Divinity on a Budget

Antasso's Blessings on the Cheap

Step this way, adventurer, and receive your blessings! Any religion or all of them! You're headed over the bridge, aren't you? I can tell. I'm sure you'll make it back just fine, but shouldn't you make your peace just in case...?

Livio Antasso operates perhaps the most egalitarian temple in the world. As a young man, he traveled the world becoming anointed, ordained, and generally trained in the rites of nearly every tradition from the old gods to the new. Whether he truly has the spiritual authority to perform all the sacred rituals he knows is anybody's guess, but Antasso certainly seems to think so, and he does so regularly.

Antasso's Blessings on the Cheap has a prime location at the very end of the Street of Wonders, mere feet from the Iron Bridge to Beast's Landing. He gets adventurers coming and going, exhorting them to make their peace or seek blessings of good fortune on the way out, and thank their god on the way back in. Each of these services, of course, costs a small fee. Antasso has a number of acolytes working under him, who perform the simple rites and keep the temple clean. They are, without exception, attractive and charming young men and women, and they spend their time hanging out on the street in front of the temple trying to attract business. Most of them are devoted to a single god, but Antasso considers one acolyte, Nemeria Wist, his protege and has been training her in all the rites and signs he knows.

Antasso's is a fairly large building cobbled together of wood and fabric. The interior is divided into multiple small chambers by colorful hanging cloths from many lands, all centered around a large main "chapel" (really just an open area with a driftwood altar) where the important rituals take place. Seekers of small blessings may be pulled into one of the side rooms by an acolyte, or whoever is handy may just perform the blessing out on the street.

1 bit	An acolyte says a few words and maybe sprinkles you with holy water
1 cp	An acolyte performs a proper blessing in the chapel
1 ss	Antasso himself performs a proper blessing, with incense and everything
1 gc	Weddings, baptisms, funerals, etc.

The Wards of Lorden: Beast's Landing

Last of Lorden's three wards is Beast's Landing on the southern shore of the Gwaun. It is totally overrun with monsters, and its neighborhoods have taken on terrifying new aspects.

Beast's Landing

Generations ago, as Lorden first grew, a mayor named Bast built the Iron Bridge and pushed the city to expand to the southern shore of the Gwaun, and the new neighborhood was named Bast’s Landing in her honor. Once it was overrun by beastmen from the south, the wags at the popular Lorden Opinionator broadsheet re-christened it “Beast’s Landing,” and the name stuck.

There are many riches to be found here, as it was abandoned in a hurry by merchant and beggar alike. The only trouble is that monsters of all sorts have made their homes in the tumbledown houses, shops, temples, sewers, outhouses, bath houses, and so on. The old divisions of Beast’s Landing have mostly been forgotten, and its “neighborhoods” are all nicknames given to notorious areas of the ruin by adventurers lucky enough to make it out again.

Beast's Landing has six "neighborhoods": The Burn Ward, The Labyrinth, The Pudding, Rat Island, The Safe Zone, and Shitburg.

The Burn Ward

A massive fire eradicated block after block of wooden houses in what was once a middle-class residential neighborhood. Well picked over by adventurers, the Burn Ward has few valuables to offer, but its burnt- out houses and shops can be a good place to hide from roving beastmen as they also have no reason to come here. Sleepers should be wary, however, of a previously-unknown species of night vulture that has a taste for burned flesh but will eat the living in a pinch.

The Labyrinth

This was once a massive temple-complex dedicated to the New God. Multiple small churches, offices, libraries, and outbuildings make up an imposing compound, but the real wonder is underground: an intricate series of service tunnels connect all the buildings in the complex, and are rumored to extend to a few other spots on the southern shore as well. One retired adventurer even claims he was held captive by a minotaur named Phobos who lives in the Labyrinth, and who only released him to warn others against going there, but nobody believes him.

The Pudding

The Pudding was the site of the last and largest battle between the soldiers of Lorden and the beastmen invaders before Beast’s Landing was abandoned. Once a great public park and garden, the earth here was churned into a foul slurry of blood, shit, urine and mud as the two sides fought in a torrential rain. Twenty years later the ground hasn’t recovered, and veteran adventurers speak of “sloggin’ through the Pudding” to get to other areas of the Landing. The terrain isn’t the only hazard, though, as monsters come here often to dine on its broad selection of corpses.

