I’m writing up a DW/WoD/Planarch Codex version of Githyanki with the serial numbers filed off. I’m posting them here before I post them up on my blog for critique as they are the first monsters I have made for this system.
Thanks, Jonathan Walton for the help getting it this far:
The Silver Swords are named for the arcane weapons they carry into battle, forged from the astral chains that kept them in slavery for centuries. Since rebelling and gaining freedom from the psionic monsters who dared call themselves their masters the Silver Swords have founded a city in the Deep Astral built from the wreckage of a thousand cathedrals, the psychic detritus of dead faiths.
The Silver Swords put their faith in no deities but in the corpse of the young lady who liberated them. When she died, their warlock eunuchs set the body on their Dragon Throne and continued to rule in her name. If one of their own people should be ritually sacrificed after completing a great work, their soul will fuel the Corpse Queen, allowing her body and will to animate and rule. When she is in repose, the Silver Empire is run by the cruel warlock eunuchs.
When the queen is awake, the Silver Empire is ferocious, just and embraces change.
When the queen is dead the warlock eunuchs are in charge of the empire and the Silver Empire is then ferocious, myopic and fearful of anything or anyone who could upset the status quo.
The Silver Swords are not quite human. Maybe it was from the psychic torments of their era under slavery’s cruel tentacles or from in-breeding with all manner of dragons and mythical creatures from a hundred different worlds along the astral sea. They are humanoid in shape and bipedal but vary greatly with only a single silver eye to unite them.
A Silver Sword is a monster with these moves:
Claim land for the Silver Empire’s Corpse Queen
Make a pact with a greater mythical beast (dragon, liche, etc.)
Free slaves from their bondage
P.S. There is an off-shoot of Silver Words, those who threw down their blades, refused to worship the queen after she died. They lead lives of contemplation in floating monasteries amidst the primordial chaos from which the primordial ur-gods created everything.
The Chaos Monks are monsters with the following moves:
Release land from feudal bonds.
Give an enemy’s inner turmoil a physical incarnation.
Let others know how to destroy the economic realities that make slavery profitable.
DW Stats
Silver Sword
HP: 7
AC: +2
Damage: d8 (roll two, take the higher)
Tags: Planar
Chaos Monk
HP: 7
AC: +1
Damage: Fists, 1d6, Psychic Blast 1d8+1
Tags: Planar
Other things to stat out: The Corpse Queen, Eunuch Warlock, Silver Sword Dragonrider
Maps: Silver Empire Colonial Outpost, Silver Navy Astral Corvette, Silver Captital in the Deep Astral, Monastery in the Chaos Waste, The Deep Astral, The Chaos Wastes
There is a typo calling the monks Silver Words, but I think that is awesome. The contrast between Sword and Word is neat.
Thanks.
I like it!
Niiiice! Maybe give them impulses?
Also it’s interesting that the moves are all high level, so to speak, rather than what they do in a fight. Like a Silver Sword might have “sever something” or “psychically call for help” or such.
The Githz… the offshoot ability to “release lands from feudal bonds” – have you considered letting them release land from the shackles of imposed reality?
They bring the elemental chaos with them, let it seep in and free the surrounding area from the rigid constraints that hold it. Crop fields dissolve into mud flats. Mountains slough off into shale and collapse into chasms.
This is wonderful, by the way. Thanks for sharing it.
Oh, thank you for the kind words, Ara.
It sounds like the life and death of the Queen is cyclic. What drives her toward death when she is alive? Will that come when you stat her?
Parker D Hicks : I’m not sure. I reckon I will make it some kind of countdown clock but I’ll have to consider what will make the hands of the clock tick down.
matt greenfelder : That is really good. Thanks.
Ben Wray : What are impulses?
Instinct, not impulse! Whoops. Getting my *worlds mixed up.
The monster generation section lists it as “What does it want that causes problems for others?” which is really the best way to describe it. Basically, the motivation, and the moves are the tools the monster uses to reach that motivation.
Yup, gotcha, I recognize Instincts. I felt like the Planarch Codex-style monster moves were a decent substitute for Inscints.
No no, it’s definitely playable as is.
Man, this is so cool.
Thanks, John.
The image evoked by the phrase “a city in the Deep Astral built from the wreckage of a thousand cathedrals, the psychic detritus of dead faiths” will stick with me for a long time. Thanks.
http://githyankidiaspora.wordpress.com/2013/01/29/silver-swords-in-dis/
I posted it on my blog. Upon re-reading it, I’m uneasy with it, worried it could be interpreted as a shitty metaphor for cultures who rebel against slavery and find freedom.
That’s not what I got out of it at all. I pictured a lonely, vast ruin, full of the echoes of long ago extravagance, with the Githyanki living there, ostensibly in mockery of the faith and pretension brought to ruin…but also sad and searching, secretly wishing they could understand the kind of belief that built things of such beauty, and wishing that such faith wasn’t doomed.
Thanks. I’m not ashamed of what I wrote or think it is wrong or bad. I’m just looking it over with a critical eye is all.
Thank you, everyone, for taking the time to read it at all.