Holdings of Lord Tomas (part2)

Upon the Holdings of Lord Tomas one will find two churches dedicated to the Celestial Orthodoxy.
Tomas is not a very religious man and generally only makes token gestures of faith. Despite that he is not very trusting of ancient Olrinian paganism or other Terrestrial faiths. Modern Tahlmyrian law permits no restriction of inoffensive religion but a great many folk still distrust terrestrial practitioners. A number of ancient and mostly disused Terrestrial shrines are present in the wastes near (and even within) the holdings of Lord Tomas. Use of such places would be discouraged by the Baron and his men not to mention the clerics at the church.

There is a church of the Celestial Orthodoxy in operation at the village of West DeAdrippa is subordinate to the Church in Ortossa. The church at West Adrippa is served by Parish Priest Father Olmanda and a number of Celestial brothers as the church serves as a learning annex to the monastery at Tormanto in addition to it's duties to the local parish.
The Church at West DeAdrippa maintains some significance outside the immediate family and holdings as it contains a mausoleum for a small number of entombed knights including the once famous 7th Baron Adrippa who served as a Paladin under the Grand Patriarch Vistandus II of the Celestial Orthodoxy. A great grandmother of Lord Tomas was very religious, becoming a cleric in her dotage and some considerable machinations on her part have served to maintain the importance of the church to this day; she is also responsible for the construction of the larger chapel in the manor castle itself.
Olmanda and the majority of the brothers have left to tend the spirits and bodies of the troops serving at the border with Jolumbria , leaving behind Brother Dollop as acting senior at the church with a pair of oblate brothers and a small number of novices. Some folks consider the friendship between Lord Tomas and Brother Dollop (of the local church) to be curious but they would be ignorant of Dollops military service in his youth and the times the baron and he campaigned together.
The parish church of West Adrippa is most obvious and fairly large for such a rural location. It's bell tower is the tallest point in the village and would be used as a lookout on times of need. The bells of the church ring at dawn, noon, mid-afternoon and sundown if the oblates can be motivated to keep track of the time.
There are a number of smaller support buildings very near or built alongside the church proper. These house the brothers, the novices, a pair of classrooms and a fair sized library for a village church (actually larger then that of the ranking Bishop). The Church was built over a number of years and each era can clearly be seen in the color, size and set of the stones of each section. There are at least five ways into the church and each is normally only open according to some obtuse schedule know to Father Olmanda, since his absence the doors generally remain open or closed until really needed.
Despite the chaos of architecture the Church itself is rather plainly decorated with but a single altar at the front. there are a small number of benched pews towards the front and rear of the main space but most of the parishioners must kneel and stand with no assistance. One decidedly curious feature of the altar is the presiding priest will stand facing the congregation instead of facing away form the congregation while delivering a sermon. There are a number of small stained glass windows in this church praising the lessons of the saints or warning the faithful of sin.
The knightly tombs may be entered from a portal on the inside of the church or through a small bulkhead that is usually locked form outside. The tombs are generally sealed except for certain holy days and may be used as the resting place for a knight for a year after his death but the remains are not kept there with those that are permanently entombed from years before. The tomb entrance to the private Tomb of the 7th baron is the most elaborate and well maintained.
The church is typically a fairly bus place for a parish church due to it's role as a learning annex of the faith but lately it's moderately quite outside of the thrice daily services. One would still only expect to see the place crowded on holy days .
There is a small infirmary at the church that usually tends to a variety of work related injuries or the occasional unfortunate illness. With most of the brothers absent only limited healing is possible within.
One building adjacent to the church maintained by the brothers serves as a small brewery. The beers brewed within are generally reserved for the clerics but are sometimes released on holy days if supplies are large enough to warrant such generosity.
A small entry hall off the west side of the church is used as a makeshift court every fortnight or so by the Baron or his Seneshal to settle minor disputes and keep check on working sof the estate. This is an old tradtion established many years before when the manorial keep was pretty small and the then reignign baron found it bothersome to have the place overcorwded by the residents of the village. It's now considered a friendly gesture by the baron to the commoners.

Pilgrims or very rarely those seeking sanctuary visit the church now and again and recieve lodging within the structure.

