Common Worlds

This still requires a LOT of work. (There aren't any trees, for example.) And some detail doesn't show from this angle or at this size. But here's something to start with. Click for a larger version.

Queen Corisand
Evina's older sister keeps Ernalda's Basket for her people. Corisand has one daughter, married to an out-clan Helering. Corisand is grooming her daughter to be the next queen.

Tarteth Salt Tongue is an older Issaries trader whose long friendship with the queen of the west hill makes it worth his while to make the trip.

Heroforming is becoming a manifestation of the god you worship. Few cults teach it, those who do teach little else, and it is usually a Secret.

Resistance in HQ2 was 1W. The skill of Heroform [god] is required. You can't improvise hero forming.

Results depend on level of success:

Complete: 100% bonus to skills the hero and the god both possess.
Major: 50%.
Minor: 10% bonus
Marginal: +1
Tie or any defeat: no effect, possible rating reduction.

Vogarth, for example has the skills of Work Hard, Honest, Strong and Slow Witted.

Every Heortling clan has clan tattoo. Some have Tribal tattoos, and I think we do. Some bloodlines have tattoos, but I'm not so sure about that for us.

What does our clan tattoo look like? Always tempting to imagine some sort of figurative thing, but at least in Sartar, clan tattoos are often not figurative, rather geometric and simple: Lines arranged in stripes or circles in a specific order and place for example.

Of all the things the clan must have, the one that they can't get on the Westhill tula is salt. Clan explorers have searched for generations, and Ernalda priestesses have prayed for guidance, but none has ever been found.

So the clan gets salt by trading, usually for honey and furs. The only Issaries trader who makes a habit of coming to the tula is getting old, and this worries the clan Ring. Some day, the Westhill may have to send traders to other clans to get salt.

Just had this idea out of nowhere. Thought it would be fun to come up with little bits of stuff that the players know about the clan. Not necessarily plot hooks, but really, almost anything can become a plot hook.

I'm going to come up with ten of them, and you can too!

To keep the same format, choose "add child page", below, to start.

I remember the crack sound of spring's first ice melt, the sound of Voria's footstep. How the elders' relief lit their faces, comparing the breaking weather to the clan's remaining food stores.

I remember that big rock that had laid in the southern pasture for as long as anyone could recall, the feel of it under my hands as it began to shift, the deep, loamy smell of the earth underneath it, how proud Pony was when he felt it start to move on the sledge, the work chant of my clansmen as we hauled it to the wall that spring.

I remember the feel of calluses on my hands at the end of spring planting, the weight of plow reins over my shoulder replaced with my shield's strap, how well spring's calluses serve when grasping weapons in summer.

I remember the shouts of instruction to the shield wall as we practiced, kicking red dirt into the summer air as with laughs and cries we pressed shield on shield and learned to listen to what Ash Face wanted.

OK guys!

Here's a silly exercise to inspire and confound.

It works like this. Post a not-too-specific adventure hook, character goal, listed westhill enemy plan, whatever in its own little "reply" thread below.

THEN, everyone else, add something to complicate things.

So, I might write:
Varu seeks permission to attend the Pharonic Phair in Nochet, to enter the Strongest Horse competition there...

but then Jon could add:
but there is too much stone hauling work in the newly cleared fields to spare him.

And Brian could add:
even though a jealous junior priestess says she has a vision of Pony's defeat.

and Brad might say:
while all Pony wants to do is stand stud for the mares of the tribal queen.

and Kirk offers:
yet grim faced thanes warn that the aldryami may be preparing for raiding in revenge for the Westhill clearing forest.

Everina said we had to leave town first thing, so we were out at dawn on the road toward New Crystal City.

Pony wasn't even a little tired from pulling the day before. Still, I made sure to rub him down extra carefully with the good liniment from home. That night we camped by the side of the road. I was glad to be gone from there, because that place makes me sad because it makes me think of how Bane the Horse died.

Everyone was in a good mood, I think, but Evina was tired and went to sleep early. I gathered wood and that took a while. When I asked, Evina promised to explain to me what it means when people say that "Shit rolls down hill." Then we settled in for bed and I wished I was back at the Westhill stead. I had a bad dream about a black bone dragon and when I woke up in the dark I really needed to whiz. It turned out that Farlip had followed us and already tied up Evina, who had been on watch. But I didn't notice that, because I really needed to whiz and it was dark.