Rat Island

The name says it all for Rat Island, a small, rocky outcropping connected to Beast’s Landing by a rickety aerial cable car system that is inexplicably still running after all these years. Each of the six cars can fit four human-sized creatures comfortably, and cycles between Rat Island and the Safe Zone on the shore at about half an hour for a round trip. The island itself is overrun with rats of all sizes, who seem to be forming a society among the ruins of an old hermitage. How they’ve gained intelligence isn’t clear, but they are certainly reproducing and mutating at an alarming rate.

The Safe Zone

The nickname “Safe Zone” is used somewhat ironically, as nowhere in Beast’s Landing is really safe; you’ll often hear an adventurer say “We didn’t even make it past the bloody Safe Zone before the damned beastmen scented us!” But as the section of the southern shore where the Iron Bridge lets out, the Safe Zone sees the highest number of adventurers, so the beastmen are more likely to avoid it than the other neighborhoods of the Landing. It’s made up mostly of old shops and homes, with a few small parks set among the buildings.

Shitburg

Once a prosperous residential neighborhood called Bromberg, this area is known for having the densest population of the meanest, toughest beastmen. Their brutal kings make their homes here in a vile mockery of civilized life, and are attended by hordes of lesser monsters. Novice adventurers speak of the area with awe and fear; veterans dare each other to sorties “deep in the Shit” after heavy drinking, and agree only after a few drinks more.

The Wards of Lorden: The Isle of Lorden

Next up in our series about the wards of Lorden is the Isle of Lorden, which sits in the river Gwaun with Norwood to the north and Beast's Landing to the south.

The Isle of Lorden

From their splendid houses here, the powerful once gazed out at the shipping on the Gwaun. This quickly changed when Beast’s Landing fell. Everyone who could flee did, most to Norwood and some out of Lorden entirely. The Isle is now inhabited by those without the means to leave and those who choose to live on the lawless border between civilization and chaos.

A succession of mayors has been only too happy to give away land on the Isle to anyone brave or foolish enough to stand against the beastmen. Mercenaries and adventurers beyond count make their homes in the abandoned mansions of the Isle, and prostitutes, addicts, and pickpockets mingle in its marble squares. Many have come to win fame and fortune, fighting the beastmen on the Iron Bridge or daring Beast’s Landing to loot the empty homes, shops, and temples there.

The Isle of Lorden is made up of five neighborhoods, plus the two bridges that connect it to the shroes: Alehouse Row, Backwash, Old Money, the Street of Wonders, and Toothy Town. There are also two bridges connecting it to the shores of the Gwaun: the Iron Bridge to the south and the Silk Bridge to the north.

Alehouse Row

Such a collection of warriors and madmen as the Isle boasts requires a ready supply of food and drink. Taverns, bars, public houses, liquories, winesinks, and drinking holes crowd the long avenue that is Alehouse Row. The Row is neutral territory, and usually a place of respite from the turf wars and beefs between petty adventuring crews that plague the rest of the Isle. This has also made it a popular location for shops that service adventurers’ needs.

Backwash

The poor and forgotten of the Isle live in Backwash along the high bluffs of the western shore. Years ago Backwash was what Norwood’s Bywater neighborhood is today, but the mansions of yesteryear are slowly tumbling into the river as the bluffs erode. Squatters pick a new house each year, and often hold parties to watch their old home collapse down into the water.

The Iron Bridge

Narrow and low, the mighty Iron Bridge between the Isle and Beast’s Landing it was built to be defensible against incursions from the southern shore. That decision proved prescient, as squads of mercenaries and adventurers regularly lock shields against sorties made by beastmen attempting to reach the Isle. Now and again a lone monster even breaks through.

Old Money

As the name suggests, this used to be the richest section of Lorden. At its heart is the Colossus of Downtown, a statue a hundred feet tall that has fallen with one hand outstretched towards the former Lord Mayor’s mansion. Surrounding the Colossus are the homes of the few people on the Isle who still maintain some semblance of respectability.

