--you become a werewolf in true; moon-fanged, angry, no longer caring of friend or foe, hateful of all outside the moon's shadow.

Intelligent Lycans are spoken of in rumor, superstition.
They're said to be conspirators seeking to spread
their curse as far & wide as possible.

Across the history of the Silvered Marches has the imbibing of silver been used for various purposes. Increasing one's life, gaining more strength, improving one's magical talents. Churches have built up around this imbibing and silver-healing is something that Luarar is famed for. But the dangers have long since outweighed the benefits. Addicts who become lycans have torn apart the countryside more than once, and many of these monsters still haunt the southern parishes. Thus, silver-healing is offered only to the rich few, and only in small amounts, and closely watched over with the threat of execution hanging over the heads of those that abuse it.

The Moonwood alone is exception to this restraint. Druids of the Circle of the Moon who worship their namesake and wish to have a seat amongst her power freely consume raw silver and ethereal ghost-flesh. In doing so, they gain the power to shift into powerful animals, namely wolves and direwolves. All Moon Druids are werewolves. Inside of their precious forest, they freely hunt and indulge in their addictions, hoping to grow closer to the Moon proper. They are led by the legendary Fenris--an aspect of the moon born in the Astral Sea who fell to the Realms Forgotten & Bloody who knows how long ago. Under his hateful shadow do they thrive.

Rare is it that these Moon Druids leave their Moonwood. They trade lumber, meat, and skins in exchange for silver and stay to themselves. Those that leave are hunted down by their kin and dragged back to these secretive haunts. During these times, Silvermarch's Knights in Silver are told to protect the southern parishes from the appetites of super-packs descending from the forest. Though careful not to bring too much ruin with them, every time a super-pack descends is a time of calamity where many inadvertently end up dead. More on Moon Druids in a future post.

Werewolf hunting is common north of the Nether Mountains.
Only desperate adventurers take such jobs.

Most horrendous of all is the ability for lycanthropy to spread. A werewolf's fangs are the fangs of the moon. Any that their pierce has a chance of becoming moon-kissed themselves. There are known cures to this, but the herbs needed are found either far beyond the Silver Marches or deep in the Moonwood. Thus, the most often cure is simple execution.

If You Are Moon-Kissed

1. While the moon wanes, you become morose, depressed. You reject things you once enjoyed, people you once loved, and only feel satisfied at night and when outside.
2. While the moon waxes, you grow aggressive, angry, and lash out easily. You no longer care for the things you once cared about; responsibilities evaporate, alongside respect for others.
3. While the moon is full, you transform. You shed your skin as a snake would and your anger towards those that are not moon-kissed blossoms into a violent rage.
4. While the moon is new, you regain all sense of who you are. Often this comes with guilt, despair, or liberating freedom.
5. Once you've enjoyed this cycle once, you can choose to embrace the moon, allowing you to freely transform into your werewolf and direwolf forms; or, you can reject the moon and suffer this cycle again and again until you eventually fall in, die, or are cured.
6. If you embrace the moon, the moon retroactively possesses you so that you were always possessed. You forget your life beforehand, and your entire brain is reworked to be a lycan in true.

Curing Lycanthropy

Embracing the moon is synonymous
With fiendish worship in Luarar.

• Limeflower, found in the Moonwood, Chult, and across the Sea of Fallen Stars, eases the cycle, allowing one to remain relatively stable. If enough is taken, and mixed with numerous other herbs, incenses, and strange rituals, silver bleeds from your body, taking with it the lycan's curse.
• Delving into the Underdark and the Veins of the Earth makes it impossible for the cycle to take hold. You are always in your "moon wane" state-of-mind and, if you can resist going back to the surface (a saving throw of Wisdom or against spells death every 12 hours), you vomit up silver & curse alike.
• Remove Curse or Greater Restoration or a Wish all strip the curse from the body.
• Death & resurrection sees the body reborn without the curse.

Werewolf Benefits

• While transformed, you gain the Strength, Dexterty, and Constitution ability scores of a werewolf, an additional 30 hit points, and a werewolf's attacks and features, as per your system of choice.
• Silver weapons do double damage to you.
• While not transformed, you gain an increased movement speed of 20 feet, and +1 to your Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution modifiers.
• You lose all respect for material goods and non-lycans, to the point where you think killing them is better than letting them live in their wretched state.

CREATE A WEREWOLF NPC

Roll on the following tables to create a werewolf for your games.

Life Before Transformation

1. Silver miner.
2. Farmer or farmhand.
3. Magic-user at the Conclave of Silverhand.
4. Adventurer.
5. Knight in Silver.
6. Noble or aristocrat.
7. Religious acolyte, cleric, or cultist.
8. Moon Druid,
9. Merchant.
10. Foreign visitor.

Why You Transformed

1. A broken mind required silver-healing. You became addicted.
2. A broken body required silver-healing. You became addicted.
3. Hateful of your own weakness, you consumed silver to prove you were strong.
4. A super pack descended and left you marked and your family dead.
5. A ravaging lycan crossed your path and left you cursed.
6. Praying to the moon for aid, you found yourself moon-kissed.
7. Desiring freedom from society's chains, you went into the Moonwood and joined the druids.
8. Wolves haunt your dreams, and eventually you became one.
9. After killing a direwolf, it cursed you to carry on its legacy.
10. You wanted revenge on someone more powerful than you, and threw everything away to get it.

Omen Heralding your Arrival

1. Wolves gather en masse, howling to a moon no other can see.
2. The moon is visible in the sky despite the fact that it is day.
3. The moon is clear, even during the Season of Thunder when clouds hide the sky.
4. Silver begins to melt and form strange puddles on the ground.
5. There is total silence, as if all animals were hiding.
6. A strange howl cuts through the night wind.
7. Ghost doe run across fields, fleeing something vicious.
8. Sudden anger blossoms in the minds of all who worship the moon.
9. Like a wall of electricity slammed into you, every hair along your spine stands on end.
10. Bloody claw marks stain tree, soil, and home alike.

Your Horrific Howl Sounds Like

1. A hundred wolves howling at once.
2. Flesh being torn and bone broken.
3. The death cry of a deer being eaten alive.
4. An avalanche of snow and ice.
5. Silver blades clashing against silver blades.
6. White noise, crackling.
7. The pleas of their last victim.
8. The scream-chanting of a hundred cultists.
9. An explosion, never-ending.
10. The hateful rage of a woman twice scorned.

Color of your Fur

1. Snow covering a bloodied corpse.
2. Dirt turned to mud by viscera.
3. A night sky bathed in starlight.
4. An aurora twisting underneath the moon.
5. Shadows over snowcapped mountains.
6. A man's chest torn open.
7. Blackness found only on the dark side of the moon.
8. Tree bark clawed by an alpha wolf.
9. The ethereal white of a ghost doe.
10. Darkness in which the golden eyes of a wolf shines.

Unique Ability

1. Having eaten so much ghostly flesh, you can become ethereal at will.
2. See trails of blood-smell leading towards living creatures.
3. Your shadow is a lycan too, leaves your body, and hunts alongside you.
4. Your shed blood becomes 1d4 silver direwolves that aid you in your hunts.
5. When howling to the moon, prophecies of the night's hunt fill your mind. Gain advantage on all attack rolls against 1 target of your choice.
6. Claws and teeth made of silver allow you silver's bless'd properties.
7. Those that hear your howl must save (Wisdom or vs paralysis) or be consumed by fear and become paralyzed.
8. Can cast the spell moonbeam fired from your mouth.
9. Can scale surfaces as if a spider.
10. You teleport into shadows at night.

Lycans grow more monstrous the longer they go without feeding;
And more twisted the longer they go without silver.

BASIC MOON RELIGIONS

While Lunagricultism and Moondancing are the two most popular religions in Luarar, they will get their own blog posts. Below, some basic shared pslams of moon worship are given, as well as blessings and boons.

Basic Pslams

• Bless'd thou who judges not by sex, not by destiny, not by work.
• Wicked are thus those who hunt without eating.
• A sliver of silver is worth only the love in which it is handed to another.
• At night, turn off all lights not needed for art and appreciate the glow of Our Night White Lady.
• Children under 10 years wane and wax law and chaos; of no crime are they guilty, but a lesson must be taught.
• Let those who ask for succor find it, so long as they have teeth and not fangs, love and not hate.
• Tragedy is to life as water to the seed; fortune comes, fortune goes, and wisdom is born.

Worshiping

When you finish a rest and say an earnest prayer to the moon (including any of its aspects), your GM rolls a 1d6 and gives you the following. This happens once every 24 hours, and does not happen with every prayer.

GMs, when a player makes a prayer and is eligible for one of the following benefits, roll d% in secret. Roll under their level + each prayer they've made since the last to roll on the table below.

1. A boon or blessing from the Dungeon Master's Guide.
2. An additional spell slot between 1st-5th level.
3. A free hit die for regaining hit points.
4. A d20 is rolled. You can replace 1 roll of your choice (yours or someone else's) with the number rolled before you finish another rest.
5. Dancing Lights appear and float around you, the tears of the moon itself.
6. A wolf leaves an uncommon magical item at your feet. It turns into silver dust when you begin your next rest.

A Moondancer in the midst of an arcane ritual.

In Realms Forgotten & Bloody: Spellcasting, Spell Levels, & Spell Slots

It's a legacy, but I don't like how mechanical "spell levels" and "spell slots" sounds. I want something for my 5E game(s) that sounds more authentic to the settings I run in (mainly a variant of the Forgotten Realms right now). Let it be known that in cannon FR, arcane magic is THE ART and divine THE POWER.

I'm thinking (in order of the above) - Spell Circles & Weave Knots.

Mathematic & Arithmetic + Fantasy = Spells 

Spell Circles, of which there are 9, are circles of magic upon which a magic-user acts. The weave is organized into these circles somewhat naturally; it is a tapestry of magical force that spellcasters "witness." Once witnessed, their minds are literally rewired in such a way that allows them to perfectly perform the actions required to cast a spell even under duress. Anyone who has access to any spell circle should roll a 1d12 for a trait gained from the rewiring.

1. Anything lyrical (poems, riddles, stories, etc) becomes an obsession of yours. You seek out these things, make these things, and sometimes even speak these things frequently.

2. Fear is baptized from you. Replacing it is an "arrogance response"--whenever you would normally be afraid, you instead seek to dominate whatever is triggering the response.

3. You lose the ability to read words of any languages you know or learn. Instead, whenever you see text, you see silvery images replacing the text that communicate the same ideas. When you write, you instead draw similar images.

4. Your sense of time is lengthened to the extreme (or shortened). Days feel like either hours or years; years feel like weeks or lifetimes.

5. Decide one mundane thing that makes you happy. That thing is replaced with an esoteric version of itself. For example, if you enjoyed eating, you now only enjoy eating when the North Star is obscured by clouds or when comets streak through the heavens.

6. Whenever you see your favorite color, you instead see an incredible kaleidoscope of shades replacing it.

7. Your pain response changes so that whenever you feel pain, you instead feel the strange, indescribable sensation of a tree experiencing the change of seasons.

8. You are utterly unmoored from those you love. For these people, you no longer feel any emotion, and when you begin to feel love again it quickly evaporates.

9. Your witnessing of the Weave has left you with a tick that requires you to weave your own strange tapestries whenever you take a rest.

10. Even when confined in small rooms, or with chains and rope, or surrounded by a dense forest, you feel as if you are in a vast space too big to be filled with anything else.

11. Movements of the stars and other celestial bodies take up most of your nights in viewing.

12. Suddenly made aware of a world within and beyond your own, you cannot help but lose all sense of value for material goods.

Magic-users can physically see and touch the threads they knot in their minds.

Weave Knots, of which there are many, infest a spellcaster once they witness the Weave. The more a magic-user's skill grows and the more access they gain to Spell Circles, the more weave threads knot in their minds. These threads are literal; the brains of magic-users, when dissected, are filled with ethereal, glowing knots of something that unravels and dissipates. Magic-user's who are memorizing their spells, or praying for powers from deities, or otherwise practicing magic at all are literally knotting these threads in their minds. Once the spell is cast, the thread is untied.

When all mechanical spell slots--now Weave Knots--are spent (now untied), roll 1d6 to see how you change. This change is reverted the moment you regain at least one tied Weave Knot.

