Got to it later than expected, as I checked over and responded to ArberDarber's sheet first, but I've sent you my evaluation webba.

Really wish I'd have gotten this stuff done sooner, but I'm just too busy and distracted this week. More Aedenshire background info will be posted over the course of the next half-hour or so. I'm on the OpenRPG Dev II server now, but I'll have to exit and reset my computer soon before returning to the game-server.

EXPANDED DETAILS ON AEDENSHIRE

Aedenshire is currently divided into 14 major territories. One is the Iron Crescent of dwarven kingdoms, largely underground but also encompassing several hills and mountains. Another is the elven Frostdale Collective in the northern highlands of Aeden's Valley, spanning a few temperate forests and some hill-country. The Collective is comprised of several small, secretive elven communities, but they do supply aid to the Wardens and several of the elven clans send warriors to join the Wardens. The Collective also trades with some allies in Aedenshire. The third territory of Aedenshire is the Aglinar Clanhold, encompassing highland moors, forests, swamps, and fields in western Aedenshire where several clans of Aglinar barbarians reside. These clans cling to the old ways of their people, living warlike and opportunistic lives as raiders and pirates, going viking along the rivers of Aeden's Valley each summer. They trade little and are antagonistic towards most other folk of the Valley, but are nonetheless obliged to send warriors to join the Wardens of Aedenshire due to old treaties and blood-oaths.

The fourth territory of Aedenshire is the gnomish and halfling Freeholders' Federation, a collection of small freeholds along the northeastern hills. Largely agricultural and trade-oriented, they contribute little to the Wardens other than basic supplies and a small number of warriors. The fifth territory is the Green Hills Alliance, several human and halfbreed townships across the eastern and southeastern hills. Slightly more warlike than the smaller folk of the northeast, they still live mostly as farmers, herders, and miners, but the Green Hills Alliance has a much more solid militia. A sixth territory of Aedenshire is the High Kingdom in southern Aedenshire, a sprawling kingdom currently ruled by High King Darius Sabrenault, and it retains some obvious Rexian influences in its culture, architecture, and governance, though Darius appears to prefer being his own lord and master, as his forces continue to fight their former Rexian overlords and contribute to the Wardens in Southfort.

The seventh major territory of Aedenshire is the Obsidian Coalition, a gathering of Southlander tribes long exiled from the Sunset Kingdoms. Dark of skin and hair like their ancestors, the humans of the Obsidian Coalition live simple but honorable lives within their territory, the plains and forests of central Aedenshire. Their warrior traditions are strong and they have supported the rebellion against Rexia from the very beginning, with a large force of infantry, cavalry, and witches skilled in battle magic and healing magic. The eighth territory of Aedenshire is the Dellmont Barony of north-central Aedenshire, a small but strong realm currently ruled by Baron Harris Dellmont. The ninth territory is the Vale Kingdom along the lowlands and riverbanks of east-central Aedenshire, ruled by King Sedgewick Vale, supposedly a distant descendent of the first king to sign the original Wardens' Accord centuries ago. His kingdom contributes much aid to the new Wardens of Aedenshire, but only because of its prosperity and relative safety far from the frontlines.

The twelth territory is the Graves Compact in the moors of southwest Aedenshire, a small country ruled by necromancers and undead. They contribute rarely to the Valley's defense, but those contributions are often quite effective at stemming the tide of Rexian invasion. Nobody but the Compact is comfortable, however, with how they pillage the battlefields of Aedenshire for every corpse they can find. Few can stand up to the necromancers when they show up, however, especially in the dead of night. The thirteenth territory of the Valley is the Western Alliance, several small and independent countries in west-central Aedenshire who have only a vague military alliance. Their populace is very mixed but primarily human. The last territory in Aedenshire is the northwestern mountain and hill country of Harrowford, inhabited by various nonhumans who make little contact with the rest of Aedenshire beyond sending some of their kind to join the Wardens and fight for continued fredom in the Valley.