The Silk Bridge

The Silk Bridge connects the Isle of Lorden with Norwood on the northern shore. Tall enough for shipping to pass beneath, and wide enough for two carriages to pass each other, with walking paths overlooking the Gwaun on either side, the Silk Bridge was originally a lovely way for the wealthy to get home. Now a cluster of small shops has appeared on the shore end of the bridge as land in Norwood has become hard to find, and the shanty towns of the displaced reach farther out from the Isle end every month.

The Street of Wonders

Once Lorden’s premiere shopping district, the Street of Wonders has gotten even wilder since the fall of Beast’s Landing. Hucksters and hedge wizards ply miracles alongside colorful sellers of clockwork toys and impractical weapons from far away, and not even business partners really trust each other.

Toothy Town

The erosion of the western shore began when a huge section of the Isle collapsed into the river overnight. A few hundred yards out from Backwash, fragments of land that remained from that collapse stick up from the river like monstrous teeth. A few structures cling precariously to these islands, home to Lorden’s most desperate and devious criminals. For a few bits you can hire a coracle to take you to one, but you’re as likely to get robbed on the trip as upon arrival.

The Wards of Lorden: Norwood

We talked a bit about the three wards, or great neighborhoods, of Lorden in the last post. Time to dig in. We'll start with Norwood, the comparatively safe and wealthy area that sits on the northern shore of the Gwaun.

Norwood

Norwood is where all the city’s respectable citizens call home, but twenty years ago, it was Lorden’s center of industry. Its traditional communities of factory workers and immigrants from the lands to the north haven’t gone anywhere, and the struggle for the soul of Norwood plays out on its streets every day. Thus it has a conflicted character: new construction by elder brahmins rebuilding their favorite parks and squares from the Isle butts up against smoke-belching factories and massive blocks of worker housing.

The exodus of the powerful from the Isle of Lorden to Norwood was made official when the previous Lord Mayor moved his mansion to the border between Ghostchester and Bywater. The politically-minded now measure their influence in how many blocks their homes are from the mayor’s.

Norwood is made up of six neighborhoods: Bywater, Ghostchester, Jadegate, Market Square, Ramundsvolk, and Redglass.

Bywater

Flat-bottomed party barges alight with many-colored lamps line Norwood’s eastern shoreline, and music and laughter echo across the water from glittering mansions overlooking the river. As rich as those of Ghostchester, the denizens of Bywater care more about having a good time and impressing their friends than influencing politics. Hardly a night goes by without at least two parties in Bywater competing to be the social event of the evening.

Ghostchester

Ornate carriages clatter past each other on Ghostchester’s broad, cobbled streets; in its great squares the wealthy take coffee and debate politics. More money has been poured into Ghostchester than any other neighborhood since the abandonment of Beast’s Landing, and it shows. Entire blocks of worker housing have been converted into massive townhouses or torn down for parks, displacing the previous residents.

Jadegate

Lorden’s famed Jade Gate, which opens the city to traders from the north, has fallen into disrepair. Its green paint is faded and flaking, revealing crumbling gray stone beneath. The neighborhood around the gate hasn’t seen the same infusion of gold as some other parts of Norwood, peopled as it is mostly by itinerant traders, immigrant settlers, and the dwarfs who work the great coal mine. Jadegate does, however, have the best food.

Market Square

The heart of Norwood is the literally-named Market Square, which replaced the Isle’s Street of Wonders as the city’s primary marketplace. The Lord Mayor’s office has begun selling space in the Square proper, so it features high-end goods; traders from far lands rub elbows with local artisans and farmers in the crowded lanes that snake out from the Square like arteries from a heart.

Ramundsvolk

A few hundred years ago, settlers led by the hero Ramund came up from the wild south and settled outside Lorden’s gates. They are now an established neighborhood, recreating their old sense of community in the city. There are no taverns or inns in Ramundsvolk, as Ramund’s People famously welcome any and all to the boisterous parties they throw in their homes. You can drink, boast, hear old sagas, and even spend the night, as long as you’re a gracious guest.

Redglass

A long-ago industrial accident flooded the streets of Redglass with liquid fire, fusing its streets into a slick red surface. Horses hate it here, but then again, so does everybody else, and the only permanent residents are the workers who cram into huge tenement complexes adjacent to the factories where they live and, often, die.

Welcome to Lorden

After various boring complications in my personal life, I'm back to work on the city of Lorden, the setting for my campaign A Wager in Hell and many more adventures besides. I've commissioned a map, and watching drafts come in makes the city seem so real. I've been writing a lot about the city and the adventures therein, so I figured I'd start sharing it.

