The World is coming apart... Literally.
The land is splintering.
The gods are at war.
Empires are crumbling.
Really, it's a time of opportunity!
The Splintering World Campaign Setting is a large and growing campaign setting designed with an eye to old-school sensibilities and a sandbox style of play.
The land is splintering.
The gods are at war.
Empires are crumbling.
Really, it's a time of opportunity!
The Splintering World Campaign Setting is a large and growing campaign setting designed with an eye to old-school sensibilities and a sandbox style of play.
It is the year 443 of the Vanir Era, by Midgard reckoning. One hundred years ago, war among the gods tore the World asunder. Now, chaos is ascendant while the gods negotiate peace. The storms that ravage the world increase in force. Earthquakes spread across the land, opening up deep fissures.
What was once a single continent is breaking apart. The World is splintering.
The World
The World is a globe circling a single, golden sun with a single, silver moon. It is tilted approximately twenty-three degrees at its axis. It spins around its axis once every twenty-four hours and it travels around its sun once every three-hundred and sixty-five days. About seventy-one percent of the World is covered by ocean. The other twenty-nine percent is covered by a single, massive continent surrounded by a series of islands of varying sizes. This land mass is splintering due to tectonic plates slowly sliding apart.
Its summer and winter seasons are separated by two sets of storms formed by the rotating weather pattern that spirals above the land, driven by the air heating and cooling as the World circles the sun.
The civilized regions of the Splintering World are widely separated, both geographically and culturally, though they all share a relatively similar level of technology, which has remained static for a millennium. This is due to the jealousy of the gods, who do not like to see a rival pantheon’s worshipers gaining advantages over their own.
The Year consists of two primary seasons—summer and winter. These seasons are divided by two month-long storms known as the Sun’s Storms, which end summer, and the Moon’s Storms, which end winter. These storms are so fierce that all activity in the World come to a halt. Those without shelter during these months of storms are almost certain to die. Each month has five weeks of six days each. The Sun’s Day is a day of rest. This accounts for three-hundred and sixty days.
The remaining five days celebrate the end of the Moon’s Storms—which mark the end of winter—and the beginning of the warm season. Called Yule, these five days are marked with feasts, drinking, storytelling, and gifts across the World.
The Splintering
As a result of the War of the Gods, Chaos has become ascendant and Order is weakened. The World is splintering as the gods fail to maintain Order.
The Splintering is driven by tectonic plates beginning to move faster and more violently than pure geology would entail. This, in turn, is literally tearing the world apart, and that tearing is accompanied by frequent and dangerous earthquakes.
Religion in the Splintering World
In this World there are multiple pantheons of gods, each jealously guarding their own territories. The more intelligent monstrous races even worship gods all their own. The inhabitants of the Splintering World tend to be aware that other regions have other gods, and they take it for granted that when a person leaves one territory and enters another, he or she will often pay respects to that region’s gods. If a farmer moves from Arast to Midgard, for example, it does him little good to continue to offer sacrifices to Grandmother Soil, for Grandmother Soil as no power in Midgard; he will offer his sacrifices to Freya if he wants his crops to grow.
There is one important exception to this, however: clerics. Clerics do not change gods as do the wider populace; rather, their divine patronage follows them wherever they go. For this reason, clerics often distrust other clerics from foreign lands, since their very presence is seen as an encroachment.
What was once a single continent is breaking apart. The World is splintering.
The World
The World is a globe circling a single, golden sun with a single, silver moon. It is tilted approximately twenty-three degrees at its axis. It spins around its axis once every twenty-four hours and it travels around its sun once every three-hundred and sixty-five days. About seventy-one percent of the World is covered by ocean. The other twenty-nine percent is covered by a single, massive continent surrounded by a series of islands of varying sizes. This land mass is splintering due to tectonic plates slowly sliding apart.
Its summer and winter seasons are separated by two sets of storms formed by the rotating weather pattern that spirals above the land, driven by the air heating and cooling as the World circles the sun.
The civilized regions of the Splintering World are widely separated, both geographically and culturally, though they all share a relatively similar level of technology, which has remained static for a millennium. This is due to the jealousy of the gods, who do not like to see a rival pantheon’s worshipers gaining advantages over their own.
The Year consists of two primary seasons—summer and winter. These seasons are divided by two month-long storms known as the Sun’s Storms, which end summer, and the Moon’s Storms, which end winter. These storms are so fierce that all activity in the World come to a halt. Those without shelter during these months of storms are almost certain to die. Each month has five weeks of six days each. The Sun’s Day is a day of rest. This accounts for three-hundred and sixty days.
The remaining five days celebrate the end of the Moon’s Storms—which mark the end of winter—and the beginning of the warm season. Called Yule, these five days are marked with feasts, drinking, storytelling, and gifts across the World.
The Splintering
As a result of the War of the Gods, Chaos has become ascendant and Order is weakened. The World is splintering as the gods fail to maintain Order.
The Splintering is driven by tectonic plates beginning to move faster and more violently than pure geology would entail. This, in turn, is literally tearing the world apart, and that tearing is accompanied by frequent and dangerous earthquakes.
Religion in the Splintering World
In this World there are multiple pantheons of gods, each jealously guarding their own territories. The more intelligent monstrous races even worship gods all their own. The inhabitants of the Splintering World tend to be aware that other regions have other gods, and they take it for granted that when a person leaves one territory and enters another, he or she will often pay respects to that region’s gods. If a farmer moves from Arast to Midgard, for example, it does him little good to continue to offer sacrifices to Grandmother Soil, for Grandmother Soil as no power in Midgard; he will offer his sacrifices to Freya if he wants his crops to grow.
There is one important exception to this, however: clerics. Clerics do not change gods as do the wider populace; rather, their divine patronage follows them wherever they go. For this reason, clerics often distrust other clerics from foreign lands, since their very presence is seen as an encroachment.