forbidden-lands-lore

name

forbidden-lands-lore

description

Verify, organize, or extend published and campaign-created Forbidden Lands 2E lore. Use for geography, chronology, peoples, kin, gods, cults, religions, psychology, society, customs, magic traditions, monsters, artifacts, settlements, named characters, regional identity, personal campaign truths, tone, and sandbox-facing rumors or factions. Trigger whenever prose or game content makes a factual or campaign-lore claim about the Ravenlands, Bloodmarch, or Bitter Reach.

Forbidden Lands Lore

This skill is the setting-authenticity authority for the Forbidden Lands 2E repo. It ensures that every proper noun, cultural detail, geographic reference, kin trait, and world-state claim in the manuscript is consistent with established canon and approved author decisions.

Bundled References

• references/INDEX.md The authority and routing index for the complete reference corpus. Load it first when a request crosses core lore, custom expansions, campaigns, or expansion regions.

• references/setting.md The master setting document. Contains:

  • World state (post-Blood Mist, broken infrastructure)
  • Religion (Raven Church, Congregation, Rust Brothers) — quick form
  • Currency (silver, no mines, old Alder War coins)
  • Geography table (canonical and manuscript-canon locations)
  • The three human peoples with approved physical types
  • Non-human kin table (8 kin with physical and cultural tells)
  • Dwarf and half-elf cultural details
  • Magic system notes (15 paths)
  • Writing rules for human nationality in prose
  • Proper noun appendix

• references/tone.md The genre-register and encounter-authenticity authority. Contains:

  • Genre Classification: re-feudal medieval survival fantasy with Swedish tone, realistic village authenticity, soft Tolkienesque poetic worldbuilding (each clause defined as a constraint)
  • What Forbidden Lands Is Not (failure modes)
  • Encounter Anti-Trope Catalog (7 anti-tropes with in-world reasons, paired to the 7 encounter shapes in the bestiary skill)
  • Vignette and Novella Register (sensory anchors, voice anchors, plot anchors)

• references/history.md Calendar (8 phases and named festivals), full chronology from the Mythic Past to 1165 AS, named historical figures index (~32 entries), guidance on referencing dates in prose.

• references/gods.md The full pantheon: the Protector under three faces (Wyrm/Raven/ Rust), Reapenters, Sisters of Heme, Vampyr heresy, the Older Gods (Huge, Clay, Wail, Flow, Nightwalker, Horn, Eor, Red Wanderer), other powers (Shardmaiden, Golden Bough, Order of the Silent, Stone Singers, Maha language). Reference NPC statblocks for each major religious order. Faction distribution by region.

• references/kin.md Cultural depth on every kin: clan names, governance, customs, named individuals, statblock anchors. Humans (Alderlanders, Ailanders, Frailers, The Silent, Aslenes, Quards, Galdanes), Elvenspring, Misgrown, Elves (Stillelves, Unruly, Ents, Melders, Watchers, Redrunners), Dwarves (Belderranian, Meromannian, Canide, Crombe, Dwelvers), Ogres, Orcs (Urhur, Roka, Isir, Viraga, Drifters), Wolfkin, Saurians, Whiners, Halflings, Goblins.

• references/bestiary.md Lore for every named creature: origin myth, ecology, cultural integration, named individuals (Erinya, Menkaura, Krasjika), folk warnings, encounter-shape anchors. Includes the lore-rule: A monster is a contract the village has been keeping, and the contract is now breaking. Pair with the bestiary skill for encounter mechanics.

• references/artifacts.md Every named artifact: myth-as-told, truth-behind-myth, mechanical hint, current location/holder. Asina, Barkhyde, Carskenfoot's Boots, Clay's Rosary, Feroxa's Claws, Ivelde, Menkaura's Tooth, Phantom Daggers, Queen Agatha's Twin Tablets, Scarnesbane, Scarnesclaw, Nightwalker's Hourglass, Tezaur, Tvedra's Twin Rings, Voller's Helmet, Wail's Horn, Well of Tears, Wyrm's Key, Arrow of the Fire Wyrm. Campaign artifacts (public legend only, true powers in campaign file): Stanengist, Maligarn, Nekhaka, Blood Star (Hemella).

