Crimson Sands

1) Introduction

Overview

The Dune People tell a story - of a people that betrayed their god, and a king that destroyed his kingdom with a curse. Once, there was a beautiful, fertile land. Men called it Tan Silat, and it was bright and fair ... but dark things were loose in the land, and eventually an ill wind blew and the desert came and swallowed it. Now Tan Silat is gone, buried beneath the ever shifting sands, with only the dust-scarred tip of an occasional minaret peeking up from the desert to indicate that it had ever been.

The land is not desolate though. Where the once-mighty river ran through the Old Kingdom there are still oases and pockets of arable land where thin grasses cling to life. With the coming of the sands, the people of the Dunes came north from the great fastness of more natural deserts they called home. Krethaani barbarians who still worship forgotten gods descend from the mountains to the north and west to raid cattle or scavenge amongst the buried ruins for magical trinkets whose true purpose has been lost.

And there is still one city - The Silent City - ruled by the Necromancer King, a foul sorcerer from the Steppes of Rama to the east. He has forged a new kingdom from the struggling survivors of the old and now his troops bring more and more towns under his sway, building larger yet their empire.

Out in the desert, wild men lurk - once human, their bodies twisted by the spores of Chaos loosed so long ago when the Old Kingdom died. In the desert there are vast tracts of quicksand, unnavigable by man or camel, but on which the Dune Sailors ply their silken rafts, sails catching the mighty desert wind. There are great pillars of limestone thrust up from the desert floor, concealing caves which wind down to a lost world below. There are hidden oases where, it's rumoured, mystics of the Dune folk and sorcerers of the Old Religion still ply their trade and plot to unseat the Necromancer King. And under everything are the lost ruins, the still houses, the dust-choked bodies of the glory that was -- men who reached too high, and whom the Gods destroyed.

TSOY stands for The Shadow Over Yesterday, a beautiful, lightweight fantasy RPG written by Clinton R. Nixon. Thanks to the Creative Commons License, Clinton has made the entire text of the game available free online. The text is in two separate documents, one which details the core rules system, and one which describes the default setting of TSOY, the magical world of Near. My intent is to leverage, and supplement, this approach by offering this document as an alternate setting in which to play. I intend to use this setting to run TSOY adventures of my own, but if anyone else wants to borrow, steal or adapt it then they too are welcome to do so.

The Fallen Kingdom of Tan Silat

Many tales are told of Tan Silat, also called the Great Kingdom. It was a great crescent that filled a fertile delta that spread in a half-moon arc east to west through the lands that are now the Crimson Sands. In those days, the desert ended at the Dune Sea, far to the south, which the Qarimi call Ilora, meaning "flowing sand". The river Meeru flowed down from the Black Mountains of Kreth in the west and across the kingdom until it vanished into lost caverns beneath the Cliffs of Rama in the east. Meeru was an old river and had worn a broad plane for itself, where it meandered and curled, split into subsidiaries and merged with tributaries running down from the north, ever growing.

Around the river, the planes were fertile and full of life - cattle, oxen, sheep and goats all lived there, and also men. The men of Tan Silat were noble of countenance and proud of bearing, for theirs was the greatest civilization the world had ever known. They had perfected many great magics until their study had become an art and their cities were filled with wonders the like of which were storied across the world - works of clockwork, intricate interlocking mechanisms, boxes of fiendish design which entertained the listener with music soothing to the soul. Theirs was the power to hew through stone and shape it like clay to their desires. And with this power they had carved a kingdom of wonders from the stone of their land. No army marched against Tan Silat, no merchant could contest the majesty of its coffers, and no ill could disturb its serenity. In the halls of learning the wise men studied all that was to be known. And in the halls of justice the land was ruled peacefully by a sagacious and honest Pharoah and by the great God whom he served.

Thrytus Orestus was the name of that Pharoah and the God he served was Brimodan, Lord of Truth. Brimodan was an old god, once one of a great pantheon worshipped throughout the land. But over the years men had turned away from the mighty gods in other lands and come to worship low gods - the spirits of places or of little fanccies. While in Tan Silat, men worshipped only Brimodan, whom they celebrated for the knowledge he had given them and the wisdom with which to use it, which was also his gift.

Until the Enemy came.

None now know what guise he wore. It is told that even to say his name was to be corrupted, for the Enemy was corruption itself - an ancient, primal force of untruth. Even to think too long on him could drive a man mad. How he came to Tan Silat, or what he sought there is not now known. What is known is that his cult spread like wildfire throughout the land until the Enemy, the Idiot God, had shrines in every city and every peasant hamlet in the land. The Pharoah was sorely vexed by this, but he was a just ruler and believed his people would turn away from their worship when they sought that the Idiot God wrought nothing good and did not help their lives. And so he plead with Brimodan for leniency and the land was spared for a time.

But the rot of the Enemy spread through the land like a plague. At first only fools worshipped him. But over time even the very wise came to be corrupted. And men who had learned much of great artifice and strong magic from Brimodan's hand began to whisper that there was great power to be tapped into through the magics of the Enemy, even the power of primal Chaos, which men say existed before the world was even whelped.

When word of this reached the Pharoah he was sorely wroth and sent out edicts across the land forbidding the study of Chaos and the making of the things of chaos. Some of the wise heeded his words, but there were others who had too long thought on these things, and for them it was too late. And so it came to pass that men whispered that the Pharoah had become afraid and that he no longer cared for the advancement of his kingdom. And eventually those who were his advisors and his assistants conspired to have him struck down.

No-one now knows who slew Thrytus Orestus, last of the line of Pharoahs of Tan Silat. Some say it was his wife, others his first-born son. Even others a certain poet with whom he had been more than close. But as he lay dying, the Pharoah called out to his God with a great curse, calling for Brimodan to scour away the evil which afflicted his kingdom, to let the people choke on the dust of the lies they had memorized and mouthed.

For a time, the desert was silent. The few survivors of this disaster - those lucky enough to flee to high ground or to know of good shelter they could take - huddled together and watched their supplies of food and water run thin. Surely they all would have died, save for the dune people - who call themselves the Qarimi. Long had the Qarimi lived in the deserts of Ilora to the south. Many had come over the years as traders and pilgrims, drawn by the tales of the wonders of Tan Silat. And now they came north in force, seeking to understand the tragedy that had scratched out that ancient kingdom.

The folk of the dunes are merciful and they did what they could to help the survivors of Tan Silat in that new and hostile land. It was they who first used the word Timora, meaning "crimson sands" to refer to that new place which had buried the old and the name stuck so that the survivors began to refer to themselves as "Timorans". Indeed, none would breathe the name of the Pharoah, or of Brimodan, who had destroyed them, and quickly to do so became a capital crime. Indeed, even to mention the name of Tan Silat was considered to be in the worst of taste.

And so it was for four score years, until there came the man who would forge Timora into a mighty kingdom once again. Goran Zuur came down by secret ways from the Steppes of Rama, which lie atop the might cliffs to the east of Timora. The people of Rama worship death and have strange rituals and it is said that Goran Zuur was an exiled priest-king of that place, cast out for unimaginable sins so black that even the Ramanites would not tolerate him any more.

Whatever the truth, Goran Zuur came to Timora thirty years ago and began to carve out an empire. At first he captained a band of raiders, known as the Iron Shirts for the armour they wore. They terrorized many in the land for years. But this first phase was as nothing. For after five years, Goran Zuur completed a terrible ritual. On one terrible night winds with fangs like ice scoured across Timora, leaving a sharp hoar of frost on the ropes of tents and the lintels of buildings everywhere on the land. And in the place where once stood Thenris Abadda, proud capital of Tan Silat, those winds came together to carve away the sands, flinging them upwards in a great cloud that lingered for days, until that ancient city was once more exposed to the sky above. That city was a place of death, inhabited by Zuur and his raiders. Men called it the Silent City and Zuur made it his capital. Worse still, he used some foul magic of the Ramanites to raise the bodies of the slain of Thenris Abadda so that the dead walk its streets, a population of angry ghouls torn from the afterlife to obey the will of their master. It was at this time that men began to speak of Goran Zuur as "the Necromancer King".

