Glistershells and Lost Spells - Homebrew Dungeons and Dragons

A bit of a mixed bag of musings today; I will start out with a little homebrew monster environment encounter for you, then a little bit of world-building concepts that can really spice up your game.

Self-contained ecosystems are what most would consider a large and populated dungeon, not always the case, certainly, I love a good necromancer's tomb that is stocked with self sufficient undead horrors, including undead that have been turned into the actual architecture and furnishings, such as zombie head audiobooks lined up on shelves like a library, I wonder if you could connect a lot of zombie heads with some psychic undead and have it work pretty much like Alexa. Nobody ever considers that the modern necromancer home can be augmented with a smart zombie system. Why make the monsters wander when you can have psychic wifi?

I guess the theme of this chat today is Restrictions, a bit of a dirty word in 5th edition, which has been knocking down some we thought were pillars the game was resting on, only to discover they are just as open to being modified or removed as any other part of the game rules. Restrictions are the hallmarks of earlier editions; in fact, you often describe the game by what you can't do in that edition, such as D&D Basic making Dwarf, Elf, and Halfling both a race and character class, and things like restrictions on character attribute scores for certain character classes, such as the Cavalier in advanced dungeons and dragons, a subclass of Paladin that was really difficult to get a natural combination of randomly rolled attribute scores in order to even pick the class, then they had a whole strict code of knightly behavior they had to conform to, all to just charge a horse at your enemy. Restrictions on players' choices, restrictions on character capabilities, I can see how some are there to discourage players from picking a character that just has really narrow expertise and will end up sucking most of the time, and domination some situations so hard, it will suck the fun out of the game for the other players.

Restrictions on Monsters are one of the key aspects of homebrewing really interesting creatures that the players get to figure out, and adding some creative restrictions to your world building can quickly and remarkably change the entire tone of your game.

Before we get to that though, I have a weird Underdark creature encounter for you.

As you move through a naturally carved stream underground, breaking through into some ancient dwarven chamber of considerable size, you notice a bright rainbow gleam in mid air, shimmering with your torchlight. It looks for all the world like some sort of soap bubble, floating in the air, and there are more, soon quite a swarm of them, drifting in your direction.

They're not a magical effect, nor a plant or insect; these are Glistershells; they're like thin membranes, so translucent they shine and shimmer like soap bubbles in the dim light of the caverns, boosted into becoming dim floating lanterns because of the bioluminescent bacteria living symbiotically inside and the conditions those bacteria love also produce gases that are lighter than air, giving the Glistershells the power of flight.

Glistershells start out as tiny eggs, barely visible to the naked eye. Hatching from these eggs are wee little slug-like creatures, no bigger than a fingernail, with long antennae about twice their body length. They are blind but sense the world through vibration and taste the air. Those who remain in slug form are the females, the ones who do the bulk of the reproducing, they grow to about the size of a human fist and have slow metabolisms, they live for decades by chewing trails along the surface of the rock and making little pockets and dank pools of slime to rest in. They are tough and produce a foul-tasting slime, but easy to catch and can be boiled, skinned, sliced, fried and dried into strips that can add protein to a spicy stew, they combine well with some of the tough underground mushrooms, particular mushrooms that grow from the trunks of larger mushrooms, usually found at the drier edge of a fungus grotto, are the absolute best combination with Glistershell strip stew, a delicacy of the Svirfneblin, the deep gnomes.

Then you have the male Glistershells. They're the ones cultivating the glowing bacteria that light up the darkness. When fully inflated and floating around in their bubble-like forms, they are about the size of a human head, attracting insects with their faint glow; they also consume old spider webs, looking like some sort of creepy Christmas baubles decorating the Underdark's more infested areas. When they catch a meal on their sticky membrane, it is quickly absorbed, and they digest it and leave behind these goo pods on the ground; these pods are packed with nutrients and the semen of the males, they release pheromones that the female slugs sense with those long antenna and when they find the goo pods, they soak them up, using the nutrients to help pump out another large batch of eggs. As the females move around, they leave a trail of slime behind them which has the tiny Glistershell eggs scattered all through it.

From the swarms of male and female juvenile slugs that hatch from the slime trails, occasionally you will get a male that doesn't absorb or gestate the same glowing bacteria inside itself as the other males. These darker slugs have tough, sharp antenna whips and their body grows to the size of a large dog, plus, those whips can deliver a wicked pulse of radiant energy, only when the Rogue Male Glistershell is seriously injured or threatened though, otherwise they are fairly defenseless creatures that populate some regions of the Underdark, restricted to being more of an environmental encounter location feature that may interact with other creatures or be used by the player characters in unexpected ways. Why they tend to be attracted to torchlight, I am not sure; perhaps they are just drawn to any light source in the Underdark in order to use it to sort of camouflage their own glow.

Not much of a threat, perhaps they get left out of the pages of monster manuals because they are just interesting creatures found in the Underdark, but I think they are worthy and, you know, in case anyone asks what the tasty, strangely meaty noodles are they are eating with their Mushroom Stew.

OK, monster ecology, underground ecology, and the gastronomy of subterranean gastropods aside, here is an idea for you: a campaign concept for those who enjoy their homebrew and world-building.

Take your entire list of Spells for whatever edition of Dungeons and Dragons (or other fantasy game including magic) you are using; now randomly pick or make a table and roll for a large bunch of those spells, say 30% of all the spells, and in your campaign setting, your fantasy world, all of those selected spells are lost magic, they are rumored to exist, but are generally known to be either lost or legendary spells that nobody has seen in many years. The players who have magic-using characters are the only ones who either know some of them or can find, decipher, and replicate those lost spells!

Now, you have a different viewpoint on spell and ritual knowledge by the spellcasters in your game. And just knowing a simple spell like Prestidigitation or Heat metal or Mage Hand when nobody else does, oh that is hugely fun! Now you have factions hunting down any whispers of new or rediscovered magics, relic hunting for spell casters is almost an obsession, and player characters who demonstrate they know some lost magic will become famous or infamous if they make no secret of it and flash their lost magic around for all to see.

I know that introducing this scarcity of certain spells and rituals among the non-player characters can create a power imbalance on paper, but in actual play, it just adds another dynamic of conflict from which to derive story hooks, plots, opportunities, folklore and enemies, all fodder for a great roleplaying game. Rediscovering lost spells and rituals can become a central theme in quests and adventures. Players may embark on epic journeys to uncover ancient texts, decipher cryptic clues, or seek out elusive mentors who hold the key to forgotten knowledge.

All the best and most iconic monsters hoard something, dragons, liches, even mindflayers, not that you really want to have what they covet, but still, seeking out the massive pile of treasure held by a mighty dragon, defeating it or somehow stealing from it, those scrolls and spell books that show up on the random treasure tables suddenly get WAY more interesting.

The possession of rare spells and rituals can become a lucrative business for player characters. They may choose to monetize their unique abilities by offering magical services to wealthy patrons or selling their knowledge to the highest bidder. Lost spells and rituals are not merely arcane secrets but also pieces of cultural heritage and history. Rediscovering these lost arts can lead to the revival of ancient traditions, the restoration of forgotten civilizations, and the rekindling of cultural pride among various factions and societies.

The control and dissemination of lost spells and rituals can become a source of political leverage and intrigue. Factions may vie for control over ancient tomes or artifacts containing forgotten knowledge, using them to manipulate allies and enemies alike in pursuing power and influence. We saw this very tool be used against the civilization of Netheril by use of the ancient Nether Scrolls, long lost and then planted for discovery by an ancient immortal, manipulating events for their own purposes.

The quest to uncover lost spells and rituals provides ample opportunities for character development and growth. Players may undergo transformative experiences, learn valuable lessons from ancient mentors, and  rediscovery of lost spells and rituals may raise ethical dilemmas for player characters. They must grapple with questions of morality, responsibility, and the consequences of wielding ancient powers that were lost for a reason. Perhaps there was a catastrophic war long ago, between the forces of Law and Chaos, and it was all because of a legendary, now lost spell called Wish.

Already the cogs and gears in your mind are pondering which spells would be the most interesting to restrict in this way.

Heh heh

I will leave you to it, thanks for listening and as always, I will be back with more for you, very soon. 

The Magic of Kara Tur and the Wu Jen

Wandering along the trade road, the morning mist still enveloping the landscape, I spotted a figure in the distance. A farmer, by the looks of him, his cautious stride speaking volumes about the wilderness that bordered his lands—a place frequented by raiding bands of horselord warriors.

Dressed in my usual traveling attire—a dark tunic and trousers, a blue cape, and a leather chest piece adorned with three large ruby gems—I approached the farmer, my staff and heavy journal strapped to my waist.

"Good morning," I said, offering a respectful nod as I greeted him in the old Kara-Tur dialect.

The farmer looked me over, his eyes narrowing slightly as he assessed the situation. He returned my nod but remained cautious, his wariness understandable.

Once I could see he understood the language, I decided to share a bit about myself and my travels in a non-intrusive manner, hoping to ease his apprehension. "I've wandered through many lands and seen countless wonders," I remarked, opening my heavy journal to reveal sketches and notes from my journeys.

