Natural 7

Two Rival Factions

Announcement the First: I recently upgraded my bear blog! That means it's discoverable on search engines, among other tiny improvements. In addition, my bear blog is connected to the rootring, a blog linking tool designed by elmcat that helps you scroll through lots of other awesome blogs like Amanda P's Weird Wonder, and Revivify Games.

Announcement the Second: This week I re-released the Caverns of El, a pair of dungeons designed to be explored in a single session. The adventure is system agnostic, so you can use any roleplaying game of your choice! The re-release was so that I could practice using layout tools in Affinity (the layout I created is heavily Mork Borg inspired).

In this post I'll present an example of two rival factions, the Eclipse Knights and the Steel Shadows. For each faction I've provided a description of what they do and a summary of their goals and other relevant information.

Some questions to consider:

The Eclipse Knights

The fabled city watch of the Sunchoked City, Loreno, and the secret masterminds behind most of the city's unjust organized crime. They are unfailingly recognizable in their mechanized armor and ever-present in the darkest corners of the city, yet they never seem to catch the real bad guys, the ones behind the operation. Nobles love them; everyone else, well, they whisper in hushed voices behind the guards' backs.

In public, the face of the Eclipse Knights is the young commander Alyna Firepike. She is fierce, competitive, and ambitious. Her speeches inevitably rile up crowds and get their blood boiling about whatever it was she was talking about. She constantly meets with rich nobles to discuss how the watch can better serve Loreno's esteemed locals. Alyna is secretly an erinyes summoned by the true master of the Eclipse Knights.

In reality, the true master of the Eclipse Knights is Heptarch Gol van Gol, one of the seven council members who rules Loreno. Gol is quite scholarly, inventive, and utterly evil. He invented and manufactured the special armor that the Eclipse Knights all wear, and is working to create a special kind of magic golem to accompany their patrols. Gol van Gol is secretly a lich, and he summoned Alyna to help with his operations. Some who know his true nature call Gol van Gol the "Gear Lich of Loreno".

Their goal: exert complete control over the economy and populace of Loreno without them truly knowing what's happening.

Their tactics: brute force, machinery, "accidents"

What keeps them from achieving their goal: the constant presence of the Steel Shadows trying to undermine the city watch.

Members of the Eclipse Knights wear mechanized breastplates studded with glowing gemstones. This armor provides a number of benefits to the Eclipse Knights:

Alyna wears a special suit of armor equipped with two machine arms: one wielding a sword and one wielding a shield. In combat, the sword allows Alyna to make one additional attack and the shield provides its usual bonus.

An example watch party of Eclipse Knights consists of 2d4 Eclipse Knights, d2 War Hounds (wolves, if nothing better), and 1 Priest of the Choking God (domains are famine, fire, and sunlight).

Building favorable reputation with the Eclipse Knights might involve performing any of the following actions:

Once favorable reputation is established, the Eclipse Knights might provide PCs with the following:

The Steel Shadows

The scoundrels and thieves of the Sunchoked City, and the ones who really keep things in Loreno running smoothly. The Steel Shadows cloak themselves in darkness and race about the streets at night, constantly evading members of the Eclipse Knights on duty. They aim to dismantle the Knights one guard at a time until they make it to the Gear Lich at the top.

Anyone you ask would tell you that the leader of the Steel Shadows is someone called the Crow Caller. Sometimes just called "Crow", he is a man who lurks on the walls of Loreno speaking to the crows that gather there. Crow is muscular, heavily tattooed, and ragged. It seems as though more than one bird has tried to peck away his eyes. He sends potential initiates on introductory quests for the Steel Shadows, usually somewhere they have a good chance of dying. If they come back alive, he knows they're worth something. Crow can actually talk to crows and he sends messages with them. He's tried talking to other birds, but the message usually gets garbled.

But Crow isn't the real leader of the Steel Shadows. No, that would be Lemonheart, who initiates won't meet until after their fourth or fifth deadly job. When they do, they'll discover that the true leader of the Steel Shadows is an actual shadow; a ghost of a ghost, not even really there except just before you blink. Lemonheart is cruel, frank, and a good listener. She invites experienced members of the Steel Shadows to help decide the faction's next missions to dismantle the Eclipse Knight's hold on the city.

Lemonheart used to be Heptarch Vaja Kin, but she was disintegrated by Gol van Gol in an epic battle on a nearby mesa (the mesa is now a scorched and blackened hill). Lemonheart doesn't enjoy talking about this experience.

Their goal: Establish a fair and just criminal apprehension system in Loreno.

What keeps them from achieve their goal: Everyone wants to join the Eclipse Knights (an excellent benefits package), and no one wants to believe the Knights are horribly corrupt and led by an actual undead lich.

Their tactics: Ends-justify-the-means, assassination, example making.

Members of the Steel Shadows usually wear dark cloaks and edgy clothing when their on the job. Sometimes they'll wear steel earrings to help recognize each other in public spaces. Most Steel Shadows are expert thieves, assassins, poisoners, con-artists, merchants, warlocks, or sorcerers.

Lemonheart is a special shadow with increased base stats, some minor spellcasting, and the ability to reflect spells on their caster. Crow doesn't fight people (a sworn pacifist), he just runs away while a murder of crows pecks at his opponent's eyes.

An example cloaked company of Steel Shadows includes 1d4 thieves, 1d4 assassins, and 1d2 magic-users (warlocks or sorcerers).

Building favorable reputation with the Steel Shadows might mean accomplishing the following:

Once favorable reputation is established, the Steel Shadows might provide PCs with the following:

Final Thoughts

There we have it. Two interesting factions for the Sunchoked City, Loreno. I came up with the lore, but it was probably inspired by Viktor from Arcane season 2, the Steel Watch in Baldur's Gate 3, and a few other things. Some of my friends will probably recognize the idea of the Eclipse Knights as very similar to an idea I had proposed a few years ago for a faction called the Eclipse Legionnaires.

How do you like to prepare factions for your games? What types of adventures warrant any faction preparation at all?

Thank YOU for reading, I really appreciate it! Happy Saturday, and I'll see you next week.

Things on my radar: