#veiled enclave campaign

[sketchytea]

just your average session two.

resident smartass belongs to @eye-may, campaign dm’ed by @solvaldezart​

[rpgsandbox]

In the days when Babylon was the greatest city on Earth, mankind lived in placid ignorance of the grandeur, vastness and horror of the cosmos. Following cataclysmic events on Earth the fragile veil between reality and the Void was shattered and the truth of existence revealed. As mankind cried for salvation they were torn from their homeworld by Void-torrents and the surviving peoples of Earth were scattered among the stars. Countless were lost and mankind seemed all but perished. Over the decades the survivors, stragglers and ragged remnants of mankind’s tribes struggled for their lives across countless uncaring worlds. However, a few managed to go beyond mere subsistence and travel the Void-currents to congregate in fabled Llyhn, epicentre of the cosmos.

BLACK VOID is a dark fantasy tabletop roleplaying game revolving around the fall and subsequent resurgence of humanity after cataclysmic events have torn them from Earth. Pursuing power, prestige and enlightenment - humanity is struggling to find a new place and purpose in a vast and unfamiliar cosmos. Players can focus on the personal struggles and stories of their characters or expand their scope putting emphasis on the fate of humanity as a species and the part they play in this.

BLACK VOID core book: A high-quality, 400+ page, full colour and hardcover book with everything you need for players and game-masters. The book is filled with original art, novel species and monsters, extensive descriptions and rich lore, detailed maps and much more bringing the BLACK VOID to life.

Game themes: The game takes place in a distant past which is both familiar and outlandish in its dark and exotic ambience. As descendants of the survivors of Earth, characters can adopt many roles such as:

Serving as emissaries, defending the enclaves and last remnants of human civilization.

Travelling the Void-currents as explorers seeking riches and glory across the cosmos.

Venturing to find Earth, the long lost cradle of humanity.

Seeking influence and claiming a new home for mankind, taking their rightful places as leaders of mankind.

Diving into the intrigues of Llyhn or perhaps building an empire in the dark depths of the city’s underworld.

Discovering the true essence of existence finding enlightenment beyond the veil of reality; in a Void filled with mindless abominations.

Game Concept: At its core the game is about the exploration, struggle for survival and will-to-power of humanity as it encounters an outlandish, bizarre cosmos. This is not a typical game of “good versus evil”. Rather, it takes a less rigid approach and probes the grey areas where morals are point-of-view. The game revolves around three main concepts:

Into the unknown - How does humanity fit into a cosmos it knows little about and where the possibilities are endless? In a cosmos where humanity’s ideals and tenets are insignificant mankind needs to adapt or succumb!

Beyond the horizon - Exploring the cosmos and faced with adversity, political intrigue and cultural tension on a scale unknown to humanity, players must cope or risk becoming collateral damage in the struggles of uncaring factions. In the end humanity must claim its place in the cosmos or perish trying!

What is humanity - Humanity is exposed to strange and oftentimes bizarre philosophies and ideals. As a result the characters must define, establish and decide what humanity is and what its place will be in the cosmos!

Rules: The entire system is based on a few basic principles, making the rules easy to grasp and implement, which in the end gives more time for the fun bit, namely playing the game. The point of simple rules is that they can be made to fit anything an inventive Game Master or player can come up with, granting endless possibilities within the game.

Game mechanics: Actions are resolved by a single roll using a twelve-sided dice to determine their success or failure. Actions have a difficulty rating, which is the value the dice-roll must equal or exceed for the action to be successful. Rolls are modified by adding Trait, ability and conditional modifiers - with the key feature that actions can be associated with differing Traits or skills enabling players to adopt their individual style depending on circumstances or personal preference.

Key features: Two main factors in the game are enlightenment and waastah. Each factor significantly impacts the game as enlightenment grant characters the ability to traverse the Void as well as extraordinary powers and abilities while waastah confers tangible and vital sway, authority and social influence with other sentient species. Aspects that are essential as mankind’s – and the character’s - very existence is threatened.

Versatility: Points-based character creation and non-linear progression allows you to create exactly the character you wish; choosing a homeworld and allocating points between traits (physical, mental and social characteristics), talents, background, skills, attributes and powers. Want to play a sly smuggler or a beguiling blood ritualist, a cheeky chatter broker or a mesmerizing mystic? Go ahead, all options are open.

Combat: Harsh and gritty, the manoeuvre-based combat system ensures consistently versatile encounters as combatants can employ a wide variety of combat actions tailored by their personal style, preference or strategic approach. Despite its versatility combat consists of only a few simple steps: Determining the sequence of actions, then declaring and resolving these.

Powers: There are two main powers in the game - blood rituals allow characters to imbue boons and fortunes from sacrifices, divine prophecies from the entrails and much more, while mysticism lets characters manifest esoteric phenomena, changing reality purely through acts of will. Both practices however, carry inherent dangers as backlash or calamity may strike the unfortunate.

Game-play: Encouraging and rewarding player creativity and ingenuity, this game is well-suited for gamers who are looking for more player agency and freedom of choice without needless restraints. A rich, versatile and ambient setting allows players to explore unknown worlds pursuing enlightenment, prestige, wealth, physical prowess or whatever their hearts' desire. The game is best suited for extended sandbox games.

The Black Void RPG is set in a dual reality: A vast cosmos and beyond this evident world an intangible void. The cosmos is the universe we know; home to mortal species such as mankind and many others. In contrast the Void is an entirely alien and bizarre domain; an ethereal ocean constantly fluctuating and inhabited by unimaginable life forms and in its depths the mindless ghostly abominations. The void is chaos and catalyst as opposed to the order and constancy of the cosmos.

