MICE and OWLS, CURRENCY, WEIGHTS and MEASURES

agent HOG WILD was here fixing up his motorbike. HOG WILD is the guy who got me into playing d&d, we used to play 4e and he was the DM. We had a conversation about coin weight and most of the good ideas here is stuff he come up with.

Ok so in the 70s monster manual if a guy can carry a lot of stuff they tell you how much that is in coins, like, a giant eagle (i crossed this out and put VULTURE) can carry 2000 gold but is slowed, and a EFREET can carry 7500 gold pieces freely or twice that and be slowed.




Mice are a staple of the peasant diet, like: if you don't have mice you'll probably have gruel or something; but a mouse will liven up the gruel, it'll get some red in the bowl.

Um, MICE and OWLS is the best-beloved part of the AGENTS HANDBOOK. In my schema everything is paid for in mice and owls. A mouse is worth its WEIGHT in copper, and an owl is worth its weight in silver. These are just the STANDARD MEASURES, like, sometimes you can't always trade in live mice and owls. Common small prey animals are measured in mice (like a goose from a human merchant weights 3d6 mice) and a larger or more predatory animal (maybe like a stag) is measured in owls. Dead animals are worth half that. Rare animals like predator eaters (like an owl-sentinel if you could find one, or like a dragon) would be worth their weight in gold if you can find a king or someone rich enough to pay for stuff in gold.

So that VULTURE probably isnt gonna pick up 2000 gold coins anywhere but he could carry a lot of sheep and lions if you strung them together.

Persons weigh one coin for each point of strength and ten coins for each point of armor, something like that. Richer guys are worth their weight in silver or gold.

It's tempting to start like a MICE FARM to produce counterfeit mice, but obviously the best mice are wild field mice: any fool can taste that a farm mice doesnt taste like a wild mice, and they'll be obvious if you look at them: malnourished farm mice eat their own tails, so you can tell the quality of a mouse by how long its tail is. A counterfeit OWL-SENTINEL is probably just a bunch of crows glued together, but a real sentinel will at least be good at catching owls.

a map of the OGRE LANDS

i made this for a bit in macnamee's painted world campaign where i had to dm and it seemed liek the party might go west (so this section is off the map to the west of macnamees painted world. this is a good place for the doglands, but of couse any map is a good place for the doglands [just throw down some dog forts] )

----THE END--------------------(to vornheim)

door--lions--vulture^monastary^

dogqueen-dogs-grift^^^&hobbits-(to ashtown)

dogs-goblins-^dragons^^^&&&fly&

wolves^ogretoll^&antlers-scarec

fishing&druids-cornerclub-farmgi(to lake dredd)

the end of the world

a great golden door

a pair of white lions

the vulture

a monastary

the dog queen

dogs north

here the dog queen’s dogs are winning

dogs south

here the wolf king’s dogs are winning

the bishop of grift

you enter the city. it is night.

the marketplace, carts are shattered and stands are torn. the streets are empty, barrels lay toppled, but lanterns are lit. in one house, a fire burns. A door slams in a house across the street. eyes peer out through a hatch, which is slammed shut. then a skeleton patrol numbering 3 for every 2 in the party, led by a ghoul, crosses. if the players are not detected the patrol moves on. a little man comes out of the house to aid the party.

"no..." says the cleric... "you can't want to go up... to THE CASTLE." <lightning>

hobbits

goblins

dragons

fly

wolves

ogretoll

sacred grove of the antler-women

fishing

druids

cornerclub

like in elder scrolls: morrowind

scarecrow

as the lamentations module (the one with the scarecrow)

the farmer's three daughters

LANGUAGES

HUMAN LANGUAGES

AKKADIAN is the best-known tongue, called COMMON, a remnant of long-gone UR.

LABRYNTHIAN, a complex speech, is used by the maze-folk in mountain caves.

SWAIN, a sailor-tongue, is common along every coast.

DESERTLISH, so-called by outsiders, is the harsh tongue spoken by all desert folk.

THIEF'S CANT, a secret tongue, unwritable, indescipherable, ever-changing, is known to all guild thieves.

ANIMAL LANGUAGES

RAKKUS is a common animal-tongue, brutish and harsh.