The farmer glanced at the journal briefly, his interest piqued but his guard still up, I could see he tried to read the text, but in Kara-Tur they use the draconic alphabet to record their language. Looking over the pages. he nodded politely, his demeanor cautious but respectful. Recalling the Bedine tea ritual I had learned while exploring the Anauroch desert, I suggested we stop to share a pot of tea together, and the farmer nodded, so I set up a simple tea set on a flat rock by the side of the road; I brewed the tea with care and he looked at every illustration and map in my journal. Handing him a cup, I offered a silent toast to whatever gods happened to be watching and we settled down to a nice chat. Curious about the local area and its inhabitants, I asked about any recent tales or legends. His responses were brief but informative, revealing snippets of local lore and cautionary tales that shed light on the challenges of living on the borderlands. It seemed every story he told involved the loss of some relative, friend or well-regarded person, but still, I sensed that indomitable human spirit, here was a man who had fought to the death to defend his family and home on more than one occasion. He was weathered not just from years working in the hot eastern sun, but his bronzed skin, wide facial features, and carefully groomed black hair all identified him as a member of the Shou people, one of the oldest branches of the many human empires, they had occupied the lands of Kara-tur for tens of thousands of years.

As we finished our tea and bid farewell, the farmer's demeanor remained cautious but not unfriendly, his eyes still wary but no longer suspicious of me, rather just back to carefully watching his environment. It was a good start, I felt.

As I traveled across Kara-tur, I was inside the nation of Shou Lung. The largest and most powerful empire in Kara-Tur, the whole time, I did hear a lot about the island nation of Wa, as that was where the sage I met later was from, and she summoned the Arcanoloth daemon that instructed me on the magic of Kara-Tur.

One thing is evident when you travel into Shou-lung and take the time to appreciate the landscape: the people who have worked the land for generations have done so under the influence of those who know about the Weave and the flow of natural energies, the townships blend into the natural landscape, the fields and roads, trade centers and government temples are all arranged around Ley lines and ancient sacred sites, of particular interest was the migration of immortal Nagas to this region of the continent long ago in the days of the empires of scales, they remained free from the pestering of the Yuan-ti and from the Batrachi empire that rose up after the fall of the Sarrukh, sauroid rulers of the serpent folk and scaly kind. There are rumors that many spirit nagas and doppelgangers are operating behind the scenes in some of the most ancient institutions of arcane studies; perhaps that explains the Shou-lung love of wavey lines and stepped fields of rich and vibrant, hardy vegetables. Trade all across Kara-Tur ensures that fresh, exotic fruit is much more commonly available than in the Forgotten Realms region, even without the advantage of an inland sea to speed along delicate trade goods and produce.

The Shou-lung people once had a great brick wall all along the border with the desert I appeared to walk out of that misty morning, but it's gone now; miraculously, some great dragon spirit was trapped inside it and got free a hundred years ago my details on that are a bit sketchy, but I did see a lot of brick walls and buildings, so, perhaps the local people just repurposed the ruined wall? They seem very practical regarding that sort of thing; you can't just leave ruins and valuable bricks lying about the place.

The Shou people have dwelled in the east for a very long time and their culture is quite different from the lands to the west, first, they live in a world where heaven, their celestial empire, is a vast mirror of the empire of Shou Lung, with its own bureaucracy, government and emperor, holding spiritual authority over all of Kara-Tur, this situation has influenced their entire culture, and all subsequent religions and teachings that have come after, so even if a person there doesn't dedicate their life to any particular faith, they all basically know that Heaven is real and they need to prepare themselves for eventually ending up in the afterlife.

Religions are quite different; there are three main belief groups, the Way, The Path of Enlightenment, and veneration of the Nine Immortals, The teachings of the Way (now see if this sounds familiar) say that there are no separate forces of good, evil, chaos, and law, but only interconnected and interrelated forces that followers of the Way can shape. Its followers are divided into a Dark Way and a Light Way and yes, it operates and sounds very much like the force from Star Wars, but with Yin-Yang symbols and most who follow they way are neutral in their outlook, rather than going to extremes in either dark or light actions, after all, its all supposed to be about peace, harmony and eternal order after all. Interestingly, more of the Wu-jen, the Arcane spellcasters, practice The Way than the Shukenja, the mostly divine spellcasters, but, We-jen are not like the trained wizards of the Western Realms, they don't attend wizard schools or academies, they have to seek out a Wu-jen and learn from them, figuring a lot of their magic use on their own, so, they are a bit sorcerer, a bit wizard, a bit druid and a bit monk. The followers of the Way are primarily responsible for research and spreading of mystical knowledge in general, but they will often be the Wu-jen who are either more open to sharing their knowledge, or taking knowledge being jealously guarded by others for their own power and reputation, both actions in the way, while opposed ethically, do still spread knowledge.

Magic in Shou Lung is viewed through the lens of tradition and ritual, with a focus on elemental magic, divination, and the manipulation of energy flows. Shukenja (divine spellcasters) and Wu Jen (arcane spellcasters) are revered for their abilities and often serve important roles within the imperial court and religious institutions.

The Shou people practice a blend of ancestor veneration, nature worship, and philosophical traditions that emphasize harmony with the universe. To them, the universe exists in a perfect and eternal balance, as long as everyone follows the rules and respects traditions, things will continue to run smoothly, or at least, not get any more broken. So, for your average Shou person, the universe and the celestial court is Indifferent, its a system, a machine, they are either cogs in that machine, or they are vital components that are destined to perform some task in their life, depending on your level of pessimism. But the whole point of Shou lung is that the empire is eternal, it certainly is doing well, so far its about three thousand years old and there have been over 70 emperors, and the troubles with bordering islands and a few smaller nations have not been very serious lately, so, things look as stable as always in Shou Lung, which is just the way they like it. 

The official state religion of Shou Lung is the Path of Enlightenment, or the True Path, its a codex of behaviors created by the Celestial Emperor in order that the mortal world and the Celestial Heaven mirror one another, maintaining order and the slow, eternal quest for attaining perfection. Basically, it's the Ten Commandments, the nine cardinal virtues, the attainment of a good heavenly credit rating on your right deeds and correct actions meter. So, its more like eastern catholicism, except the pope is actually god and cardinals are demigods and everyone knows how to use the three seashells. It's religion by state-printed pamphlets and very much wants everyone to believe that the mortal authorities also carry the authority of the afterlife, so you better stay out of trouble, or you might literally be sentenced to one of their many bespoke hells.

I'm not going to be going into any great detail about the Shukenja, divine spellcasters, or the gods of Kara-Tur, but I will drop this little bombshell on your lap.

Kara-Tur is not governed by the Overgod known as Ao, it is governed by another overgod entity known as The Celestial Emperor and it is from that entity that the entire celestial empire influences and shapes Kara-Tur, its culture and its divine magic, even the existence of dragons is governed by the Overgod there, but, our focus today is the Wu Jen, and the arcane traditions and practices of modern Kara-Tur, also, how you can include these concepts easily into your game, to represent that Kara-Tur and the Empire of Shou Lung is not on the other side of the world, a completely unknown land, ignored by the west; Far from it! Kara-tur trades with the West, and people from there live in the West and share their culture; in some places, it blends to make a whole new culture, and you get some pretty interesting player character options if you really embrace the idea that, yes, Kara-Tur is real and it should form a part of the overall vibe of Toril.

Of course, one way to explore Kara-tur culture in your game is to create and run characters from there; some cliche examples include the Wu Jen Wanderer, a traveler who has sought out ancient mentors to learn the ways of elemental magic, blending sorcery, wizardry, and druidic traditions. You could play an Imperial Agent,  A member of the imperial bureaucracy trained in diplomacy, espionage, and martial arts, serving as a loyal servant of the Celestial Emperor, or you could play a legitimate Cultural Ambassador who has studied foreign cultures and serves as a bridge between Shou lung and the Western Realms, promoting continued peace, cooperation and most importantly, trade. A Mystical Merchant who sells exotic goods from far to the east is another great option, just the idea that your character could have this serious arsenal of magic items for trade or sale, along with strange food, drinks and weird animals or plants from their homeland and basically see adventuring as a way to refresh their trade inventory. You also have the traveling guide, seer, healer, and channeller of divine wisdom and celestial insight, the Shukenja, who protects communities when they must but also seeks out new wisdom, experiences, and chances to turn people towards the Path to Enlightenment. I like to think they give out little scrolls that contain the rules for right living and espouse the importance of your mortal life as a chance to earn a better afterlife. I'll suggest a few alterations you can make to existing 5th edition classes to give them some traits reflecting a different cultural origin.

So in the west, spell casters look at the invisible energy flows and interactions of the cosmos, and they give it a persona and venerate it as a god, but in the end, their attitude towards the weave through their history has been an exploitive one, because their magical traditions were manipulated by powerful and immortal ancient beings from long lost civilizations, the oldest being mighty primordial beings which have departed the prime material plane and now reside in higher dimensions, where they can live in multiple alternate realities at the same time, oh, and they sealed off they path behind them, so mortal beings in the D&D multiverse can't attain a state of being powerful enough to alter multiple universes at the same time, and can never achieve a state where they can detect and track the activities of the primordials, because they are basically needles in a haystack of infinite alternate realities, and in return the primordials can see absolutely everything going on, including alternate courses of events, which are real locations they can travel to and interact with, so, in dungeons and dragons cosmology, the Primordials never really did stop creating, playing with and destroying universes, they just made it so none of their toys could ever really hurt them... they are running their holodeck with the safety protocols switched on, so to speak. 