1. You are impossibly morose; almost anything that happens or that someone says puts you in an ill mood.

2. You can no longer see colors, instead shades of grey.

3. Your sense of smell and taste are lost, and your skin goes partially numb.

4. Suddenly, the air, your clothing, your hair, everything feels much heavier. It is a struggle to stand upright, and walking takes momentous effort.

5. Your thirst and appetite increase exponentially; no matter how much you eat and drink you do not fill full, but you do feel very ill once you've eaten too much.

6. Looking at things that are put together, like houses, suits of armor, or even books gives you sharp, stinging headaches.

Witnessing the Weave -- psychadelic, symbol-riddled, almost grounded but not quite.

Duskwood Tree

These ill effects are known well to any magic-user, especially wizards in their schools and cabals. Collectively, they are called the Six Punishments. While apprentices are routinely trained to untie all knots so that they can function under the effects of the Six Punishments, there are a number of ways to give a "boost" around them. Namely, drugs.

THE AURORA MUSHROOM, found across Faerun, is named for the strange colors it lets off every night. Eating it alleviates the effects of the Six Punishments for upwards of 8 hours. Additionally, it gives a sense of giddiness to the ingestor, makes it so colors they see melt into one another, and strips them of any magical knowledge for the duration. A favorite amongst sorcerers.

DUSKWOOD MILK, the name of the milky white sap of the Duskwood tree, when drank in small amounts, alleviates the Six Punishments for upwards of 14 hours. However, all sensory input is interfered with; sounds are intense, touching others is either incredibly unfun or too much fun, and staring at bright lights is very, very difficult.

BLOODLETTING, specifically from cuts made underneath the eyes, softens the effects after 10 minutes, and completely counteracts them after 1 hour. Not an enjoyable process; it requires making several cuts every 10 minutes until the Six Punishments ends. The preferred method of practiced wizards.

INCENSE using blood of the spellcaster, blood of another spellcaster, and leaves from the Golden Wand tree alleviate the Six Punishments within seconds, and continues to alleviate them so long as the incense is burning and actively breathed in, regardless of one's ability to smell. Used often by clerics and bards.

REKNOTTING the weave knots instantaneously undoes any effect of the SIx Punishments. This is difficult, however, often taking 1-8 hours to complete depending on the training of the magic-user and the spell circles involved. The most common method amongst spellcasters.

In Realms Forgotten & Bloody: The Silvered Marches

I'm doing a Forgotten Realms campaign where I rewrite the Forgotten Realms as I play through. When I say rewrite, I don't mean completely making everything up, but instead taking the framework and moving it into a direction more suited to what I'm doing.

The Sword Coast is plagued with battlefields.

The pitch of the campaign is thus: the Sword Coast is named so not just for its cliffs, but for the neverending proxy wars that plague it. The City-States of the Lord's Alliance hire bands, sellswords, organizations, factions, guilds, and so on to invade ruins, fight off threats, and claim powerful spells for them. While every city-state has a standing army, using said standing army is a mistake when you can just pay a group of powerful individuals to invade a lich's lair and steal its staff. What makes these smaller groups more useful than an army is the Adventurer Phenomenon. For reasons unknown (though many theories exist in Candlekeep) these individuals, lovingly known as adventurers to the common people, are not what they once were. Years of traveling, fighting, killing, and strange magic has suffused them with the weave. A normal man cannot kill so many others within a six second period--even few elves, despite their great ages, gain the ability to call forth meteors from the sky.

In meta-terms, adventurer's become irradiated by the Weave as they work, and this makes them far more powerful than most mundanes, and even soldiers in armies, archwizards, and so forth. What keeps these same adventurer's from eventually taking over the world is how the city-state's use them against one another. Bands and guilds rush for the same prize for their city in order to get paid handsomely. There, they kill each other over what they want. A number of organizations--namely the Harper's--ensure that no group of adventurer's teams with another, tipping the power balance. It's an organized chaos, instrumental, where the Haves make the magically empowered Have Nots fight for wealth & fame in order to remain in power.

Adventurers are more like Guts, less like your normal heroes.

The players are an adventuring band who must navigate the intense violence that is their lives. A lot of this campaign I want to examine what it means to kill things that are sentient, the weight that leaves on the soul, and the changes never-ending combat can scar otherwise good people with. Though I have a somewhat literary angle I want to explore with this campaign, I also want to embrace the hodgepodge of the Forgotten Realms. The races they picked, along with their classes, might mark them as "snowflakes" to many, but to me, the Forgotten Realms is at its best when players invoke the many races that make up its canon. That being said, my players also used the Xanathar's Guide to Everything to create a skeletal backstory; they rolled on the This Is Your Life table to give me some basic NPCs and conflicts with which to underscore this campaign with.

My players produced the following four characters they'll be starting with. I say starting, as I do expect death at some point:

Human Circle of the Moon Druid. A 52 year old woman who was always plagued with wolf dreams. Her father was a wandering scribe. Her mother, unknown. At puberty, her wolf dreams saw her become a lycan, and she murdered many people, including much of her family. In exile, she was adopted by a Circle of the Moon in the Moonwood. One of her siblings later joined on the same pretense. She lived as a hermit, even within her circle, and to their chargin, she used her herblore to help those who sought her out. She had a dwarven lover that the Circle of the Moon killed. She fled them, afraid of what they would do to her. They consistently chase her down, killing everyone she loves or bonds with out of revenge, and seeking to force her to return to them.

Githzerai Way of the Kensai Monk. A young gith born on the battlefield during an Illithid extermination mission. Said parents disappeared on this mission, leaving her to be raised by the specific monk order in Limbo that her parents were apart of. On one of her first missions, she compromised the mission to save another party member (mentioned below), leading to many of the gith dying and the Illithids escaping. This led to her exile by the order, which manifested as her being left stranded on the Material Plane. Later, she is saved by the same party member during a lycan attack in the Moonwood. The two hunted the lycan, and this is how they came into contact with the Moon Druid above.

Drow Enchantment Wizard. A young, female Drow, daughter to two escapees from the Underdark. Her mother abandoned her with her exiled sister, and his father is imprisoned--he could not escape his heritage, nor the xenophobia that others felt towards him for it. Her aunt taught her the magic of her blood and of the weave. She was saved by the GIthzerai Monk when an argument between her and a then lover led to a conflict exposing Illithid influence in the Silvered Marches. She later paid the favor back, and joined said Monk on their mission to kill the lycan that almost killed them.

Half-Elf Hexblade Warlock. A half-elf born to the planes and not the material world. Wolf dreams as a child infested him, much as they did the Moon Druid before, and eventually he became a lycan that was pulled by the wolf spirit in him to the Material World. There, he ravaged the Moonwood until the Druid player found him and stripped from him the wolf spirit, curing his lycanthropy. Said wolf spirit made a pact with the half-elf: "Allow me to act through you, and your penance shall be paid." In other words, by making this pact, the half-elf will kill all he considers evil, and thus "atone" for his sins as a lycan. A flawed ideal, but one that has joined him with the rest of the party.

Now then, with the characters described, I'll begin detailing the opening world for the campaign. It takes place in what is canonically Silverymoon and the Silver Marches. I've renamed these slightly to Silvermoon & the Silvered Marches, partially for aesthetic and partially for narrative.

Below is a primer of the Silvered Marches. Future blogposts will contain (in no particular order):

• Roll tables I create for my campaign running the region.
• Primers of the main cities.
• Legends, religions, myths, and beliefs of the region.
• Big factions/famed adventuring & mercenary bands.
• Dungeons I create
• Treasures & artifacts
• Play Reports

Werewolves haunt the Silvered Marches.

SHORT PRIMER: LURUAR THE SILVERED MARCHES

Current Year: 1993 DR

Minted Coins: Slivers (5 copper pieces in other regions), Wanes (30 Slivers), Waxes (30 Wanes), Fulls (30 Waxes)

Life Style Brackets:

Statue of Silvadin, Who Wanes & Waxes

• Squalid: Beggars who make nothing a day. Common in Silvermoon and Everlund, but not really elsewhere in the Silvered Marches.
• Poor: Making a 3 slivers a day, a wane a week, and 3 wanes a month. In the cities, enough for shared apartments, living in inns on the road, or owning and working your own farm in the southern settlements. Jobs: Lumberjacks, farmers, fishermen, starving artists, miners, waste disposal, odd jobs, cleaners, and other comparable jobs.
• Modest: Making 1 wane a day, 10 wanes a week, and a waxe a month. In the cities, enough for a studio apartment, an independent house outside the city, a nice manse in a southern settlement. Jobs: Apprentices to silversmiths & other trades, early career artisans, militiamen, fur traders, hunters, herbalists, head farmers, veteran farmworkers, servents, and other comparable jobs.
• Comfortable: Making 3 wane a day, a waxe a week, and 3 waxe a month. In the cities, a nice townhouse, living lavishly in the southern settlements. Jobs: Skilled artisans in guilds, artists of all stripes that are doing well; experienced silversmiths, alchemists, hunters, and blacksmiths; militia officers, many merchants, clerics.
• Wealthy: Making 5 waxe a day, 50 waxe a week, and 3 full a month. Manses in cities, complete with courtyards and servants. Fortified keeps in the southern settlements, though small. Jobs: Famed artists, vaunted merchants, legendary guild workers (including silversmiths, blacksmiths, alchemists, etc), apprentice wizards, adventurers, brewers, architects, and other highly skilled jobs.
• Aristocratic: Making 5 fulls a day, 50 fulls a week, and 150 fulls a month. They are disgustingly rich. Castles, keeps, whatever they want. Jobs: Landed nobles, wizards (enchanters, mainly), guild councilmen, owners of fur-trading and mining operations/businesses, incredibly skillful merchants, pontiffs, generals, and other such high brass positions.

Popular Faiths: The following faiths are the most well-known cults & religions in the Silvered Marches. Others exist, but with very few followers. Expect more info in future posts. Most people dedicate themselves to one main faith, while giving alms to the others in times of need or crisis.

• Lunagricultism - Worshippers of Chauntea (Goddess of Life/Agriculture/Summer) and Silvanus (God of Natural Cycles/Cataclysms/Deep Forests). Known regionally as Miada, Mother of Moonrises and Silvadin, Who Wanes and Waxes. A religion based around lunar cycles and life-giving.
• Moondancing - Worshipers of the Raven Queen (Goddess of Death/Forgotten Memories/Tragedies). Known locally as Quaca, Queen of New Moons. A religion based around rituals and festivals that put to rest the tragedy-chained souls of the Silvered Marches. Clerics are known curse breakers.
• Weavism - Worshippers of Mystra (Goddess of Magic/Spells/the Weave), Selûne (Goddess of the Moon/Silver/Questers), and Azuth (God of Magical Craft/Wizards/Arcane Study). Collectively and regionally known as the Three Scriptures. Each is considered less a god and more a process, act, or methodology.
• Smithians - Worshipers of Gond (God of Smithing/Silversmithing/Metalworking), Helm (God of Guardians/Protection/Vigilance), and Ilmater (Endurance/Martyrs/Perseverance). Collectively and regionally known as the Long Year. Each represents both 1/3 seasons (Summer/Winter/Thunder) as well as a defense of the Silver Marches (Silver Weapons/Land-Riders/Heroic Death).

Demographics for Non-Enemy Races: (On a two-axis system of Majority/Minority and Plentiful/Uncanny. Majority/Uncanny=in power, but smaller numbers. Minority/Plentiful=low social power, larger numbers) - (Races not mentioned below are one-offs and very rare in the Silvered Marches)

Common/Classical Races

• Humans - Majority/Plentiful
• Half-Elves - Majority/Plentiful
• Elves - Majority/Uncanny (Moon Elves)
• Dwarves - Majority/Uncanny (Shield Dwarves)
• Halflings - Minority/Plentiful (Ghostwise)
• Gnomes - Minority/Uncanny (Rock Gnomes)
• Half-Orc - Minority/Uncanny

Uncommon Races

• Aasimar/Tiefling (always born in twin sets) - Majority/Uncanny
• Goliath - Majority/Plentiful
• Firbolg - Minority/Uncanny
• Centaur - Minority/Uncanny
• Aarakocra - Majority/Uncanny
• Drow - Minority/Uncanny

Monster Races (from Volos) - All monster races are kill-on-sight unless they are marked with the Silver Badge, marking them as members of some adventuring guild or servant to some wizard or lord. For these races, the two-axis population categories are for their presence in the wilderness and not in the cities.

