NWN Catara Information (english)

Update: Please head over to our forums, you will find all the infor­ma­tion in a much nicer for­mat there.

The fol­lo­wing is a collec­tion of the old world infor­ma­tion from the can­cel­led catara​.org web­site. I might refor­mat and sort it some­time later, but not today :).

If you want to log in to the ser­ver, all necessary infor­ma­tion (ie link, hak­packs, etc.) can be found here.

Life and Law

Sun­day, 06 March 2005

Someone asked for infor­ma­tion on daily life, here is a small over­view. If you have more spe­ci­fic ques­ti­ons, post them in the forum.

For the typi­cal Cata­ran, life is quite mono­to­nous. The majo­rity lives in small man­o­rial vil­la­ges and work on the fields, as wood­cut­ters or as miners.

Since Catara is a very medi­eval society, most of the lower clas­ses work as peasants on the land of a noble, recei­ving pro­tec­tion for their duties.

The les­ser nobles often live in a close or nearby manor. This is no big castle, often it is not even made from stone.

The working class is orga­ni­zed in guilds (except for free pro­fes­si­ons) and tends to con­cen­trate in the cities or big­ger vil­la­ges, but wood­craf­ters, smiths, pot­ters, mil­lers, etc can be found in nearly every village.

To most people it does not really mat­ter if their vil­lage belongs to king, noble, church or cult. This can change and the only import­ant thing is just tre­at­ment. Most Lords treat their ten­ants well, because they know of their depen­dency on them. Manors/Villages admi­nis­tra­ted by bai­liffs or she­riffs tend to endure more hardships, since the owner knows he will not stay forever.

The main worries of the aver­age men are ever­y­thing that can mess with work (wea­t­her, war), wild ani­mals or (in wil­der regi­ons) Kobolds, Gob­lins etc. Most people have fear and respect of magic users. If they are no wit­ches it is ok, but still not really good, except if shown to be otherwise.

Law and value of life are under­s­tood in a medi­eval way. If two unre­la­ted people meet in the forest and one ends up dead and the other has an excuse no one will ask too many ques­ti­ons (this is of course ano­ther thing if a noble is con­cer­ned). Since cor­po­ral punish­ment is the norm, life is not viewed and valued ‚huma­ni­ta­rian‘, as it is today. Of course ever­yone is sad if someone dies, but no one would be expecte to go out of his way to pro­tect life because „all life is sacred“ (except strong adher­ents of Shai­lin maybe) .

This also leads to no „mercy“ towards intel­li­gent mons­ters. (generally)

Typi­cal cri­mes are ste­aling, mur­der, arson, rape, adul­tery etc…

Magic, and how people react to it

Fri­day, 04 March 2005

Magic is very rare on Catara. This has of course an effect on how the com­mon people react when they see it. At the very least magic will pro­voke asto­nish­ment and wonder.

If the magic user is not rea­dily reco­gnize­able as part of the Church or the Cult or the Royal Mage Order, people will at least be susp­cious, if not out­right hostile.

Wit­ches vs „Legal“ Mages

If you are seen doing magic and people have rea­sons to assume you are not part of any of the esta­blis­hed mage groups, you will be deemed a witch.

Wit­ches will be fea­red, per­se­cu­ted, or sim­ply kil­led on the spot, depen­ding on the circumstances.

Every player who plays a magic-using cha­rac­ter will have an easy option of joi­ning one of the esta­blis­hed guilds. Until these are imple­men­ted some sort of lee­way is given by the DMs.

Howe­ver even being a „Legal“ mage will still make people unsure of you, espe­cially if your name is not known.

Esta­blis­hed and legal Mage Groups

  • The various churches & Holy Orders. Those who do not want to fol­low a spe­ci­fic god are collec­ted in Ele­gils church
  • The Bro­ther­hood of the Ring, the Wizard-Guild of the Cult of Nine (male wizards only)
  • Being a trai­ned Cult mage, but not mem­ber of the Bro­ther­hood is pos­si­ble too.
  • The Bards guild, which is an exten­sion of the church of Ephemis
  • The Cult offers several other orders that train and pro­tect magic users. Exam­ples are the Order of the Eye, Order of the Sun or the Order of the Winds.

Ani­mal summons:

If they behave and look like a trai­ned ani­mal, the most you’d get is pro­bably a few rai­sed eye­brows. „Dan­ge­rous“ ani­mals (dire bears, big nasty loo­king wol­ves“) will cause a stir if not leas­hed and / or very obviously res­trai­ned. City Guards might ask you to „res­train the beast“, or leave the town with it.

Magi­cal critters:

If you are a well-known mage (which no one under level 15 is), you may get away with having an imp fami­liar fol­lo­wing you. In every other case people will be sus­pec­ting wit­chery. Inher­ently evil loo­king sum­mons will get you into trou­ble for sure.

The act of sum­mo­n­ing / unsummoning:

Ran­gers cal­ling ani­mal com­pa­ni­ons or mages sum­mo­n­ing their fami­li­ars are trea­ted as „cal­ling the crea­ture out from hiding“. We will even­tually disa­ble the FX for these two things.

Every other sum­mo­n­ing will inva­ria­ble cause com­moners and city guards to react at least ner­vously or even with fear and loat­hing, unless the mage is cle­arly a guild mem­ber and acting to defend someone / acting in some magic show.

Gene­ral Rule:

Wha­te­ver you do: Keep in mind that magic is rare, and people are fond to think of „Wit­ches ever­y­where“. Most people have the mind­set of late middle ages / early renais­sance on earth. While they are open for enligh­te­ment, scary magic will throw them back a lot.

Even a mage in an order can be con­side­red dan­ge­rous, espe­cially if they cast spells on ano­ther wit­hout asking. Even Can­trips and non-harmful spells can be mis­trued easily.

Last Updated ( Satur­day, 08 April 2006 )

A brief History (revised)

Fri­day, 04 March 2005

In anci­ent times Elves and Troll fought for domi­nance over the world, Dra­gons devas­ta­ted the lands and Humans and Dwar­ves had to fight to sur­vive every day.About 1000 years ago the Count of Glass and his empire Cibola, rose, defea­ted the domi­nance of the Elves and began the Age of Men. The Empire Cibola ruled all the known lands across the oceans. They impor­ted Orc-slaves from afar and built great things, but their god­less­ness should bring them down again.

It was the year 807 Cibol when the signs star­ted to show. Rains, famine and unrest swept through all the pro­vin­ces. The Orcs rebel­led, floods kil­led thousands and the sun did not shine during the day.

It was the bles­sed year 1 of Light (811 Cibol) when the lords of Cibola were punis­hed by the Gods. In Catara, the Pro­phet arri­ved with a Travel-phenomenon and began the upri­sing. Collec­ting Men, Dwar­ves, Elves and Orcs under his flag he set out to rid Catara of the Empire.

The Cibolans were cha­sed off, and their capi­tal Myran­dia was shat­te­red by the Gods and sank below the sea. Sadly, there was no unity about what should follow.

After 20 years of strife and war Edward I., the Fist of the Gods, could unite all free and belie­ving counts under his flag and gave the people peace by foun­ding Catara.

In unci­vi­li­zed regi­ons the hea­thens pros­pe­red. The Witch-Kingdoms Dalora and Talore, prac­ticing witch­craft and sla­very and Gildan, Realm of the Elves were for­med. Our fri­ends the Dwar­ves retrea­ted to their anci­ent Mountain-Realm, but kept up the fri­endship with Catara and most Orcs went north to roam the plains in freedom.

After 4 years the King deci­ded to build his palace in the new capi­tal, Catar, because there was no pos­si­bi­lity of rebuil­ding Myrandia.

From 58 on there was war with Dalora, because they sup­por­ted the robber-knights of castle High­rock. By 67 the Dalorans finally gave in and deci­ded to change their policy.

The 70s brought the rise of piracy. Under the flag of legen­dary Ahab Bla­ckeye hund­reds sai­led a road of slaugh­ter. And slaugh­ter they did get, once Edward I. had finis­hed his fleet, and the pirate-threat.

The 80s and 90s were overs­ha­do­wed by odds about trade-routes and goods with Talore. There were some skir­mis­hes, but after a few years a sen­si­ble solu­tion was found.

