314 years ago, the gods came. There were 8, and they walked among the people for a day, before leaving. The next day the gods who men called the Emperor and the Dark One fought, and their fighting shook the City until it was little more than ruins, before the Emperor defeated the Dark One. The Emperor gave to 4 mortals the knowledge needed to hold the City against the Dark One, who was now bound in the Hells beneath, and from them the three great Houses arose.
Length
Basically infinite.
Number DMs
All staff have DM access.
IPs
asako.zapto.org:5121
Staff Requirements
There are no set requirements, talk to Mithreas if interested.
Scope
Medium
Hack & Slash
Medium
Classes
Allowed Classes
Base Classes:
Artisan (see below)
Cleric
Fighter
Knight Marshal (see below)
Monk
Hunter (see below)
Rogue
Prestige Classes:
General: Weaponmaster, Imperial Agent (tweaked Harper Scout)
House Erenia: Knight of the Seven (tweaked Champion of Torm)
House Drannis: Knight Defender (tweaked Dwarven Defender)
House Renerrin: Duellist (rapier-based unarmoured fighter)
The Shadow: Assassin
Please be aware that there will be IG criteria to be met, as well as the mechanical prerequistes, before taking a Prestige Class. This will be different from House to House and may be a matter of Imperial decision. One Prestige Class per character, though there may be IG exceptions.
IC prerequisites:
Assassin - planned to be an organisation within the Shadow that must be joined, requiring Shadow faction rank.
Duellist - Must be a member of the Renerrin Duelling Academy (requires Renerrin faction rank)
Imperial Agent - Must apply to the Imperial recruiter IC.
Knight of the Seven - Must be a member of the Inquisition (requires House Erenia faction rank)
Tunnel Fighter - Must be a member of the Order of the Tunnels (requires House Drannis faction rank).
Weaponmaster - requires trainer (there will be various of these, and you will need faction rank with their faction before they will train you). Note that weapon will not be restricted, mainly because of the technical difficulty of doing this.
Note - further prestige classes can be added by player-started groups. Any submissions will be reviewed and implemented by the staff.
Changes to Standard Classes
Most available Classes have been tweaked in one way or another. All alignment restrictions have been removed (there wil be a mechanism for alignment changes IG). Some classes have been modified to the extent that their names have been changed and there are two new Classes that have been split, roughly, from the idea of Bard.
Artisan
The Artisan is a character of not just knowledge, but with the skills to put that knowledge to use. Artisans become experts in their fields whether they be the Arts of Poetry or Music or the smithing and craftsmanship of items.
-d6 hp
-1/2 BAB progression
-10 skill points/level
-all skills class skills
-recieve bonus Skill Focus feat at levels 5, 10, 15, 20
-starts off with simple weapons and light armour proficiency
Cleric
-d6 hit die
-Only light armour armour proficiencies at first level
-Implosion, Darkfire and Finger of Death have been removed
-Keen Edge added
-Harm and Heal changed to 10 HP/level
-Good and Evil domains have been removed. Phantasmal killer has been removed from Death domain.
Knight Marshal
The Knight Marshal is a leader of men. They include military commanders, diplomats and staff aides. The knowledge of combat tactics and strategy is their realm, as well as the ability to inspire the troops under their command.
-Can Inspire Allies/Demoralise Enemies (Bard Song, basically)
-6 skill points per level
-Lore skill bonus equal to their class level
-Bonus feats at levels 10, 13, 16, 19
-Medium attack progression
-d6 hit die
-Starts off with medium armour, martial weapons and shield proficiencies.
Monk
-Class will be rebranded
-Weapons proficiencies may be adjusted
Hunter
The Hunter is aptly named, for they are skilled in the arts of tracking and slaying their prey, whether that be man or beast. The Hunter is at home not just in the forest, but in the dark alleyways of the city or the twisting caverns of the Undercity. Some have been known to take up positions defending those of importance, their sharp senses making them particularly suited to this task.
-Recieve Alertness feat at level 4
-Recieve Skill Focus: Spot, Listen, Search at level 8
-Recieve Disarm at level 12
-Recieve Expertise at level 16
-Recieve Uncanny Dodge at level 20
-Recieve d6 sneak attack at levels 5, 10, 15, 20
-Can keep a tame dog (rather than Animal Companion)
-Have no divine spellcasting
Changes to Prestige Classes
This will be added as it becomes finalized.
