Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 bawylie Aug 21, 2014 8:50:12	Nature. In most D&D games I've seen, it's merely a backdrop. We use trees, beautiful flora, friendly fauna, and an idyllic, romantic notion of balance to represent nature in our games. It's typically an afterthought, subordinate to our wicked plots of mad wizards and courtly intrigue.  Then maybe you get a player who wants to be a Druid or Ranger or Barbarian, and you read the sections in the Dungeon Masters Guide about balance and sprites, and civilization and you ask yourself, "Huh? How am I gonna use this daisy-eating elfin japery?" But a Druid adventurer isn't merely a wandering hippy in hemp pants. He's a player in your game - ready to get his face melted by awesome. And, like the Scorpions before him, he cries, "Here I am!" And you must feverishly respond "Rock you like a Hurricane!" (It's in the rules).  Druid adventurers and their ilk are primarily concerned with The Forces of Nature.  We're not talking about Sad-Elves and their obsession with the last Mallorn Tree, here. The Forces of Nature are catastrophic, apathetic, and alive! Primal Spirits don't pitifully linger about waiting to die. They don't hunger or plot. Their motivations and actions are inscrutable. More than anything else, the primal forces of nature want to BE.  Imagine a Hurricane: phenomenal power, unchallengeable, unanswerable, but unable to manifest except under specific conditions. It's everything we love about Eldritch Horrors like Cthulhu, except your Druids, Rangers, and Survivalists are deeply interested in it.  And do they worship it? It doesn't care. Appease it? What could they possibly offer. If it bleeds, they can kill it. If it wants something, it can be bribed, tricked, or satisfied. A Primal Spirit is none of this. It's a Natural Disaster, marshaling imbalance and chaos, spending itself in its fury until it burns out - and quiet balance is restored... for a time.  Now THIS we can use! Impersonal forces of destruction typically beyond anyone's ability to control (let alone survive).  Some Druids might see these disasters as a calamity to be watched-for and guarded against, a punishment for imbalance run too far. Others might believe these expulsions of pent-up energy are necessary and good; titanic events that bring Nature back into balance (much like a wildfire can be beneficial to a forest ecology). This we can use for adventures, settings, hazards, religions & NPCs.  What d'ya got? Write up a Primal Spirit, it's worshippers, and the conditions under which it can come forth.
#2 arderkrag Aug 21, 2014 9:26:24	Gorgorath is a strange, impatient and intolerant consciousness that draws its strength from seismic disturbances of all kinds - earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, sinkholes - any expression of the world's physical instability will do for his purposes. Gorgorath is a very old spirit, formed in the mists before time from the fury of the primordial elements. Despite being able to manifest tremendous power, he only attracts a few followers due to his callous nature and lack of knowledge of his very existence. Gorgorath's followers that do exist venerate the Lord of Trembles at sites of great historic seismic events, and construct shrines near fissures and fault lines. There is a single great temple of Gorgorath deep within The Spine of the World in a long-dead volcano, where several clergy members and roughly a dozen temple prostitutes ply their trade. Gorgorath is chaotic neutral.
#3 bawylie Aug 21, 2014 9:28:59	Perfect!
#4 Goober4473 Aug 21, 2014 11:05:21	Utia is the rage of the woods. She is the thorn, the strangling vine, the poison spore, and the dense canopy that keeps wanderers lost. She is the patron of defending nature, specifically plants, against the imbalance that civilization brings. She is friend to those who respect plant life, and great enemy to any who would deforest and burn. In ancient times, Utia could take the form of an enormous humanoid made of roots and thorny vines. Now, she has been locked away in a place between lfie and death, deemed too dangerous even by the druds that communed with her. Her idea of "balance" allowed for almost no civilization to flourish, even those most would consider harmoneous and nature-loving. Utia seeks to be free, released into the world once more, but in the meantime takes any opportunity to feel the world again. As such, she offers deals to the descendants of the druid Dydd that locked her away, allowing them a portion of her power in exchange for control of their bodies on rare occasions. Utia is neutral evil, and has few worshippers.   One of my players has made a deal with Utia. He died, and she brought him back, now with plant modifications to his body, in exchange for the use of his body on each solstice and equenox. Mechanically, he began taking druid levels, but warlock levels with a fey pact would also make sense. Last night was the first session she appeared since the deal, and she spent the summer solstice drinking and partying with wild elves and fey, as well as the rest of the PCs. She wanted to have experiences and live, which she has missed dearly, but has now also made important contacts with the wild elves for further plots, hoping they will pave the way for this or another descendant of Dydd to release her.
