The Mythosan Grimoire

A few updates this time around: MYTHOSA CODEX The Codex continues to be a "living document", which was always the intention. Though I do need to find a different application for the layout; right now, I just use Pages which means that when I change the entries it screws up the entire format. I'll have to take a look for some open source solution. Anyway, this time around I've tweaked the chronology - the months and the days of the week. Calendar:  My old design was one of those "this works out great" ideas and then turned out to be a little too pat (i.e.; contrived). Kind of like the "one deity per alignment" I originally liked and stole from Scarred Lands  and then soured on years ago. I was also inspired by Glorantha's use of "seasons" rather than "months", though for my design I have something in-between. Days of the Week:  Changed to fit a more religious origin, though the DoW are pretty much just a common point of refe...

The Mythosa Codex (found on the  Downloads  page) has been updated again. Currently version 1.5. This was just for some minor edits.

The Mythosa Codex (found on the Downloads page) has been updated again. The Mythosan calendar and days have been added.

(This is related to this post from a few years ago). Before I wrote the latest version of the Mythosa PDF (well, version 1.0 at least), I was trying to determine a new format that was both useful and practical. Generally, campaign books follow a fairly standard design that we’re all pretty familiar with by now: some sort of summary introduction (sometimes with a bit of fiction that is usually terrible), then an extensive chapter on the world’s history that will mostly be ignored, a chapter that goes into way more detail than necessary on the political entities of the world, another one fleshing out the religions, and then others that vary but cover things like why these elves are different, and what the various organizations and factions are, possibly a bunch of new mechanical elements (for games like D&D or Pathfinder this would include new monsters, new magic items, new spells, new feats, etc.). Now, let me make it clear that I’m a fan of campaign setttings; I love reading up o...

The Mythosa Codex (found on the Downloads page) has been updated. The 5E cleric information (previously posted here ) has been added to the Codex as Appendix B.

The new region map for Mythosa has been uploaded to the Downloads page. The regional descriptions will be added to the Codex eventually (for those regions that haven't already been described, such as the Grey Waste or the Varghani Desert).

Just parking this here until I can update the Codex (this will make up Appendix B). I've decided to change things up and go with the traditional route of clerics serving individual gods (more akin to historical faiths like those of Greece and Egypt). Symbols and domains are listed below. A cleric’s (or paladin's) alignment must be within one step of his deity’s (that is, it may be one step away on either the lawful-chaotic axis or the good-evil axis, but not both). A cleric or paladin may not be neutral unless his deity’s. No domains are listed for the Old Faith since this is the religion of druids and rangers. Druids and rangers can be of any alignment, though they tend towards neutrality in some manner. Covenant of the Light Orthodox Symbol: TBD Alignment: LN Domains: Life, Light, Knowledge, War Venorites Symbol: TBD Alignment: NG Domains: Life, Light, Knowledge, War Divine Host Aeristus Symbol: Crossed hammer and pick Alignment: LN Domains: Forg...

Still doing some tweaking, the map and Codex have been updated. Here's a summary of what I've done: Added a couple additional kingdoms in the west near Thracia (the region is known - as will be seen on an upcoming regional map - as the "Unhallowed Wilds"). Thracia seemed lonely so they have some friends now - Illthia, primarily made up of refugees from Tir Naroth, and Zarinth, a gothic horror-ish kingdom in the vein of Barovia. Essengard also seemed a little isolated so I moved it to the Emerald Coast and turned it into an expansionist power who recently conquered a large chunk of Calythir. In Essengard's place is the ruins of the "Kingdom of the Damned", formerly the kingdom of Tir Naroth (they tried to take advantage of Elthanamir after their war with Marasinia; it was a mistake that the survivors lived to regret). I also split up most of the woodlands. I realized that I had forests with a single name that were often the size of entire countries ...

Another map, this time the world map with a 25-mile hex grid overlaid on the top. You can find it on the Downloads page.

I've added a couple new maps to the  Downloads  page. One is a map of Mythosa with a silhouette of Europe overlaid on it, the other the same but with a map of the continental United States.

The Mythosa Cyclopedia has been updated. Changes include: Renamed "Cyclopedia" to "Codex". Added items for categories other than geography, including religion, organizations, history, cosmology, and more. Added an index of the Codex entries I also changed the layout, as I was having issues with  GM Binder  for what I was trying to do. The Codex can be downloaded from the Downloads page.

I may not have been posting on the blog but I haven’t been idle. I’ve just posted a revised map  and version 1 of the new " Mythosa Cyclopedia ". I’d like to say I’ve tweaked things slightly, but that would be a little inaccurate. But in my defense, that wasn’t my original intention! Below is a long rambling about how this new version came to be. Though I’ve changed Mythosa quite a bit over the years (that’s actually part of the world lore now; the cycle of destruction and rebirth is a central part of a universal "monomyth"), the last incarnation was intended to be the last one. I was happy with the world, but my map looked too amateurish. So I started to look online for someone to hire to make a professional-looking map of Mythosa. In the process I found an application called " Wonderdraft ". I’d never heard of it before, but once I bought it and started using it, I was amazed. This was the mapping program I’d wanted for years, it just didn’t ex...