Tricks & Traps
Medium
Level Range
1-20
Magic Level
Moderate to High
Schedule
24/7 aside from crashes and so on.
Treasure
High
Number Servers
1
DM Needed
No DM Required
Alignments
Alignment restrictions have been removed, good/evil spells/abilities are being removed or rescripted to be law/chaos.
Experience Rewards
Moderate to High
Races
Human only.
PVP
Full PvP
ApplicationReqs
You don't have to write a bio for any character when you start playing them, but you must have written one before they can leave level 3.
Bios are meant to help you think about your character and give DMs some information to work with, as well as to ensure your character concept fits in with the world. Post what you want to be public in the public forum with a note of which staffer you sent any information you don't want to be public knowledge. Any information found in the public forum is considered to be something that could be found out about your character IC - either from being around them if they're from the same House, or with a little research. Information sent to the staff will be put in a private forum, though rumours may find their way out of this forum to other people, courtesy of DMs.
This will be checked by a staffer who will then find you IG and unlock higher levels for your character. This can also be done without you having to be IG at the same time as a staffer, please ask a staffer about this if you have strange play-times.
Vault Type
Server
Death
In the world of CoW there exist things called "Soulstones". A character's commitment to their House is also a spititual one and that bond so strong that often one who thinks oneself "dead" will find that their soul and body have been reunited at the Soulstone of their House. There are rumored to be stones unknown at this time time, in hidden locations.
Prayer has been known to invoke the power of the stones, sometimes "raising" a character at the site of their demise.
There will be a very real possibility of permadeath here, but like the PvP, it will be opt-in.
PCs who engage in the following activities risk permadeath.
* Physical violence in the Imperial Palace.
* Worship of the Dark One.
* Repeatedly getting caught breaking the law (by the Imperial Guard)
* Betraying the Shadow faction
* Seriously angering very senior people on purpose.
Conversely, a (non-exhaustive) list of activities that will not result in permadeath:
* PvP anywhere except the Imperial Palace
* Dishonourable actions not covered by the above (you may and probably will lose status, and may be executed, but not perma'd).
Connection
Cable
House rules
Philosophy of City of Winds
This place exists as a place for conflict RP. While PvP is an essential part of that, it's only a part, and should only take place within the bounds of RP motivation. Actual PvP - characters fighting - is opt-in for each player, so please respect the preferences of other players.
Effort has been put into making a rich and complex IC society for players to enjoy.
Characters in CoW
Multiple characters are allowed, but they must all be members of only one House. The maximum level for all characters is 20.
Characters in CoW may be of any alignment, but all except the very short lived ones are openly lawful, or remain out of sight. Upon character creation, you will be required to choose a House. In the future, there will be an option for non-aligned characters, but admission to one will be the only path to social advancement. See the other threads in this forum for information on races, classes etc.
Changing Factions
Changing your House will be allowed, but solely on an RP basis. This will be rare in CoW as the consequences of such actions are enormous.
PvP
PvP is freely allowed in any area you get to by leaving the City through either of the West and South gates. This includes all above-ground areas that aren't part of the City or Sunrise Isle, as well as various mines and caves outside the City.
PvP is not allowed in any outdoor area of the City, except in the context of a formal duel. DMs may waive this rule for events where they are present.
PvP is allowed, with consent, in all other areas (interiors of the City, as well as the Undercity and areas below it). "With Consent" means that you must get the explicit permission of everyone else present at the RP before engaging in PvP. The cleanest way to do this when two people are present is for one player to hostile the other player, and the other player to then un-hostile and re-hostile the first player.
It's bad form to reject PvP just because (for instance) you can't see the person who just hostiled you or you're outnumbered 5 to 1. If you often engage in PvP but choose not to just because the situation is unfavourable, you may receive a warning (see below). Note that if confronted by 5 other players, if you'd rather not PvP you could always leave the option of bribing them, or some other non-combat way of "losing". Similarly, if you're one of the five people and the target doesn't want to fight, you could always humiliate them (eg by making them run naked back to the nearest exit from the Undercity ).
OOC Behaviour
Keep all conflict IC. If you have problems OOC with another player, please approach a staff member about it rather than starting flamewars etc.
If someone says you are upsetting them with a particular line of RP or your choice of language, you are upsetting them. Stop. Do not argue. Stop. If you think they were doing this inappropriately, collect evidence in the form of logs and screenshots and send it to Mith with your arguement. At the time, stop. If someone did not stop when you asked them to, collect evidence in the form of logs and screenshots and send it to Mith.
Please do not use this to try and get out of IC consequences for IC actions, this is for when, for example, a player is using particularly foul language and a child is watching the game over your shoulder, or if you can't stand cruelty to animals and don't want to play out the torture of your Hunter's dog.
Aggressive OOC behaviour will be met with a warning, see below.
Language
There are no rules on language in CoW, except for those established by society's codes. How far will a character who uses coarse language travel up the rungs of polite society? You may find out.
Banned Subjects for RP
There are some subjects that are simply deemed inapproriate to "play" in any form. These are rape, child abuse of any kind and suicide, with the exception of honour motivated actions along the lines of Japanese "Seppuku" or the Roman "falling on your sword." If you have any doubts, contact staff and ask.
Consequences of Unacceptable Behaviour
CoW operates a simple three strikes system. Your first two warnings have no effect (no temp ban or anything) and the third strike is a ban. Warnings are given by Mith, usually at the recommendation of staffers.
Banned players may be allowed back at a later date at Mith's discretion.
A Note on Recruiting
Please do -not- recruit using facilities provided for other worlds (PMs or forum postings in other worlds' forums, Tells or party chat IG, etc). It's not polite to those worlds.
All recruiting should be done via email, IM, phone or any other non-game method. Bioware forums are also OK, of course.
Content guide
Mature
RolePlay
Heavy
Description
City of Winds is currently in open beta.
The City of Winds is based around the Game of Houses. The City is controlled by the Emperor, who is literally divine, but who never speaks, so all the political decisions are really made by the Voice of the Emperor, who comes from the House which was most powerful when the last Voice tragically passed away. As the Voice being from your House gives you a rather nice advantage, they tend to have tragic accidents rather often.
The module is designed to encourage and support the roleplay of this conflict, and ensure that there is always something for you to do to advance your House, or yourself as there are also options for unaligned characters, though this path is far more taxing. The City is lawful in nature, so whilst members of Houses might kill each other in a fight over resources, in the City they will nod and smile politely.
Belonging to one of the Houses is recommended, as it automatically gives you a group of people to interact and plot with IG.
If you enjoy PvP outside the City are resource areas, which you can fight other Cs for control of, employ mercenaries to defend and claim for your own House so they can access the resources and gain power (measured by the Faction score, which can be seen here http://asako.zapto.org/factions.jsp), and this also increases your personal reputation, tracked here http://asako.zapto.org/ranks.jsp.
If you want to craft, we have a heavily customised version of the CNR which allows you to create mundane items (although the items go up to level 20 the vast majority of items you will find are merely made from a particularly strong metal, say, which makes it harder for blows to injure you) and a gem socketing system which allows you to create your own necklaces, rings, cloaks and belts by setting certain gems you find into socketed items.
If you'd rather avoid PvP it isn't allowed without consent in the City and areas beneath it, so you can fight the minions of the Dark One to keep the City safe.
For politics a Court session is held every Sunday at 8pm UK time, where there will be plenty of people around to plot and scheme with.
The world is set up to react to player actions as much as possible - news is published every week, guards are scripted to react if you try and bash down doors in front of them, PCs gain reputation by crafting, questing or claiming resources and once they have a certain reputation can challenge the leader of their House, if they think they would do a better job. House leaders have a great deal of power, for example the leader of House Drannis is currently proposing a lift to make it easier to get down to fight the Dark One's minions.
Character classes have been customised to fit in with the setting, so clerics are the only casters and there are other classes such as Expert for those who want to play a non-combat character or academic and Knight Marshal, who can inspire his allies or demoralise his enemies as well as being a general jack of all trades. There's no need to worry about making the most efficient build as you can gain XP from crafting, researching, training or praying (this is also used to mark the power of your god), exploration and sneaking past enemies.
Site
at 2006-07-01 06:08:30