A metaphysical entity, known as the veil, divides and screens these contrasting spheres from each other. But the veil is unstable and occasionally perforated allowing the influence of one to emanate into the other and people to cross the boundary and travel between worlds.

The central arena of the game is Llyhn the eternal, a median port and cosmopolis at the heart of a massive convergence of void currents. Llyhn is a vibrant melting pot of species from across the known worlds as well as more esoteric entities, attracting cultural tensions, social intricacies, religious polemic and political rivalry. It is here that humanity is struggling for survival, staring up from filthy alleys and shanties at opulent alien palaces beyond the shadows of looming walls under the watchful eyes of the masked Hohr’loh’kin, the extended arm of the unseen rulers of Llyhn.

In addition to character creation and game mechanics the core book comprise a game master chapter, extensive lore sections, rich world descriptions and numerous original species and monsters. The GM section provides everything the discerning game master needs to know about the game and how to bring the unique flavour and atmosphere of the setting to life.

The key areas of the setting, including Llyhn, multiple core worlds and numerous other notable areas are annotated with enticing plot hooks as well as many flavourful NPC's. In addition to a one-shot adventure introducing central themes and concepts of the game an extensive compilation of tools are presented for developing flavourful new worlds, NPC's, adventures and exciting stories for the players to explore.

To learn more about the BLACK VOID RPG visit our website and follow us on Instagram, Facebook or Twitter.

Kickstarter campaign ends: Sat, May 12 2018 7:39 AM BST

Website: Black Void Games

[creativerogues]

100 “Epic” Adventure Ideas...

Here are one hundred adventure seeds you can use to generate ideas for your adventures and campaigns.

A ancient and evil balor sorcerer imprisons old friends of the player characters, holding them hostage in return for a service. 

A band of several death slaadi rogues and sorcerers begins to waylay all planar travelers who chance through their recently claimed turf on the Astral Plane.

A ranger hero recognized around the world begins to organize a group of explorers for reasons unknown...

A bardic college develops a style of music that charms and dominates any that listen to it too long.

A beholder cluster, made up of many beholders driven mad, begins to war with lesser beholder communities, apparently all seeking a beholder artifact. 

A prominent deity grows sick and will die if the cause of its divine ill is not discovered. 

A beloved prophecy long accepted as true fails to occur because of the characters’ meddling, and the world turns against them...

A blinding, yellow haze seeps down from the sky, covering the world...

A celestial tree hundreds of miles long reaches its roots down and begins to grow on the world’s surface. Creatures from other worlds live in the heights of the tree. 

A child is born who prophecy indicates will one day ascend to godhood. 

A black disease blights the forest, killing all vegetation as it continues to expand without limit at an ever-accelerating rate. 

A clan of psionic militants breaks away from the kingdom — literally. A huge chunk of land hundreds of acres wide floats up and away (taking with it many terrified non-psionic people). 

A conjunction of parallel planes somehow energizes a lowly peasant to the power of a greater deity — but only until the conjunction ends. 

A cross-time catastrophe has cut off the Material Plane from all others. 

A dragon kills the ruler of the largest nation and takes over, calling itself the Dragon King.

A flaw in a true resurrection spell leaves one player character undead by night and alive by day. 

A floating city arrives from across the sea, apparently fleeing the depredations of the Warlord, a barbarian of an epic caliber.

A flock of angelic avengers and celestials is ravaging across the continent. 

A meeting is called by a storm giant blackguard. Powerful giants from around the world (and other worlds) begin to congregate. Though no one knows the meaning of this calling...

A glorious gemstone in which the first light of creation still lingers is purportedly languishing in an ancient, crumbling demi-plane. 

A great chase ensues through endless parallel dimensions as wizard researchers follow the faint trail of the long-vanished elder elves. 

A group of gargoyle paragons claims the Cathedral of Pelor as its own new home. 

A hero of renown (a quasi-deity, really) is to be wed to an elven prince, but the prince’s royal family claims the prince is under a spell. 

A hole is gouged in the veil separating life and death. As the tide of life pours out into the void, all creatures everywhere begin to die as they accumulate negative levels. The hole must be mended. 

A red dragon and two of its siblings emerge from a red-lit cavern in the earth. 

A lesser deity declares the PCs as its mortal enemies, enjoining all its worshipers and allies to find and slay them. 

A longstanding illusion is pierced, revealing that the king is nowhere to be found, and that all dictates of the kingdom have been actually flowing from the thieves’ guild. 

A new deity decides to leave the Outer Planes to set up its palace on the face of the Material Plane. Once it arrives, it demands worshipers and servitors. 

A mad chronomancer with a mastery of time, has determined how to destroy the past (and therefore the present). Unless it can be stopped, time itself will unravel. 

A planar conjunction will soon come to pass, allowing the legions of hell (or worse) direct access to a selected part of the Material Plane for 24 hours. It can’t be stopped, but some famous characters may attempt to defend key cities or strongholds from the onslaught. 

A player character’s heart is stolen and replaced with a magical gem or a strange alchemical creation. Who knows how long the replacement will last? 

A powerful wizards’ guild enters all-out war with the dominant religious order of the world. 

A quasi-deity wants an escort as it ventures into the Abyss to release a companion quasi-deity from bondage. 

A rogue moon threatens to crash down upon the world, ending all life. 

A sentient spell-virus is raging out of control among spellcasters. All who fall victim to it become part of one unified mind controlled by a malign intelligence. 

A species of “fish” introduced from another plane has provided good eating and relief from famine over the last year. Now, thousands (possibly millions?) of the fish-like creatures begin a sudden growth spurt, transforming en masse into terribly powerful and bloodthirsty predators. 