• references/places.md The village-as-system model (seven components), The Hollows full reference (template for village authenticity), Heat and Need lore-side, settlement archetypes, named geography master index covering all manuscript regions. Includes Raven's Purge adventure site locations (Vond, Eye of the Rose, Pelagia, Stoneloom Mines, Haggler's House, Ravenhole, Grindbone).

Custom Expanded Lore

The library in references/expanded/ is Apostol Apostolov's generic, custom-expanded lore corpus. It was created by Apostol Apostolov as a professional Game Master preparing and running an enlarged Forbidden Lands campaign. It is not limited to a single published campaign, even where inherited document titles refer to the Ravenlands. The files mix published canon, manuscript facts, grounded setting inference, local or contested belief, historical models, community theory, and personal campaign lore.

Treat established personal lore as authoritative for this campaign without calling it Free League canon. Preserve its depth, detail, and writing voice. Do not replace it with summaries, generic templates, cleaned-up approximations, or a canon-only rewrite. When provenance affects an answer, state which claim level applies.

• references/expanded/INDEX.md Authority notice and complete topic routing for the custom expanded corpus. Load it when a request spans several kin, religions, or social systems.
• references/expanded/society-and-daily-life.md Households, villages, authority, law, hospitality, kin, burial, labor, and festivals.
• references/expanded/culture-humans.md Human oath, marriage, naming, and adult duty under the Feather-and-Coil tradition.
• references/expanded/culture-elves.md Elven birth, partnership, custody, traditions, council, teaching, and adoption under ruby continuity.
• references/expanded/culture-elvenspring.md Mixed lifetimes, households, descent, apprenticeship, partnership, healing, mediation, stewardship, and relations with other kin.
• references/expanded/culture-dwarves.md Stonegarden exchange, household and clan standing, apprenticeship, inheritance, contract, adoption, and reopened works.
• references/expanded/culture-orcs.md Orc strength, weakness, lifelong muscle growth, painful aging, male sexual display, indoctrination, public male rule, concealed female power, kinship, adulthood, work, slavery, law, clan differences, trade and tribute, individual change, and the Urhur imperial court.
• references/expanded/culture-halflings.md Household secrecy, intoxicants, cradle fosterage, marriage, reputation, charity, old age, goblin relations, and the closed village.
• references/expanded/culture-goblins.md Night camps, theft law, hunting, wolves, names, partnership, healing, dispute, settlement life, gender, and chosen parentage.
• references/expanded/culture-wolfkin.md Pack personhood, cubs, teaching, pairing, food, altered states, exile, succession, territory, trade, fosterage, and judgment.
• references/expanded/culture-monster-kin.md Saurian, ogre, whiner, and Misgrown households, work, trade, kinship, authority, captivity, care, and outsider misdescription.
• references/expanded/culture-rust-brothers.md Rust Brother ranks, recruitment, advancement, household occupation, inquisition, selective terror, information control, and trained character.
• references/expanded/economy-exchange-and-stronghold-life.md Hunter-gatherer and mixed subsistence, farmsteads, villages, inhabited urban ruins, barter, old Alder War silver, trade geography, surplus and storage, stronghold communities, construction, maintenance, and the lived operation of every stronghold function.
• references/expanded/psychology-and-social-character.md Blood Mist conditioning, trust, kin identity, grief, trauma, magic, and recovery.
• references/expanded/power-factions-and-post-mist-rule.md The lived institutions beneath faction procedure: households and villages as political bodies, eight grounds of rule, seats, oaths, tribute, hostages, charters, judgment, information, faction forms, kin political traditions, succession, feud, occupation, resistance, and adventurers inside political life.
