On the western shores of the Meridian Sea lies the Dominion. Bounded by the soaring peaks of the Gelid Palisades to the southwest, the shifting sands of the Searing Expanse to the northwest, and the trackless jungle known as Verazun to the north, this nation of city-states thrives on the harvest of the bountiful sea and the broad and fertile plains at its heart.
On the coast lies Mareska, its streets and canals alive with color and noise, a city engaged in perpetual invention, entertainment, and celebration. Spread across the northern grasslands is the sprawling Zadar, an expansive jumble of tents and canopies where people from all across the plains have gathered together in an almost accidental city. Perched high in the mountains to the south is the Cirrus Bastion, a walled city and ancient stronghold which traces its history to the first days after the Calamity. At the center of the land, rising over the northern hills of the Silver Fells, sits Ole’ar, city of a thousand spires, a center of trade for the federation of cities, and the primary seat of study and of law in the Dominion.
Above it all, gleaming airships glide through the sky, the latest in a series of fabulous technological breakthroughs led by the Dominion’s artificers. Fantastic contraptions sit in every home, and gearwork automata glide through the streets, as a transformative era of etheric invention is underway.
Welcome to Kirilan!
The Dominion
The Dominion is a federation of city-states and their surrounding territory. Each city has near-complete autonomy in its own internal affairs, but the federation allows for shared roads, untaxed trade, and a shared military between the member territories. Each city sends a delegation of representatives to sit on the governing council, which oversees national affairs and rules on disputes between the territories. This council, by its charter, is meant to assemble in a new city every five years, but it has been several decades since the council met anywhere but its chambers in Ole’ar.
While Kirilan is technically the name of the continent on which the Kirilan Dominion lies, the residents of the Dominion colloquially use Kirilan to refer to the nation itself. The government has no objection to this conflation of names, as it reinforces the idea that there is no Kirilan beyond the Dominion's borders.
The Cirrus Bastion
Nestled in a small, verdant valley among the peaks of the Gelid Palisades is the walled city known as the Cirrus Bastion. Despite the harsh climate and high altitudes that coat the surrounding mountains in snow and ice, the valley enjoys more temperate weather and fertile soil. The residents of the Bastion are rugged folk, and the difficult and isolated terrain around their home has left them a close-knit people with an appreciation for hard work and simple pleasures. The Bastion is as much a military stronghold as it is a city, and its residents boast that its walls have stood, strong and unconquered, since the first years after the Calamity.
In the Cirrus Bastion, you may encounter:
- The headquarters and southern training grounds of the Dominion’s military.
- Various mining guilds, and the entrances to the mines reaching deep beneath the mountains.
- Adventurers and monster hunters eager to crest the mountain range and slay the beasts that roam its forbidding slopes.
Mareska (mä ˈrɛs kä)
Glowing brightly against the shimmering waves of the Meridian Sea is the city of Mareska. Warmed by abundant sunshine and balmy sea breezes, this port city is a center of arts and entertainment, and every evening its streets and canals come alive with festive celebrations. Over the past several decades, the city’s creative culture has also put it at the forefront of the burgeoning field of etheric invention, and in Mareska more than anywhere else in the Dominion can be seen an abundance of magical devices and gearwork automata. As the gateway between the Dominion and the lands beyond the sea, Mareksa is a bustling center of trade of all kinds, and much goes on in the city that is masked by the bright colors it wears on the surface.
In Mareska, you may encounter:
- A thriving community of artists and entertainers.
- Several guilds of artificers and inventors, engaged in a shifting tangle of collaborations and rivalries as they race to advance the art of etheric invention.
- Merchants, artisans, and sailors, carrying out a bustling business in trade.
- A shadowed underbelly, and an intricate network of individuals who make their living in dubious pursuits.
Ole’ar (ˈo̞ li är)
The city of Ole’ar stands proud in the center of the land, rising from the northernmost hills of the Silver Fells and looking out over the agricultural heartland of the Dominion. The de facto capital city of the federation, it is home to the ruling council of delegates, and this center of government attracts many who wish to manipulate or subvert the structures of power over the Dominion. Ole’ar is also a place of learning, home to academies, archives, and institutions of arcane and scientific research. Among its soaring spires and façades of intricately carved stone, influence and knowledge are currencies as important as any coin.
In Ole’ar, you may encounter:
- Politicians and other functionaries of government.
- Academics and archivists, researching and recording new discoveries about Kirilan and its history.
- Arcane researchers, advancing the science of arcane technologies in a much more disciplined manner than the artificers of Mareska.
- A broad spectrum of individuals and groups attempting to sway or seize power.
Zadar (za ˈdär)
Far out among the northern grasslands is a gathering place where, over the centuries, wanderers and herds-people have come together to meet, to trade, and to swap stories from across the Dominion. As more and more people have gathered and settled down in this place called Zadar, it has grown into a sprawling, colorful, unplanned labyrinth of tents, wagons, and canopies. The residents of Zadar are intensely private and individualistic, and can be aloof and suspicious of strangers, but the quiet bonds of their community run deep. Belief in the old Gods has remained strong among the people of the north, but has taken as many forms as there are families wandering the plains, and each household holds their own traditions and worships their own personal aspect of their deity.
In Zadar, you may encounter:
- A chaotic assortment of travelers from all across the land – and those who have given up on traveling and settled down for good.
- A deep community built on a network of information-gatherers and storytellers.
- Mystics, clerics, and divine believers of all kinds.
- A detachment of Dominion military sent to guard the northern border against incursions from the creatures that lurk in the jungle Verazun.
Other Settlements
Towns and Villages
In the lands between the cities, in the forests, and along the coasts of Kirilan lie many small towns and villages. The people of these settlements are farmers and fishers, hunters and gatherers, and skilled crafts-folk making their lives far out from the busy cities. Their lives are often simple, but they face the challenges of surviving at the fringes of the tamed world, and they all have stories to tell.
Ro’Kadesh (ˌro̞ kä ˈdɛsh)
This lost city once flourished around a nourishing oasis in the northwest of the Dominion, but nearly a hundred years ago, the source of water began to dry up. As the sands of the Searing Expanse swept in, the citizens of Ro’Kadesh fled, some disbanding to smaller settlements elsewhere in the desert, and others migrating across the Dominion to cities in more forgiving climates. Adventurers who have visited the site of Ro’Kadesh in recent years have reported finding nothing but shifting sand.
Playing in Kirilan
Ether and the Era of Invention
Arcane forces have existed in Kirilan since before recorded memory, and so have mortals who have learned to wield divine and arcane power. A century ago, the people of Kirilan discovered a new way to harness the power of the world around them, by capturing and refining ether, a distilled substance brimming with arcane power. Over the recent decades, ether-based technology has progressed at a staggering pace, from the large, crude mechanisms of early ether-powered machines to the creation of the more delicate etheric constructs seen today in the streets of Kirilan’s cities, in the homes of its citizens, and even soaring through the skies overhead.
Etheric invention is now a growing industry, and a driving force in Kirilan’s society. Clever and successful artificers are widely admired and richly rewarded, and possessing and showing off new inventions is a sign of great prestige in upper-class circles. Among the latest and greatest inventions are new and fantastic vehicles for traversing the great distances between Kirilan’s cities, and intricate gearwork automata capable of carrying out their master’s directions in independent tasks.
Artificers
In addition to the many character classes commonly available in D&D, there is an additional option available to players in Kirilan: the Artificer. This arcane inventor has the ability to craft magic items, cast spells, and create mechanical servants, and can choose to specialize as one of the two artificer subclasses: the alchemist or the gunsmith. Alchemists can combine exotic materials into useful magical concoctions, ranging from healing potions to concussive explosives and searing acid. The gunsmith has an arcane firearm known as a Thunder Cannon, and can modify their weapon with special abilities and ammunition.
If you are interested in playing as an artificer, please have a conversation with your DM before creating your character.
Religion
Legends tell of an age of miracles, an era in which the Gods walked freely upon the earth and mortals wielded immense arcane abilities. But something went awry… A great war arose, the origins of which are lost to history, and both mortals and Gods took part, lashing out with power that shook the earth to its foundations. Mountains crumbled to ash, the seas rose to swallow the land, and the civilizations of that age were obliterated. In Kirilan’s final hours, when life had nearly been wiped from the earth… silence fell, and the first hesitant survivors emerged to find the world changed. The great cities and the mages who had built them were no more, and the Gods themselves had vanished, leaving only mortals to slowly rebuild in the shattered remains of the world that came before.
Religion in Kirilan is much less clear-cut than in the typical worlds of D&D. While gods are known to have existed and walked among mortals, they have not been seen since the end of the last age, and much knowledge about them has been lost or twisted by interpretation and adaptation over the centuries. Because of the lack of direct intervention from the gods, or even proof they still exist, religion is a less prominent force in society than it is in many D&D worlds.
Clerics are less common than other types of spell casters, but they do have a presence in Kirilan. Their ability to channel divine power is not dependent upon the existence and favor of whichever god they worship. Instead, the powers of clerics are etheric forces channeled through the belief of the gods’ adherents. While a cleric of a god who has many followers may have an easy time channeling that community’s belief into the casting of spells, so too would a cleric of a nearly-forgotten god, so long as their own belief in their deity is strong.
The corollary to belief-based cleric abilities is that if a cleric has a crisis of faith, doubting either the guidance or the existence of their deity, they may find themselves struggling to cast divine magic.
Races
People of many races – species, really – live together in Kirilan. Unlike in more typical D&D worlds and fantasy settings, there is no strong tie between race, culture, and ethnic identity. Individuals of the various races are mixed together throughout all the city-states of the Dominion, and view their region and culture of origin as a much more prominent aspect of their identity than their race. Marriage between people of different races is fairly common, as is procreation – though not all species are capable of making offspring together.
Player Character Races
The core of the available player races in D&D can roughly be categorized as “humanoids”. These are all hominids of various heights and characteristics, and are all available as player characters.
The following races each have traits that are less human and more animalistic in nature. Though these species are less common throughout the Dominion, they are available for player characters as long as their backstory and racial characteristics are discussed with the DM before the game begins.
The races below are typically portrayed as humanoids with the addition of some sort of divine spark, infernal blood, or elemental heritage. In Kirilan, it is possible that these magical mutations may present in individuals whose parents were not simply humans or elves. If you are interested in playing a character belonging to one of these groups, plan for a conversation with your DM about how your origin story and underlying racial heritage fits in with the larger metaphysics of the world.
Inter-racial characters are traditionally portrayed in D&D as “half-somethings”, such as half-elf or half-orc, with the default other half being human. Procreation between members of different species is more common in the world of Kirilan, and more combinations of races are available to player characters, as long as they are discussed with the DM ahead of time to work out the mechanical implications of various racial combinations.