A splinter community of humans evolves into a sub-race sporting strange and variant powers. 

A syndicate of assassins dramatically expands its membership by introducing a mind-control potion into a city’s water supply. 

A team of nightmares draws a chariot driven by a powerful fighter into the city. 

A titan seeks those brave enough to release it from its age-long bondage; its rescuers may face the wrath of higher deities. 

A vampire scion from another plane begins to conquer world after world with the help of a reforged artifact of legend, Midnight’s Heart. 

A volcano erupts. In the aftermath, a portal to the City of Brass on the Elemental Plane of Fire remains open permanently.

A well-known wizards’ guild’s magical dumping ground of failed experiments and stale spell components becomes sentient.

A wizard attempting to summon a powerful devil slips up and somehow summons an abomination instead: an infernal lord of the hells. 

A wizard claims to have developed an epic spell ritual that, if cast, will slay a deity.

All magic items crafted from a particular city begin to bestow negative effects on their owners with each use. 

All who fall asleep on a selected world cannot be awakened and eventually die in their sleep. Exhaustion is beginning to take a hold on even the greatest heroes of its realm...

An adventuring party stumbles upon the tomb prison of an long dead half-god and releases it. 

An anti-magic plague is released by an unknown agency, causing sickness and eventually death to any who prepare or cast arcane spells. 

An artifact belonging to one of the characters must be destroyed, lest some great catastrophe, which has secretly been gathering, come to pass. 

An artifact capable of forever dominating all red dragons everywhere is discovered.

An enclave of gnomes customizes an iron colossus into a walking war platform.

A group of NPCs known for good deeds suddenly embarks on a death spree, murdering merchants and their envoys...

A group of NPCs decides to destroy the PC adventurers, for reasons that are initially obscure. 

A sentient, free roaming, self-casting disintegrate spell breaks loose from a wizard’s laboratory. 

A legendary paladin leads a crusade to hell. 

An inter-dimensional caravan must float on the River Styx through the dangers of several lower planes. 

Spirits begin to manifest from machines as complicated as simple steam-powered wheels — is it a warning from the gods of the forge to desist? 

Angry druids raise the beasts, animals, and dire animals of the wild, intent on beginning a new world order in which nature comes first. 

As the world ages, frequent earthquakes threaten to plunge the major nations under the sea. 

Blue-skinned merchants begin to sell enormously popular items composed of dreamstuff — “mined from the very dreams of a deity,” claim the merchants.

Deeper than the Underdark, the world is discovered to be hollow. Hanging in that vast opening is an unknown, uncharted inner world of strangeness.

Dwarf miners follow a vein of adamantine to a hinged valve sealed with divine magic of an age older than any of the current deities. 

A group of seemingly amateur rogues steal the magical scepter of the Dragon King. 

Evil opportunists slay the Guardian of the Flame of Destiny, hoping to remold the Law of Reality to their own liking. 

Ghosts of every sort begin to rise again, and they won’t recognize their own undead state. 

Mind flayers successfully gain control of a surface nation, plunging the region into permanent darkness. 

Jade pyramids of prodigious size rise from the earth. Sounds unlike any heard before echo faintly from within their stony cores. 

Construct-like creatures of insane complexity called “machines” move across the land, preparing the way for a larger invasion of automated entities. 

Magic begins to fail, supposedly because it is being “used up” faster than it naturally regenerates. 

Mercenary half-dragons who ride chromatic dragons as steeds sell their swords (and spells) to an evil empire. 

Newborns begin to be born without souls.

Off-plane raiders begin to steal people away for use as slaves and food. 

Once every ten years a small cave provides access into a magical, underground world where all living beings give off colorful light, ruled by mysterious fey lords with mysterious agendas. 

One of the player characters learns about his or her real mother or father — in fact, that parent was a demon, and that demon has come calling. 

Planetars and solars bring heaven’s war to the Material Plane, slaying any and all they deem evil or immoral. 

Chromatic dragons decide that their “species” is the only true draconic race, and they begin a campaign of genocide against all other dragon types. 

Several well-known cities and all their inhabitants suddenly disappear without a trace. More could follow...

Someone is breaking the Seven Seals that maintain the integrity of the multiverse...

The ancient Great Library has secret vaults where the Words Once Spoken are supposedly inscribed in the Book of Sleep. To speak them again would remake the universe. 

The Clock that Rules the Universe is under attack by insane gnome alchemists, who are raiding it for parts. 

The End Times threaten to begin. 

The gods of Law put all humanoid races on trial for their excesses.

The Lord High Priest of Pelor denounces her deity and faith. 

The most feared and reviled weapon of legend, an artifact sword that drains life energy with a touch, is lost by its owner. 

The Mother of Spiders emerges from her Cocoon of a Million Years to find a mate for her next spawning. 

A vast necropolis undergoes a mystical transformation. Now, each coffin, sarcophagus, and mausoleum leads to separate cemetery dimensions and realms of death. 

The PCs’ stronghold mysteriously gains new extra-dimensional halls and rooms of unknown origin, content, and extent.

The populace decides that they want one of the PCs as their new ruler, which doesn’t please the current ruler. 

The secret texts of a prominent religion, recently discovered, call into question the church’s real goal, its actual origin, and the agenda of its god. 

The souls of a good queen and her family are drawn into the Abyss by an unknown demonic agency. 

The spirits of the dead begin to possess the bodies of the living at an ever-accelerating rate. 

The sun is infested with moon-sized parasites, and may soon fail like so many other stars have fallen to this celestial infestation. 

