removed
Gazetteer of the Grey
Tue, 2007-08-28 17:23
#1
Gazetteer of the Grey
Wed, 2007-08-29 11:06
#3
Gazetteer of the Grey
Oh, and I love the town of plague-ites, too. The idea of staying away from the wasting apathy of the Gray Wastes by continually existing in a state of agonizing anguish from various diseases is great. May I steal a few of these ideas for some of the stuff I'm doing? I had an idea about a type of plant that would fit well into the Irmine Sul, and I can think of quite a few interesting twists for Glebe Pathosis.
Wed, 2007-08-29 12:19
#4
Gazetteer of the Grey
May I steal a few of these ideas for some of the stuff I'm doing?
Go for it, yourself and any other project contributors. The moment I posted it stopped being mine and became ours. Can't ever fault you for asking though. 
Thu, 2007-08-30 23:40
#5
Gazetteer of the Grey
The things I'm thinking about right now (still writing up the flavor text):
What happens when several magical plagues infect a single target and begin to interact? Either a weird-ass prestige class or a new type of plague, that's what! (I think a plague-bearer prestige class would be hellishly awesome).
Blood-nettles, a type of thorn-seed that grows rampantly in Irmine Sul. When it pricks someone (causes at least one point of damage), the thorn-seed promptly begins to grow--using blood as its chief source of sustenance. It literally grows inside your very system, spreading very quickly through flesh and veins, sprouting barbs and thorns all the while. Death is violent, messy, and horrifying, but some crazy bastards use it as a way to stave off the Fade or something-something else (dunno D:).
A Bleak Cabal group who takes the whole bleak thing to the next level--through imbibing a substance called blackwater (see below), they slowly but steadily become so infused with apathy and the Fade that they literally have become hollow--monochrome silhouettes of gray that shatter like ceramic and have nothing but shadow and smoke inside of them.
Blackwater, a substance produced from water that has soaked the corpses of soldiers who 1) no one remembers, and 2) died in a battle no one remembers. The water becomes infused with despair and eventually becomes a weak rift to negative energy plane. When corpses are left to soak in it for a day, they become reanimated as low-level zombies that immediately attack any living target and drag it into the blackwater (to produce more zombies). This process is thought to have once been the part of some strange building project in the astral that was using zombies for cheap labor, and decided to up their workforce by making the zombies drag dead bodies into the water, and told the zombies to 'make as many zombies as possible' so the zombies started KILLING people and dragging them into the water (resulting in the death of everyone involved in the building project).
The Hollows (see above) drink this stuff extensively, hollowing them out. They also harbor dreams of taking large quantities of it to the Astral and infusing the corpses of Dead Gods with it. For kicks? To see what a re-animated God will do? Just for the futility of it all? I don't know.
Fri, 2007-08-31 06:57
#6
Gazetteer of the Grey
Blackwater is already taken in stormwrack and greywater is really more accurate anyway. I dunno what, but it needs a diferent name because blank-water is a bit overused as is.
Fri, 2007-08-31 11:26
#7
Gazetteer of the Grey
Fair point!
I'm torn between whether defining the substance (whatever it's name) as something produced by soaking forgotten corpses in water, or an actual alchemical substance produced by mages.
The latter would be hilarious if it was tied to a renovation project for a city made by mages where they were using undead labor, and decided to save time by producing a zombie-making liquid (which backfired when the zombies just mindlessly went about making more zombies as efficiently as possible--by killing people--once the corpses ran out).
However, the former may imply that there are vast underground stretches of veins in Oinos composed entirely of forgotten soldiers slain in forgotten battles. The idea that these veins are so thick and huge that they can be mined--they poison water supplies with the substance--hell, maybe mining operations to try and retrieve the metal or weapons--is fascinating to me. I mean, an entire layer built out of mostly the bodies of forgotten soldiers and weapons of war? That's pretty cool, I think (even if it is a little Acheron-ish).
Mon, 2007-09-03 04:59
#8
Gazetteer of the Grey
Haven't read through all of this, but I have to agree it's great stuff.
