Refuge
Links
IC 3 Thread (Past) - Anton & Nsia
Dramatis Personnae
NPCs
King Daedius XVIII, Human Cavalier 8 (Order of the Sword)
Vaelor Roxaneis, Undead Paladin 17 (Oath against Fiends)
Morgan, Tiefling Rogue 9
Rysinder, Dwarven Cloistered Cleric 8
Vwyn, Human Armored Hulk 15
Myrunue, Human Archer 13
Grant Sanctus, Human Exorcist 13
PCs
Nsia Leece, Tiefling Alchemist 10
Anton, Half-Elf Oracle/Arcane Savant 10
Angrim Watcher, Halfling Gunslinger 10
Velatha, Elven Spell Dancer 10
Nialda Stillstride-Teldirrin, Half-Elf Ranger 10
Jahtera, Human Druid 10
Holly Evermead, Elven Loremaster 10
Rule Variants
Spell Levels & Equipment
Purify Food and Water is a 1st level spell
Undead
Sometimes, the dead will walk not long after their soul was supposed to depart this world. Corporeal undead retain their sentience but slowly go mad or catatonic over time. They are not immune to mind-affecting effects. They do not heal with rest, but have fast healing 1. A severed limb or head can be reattached to the stump in 1d4 days. Certain undead can regenerate lost limbs or their head in 1d4 weeks. With these undead, complete mutilation will result in the body reassembling within 1d4 months, while complete destruction of the body will result in it reassembling completely in 1d4 years. Sometimes after being destroyed, the undead becomes an incorporeal spirit. Once this has occured, their former body rot and decay into nothingness.
Possess Creature
(Su): Once per day per 2 Hit Dice, an evil outsider can attempt to possess an intelligent, corporeal creature within 10 feet as a full-round action. The target creature must succeed on a Will save (DC 10 + 1/2 outsider’s racial HD + outsider’s Cha modifier). Success stuns the demon for 1 round; failure means the outsider's soul joins with the target, and the victim immediately gains the possessed template. An evil outsider in their native plane can also possess an intelligent, corporeal creature in the Material Plane as a full-round action. The target may be random or one that the outsider is familiar with. The victim gets no save, and gains the possessed template.
Possessed
(Template) Once every 6 months per HD, a creature must succeed on a Will save (DC 10 + 1/2 outsider's racial HD + outsider's Cha modifier) to resist the possession of an evil outsider inhabiting their body. Success reduces both creature's Wisdom and Charisma by 1. Success by 5 or more reduces the outsider's Charisma by 1d4 and failure reduces the target's Wisdom by 1d4. Ability scores lost in this manner resemble insanity, and is only restored by successfully reducing the other entity's ability score to 0, whence its spirit forever becomes a small and mute part of the other being.
Mythic characters must succeed on a Will save once every 10 years per mythic tier. (IE; a Tier 4 Mythic character needs only make a save every 40 years.)
At any time, the evil outsider may attempt to forcibly seize control of the victim's body for 1d6 rounds. It forces a Will save (DC 10 + 1/4 outsider’s racial HD + 1/2 outsider’s Cha modifier) and the ability drain is increased. 2 for a success, and 2d4 for the loser.
Blight
Survival DC to get along in the wild is 10 to forage enough food for a day. This food is contaminated with Blight Poisoning.
Survival DC to get along in the wild is 15 to forage enough food for a day. 1 portion is contaminated with Minor Blight Poisoning, 3 with Blight Poisoning.
Survival DC to get along in the wild is 20 to forage enough food for a day. 1 portion is not contaminated, 2 with Minor Blight Poisoning, and 3 with Blight Poisoning.
For every 2 you beat the DC by, you forage enough food for one other person.
Blighted (Template)
Prerequisite: Any animal, magical beast, plant, or fey
Type changes to Abberation
Minor Blight Poisoning
Type: Disease (injury, inhaled or ingested), Save: Fortitude 15
Onset: 1d6 hours, Frequency: 1/day
Effect: 1 Con damage and Sickened; Cure: 2 consecutive saves
Often suffered by eating contaminated food or from a water source contaminated with spores or plant-life.