The winter, which was overly cold, lasts too long — the goddess of winter, Auril, is suspected to be the cause...

The woods begin to grow without bound, invading field, plain, and city. 

The yuan-ti attempt to awaken the Slumbering Serpent, a little-known abomination born of their own race and a god of serpents.

Twenty percent of all astral travelers begin to disappear in mid-trip. Mid-travel diversion spells are suspected. 

Two parallel planes move too close to each other, and denizens and objects of one constantly slip onto the other, and vice versa. 

Unless stopped, an ancient demi-lich will inject itself onto the Negative Energy Plane, where it can possess any undead anywhere in the multiverse. 

When a friend or a respected associate is resurrected, the soul returned to the body has different memories from the original. Whence does this soul come? 

[newstfionline]

Headlines: Tuesday, October 6, 2020

Trump Leaves Walter Reed Hospital, Returning to the White House (AP) President Donald Trump on Monday evening left Walter Reed hospital in Maryland. Photos showed Trump’s motorcade leaving the facility at around 6:30 p.m. ET. The departure came several hours after Trump announced he would be leaving, while his doctors told a news conference that his condition has improved enough to allow him to return back to the White House. Before his departure, the president wrote he “will be back on the campaign trail soon.” About 30 minutes later, Trump was seen at the White House, taking off his mask. Trump will need to continue treatment as he is still undergoing a five-day course of the intravenous antiviral drug, remdesivir, and will have to isolate himself for a certain period of time.

Poll: Many Americans blame virus crisis on US government (AP) More Americans blame the U.S. government instead of foreign nations for the coronavirus crisis in the United States, a rebuke to the Trump administration’s contention that China or other countries are most at fault, a new poll shows. The poll by The University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy and The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research was conducted before President Donald Trump tested positive for the virus Friday and was hospitalized. Although many see plenty of blame to go around and there’s a wide bipartisan divide over who is responsible, 56% of Americans say the U.S. government has substantial responsibility for the situation. That compares with 47% who place that much blame on the governments of other countries and only 39% who say the same about the World Health Organization. “It reflects a general lack of confidence in the way the government has handled the situation,” said Austin Wright of the Harris School for Public Policy.

Record-breaking California wildfires surpass 4 million acres (AP) In a year that has already brought apocalyptic skies and smothering smoke to the West Coast, California set a grim new record Sunday when officials announced that the wildfires of 2020 have now scorched a record 4 million acres—in a fire season that is far from over. The unprecedented figure—an area larger than the state of Connecticut—is more than double the previous record for the most land burned in a single year in California. “The 4 million mark is unfathomable. It boggles the mind, and it takes your breath away,” said Scott McLean, a spokesman for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, known as Cal Fire. “And that number will grow.” So far, in this year’s historic fire season, more than 8,200 California wildfires have killed 31 people and scorched “well over 4 million acres in California” or 6,250 square miles, Cal Fire said Sunday in a statement. The blazes have destroyed more than 8,400 buildings.

U.S. Allies Worry the White House Wants to End New START Treaty (Foreign Policy) The United States and Russia are due to meet in Helsinki, Finland, today in their ongoing effort to renegotiate and replace the New START nuclear arms treaty which is set to expire in February 2021. New START is the only remaining agreement limiting nuclear arms between the two countries. Much of the delay in renegotiating the treaty was due to Washington’s insistence that China be included in any new agreement. But the White House has since backed off that condition as Trump has become embroiled in his reelection campaign, and now the hope among many U.S. allies is that Washington will seek a standalone deal with Russia before the deadline and pursue another agreement with China at a later time. The United States has so far only proposed new conditions for Russia, a move that some officials worry is little more than a thinly-veiled attempt by the White House to scuttle the deal entirely. As Foreign Policy’s Jack Detsch and Robbie Gramer recently reported, “former officials and arms control experts worry the administration may be seeking to slow-walk the accord to death by making impossible demands of Russia just months before the treaty is slated to end.”

Cinema-going collapse (Reuters) Cineworld brings down the curtain. Cineworld will close all of its UK and U.S. movie theatres this week, leaving as many as 45,000 workers unemployed for the foreseeable future as it strives to survive a coronavirus collapse in film-making and cinema-going. The world’s second-biggest cinema chain said the reluctance of studios to push ahead with major releases such as the new James Bond film had left it no choice but to close all 536 Regal theatres in the U.S. and its 127 Cineworld and Picturehouse theatres in the UK from Oct. 8.

Ebooks (Wired) Checkouts of ebooks from libraries are up 52 percent compared to the same period last year according to OverDrive, the tech partner of 50,000 libraries worldwide for ebook services. Hoopla, a rival service, said another 439 library systems joined their network since March, increasing their customers by 20 percent. Digital offerings are nothing new—libraries pay an average of $40 per ebook compared to the $15 an individual pays for an ebook, and can lend that one ebook out for a certain number of uses or over a certain period. The system is tense: publishers are worried that a switch to library digital books will cause the bottom to fall out of their print business, while libraries don’t like that pricing model, especially because surges (like the one seen in pandemic times) can get very expensive very quickly.

Venezuela Planning New 100,000-Bolivar Bills Worth Just $0.23 (Bloomberg) Venezuela has begun to import banknote paper and is mulling plans to print bills with larger denominations as hyperinflation causes shortages of cash, according to six people with knowledge of the matter. The central bank is considering new bills starting with 100,000 bolivars, the people said. It would be the highest denomination yet, but still worth only $0.23. The need for larger bills in Venezuela is a direct result of an ever weakening currency and inflation that ran at an estimated 2,400% in the past year, meaning that paying for a cart full of groceries now requires a bag of cash. Venezuela has been suffering from hyperinflation since 2017, decimating the ability of most Venezuelans to purchase even the most essential goods—much less save. The average family requires more than 100 times the official minimum wage to meet its basic needs. Authorities have turned a blind eye to a greater number of transactions being carried out in U.S. dollars, with Ecoanalitica estimating that some 60% of all purchases are now done using greenbacks.