The dwarves of the Iron Crescent command much of the mountains around the southern end of Aeden's Valley. The Iron Crescent is an alliance of twelve dwarven kings and their respective delves, each of which is an independent city-state: the Deepford Delve along an underground river just west of Southfort, the Ironfist Delve around a major iron mine east of Southfort, the Greylake Delve around an underground lake northwest of Deepford Delve, the Blackhammer Delve just south of Westfort, the Goldpick Delve northwest of Westfort, the Truesilver Delve northeast of Westfort, the Starforge Delve southeast of Eastfort, the Felldeep Delve far beneath Starforge Delve, the Rumshield Delve south of Eastfort, the Torwatch Delve just east of Eastfort, the Stonebreaker Delve just south of Starforge Delve, and the Highmont Delve within Mount Cloudraker northeast of Eastfort. The dwarves largely keep to themselves, but do guard some mountain passes and sell arms to other folk in Aedenshire. A few join the Wardens or work in human or gnome communities, but not many.

Further campaign setting-info will have to wait, I was too busy and didn't get around to typing up what I had in mind.

Since the OpenRPG Dev II server looks to be offline at the moment (given that it's not showing up in my Browse Servers window), we'll try the OpenRPG Veav I server as a temporary alternative today. If some of us have trouble staying connected there, then I'll just start up a Wardens of Aedenshire temporary server.

Edit: Looks like some are having trouble staying connected, so I'll open the WoA temporary server in a few minutes for us.

maybe create a post containing combat rules and applicable modifiers on actions when using vehicles/war-machines/airships, including crew actions for each?

Setting-info update will have to wait a few more days, darnit. But I will post some notes on my rules interpretations and the minor houserules for how certain items work in this campaign, as soon as I have the time after today's session.

RULE CLARIFICATIONS AND HOUSERULES

War-Golems function essentially as extensions of the pilots' bodies, like a suit of armor. Generally, anything that your character could do outside of a War-Golem, he or she can still do while piloting a War-Golem; it is not considered a vehicle nor a creature, just an oversized suit of armor. The Drive and Pilot skills are only used for certain maneuvers in War-Golems. Regular armor and weapon proficiencies do not apply with War-Golems, but instead the War-Golem Operation (Mecha Operation) and War-Golem Weapon Proficiency (Mecha Weapon Proficiency) feats negate nonproficiency penalties and restrictions with a War-Golem.

The War-Golem takes damage in your place so long as you are inside the cockpit and it has enough hit points; once the War-Golem's HP is reduced to 0, the War-Golem is nonfunctional and any remaining damage is dealt to you. A War-Golem with 0 HP provides no benefits for the occupants until repaired. Note that War-Golems take damage as objects, so most energy attacks are less effective against them than against living creatures. Also, War-Golems provide an equipment bonus to Defense, incur armor penalties to certain skills, and in some cases reduce the pilot's speed, just like regular armor, and these qualities do not stack with those of any regular armor worn inside the War-Golem's cockpit (only the highest Defense bonus, armor penalty, and speed reduction apply).

Vehicles and Airships use their driver's or pilot's Defense bonuses and saving throw modifiers, but with the vehicle's or Airship's own size modifier factored into Defense instead of the driver's or pilot's size. Airships do not benefit from a pilot's Dexterity bonus to Defense unless the pilot chooses to give up that bonus for themselves in any given round (only a concern when the ship is breached and boarded by hostiles, of course). A vehicle or Airship uses its gunner's attack bonuses and related feats or talents, such as Point Blank Shot or Precise Shot, but vehicles and Airships do not use any range adjustments or other feats and talents of the gunner or driver; vehicles and Airships cannot benefit from feats such as Elusive Target, Far Shot, or Power Attack, nor from talents such as Melee Smash or Increased Speed. Airships use their own size modifier on attack rolls instead of the gunner's size modifier, and Airships typically have a targeting system that grants a bonus on attack rolls with the Airship's weapons.