The Chapel at the manorial Castle is built in the mid ward facing to the east. It is a stone building standing some 30' high at roofs-peak with a small bell tower off center rising at most 15 feet above the roof of the chapel proper.
There are two entrances to the chapel the first is the rather obvious front doors; The double doors to the chapel are decorated in a painted carving of the procession of Saint Gallant on his life's quest, the paintwork is a little faded as of late and likely to be refreshed soon if the lady of the manor has her way.
The front doors open to reveal a larger foyer and cloak room illuminated by large windows with a massive transom letting illumination into the worship space beyond. The doors leading in from the foyer are decorated with carvings of two visions of paradise from the poem "The Seven Paradises of the Heavens Above", by DeGaunte. There are no pews for there are no pews for the worshippers but one will find a number of leaning bars tat allow one to kneel and rise with relative ease and comfort. The floor of the chapel space is a warm marble with cushioned kneeling bars at the front two rows. Perhaps a 100 could worship here at one time. There are a number of small altars within the chapel one each dedicated to all five of the third generation of saints and a main altar at the fore.
There is a garden beside the chapel with a path decorated with stepping stones bearing the slightly faded carvings of the quotes of Saint Bartholos on the Knightly Virtues. One may enter the Chapel through the bell tower if the two doors are unlocked by the bell keeper. The bell keeper, known as brother Mellot, maintains the bells ringing them on the hour during the day and tends to the chapel garden, being a halfling he is the only non-human to dwell on the grounds of the manorial castle. The room at he foot of the bell tower is a simple one with a small window lighting the chamber before one enter the chapel beyond. There are three short stories in the tower above this chamber each hosting a separate room: the living quarters of brother Mellot a warm sitting room with a tiny but well equipped kitchen and a small bed, above that a workshop and the bell pulls, one finds the three tower bells above that,(Note: despite the form of address Brother Mellot is not a cleric of the celestial faith but he has long been in service at the chapel bell tower)

The chapel is used for most needs of the Family of Lord Tomas , his wife may typically be found there for an hour or so each morning. The family only attends services at the village church on special occasions and specific holy days. The baron will send his scribe to the church library to fetch him a book now and again and may be seen fetching one himself on rare occasion. The village court mentioned above is held every fourteen days or so.

Holdings of Lord Tomas (Introduction and part 1)

The Holdings of Lord Tomas will be a series of entries I hope to post on and off for a fair time to follow. Lord Tomas (also to be frequently mentioned as Sir Tomas) is a noble NPC who was part of an AD&D campaign I dm'd in the late 80's to the mid 90's. His estates and the neighboring territories were the site of many a low to mid level adventure. The posts that follow should be considered a work in progress, a flexible notebook, as I may collect them at some point in the future as part of a larger game work. I hope to cover a wide range of topics that are relevant to the Holdings of Lord Tomas in an enjoyable, informative and gameable fashion. Hopefully the posts that follow will provide hints and details others can work into their own games.

The adventuring party in my campaign at the time first met Lord Tomas lame in bed due to a wound the local clergy could not treat after meeting a clergyman (Brother Dollop) and a page on the imperial highway where it bisected a local road seeking help against a menace that threatened the manor that the wounded Lord Tomas was unable to meet.

Here now is the body of the First of hopefully many entries:

Lord Tomas Adrippa is a Baron and Knight of the Tahlmyrian empire. His holdings in the Old Olrinian March are modest but not insignificant. Three fortifications are present: the manorial castle, a village stronghold and a watchtower all staffed by a small a garrison of troops.
Tomas Adrippa is the 15th Baron in his family line to own these holdings. He is 53 years of age. He has four adult sons, the eldest two have answered a call to duty and are campaigning at the southeast border where goblins, orcs and worse menace the people at the edges of Jolumbria. His third eldest son is serving as seneschal to a doddering uncle of Lord Tomas far to the south near the coast and the youngest of his adult sons is an officer in the Imperial Legions serving to maintain order in the High Vales. His third wife has borne him three children to date, a son now seven years of age soon to be offered as a page to another lord, a daughter of 5 and an infant boy.
He also has two married adult daughters and a few grandchildren.

His nearest neighbors are Andros Adrippa (a distant cousin and one of the reasons we will refer to the holdings as those of Lord Tomas instead of those of Lord Adrippa), The Duchy of Ortossa to the south and the sizable but poorly maintained holdings of the Leifco family to the north (who are more interested in their ancestral holdings far to the south then in the backwater region that the holdings of Lord Tomas are a part of).

The holdings of family of Lord Tomas were once politically significant to the Empire as it fought, defeated and assimilated the Olrinian successor states. Economically the region is of little serious economic value beyond farming and grazing. A fair number of ruins can be found within a couple days march of the holdings of Lord Tomas: ancient Olrinian edifices, ruins from the times of imperial expansion, remnants from the era when the old marches were a booming frontier region of the empire, fortresses and villages that have remained empty since the goblin wars and even recent leavings of those that have moved on to seek fortunes in the new frontiers.

