Let's Create A Nightmare Setting Veeky Forums: Rise Of the Black Sun

You know what? I'm willing to accept that.

This is a good list as well. There's honestly a huge amount of possibilities with all the mysteries in this setting.

Alright Veeky Forums, let's say someone decided to DM with this setting. No real context given about what the adventure will be other than it's a situation where unlikely people will need to work together (so a loyal branded and a rebel could be in the same party). Knowing that you can play as someone from any faction, what type of character do you think you'd make, and how would you play them?

I think I would most definitely make a Culinary. One of the strange artisans who chase insects, beasts and folk of yore that could potentially be tasty. A journeyman hunter from the Dark Lord of the Hunt, left in human form. It would be fun, being a crazy, suicidal chef, I think, constantly wanting to die from insane battles, as a sort of barbarian with cleavers. I'd play them as someone who sees the world as really, really bleak, and finds joy only in cooking, but haphazardly throws himself into the fray with little concern for himself, stressing himself out more to improve his craft, for it is all he clings to.

That could actually be another Win Condition.
>Find and Slay A beast of Yore.
These may include:
>The Banshee
>The Thief King
>The Scrap Monstrosity
>The Plant Goliath
>The Lone Cleric himself
>The Shaper
>It That Rides As One
>Hallow's Bark
>Corpsekeeper King
>The Depthseeker
>Purifiers
>The Monstrous Brigand
Or something of that sort.

Bump.

user who was compiling the stuff into a google doc here.

working on putting relevant information together under headings next.

feel free to suggest edits.

docs.google.com/document/d/14WlvAzOgGdCzG_XytF87LvpruNQx_lUGei--Iun10zg/edit?usp=sharing

Good to see you still around, Document user.

I'd play as a Curator to provide my party with knowledge and (potentially) pre-dark weapons like guns.

> I have been given a title

The Fire Lord is often seen by his (or her, depending how how you interpret a Dark Lord) followers as a parental figure. A stern parental figure, but one that wants to see his followers rise through the ranks, crush their enemies, and achieve greatness through battle, and celebrate by relaxing in his pools of magma. The truly loyal seek to please the Fire Lord in anyway they can, to please their father (or mother). However, this is a double edged sword, as the Fire Lord's temper is notoriously short, and at any moment he can burst, destroying everything in his path, including his followers. This breaks the hearts of his followers, who have tried their best to please him, only to be betrayed and made the subjects of his scorn. Perhaps the branded of the Fire Lord do not have it as bad as others, but their abusive, twisted relationship with their master is one to be pitied.

Oh hey the previous tread was archived

good news

Yep. Someone give it one more vote so it can achieve Epic status.

> how do i vote lol

suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive.html
Just click vote on the thread, son.

Thanks. the deed i done

>my stuff got in

Thanks Docu-user

During the conquering of the planet, not every member of royalty was brave enough to stand against the Dark Lords. In fact, once it became clear that victory was nigh impossible, many nobles became Branded willingly in exchange for continued rule over the lands. In the mountains of the Archaeologist or the city of the Architect, you can still find the family lines of these nobles, managing the slaves, handling tax collection, and always plotting to gain more favor with their Dark Lord.

Alright everyone we have the major factions and general foundation of the world now we need some major locations.

Honestly, I think the unmapped setting kind of works. We're sort of in-between a Post-Apocalyptic Earth and Dark Fantasy World, and the inconsistency brings out a very unique atmosphere, where you have survivalist raiders next to sword-toting knights. Very Dark Tower-ish.

Sure, locations are probably a good place to focus on.

>On the boarders of the Dark Lord of Plants' lands, where the dead line the ground with each step to feed the Lord's children, there is one place surprisingly free from corpses.
>It is a simple forest, full of plants like any other part of the Lord's lands...but the trees all seem to be dead. Dead plants in such numbers are unheard of in this corner of the world.
>This is where the Branded who have particularly offended the Lord of Plants are sent, told that they are free to leave if they can make it to the other side of the woods.
>The banished Branded may at first think they are safe, with no deadly plants to poison, entangle, or feed off of them, but they can not be more wrong.
>Soon, the bark on the trees crack to reveal hungry mouths and soulless eyes.
>The trees grab their victims with long branch arms, and eat the Branded whole, leaving no corpse, absorbing everything into themselves.
>For this is The Walking Ground, home of the Plant Goliath and its children.

I think some interesting landmarks should be in place.

the lords stuff provides pretty good landmarks though

> sprawling city
> dense forest
> underground labyrinth of ruins
> smoldering wastelands, with craters of magma

Other ideas
> a huge observatory
> A mountain, carved out to be a city with both balconies and windows jutting from it, but the entire inside is also city

I agree that the setting should remain largely unmapped but there should be some major landmarks and faction "capitals"

I do agree with you somewhat, since the world should be very vague and mysterious, and the landscape does shift and change, but I don't think there's any harm in having a few known locations to act as landmarks or places of interest that dot the vast uncharted lands.

Who is the best Dark Lord to be branded to and why is it the Dark Lord of Black Waters?

sound like the tangle trees from the Xanth series of books

> this is the only drawing i could find, i always imagined them closer to sea anemones

Throw in that "valley of withering heads" that confused that one guy.

The Black Sea (centered on the Dawn Engine?) and each Lord has their own Island/continent, except the Lord of the Black Sea who lives in an underwater place (which may or may not have an associated island/landmass near it).

Little world building advice for locations: There are really only 2 types of location; "goals" and "paths"
A goal is defined by having something that PCs would want to get from that location, and a path is generally defined by being the area that has to be passed through to get to a goal and also has either some low level obstacle that PCs must overcome to travel through it or have sub-locations that present obstacles that need to be overcome to continue travel (which can vary as much as "some bandits live in the hills here" to "there's a customs checkpoint along this road" all the way up to "to cross this canyon you have to solve a puzzle dungeon that lowers a drawbridge" or "you can only get through htis barrier with one particular spell that is located at [$GOAL]"

Another location worth exploring also counts as one of the Eight Gifts that players might want to hunt down. Going back to a post from the previous thread, the Lord of Cities' castle is somewhere in the world, controlled by ex Branded who use it as a base to perform necromancy experiments. I assume they'd have to move it somewhere the Architect couldn't get to it easily, since the Lords probably want those gifts back.

I have a good idea, I think.
>On the islands between the ever-shifting continents, there are small shacks made of wood from the Old World, that seem to be avoided by every path that is taken by Parting the Dark Sea.
>What travelers seldom know, however, is that these are used as resting spots for couriers that are of utmost importance to the Dark Lords' communications to one another.
>These small shacks look strange in a landscape dotted by storms, darkness and the laughter of the jealous sun on the horizon, but they remain almost entirely untouched.
>This has led to stories and rumors being made of the relic, mentioning that this is the Last Respite. >The only thing to remind anyone of the Old World, and to show those born in the world of the Black Sun what things used to be like.
>These shacks are also used as torture cells for enemy spies, and those beyond refuge, but the twisted couriers with their mutated wings oft rest here.
>Lately, however, they have had metal spires built on these islands, a mystery to even the couriers themselves.
>The Stitchers seem to have taken a liking to the isolated islands in the middle of the Dark Sea, surrounded by constant storms and corpses that wash ashore.
>Skaab messengers are sent like threats, and the Couriers send messages back in the form of hellfire and brimstone from the sky.
>A sort of border skirmish between two almost unrelated groups has become sport at this point, to where the Couriers enjoy this back-and-forth so much, that they no longer tell their lords about it anymore.
>It's something to look at in a long passage while you're pulling a cart as a slave. The Branded seldom complain about it.

Do we want to expand on the Humble 67?

If you have ideas, go right ahead and suggest them, but right now I think they're a decent enough mini-faction.
>Hide knowledge instead of sharing it.
>Monks of the setting
>Recruit children and raise them into warriors
>Who knows if there are actually always 67 of them or if it's a Crazy 88 situation?