The Airship Operation feat (Starship Operation) prevents certain penalties for piloting an Airship; for instance, the pilot only applies half of his or her class Defense bonus to the Airship if lacking that feat. Likewise, the Airship Gunnery feat (Starship Gunnery) prevents nonproficiency penalties with Airship weapons; such weapons are not governed by normal proficiency feats and are not treated as firearms. Since Airships operate in an atmosphere, their weapons have a maximum range just like any other ranged weapon (10 range increments). Airship missiles have a maximum range of 5,000 feet. In this game, fusion mines deal 2d100 damage instead of 5d100, while gravitic mines deal 4d100 damage instead of 10d100.

Starships are unavailable in this game, although Airships function almost identically. Airships are not as massive as starships and cannot fly more than a few thousand or a few tens of thousands of feet above sea level, depending on their engines. Only Airships of the Ultralight type are available in this game. Airship speeds, ranges, and spaces are only one-tenth those of starships. So instead of using 500-foot combat spaces, they occupy one or more 50-foot combat spaces, and instead of making a 500-foot adjustment, they make 50-foot adjustments. Airships do not have a cruising speed, so they only operate at tactical speeds. Airships use the optional critical hit results listed for starships in d20 Future, but any result of "artificial gravity disabled" is instead "life support disabled," which means the Airship loses its internal safeguards, losing its internal pressurization and comfortable atmosphere. Occupants will begin to feel the effects of the natural temperature, oxygen level, and air pressure of the ship's current elevation. The ship will no longer be airtight after such a critical hit, until sufficiently repaired. Starship engine types that would not function in an atmosphere do, in fact, function within an atmosphere on Airships.

Note that stealth screens, cloaking screens, and similar arcanotech devices can be overcome by spells and magical effects such as See Invisibility, Glitterdust, or True Seeing. Similarly, a Class VI Sensor Array or better for Airships can detect cloaked, stealthed, or invisible subjects. Zero-point energy devices or their equivalent do not exist in this game.

Storm-Elemental Rifles (Gauss Rifles in d20 Future Tech) will affect Golembound (cyborgs), Airships, and other vehicles or electronics the same as they affect Emulant Golems (robots), dealing double damage and forcing a Fortitude save against temporary shutdown. However, a shutdown for an Airship or vehicle is localized to just one system component (any one random weapon, defense system, repair system, sensor system, communications system, utility system, engine, or life support). A shutdown for Golembound simply deactivates one random graft/implant temporarily, excluding structural features that don't require any power. Damage from Storm-Elemental Rifles ignores armor, as noted in its description, so any damage they deal is dealt directly to a pilot or passenger (randomly chosen) when striking a War-Golem (ignoring the War-Golem's hardness), but Airships and other vehicles take the damage normally. I may revise this ruling later if it turns out to be too problematic, but this is my interpretation of the Gauss Rifle rules description.

I will update this post later when I get the time.

Sorry folks, but we won't be playing tonight. I have to go out with family for an hour or two, and have to get ready to go now.

We'll resume the Wardens of Aedenshire game next week. Sorry for the short notice! I wasn't sure if we were going or not, or what time, until a little earlier today.

I'll post some setting-related updates sometime tonight.

Update will have to wait until Monday it seems. I had a headache yesterday that just got worse while I was out with my family, so I spent a lot of time resting and waiting for the headache to go away.

not sure if i'll be late or even show up tomorrow...i think ark has a node with the airship stats but it's basically roll a d20 5 times and 20s hit.

Hope to see you all this weekend for the game! mjrbatou, we'll start without you if we have to, but I hope to see ya there whenever you can make it. I'll try to get us through the party's first major battle and onward to some RP and maybe another skirmish in this week's session. Maybe we won't get that far yet, but things will speed up as we get used to the system and more familiar with what each character can do.

This is much later in the week than expected, but oh well, I'm easily distracted. Here's the latest setting update. One or two more, regarding arcanotech and stuff, will be posted sometime in the next few weeks as I get around to it. And a map as soon as I stop forgetting/slacking off on that front.

