Mars, Venus and Beyond

If you have read Blood & Treasure Second Edition, you might already know that I had a sample planar system that resembles the old geocentric model of the universe combined with Gygax's idea of the outer and inner planes. At some point, I'm going to expand on these ideas and write a book called The Outre' Dark - sort of my version of the Manual of the Planes.

To that end, I've already written an article in NOD on the planet Pluto, which stands in for the negative energy plane in Nod's cosmos. This week, I've been playing with maps of Mars and Venus (or Martis and Veneris) for the Nod setting, and thought I'd show them off here, along with a few notes on the settings.

MARTIS, PLANE OF WAR

In the Nod cosmology, Mars is a planet of Neutrality, over which the forces of Lawful Neutrality and Chaotic Neutrality fight a never-ending war.

• The humanoid Martians come in a multitude of colors, from purple to amber to burnt sienna (and even some maroons living below the surface). They spawn via spores and do not nurse their young. They may have been engineered by a Zetan civilization that destroyed the plane with atomic weaponry before leaving Martis for Nod, where they were involved in founding the Nabu civilization (destroyed in a similar cataclysm).
• They are joined on Martis by green mutants in the wastelands and bat people in the mountains.
• The purple Martians are the most civilized (LN). They dwell in hive cities connected by canals.
• The amber Martians dwell in the north, and might be considered pragmatic Neutrals.
• The burnt sienna Martians are nomads (and former seafarers).
• Atop Olympus Mons there is a monastery of weird Zen Neutral monks.
• Martians wear little armor (or clothing) and arm themselves with swords, whip-swords, daggers, darts, jezzails and pistols.
• The Martians also use flying ships (skyremes) levitated by weird rays.
• There is a plant in the Martian deserts that oozes plastic nodules, which the Martians melt down and use to make a variety of objects.
• The moons of Martis (those little specs underneath the planet) are home to ghouls, who launch themselves into space when astral ships approach too close.

VENERIS, PLANE OF LIFE

Veneris is the positive energy plane in Nod's cosmos. I mixed the idea of positive energy = life with the old ideas of Venus as a jungle world. The map is still in the "rough draft" stage. It is partly inspired by this post at Malevolent and Benign.

• Humanoid Venusians come in two varieties - the cyan-skinned cave dwellers and the jade-skinned tree dwellers. They are beset by many evils on the planet, for it is populated by numerous beastmen.
• Venus has very little technology, and all of it in the hands of the gold amazons, who dwell in flying cities. Their sons, the myrmidons, are seafarers and defenders of humanity.
• Most of the peoples of Veneris have neo-stone age technology, maybe some in the chalcolithic age - giant stone cities, simple weapons, etc. Very Flintstones.
• There are dinosaurs (though not of the earthly varieties) and other prehistoric animals.
• Beneath the surface of Veneris is a core of positive energy, which erupts from time to time from volcanoes.
• The plant life of Veneris is a riot of color. It grows very quickly - a trail cut with machetes would disappear in mere minutes.
• There are massive oozes on the planet that rise from the seas and cause ecological havoc.
• The mountains are made of solid gemstone.

MERCURIUS, PLANE OF ELEMENTAL EARTH

I'm adding this one after the fact, having just finished the map. I'm picturing a world almost devoid of plant life with a thin atmosphere where all the real action is under the surface, where the powerful elementals dwell. On the surface, where adventurers are likely to spend their time, there are cities of crystal people who dominate their fellows by dominating the mineral springs they must bathe in to survive, and plundering metallic men who serve the greedy shaitan. I'm using the old idea that Mercury always had one side facing the Sun and the other in perpetual darkness - in this case, the cities of Parahelios and Nyx mark those spots.