After a hund­red years, the time of the Pro­phet ended and the Gods took him back to their realm. Wea­ke­ned by this loss of spi­ri­tual lea­dership, a lot of people suc­cumb to the Black Death.

In the fol­lo­wing years the Cult of the Nine inheri­ted a few manors and stret­ches of land. The Cult also pre­sen­ted old docu­ments and import­ant sup­por­ters, showing thus how inte­gral a part of Cata­ran society the Cult is.

The win­ter 118 was the col­dest anyone can remem­ber. Gob­lins, Kobolds and even sin­gle Ogres attack vil­la­ges. A Giant that threa­tened Rade­screst was stop­ped at the last moment because a Priest sum­mo­ned Rilos who finally kil­led the crea­ture. Long term effects are the erec­ting or upgra­ding of city walls.

In the year 123 Edward I. is kil­led by ano­ther surge of the Black Death. Due to backup by the Dwar­ves his son, Edward II inherits.

The sight­ing of a Dra­gon in 134 cau­ses panic and mas­sive inte­rest in bows.

The King can announce good news in 140 when the fist Elvish tra­ders since the upri­sing arrive by ship and open new ways of trade. Even exo­tic goods from far away Bataar now reach the King­dom and the King out­fits a few ships to secure trade-connections.

In the 150s Dalora and Talore wage war for domi­nance. Grain­pri­ces rise, cau­sein unrest. Smugg­lers and pira­tes use the tur­moil to their advan­tage. After a suc­cess­ful run of the navy over 70 buc­ca­neers are exe­cu­ted in 156.

The early 160s see a never explai­ned series of raids on cara­vans and vil­la­ges in the south, all wit­hout any sur­vi­ors. Some sus­pect a Demon-Cult…

By 170 Gal­lows are rai­sed in many towns to dis­cou­rage ban­dits, and Catar gets a militia.

177 Bar­ba­rian attacks from the south threa­ten vil­la­ges, The Southmark-Army is created

183 The Elvish Merchant-Adventurers are allo­wed to settle in Catar for 30 years.

186 Vil­la­ges in Lee­vale are atta­cked by a horde of undead from Dalora

187 A bridge col­lap­ses under the weight of the large audi­ence at the mass-execution of 29 pira­tes. Mea­su­res are promised

188 Out­lan­der pira­tes have abduc­ted and ens­la­ved 29 traders.

190 Dalora and Talore declare war on eachother.

191 Grain­pri­ces are on the rise. Late in the year there’s a dis­pute bet­ween the king and the Counts Schee­ver and von Heene. The latter’s daugh­ter is sup­po­sed to marry prince Darin. Rumors about a pos­si­ble feud abound.

192 (pre­sent) Still trou­ble brewing bet­ween counts and pro­vin­ces. Reports of dra­gon sight­ings. Also rumors about a demon-cult ope­ra­ting near Beckron.

Domi­nant Fea­tures of Catara

Wed­nes­day, 05 Janu­ary 2005

Catara is a world with a few domi­nant features:

  1. The Arri­val of the Gods
  2. The „Cult of the Nine“
  3. The Tra­vel Phenomenons

1. The Arri­val of the Gods

About a thousand years ago, or so the elves tell, the gods arri­ved on Catar. Sud­denly they were there, wan­de­ring the world, doing mira­cles, and attrac­ting wor­ship. Alt­hough the elder elves have detail­led records of a time pre­da­ting the gods, most shor­ter lived races (ie: ever­yone else) dis­mis­ses this as a myth the elves spread to claim superiority.

2. The „Cult of the Nine“

Nearly half of the human popu­la­tion of Catar refu­ses the wor­ship the gods. They ack­now­ledge their pre­sence and their power, but they do not pray to them, visit their temp­les, or do anything that amounts to worship.

Instead, they clus­ter around 9 empty altars, cele­bra­ting their inde­pen­dence of the gods.

3. The Tra­vel Phenomenons

Every so often a huge ball of light­ning speeds across the land. Crea­tures who stand in it’s way are taken up with it, and more or less instan­tiously reap­pear at an ent­i­rely dif­fe­rent loca­tion. So far, no one can say why this hap­pens, or has been able to pre­dict these things.

Races

Half-Orcs

The Half-Orc is a pro­duct of a union bet­ween a Large Orc and a human.

Often the Orcish par­ent is, or was a slave, which means that most of these indi­vi­du­als have inheri­ted a mostly human cul­ture. Phy­si­cally they also fit in well among the humans, usually fea­turing only a slightly hea­vier build, big­ger strength and some­ti­mes the enlar­ged cani­nes as evi­dence of their orcish parentage.

Orcs

There are two dif­fe­rent stocks of orcs known: Wild and Large Orcs.

Wild Orcs are small and very pri­mi­tive huma­no­ids. They make up for their lack in sta­ture and civi­li­sed wea­pons by ample amounts of wild vio­lence. Their limited intel­li­gence keeps them from beco­m­ing really dan­ge­rous, but in large groups they are a real menace.

Large Orcs are the nor­mal rep­re­sen­ta­ti­ves of their race and have a majo­rity over the other sub­ra­ces. Because of their natu­ral endurance and strength they are valued highly as sla­ves by various other races. Des­pite the pre­ju­dice cau­sed by this, the Large Orcs pos­sess a con­side­ra­ble intel­li­gence and have deve­l­o­ped an extra­va­gant cul­ture of their own.

Hal­flings

In reclu­sive, out of the way parts of the coun­try there are some­ti­mes found these small folk.

They pre­fer the quiet life­style in their small sett­le­ments and rarely leave them. They are and pre­fer to be unob­trusive, but not as with­drawn and reclu­sive as the non-grey elves, so the explo­rer or casual wan­de­rer might sud­denly walk into a quaint little vil­lage where he really didn’t expect one.

In hilly coun­try these vil­la­ges often take the shape of bur­rows, but where the ter­rain is unsui­ta­ble they are just as happy living in hou­ses. Hal­flings are a cheery, often care­free folk. Mostly they live as far­mers, in small com­mu­nities. Gene­rally hal­flings are neu­tral to good in terms of alignment.

Some say hal­flings are a sub­race of humans, but nobody can con­firm this and hal­flings inva­ria­bly deny it clai­ming proudly that they are a full race on their own.

Dwar­ves… and Gnomes

There are four dif­fe­rent dwar­ven folks known: Moun­tain, Ice, City and Dark Dwarves.

Moun­tain Dwar­ves make up the majo­rity of the Dwar­ven races on the world. They are ever­y­thing one gene­rally assu­mes about dwar­ves: small, broad-shouldered, long-bearded, not very fond of speech, but all the more fond of ale and most of all: Gold!

A strange sub­race are the City Dwar­ves, who live in cities above the ground instead of the usual under­ground moun­tain halls and have adap­ted their cul­ture to this life­style. They fit in much bet­ter in their cho­sen environ­ment and as such get along bet­ter with humans. Catar has a small popu­la­tion of these dwarves.

Ice Dwar­ves are tough and very resis­tent to cold. They live in glet­chers. You won’t meet them in Catara.

Dark Dwar­ves are a sub­race of dwar­ves that live deep in the ground where the sun never pene­tra­tes. This suits them per­fectly, because they have a strong aver­sion to light, which was honed over the cen­tu­ries that they have lived down there. Note that Dark dwar­ves are neit­her dark skin­ned, nor gene­rally evil.

Con­trary to what most humans think: Gno­mes are actually not a sepe­rate race. In fact, nearly every gnome has dwar­ven par­ents. In anci­ent times, when the first gno­mes star­ted to appear the early dwar­ves thought them abomi­na­ti­ons, weak and way too eager on thin­king instead of mining.

There are scary bed­time sto­ries of how these gno­mes were cast out by their dwar­vish clan, shun­ned for their pecularity.

Today all this is viewed as a myth: A Gnome is just ano­ther dwarf, alt­hough a spe­cial one: He is less stocky, more wiry, and usually a lot more apt to be a tin­ke­rer, or even a spell­cas­ter. Gno­mes and dwar­ves mingle freely.

