This 36-page collection of materials provides players with an overview of the central  region of the Midgard Campaign Setting, plus a wide range of new powers and options for any Pathfinder Roleplaying Game campaign, including:

• 3 New PC races: Kobolds, ghoulish Darakhul, and Gearforged
• The Shadowsworn Class: a 20-level class of roguery and shadow magic, with 7 new spells!
• Dark Holidays of the Crossroads
• New options for Cavaliers, Paladins, and Rogues, including Griffon Knights, Fixers, and White Lions
• Ghoulish and Vampiric Sorcerer Bloodlines
• Clockwork and Illumination Schools of Magic
• 60 new feats and dozen of regional traits
• 8 new weapons for dwarves, gypsies, and rogues, including the rat poniard and Nordmansch greatax

Master the secrets of the Crossroads region and unleash its new spells, feats, and mysteries!

The tale’s the thing with the artifact known as the

The Taleblade is appropriate for mid-heroic level characters.

The Taleblade begins as a sleek rapier with a silver hilt. Though masterfully constructed, the sword is unadorned. Once acquired, however, the Taleblade begins to record the deeds and experiences of its owner and companions. Over time, the Taleblade records its owner’s journeys in incredibly fine, flowing script along the length of the blade.

Taleblade     Heroic Level

A traveling storyteller of great renown created this shining rapier. The Taleblade records the journeys of whoever owns it and seeks to complete a great tale worthy of record.

Artifact: Weapon (rapier)
Enhancement: +2 to attack rolls and damage rolls
Critical: +2d6 damage.

Properties
• The Taleblade functions as a bard implement, adding its enhancement bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls for bard powers that use implements.
• You gain a +2 item bonus to History checks.
• The Taleblade sheds dim light within 2 squares. This can be turned on or off as a free action.

Utility Power (Arcane, Weapon) • At-Will (Minor Action)
Effect: You can imprint the blade with a record of your own senses. The blade can store a single scene that you witness, including visuals and sound, up to one minute in length. Once this process begins, no action is required to sustain it. Anybody who holds the blade can summon the scene in his or her mind. Imprinting the Taleblade with a new scene removes the old one.

Goals of the Taleblade

• Record the stories of eager new explorers.
• Witness wondrous new sights and experiences.
• Complete a tale worthy of legend.

Roleplaying the Taleblade
The Taleblade seeks to find new, untested adventurers and witness their deeds, their growth, and the wondrous locations they are sure to discover. Though the Taleblade does not communicate directly, it imbues its owner with a great sense of wanderlust. The owner feels a strong desire to explore new areas, meet new people, and take roads less traveled. The Taleblade prefers owners with a strong interest in history and legend.

Concordance
Starting score: 5
Owner gains a level: +1d10
Owner is a bard or trained in History: +2
Owner witnesses something fantastic and rare: +1
Owner meets a figure of public importance (maximum 1/day): +1
Owner declines to listen to a story, song, or historical tale: –1
Owner stays in one area for more than seven days: –1

Pleased (16–20)
“We come to the climax of it all.”
The Taleblade is pleased to have witnessed many great sights and to have been a companion on a fantastic journey. It urges its owner to bring the tale to a conclusion.

Property
• The Taleblade‘s item bonus to Endurance checks and Perception checks increases to +2.

Utility Power • Daily (Immediate Reaction)
Trigger: You fall to 0 hit points or fewer.
Effect: You can spend a healing surge as a free action.

Satisfied (12–15)
“Forward, further—the second act brings us ever closer to our conclusion!”
The Taleblade is satisfied with the progress of its owner, though continues to urge its owner forward in the pursuit of quest goals. The Taleblade grants its owner powers to assist it in these goals.

Properties
• You and all allies within 10 squares gain a +1 item bonus to Endurance checks and Perception checks.
• The Taleblade serves as a sixth sense for you. You cannot be blinded or deafened while holding the Taleblade.

Normal (5–11)
“Let us write a suitable introduction for this long journey.”
The owner of the Taleblade feels a strong urge to embark on a journey and explore new areas.
At this concordance, the Taleblade has the properties, powers, and other characteristics included in its description.

Unsatisfied (1–4)
“I shall never compare to the heroes I’ve read so much about.”
The Taleblade’s owner shows little ambition or interest in his or her journey. The Taleblade grows restless and attempts to inspire a desperate longing for adventure.
The Taleblade’s enhancement bonus decreases to +1.

Angered (0 or lower)
“It would be easier to read of adventure than write my own…”
The Taleblade regards its owner as hopelessly dull and unpromising. Upon reaching 0 concordance, the Taleblade teleports several hundred miles in a random direction.