• references/expanded/magic-in-society.md The social life surrounding every magical discipline: discovery of talent, teachers, apprenticeship, ranks, grimoires, ingredient supply, Willpower, casting modes, mishap responsibility, magical labor, consent, law, religious and political authority, post-Mist transmission, and caster households.
• references/expanded/magic-metaphysics-and-path-doctrines.md Non-spoiler magical metaphysics grounded in Chapter 07: Willpower as intention that survives suffering, the shared structure of a working, ingredients, grimoires, rituals, overcharge, mishaps, corruption, Epic Magic, and Rank 1–5 knowledge for Common Spellcraft and every named magical path. Load it when a task asks how magic works in the world, what practitioners understand at a given rank, or how path doctrines agree and contradict one another.
• references/expanded/regions-landscape-and-seasonal-life.md A non-gazetteer regional model joining ground, water, route, season, labor, memory, settlement form, kin practice, sacred geography, and hospitality. Covers spring through winter, major landscape families, broad western, central, eastern, and northern Ravenlands patterns, border country, and a procedure for building lived regions.
• references/expanded/war-raiding-occupation-and-aftermath.md The social and material world beneath faction and battle procedure: campaign preparation, muster, military households, supply, camps, scouts, raids, sieges, magical warfare, surrender, plunder, restraint, occupation, displacement, veterans, burial, hunger, broken works, and reconstruction.
• references/expanded/monsters-as-neighbors-and-contracts.md Long-term relations with creatures beyond isolated combat: territory, appetite, Lore, offerings, tribute, contracts, mediation, enforcement, breach, creature-specific forms of coexistence, monster economies, exploitation, protection, rule, removal, and the vacancy left afterward.
• references/expanded/demons-mog-churmog-and-merigall.md Full-spoiler GM study of demons across Books 01–03 and Raven's Purge. Covers mog and Churmog metaphysics, ether and nexuses, demon families, hierarchy, concealment, inter-demon politics, field investigation, parley, contracts, binding, banishment, discoverable weaknesses, community theories, and an extensive operational profile of Merigall. Apply the spoiler gate before loading or revealing it.
• references/expanded/religions-rites-beliefs-and-anathemas.md Cross-kin religion routing, claim levels, common questions, and the equal-depth standard.
• references/expanded/religion-humans.md Raven and Wyrm, human churches and heresies, Older Gods, rites, dogmas, and anathemas.
• references/expanded/religion-elves.md Red Wanderer, rubies, restoration, Clay, druidic orders, sacred time, death, and anathema.
• references/expanded/religion-elvenspring.md Clay, Shardmaiden, Wail, Flow, land powers, orders, Frailers, sacred time, memorial practice, and anathema.
• references/expanded/religion-dwarves.md Huge, World Expansion, sacred work, Stonegarden observance, reincarnation, clan readings, death, and anathema.
• references/expanded/religion-orcs.md Abandonment, the Unabandoned, sacred command, clan practice, surrender, death, shrines, song, pilgrimage, and anathema.
• references/expanded/religion-halflings.md Eor, concealed moon practice, Penita, sacred time, death, shrines, omens, and anathema.
• references/expanded/religion-goblins.md Eor, cradle faith, Penita, shamans, sacrifice, sacred objects, death, dangerous bargains, and anathema.
• references/expanded/religion-wolfkin.md Huntress worship, religious authority, daily observance, sacred time, death, dreams, other gods, and anathema.
• references/expanded/religion-monster-beliefs.md Saurian, ogre, whiner, and Misgrown beliefs with limits on outsider claims.
• references/expanded/religion-rust-brothers.md Rust and Heme doctrine, sacramental iron, daily worship, rites, protected religious knowledge, sin, penance, and anathema.

Campaign Files

Bundled campaign references live in references/campaigns/. Each campaign file contains both non-spoiler public lore and a SPOILER SECTION with plot secrets, NPC true agendas, artifact powers, and outcome paths.

• references/campaigns/ravens_purge.md Full reference for the Raven's Purge campaign by Erik Granström. Scope: entirely within the core Ravenlands. Central conflict: Stanengist (the elven crown) and who controls the Forbidden Lands after the Blood Mist. Covers all key players (Zytera, Merigall, Krasylla, Zertorme, Arvia, Soria, Kalman Rodenfell, Kartorda), all adventure sites (Grindbone, Ravenhole, Amber's Peak, Eye of the Rose, Pelagia, Stonegarden, Stoneloom Mines, Haggler's House, Vond), all four campaign artifacts, and the full range of campaign outcomes.

Spoiler Handling Protocol

Before reading any section marked ⚠️ SPOILER or SPOILER SECTION in a campaign file, or before loading the expanded demonology study, stop and ask the user:

"This content contains major campaign spoilers for [Campaign Name]. Do you want me to proceed with spoiler content?"

Wait for explicit confirmation before continuing. This applies to:

• True natures and secret agendas of named NPCs
• Artifact full powers and true histories
• Adventure site secrets and dungeon contents
• Plot twist reveals and campaign outcome paths

Non-spoiler content (public legends, location descriptions, faction structures, geography) can be shared freely without asking.

Expansion Regions

An expansion region is a neighboring country with its own kin, geography, religions, magic traditions, terrain rules, and creatures. Its content lives in a dedicated references/regions/<slug>/ directory. Nothing from an expansion region merges into the core Markdown files directly under references/; those files describe the Ravenlands. Campaign spoilers for an expansion region live in the matching references/campaigns/<slug>.md file.

Loading rule: Load expansion region files only when the user explicitly asks about that region, its creatures, its kin, its gods, or its campaign. Do not load them for general Forbidden Lands queries, Ravenlands lore checks, or Raven's Purge questions.

Spoiler rule: Expansion region spoilers follow the same protocol as campaign spoilers above. Ask before reading any section marked ⚠️ SPOILER.

The Bloodmarch (Aslene)

Source: Erik Granström, Free League Publishing Campaign: Legacy of Horn Access: Via Shadowgate Pass (opened after events of Raven's Purge)

Non-spoiler reference files:

• references/regions/bloodmarch/setting.md — world state, climate, access routes, terrain types (Ashlands, Firelands, Crimson Forest with full journey rules and Crimson Sickness 9-stage table), magic traditions (Magma Song, Mentalism, Oneiromancy, Magnetism with full spell lists), drugs and potions (Blue Tar, Blue Blood, Dense Water, Crimson Ooze, Lycopodium Powder)
• references/regions/bloodmarch/kin.md — the five horse clans (Houns/ Selligar Horne, Sabirians/Mommodar, Caberians/Merdekai, Ash), Vasnians, red elves, Caprid dwarves (Firestead, kulli/ baas kulli, abolished clans), Aslene orcs (Étosh, Sisterhood of Viraga), wolfkin (Ranghöge, grargs), moon elves (moonstone not ruby, Mentalism), halflings and goblins (Penite pilgrims)
• references/regions/bloodmarch/history.md — Vasnian age, horse clan arrival, Sella the Liberator, the Demon Flood (875 AS), three centuries of isolation, Shadowgate reopening (1165 AS)
• references/regions/bloodmarch/gods.md — Horn, Have, Pyrolytes, Volitia, Sisterhood of Viraga, Nightwalker/Ranghöge, Order of Egression, Eor, Rubor and Kolor, Rust Church/Ironbrows
• references/regions/bloodmarch/bestiary.md — Smolderer, Bloodbeech, Prune, Wingsteed, Fraege, Grave Lily, Kton/Fire Wyrm, Mecha, Salamander, Sarcoptes, Forest Star, Slime Snail, Slithernet, Sporewalker, Hoverfrog, Pearlyveine
• references/regions/bloodmarch/artifacts.md — Horn's Astra public knowledge (Goblet Staff of Have, Helm of Horn, Sella's Dragonboot, Glasstooth, Arrows of the Fire Wyrm, Stonechest), Witherbeam public description (no true powers here)
• references/regions/bloodmarch/places.md — eleven sub-regions (Ashenvale, The Black, Vasnia, Havenmark, Firestead, The Wailing, Kreysel, Strilling, Druma, Varina, Hadruma), Horn volcano, Shadowgate Pass, Gander's Pass, adventure site overviews (Taregyll, Ashenstead, Salterstay, Oxengelder, Bann Guelder, Watch of the Sisters, Tribolia of the Kogler, Agnostica pointer only)