Elves

The elves are the oldest race on the world, pre­da­ting even the gods if one can believe their own legends and his­to­ries. During their long stay on the world the elves have deve­l­o­ped cer­tain sub­ra­ces and various cul­tures as well:

  • High Elves are the most anci­ent elves. They are aloof and very, very rare, to the point that nobody knows where and even if they still exist. Most people in Catara wouldn’t even know there’s such a thing as a High Elf.
  • Light Elves are an off­shoot of the High Elves ori­gi­nally that claim they are the High Elves and are only con­tra­dic­ted by their Dark bre­th­ren that claim the same (see below). They are rare in Catara to the point of non-existence and the gene­ral popu­lace doesn’t even know of their existance.
  • Dark Elves are also an off­shoot of the High Elves that claim they are the real High Elves. Dark Elves are not to be con­fu­sed with Drow; they are not dark skin­ned and a non-elf would not be able to tell a Dark Elf from a Light Elf or any kind of other Elf for that mat­ter. Ano­ther Elf would know. They are cal­led Dark because of their ten­dency to fol­low the dar­ker and more sinis­ter paths in life. Dark Elves are rare in Catara to the point of non-existence and not much is known about them.
  • Grey Elves are a much youn­ger race of elves. They are more out­go­ing than their bre­th­ren from the older races, and it is inva­ria­bly a grey elf that you will encoun­ter among other cul­tures as adven­tu­rers, mer­chants and tra­vel­lers. They gene­rally value art and know­ledge very highly.
  • Wood Elves have a close bond with nature and live their lifes with­drawn into the forests away from what we would call civi­li­sa­tion. The chan­ces of mee­ting one are at best remote.
  • Win­ged Elves are gra­cious and slen­der, and have fea­the­red wings. Their cul­tu­ral empha­sis is alike to that of the Wood Elves in that they pre­fer a close bond with nature and don’t live in other cul­tures but their own. Their num­bers are very low com­pa­red to the other elven races due to the rigors of recent wars and being a favored prey of dra­gons and other fligh­ted creatures.

A gene­ral note on Elves: As a non-elf in Catara you might meet an Elf some­ti­mes, if rarely. This is in 99.99% of the cases a Grey Elf, but the non-elves don’t really know this. The know­ledge about elves is gene­rally not good enough to dis­tin­gu­ish bet­ween the elf sub­ra­ces, if they even know there are these sub­ra­ces. An Elf is an Elf to them and thus most pro­bably also to you.

This text focu­ses on the cust­oms of the elves of Gildan, espe­cially regar­ding their children.

On Elves

The elves of Gildan seem to be united for most for­eig­ners. But in rea­lity they are quite mixed and sub­jec­ted to many schisms. The dif­fe­rent elven folks are High, Grey and Wood Elves, all of them living sepa­ra­tely. The High Elves have with­drawn them­sel­ves into the inner lands of Gildan long ago. They have quite an own way of living, mar­ked by their near eter­nal life, and their lack of con­tact with mortals.

High elven child­ren are care­free and joy­ful crea­tures. The com­mu­nity will treat them as young child­ren well until their 40th year. Only then they slowly begin to mature, a pro­cess that takes again 10 to 20 years. Humans often are decei­ved by this, as elven child­ren of 20 years alre­ady look phy­si­cally mature and are also using nor­mal „grown up“ speech. But from the elven view­point they are small child­ren, as they lack the expe­ri­ence of hund­reds of years.

Elven child­ren only stay with their par­ents for the first two years of their life. After these, they will be given to a befri­en­ded hou­se­hold. This is cau­sed by the sharp dis­tinc­tion elves make bet­ween a „par­en­ting couple“, and a „life couple“. Par­en­ting cou­ples are a neces­sity. These pai­rings are usually deci­ded at birth for each per­son. When an elf matures, he con­cei­ves a child with his assi­gned part­ner, as a com­ing of age ritual. After the new­born child has been given away the par­en­ting couple usually splits up again. Only can then both par­ties slowly start to become full mem­bers of elven society.

The „life couple“ is a pai­ring built out of love. Mutual affec­tion, and the will to walk life’s path toge­ther is the force that keeps them toge­ther. As these cou­plings aren’t made for the pur­pose of con­cei­ving child­ren, the gen­der of the cho­sen part­ner is com­ple­tely irre­le­vant for most elves. Only a tenth of these cou­ples actually raise child­ren, so those that form „fami­lies“ often build up com­pa­ra­tively large ones. The child­ren view the mem­bers of the hou­se­holds they are rai­sed in as their family, even if they aren’t rela­ted genetically.

Once a child­rai­sing couple noti­ces that one of their adop­ted child­ren has star­ted to mature, they help it to find a men­tor. This men­tor will teach the child a pro­fes­sion, tailo­red to the young ones needs, inte­rests and capa­bi­li­ties. Once the app­ren­ti­ce­ship is over, the elf is con­side­red mature.

Often these app­ren­ti­ces get a spe­cial task assi­gned at the end of their app­ren­ti­ce­ship. This task doesn’t need to be ful­fil­led at once, or even at all. Every elf can decide for him­self if he wants to do it, and no one ques­ti­ons him if he doesn’t even start to think on it. It is not uncom­mon that several cen­tu­ries pass before an elf even takes notice of that task.

But should an elf actually start to do it, he will inva­ria­bly bring it to the end, even if it takes his whole life to achieve. Those who manage to finish their task are con­side­red to be mas­ters of their pro­fes­sion, and enjoy the hig­hest repu­ta­tion amongst their kin.

In gene­ral, elves stay in Gildan. Only occa­sio­nal a few Grey Elves ven­ture outs­ide of the forests, for trade and adven­ture. Any elf seen in Catara will inva­ria­bly attract attention.

Humans

The human race is the most pre­va­lent in Catara, but the humans have many cul­tu­ral dif­fe­ren­ces among them­sel­ves. Some human fami­lies claim that their blood­line is more „pure“ than others and seek to retain that purity, even sub­scri­bing some spe­cial family traits and abi­li­ties to this hig­her blood. This ten­dency is often found among the nobility.

Most humans howe­ver are of not in this group and claim no spe­cial abi­li­ties. The majo­rity of the humans is what one could describe as com­moners; city or rural folk that live a nor­mal live.

Humans howe­ver are a highly adapta­ble race with a sur­pri­sing talent for sur­vi­val in vary­ing cir­cum­stan­ces. It is not uncom­mon for the humans in a par­ti­cu­lar region to have adap­ted to strong influ­en­ces from their sur­roun­dings and neigh­bo­ring races. The result of such adapta­ti­ons is often indi­ca­ted with a spe­ci­fic indi­ca­tor, for example „nomads“, „wood­lan­ders“, „high­lan­ders“, etc.

On Half-Elves

Half-Elves are the result of those rare uni­ons bet­ween an elf and a human. Their cul­tu­ral out­look depends mostly on the rai­sing parent(s).

If the rai­sing par­ents are elven; he will undoub­tedly be rai­sed to know some­thing about his elven heri­tage (if he can endure the nor­mal elven upbrin­ging that is). His/her human side often prompts an impa­ti­ence with the elven upbrin­ging which is tra­di­tio­nally well over 50 years. Young half-elves brought up in an elven hou­se­hold will inva­ria­bly run into trou­bles when reaching their ado­le­scence 30 years before their elven par­ents expect it…

If he/she is only rai­sed by the human par­ent, or by a purely human par­en­ting couple (read the elven child­rai­sing cust­oms), then the cul­tu­ral out­come is usually a rela­tively nor­mal child accor­ding to human stan­dards, and only the phy­si­cal attri­bu­tes set him or her apart.

High, Light, Dark and Win­ged elves are so reclu­sive, and „above“ the world that they sim­ply don’t inte­re­act with humans in gene­ral, much less con­ceive a child with them. This means that almost all Half-Elves have a Grey Elven par­ent. There may be the very, very rare excep­tion, but until now, this is com­ple­tely unhe­ard of.

In such a case the family of the elven par­ent would actually seek out the child as well as the human par­ent to inves­ti­gate the birth. Inva­ria­bly they would sus­pect a union of force rather than love, and treat the child as an abomination.

Custom Clas­ses

Witch Hun­ter

The Aca­demy of the Faith­ful Prac­ti­tio­ners of the Mys­ti­cal Arts trains a spe­cial breed of man. Sworn, and highly trai­ned, these legen­dary figu­res stalk Catara in search of those who would end­an­ger civi­liza­tion its­elf with their dan­ge­rous and unsu­per­vi­sed tam­pe­ring in magi­cal forces. This is the Witch Hunter.