>Winged mail men monsters that fight zombies
I like it a lot.

>In a whistling chasm that is far to the north, the cracks in the fault line supposedly reach to the core of the planet.
>If that wasn't enough, the chasm's rock seems to creak and groan in pain when it crumbles or shifts in any way.
>The chasm is long, steep, and extremely narrow, essentially a large crack on the face of the planet, the harsh rays of the Black Sun unshielded by clouds.
>Supposedly, The Banshee resides in these parts, screeching along the winds and groaning alongside the rock.
>What makes this chasm so well known to revolutionaries, is that it leads to the supposed secret base of the Children of the Dawn Machine.
>In addition, it is the only land bridge available that crosses to the north pole, and that connects the eastern continent to the western, when Parting the Black Sea is not an option
>Nomads and travelers seek refuge frequently here, and the walls are filled with camps suspended from cracks, staring at travelers with the mysterious Unbranded mutants.
>The Voidnarrow is a beast of a terrain to cross, but there are known paths that guides or Marrows are more than willing to risk their lives for, if it gets their rocks off.

I like to think that the masters and original monks are called the Humble 67, so while there are always willing students, the long-living masters will forever remain as 67.

I know there are a few people looking at it already, but the setting info is mostly sorted on this google doc.

Feel free to comment and suggest things on it

docs.google.com/document/d/14WlvAzOgGdCzG_XytF87LvpruNQx_lUGei--Iun10zg/edit?usp=sharing

>Deep below the deadly waves, at the bottom of the sea, live the gilled people.
>They were a race of people shrouded in mystery even before the Black Sun came, but now, with knowledge so limited, many believe them to only be myths.
>But they are real, and so are their sunken cities.
>These cities sank to the bottom of the sea during the War Against the Abstracts, and became makeshift homes for the, at the time, waring hunter-gather societies of the gilled people.
>Over time, as the gilled people united under one rule, and gained a desire to become civilized like the land walkers they learned about through the information trapped in the sunken cities.
>They learned to love these sunken cities as if they were always their own. Symbols of their growing society and civilized nature, laughing as the War above continued while peace had finally come for the sea folk.
>But once the darkness came alive, and the gilled folk's bodies were corrupted, so too did the sunken cities begin to rapidly decay into hives for mutated sea beasts and poison ocean moss.
>They are now places of scum and villainy, where the gilled folk who refuse to join the Dark Lord of Black Seas struggle to survive against sea monsters and their own tainted kind.
>For some reason, the Dark Lord does not touch the sunken cities. He offers to rule over them and establish order, but he will not outright attack unless provoked.
>Perhaps the old world secrets hidden within them hold too much sentimental value for The Dark Lord to risk destroying.

>What know you, of Hallow's Bark?
>We all heard 'a Ol' Nic's prophecings, course. Where th' Nine-of-Eight be a-birthin'. Where th' Endbringer will sing a bring this tarnation to a black-hearted end.
>Might you've heard them masked librarians say that the ol' H.B. is a fairy's tale, told to th' young 'uns and th' simple. Might be some who say it's a state 'a mind, that th' Ninth will come from within' Man's own soul.
>Horseshit, I says. I'd seen it wit' my own eyes.
>A'course, ain't got no eyes anymore. Hee hee. I was lucky enough to take 'em from my skull 'fore the Dragon could take me. He's mite protective of his charge, y'see. Can't abide a stranger carryin' away too many secrets.
>But this l'il thing I kept. Seek the Town at World's End. Th' Barkeep will point ye rightly next.
>Now leave me, 'fore th' drink wears thin.

I see you have a section for History on here. Maybe you can try to break down the elements of the timeline we do know about. It's not much, but we at least have three distinct time periods so far.

>The War against The Ancients
>The War against the Dark Lords
>The Rule of the Dark Lords

Gifts of the Dark Lords could be last purified things in existance. Little shards of hope. Assasination night purified them and now they absent black sun taint. They now have reverse properties.
Flower is last beatyfull thing and plant grow normaly around it.
Last water is infinite source and slowly dripping clean water out of it.
Castle is last heaven. Completely safe location protected from any danger.
Pup is last friend. Vigilant and loyal.