Moving On
“They will sing of this for years!”
The Taleblade feels that it has witnessed a complete tale worthy of remembrance. As soon as the Taleblade feels the tale has concluded, it creates a lushly illuminated manuscript with the full record of the story. The blade then teleports several hundred miles in a random direction, hoping to find another young adventurer to join.

If the Taleblade is pleased when it moves on, the previous owner gains a permanent +2 bonus to History checks as an aftereffect of the Taleblade‘s potent magic.

About the Author
Grayson Davis is a gamer and writer with an excessive interest in games of all kinds. He started playing RPGs as a young boy and only wishes he had more time in the day to draw maps for his weekly D&D group. He lives in Chicago, Illinois, and has run the video game website Beeps & Boops <http://beepsandboops.com/> since 2009.

As noted last week here on the Kobold Quarterly blog, we’re continuing to look at an interesting option for presenting weapons and armor in your game. If you missed the first installment of this series, you can read the first part here.

The following keywords are designed to substitute the numeric bonuses applied to armor, shields, and bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing weapons. Using these keywords breaks away a layer of metagame language and makes a world of difference to the player characters (and their players). Now the fighter can walk into the weapon shop and ask for a sword of carving, confident that the shopkeeper will know exactly what he is looking for.

Piercing Weapons

“Trust me friend, you’ll laugh less when you discover what makes the tip of my rapier boring.”

—Angelica the Divine Duelist

Piercing weapons are subtle, elegant, and precise. To embody the idiom “he did not know what hit him” and to reflect the sophistication of the design of piercing weapons, I suggest naming them as follows.

Pinpoint: A pinpoint weapon provides a +1 enhancement bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls.

Thrusting: A weapon of thrusting provides a +2 enhancement bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls.

Penetrating: A penetrating weapon provides a +3 enhancement bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls.

Boring: A weapon of boring provides a +4 enhancement bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls.

Perforating: A perforating weapon provides a +5 enhancement bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls.

Slashing Weapons

“As a weapon, a sword is inferior only to a magic sword.”

—Sergei, weaponsmith.

Artistically expressive edges and hilts make slashing weapons excellent display pieces. Often jewel-encrusted and forged in multiple hues of silver, a well-made slashing weapon is a work of art. However, on the battlefield and in violent hands, their true purpose is revealed. The names of the magical properties of slashing weapons reflect their deadliness, not their beauty.

Gashing: A gashing weapon provides a +1 enhancement bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls.

Carving: A carving weapon provides a +2 enhancement bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls.

Incising: An incising weapon provides a +3 enhancement bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls.

Hacking: A hacking weapon provides a +4 enhancement bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls.

Dissevering: A dissevering weapon provides a +5 enhancement bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls.

If you want to see more blog posts about optional naming systems such as the one presented above, please do comment below!

The shopkeeper nods. “Two swords coming right up.”

“Not two swords,” the fighter says. “One sword. +2.”

“Three swords, sir?” the shopkeeper asks.

“I want a +2 sword,” the fighter repeats, slowly and deliberately. “Just one sword, but +2.”

Clutching his patience, the shopkeeper raises an eyebrow. “+2 what, sir?”

In chess, saying a piece is killed or captured and then removing it from the board serves its purpose. In a roleplaying game, evocative language separates a rule that stumbles from one that strides. A carefully chosen key word creates the immersion that is so important in a fantasy setting. More than just an exciting explanation of the power the characters wield, key words illustrate what the characters experience. Dealing 1d6 damage per level to all creatures in a 20-ft. radius is a dull spell until it is called fireball and described as an explosion erupting on a medieval battlefield, scorching the horde of incoming orcs. This language illustrates a scene that is far more interesting than what is really happening: a series of d6s are rolled and the result is compared to a stat block to determine who lives and who dies.

Despite the extensive examples of great descriptive words in the world’s oldest fantasy RPG and its offshoots, some of the baseline magic items are bleached by some of the blandest keywords in the game. +1 sword. +2 shield. +3 armor. Sure, math is involved when you’re determining whether your character hits, but to a character trying to drive her weapon through the plated hide of a dragon bearing down on her, a +1 here and a +5 there are absolutely meaningless when it comes to evoking a memorable, shared story.