• Orks - Majority/Plentiful 
• Bugbears - Minority/Uncanny
• Hobgoblins - Majority/Uncanny
• Goblins - Minority/Plentiful
• Kobolds - Minority/Uncanny
• Yuan-Ti Pureboods - Minority/Uncanny

Citadel Sundabar, the Last Dwarven Citadel

Know her as Luruar, the Silvered Marches, where the moon is ever-full and the grounds ever hunted.

Religions dedicated to goddesses of magic, ancient deities of silver & wolves, and mysterious lords of bloodied mountains tell much of this land's history. Sense humanity first came to this northern strip--fertile, with clean rivers and deep silver mines--night-horrors have haunted them. Lycans have always lived in the Moonwood. Pale orks have always festered beneath gloom-black hills. Were it not for those same mines that humanity came here lusting for, they would have never been able to fight off these ills. But silver-smithed swords, silvered arrows, polished mirrors all have rebuked the forest and mountains, allowed for the placing of bricks for cities, allowed for culture to blossom where before there was just flesh torn from flesh. The marches are aptly named, too, for the constant battles over centuries against northern Jotun, pale ork hosts, and lycan hyper-packs that haunt her.

Foothills of the Nether Mountains.

Dwarven Citadels sit abandoned along the Nether Mountains and the Rauvins. They were here before humanity, but they could not last. Betrayed too many times for too many causes both just and foul, the dwarves fell to a never-ending, always-boiling host of pale orks, dragon-worshipping hobgoblins, lycan raids, and their own greed. Their citadels are now ghost-cities. Only one remains: the curse'd Sundabar. Treeless, soulless, here prisoners are sent alongside adventuring parties to wage wars that ply deep into the earth in exchange for silver, gold, gem-enslaved fire elementals, and the blood-night magick stolen from orks pale & horrid.

Two massive woods sprawl across Luruar. The always-mentioned Moonwood is the haunt of lycans, druids, and ghosts wracked by tragedy. The only animals in this forest are worgs, direwolves, and lesser wolves. Everything else is a spirit as well. These same spirits, at night, can be devoured, and their flesh youthens those that consume them. Thus, the Moonwood's wolf packs are old as elves and large as armies. Druids there worship them, sleep with them, care for them, and in turn are taught buy them the secrets of the moon. But for reasons known not to outsiders, these forces leave not the Moonwood less something truly foul boils from the roots of the Nether Mountains which they border. Every month, when the moon goes black, three tons of silver are offered to the Moonwood. When the moon returns, trees old have marched from the heart of the forest to be cut down, and old wolves are hung from the branches to be skinned. This pact, forged by the 1st Silverhand ages ago, has remained the lifeblood for the capital city-state of Silvermoon.

The Coldwood bordering Luruar's northern reaches is untouched by all. The evergreens here are all dyed white, the ground ever-frozen. What dwells within is known: Jotun-children, or as they call themselves, the Ettin. These two-headed giant-descendents have no society as humanity recognizes it. Instead, they are scattered, underground-dwelling hunters who live off direwolf and rothe flesh, and the flesh of any who venture within. Twice a year the capital city-state of Silvermoon launches powerful adventure groups into the Coldwood. Those that return come back with goods the Ettin have plundered, enough furs to help buoy the economy, and enough time for lumberjacks to pull lumber from those hills before both cold and monster grow too savage to stay.

A silvered adventurer meets an ancient dire wolf in the Moonwood.

Luruar's southern lands are long-since tamed. The High Forest, Far Forest, and Lost Peaks have become farm fields and silver-mining operations. Silvermoon sits at the fett of the Nether Mountains, ruling as a powerful magocracy that holds the Silvered Marches together. Other large settlements include Sundabar (mentioned above), the walled merchant-city of Everlund, and the hunting halls of Jalanthar. Settlements in the worklands support the 4 Silvered Cities, and tribal nomads north of the Nether Mountains hunt and sell to further supplement the economy. Rivers bring in textiles, steel, and other "cultured" goods, bought usually with silver, weapons, armors, and foodstuffs (namely beef, goat, milk, cheese, ale, and nuts).