His mis­sion: Seek out anything and anyone that uses weird and wild magi­cal force wit­hout trai­ning and per­mis­sion from the pro­per aut­ho­ri­ties. To bring them back for trai­ning if pos­si­ble, and if not to des­troy them utterly: Burn the Witch!

What is this?

The Witch Hun­ter is a Pres­tige Class,(PrC) made com­ple­tely from scratch to uni­quely fit into the world of Catara. Unlike our pre­viously released PrCs (the Pala­dins of Jal­etar and Rilos), which were stron­gly based on an exis­ting class, this is not a pseudo core class, which you can start leve­ling in from level 2 and up. Where the Pala­dins only requi­red a firm belief, a voca­tion, and some basic skill at arms, the trai­ning that an indi­vi­dual has to go through before mas­te­ring even the most basic of witch hun­ter abi­li­ties is stre­nuous and dif­fi­cult. Many find them­sel­ves too weak of mind to per­sist and earn their staff.

The requi­re­ments are:

  • Ali­gn­ment: Any Lawful
  • Wea­pon Focus: Quarterstaff
  • Iron Will
  • Spell­craft: 4 ranks
  • Lore: 8 ranks
  • Can­not be a spell­cas­ter (Bard, Cle­ric, Druid, Psio­ni­cist, Sorce­rer, Wizard)

Level Pro­gres­sion
The Witch Hunter’s level pro­gres­sion is not based on any other class directly, but to sim­plify mat­ters, I will refer to other clas­ses as well to illus­trate parts of the pro­gres­sion:
Base Attack Pro­gres­sion: Medium (like bard, rogue, druid, cle­ric)
Save Pro­gres­si­ons: For­ti­tude low, Reflex and Will high (like bard)

At level 1 the Witch Hun­ter gains the fol­lo­wing class feats and abilities:

  • Spell Brea­king
  • Detect Witch
  • Oratory Inspi­ra­tion
  • Wea­pon Pro­fi­ci­ency Simple
  • Armour Pro­fi­ci­ency Light

At every fourth level the Witch Hun­ter gains a bonus feat, which can be selec­ted from the fol­lo­wing list:

  • Alert­ness
  • Spell Resis­tance
  • Pro­lon­ged Inspiration
  • Ten­acious Mob
  • Fana­ti­cal Mob
  • Staff Mas­tery 1
  • Staff Mas­tery 2
  • Staff Mas­tery 3

Details of the basic class abilities:

Spell­brea­king
Spell­brea­king is the skill for which witch hun­ters are most famous. This abi­lity works like coun­terspel­ling, only the witch hun­ter has no magics of his own. He has only his mind and his staff.
To activate this abi­lity, a witch hun­ter will need to do the fol­lo­wing:
1. Approach the enemy spell­cas­ter to wit­hin range (quite long)
2. Equip his spe­cial witch hun­ter staff. Each witch hun­ter has one staff, and one only.
3. Focus — this is expres­sed by keeping parry mode activa­ted. Parry will auto­ma­ti­cally deac­tivate when moving about.

If all three steps were per­for­med cor­rectly, and the witch’s cas­ter level is not more than five levels above the witch hun­ter level, the lat­ter will get a chance to break the spell. For this a will save is made. The DC is not the actual spell DC, but based on that.
The DC is cur­rently: 10 + Caster’s Abi­lity Modi­fier + (Spell Level*1,5)
Spell Level * 1,5 is roun­ded down in this calculation.

Upon attempt­ing to break a spell, the parry mode will be disa­bled and needs to be re-enabled in order to do fur­ther spell brea­king. If a spell was suc­cess­fully bro­ken, the witch hunter’s staff will pick up some of the spell’s power in char­ges, which will improve this other­wise mundane wea­pon. A witch hunter’s staff can only hold a maxi­mum num­ber of char­ges, if this safety bar­rier is cros­sed, the staff is prone to mishaps, disch­ar­ging its excess load over the witch hun­ter him­self, with pos­si­bly disas­te­rous con­se­quen­ces. Res­ting will remove all char­ges from a staff. The maxi­mum num­ber of char­ges a staff can hold is twice the witch hunter’s level, poten­ti­ally increa­sed by the avail­able bonus feats (see below).

Detect Witch
Magic dis­rupts the world around it; it shapes things from not­hing­ness, twists objects into new shapes which they were never meant to have, and even stret­ches and breaks the boun­da­ries of rea­lity. The after­ef­fects of such feats lin­ger, not as much on the world which is highly inert, but more so on the cas­ter. A witch hun­ter deve­lops a highly spe­cia­li­sed sixth sense for snif­fing out this lin­ge­ring taint of magic on those who used it recently.

This abi­lity is acces­sed from the emote menu (for­merly the craf­ting emote radial menu).

Oratory Inspi­ra­tion
This abi­lity is gai­ned on level 1, but the witch hun­ter gains one extra use on each level, up to level 20.

Oratory inspi­ra­tion has a dual effect. The first half works exactly like the bar­dic song abi­lity, inspi­ring the party of the witch hun­ter to heroic deeds. The levels of bard and witch hun­ter stack for this abi­lity, and also for the bar­dic song abi­lity on Catara. For more details on what the exact bonus­ses are, see the NWN manual for bar­dic song.

The second half of this abi­lity allows a witch hun­ter to not only inspire those around him to grea­ter deeds, but his rou­sing speech brings in the com­mon folks from all over the area to his aid. These people will bring their own wea­pons, the tra­di­tio­nal imple­ments of the angry mob: a torch and a pitch­fork (size small NPCs will only bring a pitch­fork). The mob will fol­low the witch hun­ter around, and attempt to assist him in any com­bats, for as long as his speech keeps their blood boi­ling for justice and witch-burning. In game terms this is a num­ber of rounds equal to your per­form check.

Some bonus feats can increase the effec­tiv­en­ess of the oratory inspiraton.

Bonus Feats Details:

Alert­ness
A trai­ned hun­ter, the witch hun­ter is always on the look out for trou­ble.

Bene­fit: +2 Spot, +2 Lis­ten
Pre­re­qui­si­tes: None

Spell Resis­tance
A witch hunter’s mind is a tool for cut­ting spells, like a knife is used for cut­ting bread, and an axe for fel­ling trees. Over time it beco­mes so sui­ted to this pur­pose, so finely honed, that is hardly even needs to have the aid of the witch hun­ter staff. A witch hun­ter gains the abi­lity to resist spells, even when not in spell­brea­king mode, but only those spells that are aimed at himself.

Bene­fit: The witch hun­ter gains Spell Resis­tance 10 + witch hun­ter level.
Pre­re­qui­si­tes: Lore (16 Ranks), Spell­craft (16 Ranks)

Pro­lon­ged Inspi­ra­tion
The Oratory Inspi­ra­tion abi­lity is some­thing this witch hun­ter is highly adept in. His spee­ches and inspi­ring words stick with his party mem­bers for much longer.

Oratory Inspi­ra­tion effects lasts for 5 extra rounds.
Pre­re­qui­si­tes: None

Ten­acious Mob
This witch hun­ter has focus­sed on impres­sing the crowds with the urgency of cap­tu­ring the witch that is being hun­ted. The com­mon folks are wil­ling to go to extreme lengths to help him with this.

Bene­fit: Oratory Inspi­ra­tion Mob sticks around for twice as long.
Pre­re­qui­si­tes: Per­form (10 Ranks)

Fana­ti­cal Mob
A witch hun­ter so skil­led knows exactly which words to say to a crowd to drive them to long for burning justice as much as he does him­self, maybe even more. Even the most hum­ble far­mer will shout out for blood and throw him­self at the witch with no thoughts for self-preservation after the rou­sing spee­ches of this mas­ter of the crowds.

Bene­fit: Oratory Inspi­ra­tion Mob mem­bers all gain +4 Strength and +4 Con­sti­tu­tion for as long as they are in the mob.
Pre­re­qui­si­tes: Per­form (15 Ranks)

Witch Hun­ter Staff Mas­tery
The Witch Hunter’s staff is a most import­ant tool, and with a lot of prac­tice some witch hun­ters can push it to even grea­ter limits. A prac­tice from which there is much to be gai­ned, but can also bring great risks for those who would push it too far.

