World Bloom: War of the Six Cities

 The World Bloom is a world on a flower which floats on the black seas of infinity. 

You can read about it here: Part 1  Part 2

The Jeweled Throne of Sparkling Khandar is weakened. The Princess Phelice has gone missing, either kidnapped or killed and there are many possible culprits.

Here are the factions that will play a major role in the events to come:

Sparkling Khandar: The technical seat of power for the Bloom, Halar's own city from which he ruled over the nations. More recently, Khandar has been thrown into chaos from a war with the insectoid Scarabi under the earth that was only resolved after the miraculous intervention of Halar giving individuality to the Scarabi and enabling the human Queen Ynnar and Scarabi King Chitin to have children.

Now with a new hybrid humanity coming into being within the royalty, loyalties are questioned, humans and Scarabi still distrust each other even as their cooperation increases. Some Scarabi even want to return to their hive mind.

The conflict is instigated as an apparent assassination or kidnapping attempt has resulted in the Princess Phelice going missing along with her Scarabi tutor, Beadle.

Resources: jewels, giant bug labor, spices, and hallucinogenic orange blossoms

The White Apes of Zhandabar: Ape philosophers with a firm connection to Saint Hamadi who was one of the first disciples of Lord Halar. They are deeply interested in their Monkey Philosophy and are led by the Great Sages who rule through argument and rhetoric, they have a small but mighty army of warrior monks who are devoted to Hamadi.

Resources: printing press, dream-root incense, prayer (more on that later), passage through the jungle

Servants of Seyam: Seyam was the great serpent that dominated the World Bloom. His death at the hands of Halar began a new age for the peoples of the Bloom and an eruption of civilization. Yet, there are some who wish to return to the old ways, to a more primordial age of fang and coil. This secretive group of cultists hide subvert civilization and wield strange mind and body altering magicks.

Resources: Illicit activities, snake venom

Navigators of Infinity: The Navigator Lords of Port Numina command the arcane secrets of sailing the Black Seas of Infinity, the soup of pure potential out of which all reality comes into being and worlds are born. The Navigator Lords are quite mad since madness is required for their profession and their profession has made them wealthy and powerful. They command a great fleet of ships and they also traffic with the Void Sisters who study the mysteries of the Potentia, the stuff the Seas are made of.

Resources: ship passage, Potentia (super powerful resource), Void Weaponry

Shadow Pact: In the deep jungles, the Night Folk who swore to remain in their ancestral homes and protect them from all interlopers came to be known as the Shadow Pact. They are profoundly isolationist, however, they have some fondness for Khandar that has so far respected the jungles for their connection to Halar's birth and Saint Moon Shadow, and they consider the White Apes friends as fellow jungle dwellers but dislike their connection to the civilized world. Ralishta and other factions in civilization besides Khandar see the jungle as an unnecessary hindrance to trade and an untapped resource.

Shadow Pact ride on the giant beasts that call the jungle home, spiders, bats, and raptors, and they are fierce fighters, especially in their home environment.

Resources: passage through the jungle, Kama Trees (powerful fuel source), giant animals

The Burning Barons: Old nobility of the now-defunct Holy Solar Empire who have created great crawling beast machines powered by the beating hearts of the Great Flame Wyrms. They are considered quite vulgar by most other factions and they are maddeningly aware of it. They desperately want to eat up the jungles as fuel. They don't care for Khandar and would rather reign themselves. They hate the Daedalus Concord with a passion although they cannot declare war under Khandar's reign.

The Burning Barons are short kings. Pure bred Day Folk tend to be squat and stout and the Barons are quite inbred.

Resources: beast machines, Wyrm Blood (powerful fuel source), firearms

Daedalus Concord: Saint Daedalus was a machine of unknown origin who accompanied Halar on his journeys. Once Halar's empire flourished, Daedalus took to understanding his own inner workings and continue his function as an Avatar of Hirsu who Strikes the Iron. The Daedalus Concord is an alliance of geniuses of all kinds: artists, inventors, metal crafters. They created beautiful clockwork automata who are prized throughout the Bloom. The Concord is small but mighty and wealthy. They are loyal to Khandar so long as the Jeweled Throne walks in the way of reason yet this faith has been shaken by the chaos within the capital.  They are hated by the Servants of Seyam and the Burning Barons.

Resources: fantastic machines, Blessed Bronze (holy metal), engineers

The Outsiders: Your world burned in fire because you committed the same sins as your ancestors. You are all that is left, the remains of a whole world loaded onto a few hideous living demon vessels who feast on blood and starlight that you take from worlds, leaving them blasted wastelands behind you. Now the World Bloom is in your sights. It could be a new home. It could be supper. The Outsider threat is not widely known but tremors of their approach have reached the Navigators of Infinity.

Resources: Bottled Demons (Fuel and magic)

Enlightened Dreamers of Ghan: Golden masked, purple robed, midnight skinned, the Dreamers have recognized that the world is the dream of Aman and so they seek to dream alongside him. They dwell in secluded monastery cities in the Ghan mountains. Their connection to the world is tenuous and yet they have seen the threat of the Outsiders from afar. They rage against the end of the dream. Their main power is to conjure and command dream creatures and intercede with the gods. They are somewhat loyal to Khandar as Halar's seat, but there is some resentment as they claim that their mountain is holier than Khandar. They consider Ralishta, the Concord, and the Barons as unenlightened. They resent the Shadow Pact as stopping them from making pilgrimages to the site of Halar's birth. The Servants are heretics. They get their Dream-root incense from the Apes.

Resources: dream creatures, gold, prayer, Black Peak Beer

Petal Champions of Aelys: Poet Warriors and Artist Princes of the edenic planes, valleys, and forests of Aelys, Garden of Maia. Saint Maia was the Bride of Halar, Avatar of Belana who Paints the Sunset. Her followers are devotees of beauty and heroism inspired by Halar's heroic rescue of Maiar. They spend as much time fighting as singing, as much time reciting poetry as making love. There are many princesses and princes of Aelys who hold an oligarchical hand over the many peasants who plow their fields. They are the main food suppliers of all the Bloom.

They are loosely loyal to Khandar with a mercenary streak. Khandar is not fond of their deeply unequal society but they rely on their food. The Apes also dislike it but they love that the Champions know how to party. Ralishta has no need for their food through mysterious means. Everyone loves, hates, and wants the Champions.

Resources: food, warriors, wine, entertainment

NPC Factions:

The Houses of Night: The Vatiar or Night Folk who left the jungles created their mercantile houses in cities across the Bloom. They trade in secrets, assassinations, dreams, and subtle magicks of shadow and enchantment.

High Court of Heaven: The gods are not disconnected from the world but rather they interact with the world, sending blessings in exchange for prayers and sacrifices because of the dominion of Halar.

Low Court of Hell: The siblings of the divine who defied Halar and chose to rebel against the new Heavenly order. They took will respond to prayers and sacrifices. This is considered less evil than you might imagine. A lesser propitiation for the Low Court is part of the regular ritual cycle, including a Halloween-like holiday where the ordinary restrictions on the demons are loosened along with the vices they represent. It is nonetheless considered suspect and may cause unrest among the people to call upon the Low Court and the price might be deceptively high. 

The only demon that must never be called upon or propitiated is Vhanu who Squashes the Butterfly. His sins cannot be forgiven. 

This is going to be a part of a play by post faction game, I hope to run over the summer. I don't know if there will be a lot of room, but if you express your interest, I will reach out to you if I need to fill this game out. Let me know which faction appeals to you and why, too, not only because I want to see who wants to play what but because it pleases me and it will help me farm some good ideas about what I should do with these factions.