In the East, the invisible flows of energy, wind, heat, water, electromagnetic currents, migrations, eclipses, conjunctions, powerful events in the creation or destruction of life, strongly emotive events or objects, the normal day to day activity patterns of all things are not seen as just, the weave, this thing to be used like fuel that will just take care of and replenish itself. Instead, the Eastern spellcasters see all these energy flows as separate things that must exist and support each other in harmony. Thus, their rituals can involve things like altering the landscape and building structures designed to direct and amplify the flow of energy in order to siphon some from that flow to power magical enchantments. Eastern magic has a far more nuanced and subtle approach to using all available resources and the spellcasters tend to think of themselves as just as much a component and energy source as anything else, so the Wu Jen are known to have many weird habits, dietary restrictions, odd behaviors which they firmly believe purifies them enough to create certain types of magic or reach the higher levels of magical power.

After parting ways from the farmer, I headed deeper into Shou Lung, where I encountered a Wu Jen named Lian, a man of impressive stature with a serene demeanor. We met at a marketplace, both looking over some curious items a villager said they had retrieved from their local town. Lian's appearance was striking, with long black hair pulled back in a ponytail and deep-set eyes that seemed to hold the wisdom of ages. His robes were adorned with intricate patterns representing the elements, a good indicator that he had mastery over elemental magic. Lian's voice was calm and measured as he spoke of his travels and experiences. He shared stories of his encounters with spirits, adventures in ancient temples, and studies under wise mentors' guidance. His knowledge of the arcane was vast, encompassing divination, demonology, and the manipulation of natural energies. 

What struck me most about Lian was his unique approach to magic. Unlike traditional spellcasters, Lian drew power directly from the world around him, tapping into ley lines and ancient sacred sites to amplify his abilities, he could also tap into his own energy, describing his efforts to purify and strengthen his body as simply improving the universal spell component. he was acutely aware of signs and portents in the world around him, which was much like the habits of a cleric, who constantly looked for signs from their gods. 

As I spent more time with the Wu Jen, it became evident that his abilities were far from ordinary. His mastery over elemental magic was not just a skill but a way of life, deeply ingrained in every aspect of his being. His practices, while subtle, were a testament to the unique traits and abilities that set the Wu Jen apart from other spellcasters.

The Wu Jen's approach to magic was deeply ritualistic, focusing on the manipulation of natural energies and elemental forces, forces which he said were just as alive as he or I, and that elemental creatures should be shown respect in any form they take, as they are all a part of a whole, and are connected in a delicate balance or eternal order, much too vast for little mortal minds to fathom. Unlike traditional wizards who memorized spells from tomes and scrolls, the Wu Jen drew power directly from the world around him, tapping into ley lines and ancient sacred sites to amplify his abilities.

His expertise in divination was remarkable, allowing him to peer into the future and unravel the mysteries of the unknown. He often used this skill to seek guidance from the spirit world, consulting ancestral spirits and elemental guardians for wisdom and insight.

Demonology was another area of expertise for the Wu Jen, though his approach was far from the dark and malevolent practices often associated with the summoning of demons. Instead, he saw demons as powerful entities that could be bound and controlled through arcane rituals, used to protect against malevolent forces or to gain forbidden knowledge.

Lian's understanding of the spirit world was extensive, allowing him to communicate with and manipulate spirits to aid his endeavors.  He showed me that by simply burning the ritual Joss paper, in its many many different forms, from folded shapes of animals and objects, to illustrations of equipment and also he described as a paper currency they use instead of silver coins and trade bars, all of which is burned in simple rituals and manifest actual items, creatures and wealth within the Ethereal and to a limited extent within the Astral planes, also it was possible for Lian to burn the tiny illustration of a sword, then moments later, the thing appeared in his hand, as real as can be. 

In addition to his magical prowess, Lian possessed a deep knowledge of the natural world. His keen eye for detail ensured that he never missed an opportunity to harness the energies of the world around him, gathering rare herbs and ingredients essential for his rituals. And what rituals! I thought I had a very good grasp on ritual magic, but Liams mastery over ritual casting was unparalleled, allowing him to apply metamagic effects to his spells in ways that defied my western conventional understanding. As he performed his rituals, I could see him manipulating the weave of magic, bending the very fabric of reality to his will but being super careful not to cause any lasting disruption or damage.

Despite his formidable abilities, Lian remained humble and focused. His dedication to his craft was evident in every gesture, every incantation, and every ritual he performed.

As we parted ways, Lian's parting words resonated with me, he said the West is the frontier of Kara-Tur, and civilisation was coming, hopefully before another empire falls, to which I replied "What empire?" and he just said "Exactly,nature doesn't like unfilled seats at the table, if we don't take control of the whole continent, we will lose the west, you must know this great sage"

I simply nodded, and we carried on with our lives.

My name is AJ Pickett, thanks for joining me, if you are interested in D&D lore, learning about the Forgotten Realms and the Dungeons and Dragons Multiverse, including a massive archive of monster ecology videos, please subscribe to the channel and consider supporting me on Patreon, thank you for liking the video and as always, I will be back with more for you, very soon.

Erinyes Devils, Dungeons and Dragons Lore, The Nine Hells and Cania

One of the more unusual devils of the Nine Hells are the Erinyes, also known as the Eumenides or the Furies; they have always maintained a lot of independence from the strict hierarchy of the hells because they are the spirits that are sent to the prime material plane to collect those who have condemned themselves to an eternity of punishment, primarily by making false oaths. Swearing an Oath is a kind of magic in Dungeons and Dragons; it holds real power, so when someone talks the talk but doesn't walk the walk, there are infernal consequences, thanks to the great pact between celestial and infernal forces, that only those who broke their promises to the gods would be consigned to the nine hells. When you break such an oath, and it involves any kind of battle situation, the Erinyes, the Furies of Hell, the infernal opposite of an Asgardian Valkery, will arrive swiftly to collect your damned soul.

Furies do not bargain, they don't play silly games with mortals, and they are brutal, efficient, and extremely well-experienced as infernal beings; as long as they are not destroyed in battle within the Nine Hells, they can usually return to active duty after some recovery time, variable depending on the exact nature of their defeat outside of the Hells. Devils reform eventually and usually have recovery boosts in place or can get themselves mired down in obligations if they are forced to beg or bargain for those boosts to restore them to their former power. Erinyes who get stuck in the Nine Hells have plenty to keep them occupied for centuries if need be. If you think of each of the Nine Hells as a different hostile environment for training purposes,  there is that the Erinyes also engage in contests of strategy with Ice Devils, jungle warfare with monstrous plants and animals attacking them constantly; they also lead excavation and capture teams deep into the mysterious ice fields of Cania and many of the isolated citadels there are owned by the Erinyes, stocked with their own private army of specialists and laboratories, forges and stockpiles of powerful arms and armor. 

There is a good reason for this isolation and fortification, and here we need to go into the history of the Erinyes and the Brachinas. The origin of the first devils is shrouded in confusion, it makes good tactical sense in a multiverse where time travel is possible through magic, you don't want your infernal enemies in the Blood War getting accurate coordinates to important formative events in your history. We know that at some point, the forces of Law that were fighting against the forces of chaos became corrupted and became native to the lower planes, not the celestial ones, there were a particular breed of Celestials who became the first Erinyes, and from the ranks of those, successive generations of new Erinyes have been born, and also the deliberately altered Brachinas are elevated from the population of Erinyes. Pit fiends and archdevils use the extremely seductive and attractive brachinas as playthings, discarding them as quickly as they select them. Thus, these seducers are quick to take any assignment they can to avoid the brutal attentions of their masters and remain in the prime material plane until they have attained whatever number of souls they are after. Brachinas can be male or female, they have amber hair and violet eyes, they are extremely sexy and known as Pleasure devils for a very good reason. They specialize in corrupting the servants of the gods, the virtuous and the self rightious but weak willed, they delight in orchestrating their doom, unlike the Erinyes, who just think all mortals are weak-willed beings easily driven to evil with a simple promise of physical gratification. But, the Erinyes are not seducers, they are assassins, and its easy to see how this can be confusing, so lets take a look at their origin in Greek mythology, they are quite different to how they are presented in Dungeons and Dragons games.

That whole thing where the elves believe their spirits were spawned from the spilled blood of their god Corellon, that is actually from the mythology of the Furies, the Erinyes were sister goddess figures similar in some ways to the cursed Gorgon sisters, ironically, the gorgons, including Medusa were supposed to have wings, while the Erinyes did not, well, the reverse is true in dungeons & dragons, along with some important behavior and appearance aspects which make the original Furies more like Harpies than fallen angels. So, D&D furies are very sexy, original recipe Furies are hideous hell hags who scream horribly as they rip you open with brass claws.

So, lets just ignore real world history, its not really applicable.

A few important, defining aspects of the Erinyes is that they are the most similar to mortals in the Nine Hells, they can be any particular gender they wish, but unlike other devils, who can only sire children, the Erinyes can also carry and birth them as a mother, they seclude away their offspring and oversee their development closely, not allowing any outside interference, so their culture remains strong. Erinyes are not succubi, you can tell them apart instantly by their wings, the Erinyes have dark feathers, the Succubi have the classic fiendish bat-like skin membrane wings, there are far fewer Erinyes and Brachinas than there are Succubi, but they outrank them in the infernals ranks of the hells and their commands carry the authority of Asmodeus, thanks to his ascension to even greater levels of power.