The northern border of holdings of Lord Tomas are marked by a river which is overlooked by a old watch tower (once the family keep a very long time ago), the eastern border is a secondary imperial highway running more or less north to south, the western border is a ridge of hills rising from the forests and the southern border is a half league south of the old west road (now disused except for access within the holding). The neighboring Adrippa lands maintained and owned by his cousin run more or less east to southeast along a new road branching off of the imperial highway and with a total territory three times that of the holdings of Lord Tomas.

Lord Tomas is vassal to no man directly as the family holdings were granted by imperial writ but as an imperial knight is sworn to protect the empire, the emperor and the senate. He has traveled to the imperial seat in his youth to make an oath of imperial duty to then reigning emperor (actually Empress Aribeth III ) but has never been called to make the oath before the current emperor or the senate.
Two vassals of Lord Tomas have holdings that will not generally be accounted for in these writings one holds a small hill fort overlooking the river on the northwest edge of Lord Tomas' holdings and the other maintains a pleasant villa on a lake at the border of the Duchy of Ortossa due to the extent and location of his holdings he has been compelled to swear fealty to the Duke in addition to Lord Tomas.

[Real Life] Having a baby.

In real life my wonderful wife and I are expecting a new baby any day now, within the week actually. This will be my third child and my first with my current wife. It's been a long pregnancy as she has suffered a host of complications including hypertension, gestational diabetes and sciatica; and the woman still claims to love me.

Mutant Berries III

More berries for your Mutant Future campaigns.

Yellow Gloom Berries
The berries grow on small withered black leaved bushes in areas generally devoid of other vegetation. These "glowing" berries don't provide enough light to see by and if eaten will expose the gourmand to an intensity 1d4+4 radiation attack, per berry eaten.
It's not well known but it is the seeds of the yellow gloom berry that retain the radiation.

Gloom Berry Syrup.
About 20 gloom berries must be harvested and carefully skinned. The skins are retained and are boiled in a pot with 2 quarts of saltwater. The liquid should be boiled off until the skins have mostly dissolved and there is not more then 2 cups of liquid left behind. The syrup may be applied to cloth, armor or other surface to resist radiation blasts; any directed radiation attack will be considered 2 intensities lower. the syrup retains it's effects for 1-3 days after application.

Nox Berry
Small black berries with yellow spots that grow on high bushes. These berries produce body wracking purgative effects. Eating one will sicken a human or humanoid for 1d6 turns. If eaten within a turn of a poisoning a new saving throw is allowed against a poison, any damage suffered previously is adjusted to account for the new save. Mutant animals will suffer the effects of a 1d8 intensity poison if they ingest a nox berry.

Floyd Berry
A variety of small oblong berries that grow on low rambling plants. During midsummer a patch of floyd berries will typically have 3d10 ripe berries on any given day.

Purple Floyd Berry
Eating a purple floyd berry will cause one to go blind for 1d6 turns. Otherwise they are nourishing and rather nice tasting.

Purple Floyd Berry Wine
Collecting the juice and skins of 24 purple floyd berries and allowing them to ferment will produce about cup of Purple Floyd Berry Wine. Drinking this wine will blind one for 2d6 turns but afterward they will discover they have precognition (as the mutation) for the next 2-7 hours.

Blue Floyd Berry
Getting the juice of one of these berries on the skin of a human or humanoid will force them to make a save vs poison or be overcome with vivid hallucinations rendering them helpless for 2-7 rounds. If one eats the 2 or more the hallucinations will render one helpless for 2-8 hours. Mutant animals, plants and androids are uneffected.

Lemon Floyd Berry
these bright yellow floyd berries smell of lemons. If 3 or more berries are eaten a save vs poison must be made or the victim will fall into a deep sleep for 2-7 hours and can not be forcefully woken until at least half that time has passed.

Lemon Floyd Berry Dust
If the seeds of 12 Lemon Floyd Berries are collected dried and ground up they will produce a powder that will reverse any soporific condition in but a round. (They wake one up). This will work to reverse ingesting lemon floyd berry itself even if half the sleep time hasn't' passed yet.

Yellow Floyd Berry
These berries are about as bright yellow as the lemon floyd berry but they do not smell like lemon. If one gets the juice on their fingers from a Yellow Floyd Berry they must make a save or be paralyzed for 2-7 turns. Eating the berrys will kill a human or act as random intensity poison vs humanoids and mutant animals.
Yellow Floyd Berry Paste
If 12 or more yellow floyd berries are collected and rendered stewed to a mush, dried, pulverized and then reconstituted they produce Yellow Floyd Berry paste. Each does of this paste will produce a paralytic poison of intensity 11 if injected in a foe by dart or coating a weapon . There is one does produced for each berry over 10 used to create the paste.

Silver Floyd Berry
Are harmless and have no effects on human or mutants. The leaves of the plant carry a contact poison requiring a save to be made if precautions aren't taken by one collecting the berries or expose the victim to a soporific toxin that will force them to collapse into sleep for 2-12 hours.

Silver Floyd Berry Incense
If the leaves of the silver floyd berry plant are carefully collected. Coated in the juice of the plant and allowed to dry and then tightly rolled (the contact poison has no effect once dried) a bundle of such rolled leaves can be burnt for 2-5 turns which will require all insects within 20' to make a save (each round of exposure) or fall asleep for 1-6 turns. Some people complain the smoke gives them headaches other say it calms them slightly but not enough to have considered impact on combat or wakefulness.

possible market values
Yellow Gloom Berries .... 3 lp
Gloom Berry Syrup. .... 20 up

Nox Berrys .... 2 up

Purple Floyd Berry ...... 5 pl
Purple Floyd Berry Wine .. 25 up per glass
Blue Floyd Berry .... 8 lp
Lemon Floyd Berry .... 3 pl
Lemon Floyd Berry Dust .... 9 lp
Yellow Floyd Berry .... 5 up
Yellow Floyd Berry Paste .... 6 up per dose
Silver Floyd Berry Incense ...2 up per roll

Vehicle speeds and Mutant Future.

Recently on the mutant future forum over at goblinoid games forums have been posting vehicle stats that were in line with the vehicles posted in Mutant Future. The top speeds for vehicles is posted in mph. Which isn't the handiest figure for a game where pulse pounding action is resolved in 10 second rounds.

There are 60 rounds per 10 minute turn and as such there are 360 rounds per hour. A mile is 5280 feet long. Divide 5280 by 360 and we get the handy figure of 14.667 ft ; not the handiest measure.

To make the math all a little cleaner later we could crank this up to 5mph increments. That's 73.35 feet and as such for the sake of still easier math I recommend bring this down to a tactical speed of 70ft a round per 5 mph of true speed.

Sounds great but that is damned fast and not easily factored into the rest of the movement rules.

As per the rules an unencumbered humanoid runs 120' a round, that's a real speed of 8.18 mph. Not Olympic greatness in sprinting but certainly enough running speed for long distance hauls.

Vehicle speeds could always be assumed to be "running" speeds of course but a vehicle moving even 5 mph by my math above will be out racing an unencumbered humanoid. For the sake of game reality turning down the per round movement of vehicles could be a safe way to go.

I'm gonna recommend 50ft per 5mph of speed so bottom speed vehicles can occasionally be caught up with by people on mounts. It also works out to handy 10' per mph in a round.
Yes it bends reality but it works for a game.

A vehicle going 50 mph will be covering 500 a round. Much slower then reality but easy to keep track of if we don't worry too much that a round is 10 seconds long. It also lets us pretend that running characters are actually approaching running speeds.

So for quick and dirty math / easy conversions 10 feet a round for each mph, when dealing with vehicles.

Now someone just has to figure out how you keep track of adventurers moving 30' a round compared to a jet roaring along at 560 mph.

Lunchtime Art

Here's a piece I did during lunch today. I was inspired by reading a post over at originaleditionfantasy.

Research

Research, research and more research; not the players or the PCs, me. Doing some research on horses for an article here. Boy oh boy there is sure a lot to read about horses.

I actually started out wanting to do a piece on jousting and was quickly distracted by the role of the horse . I've always felt the horse was given pretty short treatment in most rpgs. It's not a motorcycle that sits there and waits for you. It's a living being with it's own limitations and abilities. Not just an item on an equipment list. Horses should really be treated like an NPC. Horse traits in the 2nd edition AD&D DMG and the Hackmaster GMG actually are the best treatments on the horse as an individual and different living creature I've ever seen in any RPGs. But they leaveme hungry and wanting more information.

Historically horse is a prestige item, a necessity and different breeds and types of horse really have a big impact on what you can use them for. Thankfully my wife used to live on a horse farm so I was able to consult her and talk about horses for a while to give me a better idea of what I was looking for online.

The internet might give us a lot of dubious information but it is also one of the greatest gifts to DMing that ever came along. Now I just have sort through things and dance that line between Sim and Game, realism and fun. Sometimes it all requires a bit of research.