9 Colors of Fire

1) Red-Orange.

The brilliant embers of a true fire are impossible to mistake.

All other flames are corrupted forms of this ancient and pure flame.

2) Blue.

Cobalt flame, immensely hot.

Smoke from a flame this hot can reveal wayward spirits and bring light to the truth long lost.

3) Azure.

The light of the dead star Gnottis, like ever-shifting azure glass, chill to the touch.

The star is dim and still, a monument to what was, like a glass eye. Gnottis died before Neurim knew life, yet still it clings to life animated by the glass flame. It was carried to Neurim by the servants of the Bodyless Ones known as husks. The azure flame of Gnottis is said to bring life to the inanimate though harvesting the flame is nigh impossible.

4) Burgundy.

The light of love, passion, and death. Lit ever eternal in the Crematori. 

In Sisthea the East the burgundy flame, carried from drowned Sisthea the West, burns eternal in the furnace of the great Crematori, where all Sistheans are burnt upon their death, their ashes feeding the flame. It is said that their passions color the flame. Such a deep and vibrant red could only be forged by love.

5) Magenta.

The light of illusion, a burning fire of falsehood.

It's a figment, really. An impossible sight born of an impossible color. All illusions are the shadows of this magenta flame. The most wily of illusionists can hide the flame, though novices and incompetents often fail to fool anyone with their magic. The flickering of a false flame gives it away.

6) Green.

Pale and sickly, simultaneously the color of half rotten olives and under-ripe limes.

Green flame roams the Eyeless Lands, brought by the ogres and their insipid illness from below. It is the flame of rot and disease, lit deep within the earth in the ancient city of Yersinia, long buried and left to rot and ruin. It is there that disease originates, and it is there that the sick flame burns brightest.

7) Royal Purple.

It is a regal flame, lit with a sense of self importance. It holds itself high.

It is the queen of flames, self appointed of course. Some believe it sapient. Grandiose arrogance allows fire to grow a mind. It thinks itself greater than you. It looks down at you with eyes made of drifting ash and tilts up a chin made of cinders.

8) Brass.

Liquid metal, flickering like fire.

A creation of the dwarves, once used by warriors who specialized in liquid metal weapons and armor. The art is mostly lost to the dwarves, stolen by the dragon-cult Hatavites.

9) Black.

It eats light.

An orcish invention, a flame designed to scorch gods. Few things can harm an idol and fewer still can harm divinity, but the horrid black flame of the orcs can. Enough flame and enough time will result in an undead god, the most powerful and twisted weapon of the orcs.

How Many Ancestries Is Too Many?

It's a question I have asked myself many times because I don't know. Ask anyone and you'll get a different answer. The human-centrist will argue one, just human. The standard-fantasy gamer will argue for 4, human, dwarf, elf, and halfling. The 5e-gamer will argue that there's no such thing as too many: more choice is always better.

Personally, I think there is a limit to the number of how many you can reasonably have. At a certain point, you have so many options that the average party becomes a glorified circus attraction and the things that are weird and unique cease to be interesting. In 5e, a party can consist of a sapient ooze, one of three seperate varieties of bird person, an interplanar warrior from space, and a turtle. That's not a party of adventurers. That's a zoo.

Neurim has 6: humans, elves, dwarves, halflings, mokhan (sapient rock people), and half-orcs. I have toyed with adding more, namely in the form of curseling ancestries, such as cambion/tieflings and ghouls, with curselings not being available for a first character due to weird rules and narratives. That feels good to me, though at times I wonder if cutting one of the original ancestries for something different would be cool. I like my dwarves and my halflings, which means it would be elves, and considering elves are such an extreme rarity in Neurim, it might make sense.

You'll notice I haven't answered the question. I don't have an answer. I'm not sure there is an answer to be had.

Three Action System for Exploring Dungeons

Today on an ever-growing list of half-baked ideas from Pastel.

A couple of weeks ago I made a post about why I disliked 10-minute turns. Today, I bring you a way that I think helps alleviate some of my worse issues: implementing Pathfinder Second Edition's 3 action economy into exploration.

The idea is simple: During each dungeon turn, a party/player has 3 actions that they can spend performing actions. A simple action, one that takes 2-3 minutes, takes one action, a more complex one two actions, and a long and in-depth one takes all three actions. All actions are declared  before anything happens, and then the GM describes the results of their actions before ticking down time and checking for random encounters. If multiple players, or a player and some number of hirelings/retainers attempt the same action, only one roll is made (if necessary) but is made with some sort of advantage.

For example, a rogue might be exploring a dungeon and come into a new room with a single chest in the middle. They might spend 2 actions checking the room for traps, then 1 action unlocking the chest. That's their 10 minute turn.

It's very simple on its face, though I am not dumb enough to not see the flaws. For one, there is a bit of "mother may I" in determining the length of actions. A player might think an action simple, but the GM might think it complex. These sorts of interactions can feel bad for the player, though I don't imagine it happening on a regular basis. For two, this is going to massively increase the amount of time each turn takes. I cannot answer if that's good or bad, but it most certainly is true.

I am also not 100% sure of whether or not actions should be for each player or an entire party. On one hand it doesn't make a whole lot of sense for everyone to stand around the rogue while they lock pick, but on the other giving 4-6 players each 3 actions is going to be a lot, though I do know that hirelings and retainers likely shouldn't get actions or it all gets obscene very quickly. It needs some ironing out and perhaps someone else will have an idea worth implementing further.

Some other ideas: for using this system with the Underclock, just give the players 3 actions for each time-based roll of the clock (not for rolls from making noise or general tomfoolery). For random encounters, you can roll a d3 to determine during which action monsters appear to see where each character is currently.

Level 0 (And a Bit on Shadow of the Demon Lord)

I don't know if you've heard of Shadow of the Demon Lord, but it's probably my favorite TTRPG right now, though that might be replaced by Shadow of the Weird Wizard when it drops. It's very good, pretty much everything I've wanted out of a TTRPG except for a thriving 3rd party scene. The mechanics are simple but fun, the crunch is generated via player choice and the choices players have are interesting, and enemies are threatening even to high level players to encourage creative problem solving even when combat is engaging. It's simple, but has a lot of depth.

This isn't a review of SotDL, this is a review of a single aspect of SotDL that I love: level 0. The intended start for a SotDL game is as a level 0 commoner, nothing but your ancestry, your starting equipment, and some sort of weird extra item or bonus or curse or something.

It's great. I've recently started running a SotDL campaign and the first session was one of my favorite sessions ever. Tossing the party in and letting them get way in over their heads and come out on top via creative problem solving is 100% what I play TTRPGs for. 

There's often this adage that backstories should be simple (I often limit players to a single paragraph) because the game is the story of them being adventurers, and level 0 hits that perfectly. This is the story of how the party become adventurers. How they went from nobodies to monster hunters and tomb divers.

It was great. I loved it. I think it really solidified my love of SotDL. A singular encapsulation of what makes the system good. Overall, the idea of a session 0 is one I can't recommend enough. The story of how the party becomes adventurers is such an interesting one to tell. It might take a bit of homebrew (DCC is the only other game I know of with something similar), but I can personally attest to how cool the results are.