I'll comment on the locations one by one as I find the time.
Glebe Pathosis:
I like! To fit in better with the project, though, it'd be great to have some kind of focus on either Night Hags or Hordlings (or both). You already wrote about both races being present here, but I think we need something more project-oriented.
A good idea would be to include an important Night Hag or Hordling character. Granny Vials sounded like a Night Hag (though you didn't say so explicitly), maybe she could come into focus a bit more? At the moment, the 'loths seem more important at this place than our featured races...
Mon, 2007-09-03 06:17
#9
Gazetteer of the Grey
Glebe Pathosis:
I like! To fit in better with the project, though, it'd be great to have some kind of focus on either Night Hags or Hordlings (or both). You already wrote about both races being present here, but I think we need something more project-oriented.
Then, want the Hags be in any focus at all? Yes, I also got the impression that Granny Vials was a Hag and I think this character and city perfectly reflect the subtleness of the Hags' business on the planes. They ain't just the type for being in the spotlight, rather doing their twisting and haunting where they don't get too much involved in anything (exceptions only to proof the rule).
Mon, 2007-09-03 06:25
#10
Gazetteer of the Grey
I didn't mean "focus" from an in-character point of view, but from the point of view of the reader - i.e. the player or DM. Right now, the article (as much as I like it) would fit better in a project focussed on Yugoloths or on the Gray Waste in general, but not so much in a Night Hags & Hordlings project. That's what I meant 
Mon, 2007-09-03 07:12
#11
Gazetteer of the Grey
Okay, now I got the point. I really thought on the Waste in general.
*edit: So why not include Granny Vials as sample-Hag in chapter.. uhm, what was it.. 6?
Mon, 2007-09-03 08:13
#12
Gazetteer of the Grey
As I was writing, I did suspect that thse entries were a tad too generalised - especially now Joyblood's defined the settup of the project a little more extensively. In the end I decided to leave the locations as they were rather than try to shoe-horn in a ton of Hag and Hordling references, mainly becuase my information on both races is so sketchy. With threads on Night Hags and Hordlings now out in the project, once I (or I want to stress, anyone else) has ideas for integrating them better, they should just shout out. Once we have a clearer image of how we'll be portraying these fiends (especially hordlings) I can easilly go back in and tweak as necessary (they're all really first draft at present; no point doing achres of work until I know if you want them). To be honest, I probably read the project like Kay did (apols if I'm about to get this wrong Kay), reading it as 'about the Grey Waste - featuring hags and hordlings' rather than concentrating on those races specifically. Bare this in mind for when you read Haidoupolis, which basically has no hags or hordling references at all. I wont just yank it from the thread however, in case someone has any cool ideas about utilising it.
Granny Vials.... did I not actually say she was a grey sister? I will see about adding a full NPC writeup too, with probably a lot more on how she relates/influences to the budding town (originally I envisioned her as having considerable subtle influence on things, but having to maintain the illusion of weakness and submissiveness to avoid the wrath of the Loths). Stats would probably be helpful in her case anyway, since she's been twisted by various diseases.
Mon, 2007-09-03 09:16
#13
Gazetteer of the Grey
To be honest, I probably read the project like Kay did (apols if I'm about to get this wrong Kay), reading it as 'about the Grey Waste - featuring hags and hordlings' rather than concentrating on those races specifically.
No, this was exactly what I thought.
As for the statting-thing: I'm currently working on a class that might reflect some aspects of the Hags, namely the Twisted Druids of The Waste part, which would be (mainly) applicable to the Grey Sisters (its basically twisted druidic Shadow Magic with Incantations instead of the boring Mystery-system of Tome of Magic).
That's some awesome stuff.
Still sifting through it, but I especially love the forest of Irmine Sul.
And referring to the wasting effects as the Fade is pretty sharp, too. Having a general term for it (used among planars in slang) is a good idea; I was thinking the Wasting, but Fade has a much more 'hob-nosed' feel about it (it sounds like something normal people would say).