There are three Witch Hun­ter Mas­tery feats. Their bene­fits and pre­re­qui­si­tes are as fol­lows:

Staff Mas­tery I
Bene­fit: Safe Charge Level increase: 25%, Staff gains a +1 enchant­ment bonus when at max char­ges, and a +2 bonus when at dou­ble max char­ges.
Pre­re­qui­si­tes: Wis­dom 16, Lore (15 Ranks), Spell­craft (15 Ranks)

Staff Mas­tery II
Bene­fit: Safe Charge Level increase: 50%, Staff Enchant­ment bonus +1 at 50% of max char­ges, +2 at 100%, +3 at 150%.
Pre­re­qui­si­tes: Wis­dom 17, Staff Mas­tery I, Lore (18 Ranks), Spell­craft (18 Ranks)

Staff Mas­tery III
Bene­fit: Safe Charge Level Increase: 100%, Staff Enchant­ment bonus +1 at 33%, +2 at 67%, +3 at 100%, +4 at 133%
Pre­re­qui­si­tes: Wis­dom 18, Staff Mas­tery II, Lore (21 Ranks), Spell­craft (21 Ranks)

The safe charge level increa­ses and enchant­ment bonus­ses from these feats are not cumulative.

Pala­dins

Not every god has pala­dins that serve him. Only Jal­etar, Nua­gar and Rilos actually grant their divine strength to a selec­ted few. By now, we actually have disa­bled the stan­dard D&D Pala­din class as selec­ta­ble class on this server.

Every of these four gods require utter devo­tion and a strict trai­ning from aspi­rants to ele­vate them into the sta­tus of a Paladin.

Being a Pala­din inva­ria­bly ties one to one’s cho­sen god’s church. Often young men and women are trai­ned into this from early age, and have to pass a series of tests; both phy­si­cal and spi­ri­tual. At the end of these tests, tests that go to the very limits of the young aspi­rant, he or she gets gran­ted the divine bles­sing. It is not rare that the god him­self appears during this cere­mony, to wel­come a new figh­ter into his church.

A Pala­din is always part of the mar­tial order of his church. He or she defends the church, and actively seeks out to des­troy evil whe­re­ver it is found. Every god though has slightly dif­fe­rent inter­pre­ta­ti­ons on what exactly is viewed as evil, and how to engage it.

When crea­ting a Pala­din, or mul­ti­clas­sing into one you must keep the fol­lo­wing things in mind:

  • You can­not make a Pala­din that isn’t devo­ted to one of these four gods!
  • You can­not make a Pala­din that isn’t part of the church of his cho­sen god.
  • The Pala­din class will onyl be avail­able after doing an IC quest.
  • Do not mul­ti­class into a Pala­din wit­hout having role­played a tie to the cho­sen gods church.

Pala­din of Jaletar

The Sun God Jal­etar ordains holy war­ri­ors for his cause. These dedi­ca­ted indi­vi­du­als are the Pala­dins of Jal­etar. They fight evil in all its forms, but their field of spe­cia­li­sa­tion is fight­ing fiends. Demons and devils beware, Jaletar’s Holy Light is com­ing for you.

What exactly is it that we’re offe­ring?
A whole new pres­tige class! The Pala­din of Jal­etar is much like the nor­mal pala­din (see the NWN ori­gi­nal game, or the 3.0 PHB), but there’s some sub­tle dif­fe­ren­ces. For star­ters it’s a pres­tige class, instead of a core class. That means you’ll have to have some prior trai­ning before you can take levels in this class. The requi­re­ments are:

  • Ali­gn­ment: must be Law­ful Good
  • Heavy Armor Proficiency
  • Shield Pro­fi­ci­ency
  • Wea­pon Focus: Longsword
  • Base Attack Bonus: +1

As you can see the requi­re­ments are quite light, and can indeed be met by a level 1 cha­rac­ter, so you can start taking levels in this class star­ting at level 2. There is one other requi­re­ment howe­ver, and that one is scrip­ted: the class must be unlo­cked. This hap­pens when you’ve succe­fully finis­hed your initia­tion trai­ning, which is (or rather will be) loca­ted at a very logi­cal place in game. Where exactly is for you to figure out in game.

What can this class do?
The Pala­din of Jaletar’s pro­gres­sion is highly simi­lar to the regu­lar pala­din class as well. Here’s a list of what to expect:

  1. Divine Grace*, Jaletar’s Gui­ding Light (allows the Pala­din to emit light), Pro­tec­tion from evil (3x/day), Favored enemy: outs­iders (like the ran­ger feat), Detect Evil (find it in the emote wand con­ver­sa­tion, not on the radial menu)
  2. Aura of Cou­rage*, Smite Evil*
  3. Turn Undead*, Good Domain Power (abi­lity to turn outs­iders as well)
  4. Jaletar’s Holy Decree I (1x/day)
  5. -
  6. Jaletar’s Holy Decree I (2x/day)
  7. Jaletar’s Holy Decree II (1x/day)
  8. -
  9. Jaletar’s Holy Decree I (3x/day), Jaletar’s Holy Decree II (2x/day)
  10. Jaletar’s Holy Decree III (1x/day)
  11. -
  12. Jaletar’s Holy Decree II (3x/day), Jaletar’s Holy Decree III (2x/day)
  13. Jaletar’s Holy Decree I (4x/day), Jaletar’s Holy Decree IV (1x/day)
  14. -
  15. Jaletar’s Holy Decree III (3x/day), Jaletar’s Holy Decree IV (2x/day)
  16. Jaletar’s Holy Decree II (4x/day)
  17. -
  18. Jaletar’s Holy Decree I (5x/day), Jaletar’s Holy Decree IV (3x/day)
  19. Jaletar’s Holy Decree III (4x/day)
  20. -
  21. and beyond: Epic pro­gres­sion like the regu­lar paladin.

* = See regu­lar pala­din class for description

Detect Evil

Detect Evil for Pala­dins of Jal­etars (and later as well for other Holy War­ri­ors) reve­als the amount of evil pre­sen­ces nearby. It is not imple­men­ted as a spell. People can not tell when you’re using it.
Jaletar’s Holy Decrees
As you per­haps know, assi­gning spells to pres­tige clas­ses is not pos­si­ble in the con­ven­tio­nal man­ner. In their stead we have given the Pala­din of Jal­etar some Holy Decrees. These will allow the class to mani­fest some of the pala­din spells any­way. Here’s the list of powers you can expect:

Jaletar’s Holy Decree I
- Bless
– Bless Wea­pon**
– Cure Light Wounds
– Divine Favor
– Endure Elements

Jaletar’s Holy Decree II
– Aid
– Aura of Glory
– Bull’s Strength
– Eagle’s Sple­ndor
– Sea­ring Light**

Jaletar’s Holy Decree III
– Banish­ment**
– Dis­pel Magic
– Grea­ter Magic Wea­pon
– Magic Cir­cle Against Evil
– Prayer

Jaletar’s Holy Decree IV
– Cure Serious Wounds
– Death Ward
– Free­dom of Move­ment
– Holy Sword**
– Sunbeam**

** = Spell chan­ged to reflect Jaletar’s back­ground bet­ter. See below for more details.

Spell Chan­ges
The chan­ges to spells are not expan­sive. You will still recognise the spell if you knew the ori­gi­nal, yet there will be some notica­ble dif­fe­ren­ces. These dif­fe­ren­ces stem from the fact that Jaletar’s focus is on fight­ing fiends, instead of the more con­ven­tio­nal anti-undead bias found in the regu­lar pala­din spells. Note that these chan­ges will also apply to cle­rics of Jal­etar, as far as the lis­ted spells appear on the cle­ric spell list. I won’t go into tech­ni­cal details here, but in a nuts­hell here’s what we have changed:

  • Bless Wea­pon: 2d6 damage vs. outs­iders (instead of vs. undead)
  • Sea­ring Light: Damage vs. Evil Outs­iders: 1d8/level. Damage vs Undead redu­ced to the regu­lar 1d8/ 2 levels
  • Banish­ment: Banis­hes 3HD/level instead of 2HD/level
  • Holy Sword: Does not give Holy Aven­ger pro­perty (hard­coded to work only for regu­lar pala­dins), but instead makes your wea­pon +5 with 2d6 damage vs evil added in. Also grants a cir­cle of pro­tec­tion vs. evil around the cas­ter. Only works for swords.
  • Sun­beam: Base damage increa­sed to 5d6 (nor­mally 3d6). Blind­ness unch­an­ged. Does 1d8/level damage to evil outs­iders (repla­c­ing the increa­sed anti-undead damage).