Bag of bugs becomes a bag of... good bugs?

>Thundermen recruits often make the dangerous journey from the South Pole to the North in order to find potential recruits for their Silent South expedition.
>Some nomads and travelers, strong enough to brave the journey and determined enough to escape from the Dark Lords, agree to go with the Thundermen instead of going inside the cavern.
>Unbeknownst the the Thundermen, these recruitments are actually saving potential victims of the Dawn Machine's enslaving powers from a life of mindless praise and servitude

I dont think they were meant to be corrupted in the first place. they were gifts being used to gain favour.

Besides for being excellent spies, a purified bag of bugs might also lead to more purification in the future. The vermin, instead of spreading more filth, feed off of corruption, purifying things by eating the corruption off of them.

Some say they could even eat the mutations off of people and return them to normal.

>The flower was coming out of a dead person's mouth
>The gold was covered in blood
>The bag of bugs was a bag of bugs
They may not have been intentionally made to corrupt anyone, but a lot of the gifts had corrupt origins. I can dig the idea of Assassination Night's sheer badassary being enough to clean up some of the lingering evil from the gifts.

fair

I love stories or dialogues in this setting. Really helps give things flavor.

And if you collect all the gifts together you will get... A nice place to live. Nothing more. With shelter, food, water, company, protection etc, but it will be just one place in fucked up world.

Another interpretation is that none of the gifts can be used simultaneously. Since they're all a part of the Dark Lords, each of them are repelled by one another. Water will turn stale. The pup will disappear into the night. The castle's keys will vanish, etc.

I've been thinking about how to have a campaign focused on finding the gifts and how that can help defeat the Black Sun, and what you're suggesting, for as small as it is, is the ace in the hole I'm considering.
>Find all the gifts, and bring them all together.
>...
>Nothing happens.
>You have really nice stuff but it doesn't really do anything magical or wonderful. It's just some nice stuff.
>But that purified water saves many people from being forced to drink poisonous liquids.
>And the plants you grow feed hungry refugees.
>And the flame sword scares off the beasts that go bump in the day.
>And the bugs help cure people of corrupting mutations.
>And the castle is large enough to keep many families safe.
>And the gold helps buy people weapons and gear to defend themselves with
>And the globe allows you to see how the world is changing and learn how the planet works
>And the dog not only defends the castle, but is beloved by the children
>By collecting all these gifts and creating a home for so many people, you've inspired more hope in a single few years than has been seen in generations
>You have the chance to start a new kingdom, one that Ezra and Marisol would have been proud of, one that through hope, just might save the world.

It would be a dickish thing for the Dark Lords to do, but I can see that happening.

>"Just in case those two choose a different Lord to follow, I'll make sure my gift doesn't even work if they try to use anyone else's"

This seems too happy to me for some reason, you know? I don't think there should BE a happy ending. Like Call of Cthulhu, it should end with a big, dark question mark, with only a few questions answered.

I agree, it is super happy, to a cheesy degree. But I think that it could be a unique way for the players to interpret and try to handle the gifts. It's not like having them all together instantly makes things better, the world is still a terrible place. But all the players can do is try to make the best out of it, and in that regards, using the gifts for good could be a way to gain a sense of greater victory.

>We are The Walkers Three
>We Herald the Final End
>With our thirty-four thousand tongues, we shall sing the song to end all songs, the Song Of Ruin, and we shall blight the lands forevermore
>We shall burn the world to cinders with our great wings of blackest fire
>We shall pave the way for HIS coming
>With HIS coming, there shall be no more light

I am going to bed and wont be able to update the Doc until late tomorrow night if at all.

try to keep the thread alive until then

Can do user. But I might be going to sleep myself, so we'll see what happens.

