Arcanis
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Arcanis is a campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons game, created and supported by Paradigm Concepts. It is also the name of the fictional world where the setting takes place. The setting was launched in 2001 and is known for its odd twists on the fantasy genre, as well as its wide member approval and community-based design and construction.
Arcanis is set on the continent of Onara, where a crumbling Coryani Empire (reminiscent of the Western Roman Empire) struggles with newly created nations such as Milandir (reminiscent of the Holy Roman Empire) or Canceri (reminiscent of Russia during the Middle Ages and the Balkans).
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[edit] Races of Arcanis
The playable Races in Arcanis differ from the traditional races in other Dungeons & Dragons campaign settings. There are seven primary races: Dark-kin (Infernaly Tainted), Dwarves (Cursed Giants), Elorii (Elves), Gnomes (Child of a humans and a dwarf), Humans, Ss'ressen (Two Tribes, Black Talon and Ashen Hide), and Val (Touched by the gods, many different bloodlines).
[edit] Nations of Arcanis
The nations of Arcanis are mostly human affairs, all related to the First Imperium that fell thousands of years ago; most of these are ruled by the Val. The human nations are:
- The Republic of Altheria
- The Theocracy of Canceri
- The Coryani Empire
- The Hinterlands
- The League of Princes
- Milandir
- Ymandragore
The three Elorii Nations are:
- Elonbe
- Entaris
- Malfea
The Dwarven Enclaves are:
- Solanos Mor
- Nol Dappa
- Tulipet
- Tir Betoq
- Encali
There are two major enclaves of S'sressen, one of which is an offshoot of the other:
- Black Talons
- Ashen Hide
The other races are pretty much outcasts and wanderers, though occasionally small racial enclaves arise in larger cities.
[edit] Religion in Arcanis
The Deities of Arcanis are sectioned off into different pantheons. The main pantheon is the Pantheon of Man, of which human gods reside. Other pantheons such as the Pantheon of the Elves, are broken, or destroyed leaving only one or no gods behind.
In Arcanis, "true" gods are unconcerned with petty mortal morality, so have no alignment as gods in other settings do; only churches have alignment, depending on what aspects of a god they worship. The Pantheon of Man, for example, does not have alignment, but the Ss'regorean Varn Gods do.
The three brother gods, the Head of the Pantheon and his two brothers, are the first three gods of the pantheon Illiir, the Patron God of Emperors and Order as well as the Sun God; Yarris, God of the Sea; and Neroth, God of Death. Further, three Goddesses are their sisters Saluwé, Goddess of the Earth, consort of Illiir; Beltine, Goddess of the Soul; and Anshar, Goddess of Pain and Suffering. The children of Illiir and Saluwé are Hurrian, God of Storms and Honorable Combat, the Reluctant Warrior and Nier, God of Fire, War and Slaughter, and Larissa, Oracle of the Gods, and more recently, Goddess of Pleasure. The child of Neroth and Beltine is Cadic, the God of Shadows, Murder, and Music. They have a son named Sarish, God of Oaths and Binding of Demons. There is reference to Altheres, God of Knowledge, Invention, and Artifice, as being the "Grand Uncle of Sarish," but exactly where he fits into the divine family tree is unclear.
[edit] Schisms
The Mother Church of the Pantheon of Man once held all the gods in equal worship, until a schism occurred which drove followers of Neroth, Sarish and Nier to form an independent church, the Dark Triumvirate in Canceri. The Mother Church and the Dark Triumvirate differ in several ways, primarily in that the Dark Triumvirate approves of activities the Mother Church fears: the creation of Undead and the summoning of demons and devils for the most part.
[edit] The Ss'ressen and Ss'regorean Gods
The Fire Dragon is the god worshipped by the Black Talon ss'ressen. The Ashen Hide split off from this group, believing that Fire Dragon was actually the human god, Nier.
The Ss'regorean Empire once worshipped the gods Kassegore and Yig. With the ascension of the Naga to a ruling position in the Empire, they have begun to worship a pantheon known as the Varn.
[edit] The Elorii Pantheon
The Elorii follow the Elemental Lords which created them, despite the destruction of four of them. The remaining Elemental Lord, the life spirit Belisarda, was believed to have been destroyed by The Other (or Umor, as the Elorii knew him), until the arrival of a Prophet who claimed this was not true.
- Belisarda - Goddess of Life and Healing
- Keleos - God of Fire
- Mârok - God of Earth
- Osalían- God of Air
- Beröe- God of Water
[edit] Elorii Heresy
Recently a common movement among Elorii has been the practice of identifying elemental lords with one of the human gods that supposedly absorbed those elemental lords powers. For instance, some Elorii followers of the Lord of Air consider Hurrian, the Storm Lord in the Pantheon of Man, to be their God. To other Elorii this seems to be heresy and is considered to be so, although the Mother Church (and the Dark Triumvirate in the case of Nier) has little or no issues for Elorii who choose this path.
[edit] Myrantian Gods
The ancient Myrantian Hegemony had its own pantheon of gods, although much information about them has been lost to the ages. The Mother Church of Coryan considers worship of the Myrantian deities heresy, but allows the worship of traditional Pantheon of Man deities under the names of Myrantian gods. The Myrantian Pantheon seems primarily based on the Ancient Egyptian pantheon, though not entirely. Tzizhet is considered a combination of Sarish and Neroth. Shu is a god of storms, considered the same as Hurrian.
[edit] Factions and secret societies
The setting also has secret societies, factions that have beliefs and goals that can either aid, or impede the mission of players in other cases. Each faction varies in its goal, as well as how secret each faction is.
- The Orthodoxy seeks to eraticate heretical worship of the Human Panthenon.
- The Hawk and Shield seek to eradicate the minions of the Sorcerer King or protect those who are arcanely gifted from his predetations.
- The Emerald Society are Archelolgists who seek to discover anything and everything about the history of Onara, especially from the First Imperium
- The Mourners in Silence believe that the gods of Arcanis have died and now work with other worldly allies towards unusual goals.
- The Order of the Twilight Bough
- The Swords of Nier
[edit] Living Arcanis
Living Arcanis is the name for the Living Campaigns set in the Arcanis setting. It is run by PCI and hosts major events at some of the larger game conventions, such as GenCon and particularly Origins International Game Expo.