What is Lorden?

Lorden is the oldest city in the world. At least, that's how I like it. It's a weird place full of weird people who follow strange traditions and hold ridiculous titles. It sits on the river Gwaun, a wide and old river that carries considerable shipping and sees its share of piracy. I'm building it to fit in the history of Rul (the official setting of Shadow of the Demon Lord) in a general way, so I (or you, if you like) can use it there or in our own worlds. Mostly, Lorden is independent of the politics of Rul, though it has plenty of internal politics keeping it busy.

Where is Lorden?

Short answer: anywhere you want. Longer answer: Lorden wasn't part of the Empire for very long, and its history stretches far beyond its time at the edges of the Empire. This suggests a location in the south of Rul. Balgrendia is a good choice, as it has a long pre-Imperial history and was never managed very closely by the Alabaster Throne. It also has a weak central authority in King Frederick, meaning the city of Lorden itself can act more or less autonomously; lastly, Balgrendians are just weird. So that works.

Another possible location would be the March Lands, if we take Lorden to be more involved in the ongoing struggle against the beastmen coming from the Shield Mountains.

My favorite option is to place Lorden on the northern border of the Patchwork Lands-- just close enough to the March Lands and Balgrendia that the Empire could claim it, but also a part of the Patchwork tradition of independent petty states. I imagine the river Gwaun running east to the Auroral Ocean-- maybe it's even the border between the Patchwork Lands and the Empire-- and Lorden is just its own little kingdom, with some of the strange traditions of Balgrendia to the north, and only occasionally dragged into the little wars of the Patchwork Lands to the south.

Give Me An Overview of the City

Okay, pushy, geez!

The city of Lorden is falling apart. For generations uncounted it has occupied a prime location on the river Gwaun, getting rich off busy trade in both directions, but even the wealthiest city cannot resist forever the encroaching chaos of the Demon Lord’s influence. A full third of the city, the southern ward known as Beast’s Landing, has been left to the degenerate hordes of beastmen who overran it, while the once- splendid manses of the city’s great lords and merchants on the central Isle of Lorden now house gangs, drug addicts, and mercenary companies. The displaced of these two wards now huddle in Norwood on the northern shore of the Gwaun, factory workers rubbing shoulders with nobility in the only safe zone left.

Lorden was always far from the heart of the Empire, and after Beast’s Landing fell, the Alabaster Throne decided the distant trade city simply wasn’t worth saving. They cut off all support to their troops in Lorden as the orc uprising raged out of control, claiming the necessity of those supplies for soldiers closer to home. The city has continued on without their oversight— indeed some say they have benefited from the sudden lack of Imperial taxes— but the ancient edifices of tradition that support the city creak in the winds of change.

The Three Wards

Lorden is divided into three major wards: Norwood, the Isle of Lorden, and Beast’s Landing. Each ward is comprised of many neighborhoods, each with its own personality. Norwood covers the northern shore of the river Gwaun; Beast’s Landing is what’s left of the city on the southern shore; and the Isle of Lorden sits in between, connected to Norwood by the Silk Bridge and to Beast’s Landing by the Iron Bridge.

None of the wards is what it was in Lorden’s heyday. In the last twenty years, Beast’s Landing has been overrun by beastmen and other monsters from the south. Proximity to these creatures, and the occasional northward raid across the Iron Bridge, prompted the rich and powerful to flee the Isle of Lorden en masse for the safer northern shore, leaving the glorious mansions and wide avenues of the Isle for those too poor, crazy, or foolhardy to leave. The mercenaries and adventurers who live there now venture into the abandoned streets of Beast’s Landing in search of forgotten treasures, while the merchants and nobles of Norwood try to keep on living as though the city hasn’t changed.

Okay Then

In the coming ages, I'll be delving deep into the neighborhoods, locations, people, and politics of Lorden. I hope you'll come along with me!

Basics of the Demon Lord: Actions in Combat

Like many adventure RPGs, Shadow of the Demon Lord has special rules for tracking who does what when during combat. Specifically, it has what's called an "action economy," a predetermined set of options that constrain how much your character can do in one turn of combat. But SotDL introduces a very cool twist, fast and slow turns, which changes those options a bit. Let's dig in! To follow along at home, please open your textbooks to pages 46-50, the first part of the Combat section in Chapter 2.