Pala­dins of Rilos

The good fight, the call of battle for righ­teous­ness, the drive to hunt down evil in its every form. This is the song that sounds in the veins of a true Pala­din of Rilos, a cho­sen war­rior of the lord of many batt­les. The sacred battle ritu­als of Rilos bring these holy war­ri­ors into balance with nature and their sur­roun­dings as well. To sym­bo­lise this balance they ritually fight with two wea­pons, one of which is a batt­le­axe, the second usually a smal­ler han­daxe or just ano­ther batt­le­axe. Their most com­mon enemy in and near the lands of Catara are the various evil giants.

What exactly is it that we’re offe­ring?
Shortly after the Pala­din of Jal­etar pres­tige class (alt­hough they were released at the same time) the team of Catara crea­ted ano­ther whole new pres­tige class. We proudly pre­sent: the Pala­din of Rilos. This pres­tige class is also based on the pala­din class (like the pala­din of Jal­etar), but also has some big chunks of ran­ger mixed in (see the NWN ori­gi­nal game, or the 3.0 PHB for descrip­ti­ons of both these core clas­ses), As with all pres­tige clas­ses, there are some pre­re­qui­si­tes that must be met before one can level up in this class. The requi­re­ments are:

  • Ali­gn­ment: must be Chao­tic Good
  • Heavy Armor Proficiency
  • Wea­pon Focus: Battleaxe
  • Base Attack Bonus: +1

As you can see the requi­re­ments are quite light, and can indeed be met by a level 1 cha­rac­ter, so you can start taking levels in this class star­ting at level 2. There is one other requi­re­ment howe­ver, and that one is scrip­ted: the class must be unlo­cked. This hap­pens when you’ve succe­fully finis­hed your initia­tion trai­ning, which is (or rather will be) loca­ted at a very logi­cal place in game. Where exactly is for you to figure out in game.

What can this class do?
The Pala­din of Rilos‘ pro­gres­sion fea­tures ele­ments that you will recognise from both ran­ger and pala­din core clas­ses, howe­ver there’s some new things we’ve come up with as well. Here’s a list of what to expect:

  1. Ambi­dex­te­rity*, Two-Weapon Fight­ing*, Com­bat trai­ning vs. Giants (+4 AC vs giants, like dwar­ves get)*, Favored Enemy: Giants*, Detect Evil (find it in the emote wand con­ver­sa­tion, not on the radial menu)
  2. Aura of Courage*
  3. Smite Evil *
  4. Rilos‘ Battle Ritual I (1x/day)
  5. Favored Enemy: Animals*
  6. Rilos‘ Battle Ritual I (2x/day)
  7. Rilos‘ Battle Ritual II (1x/day)
  8. Favored Enemy: Beasts*
  9. Rilos‘ Battle Ritual I (3x/day), Rilos‘ Battle Ritual II (2x/day)
  10. Rilos‘ Battle Ritual III (1x/day)
  11. Favored Enemy: Magi­cal Beasts*
  12. Rilos‘ Battle Ritual II (3x/day), Rilos‘ Battle Ritual III (2x/day)
  13. Rilos‘ Battle Ritual I (4x/day), Rilos‘ Battle Ritual IV (1x/day)
  14. Favored Enemy: Mons­trous Humanoids*
  15. Rilos‘ Battle Ritual III (3x/day), Rilos‘ Battle Ritual IV (2x/day)
  16. Rilos‘ Battle Ritual II (4x/day)
  17. Favored Enemy: Dragons*
  18. Rilos‘ Battle Ritual I (5x/day), Rilos‘ Battle Ritual IV (3x/day)
  19. Rilos‘ Battle Ritual III (4x/day)
  20. Bane of Enemies*
  21. and beyond: Epic pro­gres­sion, no new feats, choices as ranger.

* = See NWN manual or 3.0 Player’s Hand­book for description

Detect Evil

Detect Evil for Pala­dins of Jal­etars (and later as well for other Holy War­ri­ors) reve­als the amount of evil pre­sen­ces nearby. It is not imple­men­ted as a spell. People can not tell when you’re using it.
Rilos‘ Battle Ritu­als
As you per­haps know, assi­gning spells to pres­tige clas­ses is not pos­si­ble in the con­ven­tio­nal man­ner. In their stead we have given the Pala­din of Rilos Battle Ritu­als. These will allow the class to mani­fest some of the pala­din spells any­way. Here’s the list of powers you can expect:

Rilos‘ Battle Ritual I
- Bless
– Divine Favor
– Cure Light Wounds
– Magic Wea­pon
– Pro­tec­tion from Evil

Rilos‘ Battle Ritual II
– Aid
– Bull’s Strength
– Cat’s Grace
– Pro­tec­tion from Ele­ments
– Clairaudience/Clairvoyance

Rilos‘ Battle Ritual III
– Blade Thirst
– Prayer
– Magic Cir­cle Against Evil
– Cure Mode­rate Wounds
– Keen Edge

Rilos‘ Battle Ritual IV
– Cure Serious Wounds
– Battle Tide
– Free­dom of Move­ment
– War Cry
– Holy Axe**

** = Spell chan­ged to reflect Rilos‘ back­ground bet­ter. See below for more details.

Spell Chan­ges
The chan­ges to spells are not expan­sive. You will still recognise the spell if you knew the ori­gi­nal, yet there will be some notica­ble dif­fe­ren­ces. At this time, in fact, there is only one dif­fe­rent spell for the Pala­din of Rilos, but more chan­ges could hap­pen in the future, in which case they will be added to the fol­lo­wing list:

  • Holy Axe: Does not give Holy Aven­ger pro­perty (hard­coded to work only for regu­lar pala­dins), but instead makes your wea­pon +5 with 2d6 damage vs evil added in. Also grants a cir­cle of pro­tec­tion vs. evil around the cas­ter. Only works for axes.

Popu­la­tion & Government

Appro­xi­mate total popu­la­tion: 200 000

Race Amount
Humans 98 196 000
Nym­phs 1 2 000
Orcs ½ 1 000
Dwar­ves - 800
Hal­flings - 450
Elves - 400

Human popu­la­tion localisation:

Catar 18.000
Other cities 25.000
Islands 63.000
Main­land 94.000

Govern­ment structures

Gene­ral Feu­dal System

The King resi­des in Catar, the capi­tal of the coun­try. He usually rep­res­ents exclu­si­vely the coun­try. The barons are lords of their own barony, but owe the crown a monthly tri­bute and their sup­port. Con­flicts bet­ween barons are not unusual.

Lands in Catara and their rulers

Land Ruler(s)
Coun­try The King (there is only one)
Pro­vin­ces Usually Count, alt­hough some have other per­so­nal titles.
Baro­nies Baron or Knight

The 10 provinces

Pro­vince Popu­la­tion Capi­tal City City Pop. Local Lord km²
Catar 37000 Catar 18000 King Edward II of Catar 5586
Gro­vale 13200 Rade­screst 3200 Count August Scheever 10625
Lock­beck 17800 Wer­dum 2800 Count Tim­men of Heene 4727
Lower­gorn 15000 Gorn­mouth 2000 The 7 Mages 5625
Seagrove-Gorn 21000 Green­mea­dow 4000 Count­ess Juliana of Mountaincrag 10156
Lee­vale 24200 Beck­ron 4200 Count Asti­nus of Beckvale 10000
Myran­dia 11000 - - Dra­gon­prince Darin 4884
South­mark 29600 Hill­fall 4600 Baron Ata­nis 30000
Tor­kum 30100 Caverns­ton 5100 Derk of the Meadow 40000
Nyr 2000 Nyr - Queen Nyyvna 5000

Taxes

Gene­rally about 50 % of all sorts of income, for example:
·        Wood­cut­ting in the Lord’s forests
·        Her­ding ani­mals on the lord’s lands
·        Trans­porting some­thing over the lord’s lands (import/export tax)
·        Ever­y­thing that’s har­ves­ted or pro­du­ced
·        Using the mills

Taxes are also owed for various offi­cial cere­mo­nies and licen­ces:
·        Death and buri­als
·        Mar­riage
·        Church and Temple taxes
·        Guild Licence
·        Magic Licence

Law and Court

The King’s Laws

App­lica­ble to both Nobi­lity and Civi­li­ans in case of cri­mes against the Crown and the coun­try.
Exam­ples: Tre­a­son, Dis­obey­ing of direct orders, Attacking the King’s Men, Arson, For­gery, Har­bo­ring Fugi­ti­ves from the Law, High­way Rob­bery, Dis­re­spect towards the King or the Aut­ho­rity of the Crown.
Pos­si­ble punish­ments: Han­ging, Deca­pi­ta­tion, Tar and Fea­the­ring, the Rack, being Drawn and Quar­te­red, etc.

