Cinders of the Cataclysm
Die Hard meets Blade Runner meets Fifth Element meets Fallout/Wasteland. Cinders of the Cataclysm is a science fantasy cyberpunk adventure in a dystopian, postapocalyptic world where the only surviving civilisation is in one megacity. And this time you play the action hero!
Die Hard meets Blade Runner meets Fifth Element. Cinders of the Cataclysm is a science fantasy cyberpunk adventure in a dystopian, postapocalyptic world. Only this time you play the action hero!
CotC blends "action hero" with "slice of life" virtually seamlessly. The characters are larger than life heroes, but in the grand scheme of things, they're still people. Common sense and a solid amount of careful planning is necessary to survive this neon dystopia!
This Worldanvil site is the RPG codex for the CotC setting. Here-in you will find a plethora of characters, factions and plots. This is your one go-to location for all things Cinders of the Cataclysm. You want to deep-dive into this strange world filled with mystery, intrigue and horror? This is your place!
They say that the gods used to watch over us and the world was a peaceful and prosperous place. They say it used to be green and full of life, until we turned our backs on the gods and "embraced the Shadow", whatever that means. The Cataclysm scorched and scarred our world. In one gigantic, apocalyptic event everything we knew was turned into a barren, toxic wasteland. In the blink of an eye, there were suddenly no more nations, varying cultures or languages. All of it, wiped out in searing fire. On top of the shitpile that is this world is Fusion City, the single surviving spec of civilization. A monument to our greatness as a civilization. It's a trash heap full of opportunistic, greedy people clawing their way to the top of the food chain just so they can stomp on others. I say it's fucking bullshit. There are no gods and if there ever were, they abandoned us. So fuck 'em! I'm just trying to survive and fight against the tide to make the world a better place for everyone.
In a world without humans, numerous species form the remnants of civilisation, devastated by a cataclysmic disaster. Most live inside Fusion City, a domed megacity, climbing on top of each other to reach the top of the societal ladder. The city is a web of intrigue and corporate oppression where the wealthy live off of the backs of the poor, who struggle to survive midst this abundance.
Outside the city in the barren wasteland a few scattered settlements harbor the few survivors of the Cataclysm, those that did not have the luxury of living in the protected city. Mutants toil to earn their value under the elitist non-mutated survivors, tensions rising day by day as raider attacks become a growing problem.
What will you be in this world of wonder? A kuna investigative journalist, working to uncover the latest corporate atrocity? A dulzuun street-goon fighting for his gang? An illim police officer struggling with meager pay and an overwhelming crime rate? Or perhaps a vindral wasteland wanderer, seeking the freedom to live as you please?
In Celenia: Cinders of the Cataclysm, you choose what and who you want to be. The adventure awaits!
Where to start?
If you're eager to dive in but don't know quite where to start, the Comprehensive Guide to Cinders of the Cataclysm is a great place to get situated. It will explain the setting on a surface level, getting you familiar enough with it to understand any future articles you choose to dive into. Remember though that it is surface level information. It won't dive too deep into each subject as to keep things brief.Health and life
June was a good month for productivity. Both at work and at home. Mediciation is starting to really stabilize and while I'm still stressed and overworked, it's far more manageable at the moment than it's been in years. We've also just gone through the initial "stress-phase" of the investigation, so work pace is starting to settle a bit.
This has given me more opportunity work on my worlds and start to clean things up for the pending CD10 release.
CD10
The "todo list" for CD10 just keeps growing. There's a lot to do, but at the same time, progress is really great now. Many of the rules have really been polished. The Foundry system module is starting to approach something that may actually warrant release. I have a few more things to sort out before I really get to release, but it's closer than ever.
That nagging feeling I talked about in last month's update turned out to be true. Not only have I reinstated the Excess system for lethality, but I also reverted the +4 change for rolling 9's. My player-base and testers made it clear to me that while it can occasionally hilariously derail things, it provides a very necessary humorous element and there are usually tools to get around a catastrophe, even with stupidly exploding rolls.
For the more sane Keepers out there, I added a rule that 9's exploding may be capped at one reroll to curb the insanity that is 3-4 nines in a row. This rule is optional.
C2D10
Second edition is shaping up very, very well and it's pretty much ready for initial playtests. Everything is in place for creating characters and starting to play. The conflicts system is what I'm most worried about, but without putting it through its paces I can't tell if it'll work at all. Session Zero with the playtesters are kicking off in about 11 days. Excitement!
Foundry
Good progress has been made on the CD10 module and while it hasn't been released yet, the 0.5 update is looking really solid. Right now there's a lot of legacy crap in the code and I'm worried that a migration script really isn't going to be enough to clean up all the old fluff. I might actually just bite the bullet and release a non-migrated update and just accept that if there's someone out there updating their system mid-campaign, they'll have to suit themselves.
Like yes, that's on me. I was inexperienced and knew very little about Foundry development when I started and that technical debt has been building up over time and is really standing in the way of a functional system. We'll see. If I can find a clean way to do it, I'll migrate, but I very much doubt it atm.
Settings
I'm mostly working on a primer for my players in Cinders of the Cataclysm, but I'm also plodding away at Dark Shadow's history now that Chronicles is finally released. I'm enjoying worldbuilding again after a period of lull.
Celenia now has a unified place to access all the things with the url: www.celenia.se. It leads to the primary setting of Cinders of the Cataclysm, but the navbar can take you anywhere within the Celenia universe!
Support and Social MediaYou can support Celenia on Ko-Fi and get access to all the behind-the-scenes content available, get unique discord ranks and much more! Remember that CD10 Core is free to use, but that pledging on patreon gives you access to the advanced modules as well!
You can follow CD10 and Celenia on Twitter, join the official Beyond Reality Discord server as well as me on Twitch.tv where I share the worldbuilding and RPG-designing openly with you. (Stream currently on extended hiatus)
Want to support Celenia? Head on over to Ko-Fi and have a look at how you can help make Celenia a published and printed game and what rewards you can receive for supporting the development!
If you prefer Patreon, you can click the button below instead!
Celenia is a tabletop roleplaying game universe with a number of games/settings in it, most taking place on the world of Dunia, a firmament flatworld floating in an endless abyss of water. Celenia, as a tabletop setting, has been in development for over 18 years, primarily in the shape of Celenia: Dark Shadows, a dark fantasy setting with folklore-like magic and mystery.
Celenia: Cinders of the Cataclysm (CotC) is a post-apocalyptic cyberpunk sci-fantasy table-top roleplaying game set in the same world as Dark Shadows, only in a near-future setting. CotC uses the narratively focused CD10 RPG system.
Useful links
Celenia - The greater narrative universeDark Shadows - The Prequel to Cinders of the Cataclysm
CD10 - CD10 Systems Reference
To get a quick start into CotC, the Comprehensive Guide to Cinders of the Cataclysm will help you find your footing quickly!
A one-shot adventure played in this world is available below, courtecy of the team behind How to be a Great GM's series, "Adventures of the Windswift". The adventure uses the CD10, developed for Celenia settings.
Please note that this adventure was played long ago and significant changes have been made to the system since then, but the core experience is the same.
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Celenia and Cinders of the Cataclysm © 1998 - 2022 Tobias Linder. All rights reserved.
Any art displayed on the page is credited to the original artist and belongs to them, with the exception of art created by Nina Lanfer and Mizomei, which are specifically commissioned for the CotC project and are © 1998 - 2022 Tobias Linder.