You find yourself within Klep's Collection, a modest but well-curated public library of odd texts and tomes. The pleasant aromas of potpourri, ancient paper, and freshly brewed spice tea enter your nostrils. The interior immediately feels comfortable and warm.
Klep, an elderly elf man wearing old but well kept robes, approaches, a dusty old tome in his hands.
Thaddeus "Klep" Klepfeld
Oh, welcome, welcome, welcome. Come in, have a seat. Would you like some tea? I just brewed a fresh kettle of allorat, with plenty of sugar cubes available to temper the spice. Or, if you come from a more ... blunt palette, I have beer as well.
I'm Thaddeus Klepfeld, though most people call me Klep. I've been many things over the past 654 years, but what I'm best known for is keeping lore. I love lore, and fact, and myths, and legends! So if you've come to me, that means you're here to learn. And I'm here to teach.
So—one lump of sugar or two? ... Two, yes, of course, always two. Why do one when there are two? *laughs* ... well, ask away, and I will reveal everything I know.
Introduction
Hello! This is a website I have made to contain all the LORE about my new D&D 5.5e campaign setting, Broadsea. After debating on starting a wiki or jumping down the overly-complicated rabbit holes of World Anvil or Notebook.ai, I decided to just make my own thing, which has been fun and challenging!
From a meta perspective, Broadsea is a bit of a grimdark-esque setting; a world set 1,000 years after the death of the God-Emperor, the most powerful entity in the world whose reign lasted over 5,000 years. With his death, those things that his power kept at bay have begun expanding—called the Encroaching Darkness, or just the Darkness, by most.
This is a world where life is hard and finding hope is like finding a needle in a haystack. Fortunately, there are people like our party of adventurers, who take it upon themselves (for glory, honor, and/or money) to fight back the Darkness and keep Broadsea relatively safe.
Basically, it's kind of a mishmash of D&D and Warhammer 40k, vibeswise.
Q & A Stuff from Discord
(kept for posterity)
The Party!
Annalyn Stoneheart
Dwarf
Oath of Devotion Paladin
Bastion
1st Floor: Sanctuary
2nd Floor: Library
3rd Floor: Apartment (bedroom, kitchen)
Gwyndolyn
Halfling
Wild Magic Sorcerer
Bastion
1st Floor: Bedroom & Parlor
2nd Floor: Library
3rd Floor: Arcane Study
Mark Bark
Dragonborn
Circle of the Shepherd Druid
Bastion
Basement: Storehouse
1st Floor: Storefront kitchen
2nd Floor: Bedroom & Garden
Sessions
Fiction!
These are little stories/vignettes I write occasionally to help me, and by extension, you, get a better sense of the world. These will likely be very sporadic!
Places
The World
The name the God-Emperor gave the world has been erased from history. We call this area simply Broadsea, and the near areas the world, and anything beyond the Greater World, or reference the ancient nations or landmasses, like Gauldia and El-Karis. To refer to all the known lands is simply to call it the World, or the Greater World when referring to the world beyond Broadsea.
In the night sky we see one moon, Cerise, She Who Comes and Goes as She Pleases. Her light is erratic and unknowable. Scraps of the ancient texts make reference to a nameless second moon which no longer exists, though on particular nights when you look up you can see an assortment of glittering stars, which many learned mortals believe to the remnants of that moon.
Of lands, we know our own, and we know of El-Karis to the east, across the vast ocean. And west, beyond the Pastel Sea, lies Carantia, where the God-Emperor's throne and final resting place lie.
Modern
The Three Sisters
Bellerost, The Free City of Men
Highhaven, The City of Reason & Light
Other Towns in Broadsea? - Of course villages and small towns exist outside of the relative safety of the Three Sisters. The most notable are halfling warrentowns, secretive druid groves, and nomadic tribal settlements that dot the land. Despite the terror-filled landscape, people still try to eke out a living out there, for all variety of reasons.