‘Nuclear’ lockdown recommendation for Ireland (Reuters) Ireland’s government faced political and business resistance to a surprise recommendation by health chiefs for Europe’s first major second wave national lockdown to prevent hospitals from being overwhelmed as coronavirus cases rise. The National Public Health Emergency Team called for a leap to the highest level of COVID-19 restrictions, Level 5, late on Sunday, just three days after telling government the current Level 2 status for most of the country was appropriate.

Four dead in southern France flooding, up to 18 missing (Reuters) Four people have died and up to 18 more are missing in floods and heavy rain in southern France, a spokeswoman for Alpes Maritimes prefecture said on Monday. Southern France has been lashed by torrential rain over the weekend and swollen rivers have swept away houses, bridges and parts of roads.

Armenia’s Leader Makes Plea to U.S. as Conflict Rages With Azerbaijan (NYT) When Nikol Pashinyan, Armenia’s prime minister, spoke by telephone on Thursday with President Trump’s national security adviser, he raised a delicate issue: Why is nothing being done to stop a longtime United States ally, Turkey, from using American-made F-16 jets against ethnic Armenians in a disputed mountain region? Mr. Pashinyan’s call to the national security adviser, Robert O’Brien, followed an eruption of heavy fighting in and around Nagorno-Karabakh, a remote territory at the center of the most enduring and venomous of the “frozen conflicts” left by the collapse of the Soviet Union. The breakaway enclave, legally part of Azerbaijan but controlled by Armenians for the past three decades, has seen many military flare-ups over the years. But the current fighting, Mr. Pashinyan said in a telephone interview, has taken on a far more dangerous dimension because of Turkey’s direct military intervention in support of Azerbaijan, its ethnic Turkic ally. In a statement Sunday, the International Committee of the Red Cross denounced “a surge in attacks using heavy explosive weaponry on populated areas,” which it said “is taking a deadly toll on civilians.” It said that hundreds of homes, as well as schools and hospitals, had been destroyed or damaged, forcing families to flee or retreat “underground to unheated basements, sheltering day and night from the violence.” The conflict has set off alarms about the risks of a wider war and put the United States, with its large and politically influential Armenian diaspora, in the uncomfortable position of watching Turkey, a vital NATO ally, deploying F-16 jets in support of Armenia’s enemies.

Remote learning begins in virus-hit Philippines (AP) Grade school and high school students in the Philippines began classes at home Monday after the coronavirus pandemic forced remote-learning onto an educational system already struggling to fund schools. The shift to distance learning has been a logistical nightmare for the poverty-stricken Southeast Asian country that has long lacked enough classrooms, teachers and educational equipment. Nearly 25 million students enrolled this year, mostly in 47,000 public schools nationwide that would have to be replicated in homes and enlist the help of parents and guardians as co-teachers. A majority of families, especially from poor and rural communities, opted to use government-provided digital or printed learning materials or “modules,” which students will read at home with the guidance of their elders before carrying out specified activities. Most lack computers and reliable internet connections. Teachers can answer questions by telephone. Other families preferred for their children to get lessons online or through regional radio and TV educational broadcasts.

Pilgrims return to Mecca as Saudi eases virus restrictions (AP) A very small, limited number of people on Sunday donned the white terrycloth garment symbolic of the Muslim pilgrimage and circled Islam’s holiest site in Mecca, after Saudi Arabia lifted coronavirus restrictions that had been in place for months. The kingdom had taken the rare step in early March of suspending the smaller “umrah” pilgrimage, which can be taken at any time of the year and draws millions from across the world, as the coronavirus morphed into a global pandemic and prompted countries to impose lockdowns and curfews to slow down transmission. But as nations begin to ease those restrictions, the Saudi government on Sunday started allowing a maximum of 6,000 pilgrims a day to enter the sprawling Grand Mosque in Mecca. Only Saudi citizens and residents will be permitted to enter the mosque during this first phase of reopening, and each person has up to three hours to complete the pilgrimage.

[wearefusion]

FUSION Invests in Coverage of Social Justice Issues with New Cross-Platform ‘Fusion Fights’ Content Initiative

New Year-Long Effort Will Include Special Programming on FUSION TV, Enterprise Reporting, and Special Events Around Gender, Environmental, Economic Justice and Civil Rights Issues

‘FUSION Fights’ for Gender Justice Kicks off with Panel Discussion at Davos and Continues with Special Coverage of the Women’s March on Washington

FUSION today announced the launch of ‘FUSION Fights,’ a new cross-platform content initiative that seeks to elevate conversations around social justice issues that impact young, diverse communities, and often don’t receive the media coverage these issues merit. The announcement was made at the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos.

The effort builds on FUSION’s commitment to covering social justice issues and  will include the production of television, digital, and social content that amplifies the diverse voices in America and the issues that matter most to them. ‘FUSION Fights’ will also include specific calls to action driven by FUSION’s RiseUp social impact unit. ‘FUSION Fights’ will initially focus on the following social justice issues:

FUSION Fights for Gender Justice: This election cycle underscores the need to ensure more women have a strong and equitable voice in shaping our public and private institutions. This cycle highlighted the threats, veiled and unveiled, to women’s health and to the fundamental right to control our own bodies, as well as important subjects like equal pay, paid family leave, and sexual harassment. FUSION fights for these rights, and for the rights of all individuals, regardless of gender identity or sexual preference, to live with dignity, and with the security that all  can afford to care for their families.