Unlike most other devils, the Furies can enter the mortal worlds whenever they choose to, however they can't take anyone else with them so they are used to operating alone. They will use magic to disguise their celestial wings and locate some goons they can easily control, not always through magic, gems and coins also work just fine, but so does their reputation for being master martial artists and they can get quite a lethal cadre of followers just be teaching them a few of the combat techniques they know. 

Oh, I should say, Erinyes can't transport people out of hell, nor can they take inorganic material back and forth, but they can take one being with them back to the Nine hells, a victim they are dragging back for eternal damnation.

I'll quote directly from the forgotten realms wiki article on them in regards to their society within the Hells, as its quite complex.

Favored by Dispater for their beauty, skills, and unshakable allegiance, Erinyes were common within Dis. Stygia also possessed a large population of erinyes, with a whole regiment being responsible for protecting Levistus's frozen tomb from aerial intrusion. They could be found in great numbers within the political labyrinth of Maladomini, and within Grenopli specifically, they acted as patrollers to dispel or counter offensive magic and all other attempts at violence. Along with Paeliryons, the seductive Erinyes enjoyed a noble position and noticeable favoritism within Glasya's court, which often provided them targets. Hunters were known to stalk the skies of Malbolge for intruders without letters of safe passage, often capturing charismatic enemies for Glasya to torture or seduce at her leisure.

Even Erinyes, who did not work under archdevils, often directly reported to the Dark Eight instead of having an intermediary master. While some served as servants or were simply concubines, others had vastly superior tasks, such as spying on enemies and allies. Many Erinyes were responsible for bringing justice to Hell, although the method with which they did so varied greatly. Donning horned helms and stylized armor, Erinyes warriors brought death to those who defied their infernal masters or the orders of Asmodeus himself. As arbiters of justice, they acted on behalf of Hell and were responsible for tracking down those who broke infernal contracts. Others acted on the other side of the law, helping to free mortal souls by acting as legal counsel for those who did not receive what they were promised or were forced into making their own deals. The role that earned Erinyes the most respect among their devilish peers, however, was that of the temptress, the succubi rank below the Erinyes and the Brachinas are on a whole other level beyond either of the others.

The Archdevil Mephistopheles employs Gelugon ice devils and Erinyes operatives to patrol Cania in search of spies from the Iron City of Dis, along with escaped prisoners, slaves, experiments, and all of the above. The Gelugons and Pit Fiends who command squads of Cornugons; the Horned Devils, greater devils who can gate in a variety of other devils, from a small mob of Lemures, a group of Barbazus or Bearded Devils, the elite front line skirmishers of the Nine Hells, or a gang of Abishai or Scaly Devils, the draconic devils who are kind of the gutter scum of Hells armies and of course, a Horned Devil can also summon a few other Horned devils, so, its rare that the Ice devils or Pit fiends have to lift a finger in their own defense, the Horned devils are loyal and highly capable bodyguards for the Elite Baatezu devils.

So, why is Cania so interesting, aside from being a Frozen layer of the Nine Hells and home to the arch-devil Mephistopheles? Well, it's what is frozen inside all that ice that is the reason all the excavation and experimentation is going on. To understand what is going on with that, is to understand why the Erinyes are so involved with Cania.

There are hints in the various editions of the Manual of Planes, Planes of Law, Guide to Hell, and Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes; these sources tell us the environment of Cania is brutally cold, devils other than the Gelugons don't enjoy going there, a cold gust of wind in Cania is around −60 ℉ (−51 ℃), which will kill unprotected creatures quite quickly. Storms in Cania are a great blend of freezing blizzards plus unstable ground and hidden crevasses; the very frequent avalanches are also deadly, and it wouldn't be the Nine Hells without packs of snarling lemures and mute, bloated nupperibos and worse, tucked into every crack and shelter the provides even a little protection from the freezing cold. 

The entire plane seems to consist of huge mountains with highly mobile glaciers and ice sheets that travel at a brisk walking pace across the plane constantly; there are currents and flows that can be mapped unless you are anywhere near the home of Mephistopheles, named the Citadel of Mephistar, as he has control over the great glacier Nargus and his great base rests within and can travel around the plane, disrupting other ice flows in catastrophic and spectacular tumbles and explosions of ice, creating a highly chaotic and deadly landscape. 

There are countless preserved corpses within the ice, but entire alien cities (such as one called Kintyre) have also been discovered. Regions where huge creatures can be seen deep in the ice or great armies of archons or devas fighting desperately against some spined creatures nobody can identify are also present. The Deep Ice of Cania tells tales of pasts that no longer exist as the multiverse has twisted and transformed over and over again in the ancient wars for control of reality itself.

My theory is that these armies and creatures date back to a time when there were far fewer different zones of existence. Creatures such as the Draeden, living demiplanes, were still able to move around in the most disrupted and chaotic areas. However, it's a task even imagining a reality in which a Draeden would feel right at home. I don't even want to think about it.

The Erinyes know a lot more about these ancient artifacts, creatures, celestial corpses, and alien cities than anyone else suspects; they occupy thousands of secret laboratory and library citadels all across Cania, in the deepest depths of the frozen wastes, in the deep chasms cut deep into the heart of massive mountains resonating with the dull grind of ice over stone, the warehouses, prisons and armories of the secret agents of Cania are loaded with potent weapons of personal and mass destruction. Nightmare creatures that have a habit of disrupting reality and causing madness in creatures that get too close to them, alien technologies that can twist matter into fractal shapes, drain or transfer life force, celestial warheads, interdimensional parasites, phase crystals, and potent engines that create inverted freezing plasma beams.

It's important to remind ourselves that the Ice Devils, the strange, insectoid-looking Gelugons, are notoriously cold-hearted and brutal taskmasters; they can't tolerate any weakness and will simply execute weaker fiends around them when they have served their purpose or just to vent their anger. They are big, standing twelve feet tall, their hands, feet and their long tail are covered in spikes and they are very skilled at using powerful infernal arms and armor. They deal with the Erinyes all the time, so there is a harsh relationship between them where the Gelugons will randomly scheme and pitch some brilliant and nasty sneak attack on an Erinyes citadel, just to keep the Furies on their toes. Neither Gelugons or the Furies devote much of their time and attention to collecting, trading or making use of souls, they have much more interesting things to mess with that they are constantly digging out of the ice.

Now, there are other fiends that dwell in Cania, which are part of this strange, independent sub Hell going on. While in the Second of the Nine Hells you will find the Chain Devils, known as the Kytons, in Cania there are the Excruciarch devils, who are great, beefy, brutal butchers clad in thick leather aprons, mask, cruel tools of torture and great clevers for hacking apart meat and enemies. Excruciarch fiends are also known as Pain devils and they sell their services as torturers. Under their creepy leather attire, they have pale skin, red eyes, no hair, and they are only about six feet tall; they are just very broad and seem taller thanks to boots, spiked shoulder plates, and usually some large, intimidating hat. These devils love to torture helpless victims and are known to lure victims by appearing much weaker and helpless than they really are, overpowering a defeated foe and destroying any sense of hope. Standing near a Pain devil will cause small cuts to appear over your body, and any touch from a weapon they carry delivers unimaginable pain of a magical nature; they typically operate in pairs and use large scourges in battle. Where there are Pain devils, you will also find the horrific Kocrachons, insectoid but much more like bizarre beetles, while Ice devils look more like some sort of lizard mantis, the Kocrachons are 5-foot tall, dark blue-purple bugs with wings that emerge from flaps in the exoskeleton, six thin, long limbs, two legs and four arms ending with pincer claws, aside from using instruments of torture, these weak but sadistic bugs can inject a disease loaded goo into victims which will slowly kill them over weeks, they can also heal victims the same way, tormenting them constantly. Strikes from Kocrachons are particularly debilitating because the creatures spend all their time taking victims apart and and sometimes putting them back together again, weather they like it or not.

Because the Kocrachons are so resistant to cold, they tend to find a home in Cania and are common enough in the many citadels of the Erinyes that they often kick them out of the way or basically treat them as no better than furniture or unwanted pests. Erinyes most often use the bugs for their excellent ability to get information, its what they do after all, torture victims and extract secrets from them. Oh, fun fact, the devils who become the Kocrachons do so very deliberately, by enrolling in the School of Pain, located underneath the Knoll of Blades in the layer of Dis, a school founded by the pit fiend named Pearza, a member of the dreaded Dark Eight, so, while lesser devils, the Kocrachons do have a bit of a reputation for being very nasty and their slow torture being particularly good for breaking a victim's mind.

Seeing an Erinyes in combat is like watching some evil counter-universe version of Wonder Woman, armed with an enchanted rope of entanglement, epic magical sword and bow, clad in custom armor that doesn't sacrifice style for practicality, her weapon strikes are coated in caustic venom and she coordinates very quickly with her allies while laying down spells and weapon attacks from a distance, only closing into melee range when it is time to finish the fight.

Erinyes earn promotion through reputation for being extremely cunning and creative, because to rank up from their position means significant escalation in their command of the armies of the Nine Hells, its even possible for an Erinyes to go directly up to the rank of Pit Fiend, though of course they have to endure the same 1001 days spent in The Pit of Flame that the Gelugons do in order to qualify for the position.