In the intervening quarter of a century, Zuur and his forces have carved out a significant portion of Timora as their kingdom. Zuur styles himself the ruler of Timora, to the point where men often say "Timora" and mean "that part of Timora which is ruled by the Necromancer King". Zuur's men are now based out of Iron Gate, a city built in a great crater blasted out of the desert after a piece of the sky fell to earth. From there, his forces ride across the land, collecting taxes, gathering recruits and enforcing his will. The Silent City is largely abandoned to the dead now, although it's also said that a queer pale folk have come to gather there who are not dead but act as if they are.

Across Timora, in the rest of the lands of the Crimson Sands, men touch their charms and pray to whichever of the Hundred Gods they hold dearest that Zuur and his men will not come for them, that there will not be more chaos, pain and destruction.

The desert destroyed Tan Silat, but it did not end all life. Although all but one of the old cities were lost, new settlements have gradually sprung up on the sands. Where the Meeru river once wound through the fertile valleys of Tan Silat there is now a sporadic chain of oases. Around these, scrub-lands bear thin grasses from which herds of malnourished cattle graze. On the high lands and near the mountains where water still accumulates there are small-holdings and even a few proper farms. And even in the most parched of the sands the Dune People have made their homes, using a gift for dowsing which has been an environmental necessity for their kind since time immemorial. These are the cities of the desert, the few slight footholds life retains in the ruined wastes of the crimson Sands.

Paths in the desert

The Sea of Sand

The Pillars of Morr

Crater

The Tractless Waste

Kralera's Reach

Wild Men

Ironrift

Rumours fly across the desert as easily as the thin skeins of sand, twisting on the wind-currents of commerce and stories told round fires in the night. These are some of them. As to which are true, and how true, only the desert knows....

Zanat'lan
Zanat'lan is the holy city of the Qarimi, said to stand at a hidden Oasis lost somewhere in the midst of the Sea of Sand. There, it is said, folk still hold to the old ways, worshipping the lineage of Qarimi ancestry that forms an unbroken chain back to the Time of Stories that predates the material world. Due to the treacherous nature of the Sea of Sand it is difficult for anyone to visit Zanat'lan save for the Dune Sailors, and they are characteristically vague as to the truth of the rumours.

The Machine City of Yu
Some tell that in the juncture where the Black Mountains meet the Plateau of Rama a hidden vale plays host to a terrible city, forged from black iron and obsidian. This is the Machine City of Yu, ruled over by an ancient, unliving god from a forgotten pantheon. It's said that the folk of the Machine City have no more sentience of freedom of will than the worker drones in a hive of sand-hornets. Some have even whispered that the scions of the Machine city have been seen travelling in secret to visit with the Necromancer King, who wishes to use their magics to make the folk of The Silent City as obedient and robotic as their own.

Boneyard
Tirin Yoth was the mausoleum city (find synonym!) of Tan Silat, a gigantic mausoleum made of marble and bone, where under enormous arches and ancient plinths the honoured dead slumbered in peace, warded from ill by the Priests of Tan Silat. Some travellers of the western reaches of Timora tell that the fierce desert wind has stripped the sands away from Tirin Yoth, revealling the remains of that ancient city. But now, shorn of their defenses and the rituals which allowed them to slumber peacefully, they say the dead walk the streets, decomposing brows twisted in anguish and filled with a terrible fury against all of the living, whom they blame for their plight.

The Mouth of the West
Beyond Furthest it is said there is a hidden valley in the Black Mountains. Supposedly, this valley ends in a gigantic, monstrous sculpture of a face - so vast and weathered that none can say whether it's of conscious construction or a fluke of nature. The mouth of the face yawns open, full of hideous teeth of stalagmites and stalactites. Within that mouth is a great tunnel, one which supposedly runs through dark kingdoms beneath the mountains and leads those who dare them to the unnamed lands to the west.