FUSION Fights for Economic Justice: Over the last few decades, the gap between the 1% and the rest of the country has grown exponentially. History has demonstrated again and again that nations with such great imbalance struggle to uphold their core democratic principles. As President Barack Obama said in his final address: “if every economic issue is framed as a struggle between a hard-working white middle class and undeserving minorities, then workers of all shades will be left fighting for scraps while the wealthy withdraw further into their private enclaves.” FUSION fights for basic economic opportunity for all Americans.

FUSION Fights for Civil Rights: The ‘millennial’ generation is the most diverse generation to come of age in our nation’s history and future generations will make the U.S. a majority-minority nation by 2044. FUSION will fight for those championing diversity and inclusivity with coverage around issues of race, immigrant rights, islamophobia, and LGBT rights as well as issues of access and representation like voting rights and redistricting.

FUSION Fights for Environmental Justice: Quite simply, without a healthy earth, the rest of the fights will soon become irrelevant. Too often, though, traditional environmental movements and the media have overlooked the leadership and courage of young, multicultural Americans working to protect our basic, natural resources. FUSION fights for the voices who are working to protect our planet and shines a light on issues including water conservation and access to clean water, animal rights, protection of Native land and national parks, and climate change.

“With so much at stake as a transition of power happens in Washington, FUSION will continue its wide-ranging coverage of social justice issues by amplifying diverse voices and fighting for more substantive conversations on several core issues. We want to spark more dialogue and drive action that will help ensure we build a stronger democracy and more just society for our country’s diverse youth,” said FUSION Co-Presidents Daniel Eilemberg and Boris Gartner.

The ‘FUSION Fight’ for gender justice kicked off with a special panel on gender roles at the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos and will continue this month with coverage of the Women’s March on Washington. Ongoing cross-platform coverage of gender justice will include:

EVENTS

‘Disrupting the Status Quo of Gender Roles’ / January 18 in Davos | FUSION TV and Univision will host a panel discussion, ‘Disrupting the Status Quo of Gender Roles,’ at the World Economic Forum’s Annual Meeting in Davos. While gender roles are shifting, women still face many barriers to fulfilling their potential. How can we challenge stereotypes and institutional inertia to achieve gender parity within our lifetimes? Enrique Acevedo, Univision news anchor and FUSION TV Special Correspondent, will moderate a discussion with: Christine Lagarde, Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF); Isabel Saint Malo, Vice President of Panama; Cynthia Castro, Vice-President of Reinventing Business for All (RBA) in Costa Rica; Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, documentary filmmaker; and Robert E. Moritz, Global Chairman of PricewaterhouseCoopers International. The panel will be livestreamed on Facebook and FUSION.net.    

‘What to Do When You’re Expecting the Worst’ / January 19 in Washington DC |  FUSION TV, Jezebel and Fusion.net team up to host a discussion on how the incoming Trump Administration and the new Congress will impact women’s rights in America. ‘What to Do When You’re Expecting the Worst’ will bring together women and men from the political sector, nonprofit world, and journalism community.

‘The Return on Equality’ / January 19 in Davos | Enrique Acevedo, Univision news anchor and FUSION TV Special Correspondent, hosts a conversation ‘The Return on Equality’ featuring Michael Cole-Fontayn, Executive Vice President and Chairman of EMEA, BNY Mellon; Ambassador Elizabeth Cousens, Deputy CEO, UN Foundation; Vivian Riefberg, Senior Partner, McKinsey & Company; and Angela Sun, Head of Strategy and Corporate Development, Bloomberg L.P.

FUSION TV

The Naked Truth: Women’s March on D.C. | FUSION’s Cleo Stiller reports from the Women’s March on Washington for a special report. Airs Sunday, January 22 @ 8PM on FUSION TV.

The Woman Card | FUSION’s Alicia Menendez takes a revealing, provocative look at the role gender played in the 2016 election and what takeaways will prove useful under the new Trump administration and Congress. Menendez talks to the women who will be shaping the conversation in the years ahead including Sen. Kamala Harris; Sen. Loretta Sanchez; Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY); and former Deputy Campaign Manager, Carly for President, Sarah Isgur Flores. Airs Sunday, January 22 @ 8:30PM on FUSION TV.

O Girls | Oprah Winfrey has changed the lives of hundreds of young women through her Leadership Academy for Girls in South Africa. Ten years later, FUSION’s Kimberly Brooks documents the personal journey of five girls from the inaugural class as they graduate college and interviews Oprah about the power education can have to empower young women across the globe. Airs Sunday, January 22 @ 9:30 PM on FUSION TV.

Black Mamas Matter (tentative title) | In a new investigative documentary, produced by the Oscar and Emmy award-winning duo Simon Chinn (‘Man on Wire,’ ‘Searching for Sugar Man’) and Jonathan Chinn (‘American High’), FUSION’s Nelufar Hedayat examines the shocking number of women of color who are dying during, or soon after, giving birth -- all in what is supposed to be the most developed country in the world. Airdate TBA.

No League of Their Own | The conversation surrounding transgender athletes has reached a fever pitch and FUSION seeks to explore the answer to the often asked question: do transgender athletes actually have a competitive advantage? Through professional voices and personal storytelling, the special report ‘No League of Their Own’ examines the debate through interviews with Caitlyn Jenner, 1976 Olympic Gold Medalist and Transgender Advocate; Chris Mosier, Team USA Duathlete; Chloe Anderson Division II Collegiate Volleyball Player; Katrina Karkazis, Senior Research Scholar at the Stanford Center for Biomedical Ethics; among other experts. Airdate TBA.

Sex Right Now: Bridging the Orgasm Gap | FUSION’s Cleo Stiller takes an informative and entertaining look at: the plight of the sexually voracious woman and what that means for men, as well as life in the burgeoning industry of sex toys made by and designed by women, and why it's practically illegal to say the word 'vagina.' This special is part of an ongoing that explores sex, society and technology in the new America. Airdate TBA.

DIGITAL

‘Wired Women’ | A digital video series will put a spotlight on women and girls kicking-ass in tech, while making the world a little less messed up. The series will be featured across the digital properties of the Fusion Media Group including Fusion, Jezebel, and Gizmodo.

Ongoing Enterprise Reporting | The editors and reporters from FUSION.net take a deep dive into into the impact of the incoming administration and the new Congress on women's health.

Cross-platform content for the ‘FUSION Fights’’ for economic justice, environmental justice, and civil rights will be announced in the coming weeks.

[digitalmark18-blog]

'Fake News' Takes to the Air

New Post has been published on https://britishdigitalmarketingnews.com/fake-news-takes-to-the-air/

'Fake News' Takes to the Air

Business /23 Aug 2018

Born from the genesis of the Arab Spring, the conflict in Syria has unabashedly laid waste to cities, communities and the hopes and dreams of millions who are disillusioned by a dictatorial regime that retains power.

A proxy war of sorts which began in 2011 has continued which focuses on efforts to, on the one side, prop up and fortify Bashar al-Assad’s rule by the Russians and the United States who hope to take down his regime.

As the dogfight on the frontlines persists, sophisticated tactics have been deployed to buttress the endeavors by each side like stifling military operations and the deployment of both humanitarian aid and the tools to combat the Syrian regime, by jeopardizing the flight path and the corporate shelf life of the operators who carry out such challenging support-driven endeavors.

To be blunt, a ‘Black PR’ campaign has been silently yet maliciously executed, leveraging social media, Wikipedia, SEO and the malleable, post-Soviet press environment, to besmirch the reputation of and the relationships hosted by longstanding U.S. military contractors such as Silk Way Airlines, perhaps turning their own allies against them in the process.

In July, 2017 a hack made on the Azerbaijani Embassy of Bulgaria, undertaken by ‘Anonymous Bulgaria’ (with IP-address roots linked to Russia), prompted an immediate investigation by an overly ambitious reporter who had previously never written in English let alone on matters as intricate as airline diplomacy. Her works were published in the Bulgarian daily newspaper Trud (the paper has since terminated her engagement). Indeed, Ms. Dilyana Gaytandzhieva’s efforts sought to seemingly reveal how through Bulgaria, “…Silk Way Airlines exploited a loophole in international aviation and transport regulation to offer flights to arms manufacturers and private companies – with much of the cargo heading for known terrorist enclaves in Syria.”

The reporter’s efforts did not remain lost on Trud as they were repeatedly issued as tweets on her social media account (posts which would coincide with a staunch defense of Syria’s President and separately, Russia in the recent chemical attack in the United Kingdom), and would later appear in efforts made on Wikipedia to re-brand Silk Way following her captivating would-be exposé.

Her insinuations threatened a longstanding relationship held between Silk Way Airlines and the U.S. military, the former operating above board and the latter was transporting aid cargo and munitions as a private contractor.

Further, greater investigation would find that cryptocurrency-driven search engine optimization (SEO) services such as Steemit would continue to elevate Silk Way misinformation. In other words, payments were being issued to keep the Trud article elevated when Silk Way itself would become queried.

The Wikipedia positioning raised flags with U.S. military providers and institutions critical for the continued North American operations of Silk Way, which many would say has a leading role in the fight carried out by the U.S. against the tyrannical regime of Assad.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, competitors and cargo carriers continue supporting Russian military operatives to oppose any and all U.S. efforts, while Silk Way is in a state of limbo to assist in retaliation by way of dynamic supply.

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In an attempt to avoid this ‘proxy war’ of propaganda and corporate maligning, on the 19th of February, 2018, the Bulgarian Civil Aviation Administration released an official statement refuting the false allegations of the then-Trud journalist, remarking that “the Directorate General Civil Aviation Administration to the Ministry of Transport, Information Technologies and Communications of the Republic of Bulgaria, aimed to clarify that all flights operated by Silk Way Airlines from/through the territory of Bulgaria, with special/military production on board, were performed in accordance with all National and International regulations and legal provisions, with all respective permits, certificates and documents for transportation by air of such sensitive cargo.”

“Without any exceptions,” the statement continued, “…Silk Way Airlines [has strictly adhered] to all applicable regulations for the safe transportation of Dangerous Goods by air. For every flight, the operator and the shipper of the cargo are duly disclosed in a legal manner and disclose by legal documents the origin, the route of the flight, as well as the consignor, consignee and the end user.”

Flight operations in question were ultimately proven to be undertaken at the behest of the U.S government and for the benefit of U.S. foreign policy interests. As a commercial service-provider, Silk Way performed and continues to perform air transportation services under applicable U.S. government contracts.

However, the victim of propagated ‘Fake News,’ the saga of Silk Way Airlines raises eyebrows as to how often media manipulation in the spirit of boardroom competition or as a veil upon the battlefield can be executed in managing public perception, with the assumption being that the intricacy of the espionage will miss the intrepid eye of U.S. publications.