You Can Go First or You Can Do More

At its heart, the fast/slow turn rule is about making a decision: do I want to go first, or do I want to wait until later but do more on my turn? The combat round is divided into two big chunks, fast turns and slow turns. Each of these chunks is divided into player turns and GM turns. So the round looks like this:

1. Player fast turns
2. GM fast turns (monsters and other enemies, etc.)
3. Player slow turns
4. GM slow turns
5. End of the Round

Each player chooses whether to act on a fast turn or a slow turn. You can't do both, and once you've acted, you can't act again until the next round. In other words, the players can always go first if they want to! So why would you take a slow turn? Because you can do more: any creature that acts on a fast turn can either use an action or move, but not both; a creature that waits until slow can both use an action and move.

Actions are for Big Things...

So what is an action? It's the big, main thing you do on your turn. Attacking (which includes both attacking with your weapon and casting an attack spell) and casting a utility spell (any spell that's not an attack) are the two most common actions, but there are plenty of others such as concentrating on a spell effect, helping an ally, hiding, and retreating from combat (see pages 48-49 of the core rules).

...and Moves are for Moving

I know. Obvious, right? Most of the time, moving just lets you move up to your Speed around the battlefield. If you're taking a slow turn, you can use your action at any point during the move, so for example if you have a move of 10 you could move 4 yards, cast a spell, then move another 6 yards. There are multiple special types of movement, though, such as swimming and riding (see pages 47-48 of the core rules).

Except When Actions are for Moving

There are a couple of actions that allow you to move! These are Retreat and Rush. Even though they involve movement, they still take an action to use. Retreat lets you move half your Speed without triggering free attacks (a type of triggered attack, see below, that lets an enemy try to hit you as you move away from them). If you're next to an enemy who's kicking your butt, this is a great option on a fast turn to get you safely away from it. You can also use it on a slow turn, though-- use your action to Retreat away from the enemy, then use your move to keep running! This would effectively let you move 1.5 times your speed in the turn, and the part of the movement caused by the Retreat action would be safe from free attacks.

Rush is the other action that lets you move. Specifically, you move up to twice your Speed. Like Retreat, you can use it on its own on a fast turn (when you really need to get somewhere quickly!) or combine it with your move on a slow turn. In the case of Rush, waiting until a slow turn would let you move up to three times your speed in total.

One More Thing About Fast/Slow

What we've seen in playtests is that combats often fall into a certain pattern. At the start of the fight, the combatants are far away from each other, so the first round is often spent closing that gap. That means that melee combatants will generally wait until slow turns, so they can get next to an enemy and attack during the first round. They may also wait for the foe to come to them. There is also an option to charge (see page 52 for that and many other attack options) which allows a creature to move and attack as one action, at the cost of banes to all their rolls for that round.

After the melee combatants have closed on each other, they often take fast turns for much of the remaining combat, using an action to make their attack as soon as possible. They've found their position and they're staying there! Spellcasters who have gotten into a safe position may also take mostly fast turns, as they can throw spells from that spot unless a clever enemy moves to threaten them.

You Also Get One Triggered Action Per Round

Last up in our list of important stuff you can do is the triggered action. You get one triggered action per round, and that's it! Otherwise, your triggered action can happen anywhere in the round, either your own turn or someone else's. Any talent, spell, or other power that uses a triggered action will tell you what the trigger is. It could be extremely specific, or as general as "on your turn." But no matter when it happens, you only get one per round. So if you use a triggered action on your own turn at the very top of the round-- for example, using the Priest's Prayer talent to give yourself a boon to your attack roll on a fast turn-- then even if an opportunity arises to use one later on someone else's turn, you're out of luck.

The most common triggered action is probably the free attack. If an enemy is within your reach (a number of yards equal to your size number, so for most player characters reach is 1 yard) and they willingly move away from (that is, they're not pushed around by some outside force) and you're wielding a melee weapon (sword, axe, dagger, that sort of thing) you can use your triggered action to attack them with it. This rule exists to help front-line fighters lock down their foes and keep squishy casters safe in the back, but the key thing here is that it uses your triggered action-- so if you've already used yours for the round, enemies standing next to you can feel free to move with impunity until the next round.

What About Minor Activities?

Whew, almost done! There's one more type of thing you can do in combat, and it's so small it's not even called an action. Minor activities are things like opening and closing doors, drawing a weapon, and picking something up off the floor. The rule is that you can do one minor activity on a fast turn or two on a slow turn (another advantage for slow turns, if you really need to sheathe your current weapon and draw a new one, for example) but it's really up to your GM how much you can get done. For example, as a GM I would probably rule that a warrior could kick open a door and draw her sword while moving into the room beyond, all on a fast turn, because that's awesome and it feels realistic to me. But I probably wouldn't let her make an attack, sheathe her sword, and shut the door all on her next fast turn.

Basics of the Demon Lord: Health and Damage

Shadow of the Demon Lord handles damage and health a little bit differently from many other adventure RPGs. It's a system that is actually quite elegant and rewarding, but it requires you to shift your thinking just a bit to get in the groove. Here's how it works. If you want to follow along at home, we're talking about rules that appear on pages 34 (Health) and 39-40 (Damage) of the Shadow of the Demon Lord core book.

Damage Goes Up, Health Stays the Same

Your Health score is (generally) static. It represents the total amount of damage you can take before you drop (that is, become Incapacitated; see page 40). Rather than losing Health as you take damage, you have a separate damage score that increases. I'll say it again because it's key to how the whole thing works: as you get hit by monsters, traps, spells, and anything else that causes your character pain, your damage increases. Your Health doesn't change. (This is where the system differs from what we're used to, namely losing Hit Points as we subtract damage.) So if I have 13 Health and I take 5 damage, I still have 13 Health. I just also have 5 damage!

Damage Never Exceeds Health

So far, so good. The next key thing to remember is that when your damage equals your Health, you become Incapacitated. (We'll discuss the death and dying rules in a later entry in Basics of the Demon Lord.) Your damage can never exceed your Health. So to go back to our earlier example, if my character with 13 Health and 5 damage takes 10 more damage (from an ogre's club, say) he now has 13 damage. He can't go above 13 because his damage cannot go above his Health, so those last two points of damage are just lost as overkill. He's gonna drop either way-- the key thing to focus on here is that there's no tracking of "negative Health" or anything like that. You're either awake and alive, or you're Incapacitated and (temporarily, one hopes!) out of the fight. If you reduce your damage by any means (a spell from the Life tradition or a healer's kit, for example) you are no longer Incapacitated! In other words, you only ever need to heal away 1 point of damage to wake up. This is why healer's kits are so useful!

Okay, Health Can Change Sometimes

You may be starting to see why this method is so elegant. Removing things like "negative Hit Points" means the game plays faster at the table. Another rule we don't need is something like "temporary Hit Points." If we want a character to be able to withstand more damage, we just increase her Health score. For example, the spell "Call of the Wild" increases a target's Health by 10 for 1 minute (among other things). That means that for the next minute, that character can take 10 more damage without dropping. Conversely, the Circlet of Eyes relic bestows a 1d6 penalty to Health while worn, making its wearer a bit easier to take out. In other words, temporary changes to your ability to take damage don't require a bunch of extra rules. Instead, they just alter your Health score; you can keep taking damage as usual until you're Incapacitated.

One Interesting Corner Case

If you're like me, you heard that Health can change and immediately started wondering what happens when those effects wear off. Well, you should be careful when your Health is temporarily higher! Let's say you normally have 20 Health, but your friend casts "Call of the Wild" on you. You now have 30 Health for the next minute. You charge into combat and take 25 damage. No problem! But before you can heal any of that damage, "Call of the Wild" wears off. What happens to you? Well, you've suddenly got 25 damage and only 20 Health. Your damage can never exceed your Health (see above), so that extra 5 damage is lost. That's cold comfort for you, though, because now you have 20 damage and 20 Health-- yup, you're Incapacitated! In simpler terms, if your Health decreases to equal to or below your damage for any reason (maybe you had 20 health and 19 damage, then put on a Circlet of Eyes), your damage resets to equal your Health and you're Incapacitated.

Hopefully that elucidates and elaborates the Health and damage rules in the core book. Look out for future installments of Basics of the Demon Lord to get more insight into how your favorite rules work!