The following keywords are designed to substitute the numeric bonuses applied to armor, shields, and bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing weapons. Using these keywords breaks away a layer of metagame language and makes a world of difference to the player characters (and their players). Now the fighter can walk into the weapon shop and ask for a sword of carving, confident that the shopkeeper will know exactly what he is looking for. (This is the first part of a two-part series, so check back for more soon!)

Armor and Shields
“My shield is to me an outer wall, like the gate to a fortress. My armor is that fortress.”
—Bennetia of Sentay

Many warriors compare their armor to a transportable castle. They use metaphors about laying down mortar to mean suiting up or refortifying to mean armor shopping. Likewise, terms normally used to describe fortresses and their construction can be applied to the protective properties of cornerstone magic armor and shields.

You can apply the following magic special abilities to armor and shields. They are presented in order of enhancement bonus provided, not alphabetically. Although magic armor and magic shields both provide enhancement bonuses to Armor Class, the enhancement bonus of the armor a character wears stacks with the enhancement bonus of one shield the character wields.

Safeguarding: Armor or a shield of safeguarding provides the wearer with a +1 enhancement bonus to Armor Class.

Bastion: A bastion shield or suit of armor gives the wearer a +2 enhancement bonus to Armor Class.

Bulwark: A bulwark shield or suit of armor provides the wearer with a +3 enhancement bonus to Armor Class.

Rampart: A rampart shield or suit of armor provides the wearer with a +4 enhancement bonus to Armor Class.

Aegis: An aegis shield or suit of armor gives the wearer a +5 enhancement bonus to Armor Class.

Bludgeoning Weapons
“Smash!”
– A mountain man known only as the Barbarian.

Although wizards often carry quarterstaffs and many clerics favor the mace, bludgeoning weapons are predominantly the tool of choice of savage humanoids, dimwitted giants, and brutish warriors. As the simplest type of weapon to craft—if they are crafted at all and not just a thick branch or chunk of statue found lying around—bludgeoning weapons also have the most simply named magical properties. Only the most powerfully enchanted bludgeoning weapons, likely wielded by a higher class of adventurer, are given a more complex name.

Thumping: A thumping weapon provides a +1 enhancement bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls.

Whacking: A whacking weapon provides a +2 enhancement bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls.

Pounding: A pounding weapon provides a +3 enhancement bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls.

Smashing: A smashing weapon provides a +4 enhancement bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls.

Ruination: A weapon of ruination provides a +5 enhancement bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls.

Watch for more to come within the next several days!

I think you’re gonna like this one! Sam and I had fun making both the moon hammer and the video.

So, How Do You Make a Moon Hammer?

It’s really simple. I took a 3” long piece of 1.125” inside diameter mild steel structural pipe with 0.1875” thick walls and MIG welded a 3.25” forged mild steel ball to it. I then drove a 24” length of 1.125” diameter white oak dowel into the pipe (it’s a really tight fit), drilled two holes, and peened in two copper pins for insurance. The whole thing weighs in at 6 lbs.

I will be putting some kind of handle treatment on it but haven’t decided yet whether to go with leather wrap or some kind of studs — or both.

I didn’t swing the moon hammer that hard and was kind of surprised at the results…

This covers the mace request, and we’ll do the Danish axe soon. I do plan a war hammer and war ’hawk soon also. Any other requests?

Yeah, I heard ya on the assorted fruit targets — we’re saving that for the edged weapons.

Remember the tetsubo?

Remember asking for some video of stuff getting cut and smashed? Good! Check this video out:

What else do you want to see? We can do videos on the subjects of previous written Real Steel articles, or we can do something completely new. Tell us what you want to see! If we like the idea and it’s practical, we may just give it a try.

What video is next? I’m thinking something “edgy.” As always, feel free to axe questions… have I offered you a Danish?

The war club, in the form of a stick, was probably the first or second weapon ever used by human beings—a rock also being on that early list. Although a stout hardwood branch can get the job done, many cultures have improved both the function and appearance of the humble bludgeon. Native Americans have given us a number of designs, ranging from all wood with a large heavy knob, to a rawhide wrapped stone on a wooden handle. The Celts gave us the burda, and the Zulu the knobkierrie.

This is Real Steel, after All…

The version of the war club featured here has a steel head, mostly because this is Real Steel, not Genuine Wood. There was no smithing involved in making this one—and just a little simple machining. It doesn’t technically meet the specs for any historical war club I’m aware of, but it’s close to a burda…

Get Your Head Wrapped Around It

The head of the club is simply a 4” long piece of 1” inside diameter mild steel pipe with 3/16” walls. The pipe was cut to size using a metal cutting band saw. I used an acrylic paint to create a mask, and then soaked the head in ferric chloride for about 2 hours to etch a deep pattern. A chemical stripper was then applied to remove the paint, and then I used a scotchbrite belt on one of my 2×72” belt grinders to create a uniform satin finish. I use the chemical stripper instead of the grinder to remove the paint because the woven scotchbrite belts are especially subject to clogging if misused, and paint is very gummy.