Civi­lian Law

App­lica­ble to pro­vin­cial and baro­nial courts and smal­ler lands in case of argu­ments bet­ween civi­li­ans or civi­lian insti­tu­ti­ons as well as smal­ler, local cri­mes.
Pos­si­ble punish­ments: being decla­red an out­law, ven­detta, mai­ming, gold (fines), forced labor, having the Thie­ves‘ Mark bran­ded into your hand or in more severe cases your forehead. Fines and forced labor are the more com­mon punishments.

Dei­ties and the Cult

Reli­gious Systems

There are two oppo­sing sys­tems of belief and wor­ship on Catara

People on Catara know that the gods are there. Many have actually seen one at least once. Wor­ship as a rule is poly­the­istic. People pay homage to wha­te­ver god suits their cur­rent needs. Only Pala­dins and Cle­rics focus on one god or goddess.

Oppo­sed to that is the Cult of Nine. It is a quasi-religious group, that actually rejects the gods. Men can do wha­te­ver they want, they claim, and that the gods are meddling instead of hel­pful. The Cult still ack­now­ledges the exis­tance and power of the gods, but refu­ses to wor­ship them.

The Cult of Nine

The Cult of Nine is a quasi-religious group that actually rejects the gods. Men can do wha­te­ver they want, they claim, and that the gods are meddling instead of hel­pful. It’s mem­bers ack­now­ledge the gods exis­tence, but refuse to wor­ship them.

It is import­ant to note that they are not non-believers. The exis­tance of the gods isn’t argued, just if they are worth wor­ship­ping. The Cult of Nine thinks they aren’t.

The vast majo­rity of the Cult are humans, alt­hough there are a few non-humans in it too. Note­able is the scar­city of Half-Orcs or orcs in it: The Cibo­lean Empire trea­ted them as sla­ves, and since the insur­rec­tion, few for­mer sla­ves have embra­ced this religion.

The Dif­fe­rent Orders of the Cult

The Cult of Nine is split into nine orders. Nine is an extre­mely import­ant num­ber for them actually.

Order of the Eye

The Order of the Eye are said to be the Seers of the Cult. That title is a bit con­fu­sing though. They are not actual divi­ners or pro­phets. They are Psi­ons and well ver­sed in under­stan­ding and using the human mind. Their task is to under­stand other people, to give advice on what they are likely to think. Mem­bers of this order can be spies, advi­sors, scho­lars, sooth­say­ers, coun­celors and therapists.

A novice of this order volun­ta­rily gives up his eye­sight for a long time, to bet­ter train his other sen­ses, and to focus his mind. During the long trai­ning, he will learn how to tap an inner well of power, to per­form incredi­ble feats. No one really knows what the limits of these powers are, but it is said that they par­al­lel those of true wizards in some ways.

The Cult of Nine always sta­tes that the mem­bers of the Order of the Eye show what humans are capable of if they really focus on their own skills, instead of depen­ding on gods. In fact, there has been no report of a sin­gle god-worshipping Psion on Catara.

Order of the Robe

The spi­ri­tual gui­des, as well as the inter­nal Inqui­si­tion of the Cult

Order of the Sun

The Druids, Ran­gers and herbalists

Order of the Fire

Here the smiths, alche­mists and artists gather, to fashion the things the Cult would need.

Order of the Snake

Bro­thers and Sis­ters of the Snake are the healers.

Order of the Winds

Heralds, talent scouts (dub­bed Com­ferrs) and the rese­ar­chers and map makers of the Cult.

Bro­thers of the Ring

The wizards of the Cult. It is noted that no sorce­rers are part of this bro­ther­hood, and only men are admit­ted. Sign of mem­bership is a light gray metal ring worn on the little fin­ger of the left hand.

Order of the Fla­ming Blade

The Knights of the Cult, and their fight­ing Order. On joi­ning, a Knight has to pledge 9 years of devo­ted ser­vice. Only after having ser­ved as a knave, the the knight is allo­wed to take his vowes, which include celi­bacy and poverty. The knight will be owning not­hing but the equip­ment the Order grants him or her.

The nine years will be spent as wan­de­ring years, where he may only reside up to 9 months at the same spot (these times are usually spent in some garrisson)

After this ser­vice, he ascends to a hig­her rank and gets per­mit­ted to marry and acquire goods.

A Knight of the Fla­ming Sword has nonethe­l­ess a high pres­tige, and after the 9 wan­de­ring years will often take up high posi­ti­ons in the guards of one of the other orders, or maybe even a com­mand of one of the many keeps of the Cult.

They are impo­sing figu­res, wea­ring magi­cal blue robes, a blue steel hel­met and, if they are of a very high sta­tus, fla­ming two han­ded swords.

Coun­cil of Eternity

The ori­gi­nal Coun­cil of Eter­nity is in Cibola. As such, com­mu­ni­ca­tion with them seems to have bro­ken down for quite a while due to the insurrection.

In Catara, there is an inte­rims Coun­cil, made up from the hig­hest mem­bers of the indi­vi­dual orders.

Their names are known to the public:
Isak Herb — First Pro­clai­mer of the Cult — „The Ninth„
Mas­ter Uram Der­ragol — Arch­mage of the Cult of Nine — „Ring­bro­ther„
Uhar Fires­son — Order of the Robe - „Should­er­piece„
Ayahn — Order of the Eye — „High Seer„
Gasra of Myran­dia — Order of the Sun — „Flet­ching„
Emjen Tage­ryn — Order of Fire — „Gold„
Jarela Star­sign — Order of the Snake — „Heart„
Sir Nas­ran of Gorn­he­art — Order of the Winds — „Northwind„
Sir Garan Cho­renn — Order of the Fla­ming Blade — „Cross­guard“

The Gods

Con­s­tain — God of Nature

Like Jona­ton, Con­s­tain is a Nature God. Where Jona­ton empha­si­zes the good­ness, har­mony and balance of nature, Con­s­tain embo­dies the oppo­site; the destruc­tive and pure force that is nature in its rawest form. He loves nature, but hates the races of sen­ti­ent spe­cies that have come to live in and on it, regar­ding them as para­si­tes to get rid of as soon as pos­si­ble. Con­s­tain is said to have a body that con­sists of shape­l­ess goo or ooze.

Ali­gn­ment: TN
Favored Wea­pon: Grea­taxe
Domains: Ani­mal, Destruc­tion, Plant

Sorudred — God of Destruction

It is unknown if Sorudred is really a God or just an obscure demon, but still ill­nes­ses, con­flagra­ti­ons, pla­gues, and other pheno­me­n­ons of grand scale destruc­tion are often attri­bu­ted to Him. It is a wides­pread custom to use His name in cur­ses and when swearing.

Ali­gn­ment: CE

Favored Wea­pon: Greatsword

Domains: Death, Destruc­tion, War

Rak­kar – God of Thie­ves and Ambushes

All thie­ves ply their trade in the favor of Rak­kar. When someone has had some­thing sto­len then it is often said that Rak­kar has played His tricks on him or her.

Ali­gn­ment: NE

Favored Wea­pon: Dagger

Rilos – God of War and Hunting

Rilos loves fights and batt­les, but also the hunt. Often he’s repor­ted to ride around on his win­ged horse, hun­ting down giants and des­troy­ing other unfri­end­lies. Rilos‘ true fol­lo­wers will never just kill for the kil­ling though. Every oppo­nent that is met in battle, and every prey that’s hun­ted deser­ves to be hono­red and respec­ted, as wits, strength and cun­ning are tes­ted in battle or pursuit.