REXIAN DOMINION OVERVIEW:

The Rexian Dominion is a human-dominated empire originating in the Southlands of Teles, and still dominant over roughly half of the Southlands. At its height, the Dominion spanned most of the Southlands and a third of the Northlands, with Aeden's Valley the lynchpin holding the northern and southern Domains together as one nation. Since Aeden's Valley erupted into rebellion and instigated the Rexian Civil War, however, the Domain of Aedenshire broke off and splintered into old territories held by the ancient factions of that region, while other Domains began to break off and claim their freedom, either returning to old nationalities and traditions or forging new, more-chaotic states. Although the Rexian Civil War has continued for 10 years now, the core of Rexia remains strong and resolute in its attitude of manifest destiny and continental conquest.

Founded almost 230 years ago, in Year 1 of the Rexian Record, the Dominion is only the latest powerhouse to arise from the ancient land of Rexia. The humans of Rexia have a legend that says their people arrived in the center of the Southlands after departing an ancestral homeland in the sky, the floating continent of Rexium. Said to have once drifted among the clouds, under the grace of the Rexian pantheon, Rexium is believed to have been destroyed by a war among the gods, with the gods' favored children, the Rexian humans, sent down to the earthly realm so they would escape the Divine War. Rexians still believe that Tyrus Rex and Domi Rex, their patron god and goddess, watch over and guide them to glory. Dozens of other deities are worshipped as part of the Rexian pantheon, but all are considered less important than those two, king and queen of the old gods before the Divine War divided Rexium.

The humans founded their own country on Teles, called simply Rexia, and began building with the materials, magic, and alchemy they brought from the Celestial Continent of Rexium. Hundreds of years before anyone else on Teles was aware that it was, in fact, a continent, the Rexians knew it as fact and had maps of the entire planetary globe, which they called Terestrix. However, those maps have long since been destroyed in the wars and lesser conflicts between Rexia and native Telesians. Folk of the Sunset Kingdoms say the Rexians sailed inland by river, arriving from across the western seas, and Rexians are certainly known for their naval prowess, so it may be true, though Rexians steadfastly deny stories of any such mundane origins.

Pureblooded Rexians are certainly quite different from other humans of western Teles, with fair skin (not nearly so pale as the Aglinar, and never freckled), dark hair, and eyes of brown or amber. It is said that those of brown hair and brown eyes are of Domi Rex's favored bloodlines, while those of black hair and amber eyes are of Tyrus Rex's instead. Rexians have a refined accent and precise enunciation to their speech that sets them apart from native Telesians. However, many Rexians have crossbred with other human tribes that they have conquered or allied with over the centuries, so there are now many humans with a mix of Rexian and non-Rexian features.

Rexia is a warm, fertile land of plains, forests, rivers, lakes, and marshes in the center of the Southlands, nearly surrounded by semi-active volcanoes. The Rexians established their dominion over the mighty beasts native to this land, dinosaurs, "thunder lizards" in the Rexis language, early and definitively. Rexian magical prowess and divine artifacts made it the work of only a few decades to tame, or at least corral and control, the native dinosaurs that had previously made the region uninhabitable to humans. It is believed that Rexians arrived roughly a thousand years ago, and after a few centuries they had expanded past the lowlands and begun conquering the surrounding highlands, starting with a conquest of the river-coasts. A few different Rexian civilizations have sprung up from Rexia over the past thousand years, as infighting and inheritance disputes occasionally divided the Rexian people into different factions.

The Rexian Dominion is the latest of these civilizations, founded by Dominus Davinus Rex and Domina Tremia Rex after the end of the last Rexian War of Ascension. As they established their own sovereignty over the feuding clans of Rexia, Davinus and Tremia united the clans in a new war of conquest, expanding Rexian territory beyond the central Southlands and western rivers. While Rexia made little progress expanding westward and southward, they found the northern and eastern tribes easy prey for Rexian ballistas, trebuchets, fire-spitters, repeating crossbows, battle mages, war priests, and of course, dinosaur-riders. Those who didn't fall to Rexian dinosaur-cavalry instead fell to Rexian siege weapons or the infamous Umbral Legion, a large force of magic-wielding, artifact-laden spies and assassins.

