Dark Heritage, mapmaking and post summer update

Because I made a YouTube video, rather than recreating it in text, I'll just link to it here.

Actually, I've already talked about some of these issues here, although even then it's been a couple of months.

The Union of the Snake

In Sarabasca, anyone who sells anything; a good, a service, a slave--no matter what--risks the wrath of whatever applicable guild governs his actions if he doesn't first buy a membership in the guild. This often isn't much money, especially for those who want to sell fruit from a cart, or be available for temp labor, or something like that--a guilder or piece of eight or other local gold coin for a year-long membership, for example--but because the sultan gives these guilds tacit authority to police their industries, anyone who risks dodging guild membership is setting himself up for a severe beating and confiscation of his money and merchandise at best, or a permanent stint as shark food in the harbor at worst.

Some guilds, however, are more than simply shakedown rackets; some of them have a great deal of power, influence and money even beyond Sarabasca's borders. The Union of the Snake is one such guild. Because the sultan has not deigned to outlaw or control any substance in Sarabasca, it has become the poison and drug capital of the world, and because the poison-maker's guild has decided to define drugs as long-term poisons that frequently have pleasant short-term effects but certainly poisonous long-term effects, the same guild monitors both poison and drug manufacturing and sales in Sarabasca. This wasn't always the case, but when almost all of the important guild heads of the drug producer's guild died in a single night, the poison maker's guild had made their point. Since Sarabasca is the capital for such activity throughout the Mezzovian Sea region, that makes the colorfully named Union of the Snake one of the primary movers and shakers of the Sarabascan economy, with a cash flow to make kings weep. Named for the deadly and subtle serpents that the poisonmakers aspired to be compared to, the Union of the Snake has secret agents and assets in every major urban center in the entire Mezzovian area and even beyond.

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Union members are much less casual about their affiliation than many other guilds in Sarabasca; most have a small tattoo of a poisonous asp or cobra on their wrists or ankles to identify themselves, they pay much larger dues, but in return get a great deal more support from the guild, especially in terms of contracted security for major shipments or deals. Although closely allied with the assassin's guild in Sarabasca, outside of that city, expatriate Union of the Snake members often are themselves assassins, and can command a premium in many other markets, known for their subtle use of poisons that sicken or kill their victims and make it appear like a completely natural death. Other contract killers, especially those associated with the Cherskii Mafia are more brutal and appropriate when a message wants to be clearly communicated, but the Union of the Snake is infamous for its subtlety. The following is one way in which the Union of the Snake can be brought into a DARK•HERITAGE campaign:

• A prominant local politician dies unexpectedly of a strange sickness. His family believes that foul play was involved, and puts out subtle feelers that a reward will be offered to anyone who can prove that this was so. The local politician was a strong supporter for harsher controls on the local drug trade--with him out of way the motion to pass stricter controls will fade away quietly, as no one else was interested in seeing it come to fruition. Sufficiant investigation will point towards a foreign (Sarabascan) ship that is reasonably well known in the criminal underworld as a smuggler of large quantities of drugs and poisons. While the captain is not a major player himself, and can be brought to justice (of one kind or another) if the PCs so choose, he is a member of the Union of the Snake, and the fact that he has been subtly investigated is enough to prompt the guild into action to shut the PCs down. If they actually bring proof to the victim's family of his involvement, or worse, bring him to even harsher justice, then the PCs have simply invited even stronger reprisals.


• Ever the subtle ones, the Union doesn't initially get directly involved, but a bounty has been put on the PCs. At first this means relatively unprofessional thugs start crossing their path, but assuming the PCs either succeed in thwarting these efforts and don't leave town to avoid trouble, the bounty goes up or more direct contracts are placed on them, and before long, professional and skilled assassins are targeting them. Assuming the PCs can survive this attention and piece together the clues that they need to get to the bottom of the attacks, they discover that a crime lord who's a local patsy to the Union is to blame for the bounty; but taking him down means taking on an entire gang of seasoned criminals.


• By this point, the PCs have significantly disrupted the Unions operation in the city in which they live, and it's time for more direct and decisive action. The Union of the Snake, as it turns out, has more resources than the PCs may have imagined. Much of their success in the inventing, making, and marketing of dangerous substances comes through their alliances with the forces of Hell itself. It's one thing to be targeted by competent earthly assassins, but its another entirely to be targeted by a daemon. Evading this hellish assassin and minimizing collaterial damage is a major undertaking. And even if they do, the Union has more "specialists" who can only bring on more pain and suffering for the PCs back in the Sarabascan home office. How will they eventually either bring down or at least make peace with the Union after allowing the stakes to be raised so high?

Freeport again

On a bit of a whim, I just re-read Green Ronin's systemless sourcebook, The Pirate's Guide to Freeport which is always an interesting endeavor. While the book is systemless, it's also very clearly designed with D&D in mind; it refers to elves, dwarves, gnomes, wizards, dungeons, adventurer heroes and a lot of even more esoteric details that are very D&D specific. Unsurprisingly, as a guy who's implied setting tastes have migrated away from a lot of the overt D&Disms--a process that was a long time coming--I find that disappointing. That said, I'm still a fan of the Freeport setting. While it's occasionally too tongue-in-cheek for my taste, in reality even the most serious of games has to have some comic relief, right?

I'm going to review a few other of my sourcebooks, including Paizo's books on Katapesh and Absalom, and then Privateer Press's book on Five Fingers, which is a good book-end along with Freeport, and the four books together really make for a long dive into fantasy wretched hives of scum and villainy. Maybe I'll even dredge up my Sharn book and re-read that too, while I'm at it.

One of the things that I don't particularly remember giving much thought to about Freeport, but which I quite liked this time around, was the very last section, where it detailed some sample "campaign threads." These were some very loose, and very vague outlines for how a campaign might run. Technically, they were meant to be threads that could be interwoven with other adventures or whatever, but which detailed a possible plot or scenario that PCs could encounter and deal with over the course of a lengthy campaign. About a paragraph long, and then with 5-6 bullet points that were also--at most--a paragraph long describing possible steps in the scenario as it unfolded, these are about the level of detail that I like to prepare at most before running. And I also liked how they were themed; one was specifically focused on the crime lords, one on the cult of Hastur the Unspeakable, one on a race for a pirate treasure, one on a series of Sherlock Holmesian investigations, etc. I like the fact that it gives a sense of direction, but very loosely, and can be adapted or changed on the fly as the players surprise the GM, and do something completely unexpected. Having several threads woven together also works well because you can focus or unfocus your attention on them depending on how well the players take to the themes and ideas in each thread.

I'd like to come up with some possible campaign threads for DARK•HERITAGE over time, so I'm creating yet another new tag, campaign threads, to discuss exactly this. And I'll gradually post a few over the next few weeks while I'm at it. My threads will also be themed; themes that I see as relevent to the DARK•HERITAGE setting include political intrigue, supernatural horror, organized crime, swashbuckling action, and dealing with dangerous wilderness. Ideally, any campaign would touch somewhat on all of these, but each thread will specifically highlight one of these themes as it goes.