Ancient & The Greater World
Beyond Broadsea lies the Greater World, where all manner of malevolent and abominable forces have gathered strength throughout the millennium. To tread this land is to know death, quickly and imminently.
The Empire of Orcs - In the ancient ruins of Gauldia to the south, the Orcs rose in prominence, forming their own massive empire as they escaped the tyranny of the God-Emperor and the stigma of being his legion of cannon fodder. There they eschew any and all “mortalkin" designs, as they see all non-orcs as those who served the God-Emperor, and thus, those who continually murdered and subjugated their kind.
Gauldia - The former nation south of Broadsea, which extended south and west along the Gauldic Peninsula. Gauldia was a significant economic force in the old world, and was razed to the ground out of sheer spite by the God-Emperor at the onset of the Last Holy War. In its ashes rose the Empire of Orcs.
Carantia - Far west, beyond the Tolstead mountains, the now-black Pastel Sea, and the lifeless jungles of the Ungruan, lies the ancient nation of Carantia, the former home of the God-Emperor and now the home to the 100 pieces of his corpse. The land is ruinous, untouched by any but those in service to ensuring the God-Emperor cannot return—the Darkwraiths.
El-Karis - To the east far across the ocean lies the heretical island nation of El-Karis, where the Karisian people lived in constant fear of the God-Emperor that they chose willingly to betray. And succeed they nearly did, through the guidance of their Shaman of Mercy, Pae-at-Anwa, the Merciful Dagger, who taught the Karisians to shun the divine resonance of their lord. But they were ultimately betrayed by their own coven, led by the Black Witch, who killed Pae-at-Anwa and broke through the barrier preventing the God-Emperor from enacting his ruthless murder of their entire population.
People
Things
Calendar - Broadsea operates on a 365 day, 12 month calendar, with 24 hour day-night cycles. For simplicity's sake, the days and months are our own, as are the seasons, as it makes it a lot easier to understand contextually where we are in a year. The current year is 1040, and the calendar years were backdated when it was developed in what was dated the year 800. Prior to then, there was no national calendar; each city state kept their own time. It was very confusing.
Divinity - Above the Clawed Palace in Highhaven rests Divinity, an orb of all the remaining divine essence in the world. It is unclear how this orb came to exist, though the existence of the Clawed Palace, which itself was constructed during or even before the God-Emperor, presumes that it was there for as long as Divinity, if not longer.
The orb is a dull orange in color and projects a black glow around it. It does not cast a shadow, nor does it illuminate at night, instead appearing completely black. The orb has no semblance of personality and does not feel in any way malevolent or cruel. Pondering the orb produces little to no results.
Divinity is the only known source of divine power in the world (aside from the inherent power of the aasimar, though this cannot be harnessed by anyone but themselves). It is what all divine spellcasters use to fuel their spells through intricate prayer and use of the True Words. It is known that proximity to Divinity is necessary, and that prayers will diminish in power the farther one is away from the divine source.
Thaddeus "Klep" Klepfeld
Hm? Divinity? Oh, that's a tricky subject. A lot of theories, a lot of postulations ... was it the source of the God-Emperor's power? Well, if that were the case, why is it here, in Highhaven, and not in Carantia?
Is it the remnant of the God-Emperor's power? Ah, but some of the ancient texts refer to Divinity while the God-Emperor reigned....
Is it even divine power? *laughs* Don't bring that up within earshot of any stuffy paladin! But, some do believe it is merely an arcane source, dolled up to seem divine in nature. If that is true, then why? And what source of arcane energy could do such a thing?
Personally ... I prefer not to dwell too much on the subject.
A Map!
This, as you might assume, is a map drawn from memory of various locations within Broadsea. It is not completely accurate—the land of Broadsea itself is not a perfect square, for example—but it is suitable for getting from place to place.
What's important is that beyond this “square” of land, life gets harder. Much harder. Even within Broadsea, anywhere outside the Three Sisters is fraught with danger; the Greater World, meanwhile, will kill you. So be wary, won't you?
