[Gatejammer] Finality: Brainstorming

[Username17]

...Don't Giants and Dwarves have some general animosity to the point of getting racial bonuses against each other in combat? In other words, isn't this the biggest "fuck you" ever from Finality's Dwarven population?

Yes. Dwarves really do most of their "not getting along" with Frost and Fire Giants. But no love is lost between them and other Giants either. Turning a Giant's palace into a Dwarven art studio is very much like erecting a giant flaming middle finger on Titan Town's front lawn. In any case, more neighborhoods:

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New Phlegethon

"The comforts of Nessus."
New Phlegethon is the brainchild of the Pit Fiend Beleth, who has invested considerable time and resources into making an area in Precinct 2 be more Baatorian in nature. The project has succeeded in getting many fiends to move there and has made the area a major tourist attraction. Archways 11 meters in height grace several major street entrances and they are adorned with the bronzed skulls of a thousand creatures from a hundred worlds. Geysers shoot sulfurous steam from the ground and it is channeled into fountains that show cavorting fiends in numerous poses. The architecture is mostly faced with acid resistant and fireproof black granite, and covered with spikes and points and hooks. The architecture is built to accommodate large creatures, but it is usual for doors to be made with “ape doors” and “imp doors” cut into them that open separately for smaller creatures to get in and out. Many of the residents of New Phlegethon are Fire Giants and fiends and the overall scale of the place is geared to that size of person. But nearly half the population are Imps and the like, and amenities for tiny creatures are also to be had.

The High Court: The largest open square in the Precinct is Dictum Square, and it is lined with shops, scribes, and money changers. At one end sits the High Court of Finality, which is a massive black stone building covered in metal hooks and graced by an eternal flame in a brazier held over the immense iron front doors that are never closed. Running the length of the square (which as many people have pointed out: is actually a rhombus) are seven statues celebrating Baatorian virtues: Integrity, Courage, Industry, Patience, Acuity, Loyalty, and finally Justice which stands before the steps into the Court. Technically, the fiends do not control the High Court, which interprets the laws passed by the Council and serves to appeal cases that have been heard in lower courts throughout the city.

The Pit

"We have radically different ideas of what to do with the Z-axis."
Precinct 18 is crossed by a rather deep ravine. Rather than build around this ravine, the residents have extended the city right down the sides, creating a series of cliff face dwellings connected by an ad hoc network of stairs, ladders, and steep trails. Some of the dwellings are tunneled considerable distance into the rock, while others are more like sconces made of clay. There are several elevator services, which will take you up or down the Pit for a copper coin, but it isn't necessarily obvious how to get from whatever level the elevator takes you to where you actually want to go if the X-axis differs. It is dark in the Pit, and sunlight filters to the bottom for just a few minutes a day (and doesn't come at all during the winter). Many light-averse creatures live in the Pit. It is a popular residence for Drow and Myconids. Few large creatures make their way into the Pit, the paths up and down were never intended for anything larger than a Bugbear.

The Rookery: There is a section of habitats that isn't really connected to the rest of the city. No stairs or ladders connect The Rookery to other dwellings or the surface. The creatures that live there are gifted with the power of flight, and do not bother with such trivialities. The residents are Harpies, Gargoyles, and Desmodu, and they are so segregated from the rest of the Pit that despite their literal proximity they are in many ways a neighborhood to themselves.
The Farm: The bottom of the ravine has a river running through it, and the damp stone around that is given over to a Myconid agriculture project. They make mushrooms of various kinds. Some get winched up the elevators to be traded for currency (and ultimately things that can be purchased with currency), but other fungus is grown for the Myconids to consume themselves and still others are just stored in cavern warehouses for some unknown Myconid reason.

The Waterfront

"Water is life. Life is pain."
Technically the River Acheron flows all the way across the city, so lots of places are waterfront. But when people say “The Waterfront” they are almost invariably referring to a specific part of Little Nishrek that has several docks, a number of warehouses, and the Aqueduct. Orcs and Ogres make up most of the dock workers here, and it is the first landing point for many Orcish immigrants who leave the boats from Nishrek on a regular basis. Living conditions in residences around The Waterfront are fairly poor – most people live in hastily converted warehouse space that was never designed for inhabitation. Noise from the moving of heavy objects continues night and day and it is sometimes loud enough to cover the sounds of shouts and breaking wood from all the crime. Sometimes a thick gray fog rises off the river and it makes exposed skin itch. Many people commute to work at The Waterfront from elsewhere in Little Nishrek, and those who actually live there are generally trying to find a way out.

The Aqueduct: The water of the River Acheron is agonizing to the touch, which is how it gets its name as the “River of Pain”. The Aqueduct is a plant that diverts some of the water from the river and then removes that property from the river so that it can be used for drinking and washing. Raised stone canals carry that water throughout the city, and it is also used to fill barrels and urns that are used privately.

Portal Pentagon

"How we get from here to there."
Portal Pentagon is the name of a specific five sided city square in Precinct 5 that has a lot of Portals in it. It's also the name of the neighborhood extending for several blocks in every direction from it, and there are also a lot of portals in the streets and buildings there. Almost no one actually lives in Portal Pentagon, the land values are simply too high and the quality of life too low to allow residential development to exist. What beds there are consist almost exclusively of hotels that are rented by the hour for off world merchants to catch a bit of a shuteye or meal as they count down the hours before they can again travel through a portal to reach their next destination. Gateways in Portal Pentagon are not free, but they are not particularly expensive. Customs officers from the Inspector General's office apply tariffs in both directions, but they are not exorbitant. Finality's coffers are filled because of volume, and the Inspector wouldn't dare strangle the golden goose. Warehouses and markets take up most of the actual land area, and many offworld merchants are able to unload their cargo and fill up on goods they consider exotic and valuable to leave again without ever leaving the neighborhood.