HIVE is the vibrant speech of insects.

TWILL is the flowery speech of birds, also known by cats and elves.

MER is a confusing language sometimes spoken by fish and other sea-creatures.

RACIAL LANGUAGES

ELF, GOBLIN, DWARF, and GNOLL are common.

skullfire island

main factions
-the heirarchs, roman conquerers from the continent
-the driftlords, like mobsters or japanese daimyos, split remnants of earlier rule

neutral factions
-the fiends, the native population of tieflings, imps and so on.
-the lizards, bands of mercenaries, often dragonborn.
-the collectors, the ashsellers, the ghouls and the tinkers

beast factions
-the hive, kruthik or similar
-the rocs and raptors
-the triffids

cities
-The industrial city, Phintad
-The holy city, Kitan
-the steppe merchant town, Yartagun
-the ruined city, Argol

a king-cat can look upon a cat-king, but never the reverse

In Arlabest it was ruled that a cat may not look at a king. Any cat found looking at the king is immediately beheaded.

In Benegon it was ruled that only a cat may look at a king. Anyone other than a cat found looking at the king is immediately beheaded.

In Creyegad it was ruled that a cat must look at a king. Any cat found not looking at the king is immediately beheaded.

In Dralmenar it was ruled that only a cat may not look at a king. Anyone other than a cat found not looking at the king is immediately beheaded.

In Elreband it was ruled that only a king may look at a cat. Anyone other than the king found looking at a cat is immediately beheaded.

In Friyadin it was ruled that a king may only look at a cat. The king, if found not looking at a cat, is immediately beheaded.

doll day

all halflings make and keep dolls for each year of their life. on doll day, everybody puts aside their doll from the previous year, and starts a new doll to carry with them into the next year. dolls can be made out of anything.

the baron of baddock and the duke of durham

the baron of baddock and the duke of durham are two brothers who hate one another, ruling two cities who hate one another. in arcadia there are three tourneys each year, one at each of baddock and durham and one by the crossing, the bridge city. knights of baddock ride in to battle on the backs of hounds, in durham they ride snow cats.

dwarves are knights, halflings are gypsies, elves are deodands.

realm of arcadia

click to expand

willow water from the willow sea is not salty (and as a result, mineral salt is extremely valuable) but it dulls pain (as lay on hands or cure minor wounds) and makes you forget.

alexandria, the domed city, is home to the burned library. whenever a book is burned anywhere, thery bring it here. most of the books are useless, but many have fragments that can be read. in the piles of the burned library you can find fragments of burned texts that were never written and have never been seen elsewhere, these books are 'born of the flames'. in arcadia, reading and writing are both acts of profanity. reading an unburned book curses the reader. it was reading and writing that ruined the world in times of old.

however, whatever words are spared by the flames are holy. everybody learns to read, but nobody is allowed to write anything - not a map, not anything. anyone carrying an unburned text can be freely attacked by priests of akkos. burned texts should be taken to the burned library in alexandria where they can be properly stored and preserved. the witch kings also practice book burning, and burned books is mostly what they trade with arcadia. in labrynthia, is is said, they read books unburned.

(in general, arcadia is law, the witch kings are chaos, labrynthia is neutral )

in arcadia they worship akkos, the king of fire, and terminus, the protector of the dead, and the hog king of rats.

all dead rise from their graves in the night to slay the living, but they should not be destroyed, instead they are taken to the dead lands across the river, where they roam free. priests of terminus have a 'sleep undead' ability.

(hex map by d7 at the seven sided die.)

currency

copper coins are mice. anyone who can carve or stamp a mouse on a piece of copper, that's a valid coin. a live mouse is worth exactly 1 copper. you can trade with live mice if you don't have copper ones. also, you can eat the mice (mice are a staple of the peasant diet).
silver coins are owls. 1 owl is worth 10 mice. owls are made in presses, but each coin maker has their own press, with their own markings.
gold coins are sentinels. an owl-sentinel is a mythical blackbird that hunts at night and eats owls. nobody's ever seen one, but they find casings. the picture on the coin has about ten legs. 1 sentinel is worth 10 owls. by law, all sentinels are made in the royal press at alexandria.
an ounce of salt is worth 100 sentinels.