the northland sagas has been a long time coming. I have all ways wanted to run a Norse type of game but never wanted to have it set in our own history. now I see how, make it a Nordic fantasy/horror game. its not on earth and the people are not called the norse or vikings or what have you.

some of the following post are taken from the savage worlds forum where I first posted them. others are new and more will be added as time goes by. everything is subject to change and may not even make it into the final version of the northland sagas.

please come back to this topic as I'm adding to this all the time, even editing old posts here and there. feedback is more than welcome.

my system of choice for this setting is Savage Worlds so without further delay lets visit the northlands...

I'm taking everything norse and putting it into a huge savage world GM's melting pot and coming up with the game I have all ways wanted to run.

there will be 2 races;

Humans also known as the Nor or Northlanders

Half - Bloods are the second race. they are humans with mixed parentage from such creatures as trolls, giants, fairies, demons, and earthkin to name but a few. half - bloods are blessed (or cursed some may say) with powers and other odd gifts from the beast that sired them. they are also treated as outcasts and will never have the chance to rule over human lands.

the main Idea that drives the northland sagas is that the players are all taking part in tales told to the children of the northlands 500 years later by a mysterious travelling storyteller in the hall of the Northlands king. who passes on the story's to them to keep the history of the land alive and hope in the hearts of its people as with the passing of all the great heroes of old all magic suddenly vanished with them. life is harsh and people need to be remided where there come from and that they to could be like the heroes of old.

the players will also be able to take a wife or husband and even start a family to pass on the name as well as starting a settlement of their own and forming alliances with others to unite a land against a common foe from the far north. one that is older than the gods.

one of them could even challenge every chief and if they beat them all one day become king of all the north clans and rule over them till the next challenge in a years time or pass the crown onto one of their children when they die.

they will gain titles, some good, some bad for the things they do.

as for the creatures that stalk this ice locked land I have a wealth of them to cheery pick and savage to my needs.

I'm looking forward to it. will post more when I have it.

now for some legal stuff,

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The Northland sagas, character names, place names, and the contents of this post and all other posts in this topic are copyrights of Chris Hilton. the contents of this topic can not be used with out permission and can not be copied or reproduced in any way or changed.

note: a lot of the posts here are being added to all the time, feel free to reread it from time to time as you will find new things added all the time.

thanks for your time! and I hope you enjoy reading this topic as much as I do writing it!

as well as all the usual norse creatures I'll have a few of my own added to to mix.
one such beast is the Mountain shard, said to be controlled by the gods and sent against anyone who crosses them. this huge creature that looks like a man made of stone with eyes that burn like the sun. it towers over the hills and trees and is made from the side of a mountain. they are thankfully very rare and only two have ever been unleashed on the world.

the first was destroyed by three brothers after they stole a wooden drinking cup from the gods table. the shards remains can still be seen to this day but what happened to the brothers and the cup is unknown.

the second is said to be locked in ice deep within the earth far to the north after a battle maiden trapped it with the help of a wizard to save her mother who claimed she was a goddess in mortal form.

mountain shards are also the source of the saying "may the gods move the mountains against me if I'm wrong" only uttered by the very brave or utterly foolish.

pray you never meet one or we will be singing and telling tales of your death early my friend!

an Idea I'm toying with is to had out more xp so the characters get to a higher rank a little bit faster.

I was thinking of giving out up to 5 xp depending on what the character gets up to, how brave they are etc.

I also think some sort of rule to do with making a boast would work well for the setting. sort of like an oath "I will defeat this beast with no armour and only use my bear hand, I need no weapons!"

no real idea for rules or how this will work right now but will post my ideas when I have them.

another creature for you.

FROST SPITTER. a giant, huge even for his own kind. some say he pleased the gods so with his great strength, fury and wisdom that he was given a gift.
this mighty lord of giants rules over his kin far to the north past the frozen sea and it is said that he can belch forth a deadly shower of ice like that of the dragons of old.

there is a vast amount of information on the Internet to draw from and that has been a blessing.

I've stopped looking at sites for the moment and have started to get down to the important bits.

the gear is done. not many weapons or armour but I don't need a lot. plus I've raised the cost to make it more realistic.