The Dreamgate: The majority of the gates in Portal Pentagon go to worlds that are either in or near the Acheron Cluster or the Core Worlds. A scattered few go to other transit nexuses, but the one which goes the farthest is the Dreamgate. Built of solid but ancient and worn megaliths, the Dreamgate takes a traveler to the far end of the Bleak Eternity of Limbo. The other end is a barren floating rock in the Dreamlands, but it's not far (relatively speaking) from Tu'narath. Those caravans headed to places far from the Core Worlds in a voidwise direction often find that their shortest travel distance is to take the Dreamgate and then backtrack through shorter gatejumps.

[angelfromanotherpin]

Turning a Giant's palace into a Dwarven art studio is very much like erecting a giant flaming middle finger on Titan Town's front lawn.

Of course, since it's an art studio full of Dwarves, they can actually do both things. Sounds like a decent plot hook...

• Dwarven artists have erected a giant flaming middle finger on Titan Town's front lawn. Nobody wants this to escalate further – except for the Dwarves and the Giants. If you can cool things off, you'll ingratiate yourselves with some big men in society/general.

[Username17]

The Hive

"They collect words like a bee collects honey."

Precinct 4 has a lot of Modrons and Formians living in it, and the area that is densest with these creatures is called The Hive. The residents object to the characterization, on the grounds that there are actually several hives living there as defined by having their own Queens as well as representatives from hives whose Queens are far away, and a number of Modron clades that are following their own directives. Architectural styles are discordant, with individual buildings split between a flanged ziggurat style, a polished metal box style, a rounded stone domes style, and a stucco hexagon style that each proudly and uncompromisingly proclaim their architect's adherence to the vision of one of the four distinct visions for the hive. Absolutely no attempt is made to meld the styles or to unify the neighborhood's aesthetic. Many of the beings of The Hive are experts at repair and the crafting of clockwork, springs, and machinery. But while most of their currency trade with the rest of the city (and offworld visitors) is conducted by trading in these sorts of services and goods, within The Hive such things are considered fairly unimportant and designated “scrap work” and assigned to the lowest castes of bug and whatever Modrons are (these low caste creatures then perversely often have the most access to currencies valued elsewhere). Real pillars of the community spend their time reading books and spouting philosophy.

The Great Library: Built a long time ago by an architect whose vision is not otherwise represented in the city, the Great Library's exterior is a bunch of round towers of pink stone pressed closely together. The effect from a distance makes the library look not unlike a large pipe organ. The Great Library gives greater membership privileges to people who have been a member for longer amounts of time – most notably that new members have to put down a deposit if they want to borrow a manuscript and those who have been a member for more than ten years don't have to do that. The Library funds itself primarily through the sale of manuscript copies, especially of copies of magical writings and enchanted runes, which are quite expensive and in high demand.
The Hall of Records: Each institution in Finality is expected to handle its own paperwork. However, as documents become old or obsolete, they are sent to the Hall of Records for long term storage. The Hall of Records maintains transfers of titles and manifests going back hundreds of years, and copies of documents can be requested from them at any time for a small processing fee. For those who have the rights, the originals can be given up as well. Running the Hall of Records is not without its perks – not everyone can look through the archives without knowing what they are looking for.

The Castle

"Can you imagine fitting everything worth protecting into something so small?"
Long ago, Finality was a castle city boasting a population no larger than what passes for a large city on a frontier world today. Everything fit within the crenelated walls and towers overlooked every entrance into the town. Finality has long since burst from those confines and even Precinct 1 includes many times more land and people outside the city walls than within them. Still, while the Duchy of Finality is now just an empty throne, the castle itself is regarded as a source of prestige and tradition. The land and apartments within the castle walls are expensive and have been retrofitted into luxurious residences with all the modern amenities you would expect such as clean water, and magical light and heat. Most of the residents today are long lived fiends who purchased space within the castle long ago when it could be had for very much less money than it would go for today. The courtyard is filled with buildings leaving a relatively small public square in the middle for public gatherings. The square is lined with restaurants and shops, and they are expensive.

The Gates: The main entrance to the Castle is open night and day. Hobgoblin guards stand at attention with archaic looking arms and armor. They are of course mostly there for show as part of the theatrical experience of visiting the old castle grounds, but they also have the ability to raise alarms which will call a significant number of Hobgoblins whose glaives and breastplates are very much not for show. The guards are omnipresent in the courtyard, but they have a quiet and hands-off approach to revelers.
The Market: Twice a week, the courtyard square becomes host to the Grand Market. It's a chance for farmers and artisans to sell high priced, high quality items to discerning but unreasonably wealthy customers.

The Box

"I was only kidding!"
Box Street is a major thoroughfare that turns at an almost right angle in Precinct 14. Nominally the area between that corner and the point where cross streets Stolas and Gremory meet is “the Box” after which the neighborhood is named. But practically speaking, most people would describe themselves as being “in the Box” if they were a block or two on the wrong side of Box Street if they were at all near the turning point. The neighborhood attracts a considerable amount of Gnolls, Minotaurs, Ibixians, and other bestial peoples. Almost half of the city's Satyr population lives in the Box. The streets running between Stolas, Gremory, and Box are a literal maze, having been designed by Minotaurs to be the kind of thing you could get lost in. The Box has many famous greasy spoons, cabarets, and comedy clubs. Production values are not high for the performances or the cuisine, but they try hard and are inexpensive. Street brawls outside local watering holes are not an uncommon occurrence late at night on weekends.

The Tout: The Tout is a rival paper to The Herald. It has a reputation as a scandal sheet and gossip tabloid. Many respectable citizens look down on The Tout and are reflexively skeptical about things written in its pages. This can work to the paper's advantage, as being caught reporting things that are not true does not appear to harm The Tout's circulation.

The Swamp

"Slrk. Smuk. Shlurp."
Built into a natural pond, the streets of The Swamp are flooded to nearly a meter deep of murky water. It's to make life easier for the species that need to moisten their skin, who of course are crowded into The Swamp like it was a ghetto. But it's also simply “homey” for creatures who come from marshes and bogs on their home worlds. Drylanders can slog through or travel by boat, but most choose to go around. The natives include Bullywugs, Lizardfolk, Slaad, and virtually all of the city's Sahuagin and Kuo-toa population. Some buildings are up on stilts, while others are simply partially submerged on the ground floor. It's important to note that the water in The Swamp is no good for drinking and even worse for breathing. Actual water breathing creatures do not find a good home in The Swamp.

The Bad Egg: The Bad Egg is a meetup joint for various amphibians and reptiles. Most such creatures are incapable of reproducing with one another, but that in no way slows down the hookups.
The Whirlpool: There is a constantly swirling pool of water that is a fairly dangerous portal to the seas of Stygia, and it is kept separate from the rest of the waters of The Swamp inside a buiding made to house it. A group of Sahuagin own the building and operate as customs authorities to anyone wishing to enter Stygia in this manner. From time to time someone will pop out of the Whirlpool as well, and for a modest price, the Sauhuagin will fish the unfortunate out.

[Username17]

The Menagerie

"I'm going to catch all of them."
The Menagerie is essentially a zoo, where many of the residents are also the displays. There are cages that contain exotic animals from a hundred worlds, and a whole lot of creatures that are tied to a place – such as Dryads, Nymphs, and Fossegrim, simply live there in trees, pools, and fountains amongst the parklands . Five of six of the Elemental Weirds of the city live in the Menagerie, their elemental pools surrounded by topiary. Creatures who are rare can be afforded cheap rents, so long as they submit to living in a glass house for gawkers to stare at while they are at home. The impetus for all this is the patronage of a wealthy (though not particularly high ranked) Dao named Bey Parviz. The population of The Menagerie is not large, but it is perhaps the most diverse on any world.

The Delve

"We dug too deep and things got weird."
Precinct 10 is home to a great many Dwarves, and not a few of them feel somewhat uncomfortable living on the surface. Underground accommodations are at a premium, and so a construction project was drawn up to excavate several city blocks down a few hundred meters and build a city expansion straight down. What actually happened is that when the excavation process got deep enough they uncovered something “weird” and now the area is full of Xorn. In the years since, the Delve has become a neighborhood of Dwarves and Xorn in a peculiar but symbiotic relationship. Tunnels and doorways have been built along the hexagonal patterns that Xorn seem to prefer, while the wall engravings are demonstrably Dwarven in nature.

The Gate to Xorn: What the Dwarves found was a gateway to the planet Xorn, a world somewhat Counterspinward from the Core Worlds. Complex animal life there is trichordate and has radial symmetry. Also, the surface of the planet is constantly baked by the harsh radiation from the blue-white local star of Xorn. The gateway goes to a cavern complex which is full of Xorn. Yes, the Xorn people live on the planet Xorn around the star of Xorn. It's a tonal language, it makes more sense in Xorn. The Xorn and other creatures from Xorn do not interact with space and solids the way other creatures from other worlds do. They can swim through some forms of rock as if they were water. Iron ore is passable to them but chalk is not. And gibbsite is clearly in the passable category which pretty much blows away any working theories, because gibbsite isn't even a metal ore.
The Lower Court: Hammering out a land sharing agreement between the Dwarves and the Xorn was a long and confusing process, and one of the results of it was the creation of a shared government for the overlapping region of control. This “Lower Court” has jurisdiction up to the surface (where Finality's laws hold sway) and into the first cavern complex past the Xorn Gate. The council is three Dwarves, three Xorn, and a tiebreaker from another world who is neither Dwarf nor Xorn.

Whisper

"..."
With a primarily Hobgoblin and Bugbear population, Whisper is just a quiet place. No heavy industry, no shouting. Even the wind is mostly silent, as the neighborhood is sheltered from wind storms by Red Hill. Most construction in Whisper is made of wood and paper, and it would be easy for anyone to wake up many of their neighbors, but generally they don't. The River Acheron borders Whisper where it passes through Precinct 11, but there are no ports here. The water flows quickly and there are many rocks. It would be unsafe for ships to try to take on or unload cargo or passengers in Whisper. And so it is that the rocky shores of the River Acheron are allowed to grow plants. The area is treated as a park of sorts, though of course you can't actually touch the river without stinging pain. Residents regularly stand on the rocky shores and just stare across the waters. The burble of the waters over the stones is usually the loudest thing in the neighborhood.

The Armory: Finality's Armory is a vault whose purpose is as much to keep people safe from the weapons as it is to keep the weapons safe from people. Over the centuries, the city has come into possession of some crazy weapons: a sphere that annihilates anything it touches, a talisman that opens a teleportation circle into a star, a sword that can slay anyone in the world but leaves itself in the body of the target, and many more. Many of these weapons are a threat not only to the target and the user, but to the world itself. The guardians of the Armory take their charges very seriously, and wrap many layers of protection both magical and mundane to keep these things safe.
The Temple of Silence: There are millions of people and millions of gods that are worshiped by those people. While many religions maintain their own temples somewhere in Finality, the Temple of Silence is for all the rest. The walls are covered with idols from ten thousand religions, and each person comes here to pray in silence to the god or gods of their choice. Proselytizing or audible prayer is considered offensive, and the Bugbear monks will silently but firmly ask someone to leave for doing so. The temple is always willing to take in new sacred relics and graven images, and will find a place for them where they can be worshiped without comment.