We look forward to sharing greater instances of this haphazard cyber-warfare in the days and weeks to come. Until then, it is in our hands to create lasting change.

Source: https://intpolicydigest.org/2018/08/23/fake-news-takes-to-the-air/

[kayawagner]

CASTLE OLDSKULL - Game World Generator - Deluxe Edition

Publisher: Kent David Kelly

Please Note: This Deluxe and Revised Edition of the Platinum Best-Selling Game World Generator is actually two books in one.  It is a fully expanded, reformatted, re-illustrated, and re-edited version of the original Game World Generator, along with a new 70,000-word book -- my requested City State Design Guide -- which is featured as a part herein, where the previous edition ended with very little city state information.  The two books are united as a continuous narrative due to the number of requests made by GMs for these associated topics over the years.  This Deluxe Edition supersedes the existing Game World Generator (GWG1 V1), which remains available separately at an introductory price.  The original edition's 71,000 words have expanded with new material to encompass 161,000 total words in the Deluxe Edition, thereby featuring more than double the content, and making this volume now my most extensive gaming supplement to date.  Enjoy!

**

Affordable excellence. A Platinum Medal Best Seller (DriveThruRPG & RPGNow), now fully revised and expanded with more than twice the original material.

  Wolf-haunted wastelands of frigid tundra,

Veiling lost cities sunken and frozen into the ice …

Mist-wreathed mountains teeming with orcs,

Goblins, demons and dwarven underworlds …

Burning battlefields, reigned over

By imperious and ancient dragons …

Steaming jungles, filled with headhunters

And savage apes, guardians to ancient temples

Filled with accursed gold …

  These are the realms of old school fantasy role-playing, the world of your imagination. This world is a dark and wondrous place, an endless milieu teeming with danger, intrigue, exotic wonders, epic quests, and the bold heroes and villains who dare to conquer all. And you, as the Game Master, are tasked with creating those kingdoms from scratch. It is your mission to forge an entire alternate universe filled with infinite possibilities, a world which your friends and fellow role-players can explore for years to come. But how do you create a world? How do you even begin?

The CASTLE OLDSKULL GAME WORLD GENERATOR is the only guide specifically and solely designed to assist you in creating an entire old school fantasy world. This is no “It is time for you to take the world into your own hands, and no one but you can decide what to include” copout dodge which demands everything of you and gives you nothing. This is a massive step-by-step guide, from blank hex paper to the fully-realized game world, which explains the entire process to you in granular detail. Even better, this book is filled with dozens of helpful graphics which illustrate the entire mapping process. If you love lost worlds like Dave Arneson’s “Black Marsh,” Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Barsoom and Pellucidar, Gary Gygax’s “Gray Kingdom,” Robert E. Howard’s Cimmeria and Hyboria, Fritz Leiber’s Nehwon, H.P. Lovecraft’s Dreamlands, Michael Moorcock’s Melnibone and J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle Earth, then this is the book for you!

Highlights include: world conception, mapping, scale, landforms, terrain, kingdoms and fiefs, wilderness design, feudal realms and foreign equivalents, city and wilderness names, treasures and resources, hierarchies of nobility, ruler classes and levels, realm alignment, campaign-tailored population formulae, demi-human enclaves, humanoid tribes, starting area development, dragon lair placement, dungeon placement and much more. Everything you need to turn your ideas into a solid, coherent and adventure-filled world is right here at your fingertips.

The GAME WORLD GENERATOR is brought to you by Kent David Kelly of Wonderland Imprints, a role-player and Game Master with over 35 years of play experience. Best of all, if there are any other materials you would like to see relating to world or dungeon design, feel free to contact the author. I create the supplements that Game Masters want. Many more CASTLE OLDSKULL supplements are being prepared specifically to support the players, initiates and Game Masters of the Old School Revival (OSR). This book is your gateway to the realms of sword and sorcery. Join us for the adventure! (A complete reference work designed to supplement existing pen-and-paper Fantasy Role-Playing Games. 5 parts, over 100 section topics, 161,100 words, over 430 pages; organized via a fully hyperlinked table of contents. Just one of the proud creations available now from Wonderland Imprints — Only the Finest Works of Fantasy.)

Price: $4.99 CASTLE OLDSKULL - Game World Generator - Deluxe Edition published first on https://supergalaxyrom.tumblr.com

[sketchytea]

ciaran thing

[sketchytea]

"If you fuck with my hair while I'm catatonic, I really will carve a smiley face into one of your knives." 

There was a pause, before a ghost of a smile crossed over Ciaran's face. 

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

old dnd sketch that i felt like posting. sav belongs to @eye-may

[sketchytea]

that relatable feeling when you have a wild magic surge vis-à-vis your traumatic backstory and you end up temporarily turning all of your unfortunate colleague’s beloved weapons into bread and staining everything you touch with blue ink. requiring you to then be carried around the streets of a major city by said colleague so you can get treated at a temple only to then be told the effects are here to stay for the next five days

[sketchytea]

belated veos birthday gift for frand ⚡

[sketchytea]

nothing like a good blorbo shot to shake off some fresh post-burnout restlessness 🩸

[sketchytea]

wake up babe a new sav design's just dropped

sav belongs to @eye-may

[sketchytea]

Ice in my veins, Never gonna run

Venom on my fangs, Fire on my tongue

I’m cold-blooded

[sketchytea]

“Let’s clean up this mess.”

belated birthday gift for my friend who plays evelynn, our badass aasimar fire genasi monk! she’s extremely hot literally and metaphorically 💛

[sketchytea]

happy pride specifically to me and my favourite group of badass dysfunctional fools 🌈 purple rat man belongs to the awesome @eye-may ✨