As Alex Putnam Once Said, “The Haft of It”

The handle is an 18” long piece of 1.25” diameter white oak dowel. I used a coarse belt on the aforementioned belt grinder to first thin the end where the head will slide over the handle, then to shape the repeating conical pattern, stepping down the grit to begin smoothing, finally finishing the sanding by hand with 220 grit. The wood was then scorched on the high points with a propane torch and finally sealed with two coats of teak oil. Oak is very hard and strong, but splinters are a problem, so it must be carefully finished. Torch hardened oak splinters are no joke.

Some Assembly Required

The head is affixed to the haft three ways. First is pressure: I left enough meat on the handle so the head had to be forced on.  Second, I use the same two-part epoxy that I use to affix knife handles. Last, I drill completely through the assembled and epoxied head section and epoxy in a copper pin, the pin is then peened on both sides so it is thicker on the ends than it is in the middle. Peening also somewhat thickens the pin in the middle so it expands to fit tightly in the hole. The top of the handle was then ground off so it’s flush with the top of the head.

Evolution

The modest club is the direct ancestor of the mace, morning star, and flail. We’ll be covering the mace and morning star in the near future. I probably won’t make a flail because they are exceedingly dangerous and difficult to handle safely—but we’ll see…

Let’s Talk About It

I’m really having fun making these for a couple of reasons. They’re quick to make and don’t require expensive materials or consume expensive resources. As a result of this, they allow me to offer them relatively inexpensively. In the near future, we can look forward to a contest featuring a steel shod war club—warm up your keyboards.

My favorite part of writing Real Steel is the discussion that follows. I’d like to see some links to various types of war clubs. There are lots of examples out there—let’s show and tell.

One of the many cool things about bladesmithing is that if you come up with a new design or even a twist on an older one, you get to name it. While recurves are nothing new—and even Japanese recurves have been done many ways—the overall pattern of this knife, to my knowledge, has never been done before.

Planning… or Lack Thereof

Sometimes, as with this knife, I start forging without having anything particular in mind. Part of the creative process is to think less and just do. It involves transferring control of the hands—and therefore the hammer—from the conscious, logical part of the brain to a deeper, simpler, more creative part. This part of the brain doesn’t think with words; it instead holds a cloud of concepts.

For this knife, I charged the creative part of my mind with two concepts: elegance and lethality…

Forging the Razor

The razor started as a round bar of 5/8” W1 steel. The “W” stands for water quenching (though I quench it in oil), and the “1” indicates the formula #. “1” is a common form of W steel although “2” is making a comeback. The formulas are very simple and similar with W2 having some vanadium, which makes it tougher and more easily manipulated into forming a complex hamon.

I started by striking the tip while rotating the bar, forming a point. I then used my hydraulic press to flatten the bar and create the initial profile. I refined the profile by hand hammering—by this time, knowing I would be making a recurve. Next is the forging of the bevels, but this presents a problem with a recurve: as the bevels are forged the spine is forced backward, and a recurve is supposed to bend forward. I counter this effect by frequently forging small adjustments, forcing the tip down over the horn of my anvil. When the forging was done, I normalized and annealed the steel, refining the grain structure and softening the steel in preparation for hardening and grinding.

Grinding and Heat Treatment

Since I’ve done a good job forging, the rough grind didn’t require much more than removing forge scale and touching up the profile and bevels. This knife was differentially hardened, using a clay application along the spine resulting in a hamon which can be seen in the accompanying pictures. As always, tempering follows hardening to draw back the steel to a usable hardness, followed by final grinding and polishing.

Can You Stand the Handle?

The razor has a fairly traditional Japanese handle treatment: stingray skin underlay and black cotton maki (wrap), which is impregnated with a phenolic resin to harden it and hold it in place. This is purely an art knife, never intended to be carried, so instead of a sheath, I made a stand from black walnut.

Why Recurve?

A recurve blade has tremendous cutting power when compared to straighter blade profiles. The trade off (remember, it’s always a trade off) is they are generally not great stabbers when compared to straighter, narrower blades. Some historical examples of recurve blades are the kopis, falcata, and kukri.

I think it came out OK. What do you think?

As always, your questions and comments are most welcome!