>The Lord of Black Waters is often seen as an infuriating Lord by others for his random and chaotic storms, his high prices for safe travels, and his general lack of co-operation with other Lords.
>It seems like the Dark Waters Lord would be content sitting at the bottom of the sea doing nothing of value
>Yet some say that this Lord does have operations on the surface, they are just kept very quiet.
>Some say they see gilled men, branded in service of the Black Waters Lord, sneaking into the deep caverns and mountains, searching for something.
>Confronting these gilled men proves to be treacherous, as they are armed with the acidic waters as a weapon, controlling it with dark magic.
>Some believe that these gilled men are searching for the Dawn Machine, attempting to use their waters to flood it out and extinguish it before it can become too powerful
>Yet as more gilled men are spotted, it seems they have yet to succeed.

>In fact, many a time the followers of the Dawn Machine and the gilled men in service to the Black Water Lord can be found clashing, blades of clockwork and solar energy against the dark water that the gilled men manipulate through their magic.
> These battles are usually fought within the deep caverns and mountains, but the flashes and flares of dark magic and solar power are easy to spot.

These battle infuriate the Mountain Lord, as they often are held in his territories, leaving his caverns and mines in complete disarray. But since the Waters Lord is so hard to reason with, and the Dawn Machine cannot be found, there is little he can do other than try using his Branded to kill off whichever side survives the skirmish when he can as revenge.

Someone in previous thread mentioned Artifacts of the Abstracts. Got ideas?

>Much like the Abstracts themselves, the Artifacts of the Abstracts are broken, destroyed, mere shells of what they once were.
>However, they still contain great power for those who know how to unlock these half-broken puzzle boxes
>Each artifact is different in its own way, designed with a different power in mind, but all seem to have a key ability to alter reality.
>One artifact may freeze time
>Another may rewrite someone's memories of the past
>If their powers are used too much, the artifacts will turn to dust.
>However, a smart user may choose to only open the artifacts slightly, using their energy to better reinforce their protective armors so they may have an easier time resisting the Black Sun's rays

>A blade of pure crystallized Hope, laughter given form, sealed within an ancient tomb buried deep in the depths of the earth.
>A book holding all the names of the Dead Abstracts, and the old rites once performed in their name, bound in dark leather and kept hidden from the world, in a place outside normal reality.
>A great machine which holds a deep power, one which still animates the great mass to this day.
Some ideas before I go to sleep.

But its just a small place. Soon black water consume the land and all that is left will be your castle. Forever.

Early in the original thread, it was mentioned that the massive corpses of the Abstracts still leaked their essence as a source of power.

We could give some of those Abstracts identities like we did for the Dark Lords. But only a couple, as it seems the Abstracts have fallen into myth at best, if not altogether forgotten. Maybe only a name and some vague hint at their purpose in the world before the light inverted came to be.

If the Unbranded have the Dark Lords to curse, wouldn't they might have some obscure deity to pray to for salvation? A rumor, some seemingly made-up name, a battlecry, but something more than just blind faith that opposes the dark ones? A chance, however slight, of receiving power to oppose the Black Sun? If reality is Hell, shouldn't there be Hope of a Heaven to escape to? Even if Hope is the most damning gift of all, wouldn't it be better than simply surrendering?

Are you saying that the sequel setting is a high seas adventure following survivors on an ocean castle battling sea monsters?

There are still worshipers of the Abstracts, they just need to go into hiding as their worship is now considered illegal. The Mystics, basically traveling super priests, are collecting Abstract energy scraps in order to build them up and either use them to fight the Dark Lords, or maybe even try resurrecting an Abstract.

Does the Black sun cover entire planet? Is there darkside of the planet with unspeakable horrors and ancient cities long lost in annals of history and time?

>Howdy, stranger! I see you've an eye for my wares. Might be you see a piece for that there belt?
>Oh, this ol' thing? Heh, I see you've got an eye for quality, sir.
>No, it ain't no mundy razor at all, nosir. You can smell it, can't you? The blood of the Powers That Were?
>That it is, sir, that it is. Meat-steel carved out from Mount Juno in yonder north, where the Sky-King fell. A piece of God himself, stuck on this hilt.
>Them Machinists found it, hammered the marrow-bone of lightning into a shape most pleasing. Might be they hoped to make iron what can wound the Sunners in the service of the Lords. Whatever they did, they got that piece o' god into this thing here.
>You feel it, don't you? Power from times back when? Before the Sun, when the Lords Above still walked? You feel that bit o' God in this, doncha? I'm guessin' you'd be wanting that for whatever questing you're on right now.
>How'd I get it? Heh, well, don't you be worrying your head off on that. Just know, for but a hand 'o silver, this piece of God right here? It's all yours.

