On the morality and intricacies of love, passions and marriage in dragonblood-led societies

Guest post from the in-house testing team, on topics that have become relevant during our long running Ducal House campaign.

Dragons are among the most unpredictable creatures in existence. When they bred with humanoids, chief among them the ever-unsteady humans, their bloods mixed together in strange ways. All except the most distant of dragonbloods are fundamentally the same, their dominant draconic heritage an internal unifier, almost no matter to which extent their blood carries human, elf, or even, rumor has it, goblinoid parts; and yet, they can be fundamentally different in what drives them. There is no predicting the passions of a dragonblood - only the fact that there will be passion for something, be it buried deep or spilling out of every word and gesture.

A dragonblood-dominated society lives by unwritten, oft unspoken rules where passions of the flesh are concerned, necessitated by the potentially vast differences in the extent of such needs and wants between individuals of even the same clan.

For obvious reasons, marriage and offspring are vitally important concerns to titled individuals and families. Owing to the ancient magical prowess and recipies of the elves, however, these have little bearing on how an individual dragonblood chooses to live out their passions.

Two maxims appear to rule intimate relationships: discretion and plausible deniability. If an innocent bystander observes something they may well have overlooked had their gaze been turned a different direction, it is presumed by all parties that nothing of note occurred. Indiscretion and carelessness, however, are frowned upon and will lead to gossip and/or pointed questioning, particularly in repeat occurrences.

No dragonblood need fear moral outrage for engaging with their passions, even well outside their own species, as long as a certain amount of deniability is maintained.

Two dragonbloods who are courting may do so openly with decorum. Sharing a residence or discreetly sharing a bedroom before or without marriage will not be commented upon by society at large, though it has been observed that the closest acquaintances will take particularly the latter as permission to ask, nudge, jibe and joke with incongruous relentlessness.

Most dragonblood marriages among the higher strata of society take place under the patronage of Bahamut rather than one of the goddesses. What couples promise to one another in front of the altar of the Oath-Keeper allows for some variation, and the clergy of Bahamut does not concern itself with the policing of such vows (any who swore an oath in the Platinum Dragon‘s name will have to answer for its keeping before being granted his eternal rewards, after all), except perhaps for a gentle reminder in particularly ostentatious or high-profile cases.

However, engaging with one‘s passions outside of one‘s established marriage is a vastly more risky proposition among dragonbloods; the reason for this lies not in social repercussions or admonishment by the church, but rather in the well-documented irrationally possessive nature of draconic creatures.

Dragons High! Setting for Legojam

An entry for the Summer LEGO RPG Setting Jam created by DIY & Dragons. If you want to have a go - here are the curated helpful links we were given.

I was too slow with my initial idea (pirates plus atlantis - TableTobRPG did the Azure Archipelago) so it took me a while to come up with a fresh idea - portal invasion! Here we have a world of islands where the resident elves are getting pushed back by clockwork invaders. All is not going well for the invaders however, as it turns out this place is rife with ferocious deep sea monsters and a resident bunch of underwater hostiles. This is a setting about dragon-riding! Aerial combat using the rules of your choice - MCDM's Aces High if you're feeling like quick stuff, Calidar Skyship Combat Mechanics work for monsters if you're on for a challenge.

Below are the tagged hexes and outside of those use the High Seas random table. I drew on Dungeonfruit's "Making Good Factions (For Your Dungeon)" is a good one.

Hex list:

0101 - Home Trees - elven idyll, as yet relatively undisturbed by the encroaching invaders - place for rest and resupply
0801 - Turtle Island - elven beastmasters and turtle riders patrol against the deep ones and keep the monsters at bay.
0901 - as 0801. Here find Queen Blinze - turtle-rider, druid-like, tactical genius, neglects realm
0203 - Grace Harbour - home of the elven fleet, the most raucous port around.

0205 - Scorpion Shallows - a great sea scorpion lairs in the shallows between the two islands and preys upon any who stray near
0206 - Dragon haven - training base for dragon riders, nursery for young dragons.
0207 - as 0206. Here find Polse - dragon trainer, elven eldest
0303 - Megapirahna
0304 as 0203. Directed by Captain Folmirth - most senior ships captain, record-holding free-diver.
0306 as 0206.
0308 - Great Black Shark

0405 - Hall of the Deep Ones - center of their own trans-world network of sub-ocean gates - utterly uninterested in the doings of the 'skim-world' above them
0501 - Manta-folk tribe
0507 - Giant sea spider

0603 - Clockwork forge tower - sprouting from the seabed, creating new portals to drive the invasion.
0604 - Deep One beast-masters - those charged with keeping the pesky skim-worlders from disturbing their betters
0608 - Deep One archmage lair with guardian colossal squid and chained undead octopi
0802 - Clockwork interchange hub - constant traffic of purple mining units bring ore to forge before shipping to the clockwork construction yards
0804 - Predatory octopi
0806 - Seabed mine - operated by Purple Mining Unit with white cuboid nodule scavenger
0809 - Clockwork lava forge
0901 - Dragon Watch - home to most dragon riders, including nests
0905 - Clockwork construction yards - dragon-automata made in mimicry of the local species are beginning to be completed and starting to fly against the native dragons

Over the deep ocean, the mobile forces from various locations or roaming monsters can be encountered.

Deep Ocean table (2d6)
2 - Young elven dragon on training flight
3 - Elven dragon on patrol
4 - Elven fleet on blockade run
5 - Elven turtle rider scouts
6 - Calm skies
7 - Inclement weather - roll d6 to determine what neighbouring hex you get thrown to
8 - Deep Ones
9 - Giant octopus
10 - Megapiranha
11 - Great Black Shark
12 - Clockwork dragon on a test flight

Shiny TTRPG links #179

Some links, some archive diving during this holiday period. For yet more links, see the previous list found here or you can check the RPG Blog Carnival or on Third Kingdom Games news roundup. Originally inspired by weaver.skepti.ch End of Week links.

lumpley games gives us In Brief, the Problem of RPG Design

Daily Adventure Prompts shares DM TIP: PUZZLING IT OUT

@prokopetz gives us rules don't matter

Torchless writes LOW OPINION: Short-Sighted Focus on Fun Ruins Long-Term Enjoyment of Tabletop Games

The Welsh Piper gave us What’s Your Genre?

Periapt Games Design Blog shares Upon training your character's replacement