Spoiler-only file:

• references/campaigns/bloodmarch.md — load only with explicit user consent; contains true powers of the Astra, Witherbeam's full capabilities, NPC true agendas, ancient world history, campaign phases, adventure site secrets, and campaign outcomes

• skills/forbidden-lands-bestiary/SKILL.md — encounter design mandate, the seven encounter shapes, the Resources mandate, statblock format. Load alongside this skill when writing any monster encounter or bestiary entry.

• skills/forbidden-lands-writing-voice/SKILL.md — sentence-level prose technique and the Worldbuilding Voice section. Load alongside this skill when drafting manuscript or proposal prose.

• skills/forbidden-lands-design/SKILL.md — mechanics and rules integration.

Playbooks

Operational workflows for expanding the skill live in playbooks/.

• playbooks/integrate-region-source.md Step-by-step protocol for absorbing a new sourcebook, regional supplement, or campaign module into the reference files. Covers the three-pass integration workflow (structural extraction, lore depth audit, small-detail texture pass), spoiler triage, campaign file creation, wiring, cross-reference audit, and multi-session handoff. Use this whenever a new source is being added.

Make Lore Playable

Classify every fact by what players can know:

• Public: common names, visible customs, broad history, roads, rulers, festivals, and widely repeated stories.
• Local: knowledge held by a settlement, profession, kin, cult, or region.
• Contested: several groups hold incompatible accounts; record each source and what the disagreement changes.
• Hidden: discoverable secrets that create leverage or danger.
• GM truth: causal facts needed to run consequences consistently.
• Campaign spoiler: protected material loaded only under the spoiler protocol.

Do not expose GM truth merely because a reference file contains it. Convert lore into signs, claims, rites, prices, ruins, grudges, routes, and behavior that players can encounter.

Sandbox conversion

For any substantial lore element, identify:

1. who believes it
2. who disputes or benefits from it
3. what physical evidence exists
4. what practice or institution it sustains
5. what choice it changes
6. what happens if the players reveal, disprove, exploit, or ignore it

A fact with no present consequence is background. Keep it brief or connect it to play.

Faction truth

Describe factions through aims, assets, constraints, methods, internal fault lines, visible signs, and offers. Do not reduce them to moral alignment. A faction may be cruel or benevolent, but it still needs material interests, relationships, and limits that players can manipulate.

Contradictions

When sources conflict:

1. record both claims and their sources
2. distinguish authorial contradiction from intentional in-world disagreement
3. preserve ambiguity when it creates play
4. choose a manuscript ruling only when procedures or continuity require one
5. document the ruling and update all dependent references

Do not silently harmonize contradictions by inventing unsupported history.

Lore Design Workflow

1. Define region and spoiler boundary.
2. Search the manuscript and the narrowest relevant reference.
3. Separate confirmed fact, inference, public belief, and secret.
4. Check chronology, geography, kin, religion, magic, and institutions.
5. Convert new facts into present practices and visible consequences.
6. Provide at least two routes by which players could learn actionable lore.
7. Test how the world changes if the fact becomes known or false.
8. Cross-link every affected reference and manuscript passage.
9. Load the writing-voice skill for final prose.

Hard Rules

1. Canonical locations are not movable. Weatherstone, Harga, Ravenford, Stillmire, Amber Peaks — these are fixed on the hex map. Do not relocate them or change their character.

2. Manuscript-canon locations are flexible but consistent. Hollowford, Ashfall, Blackwood, Greymark, Redrun, Yellowdew, Fen River — invented for the manuscript. Once placed, keep them consistent across all references.