54469603
>If your fantasy setting is so generic grimderp shit that it bears similarities to low-hanging fruit fa/tg/uy grimderp porn, you're better off not publishing it.
if you don't like grimdark settings, what are you doing in these threads?

There is a tale about a group of uncorrupted artificers that escaped in a spacefaring vessel during the early wars. They hide to this day in the very shadow of their homeworld. They investigate changeling materials, able to resist corrupting entropy of the Black Sun. With enough of those, they will be able to eclipse the Sun permanently.

Bump, also is there an archive for this thread? I'm interested in running a campaign in this setting.

There's an archive for the first thread, and a more organized document. I'll give you the links.

suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive.html

docs.google.com/document/d/14WlvAzOgGdCzG_XytF87LvpruNQx_lUGei--Iun10zg/edit#heading=h.l8yjw13zvvpu

Make sure to share how the campaign goes!

>The Mystics
Weren't the Mourners the last worshipers of the abstracts?

>Identities
If we do give the Abstracts some domains, they shouldn't be standard things like fire or water or anything. They were called abstracts, that sort of implies they were gods of abstract concepts.

Shit, you're right. The Mourners, not the Mystics.

What are some good strategies that rebels are able to use to fight against the Dark Gods without taking them head on?

A few I've thought of

>Killing a black mage while he's Parting the Black Sea, drowning the entire slave caravan and destroying a Dark Lord's supply route
>Manipulating the not!Tarot card readings of black mages so they predict outcomes that hurt enemy moral
>Using predicted eclipses to their full advantage, stealing key information or supplies while Branded are crazy and distracted

>The Abstracts had names, but few remember the names of these great deities who once held sway over the world
>Most of the what is currently known about the Abstracts is uncovered through ancient texts and tomes, and from what the Mourners care to reveal.

>What names can be found in the texts are often missing letters and key markings, making the true names of the Abstract lost forever.
>Xc'__fe-da__m, or Ve___a_ae, and the like
>As such, when a specific abstract is mentioned, they are either referred to by the concept they were most associated with (joy, accomplishment, discipline,) or through the jumbled mess of sounds left from whatever their true names were.

Christ, this place makes Athas look like Disneyland.

Something I like about this setting is its flow of time. It's not a dumb as the dark souls flow of time stuff. The Black Sun never sets or moves, and it's corrupting influence has so warped reality that you have space stations orbiting an earth where low-tech humans exist alongside higher tech people. And it's not a matter of one Advanced or the other degenerated, but that's just how reality is.

And how the world is constantly shifting. The only stability in geography provided by hellish dark lords.

I really wanna run games in this setting, be they wargames, skirmish, or rpgs. I might turn my hand to some short fiction in this setting to.

Excellent job everyone so far.

Oh dude, if you want to write some fiction for the setting, go right ahead. We already have the Eight Gifts storyline, and now that's a big chunk of the lore, you could bring in some sweet stuff.

What factions would be in a Black Sun war game? You'd have dark lord armies for sure, but lore wise the resistance groups are pretty small. Still, I'd love to see a painted army of Thundermen.

>it is said that if one follows the Black Sun into the west they will eventually come to The Fleshmire.
>a sight of many battles in the Days of the Old Sun, the Black Sun's corrupting rays have turned it into a waste of flesh, blood, and jagged bone. Unspeakable horrors are said to haunt it's bloody runs.
>consequently, this is also one of the best places to obtain quality world-flesh for making of protection against the Black Sun.