Capitol Peak

"Where everything gets done that is going to get done."
The bleak and pock marked stone building known as the Council Chambers looms over the rest of this neighborhood on a bluff surrounded on three sides by cliff faces. Supposedly, the building was originally built as a fortified factory where Maug could build more Maug that was abandoned after a war or perhaps when the quarries that fed it ran dry of the stones needed to construct more Maug. Regardless, it was empty when the Council took it over and chose to fortify and retrofit it for a building confrontation with the Duke. That's all ancient history now, the Council's government is still standing and no one has tried to wield the Ducal Scepter for hundreds of years. The area around and below the Council's Building is still called “Capitol Peak” even though it is obviously well below the actual peak. That area has some very old residences that host mostly creatures that have been here long enough to rightly be called “natives”: Bladelings, Tieflings, and Maug are the most common residents in Capitol Peak. The days when the entire administrative functions of the city could all fit into the old factory are long over, and now the government is distributed to multiple buildings and even extends out of the neighborhood and into Precinct 3. And that's before the separation of powers, where the Judiciary, the Banking, the City Guard, and the Inspector General are all separate branches of government housed elsewhere (though in the case of the Judiciary, not very far away).

The Council Chambers: Each Precinct has its own government and can issue their own laws and figure out how to finance themselves if they want to provide any services that cost anything. Some neighborhoods have their own governments or effective governments. The Council is the government of the entire city of Finality. With only 17 voting members on the Council, they don't have any direct representation from almost half the city, but the reality is that the government is also far too massive for any of the Councilors to actually understand or write legislation for. Actual legislation and budgets are written up by teams of scribes, actuaries, accountants, and lawyers. And it is influence on these invisible cogs and gears in the machine of government that the Factions truly grasp for. At the end of the day, the Council passes pretty much anything that lumbers across its ornate desk with the assumption that it wouldn't have come out of the drafting commissions if it wasn't good enough.

[virgil]

@Frank: You seem to be hinting at an intended organization for the planar structure with the reference for the Dreamgate, traveling voidwise. Could you elaborate?

Hotel Microcosm

"Where small things loom large."
Historically, it was an exceptionally large hotel that was abandoned for a variety of economic and social reasons. It has since been converted into a neighborhood in and of itself, the interior rooms and additional buildings constructed for natives no taller than two feet. The vast majority are jermlaine, but there more than a few mustevals and imps. It's a crowded place, to say the least, and the construction is lousy with discarded trash from the big people of the city. Of the locals with jobs, most are maintenance and vermin control, but message delivery and spying is a more prestigious position that brings the lion's share of income to the community.

Firefly Alley

"Temperance and restraint."
One of the most brightly lit neighborhoods, most of the hound and lantern archons live here. Transplanted from the Chronias cluster is a relative of the fire beetle, the star beetle, which seems to thrive under the sun of Clangor and gives the neighborhood its name. Taking advantage of their innate teleporation, numerous thin spires with hollowed out bulbs capping them are built atop the buildings with no means of egress (lit by continual flames) other than teleporation. The population is surpassed by the aasimar who live on the lower levels. It used to be a much wealthier location due to a portal to Hestavar, but was lost in a conflict by a mad thing that escaped the Labyrinth. As part of a treaty several centuries ago, undettered by the loss of the portal to Hestavar, the lighting needs of the city are subsidized through Firefly Alley; which has kept the lower ranking archons in the neighborhood so as to fulfill the obligation.

Cyst Square: Only a piece of the original sun gate remains, eternally bathing the central square in daylight. Great parabolic bronze mirrors held skyward by statues circle the square, originally focusing the light of Clangor upon the gate itself before reoriented by the Labyrinth escapee. Few know exactly what happened, but a number of kaorti have been buying buildings around the square since the disaster.

[Prak]

To appear on the census of “people” in Finality, a creature must exhibit three traits: it must be intelligent, it must be in control of its own choices, and it must have hands. A Worg or a Cloaker is certainly intelligent and able to speak for itself, but cannot engage in commerce or open doors and are considered to be beasts.

Dogs may have difficulty opening doors, but an intelligent one could certainly engage in commerce. Arms of the Naga are ridiculously expensive, but a modified harness would give worgs manipulating appendages. Cloakers have long tails, and with them could open most doors, if you assume their tails are prehensile (which a feat could make them).

So the question is, if a Worg buys a magic item that gives it hands, or a Cloaker takes the feat that makes it tail prehensile, are they still considered beasts?

Yes. Dwarves really do most of their "not getting along" with Frost and Fire Giants. But no love is lost between them and other Giants either. Turning a Giant's palace into a Dwarven art studio is very much like erecting a giant flaming middle finger on Titan Town's front lawn. In any case, more neighborhoods:

I like the idea that it's in the center of Titan Town, so that many Titan Town maps depict the neighbourhood as a torus, with the center considered an entirely different neighbourhood. It also could explain why it went uninhabited long enough for dwarves to squat in it- the property value at the center of town could have been so high that bidding just took decades, during which time, the dwarves set up shop.

Portal Pentagon is the name of a specific five sided city square in Precinct 5 that has a lot of Portals in it. It's also the name of the neighborhood extending for several blocks in every direction from it, and there are also a lot of portals in the streets and buildings there.

I don't suppose those neighbourhoods could be roughly triangular so that the living space associated Portal Pentagon actually forms a pentagram, could they?

Edit: Also, keep in mind that the Armoury and the Foundry are controlled by organized crime.

[Username17]

Edit: Also, keep in mind that the Armoury and the Foundry are controlled by organized crime.

When I first read that, I was all like "What?" and then I read it again and I was like "What?". Then I went back and found out that you had edited a bunch of stuff into your Hungry proposal from earlier, but I hadn't even seen the revisions because I normally don't reread posts that I've already read and responded to.

