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EWF architecture and society


Beoferret

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Oh devotees of the Knowing God! Hear my plea! Are there examples of EWF architecture in any current publication? If not, from what ancient culture(s) might a GM best draw upon for inspiration, in their hour of adventure-formulating need? And where might one find a basic outline of EWF social structure/society? Many thanks for whatever morsel of you may bestow upon this unworthy supplicant. 

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I can't remember seeing any EWF architecture in supplements. Most of it will be in ruins now, anyway.

14 minutes ago, Beoferret said:

And where might one find a basic outline of EWF social structure/society?

EWF society was mainly Second Age Orlanthi, although I would say urban Orlanthi, instead of the hillbilly Orlanthi that we know and love.

Sure, there was a veneer of Dragon-worshippers at the top, with the mystics, but the majority was Orlanth-based.

Orlanth the Dragon and Ernalda the Serpent had some influence and definitely changed some of their worshippers.

There night have been some fashion changes, for example wearing clothing that resembled that of dragonewts, or was like scaly skin, similarly EWF citizens emulated dragonewts in many ways.

 

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Simon Phipp - Caldmore Chameleon - Wallowing in my elitism since 1982. Many Systems, One Family. Just a fanboy. 

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41 minutes ago, Beoferret said:

Are there examples of EWF architecture in any current publication?

Well, the obvious published place is Old Pavis (i.e. the Big Rubble).  However, almost all of it is ruins.  Think there was an image of Griffin Gate though.

However, there was a recent Jonstown Compendium supplement set in one EWF ruin that might be useful.  (You'll find the place named Bonn Karpatch IIRC in Chaosium works.) The preview does not include any pictures of architecture though so I don't know if any are included. https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/346045/Ruins-of-Bonn-Kanach

 

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Old Pavis was erected in EWF style, and the aerial view maps of Old Pavis in Pavis: Gateway to Adventure show some of those in low resolution. But then, Old Pavis has a lot in common with Karakorum, including the ruling class of (striped) horse warlords and the multicultural city quarters.

There is one very nice illustration of EWF folk and some of their buildings in the opening sequence of the King of Dragon Pass game.

The WIlliam Church drawing of the Dragon's Eye shows dragonewt architecture, but EWF architecture would have been influenced by that.

The Smoking Ruins are mostly from the EWF era, with older periods of the city forming some of the rubble covering that scenario's maguffin. All the ruins were given a (low resolution) William Church treatment in the board of Dragon Pass (hence my pointing to his higher resolution drawing of Dragon's Eye).

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Telling how it is excessive verbis

 

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I seem to vaguely recall Jeff posting references for Vingkotling/Dawn Age cyclopean architecture, second age EWF/Orlanthland architecture, and modern Orlanthi architecture at some point, possibly in one of the threads discussing what Orlanthi steads/halls look like (and discussing the idea of the Ernaldan squarehouse which has more or less been canonized as the default Orlanthi dwelling nowadays). 

As for inspiration: 

I recently read the graphic novels Conquering Armies and Arn by Jean-Pierre Dionnet and Jean-Claude Gal. The artwork by Gal straddles an incredibly fascinating line between historical and fantastical. It's fantasy, but it's the sort of thing that makes you think that it's from some plausibly alternate history, if that makes sense. I believe the same style is used in a graphic novel called Diosamante. It's not spot on for Dragon Pass (the areas they tell stories from tend to be drier), but there is a mix of rock-cut and masonry on the one hand, and fantastical shapes and proportions on the other hand, which gives the buildings a kind of semi-organic look to them, which I think isn't a bad approximation for humans influenced by Dragonewts. If you're really interested, I'd suggest looking them up, or at least googling a bit around.




 

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Some suggestions, just out of my imagination:

They favor tile roofs with overlapping tiles which evoke dragon scales.

Further, the most important buildings are shaped like the Beast Rune, since that's also the Dragon rune.

Peasant buildings are much like 3rd age Dragon Pass but with draconic imagery painted on them.

Buildings favor the color of whatever dragon lives closest.

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22 hours ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

I seem to vaguely recall Jeff posting references for Vingkotling/Dawn Age cyclopean architecture, second age EWF/Orlanthland architecture, and modern Orlanthi architecture at some point, possibly in one of the threads discussing what Orlanthi steads/halls look like (and discussing the idea of the Ernaldan squarehouse which has more or less been canonized as the default Orlanthi dwelling nowadays). 

As for inspiration: 

I recently read the graphic novels Conquering Armies and Arn by Jean-Pierre Dionnet and Jean-Claude Gal. The artwork by Gal straddles an incredibly fascinating line between historical and fantastical. It's fantasy, but it's the sort of thing that makes you think that it's from some plausibly alternate history, if that makes sense. I believe the same style is used in a graphic novel called Diosamante. It's not spot on for Dragon Pass (the areas they tell stories from tend to be drier), but there is a mix of rock-cut and masonry on the one hand, and fantastical shapes and proportions on the other hand, which gives the buildings a kind of semi-organic look to them, which I think isn't a bad approximation for humans influenced by Dragonewts. If you're really interested, I'd suggest looking them up, or at least googling a bit around.

Found an example:

editionon116048.jpg

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On 6/17/2021 at 3:07 AM, Beoferret said:

Oh devotees of the Knowing God! Hear my plea! Are there examples of EWF architecture in any current publication? If not, from what ancient culture(s) might a GM best draw upon for inspiration, in their hour of adventure-formulating need? And where might one find a basic outline of EWF social structure/society? Many thanks for whatever morsel of you may bestow upon this unworthy supplicant. 

Of all the damned things.  I have actually been working on this as part of my notes for New Pavis and the Big Rubble, figuring that if we are going to be talking about a huge ruin, that the architecture might be important.  I actually wrote a (deliberately pretentious) article on the subject from the perspective of a LM scholar specializing in architecture based on what I had read from a gf's architecture literature review.  Here is an excerpt regarding one building, definitely erected during the EWF period:

In discussing the architecture that remains in Old Pavis, I want to draw your attention to a final building.  It has long since been profaned and damaged beyond repair, but with the Lhankor Mhy blessing of Recreation it is yet possible to roam the structure intact, and for the student of architecture it is well worth the time.  The site is a haunting enigma, and a homily in stone, and some have even suggested that it speaks quietly of impossible things to those who have the wit to understand.  I speak of the Temple of Aldrya on Opili’s Hill.  It is not unknown for humans to have altars and shrines to Aldrya, but the Elf Goddess is elusive, inhuman, barely tied to the man rune, and the sense of those human built shrines is inevitably ersatz.  If one is not Aldryami, the representations can only be incomplete, alienating, and disquieting at best.  In this respect the Temple Hill example is quite unique for many reasons. 

Here we see colonnades, straight and linear on first appearance at a distance, yet as one draws closer, it becomes apparent that this is a trick of perspective, for the columns are mimicking the trunks of trees, yet in green shot marble.  We see subtle uses of jade-like stones, to create a semblance of life in what some might call an homage to the Vegetarian heresy of the Mostali, so we find ourselves wondering if Lord Pavis Half-Elven himself had some hand in its creation, for how else could this be?  We see beautiful caryatids, forming stone nymphs and dryads, and walled sanctums that use crystal to mimic both darkness and the dappled light that falls between branches, yet all is stone.  The Temple is formed as a Plant Rune, and once housed a Flamal, a Shanasse and an Aldrya sacred tree in each of the open courtyards of the rings that make the rune.  And yet, when we study the workmanship, there can be no doubt that this is Mostali work. 

The tracery and detail is beyond anyone else, but goes beyond a naive realism that merely represents what is, to scale, for the trees vary in size and scale, species and composition quite deliberately.  This is like the work of a dwarf, and yet it is art, and not human art trying to depict an Aldryami theme, but something greater and finer than any dwarf or elf or man could possibly create on their own.  This is architecture as art in its truest sense, for we do not know the artist, and yet we see hints of their hand in other buildings and works, including the Atring family mansion.  The record of their name is lost, and it is unlikely that this was the work of a Diamond Dwarf, though the skill required might well be of that order of magnitude.  So we face the mystery, and we are dumbfounded, and because we do not speak, we listen and we hear the Silence,  and that impossible Silence somehow provides that missing communion. And then we understand. This Temple of Aldrya is impossible.  It embodies the Green Age, and so much more, and then the Reconstruction spell lapses, and we weep at the loss, for the trolls alas have also made their contribution.

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