Design Notes

Description

Kementari is a historically inspired setting/milieu for Medieval Fantasy Role-Playing.

Inspiration

There were several sources of inspiration for Kementari. The first, of course, are the works of J.R.R. Tolkien, specifically his works about Middle Earth- The Hobbit, The Lord Of the Rings, and The Silmarillion. Another inspiration was the World of Greyhawk Campaign Setting, from TSR, Inc. in 1983. Yet another was also from TSR, Inc.- the Deities and Demigods sourcebook from 1980- which gave me the idea of all these cultures interacting with each other. Finally, the largest inspiration is my abiding obsession with every facet of Medieval Western European history- an obsession so strong that I even have a completely useless higher education degree in the subject.

Purpose

Kementari is intended to provide a general setting for almost any kind of genre of story. I personally prefer epic story lines of Medieval Fantasy.

General Setting Information

Kementari is modeled after medieval Europe and the Middle East/North Africa, with it's technology mostly circa mid-thirteenth century (1250 A.D.). That still allows a wide range of cultures and places for players and Game Masters to explore. Various kingdoms and regions are modeled on real-world historical cultures. This gives me as the Game Master and my players an immediate "feel" for a region/culture that greatly helps in fleshing out descriptions of places, people, and things. It also helps to keep those details consistent within a region or culture, allowing the players to "narrow their suspenders of disbelief". Yes, this uses stereotypes to a certain extent, which is something that all humans do- and, of course, a lot of the fun of this type of storytelling is to set up one of "those" stereotypes and then turn it on it's head.

Analogs of ancient Egyptian, Sumerian, Babylonian, ancient Greco-Roman, and ancient Celtic cultures are part of Kementari's history. The Kementari analog of the Roman Empire did not disappear like ours did, but it did significantly retrench- and split- providing an analog of the Byzantine Empire. Analogs of the Christian Church are present, with the three large branches of the medieval period represented (Roman Catholic, Celtic, and Orthodox). There is also an analog of Islam, and various Arabic influenced cultures.

Allowed Races

Humans are BY FAR the most predominant race in Kementari. I realize that most players want to play other races, as they are already familiar with the "human experience", but by design- non human races are relatively uncommon. So, most of the "generic" NPC's are human, and almost all of the political powers are human led and human focused. Otherwise, I need to come up with a LOT more history, and that is a lot of work. If that history is not there, then the players begin to sense it as the story progresses, and those little inconsistencies begin to erode the immersive feel of the setting that I am trying to present.

Allowed Classes

Kementari is modeled after a particular region of our real world at a particular point in time. Classes from other regions of the world and other times will "clash" with the setting, causing the players to have to "widen their suspenders of disbelief". This is the basic rationale behind the decision to not allow the Monk character class from Dungeons & Dragons, or the Kenku player race (also from Dungeons & Dragons). They will have an excessive amount of "story baggage" that they will have to tote around. I already have to work in giant fire-breathing flying lizards somewhat consistently, and now you want your Wuxhia ninjas storming Nottingham castle? Boundaries need to be set somewhere.

Magic and Technology

Kementari is a relatively low magic setting by design. One problem that I have with high-magic settings is that magic just becomes a new technology, and the setting eventually just becomes a variation on modern life. This is not something I am particularly interested in. Keeping the magic level relatively low makes it much easier to make magic more wondrous, and to keep the medieval feel that I want.

Gunpowder is also not present in Kementari by design. In the real world, the adoption of gunpowder by Europeans radically affected the development of every other culture on the planet. From a story telling viewpoint, this would cause a LOT more history. From a game mechanics viewpoint, firearms are a LOT deadlier at much longer ranges than other types of weapons, so I feel their capacity to unbalance the game (and therefore the enjoyment of the players) is just too high.