#5 Mechatarrasque Aug 21, 2014 11:28:27	Almost sounds like kaiju to me (when primal spirits get coporeal).   Harrk was once known as the Glacier that Walks.  For a 5 centuries, he searched the land for a drink from the Spring from Which All Rivers Flow, crushing rocks and dragging soil behind him.  Then he stopped and melted.  Did he eventually find the Spring?  None know, but Harrk has become the spirit of a 1,000 lakes formed from his passing.  During the warm heat of the summer, he is drosy, and druids may ask for his aid without fear (as long as it doesn't require too much work), but the cold winter revives his thirst for the Spring, and any who walk on the ice of his lakes may be pulled in to answer his questions (and he cares naught for the fate of those he questions).
#6 iserith Aug 21, 2014 11:42:16	Gale, Primal Spirit of the Hurricane. Mother of Tornadoes. Bringer of Floods. Wrath of the Sea God Sekolah.   When the evil and blasphemy of the land-dwellers can no longer be tolerated, when the waters of the world are despoiled by their insatiable gluttony and waste, the sea will boil and give rise to Gale. She marshals the clouds to her side, feeding upon currents of ocean and air, growing ever larger and stronger. She sets her eyes upon the land and all who know of her coming must flee lest they be drowned or impaled by their own foul creations.    We, the Sahuagin of the Storm Surge, are her vanguard. We ride upon the waves that precede her landfall, to offer the blood of the land-dwellers to strengthen her primal might.
#7 Chaosmancer Aug 21, 2014 11:56:41	Trying to flip the traditional.   Chrk is the First Spark, the first light of flame in the darkness. He sees through the embers of campfires, the glow of candleflames, illuminating the darkness both literal and metaphysical. He is knowledgeable in many things, secrets that he shares with those who call upon him, like sparks drifting through the void to alight new flames. Why he shares these secrets is known only to him, though some imagine he hopes to spark more like himself in the darkness of mortals minds and hearts. Generally peaceful Chrk can be safely summoned in contained locations, like fire pits for a bonfire, but his appetite and desire to spread are great, and if given enough fuel or the right chance he will consume everything in his path.   ShL is the rushing waters, the unending stream. She cares for nothing except the movement of the water, the headlong rush down the mountainside and the crash of obstacles collapsing under her. Some see her as a spirit of freedom, summoning her in streams or lakes to seek advice or power, but most of these end in disaster, with ShL breaking free or tricking her summoner to release her, allowing her to break down banks and dams and destroy everything in her path.
#8 Lord_Ventnor Aug 21, 2014 11:58:49	A tale that seems to surface again and again, in both Druidic sagas or campfire tales in the wilderness, tells of the First Hunter. It goes by many names; the Primal Beast, the Alpha of Alphas, the Inescapable Predator. This spirit is said to be the archetype upon which all other predators are based. The First Hunter was the template which the wolf's jaws were based around. The swiftness of the shark is an echo of the First Hunter. Even those few mightiest of creatures, the dinosaurs, are but mere reflections of the First Hunter's power. The appearance of this spirit changes depending on who tells the tale. Some say that it is a shapechanger, assuming whatever form will allow it to finish the hunt it is currently on. Others say that the spirit possesses all aspects of the great natural predators at all times, and has no need to change form. And there are those who say that no one can ever know the true form of the First Hunter, because you can only see it moments before it has caught and devoured you.   The First Hunter cares not for those who worship it; the hunt is all that it lives for. It can be felt in every chase, from a bounty hunter tracking a fugitive to the legendary Wyld Hunt itself. Those who venerate the First Hunter try to emulate its perfect lethality. Druids will assume the forms of powerful predators, Rangers will master the art of tracking and stalking, Assassins will perfect the art of killing with the first blow, and Wizards will perfect the art of divination to better know their prey. These are but a few examples of those who follow the example of the First Hunter; know your prey, find the the perfect opportunity to strike, then finish the hunt without mercy.
#9 bawylie Aug 21, 2014 12:21:54	To Break a Heart of Stone    As the planet traverses space, endures seasons and aeons, it's crust expands and contracts. Mortals feel these tremors and think little of them. For none guess they are the flexations of the power of Ourea who strives to rise. No greater ambition than to push, to stand, to reach dizzying heights and survey from towering summit to dark crag. Ourea's slightest movement is suffering, transformative, and callous - he knows nothing of mortal life. Some few rare Dwarven Druids (Stonecallers and Diamondsouls) who have heard his voice report only his name, uttered in the cracks and groaning a of a shuddering land. They have learned this secret to Ourea's ultimate weakness: a pride stymied by a bent back. And now they conspire to lay him low, to prevent an inevitable rise, to break a heart of stone.