When it comes to dungeon maps, I favor utility over artistry. Maps with rendered furniture and torchlight shadows are nice, but if they’re only seen by the GM, they’re not very practical. I want maps that are clear and make layout with dungeon tiles easy. If they can convey additional information without being too busy, all the better. Given the above, I really like this map of the venerable “Caves of Chaos” I found on The RPG Cartography blog . Not only is it practical but it contains a lot of useful information without being overdone. The only thing it’s really lacking is a square grid, though that might have clashed too much with the other elements (maybe tick marks on the outside of the walls could have been substituted...?). I’m not sure how much use I’ll get out of this map, but it’ll definitely be a model for ones I make myself in the future. (Note: The first link is to a JPG of the map, but the PDF you can download from the second link is much higher quality).

There's been plenty of discussion over the years about the impracticality of the armor female characters are often portrayed wearing, but can we take a moment to discuss this travesty? This is from Dragon #52 , for a D&D ad. It's kind of a chainmail half-shirt but slashed diagonally up the side for...reasons? Maybe he gets a Charisma bonus to distract female orcs with his partially-exposed pecs...

(Has it really been 10 months since my last post? I really need to post more often! I do have things I can put up here...anyway, I digress). While tweaking my Campaign Guidelines page  recently (though I'm still not satisfied), I realized that I’m not a huge fan of “house rules”. I use them like everyone else, but I’m trying to minimize that. To me, when you sit down to a game at someone’s table and they say they’re playing “Game X”, if you already know that game you shouldn’t have to re- learn a bunch of things you already know. I can’t get away from tinkering a least a little bit, but ultimately I have to ask myself if a change is really necessary. Most of the time, it isn’t. That said, I do consider there to be two types of “house rules”: rules changes and option availability. The former are actual changes to existing rules, like saying that active Perception rolls can’t be lower that a character’s passive Perception score, or that items need to be saves if their ...

I recently read a somewhat old post about world building from the Tales of the Grotesque and Dungeonesque blog . I've talked in the past about simplifying world presentation, and the post really resonated with me. Years ago, I definitely was the type of DM who wanted to detail his world to the nth degree (though generally after I over-detailed something I would get tired of it and move on to something new - tells you something about doing that which I didn't catch onto for too long...). But I've seen that, in general, your players really don't care about that sort of thing. Heck, when I'm a player I rarely care about that much detail. Which is the point that the post above makes, among other things. World-building is a fun activity, and if you want to go into hyper-detail mode, go nuts. But don't think you're doing it for anyone other than yourself. Now, that's not to say that you shouldn't flesh out anything in your world or just drop it...

A couple months ago I backed Printable Scenery 's "Time Warp" Kickstarter , specifically the "Rampage Castle" (the Western buildings were cool but I didn't need them, and the Europe line, also cool, wasn't something I was that interested in). The first thing I built with the castle sets was a basic tower; I'm not going to go into that here since detailed instructions on available on the PS site and in their YouTube channel. My second project was a simple stronghold. Took awhile to print (~400 hours) between two printers. Actually took longer than that since I miscalculated some of what I needed and ended up printing a few pieces I didn't need (though that gives me a jump on the next castle, I suppose). It actually looks more like a church or temple - a friend mentioned it reminded him of the cathedral from Diablo - but that's OK :) Anyway, I told the  3D Printed Terrain & Miniatures  group on Facebook that I'd provide a parts list f...

I recently (well, about 7 months ago) got into 3D printing, initially spurred on by Fat Dragon Games ' second Kickstarter for their Dragonlock line . Since then I've also been printing objects from  Printable Scenery , free objects from  Thingiverse , and other places. As I've been a little light on blogging here, I figured I'd start adding discussion about this new facet of the hobby. It's very cool, more affordable than ever, and the potential is pretty amazing. More posts coming...

While cleaning up some old bookmarks, I found this blog post from almost 10 years ago:  Guiding player movement . It's interesting since what Shamus describes is something that I've started doing recently (with a fair amount of success), though I originally got the idea from the excellent  Hill Cantons blog . Specifically, his first post on  "point crawling"  (and one of the commenters references the other article). I may end up writing up some posts on how I use "point crawling" for my game, but I'm still working the kinks out. In any case, I think it's preferable to using a hex map since it makes it easier to "fast-forward" wilderness travel if nothing interesting is happening, but it still allows for player choice. The choice isn't as great as "which direction of the six do you want to travel out of this hex", but it tends to be a more meaningful choice. Hex crawls have the danger of turning into punctuated slogs, wherea...

The  Campaign Guide and House Rules page  has been updated to reflect allowed material from Princes of the Apocalypse  and the Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide , as well as clarification regarding material from Unearthed Arcana .