Sup, Veeky Forums. I'm making a 5th ed campaign set in Ravnica. Can anybody give me some lore/information on the plane itself, outside what is on the wizards page for it?
Deeper information on the guilds, the denizens of the plane, sections of the city, etc.
I can offer nothing in return but cropped pron images.
Other urls found in this thread:
magic.wizards.com
mtgsalvation.gamepedia.com
warosu.org
twitter.com
I suggest you read the tie in books, they were actually a lot of fun and give you a pretty good idea of how the guilds interact with each other.
I don't want to be spoonfed, but got a name or two I can peruse?
the session starts in a few days, and while I like to wing most of my games (my players like spontaneity), I'd like to have an in depth understanding of the intricacies of the city/plane of ravnica itself.
Boros Legion are cops, most murders can be traced back to Rakdos. The Golgari have zombies that range from mindless laborers to full sentient, even holding positions of power within the swarm. The Izzet blow themselves up as often as they create wonders and the Simic can't stop grafting organic bits onto themselves and others.
I have a pretty good memory so if you have something a little more specific to ask feel free.
So I know ravnica is basically just one huge city. How is broken up? topicology, locations, major subsections, etc.
How does the guard work? What structure is there to the "police" so to speakk? What form of rulership is there? A dictatorship, a heirarchy, a monarchy even?
Main sources of business. Goods traded, services exchanged. What kind of public systems are there, possibly transit?
What work is there normally for adventurers to find? What kind of intrigue/scheming are the guilds up to?
What kind of food do they eat? This ones a ballpark question, I can just substitute generic fantasy food here.
rulership is WEIRD. basically each guild rules over their own guild and the direct area they reside in. the Guildless have to hope the guilds will take care of the important parts of the city for them, like izzet maintaining the power/water systems, and simic being around to patch you up for medical reasons.
Azorious is in charge of the law making. It is a lengthy process and of course most laws tend to serve Azorious in some way. Azorious supplies most of the basic law enforcement as well. Boros usually works alongside them as far more militant peacekeepers. They tend to be used for outright battles with the malcontent guilds like Guru or Rakdos.
when you say the wizards page, what page? how about you list what you been using so far for sources.
I've been using this so far: magic.wizards.com
Alright so what I'm seeing is a bunch of sections of a city each being ruled by some different form of guild. Just need some more info on the actual makeup of the city itself.
There is TONS of articles wizards did you can get info from. But that would require so much archive hunting it will make life hard for you.
so go here mtgsalvation.gamepedia.com
I highly suggest you make use of all the links on the page, inlcuding the sources/reference links to Wizards articles. look up every guild, every iconic character from the guilds if they have pages and so on.
Ask if you need help with some stuff
one interesting thing to note is rav is so overdeveloped that the oceans are covered over. New Simic is actually the result of some sinkholes forming in old all but abondoned sections of city and the merfolk underneath rising up.
The city has few landmarks. The Selesnya tree was one to name. As was the tower of the Izzet. There are several floating micro-cities, one belonging to the Legion and another to the Azorius Senate who has a sphinx as one of their great leaders. The make-up of the cities is rather ever shifting as old areas are torn down to be remade or areas are demolished and returned to nature by the Gruul clans as revenge.
I recommend checking Wikipedia for more specifics on the setting. It's pretty accurate.
There is no direct rulership of Ravnica, the guilds have their leaders but they don't really interact with each other even with the alliances between them. Boros and Azorius seem the most tight knit since one enforces the laws the other creates. Beyond that Selesnya are secondary enforcers for peace because they put the needs of the community over the needs of the individual.
Business is as diverse as any other setting. and transit is most likely handled as a division of the Izzet league since they build most of the machinery in Ravnica.
Adventurers, depending on their background, could be put to work by any of the guilds as private contractors so the guilds could maintain plausible deniability. They could be set to steal a prototype from the Izzets, find a bit of blackmail for the Orzhov to use in their deal making, eliminate trouble making Rakdos, uncover who is a Dimir spy or assassin, or any number of things.
Food was never very specific though they did make a cool plot point about the main character having an addiction to healing potions (called drops), with the fact that if he every used them again they'd give him a heart attack.
>Beyond that Selesnya are secondary enforcers for peace because they put the needs of the community over the needs of the individual.
They don't 'enforce peace'. Maybe they make the most actual peace, but they don't enforce like Azorious or Boros do.
I got to expand on something u mention for adventurers. You made me realize Ravnica would be PERFECT for a 'medieval' fantasy shadowrun type of campaign.
>Ravnica would be PERFECT for a 'medieval' fantasy shadowrun type of campaign.
Exactly why I wanted to make a campaign based around it. Although my players are faggots and don't want to play anything except fifth.
First thing I would do is go onto gatherer (just type it into your search engine; it should be the first thing that pops up), go to advanced search, and for sets select:
Ravnica: city of guilds
Dissension
Guildpact
Return to ravnica
Gatecrash
Dragon's maze
And just look at ALL OF THE CARDS. Look for proper names (mostly for places), events and customs of each of the guilds, spells and creatures that might make it into your game, etc. look in the flavor text, the names, the art. This might take a good 3 hours, but it'll be worth it.
Another thing to do is check out some of the magic stories that are in ravnica (the link that you've been using can actually be used with what I've been telling you), and read all of them as well. Note some of the culture that you see, some details that seem interesting enough.
I wish you luck then that you pull off shadow run stuff with fifth.