3. Human peoples have approved physical types. Do not improvise new racial features. Use the approved anchors:

   • Alderlander = Icelandic/Swedish
   • Aslene = Arabic/Mongol mix (light-skinned, Mongol features)
   • Ailander = Slavic

4. Kin traits are mechanical. Dwarf True Grit, half-elf Psychic Power — these are game talents with specific effects. Do not embellish them into something they are not.

5. Magic paths have rules. Blood Magic works through blood and Willpower cost. Mentalism is political and invasive. Do not mix path effects or invent new ones without checking the reference.

6. Show, never label. One physical detail per character, at most. Do not name the culture directly in fiction prose. Let the reader assemble it.

7. The Blood Mist is recent history. Ten generations of isolation. The Mist lifted in 1160 AS; the manuscript "now" is 1165 AS. Infrastructure is broken. Settlements are suspicious. This is the baseline.

8. The tonal register is fixed. Re-feudal medieval survival fantasy with Swedish tone, realistic village authenticity, and soft Tolkienesque poetic worldbuilding. Each clause is a constraint — see references/tone.md for the definitions. Reject any draft that drifts toward generic high-fantasy, heroic-quest, or modern-comic register.

9. Encounters refuse the seven anti-tropes. Kill-the-monster, purge-the-undead, defeat-the-cultists, kill-the-bandits, mindless-orcs, good-faction-vs-bad-faction, find-the-artifact-win. Every monster encounter is a contract that the village has been keeping. Every undead is a confused dead or a wrong unanswered. Every faction is partly right. Every artifact carries a curse, a contested provenance, or a binding that was load-bearing somewhere. Pair with the seven approved encounter shapes in the bestiary skill.

10. Named historical figures are mostly still alive. Elves millennia, dwarves centuries, Death Knights and undead artifacts longer. Hroka, Archa, Karonax, Sulma, Tademir, Turik, Tormund, Zytera, Zygofer, Therania, Merigall, Krasylla, Zertorme, Badalar, Geno, Kartorda, Blaudewedd, Veliman, Teramalda — alive in 1165 AS. See references/history.md.

11. Every village described in prose names at least three of its seven components in the first 200 words — food source, water source, defense, shrine(s), burial place, authority, grudge structure. The Hollows is the template. See references/places.md.

Audit Checklist

When auditing prose for setting authenticity, check:

• Place names match canonical or manuscript-canon list
• Human character descriptions match approved physical types
• Kin descriptions match the kin table and the deep-dive file
• Magic references match the correct path and mechanics
• Religious references use correct faction names; faction distribution is plausible for the region
• Currency references use silver (not gold, not "coins" generically); old Alder War coin is the prestige form
• World state reflects post-Blood Mist conditions (1165 AS, five years since the Mist lifted)
• No anachronisms (no banks, no courts, no postal service, no printed broadsheets, no hospitals)
• Proper nouns spelled consistently
• Cultural behaviors match the people
• Tonal register matches the genre classification (re-feudal / survival / Swedish / village-real / soft Tolkienesque). No high-fantasy drift, no comic-fantasy drift, no modern-genre drift.
• Encounters refuse the anti-trope catalog. No kill-the-monster as the right answer; no undead-purge as the right answer; no mindless-orcs; no good-faction-vs-bad; no find-artifact-win.
• Monsters carry a contract that some village or person has been keeping. The contract is the scene, not the fight.
• Named historical figures referenced consistently with the chronology (alive vs dead, current location, current pressure).
• Villages are named via at least three of the seven components (food, water, defense, shrine, burial, authority, grudge) in the first 200 words.
• Time is anchored by the eight phases (Springrise → Springwane → Summerrise → Summerwane → Fallrise → Fallwane → Winterrise → Winterwane) or named festival boundaries (Awakening Day, Springturn, Lushday, Midsummer, Harvest Day, Fallturn, Rotday, Midwinter), not "spring," "autumn," "next year."
• Calendar dates are in AS (After the Shift) only when an old object, person, or grievance forces them into the scene.