I'll be borrowing the rules for rage from Solomon Kane as it seems to fit.

still going to have 2 races. give the players some cool things to pick from. as the half - blooded race allows them to pick and mix edges and hindrances to make their own "race" so to speak.

(may even have a few human nations to pick from too so anyone playing a human has some cool things pick from too.)

working on a rule for making boasts.
the character makes a boast before they go off on some quest (like slaying a huge beast) and if they pass the test for the boast they gain a bennie and get an exta one for each raise to use at any time during the quest. the roll is opposed and must be made in front of NPC'S. still working on this so it needs some work as you can see.

also looking at ways of using bennies like in deadlands so the players have more uses for them as the will not be turned into XP on a 5 or 6.
XP will also be handed out per quest and not just at the end of the night as I want the characters to go up in rank a bit faster. each quest will give the player an amount of XP from 1 to 4 depending on how hard it is.

also going to be using a new stat called "renown" works in the same way Pirates of the spanish main uses reputation.

the players will also be able to start their own settlement and will be able to build them up like the lodges in Rippers. plus I like the idea that they could start a family and have children to carry on their names should they die.

so far I'm pleased with the way its going. I think I've got a game that my players will like.

it may look like im cherry picking from other SW games for ideas but I say that is one of SW greatest strengths. it is so easy to port over things from other setting with no real work or fear of unbalancing things.

also this game will be harsh. PC are going to die. I've not going to go out of my way to kill them off, no the die rolls will see to that. but if you pick a fight with giants and other huge beasts then it should not be a cake walk.

I want to see at least one longboat with the dead hero laid out in with his armour and weapons etc then set on fire as it drifts out to sea or a huge fire with the hero on top so even the gods will take notice at his passing! hell yes! when I hand over the setting for others to run for me I will go out that way at least once!

more soon.

as for magic I was thinking rare but powerful.

there are rune crafters, who use runes and their metalworking skills create rune weapons and armour.

the rune scared who cut themselves up to power their spells.

and lets not forget the druids.

plus there will be the long forgotten dark arts. used to summon demons and other monsters, raise the dead and curse people etc.

so thats 4 for now and may stay that way. as too many could be a bad thing.

one thing I do know about the magic for the northland sagas is that it will not use power points and will mess you up should you fail.

the lands of the north are a harsh and unforgiving place with many dangers and the magic will be no different.

thank for reading (it would be good to see what people think so far)

more soon.

back to the races for this post.

there are still only two

humans and the half-blood.

the humans of the northland sagas come from a number of clans. each clan has its own edges and hindrances that you start play with.

the half-blood can be half giant, troll, demon, fay, or werekin(bear or wolf)

they can take or roll a number of racial edges and hindrances depending how strong their background is. they all have the outsider hindrance.

in most settlements you will find a number of large standing stone used to record the names of the dead.

depending on the size of the settlement there will be a number of different monument stones such as the peoples stone (also known as folk or common stone) for the common folk, a king stone (also known as the elder or high stone. as it is the tallest) to record the passing of kings and elders, and hero stones (offen known by the name of the hero whos life deeds it records, such as "Tarn tellerson's deed stone" found in High Gate. or legend stones) for someone worthy of note who performed many great deeds.

these stones can also be used to speak to the dead in times of great need by druids. but this can often be deadly for the person contacting the dead.

the loss of these stones will bring shame to people and will anger the spirits. there is one tale of bandits who raided a small settlement and after they burnt it to the ground and killed everyone. they then defaced the monument stone and buried it. one year later the bandits were attacked by foul rotten beasts of great strength. these where the spirits of the dead villages they had slain who had hunted them down.
the bandits where forced to put the stone back, re carve the names and add their own before the dead fell on them to get their revenge.

it is said that out in the wilds there are monument stones of the forgotten and cursed. the spirits of the dead carved into the rock of these stones often need the help of the living or just want to cause trouble.

I've been thinking a lot about the half - blood race and how they are made during character gen. at the moment you pick a monster type you would like and pick your racial abilities and hindrances from a list (each type of monster backgound has its own list) but it feels a bit long winded and not very FFF.