So lets have a look at their basic stats in 5th edition D&D, they are a challenge rating 12 threat, armor class 18, 153 hit points, all attributes well above humans of course, all the physical combat side of them is fine, +8 to hit with a longsword coated in poison, +7 to hit with a longbow and poisoned arrow, nothing special about the poison at all. Says they have magic resistance but I don't see one mention of their ability to charm or enthrall anyone, nor cast any spells, nor gate in other devils, and minor oversight, while Erinyes do have telepathy, they never use it to seduce their victims. OK, so, clearly, they have all the seductive powers of the Succubus, automatically, and give them a spell list similar to a bard with some decent illusion and mind control magic, plus they are very capable of using teleportation magic, as its often part of their operational duties and a natural choice for the devil that has the power to just move freely between the infernal and mortal realms. 

Plus, every single one of their weapons and their armor, plus a bunch of assorted wondrous devices should all be Magical as HELL.

And that is about all I have to say for the moment about the Erinyes, but I probably will be back to Cania later, it is the last stop before reaching Nessus and the Home of Asmodeus after all. In the meantime, my name is AJ Pickett, as always, thanks for listening, liking and subscribing and I will be back with more for you, very soon.

Bards of the Forgotten Realms

The history of the Bardic arts goes back a long way. The faithful of the god Denier will say that music is the very stuff from which all is made, and the alchemists of Lantan speak of planar harmonics when they overlay magical enchantments on the finest gems ever seen. Music is beauty, creation, and life itself.

Long ago on the island of Alaron in the Sea of Moonshae, born in the little village of Hickorydale, simply the greatest bard the world of Toril has ever known was born; his parents were human and elven, the best of both worlds; they named him  Falataer, friend to all, he grew into a strikingly handsome young man who gained the love of his land of Alaron, in seeking out the legends of old, he achieved stunning deeds, becoming the foremost bard in Alaron's capital, Caer Callidyrr.

The kingdom gave Falataer a magnificent sailing vessel, and a brave crew flocked to his side; heroes one and all, they sailed to distant lands; the fame of Falataer grew as he bested pirates and monsters and saved countless lives; the other nations sent ambassadors and trade blossomed between the Moonshae isles and the Mainland's kingdoms, Callidyrr was always Falataer's home, but he found such amazing talent and opportunity on the mainland of Faerun that he founded a Bardic college, the first of its kind, combining his love of elven and human traditions, magical arts of the fey and fair folk, the sword fighting techniques that served him well on the high seas, a particularly versatile swash-buckling style and his greatest treasure so far, not only seven wondrous musical instruments but also a great collection of rare and comprehensive knowledge, including all his journals, for his students to absorb. He founded the first college in Silverymoon, named after the first instrument he played, the Fochlucan bandore. The school taught lore, and its mastery gained the bard the title of a Fochlucan level of skill, kind of like a white belt in Karate; the bards of the College of lore return to Silverymoon and the widespread network of that academia to continue learning and working after they complete the other levels of bardic skill if they want to, and a great many do. When you see references to the bardic college of Lore, it refers both to the location these arts are taught and also to the organization itself, bound by tradition and the bonds of masters and students, but there are many other colleges of the Bardic arts, those who focus on combat are taught in the style of the College of Swords and can attain the title of Blade, a type of bardic tradition and training that produces unequaled hired killers and mercenaries.

From the original college in Silverymoon, the students of Falataer went on to become masters of all seven of his fabled instruments and all aspects of his teachings; they each returned to their homelands to found their own bardic colleges; however, each taught both the basic levels of skill, and advanced training, mastery over one of the seven instruments, for which each college was named, and mastery over consecutively more difficult bardic arts.

Bards studying to obtain the rank of Magna Alumnae attended all seven colleges, starting with Fochlucan before moving on to Mac-Fuirmidh across the sea in Falataer's homeland, the Moonshae Isles. Named after the musical instrument the Mac-Fuirmidh cittern, the college taught healing and protection magic and the mastery of playing the cittern in a particular style; after this campus, masters would move on to study at Doss, a bardic college in the large city of Berdusk, the Jewel of the Vale, a fantastic city known for being a center of activity for the guild of Harpers, the bardic college in Berdusk taught a lot of noble born as well as master bards seeking Magna Alumnae status, they taught nature-based and healing magic there, along with mastery of the Doss Lute, rubbing shoulders with the next generation of nobility also taught bards the finer points of courtly ettique and intrigue, perhaps costing more than a few promising careers, and ensuring success for many others, some would call this the real purpose of the college of Doss. Bards who follow the College of Whispers have spread out in the shadow these traditions, no longer such an obvious campus, the dictates of their craft have seen this college disperse into many smaller groups, none know of them all, each of them is connected to just a few others, for the greater protection of all, and as a way to limit the spread of secrets.

The master bards seeking further advancement would then travel on to the land of Tethyr and the capital city of Zazesspur, a city of legendary wealth and intrigue where the culture of the Hartlands blends with the exotic Calishite influences and many tall spires decorate the city with impressive pennants and flags with windows decorated ornately, even roof edges are artfully crafted. Zazesspur's bardic college is named after mastery of the Canaith Mandolin, the school taught a lot of lore of the far eastern lands and the history of the Hartlands, it also taught spellcraft of a more energistic nature, perhaps influenced by the magic of the Djinn, thanks to the calishite influence. From there, master bards would travel to none other than the City of Baldur's Gate and the college named for the Cli Lyre, the ancient bardic college may no longer be there, but the famous Elfsong Tavern that served it still stands, and many would consider it a bardic college of sorts, undoubtedly many of the passionate voices which brought about the revival of the colleges of Fochlucan and New Olamn started out in the Elfsong Tavern. The College of Cli taught a diverse range of protective spells and further advanced other magical abilities of the elven song tradition, powerful protective magic, a good grounding for the power of the next tier of bardic mastery; from Cli, the master bards moved on to the walled city of Sundabar, one of the wealthiest and most militaristic cities within the nation of Luruar, or all of Faerûn for that matter. Heavy influence of Dwarven culture and the potent elemental magic of their arts is taught in the college of the Anstruth Harp, the graduates of this college go from there to the final college, traveling to the fabled city of Waterdeep and the college of the Olamn Harp, the last instrument of Falataer's tests and the school that teaches the most potent powers of the bards, to control not just the weather, but the minds of other people. Enchantment is a powerful school of arcane magic, but the bardic college of Olamn puts them to shame, I assure you.

So, advancing to our modern age, much has changed in the way bards learn their arts and interact with each other, originally taught from a single college divided in seven levels of skill, then a series of well-established college campuses spread across Faerun, by the 1480's in Dale Reckoning only two of the elder colleges are were still active, and as I mentioned, a lot of passionate individuals have brought about something of a bardic revival, with more traditional centers of learning being built, not just from buildings, libraries and musical equipment, but by trained and dedicated masters of the traditional bardic arts.

In the modern era, other bardic colleges now exist. The college of the Herald within Herald's Holdfast a full day's travel, about 30 miles west and a bit north of Silverymoon, is a huge library and museam protected by powerful magic, sturdy walls, mostly underground chambers of impressive size, and of course a highly skilled bunch of bards. This college teaches the bards who belong to the Heralds of Faerun, the holdfast is amazing and easily worth a video on all its features, history and associated heroes. 

Holdfast's Heralds are a very influencial group who maintain the traditions of Heraldry and keeping detailed records of the nobility of Faerun, they are foremost advisors to the organisation known as the Harpers, among others, the High Heralds begin their apprenticeships as assistants to the high heralds, the deliver messages, conduct secret business and learn a vast trove of lore. The high heralds are so well respected that they are referred to as Grand, so, the Grand Geoffrey of Arrabel, for instance.

There is an excellent article on the Heralds in the Forgotten Realms Wiki, and I quote,

"The Heralds of Faerûn organization was the brainchild of Harper Aliost Oskrunnar, who recognized some problems facing many leaders, armies, and countries of the time. First, miner guilds and settlements were placing metallic colors on top of one another in their coats of arms, which was forbidden in the rules of heraldry of Calimshan and other regions along the Sword Coast. Second, there were a number of heated arguments over who owned what symbols. Third, state-sponsored imposters had been known to foment unrest and put the blame on others. Bandits also took advantage by disguising themselves with the coat of arms of a legitimate lord or city. Finally, there had been some tragic accidental fratricides on the battlefield due to indistinguishable blazons in the fog of war. Aliost Oskrunnar proposed an organization to establish and enforce the Law of Arms, codify the chaos of the current heraldic emblems, and be independent of any political leaders or boundaries. He and the Harpers persuaded the rulers of Baldur's Gate, Calimshan, and Sundabar, and the leaders of various religions that supported the Harpers, to fund the creation of the Heralds of Faerûn. In the Year of the Watching Helm, 992 DR, nine High Herald offices were established, many of them filled by Harpers, but with the understanding that they were to be independent and neutral in settling matters of ownership, title, inheritance, enforcement, protocol, and legitimacy. 

The nine High Heralds are responsible for west Faerûn from the Calimshan border northward; all the islands in the Sea of Swords; northwest Faerûn; and most of the interior. They roam the territory in conjunction with the Harpers and commission local Heralds and agents to gather information, such as histories, genealogies, and other important records. The men and women of the High Heralds are persons of integrity, or at least they should be.