I'm going to just repost my original response to the original proposal because apparently that is a thing we are doing:

Well, you started with a Scarface quote, which is solid. Other than that, you don't really seem to have a philosophy or a recruitment pitch. Like, at all. These guys are an organized crime ring that does protection rackets and is has a controlling interest in the steel workers unions. Also they are violent. So I'm guessing that they are basically 1970s era Mafia? The Scarface references seem to lean in that direction.

But like with the Sewage discussion, there has to be more to a faction than just a job and a list of perceived self interest. Why did they target steel workers for infiltration? And why do the steel workers work for them? What did the steel workers offer that fed the Hungry's goals, and what about the Hungry's platforms appealed to the Steel Workers? As you have it written up now, it appears that the only reason they went after The Foundry was just because it happened to be within walking distance. And there's really no reason even implied as to why the Foremen joined up instead of some other faction or just paying off a police contractor.

Now since then you've stealth added a bunch of text. But the added text doesn't address the core point: "How are these guys a Faction in any meaningful sense?" You've chosen to address the "How" of how they infiltrate organizations, which is apparently a mixture of bribery, threats, and getting people addicted to drugs and other (sometimes literal) honey traps. But that's not a particularly interesting "How" question, it's just a single adventure seed. It's not a philosophy, it's not a motivation, it's not a system of governance. It is not, to put a fine point on it, Faction material. Any Faction could use bribery, extortion, and blackmail to advance their cause and I'm sure all of them do. You still haven't written up a "cause" for these guys other than "get a higher score in GTA: Finality".

The entire steel monopoly angle is fundamentally absurd. The city has fifty thousand Azer. It has forty thousand Bladelings. It has over a hundred thousand Modrons. There are tens of thousands of people who can make a sword in their living room. You can't have a monopoly on weapon production. It wouldn't much matter if you did, because of course there are hundreds of tonnes of cargo coming in from offworld every day, but even if the gates all closed or it was somehow important that swords be made in town, there is still nothing you can do to keep people from doing that outside your supervision. Mao's vision of backyard produced steel is a reality in Finality, and there is nothing you can do to stop that.

Controlling the Foundry would not, and could not give you a monopoly on weapons manufacture. It can't give you a monopoly on the production of any item small enough to be made in a living room, because there are too many fucking living rooms and too many people who can forge steel items in their living rooms without tools. Control of the Foundry can only create a choke point over large items. The foreman of the Foundry can veto a work order on the production of a portcullis or a bell, and no back yard Azer workshop is going to be able to go around that bottleneck. Being in control of the Foundry would make you the one and only source of enough I-beams in sufficient quantity to undertake large construction projects using them. It would not and could not do dick all to the supply of fucking swords. Recall that Swords of any quality in D&D land are actually art objects made one at a time in homes by Wizards - the mass produced ones aren't even a thing that people care about.

-Username17

[Vebyast]

It's hard to pull off a manufacturing monopoly even with larger items. When you have Fabricate or Shape X the size of the items you can build is effectively limited by the size of your living room, and unless we decide to do something radical about level demographics there are going to be thousands of people who are both high level casters and have huge living rooms.

Side note: level demographics are probably just as important as "who's on fire?" demographics.

[Ancient History]

I'm betting you'd need some specialist mages to fabricate some things properly, and the Foundry would still do it cheaper and in bulk.

[virgil]

Side note: level demographics are probably just as important as "who's on fire?" demographics.

We need to remember that any demographics for Finality are NOT going to be indicative of any demographics on the worlds they connect with. This is a planar metropolis, and having CR 14+ be .2% of the population just isn't feasible in the worlds at large (nalfeshnee for every village).

Once we acknowledge that, the demographics already show that well over .2% of the population is CR 14+ (ignoring elementals, guardinals, demodands, etc) before class levels are even factored in. If we lower the threshold to monsters as powerful as wizards who can make stone walls, then ~3% of the population can do this without ever leaving their parents' basement (we've hit common at this point).

Level demographics are indeed important, especially for class distribution.

[Username17]

On the Sign of Tetra: I get the "Fear is Power" spiel. It's a good thing for evil emperors to rant about and a solid shtick for training of new apprentices. It's basically Scarecrow from Batman if he was in charge of a Faction. It suggests a range of tactics from spreading fear and doubt to undermine those in power to spreading panic in order to ram through unpopular reforms.

But... I have no idea what their desired reforms might actually be. And really, other than being "pro courage", I really don't know what they value. There's a list of places they have power and influence in, but I couldn't tell you why they care about those places or what they do with them.

As a general sort of thing, I think Factions should be tied in to what they want and what they do rather than rattling off lists of rivalries. If a faction's description is filled with barren lists of allies and enemies, it ends up coming off like the rivalry of Blue and Green in Magic: the Gathering.

I like that new justification for the White Spider faction much better.

I'm sorry to be stupid... but... what?

You seem to be hinting at an intended organization for the planar structure with the reference for the Dreamgate, traveling voidwise. Could you elaborate?

The gates exist between worlds that go around stars which are recognizably in the same galaxy as each other and relatively well connected. Those are the Core Worlds. And while the gate connections between them are not necessarily related to their physical locations, people who spend a lot of time staring at the skies and doing math can in fact figure out what those literal positions are. This gives rise to planetary directions like "Spinward", "Coreward", "Outward", and "Trailward" (which I think I called something stupid in the Xorn writeup).

But things are not so neatly three dimensional. Many places don't have skies with stars in them, and their location is unknowable (assuming they are in the same Galaxy at all, which they may not be). It is possible to take a series of jumps that get you into progressively crazier dream worlds that are collectively considered to be Limbo. The act of going off into the more physics and matter optional worlds is considered "moving voidwise". Voidwise is considered to be an orthogonal direction that sends you into pseudonatural far realms and nightmare hellscapes where gravity is optional and solid land comes into being by force of will. It's not at all obvious that this constitutes a single direction, and may in fact be every direction that isn't one of the more traditional six.

Meanwhile, there are other important directions that describe the way worlds are actually connected. If you're in the Okeanos Watershed, the Styx Watershed, the Acheron Watershed, and so on, there is the obvious consideration of "upstream" and "downstream". While you're on Clangor, Nishrek is "Upstream" even though of course it is also visible with the naked eye as a red dot moving across the night sky. When you're in Sumeru, Pretaloka is "Uphill" while Naraka is "Downhill". And that's irrespective of the fact that Naraka doesn't even have stars in the sky and may not be in the same galaxy as Sumeru. Just the fact that there's a big mountain that you can go to via a ridge line and then walk down to end up in Naraka defines the direction that way.

-Username17

[Whipstitch]

I'd actually make the Tetras a sort of cross between the ACLU and a messed up collective of intelligent undead artists and psychoanalysts. I mean, a lot of them wield fear but can no longer experience it themselves. With time terror might become viewed as one of the few novel experiences left to the undead, so you end up with a bunch of dudes moping around Tremere Toreador style soliciting essays, interviews and artwork from mortals and studying mental patients or working on (typically illusionary) art installations that often look kinda like that one tool video cranked up waaay past 11 in an effort to actually get a rise out of their undead brethren. Obviously, not everyone is pleased with the idea of having these guys as neighbors, but given Finality's diversity they've so far been able to defend their organization's activities from charges of disturbing the peace on cultural grounds.


I edited in a bunch more stuff because I have apparently gone senile and suck at smart phones.

[fectin]

I like that new justification for the White Spider faction much better.

I'm sorry to be stupid... but... what?

While sitting in Buffalo Wings, I posted some partly-coherent thoughts on the not-god tree. After that, I also wrote:

- when you're writing factions, it's jarring if you write that they are objectively wrong, or ignorant. In the white spider for example, don't say they want to protect their own positions, say that (e.g.) they believe that different people have different levels of ability, that everyone rises or sinks to their level, and that it's wasteful to allow a talented individual to be dragged down, and cruel to set someone untalented up for failure. (that also lets them have weirdly good relationships with unions, where they have a romantasized view of the nobility manual labor, even if they would never do it themselves)
Or whatever; the point is, everything should be perfectly sensible in a faction description, if you accept their premises.

When I got home and online 5 hours later, the white spider description had been edited. Specifically, this bit:

They feel that those in their respective class are there by natural progression, finding social welfare to be a waste of resources; any who climb the social ladder serving as proof of the ones deserving their station, and those in their station do not need to be weighed down by onerous restrictions. As attitude and public perception is important to the existence of social order, "fake it 'til you make it" is a common way of thought. This does make them frequently allied with the trade unions, as they respect manual labour as performed by those suited to it.

...had replaced an earlier draft where they were just ignorant, posturing assholes.

They might still be ignorant, posturing assholes, but now at least they have a coherent enough worldview that you could pretend be an elf who thought that way.

[Prak]

@Frank: I could have sworn I'd mentioned updating. Perhaps I didn't, sorry about that. On the other hand, I'm reasonably certain they held control of the foundry and armoury from the start.

Either way, The Hungry are a faction in the sense that they are a power group in Finality which wants something and has a large number of foot soldiers to get it, at least conceivably. The guardians want to stifle change, enforce a set of laws, and extort money. The Brotherhood of Blood want to educate people and recruit more vampires and werewolves. The White Spider wants to accumulate fame and power. The Hungry want money and control, and so they run weapons, drugs and hookers. What is the missed part, here, Frank?

[virgil]

As a general sort of thing, I think Factions should be tied in to what they want and what they do rather than rattling off lists of rivalries. If a faction's description is filled with barren lists of allies and enemies, it ends up coming off like the rivalry of Blue and Green in Magic: the Gathering.

I've updated the platform of the Sign of Tetra to be less about color rivalry and more about their actual goals.

@Prak: I think Frank's hangup is that their platform is whatever their boss says. There's no ideology or philosophical direction for their votes other than naked self-interest (sometimes partially enlightened). I get a distinct 'cult of personality' vibe from it, where murdering Atonya would completely dissolve any structure of the Hungry; any splintering would be solely what his lieutenants were like and the loyalties they had, rather than any kind of philosophical divide.

[fectin]

I'll just leave this diversion here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddxIfMRZemc

[Username17]

I think I have to use really short sentences. The Hungry are not a Faction. It's just a guy playing GTA: Finality. No members of the group have any loyalty to the group. No members of the group have different ideas of how to accomplish the goals of the group. Fuck, the group doesn't have any goals. There is no philosophy. There is no vision. It's just a fucking guy playing fucking GTA: Finality. It's unusable material.

I understand that you had a lot of fun playing a Saints Row game or something, but GTA-style senseless criminal havoc cliches run together does not make for a decent political/philosophical conflict. Those games are single player games where the lack of coherent motivation for the character is a drive for sandbox style mission-based play. It is wholly inappropriate to try to use that for a setting intended for use by multiple characters who are supposed to navigate delicate political allegiances.

Organizations that exist for no reason other than to exalt the position of the people at the top of them can be player character led organizations. they can be villain organizations. They can neighborhood toss-offs. But they can't be Factions, because they don't fucking care about anything.

-Username17

[Prak]

No, apparently it is I who must use short sentences. Sure, the people at the top get the most out of their activities, but being part of the Hungry is an awesome deal, even if you're just coming in off the street. You're essentially playing adventurer, but you can guarantee that you'll be resurrected if you're profitable enough (ie, bring in more money than it takes to raise you). Where other schmucks work retail or quarries, you run around and threaten people for money. The gang takes care of you until you betray them, or cost them too much money.

Yes, I wrote the Hungry because Finality Gatejammer seems a natural option for running Saints Row d20, but that shouldn't invalidate them as a faction. Yes, they began as disparate gangs, but they joined together and are actually at least as loyal to their higher ups as the writers of the evil newspapers. If Atonya dies, one of his lieutenants, likely Griznal, would step up. If they died, the next lieutenant would step forward. Sure, some low level members will flee as you hack up lieutenants, but the same will happen if you kill the head of the Guardians.

[Parthenon]

I have to agree with Frank- the Hungry isn't an actual faction. I'm going to try and make it obvious by quoting your writeup and just striking through everything that isn't part of their goals, aims or desires.

The Hungry were originally a set of four rival gangs. A few centuries ago, however, Atonya Agathion, half-pit fiend leader of the Castle Precinct Pits, approached the leaders of the Little Nishrek Eyez, the Shadow Walkers (of District 4), and Dead Boys (District 18), proposing an alliance. The four gangs moved from their respective districts where the controlling factions were beginning to win the fight to wipe them out, and convened in the Adamant District (D.9), a district with no organized criminal presence, just waiting to be exploited, claiming it as Hungry Territory. They sought out the small collections of thieves who worked together for safety, minor pimps with a handful of prostitutes, and dealers with too few customers, and either killed them, ran them out, or absorbed them, and dominated all crime and vice in the district.
With no criminal rivals, they then began a campaign of harassment and racketeering, becoming a sort of insurance for the Metal Workers Guilds' various factories and the foundry. They established brothels, and set up organized drug operations, increasing profit and availability.
Most of their street level members are metal workers who joined on the theory that it's better to be at the right hand of devils than in their path. Others come from Castle Precinct, Little Nishrek, (District 4) and the Dead District, where the Hungry still recruit the classic members of the four original gangs from young fiends, orcs and goblins, intelligent but lazy youths and fresh undead. They offer wealth to those who would not likely find it, community to those who seek it, and a profitable outlet for violent tendencies to those who want it.
Taking control of the Metal Workers' Guild itself was a trivial concern for the Hungry. A mixture of greased palms, gang members in the guild, and terrible "accidents" soon saw one of Atonya's lieutenants, Griznal, formerly leader of the Eyez, seated as the guildmaster.
The Foundry took more work, but a few weeks of plying the Head Foreman with devilweed and sex partners harmful to reputation, and he quickly towed the line. The man should have died at least half a century ago, but is in the peak of youth. Though no one will outright say it, most knowledgeable people in Finality recognize that he has likely extended his life through the use of Royal Blood Jelly.
The Hungry supply him with his now daily dose as part of his buy off, but it's really just another way to control him. He has been informed that should he ever veer from supporting The Hungry, even in the slightest, the deliveries of Royal Blood Honey will stop, and he will die, and the cursed thinuan ring they gave him long ago, disguised as a gift, will trap his soul before being teleported to Atonya's hand, denying him any chance of resurrection.
With control of the guild and the foundry, The Hungry now control all production of metal goods in Finality, which notably includes most weapons and armour. This makes them ridiculously wealthy, even for expansive organized crime, and keeps them well equipped.

Politically, The Hungry are in favour of colonization, as an outgrowth of gang land turf control. They are also, perplexingly, in favour of welfare, which comes out of gangs' tendency to care for their own and brutal justice (for traitors. They advocate legalization of, essentially, everything). Taxes are an odd one. They want taxes lowered, for them. For the district they control, "taxes" are essentially institutionalized protection rackets, and thus set to "whatever we feel like." On slavery... well, there are two schools of thought in The Hungry. Slaves themselves are profitable. They produce valuable goods or services, but comprise little overhead, especially if they're undead or golems. On the other hand, you can't enslave everyone, otherwise there is no one to buy what the slaves produce.

The Hungry's primary chapter house is called "The Legitimate Business-beings' Social Club, which mostly got approved due to equal parts missing the joke and terrible senses of humour. They also hold a number of penthouses and brothels as additional chapter houses, as well as a number of fashionable, if clichely pompous coffee houses and drug dens, the Shadow Walkers' contribution. These chapter houses even pop up outside the Adamant District, wherever the Hungry maintain a covert presence through the names of the original four gangs. It's not uncommon for Atonya to be found at a table of one of Castle Precinct's fashionable bistros, discussing business matters with his lieutenants.

The Hungry are Finality's most proactive faction, given that they are, well, hungry. They hunger for money, people, souls, drugs, and, most of all, control. If Atonya had his way, he would sit in the center of the Castle, as lord of Finality, and the entire multiverse, subjugating all to his whims. As such, they pursue control of ever more districts, and have a number of members hidden in other factions.

You see how little is left? You've mostly just rambled about the history, a big plot hook and wanked over the fact that they are "hungry".

And now your justification for it being a faction is the fact that there are benefits to being in the faction. You may not have noticed, but that could be the case for any other criminal faction, including one which has some actual personality and development.

And even then, the few tidbits you have left are mostly either contradictory, are stupid for them to want, or what they want is just for within the faction and as such noone outside the faction gives a shit.
A couple of examples:
[*]Welfare. Welfare to everyone, or just the Hungry? It had better be for everyone because otherwise they don't actually want welfare, they just want benefits for the gang members, which is something they aready have. And if they want welfare for everyone, why? That doesn't fit in with the idea of being hungry.
[*]Legalisation of everything. This makes no sense- if everything is legal there's less money in providing it and there are fewer opportunities for blackmail.
[*]Brutal justice against traitors. This is basically a within-faction thing, and they already have it.

There is no ideology, there are no realistic goals, there is no faction.

Just look at Frank's suggestions for what a faction needs:
[*]A locational powerbase. - Nope
[*]A demographic powerbase. - Nope.
[*]A persuasive philosophy. - Nope.
[*]Plot hooks. - Nope. They have no plot hooks that could be done just as well if not better by a criminal gang with actual personality. There is nothing unique to the Hungry.
[*]Political opinions. - contradictory and nonsensical. Not really.
[*]Temporal power. - They have two locations. Yay.

If someone can come up with a better criminal faction, you can just add all the deeds of the Hungry to them and it would make no difference. There is nothing unique to the Hungry. Nothing to make them stand out, to show what they think or want. Nothing.

[Prak]

Can you link me to the post where Frank makes those suggestions (Assuming he outlines what he specifically means)? I'll see if I can write up a group of people with a goal and a general occupation that Frank will graciously deem a faction.

[K]

You know, the Hungry would work as a criminal/Communists.

So they are all into unions and collectivism, but instead of farms it's scroll repositories and unions of sorcerers. They'd be all about paying clerics the same wages as street cutpurses so that people can afford healing magic. They'd be anti-monarchy and anti-feudalism, but with a dark core of secret police and black markets.

Sprinkle with skinny prostitutes with funny accents to flavor.

[virgil]

I'd actually make the Tetras a sort of cross between the ACLU and a messed up collective of intelligent undead artists and psychoanalysts. I mean, a lot of them wield fear but can no longer experience it themselves. With time terror might become viewed as one of the few novel experiences left to the undead, so you end up with a bunch of dudes moping around Tremere Toreador style soliciting essays, interviews and artwork from mortals and studying mental patients or working on (typically illusionary) art installations that often look kinda like that one tool video cranked up waaay past 11 in an effort to actually get a rise out of their undead brethren.

The side-goal and activity of trying to get a rise out creatures that no longer feel fear is certainly their, and is part of the reason why they had Opal. I felt it too cliche for them to be running it in the present however; but leaving it as an old habit, with remnants still haunting the asylum (literally in some cells) and the temptation being in arms' reach, I feel leaves more hooks to take.

The goal's for the study of fear to leave them more acutely aware of the actual dangers out there, and make them ironically driven by a more existential fear (is terror the right word?) to stop bad things from happening.

For the Hungry, I am tempted to offer a write-up for them to follow something close to philosophical materialism; but I won't step on your toes for your faction write-up.

[Prak]

I may be bristling a bit at what I feel is entirely arbitrary "Nope, not a faction because Prak wrote it," but I'm genuinely interested in writing up a faction, especially this specific faction. I take things far too personally, so while to me it seems The Hungry are roughly as much of a faction as The Guardians, I kind of understand the point. I just want more of a guide as to what a faction writeup needs.

[Grek]

Here's a list:
-A seat on the City Council. In order to be a Faction, there has to be some reason for the other Factions to acknowledge you and accept that your group has the right to vote on things in City Hall.
-A political agenda. Like, lists of laws that they try to get passed with their Council Vote. For the Hungry, this should probably be increased taxes (the Hungry are smugglers and don't actually pay taxes), gutting police funding, mandatory unionization (this helps their protection rackets) and anything that fucks over the merchant class because fuck rich people who aren't crime lords.
-A philosophical idealogy which justifies their political agenda. In the case of the Hungry, they think that poors, criminals and social outcasts deserve more than they are getting now and should rise up (as part of their gang) to reach out and take it, legally or otherwise.
-An explanation of why they hold the territory they do. Like, why did the Hungry set out to take over the City Foundry? Is it symbolic of something for them, or is it part of some grand master plan, or what?
-Demographics. Who is part of this faction? What social classes, races, religions, whatever, are in on this?
-Stuff for PCs to do. Not missions or anything, but things that a PC member might be interested in using/doing for the faction during their adventures.

[Username17]

So youse want to be a faction?

There are lots of organizations, there are lots of religions, lots of philosophical ideals. But only like twenty Factions. Let's go step by step.

Why the fuck would I help these people?

The first step is the faction's sales pitch. This isn't geared to the question of why someone would actually join (which could after all be as simple as a pile of shinies for joining or a facestab for failing to do so), but an actual set of philosophical reasoning that the faction can give for people who are not members to support it in its goals. This of course necessitates the organization actually having goals that can be logically argued as being to the benefit of people who are not only not lower level members, but aren't members at all.

How the fuck do they pay for all this shit?

Being a faction is expensive. You have a bunch of full time employees, you have to pay for posters and meeting halls, and you have to arm a bunch of Freikorps. Obviously, there has to be a cash flow, and a reason that cash keeps flowing towards maintaining the Faction rather than being hauled away in Santa Sacks by people who decide where the money goes.

Who are these people?

A typical faction member has to be defined or at least conceivable. Where are they from? What kind of person joins the Faction's Freikorps? What kind of person get promoted up the ranks? What kind of person hangs out in the periphery of the Faction as a passive supporter?

What the hell do these guys do?

A Faction has to be providing services to the people of the city in some way such that the people of the city actually care that they exist. They have to be providing something so that there would actually be a reason why their philosophical opponents don't hit them with a scorched earth strategy where Mariliths teleport murder every single member just before a group of Gelugons telport in and take an actual giant shit on everything the Faction ever built or said. But they also have to be out there doing stuff so that player characters can interact with the Faction while it is doing shit rather than simply having the Faction affiliation being merely a meaningless adjective on the character sheet of prominent NPCs.

---

Now you're going to want to be able to answer some basic 5w questions as well. But even before we get into the nitty gritty, we need some sort of meat that would come in and answer the basic three questions of why we are supposed to give an actual fuck. From a "Faction character sheet" standpoint:

• Location.
• Justification.
• Benefits of Membership.
• City Services.
• Political Beliefs.
• Group Powers.
• Group Resources.
• Philosophical Beliefs.

What this all comes down to of course is that the "In Their Own Words" section is actually the most important. If you can't come up with a way for the faction itself to tell people that the faction's goals are worth pursuing, you don't have a faction worth writing.

-Username17