I was thinking of cutting it down to just taking the outsider hindrance if you are a half - blood and then picking the racial abilities and hindrances from one list.

depending on how strong your heritage is determines how many points you have to spend on racial abilities and in turn how many minor and major hindrances you have to take to balance it all out. half - bloods do not get a free edge as normal humans do.

it works out as follows:
3 points of racial abilities = outsider (minor) hindrance.

4 points of racial abilities = outsider (minor) hindrance plus 1 minor hindrances.

5 points of racial abilities = outsider (minor) hindrance plus 2 minor hindrances or 1 major hindrance.

6 points of racial abilities = outsider (minor) hindrance plus 1 minor hindrance and 1 major hindrance or 3 minor hindrances.

I have not posted a list of racial abilities and hindrances to pick from at this time as just wanted to see how others found the above (plus I still tweaking the list). was it easy to understand?

you can still take up to 4 points of hindrances as normal but this is done after the above.

as well as all the usual roleplaying "stuff" that the players can get up to they will also be able to take part in "the games" held once a year. sort of like worlds strongest man but women can enter and you have to slay monsters, drink till you pass out as well as perform superhuman feats of strength.

they will be able to show off how strong they are. how good they can fight and even tell others the tales of their past adventures. and lets not forget the high point of the games, the feast and the drinking contest that ends the games.

anyone who takes part will have the chance to win the mighty stone hammer "Crag splitter" and may keep it till the next games.

characters have a renown score. work like fame in pirates of the spanish main but with one major difference. there is not set table you draw a card from the action deck to work out what the effect is. some effects stack or you get a slightly different effect is you draw the same card a second time.

as for working out what effect you loose when your renown changes all you do is remove the last effect listed. if you get to -50 renown then its time to hand over your character to the GM as it has become one of the stone hearted, one of the creatures used by the gods to test heroes to see if they are truly worthy of their blessings.

I wanted to have a random feel to the effects of renown. I like the idea that the gods are unpredictable and no one knows what they will bestow next.

something I've noticed about this home brew is that characters will get more XP and bennies than normal but that fits the feel of a norse saga and that was what I was aiming for. so i'm pleased. characters may get more XP and have more bennies to spend but the creatures they face are in the most part bigger, stronger and in some cases nearly unstoppable.

I'm close to putting all the setting rules together so you can see for your selves if I have done my job right. I hope you'll like it.

working on settlement rules now. based on the rules for lodges in Rippers but with a few more stats. but not too much that its not FFF.

also have plans for a random event generator and a plot point campaign.

as for the humans having different starting edges and so on depending where they come from I'm happy to say thats been cropped. keeps it FFF and more in tune with the feel of the setting, they may live may miles appart and never meet but are still the same. after thinking about it I see no reason why one group with be better skilled in this or that.

one other idea for the setting that the people i'm going to be running it for liked is that if a character dies they can be called back to help. they are undead and are only around for as long as the problem that they are needed to help with is. no PC will have the power to call back a dead character the players will have to find out it can be done first from events in the plot points and then set on the death defying quest to find who can and see if they will help. they may even have to go on another adventure so that the NPC will help them. getting a dead hero back from the dead should not be easy! lol

had an idea to keep boats FFF. as this setting is based on all this norse the boats need to be the same. in the real world norse boats as far as I know from what I've seen where all of the same type but built to the size needed by the people at the time.

so why not use this in the setting.

just off the top of my head I could have say 5 ship sizes all with their own stats. if you wish to have a ship built just pay for what sized ship you want, can pay for, or if in a rush have the time to wait. then wait for it to be built (add ship eges and hindrances like those found in pirates) and then away you go.

this could do with more work but i think you get the idea. FFF for both the players and GM.

the races are a bit of a problem at the moment. I know what i want to do with them but they will not behave when put on paper.

I'll work on other stuff and then go back and give races another beating. there will be about 6 races from what i can tell. well humans and half - blood (the half - blood are split into a number of sub races that you can pick from and you are free to pick the racial abilities and hindrances so you can come up with the "race" you want.

seems to work in my head but will have to see how it works out for real.

stay tuned more northland stuff soon.