Blight Poisoning
Type: Disease (injury, inhaled or ingested), Save: Fortitude 20
Onset: 1d3 hours, Frequency: 1/day
Effect: 1d4 Con damage, Fatigued, and Sickened; Cure: 2 consecutive saves
Often suffered by being wounded by a heavily corrupted animal or eating a moderate portion of contaminated food. If burning contaminated plant-life equal to a campfire or a few bushes, a small cloud can cause this.
Greater Blight Poisoning
Type: Disease (injury, inhaled or ingested), Save: Fortitude 25
Onset: 1 hour, Frequency: 1/day
Effect: 1d8 Con damage, Exhausted, and Sickened; Cure: 2 consecutive saves
Often suffered by eating a full meal of contaminated food or from being wounded by completely blighted creatures, though these cases are rarely seen. Much more often, an entire tree burning can create a cloud of this.
History
A Golden Age
The great civilizations of man and elf and dwarf, although by no means perfect, had created for themselves a relatively utopian society. In ten thousand years since the first recorded historical event, the population reached an excess of ten billion worldwide. This is was due to the widespread availability of magic. Even the smallest of settlements could produce a town shaman or mage who was capable of enchanting the soil and crops nearby, making inarable land fertile and the food supply long-lasting while resistant to disease and pests. This allowed civilization to consistently grow and prosper without mastering even the most fundamental agricultural techniques. While this was not magic's sole contribution to the societies of Refuge, it proved to be its' most disastrous. Civilization's dependence on magic was a substitute for medicine and hygiene to the masses.
The Great Famines
When magic started to fade from the world, it began from the bottom up. The mass of town shamans and mages who sustained the population suddenly began to lose their power. While the more skilled archmages retained a portion of their abilities, they were simply too few to feed the billions of inhabitants of the planet. Magically fertile land reverted to its' natural state and withered into dust. In less than a century after the zenith of civilization, the first great famines swept throughout the empires of man and demihuman. It was as if all the averted disasters of a world without magic was thrust upon humanity in an instant. For every three who survived it, a fourth would starve.
The Dark Times
Undeterred, the wracked empires diverted their efforts from the magic academies and scholarly pursuits towards something now more reliable. The rush to find technological alternatives to magic led to a second renaissance, but it was a rebirth that came far too late. The inventors struggled in vain to combat things they could never understand as the birth rate steadily decreased over the years. Inexplicably, it became difficult to conceive and longevity was shortened...
But what was perhaps most dire and unnoticeable, was that the ancient lore and acquired knowledge of ten thousand years of civilization became no more than unimportant relics of an obsolete age. In many lands, communities inexplicably reverted back to their tribal nature when generation after generation chose simply to ignore the progress that their ancestors made to amend their past overindulgence. It was simply impractical to look to the past for answers.
The Blight came, spoiling the soil and corrupting the forests and those who dwelt within. The flesh of animals became like poison once blighted, and the spores of blackened wood poisoned all those who inhaled it.
Undeath pervaded. In the beginning, the survivors welcomed the chance to see their loved ones return... but over time, the undead slowly slipped away. Many became husks, content to lay where they were. Others slipped into madness, while some became violent and predatory. Fiends were always a thing of myth and legend, but over time more and more came to visit the planet, possessing the bodies of its inhabitants.
The Scourge
Nine hundred years after the height of civilization, the possessed hosts of the fiends began to pull apart the boundaries of the planes. Hell and earth were one in such places, and demons could pass through these gates without needing to take humanoid form. Thus began the scourge. Two great lords emerged from the flaming pits, Adramelech and Nergal. They claimed the planet as their own and brought forth more and more of their fiendish brood into the world. The last remnants of civilization was shattered. Nations became towns and the demons claimed dominion over all.
In the mere span of one millennia, the world's population dwindled from ten billion to nearly a single percent of its' zenith. A quarter died from the famines, but many more suffered from the demons, the undead, the creeping forests, monsters, and each other. The earth teeters on the brink of collapse, a dark and foreboding dread lurks in the hearts of all. But not all is yet lost. King Daedius found a flower, unblighted.
