Weblog Licentiae Moeticae

Benandanti

Guy Gavriel Kay didn't invent the benandanti, as you'll see he notes in the foreword to his Tigana.  They were a real group of mystics in northeastern Italy, which makes them fair game for adaptation into 7th Sea.

Because who wouldn't want to fight witches in dreams, using only a stalk of fennel?

Kaptara: Secret Warriors II

I believe it's actually illegal to have a fantasy Minoan Crete without labrys-wielding warrior-priestesses.  Not wishing to run afoul of the RPG Police, here's the Sisters of Thunder.  This Swordsman's School was traditionally limited to only Noble women of Kaptara, who served with honor as bodyguards, honor guards, and the personal military force of the woman serving as Queen of Kaptara and High Priestess of Dea Mater.

If the Sisters of Thunder are still around, they probably exist only on lost islands.  The old temples to Dea Mater have few, if any, Dark Secrets that must be protected from all comers; it would be like the Vaticine Church guarding every cathedral, forever.  If any Cymbr have preserved this ancient style, they will have lost the Sailor part of the curriculum.  It used to be critical for the warriors of this sea-going people to be able to fight upon the waves, but the Cymbr have abandoned that part of the Kaptaran tradition.

Kaptara: Secret Warriors I

It's inevitable in 7th Sea that if there is some ancient culture which may have survived, there is indubitably some Ancient Order of Guardians which has also survived.  Moreover, they will have their own Swordsman's School.  Indeed, the Ancient Order of Guardians often persists long after the original culture has perished.

If "Fall of Kaptara" is factual, perhaps the descendants of that original initiate of Sol Invictus and his stalwart companions have persisted to 1668.  They guard certain key mystical sites, sworn to protect them from intruders who might use them to awaken Mare Obscura from her dark slumber.

Yeah, those guys from The Mummy and Last Crusade, pretty much.  Only with a bull-leaping themed Swordsman's School.

Kaptara: Ruins

There's a lot of ocean and land between canonical Cabora and the Vodacce islands.  It sure seems like there ought to have been other Kaptaran colonies on the shores of Cathay, Ussura and the Crescent, doesn't there?  On the other hand, we don't want to go too crazy with this.  It's supposed to be a historical blip that could be added to canon, not a major historical re-write.

Kaptara: Survivors

So ancient Kaptara fell; whether to invaders or the waves, who can say.  But that still leaves two colonies of its people in Vodacce (and who knows where else).  What happened to them?

If only there were an ethnic minority in Vodacce, with slightly different customs, different views on women, and a propensity for far-traveling.

Oh, wait.

Kaptara: Fact or Fiction?

Although Kaptara is filling an Atlantis role here, the parallel breaks down in one important way.  Our only record of Atlantis is Plato.  Kaptara appears only in the fictional "Fall of Kaptara" but mundane Arete travelogues also assert the existence of Kaptaran colonies in the Vodacce island chain.  Something called Kaptara existed, and then ceased to exist.

So what's fact and what's fiction?

Kaptara: Maleficus Mare

If all of the Arete accounts are true, something radically changed in the worship of Dea Mare. The sudden appearance of a supernatural force, actually granting powers, masquerading as the pre-existing goddess could easily account for that. The exact nature of the supernatural force can be left up to the GM. Outsiders, either Queen of the Sea, a being from the 7th Sea, or some Lovecraftian force of darkness and madness could all be used.  What kind of sorcery would result?

Caveat Emptor: Rules design is not my strong point, and this isn't play-tested.

Kaptara: Carbuncle Technology

A proposed rules set for mystic technicians who can recharge Domae stones, called "carbuncles" by the Kaptarans, and apply them to a variety of mundane tasks.

Kaptara: Introduction

Go back four hundred years and more before the city of Numa was founded. In these mists of prehistory, while the Inish were still fighting the firbolgs and the Grumfather still had both eyes, there were eight major islands off the coast of what is now Vodacce. The southernmost two were colonies of Kaptara, an island nation past the Vodacce peninsula to the east. The northernmost four were home to the Arete. The tribes on the mainland would one day unite themselves as the Numans, and the precursors to the Acragans lived to the west, beyond the gulf.

There are no records that survive from Kaptara. All that Theah knows of it comes from legends recorded by the Arete, and even these seem to post-date the supposed destruction of the legedary home island and the desolation of the colonies. The southernmost colony island disappeared in 1088 at the hands of Marietta Lorenzo; if artifacts remain, they will be found on Mondavi Island. If indeed they ever existed at all - most scholars believe that Kaptara is nothing more than an Arete morality tale and never actually existed.

Draco's Little Gifts

The senator everyone called Draco ("the Dragon") was a bitter, withered specimen of humanity when the Bargain was made. He earned his nickname at the height of his power, in the years before Macer was Imperator, fighting as a general in the Legions, against the Alemanni tribes to the north. The natives were so impressed with his brutal tactics and vicious death-dealing that they called him "der Drachen," after the largest and most powerful beast in their lands. He liked the appellation and carried it home with him.

His words, in the days before the Bargain, led the other senators to suspect that he would be asking for the return of his youth and physical prowess. The sorcerous gift he actually requested stunned them all with its audacity - the power to kill with a touch. The room erupted in protest, but the dark powers they'd summoned ignored it and gave Draco what he wanted.

Montanus couldn't fathom it. Draco couldn't expect to live, considering the threat he posed. Then again - Draco didn't expect to live, period. He was old. And he wanted to inflict maximum damage on his enemies before he went - or after he was gone.