Do the inteligent magic using races engage in deliberate habitat creation and destruction in your games?
For instance the game I am prepping for Christmas will take place in an area called The Fens but used to be The Green Sward (not overly original I know) 200 years ago a Lizardman druid started a rockslide damned up a river planted a magic tree and flooded the who area.
I was also picturing an army of dryads that plant holly and acorns in the bodies of the slain in a battle field, come back in 6 years and Forest!
Ice giants that help the glaciers march down the mountains.
Wondering if anyone else runs with that Idea.
In my current Thursday night game, I am running Volant, using the ruleset and chargen from StarCluster 4 - Sabre and World. The PCs have claimed a "fragment' - a smaller (14X9 mile) chip of land broken off from a much larger land (the size of Connecticut in this case) which pulled out of the earth and floated into the sky, as land is wont to do in Volant. They have already dammed one river to prevent water loss, and are currently examining the fragment to see what else they need to do.
I am using Fragments of Air And Stone, a supplement for Volant, which details all sorts of changes that can be made to fragments, some of which take years to come to fruition. For example, they can chip away non-floatstone rock and make the fragment lighter, so it will rise into cooler air, or the reverse to warm the fragment. Every 1000 feet is three degrees F! They can change water loss with dams and cisterns. They can tunnel from one section to another. There are tons of changes which can be made for the ultimate value of the land.
It's funny. We create these artificial barriers to themes*. Terraforming might be considerably easier with powerful magic! I've never applied before specifically. I do often consider magical places to have been protected by magic to allow them to remain untouched.
Even the simple act of controlling crops and the weather could dramatically impact a locale. With spells like earth to stone, stone to mud, etc. building canals, dams and passes would be easier. This is a cool idea!
*What I mean is that I personally linked Terraforming to sci-fi, but it certainly doesn't have to be.
In our RQPavis Gloranthan game, the Aldryami (Elves/Dryads) have already begun the Greening, planting forests over vast areas. The mermen have a plan to drown the lands and someone else has a plan to raise drowned lands.
So, yes ...
My main homebrew fantasy setting is a big terraformed patch of an alien world... endorsed and aided by the god-satellites.
Good point - people have been terraforming Earth since pre-agricultural times, but I don't recall anyone ever considering the impact magic might have on this. Another example of how most fantasy settings don't really consider the effects of magic outside combat.
Quote from: soltakss;1008268In our RQPavis Gloranthan game, the Aldryami (Elves/Dryads) have already begun the Greening, planting forests over vast areas. The mermen have a plan to drown the lands and someone else has a plan to raise drowned lands.
So, yes ...
Those tree-hugging Aldryami cause trouble everywhere they are. :D
How many game revolve around a location and the betterment of it?
Historically people tended to "improve" where they lived but, with wandering adventurers, how often does this matter in games do you think?
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I use it extensively in some campaigns. Either by mundane means or by magic, or even superscience. Sometimes an area is accidentally terraformed when a spell or other effect goes awry. A curse might be the culprit. Well meaning druids. etc.
One of the big epic campaigns I wan involved the mind flayers trying to terraform various worlds by darkening their suns.
In my BX to 5e campaign the Atrughin region and especially the plateau area were part of a regional terraforming via a combination of magic and manpower. And large chunks of the great Aelfheim forest kingdom is the result of elves doing it by hand.
Though usually if the terraforming is small scale its more aptly a sort of "bottle ecology".
Hmm, interesting idea, I've really never thought about terraforming outside of sci fi type games. I probably wouldn't have any wizards powerful enough to change their world in that way in a fantasy game as I prefer very low levels of magic accessible to PCs. Maybe an evil NPC but probably still too powerful for me. Interesting idea, though.
Quote from: Headless;1008234Do the inteligent magic using races engage in deliberate habitat creation and destruction in your games?
Yes.
However, you are thinking in too small of a scale.
Quote from: jeff37923;1008555Yes.
However, you are thinking in too small of a scale.
You have my attention.
Quote from: Headless;1008234Do the inteligent magic using races engage in deliberate habitat creation and destruction in your games?
Not until I read your OP.
Fantasy terraforming is a very cool idea!
Thank you Headless!
The t'skrang lizardman race in Earthdawn uses terraforming (aqua-forming?). They live in huge towers submerged halfway in the local river or body of water. One of the larges lakes in Barsaive has 2 outlets and is kept stable by the t'skrang House that lives there. They use "structures" built of "hardened water" (not ice, still ambient temp) to build reefs as fortifications against enemy ships and to control the yearly flow cycles and erosion. Many "ruined" t'skrang towers are left in the dry remains of a river/lake/waterfall.
In my DCC Last Sun campaign, the entire world is artificial, it's a dyson sphere created around the last sun left in the universe, converting it into a vehicle intended to escape the death of their universe and escape through the void to another one.