From its auspicious beginning, the Heralds of Faerûn were the catalogers and keepers of heraldic devices, lore, and etiquette. As an adjunct to this, they collected and collated vast numbers of names, titles, genealogies, and historical claims, keeping detailed records for the preservation of history and arbitration of disputes. Based on their reputation of integrity, all Heralds served as emissaries at whatever level was requested: as a member of diplomatic missions between kingdoms, liaisons between nobles within a realm, and information brokers between bards and sages."

End quote.

Another Bardic College is the Academia Vilhonus in the capital city of Chondath, the city of Arrabar, known for its crime and corruption, the chondathan culture favors the tradition of carrying a sword as a symbol of a citizen's status, you can count some of the best Blade subclass bards from this college, in Arrabar, each of the noble houses who have their impressive manors along the city walls has their own standing army but the city is ruled by a lord and has the loyalty of all the loyalist warriors of Chondath. This is a culture that is hostile to wizards and spell casters, the warriors of Chondath often refuse to even carry enchanted arms and armor, such is their distrust of magic. Don't forget, the Vilhon reach was devastated by elven magic so Arrabar is a very proud and traditional city, executions of mages is a common occurance. You can imagine then, that bardic training is much more about lore and martial arts than the use of magic, however, the powers of the mind are highly valued, and the art of performance, bards from the Academia Vilhonus are extremely confident masters of one on one combat with blades, they are also marked with a series of three dots on their foreheads, these symbolise their ability to read, write and practice the art of magic in Chondathan society, they are mandatory marks.

Turmish is also a nation that is famous for the skills of its deadly sellswords and duelists, its a prosperous country and sends shipments of glassware, grains, lumber, salt, metals, trade goods, tools and luxury items all through the Vilhon reach and the interior lands of Faerun through the Sea of Fallen Stars. Turmish is an interesting country, its been ruled by merchant families, coin lords who gained enormous wealth, the rise of the Wizard Conclaves and then their downfall at the hand of a Dragon, then a Dragonslayer who took the thrown but resigned from it in favor of a Democratic Republic, called the Assembly of Stars, established in the Year of the Cockatrice, 248 years ago. Unlike Arrabar, the cities of Turmish are safe enough for spell casters, in fact the country is said to be riddled with extradimensional safeholds, which is fascinating, as that is elven magic and is no longer practiced in faerun as of the 14th century of dale reckoning.

As of today, you can still train in the traditional school of Falataer, the two bardic colleges now operating teach the full body of training between them, but bardic training has now spread and diversified quite a lot since the days of Falataer, centuries ago.

Its funny to think that this whole character class is fairly recent in the forgotten realms and has such a well defined, but also frustratingly vague origin. What exactly are the secrets of bardic magic, lore and martial arts that are taught at each of the different instrument levels of accomplishment? The Moonshae Islands are an excellent place to start any sort of campaign in faerun, bards taught the traditional way certainly were well travelled and well grounded in the politics and cultures of Faerun, thats for sure.

Exactly what you would expect from a class so well suited to Half Elves, but the original bard colleges accepted Humans, Elves, Halflings, Gnomes and Tieflings, you wouldn't see a lot of Dwarves, Half Orcs, any of the goblinoids, they simply were not involved in the traditional bardic colleges. I am not saying they can't learn, I am simply saying they would be a unusual individual in the forgotten realms according to the source material.

Your game table is your own business of course.

Bardic magic is interesting since it existed before the fall of Netheril and the rise of the more modern wizarding traditions where there are many schools of philosophy, these cover Abjuration, Transmutation, Conjuration, Chronomancy, Dimensional, Divination, Elemental, Enchantment, Evocation, Feather, Force, illusion, Incantation, Necromancy, Shadow, Talisman, Thaumaturgy, Wild and Universal magic. I know, that sounds like more schools than you are used to, but now you can see your average wizard trained the traditional way is also limited in many ways. Bards trained in the seven instruments of Falataer recognise three schools of magic, they are Inventive, Mentalism and Variation, in a nutshell, Inventive spells are used to create or destroy, mentalisms are used to influence the minds of creatures and people, the bardic colleges are particularly good at this side of magic, and variations are used to transform things, change energies and states, including altering other spells, in what became known as Metamagic. 

Bards also have access to the secret arts of Song Magic, which along with the artifice of their magical instruments and their skill at harnessing wild magic, makes them a type of Thaumaturgy specialist spell caster. Once you step back and look at what Falataer actually taught, its clear he was establishing  school of Thaumaturgy, along with a private army of highly capable charismatic super operatives with a license to come and go where they pleased, thanks to their performance training.

And I am looking at the Harpers here.

One thing the old empires of Faerun passed on to their arcane traditions was a love of heirarchies and those with magical ability generally looking down on anyone with less or none of it. Bards are specialists in slinging insults, and they spare no quarter when being critical of the magical talents of others. Wizards and Bards always sling insults at each other, its not always serious.. not until you hear the bard say, "So much for wizard intellect, you brought a wand to a sword fight."

So, I have mentioned the various Sub Classes of the Bards, lets look at some of their traditions and the cultures surrounding them. In the North, you have the warrior poets, the Skalds, less inclined to carry musical instruments in favor of a decent war axe, you can find them among the Uthgardt and Reghed barbarian tribes, hunting reindeer across the Yeti-infested frozen Tundra, they follow along beside famous heroes if they can, recording their exploits in epic sagas and poems which they recite to avid listeners inside the long halls and chieftains tents, considered honored guests, skalds are afforded safe passage through tribal lands by their own strict traditions. Skalds are also found among the Frost Giants of the Northern lands, particularly Pelvuria, beyond Vaasa, Damara, and Narfell, the northernmost lands you normally find humans, so they tend to think the world stops there and maps of the giant lands and great glacier are rare.

Storytelling is also highly popular across the ocean from the Moonshaes in the Islands of Lantan, one small, rocky island named Orlil is home to a bardic college that invites guest speakers and lore experts, such as myself, to go and teach the students there as many stories and fables as they can, and the collection of folklore that island has amassed over recent years is quite amazing, The bards of Orlil are known as Fabulists and they include a race of sentient quadroped, human-sized Wombat people, about 50 of them live on the island, though not all of them are bards of course.

I have mentioned that Blades, a subclass of bard in 5th edition, a player character kit option in 2nd edition, I played a duelist in Advanced Dungeons and Dragons back when I was a teenager, I photocopied the pages from a dragon magazine, had copies of some pages from Unearthed Arcana and the approval of the Dungeon master to play a duelist as a player character, he was a bit underpowered compared to the other player characters in the campaign, but he had clear goals and actually managed to survive, though, he never really got to fight a lot of duels and advance his social standing, he got fairly wealthy out of his element, going on hair-brained adventures for a mysterious and intimidating wizard named Glint Nightshade.

Blades are masters at swordplay. Any single-handed bladed weapon in their hands can be used to disarm opponents, disable limbs, deflect just as well as a shield, counter and simultaneously attack, and deliver brutally fast lunging stabs that will skewer an enemy's organs very effectively. Blades are good against many types of monsters, but they excel at murdering humanoids.

Well, hopefully, disarming and forcing them to surrender with a bit of style, but it's sword fighting, it's very dangerous, and people often get killed. Most societies have accepted conditions in which an honor duel can be fought legally and publically, not killing any bystanders is very important, and minimal property damage is preferred, but mostly it is the public consent of both parties involved that absolves them of responsibility for murder, though reparations towards a slain opponent's dependants is often customary. From as simple as a few coins for the widow to taking on the opponent's orphaned child as a ward, taking care of their training until they are old enough to look after themselves. 

Moving on, I suppose we should talk about the so-called College of Whispers, a bard subclass well suited to those without a strong sense of morality; the whispers use secret identities, safe houses, mentalism and their wits uncovering closely-held secrets, and manipulating others, often for profound personal gain. They hide within the ranks of other bard colleges; they have no titles for their ranks; in fact, becoming well-known is something they aim to avoid. Their power to level antagonistic magic with the delivery of physical strikes and verbal tirades is without peer among bard styles.  College of Whispers bards know how to adopt the persona of a recently dead person. After witnessing someone's death, the bard can magically adopt the dead person's shadow as a disguise. So they take on the appearance and personality, the mannerisms of the dead person and even gain a little bit of knowledge about their life and person relationships, so you can see it is perfect for shapeshifters already, before adding their power to mimic others. By shapeshifters, I mean Doppelgangers, changelings, dragons and were-folk in some cases, who gravitate to this sort of lifestyle.

A whole lot of supernatural creatures native to the lands of Kara-Tur, Zakhara and the tropical islands far to the east. Halrua, a nation descended from Netherese mages, strongly leans toward College of Whispers bards, skilled at infiltrating and avoiding magical alarms, traps, and the occasional bout of spell-slinging from an irate wizard.