The Vale of Lights

The Monastery of Tan Silat
Some say that when not everything in Tan Silat was destroyed when the Great Curse was let loose. The desert is full of tales, and one that is repeated from time to time tells of a monastery of holy men, loyal still to the lost god of Tan Silat. These men, it is whispered, know more of the lost magics of Tan Silat than any other, and have many mighty artifacts at their disposal. How else could the location of their monastery so long elude the servants of the Necromancer King? For it is told that they scheme against him, waiting for the day when they will call on all true Timorans to rise up and end his reign. Wise men do not know whether to give credence to these rumours, nor whether the servants of Goran Zuur who scour the desert are truly seeking for the hidden monastery or for some other lost thing the Necromancer desires.

Grief

3) Cultures

Qarimi : People of the dunes

The Qarimi, or "dune people" as the Timorans call them, used to live away far to the south in distant lands beyond the Dune Sea. However, when the desert came to Tan Silat, many Qarimi came north to explore the lost land. Some came because of rumours of the wealth buried beneath the sands, others came out of curiosity. Some even came out of a sense of duty to help those few survivors of the lost kingdom. Later, more Qarimi came for reasons of family, trade or to escape religious persecution in the southlands. Gradually, the Qarimi transferred their culture to the lands of the Crimson Sands, made settlements and put their roots down.

These northern Qarimi settlements are now separated from their ancestral culture by the Dune Sea. Only the Dune Sailors can cross that treacherous expanse and they provide the Qarimi of the north with an important link back to their history and the lands of their ancestry.

Historically, Qarimi culture has focussed on lineage and family. Orthodox Qarimi can trace their lineage back to the First Peoples, who existed in the Story Time before the world was made. The old religion of the Qarimi stresses ancestor worship and long periods spent in trance or contemplation, trying to be in contact with the Story Time, which is still around us, though separated from us by the veil of the world.

However, many of the Qarimi who came north came to escape the rigidities of the caste system which ruled the southlands, or simply came because their temperament was more pragmatic than spiritual. The majority of Qarimites in the Crimson Sands have settled for the worship of the Hundred Gods, who offer immediate aid and demand little, with only a minority still focussed on the ancient observances to the ancestors.

Communities: Zanat'lan, Deep Well, Bazaar, Teng'la, Yarsht, Farthest, the Dune Sailors.

Crunchy bits:

Cultural Abilities

(Artistic) Appraisal (R) : Figure out the true worth of artworks and artefacts. Keeps you from buying a pig in a poke.
(Craft) Distill plants(R) : Qarimi know how to get the best poisons, hallucinogens and medicines out of the flora of the desert.
(Outdoor) Dune sailing (I) : Knowing how to operate a dune vessel, how to sense the currents in the sands and the like.
(Outdoor) Direction Sense (I) : Never get lost, even if you're away from defined Paths.
(Priestly) Dream Walking (I) : Knowing how to enter a lucid dreaming state, while still waking. Similar to "dreamtime" notions stolen from the aborigines.
(Social) Sword Dance (V) : How to dance like a crazy dervish, while wielding a bladed weapon. Useful both for display and martial purposes.

Cultural Keys

Key of True Lineage
The character may trace his or her ancestry back to the First Peoples. The character is conscious that their actions reflect not only on on themselves but also on the whole line of Qarimi that links the Story Time with the Here And Now.

• Gain 1 XP whenever you make obeisance to your ancestors, tell their story or keep their traditions.
• Gain 3 XP whenever you undertake a dream quest or do a great deed which extends the legend of your lineage.
• Buyoff: Put aside worship of your ancestors and choose to follow another path, such as the obeisance to the Necromancer King or the worship of the Hundred Gods.

Cultural Secrets

Secret of Bodily Going
The character is attuned enough to the Story Time that s/he may enter a deep trance wherein s/he actually enters the Story Time and leaves the physical world behind. With a successful Dream Walking roll the character may trance and dream his or her way to where s/he wants to be. On awaking, she will find herself physically transported there.
Cost: 1 Instinct per day of travel.
Perquisite: The character must worship the Qarimite ancestors, not the Hundred Gods or other masters.

Secret of Leading the Waking
With this Secret the character may lead others, even those not naturally welcome, through the Story Time.
Cost: 1 Instinct per "guest".
Perquisite: Again, this gift is only available to orthodox Qarimites.

Secret of the Healing Slumber
The character may use trance to effect significant healing. While in the Story Time you receive a bonus die to all Healing and Counsel checks to remove damage.
Cost: none.
Perquisite: Only available to Orthodox Qarimi.

Timora is the Qarimi word for "crimson sands". Even the name of the land that was once Tan Silat now adverts to the doom that has overcome them. The people who call themselves Timorans are twice doomed - once by the loss of Tan Silat, and once by the rise to power of Gorann Zuur, the Necromancer King.

More detail here.

Communities: The Silent City, North Point, Iron Gate, The Yellow City, Bazaar, Teng'la, Mountain Foot, The Vale of Brinn.

Crunchy bits:

Cultural Abilities

(Artistic) Appraisal (R) : Figure out the true worth of artworks and artefacts. Keeps you from buying a pig in a poke.
(Craft) Forgotten Lore (R) : Knowledge of the lost secrets and legends of Tan Silat.
(Craft) Use Artefact (R) : The ability to use the mysterious constructs and items salvaged from the ruins of the Lost Kingdom.
(Outdoor) Mining (V) : Extracting ore from the rock, the ability to survive underground, and to survive the prospector's lifestyle.
(Fighting) Infantry (V) : A fighting style dependent on troops, tactics and manouvres. Includes training with spear, short-sword and shield.

Cultural Keys

Key of the Slave to Darkness
The character is either beholden to or under the eerie control of the Necromancer King. while this obviously sucks for the character, for the player it can be a lot of fun to play someone who is partially under the control of another. And, hey, this Key lets you milk it for points so why the hell not? Go, author stance!

• Gain 1 XP whenever you act in the service of Goran Zuur.
• Gain 2 XP whenever you endagner yourself or violate your principles in the service of Goran Zuur.
• Gain 5 XP whenever you are successful in some major task which furthers the interests of Goran Zuur.
• Buyoff: Break the control or otherwise loose yourself from whatever hold Goran Zuur has over you.

Cultural Secrets

Devices are the flotsam and jetsam of lost Tan Silat. The old kingdom was home to artificers of great and enduring skill and many amazing inventions were wrought by their hands. Even in these lost times ancient works of wonder persist, buried by the sands or housed in forgotten mausloea of that which was. The Secret of [Device] is a generalized Secret that can represent ownership of any of hundreds of possible artifacts from the before time.

First we will present some generalized rules for Devices, then some examples.

The Black Mountains of Kreth ring off the kingdoms of the crimson sands to the north and west. This is a good solid chunk of mountain and really divides the KCS from whatever is over them (all edges of the setting are blank). The barbarians who live in them are influenced (mildly) by the tribes of the Hindu Kusht, by Conan, and by a very nice Sikh gentlemen whom I knew as a kid and who explained to me the sacred vestments of the Sikh.

Many different tribes of Krethaani live in the mountains. They worship the Old Gods - a pantheon that was ancient before time began, but has been outmoded for centuries now. Certainly the folk of the Crimson Sands would scoff at such worship - though not while the Barbarians were near. In fact, worship is a big deal to the barbarians and cult membership is where a good chunk of their crunch comes in. (See below.)

They organize themselves into tribes, which are represented by various animals. I'm trying to avoid the word "totem" here, since that brings with it a lot of the wrong cultural baggage. The animals are really symbols of the tribes, rather than anything else. The tribes war amongst each other constantly - not blood-drenched feuds so much as competition for each other's resources. Tribes subsist on farming goats or small gardens on the rugged mountainside, and on raiding the (now rather spartan) herds of the lowlanders, or of other tribes.

Physically, tribesmen look like Sikhs, in that they are large, caucasian (in the true sense) gents (and ladies). The men are usually forbidden to cut their hair or shave, hence the term barbarians, don'cha know. They dress in linens and sheepskins. Leather is rare and sandals are more common than boots. Symbols of one's cult membership are common. Tribal weapons tend to be spear, small shield and knife, with bolas and slings common as missile weapons. Iron is found in the mountains and they know how to work it, but its supply is too meager for metal armour to have caught on.

Communities: Most tribes make their homes in the Black mountains of Kreth. However, Krethaani are not uncommon in the kingdoms of the Crimson Sands, where many work as mercenaries, guardsmen, enforcers or hired hands. They are most common in North Point, Iron Gate and Bazaar.

Crunchy bits:

Cultural Abilities

(Innate) : Endure suffering (V) : The Krethaani way is a hard one. This ability represents their ability to survive cold, torture, disease and long hours of boredom on the hunt. It may be used to augument Resist, and vice versa.
(Priestly) : Cult Lore (R) : Knowledge of the legends, rituals and customs of one of the Krethaani tribal cults. This ability is only open to those who take the Key of Initiation -- see below.
(Craft) : Ironworking (R) : The Krethaani know how to refine iron and make steel -- knowledge which they jealously guard. Each tribe has at least one ironworker.
(Fighting) : Spear-fighting (V) : Knowledge of how to use a spear as a weapon, both in hunting and in war.

Cultural Keys

Key of the Initiate : The character is initiated in a cult of one of the Old Gods. Take 1 XP whenever you swear by your God, observe his customs or explain (or impose) your faith on/to others. Take 2 XP whenever your God's path causes conflict for you. Take 5 XP whenever you endanger your life in service to your God or your Cult. Buyoff: Leave the cult, denounce your God, put aside his magic and don't look back.

Cultural Secrets

Most barbarian secrets are Cult Secrets. meaning they have a perquisite of Key of the Initiate for that cult. I haven't really worked out the details yet, but I plan to give each Cult three Secrets, possibly ordered Initiate, Devotee, Priest or somesuch. Yes, I'm stealing from HeroQuest.

Some types of cult secrets:

• Refresh one of your pools in an unusual circumstance. F'rex, a servant of, oh, let's say Crom, might refresh his vigour whenever he enters a killing ecstacy and leaves none of his foes alive.
• Swear by your God and spend one point from a pool appropriate to your cult to add a bonus die to magical resistance. This is on top of any pool points you may take for the Reaction or Resist roll in question.
• Basically, any secret could be a cult one. I really need to mock up some example cults, I guess.

Secret of Animal Companion: An animal of the type appropriate to your tribe accompanies and aids you. It has no supernatural powers but does seem to be relatively intelligent. Since most tribes are aligned with hawks and mountain lions rather than with bunnies and turtles, this is probably a good thing.

The Plateau of Rama lies to the east of the crimson sands. It is separated from the sunken kingdom by terrible cliffs, standing nearly half a mile high. Only a few know the treacherous paths by which a man may descend these cliffs. Even then, the paths are so steep and so treacherous that it is impossible to imagine bringing a wagon, a camel, or even a well-trained mule up or down them. In this way, the barrier between Rama and the Crimson Sands is nearly complete. Isolated individuals may occasionally cross it, but there is no regular trade, no armies march across it and very little cultural exchange occurs.

Another reason for this is that Ramanites have a very bad reputation in the lands of the crimson sands. This stems direcly from their religion, in which they worship death. The fact that Goran Zuur is an exile of Rama, and has used the Ramanite magics to raise the unliving legions which cement his power base, certainly does nothing to further endear the lowlanders to the people of the steppes.

But those inside the Ramanite religion see something very different from what outsiders see. Although their religion certainly does venerate death as the greatest, the last and the most sacred state, it is not one that is inherently evil. The Ramanites merely acknowledge that death is the gateway into another plane, one that is here, all around us, and one with which we can have communion if we open ourselves to it.

Unlike the Crimson Sands, Rama is comparatively lawful. The land is organized into principalities, each ruled over by a single city which is led by a Priest-King. The Priest-Kings and their city states form a loose alliance, which is responsible for enforcing justice and seeing to the needs of the people. Basically, it's a theocracy, and while the codes of behaviour are strict life in Rama is probably more comfortable for most of its people than life in the crimson sands.

That said, the game's not set in Rama, is it? Ergo, Ramanite characters will de facto be those who have chosen to leave their native land and go forth into the world. They could be political exiles, religious heretics or merely curious adventurers hungry for the forbidden knowledge lost beneath the shifting sands of Timora. whatever the reason, deciding why a Ramanite has left home and come to the planes of sand is a key element in their creation.

Communities: Because of the above, Ramanites do not receive the free Community Membership Key that other peoples do. (Or if they do it is to a commuity in distant Rama and will rarely come up in play.) They may take membership in any other community by use of a regular Advance, just as any other character may.

Crunchy bits:

Cultural Abilities

(Craft) Anatomy (R) : Detailled knowledge of human anatomy. Useful in preparing the dead, performing surgery, etc.
(Craft) Bladework (I) : The use of a blade for precise cutting -- useful both for surgery and for combat. Woot!
(Priestly) Cerements (R) : The preparation of the dead for burial in accordance with Ramanite tradition.
(Priestly) The Black Speech (R*) - special, see below

Cultural Keys

Key of the Death Hunter:
As the Qek cultural key.

Cultural Secrets

The Black Speech : Ramanites have access to a number of Secrets concerning The Black Speech, which has been described above. These Secrets are:

• Secret of the Black Speech - The character knows the language of The Black Speech and may use it to influence the minds of others. This Secret allows the character to take advances in the 'The Black Speech' Ability, which is a Priestly ability, listed above. At this level, the Black Speech may affect up to half a dozen targets at once. All must be within earshot (and able to hear - deaf people and those who fill their ears with wax are unaffected). Targets will be aware that they are being influenced by the words they hear but will be helpless to resist (unless they make their rolls, of course...). The effects of the speech wear off within an hour.
  Cost: 1 Reason per contest used.
• Secret of the Subtle Voice - Characters with this ability cause those they successfully influence to forget that they ever heard the Black Speech. Their minds become clouded and they rationalize the actions they were influenced to take to the best of their ability to do so.
  Cost: 1 Reason.
  Perquisite: Secret of the Black Speech
• Secret of the Opiate Eye - The speaker may alter the sensory perceptions of the listeners, changing what they perceive.
  Cost: 1 Reason per sense.
  Perquisite: Secret of the Black Speech
• Secret of Swaying the Horde - The speaker may amplify his voice, and his power, to affect greater numbers of listeners:
      - up to25 targets costs 2 Reason
      - up to 100 targets costs 5 Reason
      - all targets costs 9 Reason
  Perquisite: Secret of the Black Speech
• Secret of the Lingering Whisper - With this Secret, the effects of the Black Speech can be made to persist for greater periods.
      - effects that last till sunrise/sundown cost 1 Reason
      - effects that last a week cost 3 Reason
      - effects that last a month cost 6 Reason
      - effects that last half a year cost 10 Reason
  

4) Extra Crunch

Some Rules Tweaks

As mentioned above, there are a couple of small differences between the print version of The Shadow of Yesterday and the online version. This game will follow the latter rather than the former.

Additionally, there are a couple of house rules which will be in effect for this game.

We will be using an alternate set of rules for Bringing Down the Pain - the extended contest mechanism of TSOY. These rules better allow characters to play off specific strengths against each other's weaknesses, rather than the simpler winner-take-all approach of the regular BDTP rules.

Places & Ways : Nodes & Edges

Desert cultures don't understand space the same way that other cultures do. simply put, the sand is largely worthless. There is no "there" there. The only things that are of import are the real places - the oases, settlements and other points of interest. Thus maps of desert regions are not composed of borders between regions. Instead, such maps are composed of nodes - the points of interest - and edges - the lines that connect them. From a gaming perspective, this approach to mapping is rather useful and lends itself to a couple of nice pieces of trickery.

Secret of Another Culture
The character has spent a long time living amongst another culture and has come to know their ways. He or she may count that culture as their own in game mechanical terms - including taking any Cultural Abilities, Secrets or Keys, or choosing a Home Community suited to that culture.

Secret of the Ready Mount
The character may always find a camel, mule or other riding beast in relatively short order and thus does not have a hard time getting about in the desert.
Cost: 1 Instinct to find a beast by the end of the current scene. 3 Instinct to find a beast right away, leap onto its back and be off.

Secret of the Liquid Eyes
The character has great, dark eyes which seem to gaze into the very soul of anyone who meets them for too long. These count as a weapon, adding +2 damage to all social attacks against anyone of a sexually compatible disposition with whom the character engages.

1) Free Keys

The Key of Opposition
Goraan Zuur, the Necromancer King of the Silent city is explicitly in this setting to be the bad guy. Although sword & sorcery settings typically do not feature ultimate conflicts between good and evil, they often do contain outright evil elements. Zuur is such an element. In the interests of creating some rudiments of cohesion amongst the player characters I like to offer them all a free Key: The Key of Opposition (to Goraan Zuur). Note that characters can have whatever reasons they choose for this key. Perhaps they aspire to Zuur's power. Perhaps they strive to bring back the lost dynasty of Tan Silat. Perhaps his men murdered a loved one while suppressing rebellion and the character is simply out for revenge. Whatever the reason, this key should function more or less the same:

• Gain 1 XP whenever you act against the interests of the Necromancer King, or help those oppressed by his rule.
• Gain 2 XP whenever you endanger yourself or compromise your own plans in order to thwart the plans of the Necromancer King.
• Gain 5 XP whenever you score an important victory over the Necromancer King or his agents.
• Buyoff: Give in to, serve, deal with or otherwise accept the Necromancer King or his agents.

Key of Community Membership
In the desert, no-one survives without community. Apart from anything, both food and water are extremely scarce. Being a part of a community means having a place where people will share those things so necessary to survival with you. It also means having an obligation to that community, and to uphold whatever standards of behaviour that community considers "normal".

In Crimson Sands every character may start as a member of a Home Community. This is a free Key which allows the character to be from somewhere. Players who desire that their characters be mendicants are of course free to waive this, but the offer is there. (Except for Ramanites who, by coming to the Crimson Sands, are pretty much de facto itinerants). Any character may add additional communities to their list simply by taking the Key of Community Membership over.

Mechanically, the bonuses for the Key of Community Membership are as follows:

• Gain 1 XP whenever the character engages in play in the regular activities of the community - hunting, trading, festivals, rituals, etc.
• Gain 2 XP whenever the character inconveniences him or herself for the sake of the community, taking time out from plans or making sacrifices.
• Gain 5 XP whenever the character endangers his or her life, or sacrifices something s/he really wants for the sake of the community.
• Buyoff: Burn your bridges and walk away from the community.

2) Other Keys

Key of the Kicker
The term "Kicker" was devised by Ron Edwards in his game Sorcerer. Simply put, a Kicker is the "inciting incident" which propels a character into action in a dramatic piece. In Sorcerer, players are required to create specific Kickers for their characters as part of the process of character generation. The goal of play for a given "adventure" is for characters to each work towards the resolution of their individual Kickers. For some Crimson Sands adventures this approach will also be very suitable.

In such adventures the Story Guide should either require players to take one Kicker Key from their starting allotment of Advances or else provide them with a free extra Key to cover their Kicker. (It should be noted that with a Kicker, a Community Membership and the Key of Opposition, characters may be starting with three extra keys. Story Guides or play groups should figure out how many Keys they think is an optimal starting amount.)

A Kicker is any inciting incident. It impels the character towards a course of action. The Kicker is resolved when the course of action comes to its end. Hamlet's chat with his father's ghost is such an event, as is Luke Skywalker's discovery of a fragmentary message from Princess Leia inside his uncle's R2 unit. My personal favourite example of a Kicker is in Norman Mailer's novel Tough Guys Don't Dance, whose protagonist wakes up from a drinking binge with a pounding headache and memory loss, only to find his ex wife's severed head in the icebox.

The Key of the Kicker looks like this:

• Gain 1 XP in every scene where your character is actively working towards resolving his or her Kicker.
• Gain 2 XP every time the character endangers him or herself or sacrifices something dear to him/her in order to further pursue the Kicker.
• Gain 5 XP whenever the character makes significant progress in resolving the Kicker.
• Buyoff: Resolve the Kicker outright or abandon it for good and all.

Other Resources

1) Additional Crimson Sands stuff

Some additional web documents may help you play crimson Sands: