Here’s another thread item developed for my Earthdawn campaign.

Hunter’s Companion
Maximum Threads: 1
Spell Defense: 12

Hunter’s Companion is a large blue-green collar that appears to be made of some type of lizard hide. A silver clasp on the collar has a large incisor hanging from it. The clasp can be opened to remove the tooth from the collar.

The collar was made by the Beastmaster Zael, who lived before the Scourge. He was a member of the group known as the Spears of Tolor, which helped defend the city of Raj Tolor. The hide and the tooth came from the first Horror the group destroyed.

A storm wolf came to the group’s aid in the battle, and Zael formed a bond with the animal. The wolf, who became known as Frost, continued to travel with the group, and Zael crafted the collar to commemorate the event and The bond between Zael and Frost grew, and Zael eventually took Frost as his familiar.

The pair fell to a Horror attacking Raj Tolor, and were laid to rest in the vaults of the city fortress.

As the thread ranks of the collar increase, the animal wearing the collar develops physical characteristics reminiscent of a Horror. Its hide grows tougher, its muscular structure grow heavier, and its teeth and claws grow sharper and more feral in appearance.

Rank 1
Cost: 200
Key Knowledge: The user must learn the Name of the collar. In order to activate its powers, the character must wear the tooth as a pendant or brooch, and have an animal companion wear the collar.
Effect: The collar grants the animal wearing the collar the Durability talent at rank 1, raising its death and unconsciousness ratings by 6 and 5, respectively. The rank of the talent increases as the woven thread rank of the collar increases.

Rank 2
Cost: 300
Key Knowledge: The user must learn the name of the collar’s maker.
Effect: The animal’s hide toughens somewhat, granting the animal one additional point of physical armor.

Rank 3
Cost: 500
Key Knowledge: The user must learn the Name and species of Zael’s animal companion.
Effect: The animal becomes more flexible and fluid, granting a +1 step bonus to its attack tests.

Rank 4
Cost: 800
Key Knowledge: The owner must learn the Name of the group Zael belonged to.
Effect: The animal’s teeth and/or claws become sharper, granting it a +1 step bonus to damage tests.

Rank 5
Cost: 1300
Key Knowledge: The owner must learn the names of the other members of Zael’s group, the dwarf Elementalist Dunsin Aree and the troll Warrior Korin.
Effect: The changes to the animal become more pronounced, and the animal grows scaly plates on its body, granting a total of three points of physical armor.

Rank 6
Cost: 2100
Key Knowledge: The character must learn the final resting place of Zael and Frost.
Deed: The character travels to their resting place and swears a familiar oath with the animal wearing the collar. If they already share a familiar bond, they reaffirm that bond (at no additional damage cost). This legend award for this deed is 2,100 legend points.
Effect: The transformation is even more extreme. The bonuses to attack and damage each increase to +3 as result of the physical changes.

Rank 7
Cost: 3400
Key Knowledge: The owner must learn where Zael found the materials for the collar.
Effect: The collar grants the animal a karma pool. The pool has a maximum of 10 points, with a step 6 karma die. Points may be spent on any test the animal makes. Spent points normally refresh at the rate of one per week.

So… the weather has been strange around here lately.

We started off the month with a week of warm, spring-like, thaw weather. The snow was melting, and life was looking good (consider, here in the wilds of the North, we often don’t see spring until summertime).

Then, last Thursday and Friday we got hammered with a Nor’easter that blew in and dumped (at last tally) about a foot and a half of snow — in about 36 hours.

Global warming was sounding like a damn fine idea the fourth time I was out clearing the driveway.

And now, the last couple days… back to temps in the mid-upper 40s, snow melting… and this evening it was raining!

Strange weather indeed.

In my continuing efforts as an Earthdawn fan and booster, I have started up a play-by-post game of Earthdawn over at RPGnet, entitled “Scavenger Hunt” it is an introductory scenario of sorts, revolving around the election of a new magistrate in the city of Travar.

What is unusual about “elections” in Travar is that a group of wizards devises a series of challenges, and the candidates hire champions to take part in the tournament. Whichever candidate’s champions win the tournament, that candidate wins the magisterial seat.

It looks like it is going to be a good game. Here are links to the relevant forums if you’re interested:

The In-Character thread.

The Out-of-Character thread.

One of the players has also put together a Wiki for the game. You can visit it here.

I have posted a new entry in the Riders on the Storm saga. It is another brief entry, but transcribing it over from the original was somewhat… problematic due to the eccentricity of the player who wrote it.

You don’t want to miss this one — it needs to be seen to be believed.

Rensil: 13-18 Raquas, 1509 TH

I don’t know if any of you have seen the trailers for the latest “comic-book” movie to come out of Hollywood — Constantine — but I have to say that not since I learned Winona Ryder was playing opposite Richard #@$%-ing Gere in the woeful Autumn in New York has the casting of a film gotten me so riled up.

When I first learned that Constantine (based on DC’s Vertigo title Hellblazer) was being made, I was pleased… John Constantine is a great character, and while I haven’t followed the series closely, I have enjoyed the parts of it I have read — and his appearances in other DC books (like Sandman or The Books of Magic) have been fun.

Then I learned that Keanu Reeves is playing the titular role…

Keanu @#%$-ing Reeves!

Never mind that Keanu is a generally sucky, one-dimensional actor…

John Constantine is British! And based on what I’ve seen in the trailers, Keanu doesn’t even try a British accent…

(For which, I suppose I should be glad… we were probably looking at a degree of bad accent not seen since Kevin Kostner’s fabled attempts in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves.)

What was that Shakesperean film Keanu was in with Kenneth Branagh? As You Like It? No… it was Much Ado About Nothing. (*shudder*)

Don’t get me wrong, there are some roles Keanu has done well in. Johnny Mnemonic has one of the greatest monolgues in the history of film — the “slag heap” speech, as my buddy called it. Priceless stuff. Besides, Johnny has had part of his brain removed — that would explain why his personality is so flat, and plays into one of Keanu’s strengths.

I mean sure, Constantine is a generally cool cucumber… but I’m sure there are any number of British actors who could do it better.

It’s a shame, really. It could have been so cool… and yet, Keanu makes me fear it will suck.

There is some potential for redemption in the person of Rachel Weisz… rowr.

We woke up this morning to find that a snowstorm snuck up on us last night. Here in Bangor we got about a foot of light, powdery white stuff. It wasn’t too difficult to clear away — the biggest problem was where to put it all.

Hopefully in the next day or two some pictures will be made available so you can see what we suffer up here… and why I refer to it as the “great white north.”

A couple of quick notes in reference to the Staff of the Aerie. The Legend Award for the deed at Rank 7 is 1300 Legend Points, and the oath sworn between the Elementalist and the spirit is a standard Blood Promise Oath. The sprit’s end of the bargain is to recharge the gemstone. The Elementalist’s end of the deal is left fot the Gamemaster to devise.

As I have been working on the site-wide adjustments to The Lore Merchant, I have also added some additional features. I have now added the option to syndicate the updates with ATOM. If you have a blog reader, or something along those lines, you can now get easy updates of the material. The link is in the menu bar to the right.

Last year, there was a bit of a long-term story running on TechTV’s The Screen Savers about a website — freeipods.com — that was giving away free iPods (you know, that hot Apple mp3 player). You sign up for one of the services offered through the site, refer five (or more) friends who also sign up for a service… and they send you a free iPod.

After some digging, it turns out the offer is legit, so I decided to take the plunge and sign up. I’d like all my faithful Lore Merchant readers (yes, all five of you) to help me out here. Click on the link below, and sign up for one of the services offered.

Free iPod Offer

Sadly, this offer is only valid for US residents. My international readers will not be able to take advantage of this offer. Thanks in advance for your assistance!

Tonight I thought I would give you guys some crunch — here are the game statistics for one of the magic items recovered from an old Temple of Chorrolis.

Staff of the Aerie

Maximum Threads: 1

Spell Defense: 14

This four-and-a-half foot long wooden staff is decorated along its shaft with carved looping whirls inset with silver. At one end is a pair of stylized wings, also crafted of silver, which flank an oblong crystal of blue quartz. At the other end is a burnished steel endcap.

The staff was created before the Scourge by the Elementalist Dunsin Aree. Dunsin was from the city of Raj Tolor, a vibrant trade city in the formerly fertile farmland of what is now the Badlands. As news of the coming Scourge spread, Dunsin did what he could to prepare the city for the Horrors — and defend it from them. He was aided in this endeavor by two other adepts: Korin, a troll Warrior, and Zael, a human Beastmaster. Together they formed the Spears of Tolor, a group dedicated to serving the people of Raj Tolor.

On one of their expeditions to an outlying village, Dunsin discovered that one of his former students had become corrupted by a Horror. This corrupt Elementalist (whose name has been lost to history) had bound several elemental spirits and was using them in dark magical rituals (which have also, thank the Passions, been lost to history). The Spears defeated the corrupt Elementalist, and one of the freed elementals gave Dunsin a blue quartz crystal imbued with elemental air. Dunsin used the crystal to construct his staff, a magical focus that held one of his spell matrices and boosted his magical abilities.

Rank 1

Cost: 200

Key Knowledge: The wielder must learn that this item is Named the Staff of the Aerie.

Effect: The crystal at the end of the staff acts as a Spell Matrix of rank equal to the thread rank. In addition, the staff grants the wielder a +1 to his spell defense.

Rank 2

Cost: 300

Key Knowledge: The wielder must learn the identity of the staff’s creator.

Effect: The staff grants the wielder a +1 step bonus to Spellcasting tests.

Rank 3

Cost: 500

Key Knowledge: The wielder must learn the name of the city-state that Dunsin was from.

Effect: The staff allows the user to cast the 1st-Circle Elementalist spell Air Armor. This takes the Elementalist’s action, and uses his own Spellcasting talent.

Rank 4

Cost: 800

Key Knowledge: The user must learn the Name of the group Dunsin belonged to.

Effect: The staff now grants a +2 bonus to the user’s Spell Defense, and a +2-step bonus to the user’s Spellcasting tests.

Rank 5

Cost: 1300

Key Knowledge: The user must learn the Name of one of the other members of the Spears of Tolor.

Effect: The staff allows the user to cast the 4th Circle Elementalist Spell Air Blast, as if it were held in an enhanced Matrix (i.e. the user does not need to weave the thread).

Rank 6

Cost: 2100

Key Knowledge: The user must learn the Name of the other member of the Spears of Tolor.

Effect: The staff grants a 2-step bonus to the user’s Willforce talent for spells cast from the staff; this includes the spell matrix crystal, and the two additional spell powers. If the user does not posses the Willforce talent, the bonus is applied to the caster’s Willpower for the purposes of determining effect.

Rank 7

Cost: 3400

Key Knowledge: The user must learn the source of the gem on the staff.

Deed: The user must have an air elemental recharge the gem in the staff, which requires the user to swear a blood oath with the spirit.

Effect: The staff grants a 2-step bonus to the user’s Willpower for the purposes of summoning or commanding elemental spirits.