Sundara's Phase 4 Is Here! (Whispers & Rumors)

I released the first supplement for my Sundara: Dawn of a New Age fantasy setting nearly 4 years ago. Ironfire: The City of Steel, which is available for both Pathfinder's First Edition as well as DND 5E, was meant to be a location that GMs could either use as part of the Sundara setting, or which they could plop down into their own world to save them the heavy lifting on world building. That was the first stone I threw out into the water, but it was far from the last! Since then I've covered 4 other city states in the setting, along with gods, guilds, cults, mercenary companies, and even Primquakes (magical natural disasters).

I made it through 3 phases, and I slowed down for a while... however, several months ago I got to work on reinvigorating the setting, and trying to go a little deeper, while adding more details. Phase 4 is going to be Whispers and Rumors, and the first release is, of course, 100 Whispers and Rumors For Ironfire, The City of Steel!

If you haven't grabbed your copy yet, you should consider it!

But before I get into the meat of today's post, remember, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Also, if you've got a bit of spare cash that you'd like to use to help keep the wheels turning, consider becoming a Patreon patron! Also, be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree.

Lastly, for hundreds of extra articles on gaming, weird history, and for more free fiction, check out my Vocal archive, too!

Expanding Phase 1, And Getting Back To Basics

For those who missed what Phase 4 was going to be about (because it's been a while since I talked about it), the general gist is that I wanted to give Game Masters and players alike a set of rumors for the Cities of Sundara releases. While the initial cities had a collection of rumors in them already (roughly 15 of them per book), I wanted to expand that with an extra 20 rumors to be heard per district of the city!

These supplements serve an important feature for the setting, which is why I wanted to put them together. First and foremost, they expand the lore of the original cities so that Game Masters and players alike can get a better sense of the personality of the different districts, and the sorts of things that might be happening in them. Secondly, though, I wanted to give Game Masters a way to both fill in the cracks in the cities to make them feel more lived-in, while also providing some inspiration for those who want to run their own games in the City of Steel.

For example, if you want to run a plot in Ghostborough where players are taking on the syndicates that have held power for so long, do they run afoul of the terrifying vigilante known only as the Wraith? Are they hired to explore lost or forgotten tunnels that run beneath Middleshade, possibly causing them to stumble into parts of Ironfire that have been lost since the city's founding? Are they recruited to track down what happened to a mysterious body found floating in the Harbour, where the only clue about them is the bizarre book they had chained to their wrist in a watertight container?

Any of these things might be the spark that starts off your new campaign, or which fills in those early-to-middle levels that can sometimes have Game Masters scratching their heads.

Additionally, the Whispers and Rumors series of supplements will tie the cities to many other supplements. For instance, the entries in Merchants of Sundara have already made an appearance in several of the manuscripts as various artisans and collectives expand their reach to new markets. Many of the mercenary companies featured in Sellswords of Sundara (still available for both Pathfinder First Edition and DND 5E as well) are also featuring in these books. This should make the setting feel more organic, and show that even though all of these elements may be in disparate books, they're still interacting with one another on the page.

My hope is that these supplements will be a helpful aid for Game Masters who've been looking for a few more resources to bring these cities to life, and that it will help run more varied and interesting games, while giving everyone a chance to explore this world I've been slowly building.

And, of course, my hope is that folks who haven't heard of Sundara before might use these as their entry point into a world that is still expanding!

A Final Note: Why Phase 4 Isn't Modules

I've had some folks ask this question off and on over the years as I released new content for Sundara, and I wanted to answer it here so there's no confusion. The short version is that adventure modules are, statstically, the things that sell worst in my entire catalog. Not only that, but they are some of the most difficult things to create, as they combine the need to write a short story, provide a mechanical framework for the plot, and then to include enough additional material that players have at least some freedom to achieve the end goal their own way. And then on top of that you have to make sure you have appropriate art to really make the thing pop, along with maps to make sure things can be properly plotted.

Adventure modules are exhausting, and generally speaking I try to avoid projects that will both take a lot of work on my part, but which are also unlikely to pay me enough to make rent this month.

However, if you're someone out there who feels very strongly that Sundara would really benefit from a series of adventure modules, there is one, simple thing you can do to make that happen.

Do what you can to support the setting.

If you have spare money, or holiday vouchers, then buy copies of the supplements for Sundara. When you've had a chance to read them over, leave reviews for them on Drive Thru RPG. Check out the 47-video long playlist for the Speaking of Sundara series I've made on the Azukail Games YouTube channel, and while you're there, subscribe to the channel to boost our metrics! Hell, check out the fiction that's been made for it, both text-based and the audio dramas on the Azukail Games channel!

Numbers talk, and when my publisher sees that Sundara is pulling in numbers (whether it be sales, reviews, watch hours, or whatever) that is when I start getting the green light to do more complicated, more involved things that are seen as a bit of a risk... which adventure modules definitely are.

I love the setting, and I'm doing everything I can to expand it. I can't eat fun, though, so if it comes down to passion projects or paid bills, bills win every time. The best way to get more Sundara is for everyone who wants to see more of it to turn Sundara into the project that pays the bills!

Like, Follow, and Stay in Touch!

That's all for this week's Moon Pope Monday. To stay on top of all my content and releases, make sure you subscribe to my newsletter at the bottom of the page!

Again, for more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, and stop by the Azukail Games YouTube channel, or my Rumble channel The Literary Mercenary! Or if you'd prefer to read some of my books, like my dystopian sci-fi thriller Old Soldiers, my hardboiled gangland noir series starring a bruiser of a Maine Coon with Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife or my latest short story collection The Rejects, then head over to My Amazon Author Page!

To stay on top of all my latest releases, follow me on Blue Sky, Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now Pinterest as well! To support my work, consider Buying Me a Ko-Fi, or heading to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a regular, monthly patron. That one helps ensure you get more Improved Initiative, and it means you'll get my regular, monthly giveaways as a bonus!

Getting Better At Your Craft (A Small Retrospective)

I spend so much time plotting, working on, and releasing new content that I sometimes forget to stop, take a breath, and look at just how far it is I've come in execution and skill level in some aspects. This is something that I think a lot of folks deal with in creative fields, especially those who haven't "made it" to the point that they have name recognition, and the sponsorship checks to go with it.

However, it's still a good idea to look back at the stuff you're making, and to acknowledge how far you've come, even if you're not quite where you want to be just yet.

It all comes back to drawn blades, and a little blood.

Before we get into the nitty gritty this week, don't forget to sign up for my bi-weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Also, if you've got a bit of spare cash that you'd like to use to help keep the wheels turning, consider becoming a Patreon patron! Also, be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree.

Lastly, for hundreds of extra articles on gaming, weird history, and for more free fiction, check out my Vocal archive, too!

A Year Or Two Can Make A BIG Difference

I have always enjoyed audio dramas. I grew up listening to them, and back when I was still earning my degree I dabbled with making an episode or two. It was an overall rewarding experience, but at the time I simply didn't have access to the tools and materials I needed to make things happen. Fast forward to not quite 2 years ago, and Adrian Kennelly at Azukail Games was looking to some ways to expand the content available on the company's YouTube channel. Since I was one of the major contributors, he asked me to talk about Sundara, my plans with it, and where I was going with the setting. That did pretty well, and he wanted to keep expanding... which gave me the idea to dramatize the short fiction from the supplements we already had on the market as a way to draw listeners into the worlds we were creating!

The Duel was the introductory fiction from Cities of Sundara: Ironfire, the first supplement from Sundara: Dawn of a New Age, which is still available for both Pathfinder Classic as well as Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition. I wanted to start the setting off with an engaging story, and though it was originally split into two parts, the audio drama put them both together.

For what I was capable of at the time, this wasn't bad. I was recording off of a very small mic (the Samson SAGOmic, which is a fine piece of portable equipment or for virtual tabletop play, but not amazing for dramatic recording), I was using the free version of Wondershare Filmora (hence the watermark), and while I could competently clean up the vocals and add some sound effects and background music, there was definitely a lot of room to grow.

Compare that with the most recent tale told in Ironfire that came out a little over a week ago!

Swords and Sand is the opening story for the most recent supplement Merchants of Sundara. This supplement brought 3 years of releases full circle, and gave us the second installment of the tale of our mysterious outlander, and why he's returned to Ironfire. And if you watch this video you can hear the upgrade in my mic (I now use a Blue Yeti microphone, which I'd highly recommend), but it's more than just the tech that's improved. I've learned a lot of new tricks for cleaning up tracks, adding effects and voices, and I knuckled down and learned how to make an actual video using Shotcut to go with the audio drama (even if it is really more of just a slideshow to follow the main beats of the story).

It's not perfect, by any stretch of the imagination. However, I feel that it does show the improvement one can make if they regularly put in the time, energy, and effort to get better at something. and I wanted to take a moment to remind folks out there that, whatever it is you're doing, ask if you could have pulled off what you did today 2 years ago. A lot of you probably couldn't, which means you're doing better!

Coming Full Circle

Before I go today, I wanted to draw readers' attention to another video that recently went up on the Azukail Games YouTube channel. Because my Sundara: Dawn of a New Age setting is in something of a unique place right now. I don't want to stop expanding it, but at the same time I want to poll the audience to ask what they'd like to see more of.

I've gone through three phases of releases for the setting thus far, and I'd like to know what it is that readers and listeners are most interested in out there. Do you want more audio dramas? Novellas? Setting books? Factions? Species? Would you like to see small towns, plot hooks, or full adventure modules?

Everything is on the table right now, but I need to get feedback from folks to make it happen! And if you enjoy our audio dramas, and want to see more of them, go back through the archive, and leave comments on your favorites that you'd like to see expanded! Then, before you click away, make sure you subscribe to the Azukail Games YouTube channel to help us get monetized so we can afford to keep making things!

What's Next on Table Talk?

That's it for this installment of Table Talk! What would you like to see next? I'm listening for your comments and votes!

For more of my work, check out my Vocal archives, as well as the YouTube channel for Azukail Games. Or, to check out books like my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, my hard-boiled noir series featuring the street beasts of NYC in Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my dystopian sci-fi thriller Old Soldiers, or my recent short story collection The Rejects, head over to My Amazon Author Page!

To stay on top of all my latest releases, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter, as well as on Pinterest where I'm building all sorts of boards dedicated to my books, RPG supplements, and greatest hits. Lastly, to help support me and my work, consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a regular, monthly patron! Even a little donation can have a big impact.

What is "Sundara: Dawn of a New Age" All About?

All the folks who keep a sharp eye on my latest additions and updates probably saw Cities of Sundara: Ironfire last week. This supplement is all about Ironfire: The City of Steel; a full-fledged industrial fantasy city built atop the volcanic forge established by an alchemist who figured out the formula to mass-produce dragon steel. The supplement provides a history of the city itself, insight into the culture that grew up around it over the past century or so, and it also gives you a map, as well as a district-by-district break down of what's in the city. There's a slew of NPCs, unique locations, and rumors you can use as jumping-off points for your game in there, too. Lastly I provided rules for using dragon steel equipment, stats for playing volcanically-adapted Cinderscale lizardfolk, stat blocks for dragonsbreath salamanders (the huge riding lizards native to the region), as well as unique background features for veterans of the city's mercenary trade.

Seriously, go get a copy!

This particular supplement is available both for Pathfinder Classic (or first edition for those who insist on the name), as well as for Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition.

However, while Ironfire can technically be used all on its own (either as the main location for a campaign or folded into your existing campaign world), it is merely the first installment of a much larger setting that I've been hammering on since the end of 2020. And since there are several new installments coming down the pike, I wanted to take this week to let people know what they can expect from Sundara: Dawn of a New Age.

And if you want to make sure you don't miss any updates on Sundara (or any of my other projects) then sign up for my weekly newsletter today!

What Is "Sundara: Dawn of a New Age"?

Several months ago I had an exchange with my contact at Azukail Games, and he suggested that we break some fresh ground by providing unique locations for GMs to use in their games. It was a deviation from the huge lists of NPCs, gear, random encounters, etc. that we'd done in the past, and I figured it would be a nice change of pace where we could see what the audience thought.

The first part of this project, 10 Fantasy Villages, went Copper in less than a week... so you could say we'd stumbled across something folks were definitely interested in seeing more of.

It really does have a lot of stuff crammed into it. Go on, get one for yourself!

One idea for a follow-up was to expand on the initial concept, and to do a collection of 10 fantasy cities. After all, urban games are tough on a lot of GMs, and you can never have too much content to draw on when setting a scene or making a unique location. For folks who are good at pattern recognition, though, you'll know that cities are my jam, so I didn't just want to do a shallow dive on a bunch of places that had the potential to become so much more.

And that was the inspiration for a whole new fantasy RPG setting which has become Sundara.

There are a lot of factors that make Sundara: Dawn of a New Age so unique, in my opinion. The first is, as the name implies, the setting is striding out toward progress, change, and finding new solutions to the problems people within it face. Unlike so many fantasy settings that can trace their roots back to the works of Tolkien, the world of Sundara is meant to feel rich, varied, and full of strange discoveries waiting to be made. It's got its share of old ruins, abandoned tombs, and lost places, but the idea is that people are looking forward to make new things, rather than trying to reclaim ancient relics of the past simply because they represent some lost time of glory or achievement.

What better way to represent that, we thought, than to start with a series of supplements that showcase some of the cities across the face of this new world? Places that have developed their own unique industry, and which make a statement about the sort of things that are possible during this, the dawn of a new age?

Not High Tech (Technically Speaking)

One misconception a lot of folks have when I have talked about Sundara so far is to just assume that it's a high-tech fantasy world, or that it's a magitech setting. And while there are definitely going to be pockets of such things in the world (freshly-discovered methods, or jealously guarded secrets protected by engineering guilds), that's not the thrust of what is going on.

Rather, what I want to do with Sundara is to introduce (for lack of a better term) "period" technology, combined with all the bizarre elements that are available in RPGs filled with monsters and magic.

Just as an example...

Getting back to Ironfire for a moment, the city was founded on the volcanic forge that produces reliable, high-quality dragon steel. While the location and method of power is very fantastical, the item being produced is pattern-welded crucible steel... what most of us think of as Damascus steel. This steel was regularly used for swords at least as far back as 800 a.d. in our real history, and techniques for producing crucible steel in the Middle East and India go back to the third century or so.

That is, in a nutshell, the sort of thing you're going to see all over Sundara as the setting expands.

Because our real history is full of wide-sweeping industries, feats of amazing engineering, and achievements that astonish us even to this day. From the highway system and shopping malls of ancient Rome that I mentioned in Introduce Some "Period" Technology In Your Game, to the industrial levels of soap production during the Middle Ages (as well as the enduring legacy of communal bath houses held over from the Roman era), history is a strange and undiscovered country. And that's before we add in things like celebrity advertising (how gladiators often shilled for particular products), or the attempts to keep products legitimate through maker's marks and guild seals like I mentioned in Who Are The Famous Brand Names and Merchants in Your Setting?

And those are the things I'm adding in to give Sundara its unique flair as a setting. It's a world that is full of odd quirks and strange resources, bizarre industries and curious crafters who are all trying to explore and expand on the resources of this unusual world they all live in. And that's in addition to the wide array of fantastical beasts, bizarre species, and competing ideologies that will likely span the width and breadth of the setting.

What Else About It Is Different?

In addition to the theme of moving forward into discovery rather than attempting to reach into the past, Sundara is going to have a variety of other elements about it that won't conform to what folks who play Pathfinder or DND 5E are likely to expect. While I'll be going into some of these in greater detail in future releases, I figured I'd provide a short list of some of the bigger ones here.

- Sundara does not use the alignment system. This will require a lot of changes both thematically and structurally for Pathfinder players, which will be addressed in upcoming supplements.

- I'm also nixing the multiplanar setting we've grown used to, with three-dozen or so different planes to explore. Sundara has only two realms; the material plane, and the Prim, the place where magic is born, and where the gods dwell.

- For the foreseeable future, Sundara is probably going to drop in separate splat books and expansions, rather than a single, unified rulebook/setting guide.

There's more, but I think this is enough to chew on for a bit.

For the first point on this list, alignment is one of the most contentious points for many Pathfinder players because it's such a huge part of the game as it's written. And like I said in Alignment's Roots Go Deeper Than We Might Think (How Much Stuff Do You Lose Pulling It Out?), you basically have to tear down the old cosmos, re-write a lot of spells, and either eliminate or greatly alter a lot of classes in order to adjust for a game that doesn't use it. And since I'm creating a whole new cosmos from the ground up, I figured that I would purposefully provide a setting where not using alignment was intended right from the get go.

As far as the cosmos, boiling it all the way down is meant to do a couple of things. One, it deals with eliminating so many planes tied to alignment (no devils, no angels, no demons, and so on, and so forth), and it allows the GM to keep gods and their desires more varied and mysterious. I'll go into greater depth on this in Gods of Sundara, which I hope to start soon, and hopefully you can all see where I'm going with this one.

Lastly, though, Sundara's books will (for the foreseeable future, at least) keep coming out in what amounts to splat books. And I want to talk about my reasons for that.

There is method in my madness, I assure you.

First things first, part of the reason for this decision is because this is a one-man show at time of writing. I can only produce content so fast, and while I can put out one Sundara supplement a month without straining too hard, a big RPG book could take a year or more to complete. A year or more of not getting paid at all, and the book could flop utterly after all that time and effort, leaving me nothing to show for it.

This setting is still in its infancy, and I'm trying to build up a fan base for it that wants to see new, fresh content. It's a lot easier to convince a publisher to put out a city guide, or a supplement for discussing gods and the nature of the divine, than it is to get someone to commit to a hefty tome that lays the groundwork for a whole new setting. And it's not just getting the project greenlit, either; it's also a lot easier to convince players (many of whom may have setting fatigue) to just try a bite of something new than it is to get them to fork over a big chunk of change for a massive book with an equally massive price tag.

Lastly, I want these early supplements to be flexible enough that players and GMs can have fun at their tables without needing to use the whole of Sundara to do it if they don't want to. If someone thinks Ironfire is neat, or they want to use Moüd: The City of Bones (this month's supplement, so keep your eyes peeled for this necromantic nonsense) as a central hub of a dungeon crawl game, they should be able to do that. The mechanical goodies that I'm loading into every supplement are meant to be used, as well. Even if someone opts not to play with them with the location I'm tying them to, I want people to use these tools to enhance their games.

What's Coming Up Next?

Well, in addition to Moüd (an ancient city that's been brought back from the graveyard of history by a guild of necromancers), and a supplement discussing Sundara's gods and magic, there's been a lot of talk about where this setting could expand if folks decide they want more. At present, the goal is to put out several more city supplements, and some more general supplements expanding the map and mechanics, and then to delve into providing more hands-on adventures. Species of Sundara is on the list, as well, for providing a varied, alternate take on the creatures players can take control of, ranging from the usual elves, dwarves, and orcs, to goblins, gnomes, and others.

Other potential projects include adventure modules, and if players respond well to these shorter stories it's definitely possible that bigger campaign books (with additional details, NPCs, and extra gaming goodies) will be produced as well. So if this is something you want to see more of, please boost the signal by sharing the links around, leaving positive reviews, and of course getting a copy of Cities of Sundara: Ironfire for yourself if you haven't done so yet!

Oh, There's Also Easter Eggs!

For folks who've enjoyed all the other supplements I've released over the past few years, there's going to be several Easter eggs for you to spot in the upcoming books.

As an example, all of the mercenary companies in Ironfire, from the Scarlet Company to the Bloody Fools, are taken right out of my supplement 100 Random Mercenary Companies. Additionally, the dragonsbreath salamander was a creature that I invented because of the salamander steaks entry that I talked about in 100 Fantasy Foods where I mentioned the meat had to be eaten raw, or acid seared, because of the creatures' resistance to fire. And for the upcoming City of Bones, the Silver Wraiths were one of the early entries in my 100 Fantasy Guilds supplement, and they are the backbone (pun very much intended) of the necropolis turned metropolis.

If you've been following all my past work, there's going to be a lot of call backs as I expand on Sundara... so keep your eyes peeled!

Like, Follow, and Stay in Touch!

That's all for this week's Moon Pope Monday. To stay on top of all my content and releases, make sure you subscribe to my newsletter at the bottom of the page!

Again, for more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, and stop by the YouTube channel Dungeon Keeper Radio. Or if you'd prefer to read some of my books, like my cat noir thriller Marked Territory, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife or my latest short story collection The Rejects, then head over to My Amazon Author Page!

To stay on top of all my latest releases, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now Pinterest as well! To support my work, consider Buying Me a Ko-Fi, or heading to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a regular, monthly patron. That one helps ensure you get more Improved Initiative, and it means you'll get my regular, monthly giveaways as a bonus!