CITY OF A HUNDRED GODS: Part 1/10 City Limits

Jewel at the Foot of the Mountain. The Bridge Over the Great River. City of Many Stairs. Gateway to the Sun and Heavens. The Endless village. The city has nearly as many names as the number of deities to whom its inhabitants pray... and it is this peculiar feature that grants its most familiar name: the City of a Hundred Gods.

Was going to use this as the cover for PARIAH volume 2 then remembered...
...we ripped it off Assassin's Creed...

To outsiders these "gods" are hungry, capricious demons that thrive on that unique misery endemic to urbanised societies... but to those born within sight of the city's incredible walls, they are entities worthy of their devotion. The myriad cults venerating these one hundred deities each work in synergy to make the metropolis greater than the sum of its parts.

So come then, let us explore each district via the "gods" venerated there, starting with the outskirts of the city and of course its walls.

THE UNLUCKY ONES: PARIAH CAMPAIGN, WEEK 30

This is the summary of the 30th week of the PARIAH campaign, covering 8th-13th February.

The previous session report is available at this link:
https://aloneinthelabyrinth.blogspot.com/2021/02/pariah-etau-campaign-session-28-29.html

You can catch up on all the session reports via this link here (all posts tagged "unluckyones"):
https://aloneinthelabyrinth.blogspot.com/search/label/unluckyones

Multiple sessions were put forward with the nature of the session determined by the players present, similar to a "west marches" style campaign. Dates provided are in-game, to help players to coordinate the events of the past few sessions.

The World in a 1d100 "I search the body" table

Once again, a fun challenge has emerged from the OSR discord, this time issued by Sahh: create a 1d00 I search the body and grant flesh to the bones of your world. The first response to this challenge was made not by Sahh but Locheil of Nothic's Eye and it is this post that I shall first link below:

 https://nothicseye.blogspot.com/2021/02/i-loot-body-d100-aclas.html

...but Sahh was quick to remedy the situation and put up her own: 

 https://coloursofpentagrams.blogspot.com/2021/02/world-in-1d100-i-loot-body-table.html

Illustration by Greg Harlin from this cool article: 
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/culture/article/100830-first-feast-science-proceedings-israel-shaman-sorcerer-tortoise

A lot of these are taking from the 48 or so starting items. Half sorry about that.

PARIAH ETAU CAMPAIGN, SESSION 28 & 29:

These events continue from the TWENTY-SEVENTH session. The real world dates were Sunday 31st January and Saturday 6th February 2021 on the Atelier Hwei Discord.  

Players:

- Mister Kent https://twitter.com/MrKentKomiks as Beautiful Other-far-from-the-Lake
- Oisín https://twitter.com/OisinoftheHill playing as Earnestly Wooded
- Semiurge http://archonsmarchon.blogspot.com/ playing as Witheringly Footed at the Point

30th Day of Crow Moon, Last Slither of the Old Moon

Map annotated by https://twitter.com/MrKentKomiks!

The pariahs spent the day resting until sundown, then split the party in two:

• Antelope, Fallen-far-from-the-Wind and Rides the Grove built a large pyre on the edge of the forest, in sight of the temple's main entrance;
• Beautiful Other Far-from-the-Lake, Earnestly Wooded, and Witheringly Footed at the Point waited in cover of darkness by the temple's west entrance, in preparation for their daring raid. 

2 Curse Templates: Doom of the Sleep-flower Smoker | Lycanthropy

CW: SUBSTANCE ABUSE/ ADDICTION and BODY HORROR

In PARIAH, powerful curses are represented by curse templates. Inspired by Emmy Allen’s lateral advancement trackers (particularly wendigo sickness and the wounded daughter) templates provide the opportunity to inflict a doom on a pariah over an extended period rather than removing them from the game immediately—providing the opportunity to remove the curse, or at least having some fun in the attempt.

This is the basis for ghouls in PARIAH:
http://aloneinthelabyrinth.blogspot.com/2020/04/ghouls.html

Each template has triggers which initiate a roll on the affliction table. Each entry reveals one (or more) afflictions: beneficial, baleful or both. Each curse has a point at which the player must surrender their character to the GM, though it is down to the table to establish when that point might be (suggestions are provided). A pariah may suffer multiple curses concurrently.

Curses are thus diseases, a monsters, and a weird mode of lateral character progression (but not necessarily in that order)...

Doom of the Sleep-flower Smoker

Sleepflower by Abigail Lingford

Sleepflower is a powerful entheogen: used without caution it can be lethal... but even cautious shaman may begin walking a path darker than that which leads to the realm of the dead...