College of Glamour bards often house the most College of Whispers bards, operating in secret and maintaining a secret identity. Glamour bards lean heavily into the lore, mythology, folklore, exploration and magic of the Fey Realm, the Fairy Kingdoms, as real a place to them and the lands just over the next mountain range or stretch of ocean. Considered some of the most wondrous and awe inspiring bards in the Forgotten Realms they are never short of an audience when they perform for others, and there is a sense of excitement and fear as they weave tales of alien places, with spooky magic that rural folk tend to fear from fey folk, but provide enjoyable jump scares when used by Glamour bards in the packed and friendly atmosphere of a cosy Inn. As they advance in skill and rank, the glamour bards become so magnetic in appearance and magical presence that they can instil intense emotions of apprehension in bystanders and enemies, they can also cause opponents to hesitate in combat, giving them crucial advantages as they deliver deadly strikes with a light weapon or potent magical enchantments that cause enemies to act like best friends, stepping in harms way to protect the bard. Its hard to fight someone who can just command you to drop your weapons. Glamour bards are highly sought after by mercenary agencies and some of the most famous bardic performances have been delivered by Glamour bards.

Do we have many more colleges to go? Well yes, there are quite a few now, the college of Lore is the most numerous and has a few notable library centers where they train and people can pay to access their extensive collected knowledge, you can see a good example of that with the masters in Game of Thrones, who wear metal necklaces, each link in the chain representing mastery of a branch of lore, College of Lore bards are like that, they can retire and become sages, travel and sell their expert advice or tutor others, it's a great profession with a lot of options.

However, we now have the college of Creation, college of Eloquence, college of Spirits, college of Valor, college of The Road and a College of Tragedy, what can I tell you about those? Thankfully there is information on these sub classes online, so lets just read what they have to say on them.

Borrowing philosophy from the church of Denier, the avowed of Candlekeep, various other faiths and some of the oldest elven magical traditions from the ancient forest adjacent to Netheril, the college of Creation bards believe in the Song of Creation, the primal music that forms the basis of all reality. Some cults speak in gibbering whispers of the song really being the dream of an omnipotent primordial being, one of the great old ones, but most would rather not imagine a reality like that. Dwarves and gnomes often encourage their bards to become students of the Song of Creation. And among dragonborn, the Song of Creation is revered, for legends portray Bahamut and Tiamat—the greatest of dragons—as two of the song’s first singers. Greatest of Dragons is a bit of propaganda by the way, some ridiculously powerful cosmic beings started out as dragons, immortal spirits native to the prime material plane. Song of Creation bards are skilled at conjuring items and causing ordinary objects to come to life with magical vitality, dancing temporarily around to the bard's music.

Adherents of the College of Eloquence master the art of oratory. Persuasion is regarded as a high art, and a well-reasoned, well-spoken argument often proves more persuasive than facts. Diplomats, political or union leaders, charismatic pirate captains, those who the king trots out to inspire the troops with a stunning speech before battle, the Eloquence bards are extremely difficult to argue with, they are in their element the moment you start a debate with them, and woven into their words are the powers of mentalism, they can bind your mind at the same time they turn the hearts of anyone listening in their favor, and against you. They master the arts of deception, bluff and intimidation, they can also communicate with just about anything capable of understanding language and their words have the power to spread, passing on like memes from person to person, a powerful ability in a city with a population in the tens of thousands where rumors and scandals can be used as weapons.

Unlike the charlatans who pretend to summon the ghosts of the departed for a few coins, the college of Spirits bards can actually do that sort of thing. They channel spirits, what more can I say? They use crystal balls, candles, occult symbols, all that sort of thing; they tend to be popular enough, as long as they steer clear of actual necromancy; I don't think anyone is too bothered by them. The more nefarious will take advantage of wealthy widows and widowers, swindling them out of a small fortune, while others devote themselves to grief counseling, legal matters, criminal investigations and the like. There are any number of TV shows that can serve as inspiration.

The College of Tragedy and College of the Road are both third party content recently added to 5th edition's bard class options, basically a Jack of All Trades option and the classic architype of an Emo bard who sings mournful dirges and manages to learn some tricky magic that can bend the hand of fate, or at least predict when things are about to get very bad.

And that, my friends, is a fairly good primer on all the different bard schools, philosophies, traditions and varieties you can find in the Forgotten Realms. There are far-flung places on Toril I have not visited; the vast lands of Kara-tur and Zakhara no doubt have a whole other set of bardic traditions or the equivalent sort of role in society, but I am not the one to ask about that. 

Not yet, anyway; in the meantime, my name is AJ Pickett; thank you for listening, and as always, I will be back with more for you very soon.

Belabra : Dungeons and Dragons lore

What many folk know on the Sword Coast is that the small town of Phandelver has a few deep old mines that still have a lot of Cold Iron deposits; However, I have not seen many fresh ingots on the market lately; there are plenty of things made from the material that attracts the trade of a certain kind of hunter, though, as word of the materials availability spreads far and wide across the busy trade routes and their many roadhouses. It was an unseasonally pleasant morning when I left the road and headed deeper into the heart of the continent as I was on my way to visit the Spirit Soaring Cathedral and the family of Cadderly Boneduce; I was not expecting to meet anyone who was not a bandit or hermit of some kind, so was moving at a wary pace, keeping my eyes peeled, as the humans say. Halflings have other terms, usually involving the sensitive hair on our toes, though, to be honest, my feet are not hairy at all, thanks to my mixed ancestry. The sun was just cresting over the treetops when someone with very sharp senses spotted me.

I met Lucan Thrys on his way from Calimshan, traveling off the main road as I was. Of course, we were wary of each other initially, but as soon as I offered to share a pot of tea, he relaxed his guard and called off his lurking pet.

That pet is the subject of today's video.

Lucan Thrys was journeying through the wilderness, both because he was not a member of the races and societies of Faerun and where he came from originally; the wilderness of faerun is like a stroll through a park by comparison. Lucan is a Bariur, with the upper body of a stout and muscular man and the lower half of a mighty mountain goat; he sported a pair of magnificently curved horns carved with intricate runes and decorated in gold and jewels like a king's crown. He carried two scimitars of silver steel and a recurved bow made from wood and horn taken from his home plane of Ysgard, and he was on the hunt for fey creatures, hence his need for Cold Iron. 

As we settled down next to a fire for tea, his companion spooked me again as it scuttled around from concealment in the tall grass and flax plants. Then, in a flash of tentacles and protruding eyestalks, it was suddenly a smooth, pale boulder, rounded and pebbled with a natural-looking pattern, like very weathered coastal river stone. It nestled into the ground next to Lucan, looking to all the world like a boulder that had been there for years. 

I'd seen this behavior a few times and wondered if it was anything like a sea creature that had adapted to live on the land; back at the end of the Blue Age on Toril, many creatures like that had evolved and still thrived.

I asked Lucan what his animal was, and he told me it was called a Belabra. It was not from Ysgard; it was native to Toril, as I suspected.

So this was the Belabra, I'd never seen one, but I had seen the name in some journals from Candlekeep.

As we drank tea and ate some bread, he told me all about the creature he called his one 'Nasty,' which was less a reflection of its temperament and more a reaction to what it could do in a fight. He had picked this one up a year before in the markets of Calimshan for fifteen hundred gold coins, which I thought was reasonable as it was clearly well-trained and in its prime.

Lucan was enthusiastic in regaling me with tales of the creatures hunting skills, he said it was not suprizing that not many knew of the creature, even on it's home world, as it was so elusive, an real ambush predator that seemed to get agitated whenever it was observed directly by anything other than it's prey. It seemed to know that Lucan was the one who owned it though, he said it had never been aggressive towards him and took care of its own needs, hunting small game, though it did tent to eat a lot of stray cats in Calimshan, they were too easy for it to grab, while rats required a bit more effort.

I didn't much like the sound of it having a taste for cats, but held my tongue.

We broke open some herb bread I cooked over the fire and Lucan told me he ran across some elves who thought the Belabra was some kind of sacred animal of a god of theirs named Rillifane Rallathil.

I knew that one, the Tree god, he was not just revered by the elves, I know the star elves of Aglarond in the ancient Yuirwood worship a giant treant called Relkath of the Infinite Branches, which was purported to be an aspect of Rillifane Rallathil and I know another of his names is the Great Oak, so, a powerful nature deity probably not very active outside the deep forest. If any of the other gods were similar, that would mean that Rillifane Rallathil used the Belabra to provide aid to his faithful and his clerics could probably summon them.

I learned a lot about the creature from that pleasant conversation with Lucan.

Oh we also figured out his Belabra was pregnant, but more on that in a second.

A Belabra is a medium sized creature, the hard shell is 2 feet in diameter and ranges from black or dark gray to the more rare, pale and weathered look sported by Nasty. The creature has twelve barbed tentacles that allow it to stand upright on them about five feet tall in total, and when it does that, you can clearly see the similarity to those peaceful underground creatures called the Flumph, though its like a flumpg and a grell had a baby, or perhaps the Belabra is a primitive ancestor to both species, I am not sure, they are very similar anyway, but I am not entirely certain they are related.

The shell does have a weakness, it has four gaps in the top where the Belabra keeps its retractable eye stalks, very similar to those of a snail, but with much sharper eyesight. Under the shell, between the tentacles its hide is white and it has a powerful beak like a squid that can take a hefty chunk out of anything it bites. 

In combat the Belabra will put on a burst of speed and agility, and thanks to some short membranes between the tentacles the creature can leap and glide quite unexpectedly. the belabra utilizes its shell for defense, bounding about to shield its vulnerable underside. It attacks by either ramming foes with its shell or entangling them with its barbed tentacles and attacking with its beak.