After two decades of expansion, conquering all but the westernmost and southernmost reaches of the Southlands, Rexia marched north into Aeden's Valley and began conquering the various tribes of people there. Only the most-remote communities avoided Rexian conquest in the Valley, and Rexia quickly rolled onward into the Northlands with its burgeoning armies. Many natives of the Southlands and some in Aeden's Valley joined the Rexian Legions for the high salaries, privelages, glory, and citizenship that military service carries in Rexia, so despite losses in each battle, the Rexian army just kept growing. Some peaceful or small communities even surrendered to Rexian conquest without a fight, joining the Dominion willingly, albeit grudgingly.

Even now, in the midst of civil war, a large number of the conquered tribes remain loyal to Rexia and have adopted Rexian culture as their own. Everywhere they went, the Rexians spread their advanced knowledge, technology, artifice, alchemy, and to a lesser extent, magical lore. Most importantly, they spread Rexian culture, military discipline, and architecture, as well as religion to a lesser extent. Over half of the Southlands, half of Aeden's Valley, and a quarter of the Northlands now show more Rexian art and architecture than any other kind, with only scattered traces of the native styles remaining.

The Dominion's wars of conquest finally took it deep into the Northlands and the toughest corners of the Southlands when arcanotech was invented in 127 R.R., starting with the first automated mills, textile factories, weapon factories, Golembound grafts, and War-Golems. Combining new discoveries in the field of arcane magic with advancements in technological mechanisms and alchemical mixtures, arcanotech turned the Dominion from a struggling empire attempting to conquer and hold on to vast tracts of land with a modest number of soldiers and mages into a strong and increasingly-unstoppable force. Gunpowder and firearms had been developed early in the second century R.R., but were drastically escalated in use, power, and sophistication after arcanotech principles were applied to them.

Over the course of a few decades, firearms became the mainstay of the Rexian Legions and became so simple in operation that even children could fully operate them. Sport hunting with firearms became a popular past-time, just as archery and boar-hunting had long been. Rexian Legions gunned down giants, dragons, griffons, manticores, chimeras, and other monsters that had once been serious threats. Arcanotech advancements lead to Golembound soldiers, dragon-powered armor suits, fire-elemental beam-weapons, air-elemental gravity-manipulation devices, flying Airships, intelligent Emulant Golem automatons, and the arcanotech Logicrons at the heart of many of these new devices, as well as the Dreamports and the Etherweave construct that developed from an extension of the Logicrons' ethereal matrices.

However, the spread of arcanotech eventually proved to be the Dominion's undoing, as rebels and outlanders got their hands on these devices and began producing more of their own, until finally, they had enough to fight back against Rexia. While arcanotech fueled the northward expansion of Rexia, and allowed the Dominion to maintain dominance for just over a century in the Northlands, it was then used by rebels in the Domain of Aedenshire to overthrow the local Rexian overlords and thereby split the Dominion in two. Although Aedenshire has gained independence, it still has to fight Rexian invaders trying to re-establish control. As Aedenshire gradually took over or destroyed the Rexian armaments in that region, small pockets of resistance rose up across Rexia to revolt against Rexian rule and reclaim their ancestral lands.

The recently-conquered Northlands were among the first to revolt, gradually developing into the Free Marches, while the Jotunlund Grafdom took over part of the Northlands while Rexian forces there were distracted and weakening. As the war raged on, Rexia could no longer maintain ties with its northern Domains, leaving those to establish their own semi-independent rulership as the Talonian Dominion. Talonians retain some dinosaur-mounted cavalry from their time as part of the greater Rexian Dominion, but the thunder lizards are poorly suited to those northern climes and their population slowly declines in the north. Parts of the Southlands, which had been under the heel of Rexian rulers much longer, only revolted after enemy nations began invading and taking advantage of Rexia's distraction with the Rexian Civil War. These territories became what are now called the Fractured Domains, as they continue to fight Rexian rule and attempt to re-establish their old local traditions. Most of the conquered territory in the Southlands remains loyal to Rexia, however.