As someone that's actually in a 5e Ravnica campaign though we've since branched out to other planes for reasons I would have to say it's probably one of my favorite planes. We started out arrested by the Azorius on grounds of "sudden appearances in public without a permit" before clearing our case and , while heading off elsewhere, fighting down some Weirds until the Izzet scientists come out of the hole blown in the wall like "Stop! What are you doing?". After that we quickly teamed up with some Boros to clear out a Rakdos nest, and as a tip of the hat got us the deed to the place as payment.
Since then we've been bumming around, doing odd jobs for guilds, reeling in escaped krasi for the Simic, assisting Boros raids, middlemanning grievances between the Gruul and Azorius, and even waiting tables at Rakdos establishments. It's quite literally Sidequest City.
Now I must know how the rakdos stuff went
Well since trips asked so nicely, I'll first disclaimer that 1. this was one-on-one stuff with the GM, since 2. being Rakdos, it got magical realmy fast.
To start, my character has an amulet that lets him Alter Self basically at-will. Since it's fun side-story stuff, we let the spell have some odd houserulings, including allowing genderswapping. So, knowing the powers of feminine wiles, he's a she for the majority of the story, and the group's Rakdos contact sets them up with a part-time gig, since being a nature-y ranger guy and living in a city don't really mix.
Through dick, unity a miracle coalition of progress between a few guilds, the Rakdos have made a bunch of little intelligent signets that allow the wearer to both know a customer's fetishes, allowing specific catering to them, as well as having the transmuting magicks to allow some of the less vanilla ones to happen. Starts "innocent" enough, amazonian for the one guy here, some foot teasing there, thiccening up for the birthday kiddo who's guardian apparently thinks a Rakdos maid cafe is anywhere for anyone under the age of 21.
Then my character's NPC gf comes in. Now she's shocked at first, she walks in on her genderbent bf getting felt up by a shota, of course she is, but she's long since understood that my character is just really friendly and doesn't quite GET a lot of layman's social customs proud and noble race. We take it back to a private room, kink it out, signet says she's got enough fetishes stored up to make /d/ offer membership forms.
Afterwards, the waiting continues, have a few cameos from game NPCs, use an Orzhov's drunkenly generous tipping to pay for a deadbeat Gateless' bill, both a small fight and small orgy both break out in the restaurant and get calmed down before the place is trashed. After the shift, a lot more kink time, and then we have everyone walk home and call it a sidequest completed.
Lots of fun. 10/10, would do again.
>One on one
Not quite what I was hoping to here. Still a decent story time, just was hoping for ideas involving selling such a task to a full party.
Just have it be an option among all the other things like Orzhov business deals and Gruul Fight Club. Most importantly, make it sound like one of the easier options. "Oh yeah, just pick up a shift at the pizza joint. [contact]'s coworkers just exploded during the show yesterday and we're in a pinch." and then watch 'em run around tables, taking orders, have a few party members in the back still figuring out where the mutagen dressing for the "Simic Salad" is kept. Once they start getting comfortable you can have a bar fight break out and they have to break it up.
Also most important, Rakdos is all about the kinks, so you gotta be able to pile on a lot of suggestive comments. Have the owner bribe them into wearing the most revealing outfits they've got, break out every catcall and pick-up line you know, just in case. Feeling risky, the customers can try to cop some feels, Red Rakdos don't care about inhibitions. Just make sure you actually flatter them every once in a while or else they might start thinking of bailing like a bunch of byetches. Have the Selesyan compliment them on the craftsmanship of their outfit instead of how it draws attention directly to the grundle.
Major form of government is the Azorius Senate, though since they're vying for control with other guilds, it makes things tricky.
The city itself is broken up into districts. Most of the events of the actual sets take place in the tenth, which is on top of a plateau where the major guild headquarters are.
Boros are effectively Roman guards crossed with that loose cannon cop who doesn't play by the rules. They function as both military and police.
Azorius also has Gus says and managed which are more disciplined. They don't have true authority over the boros, and can be thought of as closer to FBI.
Selesnya and Orzhov also do a bit of policing. Selesnya are essentially militia in times of need, while Orzhov are the mafia and prefer to keep order in neighborhoods they control.
Most places in the important distracts can be assumed to be under one guild or another's control, but there's a lot of grey areas where they overlap or there's no real claim.
Crime is mostly the domain of the Gruul (naturalist vandals who tear down buildings), Rakdos (crazy murder carnival), Dimir (spies and info brokers), and Orzhov, again (the Catholic church if it was a front for the mob)
Izzet, Simic, and Golgari are the more neutral guilds, being focused on science and agriguclture, though they do have their leanings.
Typically, you can expect your players to want to be members of a guild, as the more without tend to be screwed a lot. It's a good idea to ensure they're choosing from guilds that don't contradict too much though. A look at the color pie can often identify these though.
An interesting note is that the enemy color guilds often overlap with their shared ally color in terms of who they dislike.
For example, Boros is White/Red, whose shared ally is Green. They heavily dislike Dimir, which is Blue/Black, the enemy colors of green, due to their deceptive and cowardly nature.
Ravnica is a hard setting to get a grasp of. I wouldn't suggest it for your first foray
Selesnya is called out as being a militia in some instances, though they are more focused on protecting their own than busting crimes.
aside from those links other gave you, try this out for some ideas. Took me a while to find this one, but I recall at least a couple more threads like this.
warosu.org