It definitely wouldn't be on the level of the Eight Gifts lore. Low level stuff: I was thinking about a story where a wanderer crosses into what he thinks is a safe place where the sun doesn't shine but is actually the dominion of a high level branded of the Mountain Lord.

I think skirmish level games would work the best. Advanced Song of Blades and Heroes I think would allow the flexibility needed. As for models...bit at a loss. Humans are easy, but it would be hard to find suitable minis to represent the horrors of the Black Sun.

>Harvesting from the Fleshmire is a dangerous task, but not just because of the horrors that haunt the land.
>For you see, the Dark Lords know that world-flesh resists the Black Sun's rays. It is not something that interests them, as they and their Branded have little to fear (well, the Branded have plenty to fear from the Black Sun, but to a lesser degree as they would if they were unbranded)
>The Dark Lords know, however, that rebels need the world-flesh, and take great joy in crushing rebellion where they can.
>When traveling the Fleshmire, be ever vigilant. For its not just monsters you need to look out for, but traveling war bands, hidden traps, and creatures trained to sniff out the blood of the untainted.

>the Fleshmire is still hotly contested ground between the Dark Lords to this day, and a simmering cold war has been brewing for access to the valuable world-flesh.
>cruel taskmasters dominate the newly branded of the Dark Lords at the harvest sights. Blessed by their masters and the Black Sun, they have given themselves entirely over to soulless productivity and blood-curdling tortures to ensure it.
>rebels have lately been sighted in the Fleshmire, picking at the outskirts for world-flesh. Nothing is invisible to the Lord of the Thousand Eyes, and the Lord of Hounds is quick to send his wolves to prevent interlopers from utilizing the Fleshmire.

Little stuff can go a long way all the same, go right ahead if you have the time.

As I'm more on the RPG side of table top than the wargaming side, I'm probably not the best guy to suggest advice, but Warhammer daemons and cultists might be a decent enough start for the corrupted factions.

Dude perfect I love that.

I've also considered Warhammer 3rd edition. Lots of freedom In army creation and a freakin SWEET mutations table in the main book.

Well shit. These two ideas kinda contradict each other, but I love the idea of a Dark Lord cold war. More opportunity for stories. Rebels would jump on the opportunity to harvest world-flesh for themselves, so really it could be an all out rush between the Lords and the rebels to get whatever flesh they can.

I don't see a contradiction. Maybe the Dark lords harvest the world-flesh to keep it from being used by rebels.

Eh, you're right, that works.

>some of the most useful world-flesh is that which lies beneath the pools of the Fleshmire.
>Corrupted water and blood mix to create a slimy red ichor that only those Gilled Ones branded by the Lord of Black Waters can access.
>why the Dark Lord sends his agents to collect this red world-flesh is unknown.

>"Come, step into my parlour," said the dark mage, waving the lumbering Branded task master into the building.
>He was a mid ranking Branded, but one of ever growing fame, in charge of the slaves on the outskirts of the Architect's sprawling city, creating homes for their ever growing society.
>"Tell me my fortune, wizard" said the Branded. "I must know if I am to receive the Dark Lord's favor. I must know if there is a future for me beyond whipping slaves to stack bricks faster."
>The mage softly chuckled. "Then you came to the right place, let me see what the Black Sun thinks." He took out his cards, shuffled his deck.
>The Branded looked at the mage's hands as they moved over the cards. He never believed in the cards before, but at this point he was willing to take whatever confidence he could get.
>The Dark Mage drew a card. The City.
>"Yes," said the Branded, "the City! That must be a lucky card! That must mean I am promoted, right?"
>The Dark Mage frowned.
>"This card is faced down."
>"So?"
>"You must run. The people you command, the people you serve under, they will destroy you. There is no safety in community for you, you must leave the City now, before it is too late."
>The Branded's heart sank.
>"No...no...I must...I must tend to my things..."
>The Branded ran out of the building, too panicked to question anything.
>The Dark Mage laughed, and began to pen a letter.
>'It is done. Your rival will be out of the city within the week. I expect the next half of my payment.'

>The Dark Lords tremble when the Blood Moon rises, and rebels dance in fire's light.