When ramming, the belabra kicks with its tentacles to launch itself into the air, traveling up to 60 yards. It can attempt to entangle a target mid-leap, imposing penalties on the victim's dexterity and providing a bonus to the belabra's subsequent attacks with its beak. Victims can try to escape the entanglement, suffering damage from the barbs in the process.

The belabra's shell grants its head a significant Armor Class bonus, while its tentacles and underside are more vulnerable. When a creature within 5 feet of the Belabra hits it with a melee attack, the Belabra sprays blood from its injured tentacle. Each humanoid creature within 10 feet of the Belabra must succeed on a DC 12 Constitution saving throw or suffer the following effects: On a failed save, the creature is poisoned for 1 minute. If the saving throw fails by 5 or more, the creature is also blinded until the poison ends. A poisoned creature can repeat the saving throw at the end of each of its turns, ending the effects on itself on a success. This may or may not confer immunity to the blood spray for the next 24 hours, I'm not sure on that point.

While the Belabra is prone and hidden under its shell, it gains has a +4 bonus to its Armor Class against all attacks, advantage on Constitution saving throws and it is effectively concealed, difficult to detect while motionless and hidden in this manner.

It is +4 to hit with attacks, the barbed tentacles inflict 1d8+2 damage with each strike and the difficulty class for escaping it's entangling tentacles is 12, plus, tearing free of those barbs also inflicts 4d4 damage. If a target is grappled by it, the Belabra makes bite attacks with it's beak with advantage, inflicting 1d10+2 damage with each attack. 

The Belabra has a natural armor class of 14 and around 52 hit points, a speed of 30 feet both on the ground and climbing surfaces or trees, its attributes reflect its physical strength and fortitude, including a pretty high dexterity, but it only has an intelligence of 3, so it can understand commands, but not spoken language.

Oh yes, how could we tell that Nasty was pregnant.

Although Belabra is not asexual, they only have one gender, and they all require a partner to reproduce; both get pregnant from the union, and the young start out as buds that grow on the inside of the Belabra's inner wall of the Stomach. The buds can grow in there for the next six to ten months and then get vomited out by the parent. When Lucan was describing the recent changes in behavior and that Nasty was off it's food and not moving as quickly, we managed to figure out that his Belabra was indeed pregnant and would be spitting out quite a few little offspring in the next couple of months.

If taken at a young age, a belabra can be trained to obey simple commands and act as a guard or hunter. If so trained, it identifies with its master and remains with him even in the heat of battle. Training a captured bela bra takes up to four months and requires a skilled instructor, a number of live animals (to serve as practice kills), and the frequent presence of the person who will be the creature's master. Adverse conditions can greatly extend the training period. Once their training is completed, the belabra can be employed in the same manner as an attack dog. A young belabra that has been raised for two years can be taught to capture and hold a victim without trying to kill it. 

I left Lucan and Nasty and carried on my journey to the east, though I did keep a more wary eye on the long grass and shadowed upper tree branches, now knowing yet another weird creature might be hiding there, stalking me and drooling.

We halflings are notoriously delicious after all.

My name is AJ Pickett, thanks for listening and as always, I will be back with more for you, very soon.

 

Attack of the Battle Moon (Super Atomic RPG Lets play)

Dalmosh (Dungeons and Dragons Demon Lore)

Viewer requested video time. This week, it's Dalmosh of the Infinite Maws. Perhaps a mere blip on the scale of the abyss, but something of a legend for good reason. Dalmosh is a demon kaiju, a living, breathing cataclysm.

Let's set the scene.

Calling Dalmosh from the abyssal depths requires a ritual and a feast of epic proportions. We're talking about a spread that's the stuff of legends, worth a small fortune of 10,000 gold pieces. Imagine the scene: a vast cauldron, bubbling with the most exquisite, mouth-watering delicacies from across the realms, an offering so lavish that it could salivate a god, surrounded with hundreds of platters, each a meal fit for a whole group of people, dish after dish of gorgeous and rare foods, and amidst this opulent display, the members of a ritual circle are chanting deeply for a solid hour, weaving magic to draw Dalmosh forth, not just with the promise of this grand feast but with the chanted promises of assured, massive devastation for the lord of hunger.

The summoning ritual reaches deep into the chaotic heart of the Abyss to a layer housing the Flesh Mountains, one of many living layers; the landscape is all undulating hills of meat, covered in thick skin with drifts of old dead skin flakes like dunes, patches of thick, stinking hair like alpine tussock plants and more than a few species of carnivorous fungus and oozes. The mountains of flesh are shaped into strange swirling patterns, thanks to the eons of voracious eating by Dalmosh, a 50-foot-tall, gigantic humanoid of unknown origin.

Somewhere above his largest maw are two deep-set blue eyes, but that's about as close as he has to a face; his entire body is kind of soft, he has no actual bones, and his entire bulk is kept together by muscle, thick vascular tubes and tough sinews that web their way through his insides, the rest is all digestive system, his entire body is really an immortal living gateway to a bounded sub-dimension called The Gullet, it doesn't occupy any space but is co-terminus with the inside of Dalmosh's body and spawns a new portal every time Dalmosh spawns a new mouth, which happens any time he gets slashed open by a weapon or some such.

A creature that is large seems to move slowly but covers a lot of ground; a standard movement in a round would be 50 feet (15m) or twice if he is charging at some new target of his hunger. Dalmosh is only really motivated by hunger and an equally endless desire for destruction, any creature up to large size that gets in his way will be grabbed and thrown into his maw, taking a huge amount of bludgeoning damage, followed by round after round of inexorable acid damage while trapped in the Gizzard of Dalmosh, the crushing and digesting compartment before it gets to the portal into the Gullet sub-realm, so you can still cut your way back out of Dalmosh from inside his gizzard, you have to inflict 75 points of damage in a single round with a light weapon, not an easy task. The gizzard is fairly large, and it can hold up to eight medium-sized people; most inanimate material swallowed goes straight through into the Gullet. Dalmosh has a standard, brutal, and effective combat move, he will charge 50 feet through a group of targets and inflict a full bite attack on each target adjacent to his path, which can be devastating to large groups of other creatures, making short work of masses of ranked soldiers in the blood wars, for example.

To quote directly from the 5th monster manual for 3.5 edition dungeons and dragons, 

"Though Dalmosh is dull, brutal, and indiscriminately destructive, he has managed to accumulate admirers. Trolls and ogres view Dalmosh as the ultimate expression of their vicious, avaricious natures. Some orcs do the same, but they see Dalmosh as a potential weapon, not as an object of worship.

 Those who summon Dalmosh do so to destroy their enemies. No sane creature believes that Dalmosh is capable of more than this. In fact, Dalmosh’s summoners know they risk their lives, for he of the Infinite Maws readily eats those who remain nearby after a summoning ritual.

He has no ecological niche. He simply devours everything in his path, following the movement and noise that attract him to a potential meal.  The Flesh Mountains, his home, stretch across several layers of the Abyss. His dwelling is a vast cave eaten out of those same mountains, where he lounges and takes brief moments to digest. The mountains eternally grow larger, and only Dalmosh’s endless eating keeps them in check.  Some say that Dalmosh is the living will of the Flesh Mountains, a strange entity that has existed as long as the Abyss itself.

When summoned away from the Flesh Mountains, Dalmosh will always return and reform there after two days, earlier if somehow killed by something, he just reforms in the Flesh Mountains eternally.

Creatures that Dalmosh swallows sometimes knowingly choose to enter the Gullet rather than perish in his gizzard. Those unfortunate creatures that lack the means to travel the planes become trapped. They survive by eating the remains that fall from the sky, gathering magic items, building materials, and other tools that survive the trip into the Gullet. Here and there, crude settlements have arisen, and Garnamastra is the largest of these. A rakshasa known as the Eyeless Tyrant rules this place, backed by a small cabal of assassins and spellcasters"

I recall that movie with the Cloverfield monster, and the ideo that it was covered in parasites so large, they were a lethal threat to creatures as small and puny as humans.

Dalmosh is a creature of flesh, so why not have sufficiently large chunks that get carved off him in battle, have similar qualities, but be much smaller. The Spawn of Dalmosh could still be large in size, depends on the chunk carved off and how fast it can reshape into a humanoid shape.

Dalmosh's stomping grounds, are as alive and as grotesque as the demon itself. Imagine mountains made of meat, their surfaces undulating, covered in a skin-like crust, with drifts of old dead skin flaking off like snow. Here, amidst this living landscape, thrive the demonic fungus and oozes – entities born from the very essence of the Abyss.

The carnivorous fungus here is no ordinary mold. These are aggressive, sentient growths, feeding not just on the decay left in Dalmosh's wake but on the very energy of the Abyss itself. They lure, trap, and consume anything that comes too close, digesting it slowly, adding to the grotesque beauty of the Flesh Mountains.

And then there are the oozes – slithering, sentient slimes that roam the fleshly valleys and crevices. These are not mere puddles of goo; they are predators, each with its unique method of hunting. Some dissolve their prey with acidic secretions, while others engulf and digest them over time. 

But Dalmosh always returns, and with him, the cycle continues. He devours, he destroys, and in doing so, he feeds the very land that sustains the bizarre ecosystem of the Flesh Mountains. It's a symbiotic relationship, in a twisted, abyssal sense.

My name is AJ Pickett, if you enjoy these deep dives into Dungeons and Dragons lore, please subscribe to the channel and hit the like button, thank you for listening and as always, I will be back with more for you, very soon.