Ali­gn­ment: CG

Favored Wea­pon: Battleaxe

Domains: Ani­mal, Plant, War

Jal­etar – God of the Suns and the day

Jal­etar rep­res­ents the two suns that rise over Catara every day. He makes sure they stay on course and rise and set cor­rectly. His name and power is also often invo­ked when banis­hing dae­mons or crea­tures of pure evil. It is said that in His holy light, no dar­k­ness or crea­tures of dar­k­ness can exist. His twin bro­ther is Nuagar.

Ali­gn­ment: LG

Favored Wea­pon: Longsword

Nua­gar – God of Dar­k­ness, the Night and Dreams

Nua­gar is Jaletar’s twin and their sphe­res of influ­ence clo­sely bor­der; his sphe­res of influ­ence lie in the res­ting phase of the dark night. He is not an evil god though, but rather rep­res­ents the who­le­some aspects of dar­k­ness and night; the sleep and rest­ful dreams that bring refresh­ment and strength to face a new day.

Ali­gn­mentL: NG

Favored Wea­pon: Crossbow

Domains: Air, Hea­ling, Protection

Shai­lin – God­dess of Love and Feelings

Shai­lin is the patron of those who love and those that approach each other with affec­tion of some kind. Many hea­lers are found in her ranks, for hea­ling comes forth from a love of life itself.

Ali­gn­ment: NG

Favored Wea­pon: Net

Domains: Good, Hea­ling, Protection

Dre­kon – God of Death and Mourning

God of Death and Mourning

Dre­kon is the most dra­ma­tic per­so­ni­fi­ca­tion among the gods. Accor­ding to legend He is the One that loves all people and all crea­tures the most. This is why, after the many wars and the many deaths his heart is bro­ken. Legend paints him as a bro­ken figure of a man tra­vel­ling through the deserts and was­te­lands, loudly pro­clai­ming his lament. He stops at every death and mourns it, then takes the deceased’s soul and leads it into a bet­ter world.

It is Dre­kon who cries for the deaths of us all, whe­ther we are kings or thie­ves, and in the end we all pay him our last tri­bute, which he never wan­ted or asked for.

Ali­gn­ment: TN

Favou­red Wea­pon: Shield

Domains: Death, Pro­tec­tion, Strength

Uga­ris – God of Trade and Luck

Cur­sed and prai­sed equally by many, Uga­ris is a con­tro­ver­sial god. His favor is fore­ver chan­ging and fluc­tua­ting, all want to have it, but it always seems to aban­don them at the most inop­por­tune time, while at the same time being there when nee­ded most. No mer­chant, tra­der or gam­bler can go wit­hout his favor for any length of time, so des­pite being jud­ged a bit immo­ral by some, his fol­lo­wers are still many. His favo­rite pas­stime is the riddlecontest.

Ali­gn­ment: CN

Favored Wea­pon: Shortsword

Domains: Chaos, Tra­vel, Trickery

Mag­mos – God of Fire and Blacksmiths

Mag­mos is des­pite his small sphere of influ­ence quite popu­lar among the people. He is often rep­re­sen­ted as a mus­cu­lar man, always with a cheer­ful rhyme ready. He sees to it that the hearth­fire is burning brightly and that Rilos‘ arrows, and the kni­ves of figh­ters and chefs alike are always sharp.  Mag­mos has a great, popu­lous fol­lo­wing (espe­cially among the dwar­ves, where his fol­lo­wing is unanimous).

Ali­gn­ment: LN (lea­ning towards Good)

Favored Wea­pon: Warhammer

Domains: Fire, Pro­tec­tion, Strength

Or-Koris – God of the Sea and Storms

Vene­ra­ted by tra­ve­lers on all seas, Or-Koris is the per­so­ni­fi­ca­tion of the wild storm. Many lives has He clai­med alre­ady and many will still fall vic­tim to His winds and waters. Every sea­fa­rer, whe­ther casual or pro­fes­sio­nal, should endea­vor to appease Him and avert His fury before set­ting sail, so the jour­ney might be free of dangers.

Ali­gn­ment: CN

Favored Wea­pon: Trident

Domains: Air, Destruc­tion, Water

Mar­ros – God of the Earth and Volcanoes

Mar­ros is pri­ma­rily wor­ship­ped as the God of agri­cul­ture. It is wise to attract His favor; He pro­tects the field and ensu­res the earth is fer­tile. Ano­ther side of His influ­ence is howe­ver the destruc­tive power of the earth, espe­cially volca­noes. This means that it’s highly unwise to pro­voke His wrath, because not only may your field remain bare, but your lands might even be covered with a layer of mol­ten stone and debris. Besi­des Mag­mos, Mar­ros is the only god wor­ship­ped by the dwar­ves. Any tun­nel or mine built wit­hout His consent is said to be doo­med to collapse.

Ali­gn­ment: TN

Favored Wea­pon: Scythe

Domains: Earth, Plant, Strength

Jana­ton – God of the Forest

Jana­ton is often por­trayed as an old man, living peace­fully in a small cabin in the middle of a large forest, sur­roun­ded by all kinds of ani­mals. One pro­vo­kes His wrath by unne­ces­sa­rily dama­ging nature. There is not­hing wrong with hun­ting if done well, because the hunt is a part of the natu­ral cycle of the woods and the ani­mals living there.

Ali­gn­ment: TN

Favored Wea­pon: Longbow

Domains: Ani­mal, Plant, Protection

Mirika – God­dess of the Fishermen

Mirika is the wife of Or-Koris and is highly respec­ted among fisher­men on the coast espe­cially. She assu­res that enough fish migrate close to the shores, so the nets of the fisher­men are always full and the catch is bountiful.

Most nota­bly King Edward of Catar is a strong fol­lo­wer of Her and has his own shrine dedi­ca­ted to Her. This is because his favo­rite dish is fresh fish.

Ali­gn­ment: NG

Favored Wea­pon: Spear

Domains: Ani­mal, Good, Water

Ephe­mis – God of Art and History

Bards, pain­ters, sculp­ters and poets; all artisans are pro­tec­ted by the vir­tue of Ephe­mis‘ powers. All pray to him for inspi­ra­tion and that little extra bit of skill that will make a sim­ple per­for­mance or sculp­ture into a true work of Art. Also all who write down or recount the times gone past, and so pre­serve lore and history for the gene­ra­ti­ons to come are spe­cially pro­tec­ted by Ephemis.

Ali­gn­ment: LN

Favored Wea­pon: Rapier

Domains: Know­ledge, Tra­vel, Trickery

Noma­kon – God of Magic and Knowledge

Noma­kon is hono­red by all that are sear­ching for enligh­ten­ment and know­ledge. He rep­res­ents Intel­li­gence, Expe­ri­ence and Wis­dom. Magi­ci­ans and libra­ri­ans espe­cially, are often found among his fol­lo­wers, because there is no part of magi­cal lore that He is not fami­liar with. He is the defi­ni­tive Patron of all wizards, and those that aspire to become such will do well to acquire his favor. Also those that wan­der long for­got­ten paths, sear­ching for the wis­dom of the anci­ents are under his pro­tec­tion and wor­thy of his favor.

Ali­gn­ment: LN

Favored Wea­pon: Mace

Domains: Know­ledge, Magic, Trickery

Ebruk – God of the Poor

Ebruk rep­res­ents hope for the poor. The temple of Ebruk is a shel­ter for the home­l­ess and a place where those wit­hout gold can get a warm meal. It is cust­o­mary for all, even the most wealthy, to donate to Ebruk now and then, to ward off fal­ling into poverty themselves.

Ali­gn­ment: NG

Favored Wea­pon: Club

Domains: Good, Hea­ling, Protection

Ele­gil – Ruler of the Gods

Ele­gil is the Ruler of the Gods, Lord of the Pan­theon. There’s not­hing else to say about him, for he does not meddle in the affairs of the mor­tals often. Only in Catar is there a temple dedi­ca­ted to him, and quite often the com­mon folk not of the capi­tal will never have even heard of him. He is sup­po­sed to have been the God of the prophet.

Ali­gn­ment: NG

Favored Wea­pon: Flail

Domains: Know­ledge, Magic, Travel