Talislanta

Talislanta
RPG published by Bard Games, Wizards of the Coast, Pharos Press, Shooting Iron, Morrigan Press
Rule System	Omni System
Authors	Stephan Michael Sechi
First Publication	1987 (1st Edition) 1988 (2nd Edition) 1992 (3rd Edition) 2001 (4th Edition) 2005 (d20 Edition) 2007 (5th Edition) 2016 (Savage Lands)

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"No Elves"

– The tagline for the gameline

Talislanta is an RPG and setting created by Stephan Michael Sechi. The setting is inspired more by the works of Jack Vance and Lovecraft, rather than Tolkien, as evidenced by the tagline. In 2010, Sechi put all of the English-language products under the Creative Commons license, so anyone could download them from the Talislanta webpage.

Setting

Archaeus is the world of which Talislanta is continent. It is (now) a flat disk mostly ocean. The world orbits two suns and has seven moons, which are used to keep track of time. In the 1990 edition, Archaeus was a sphere with the twin suns and moons orbiting that.

In the distant past, The Great Disaster, brought on by the falling of the flying cities of the now-dead Archaen, transformed much of the worlds surface. Once verdant lands turned to desolate wastelands and a colossal magical hurricane settled around the continent, occasionally bringing in things like acid rain and arcane energy storms. From this came the Age of Confusion, during which Talislanta: The Savage Land takes place, when people abandoned the cities of old and much knowledge of magic and the world was lost.

The main gameline takes place in the sixth century of the New Age, as pockets of civilization have risen from the ashes, surrounded by ruins of ancient cities with riches and knowledge to be found, wild beasts, breath-taking sights, savage tribes, and rumors of a coming second Great Disaster.

The main players on Talislanta are the western Seven Kingdoms, which are mostly harmless; the Quan Empire to the east now run by KANGS, and Zandu and Aaman. Also plenty of wilderness, especially up norf.

Northwest of the continent is the Midnight Sea; this blends into the Aethereal Sea. This features sea-dragons and Khazad ghost-ships. Northeast is the Sea of Madness. Azure Ocean is west.

The Unknown Lands

Other continents / planets / planes are associated with this mainland. The windship (read: airship) explorer Nauticus, a good fwend of Biggus Dickus, "circumnavigated" the Archaeus world back when the Tarteran side of The Darkness was still Thanatus and when the Neurians were still a thing in Simbar. He visited Celadon and Altarus as well.

There's even a map, in the 1990(!) Talislanta Worldbook. It's a sketch and a very early one, so not to be taken as full canon anymore; but it does imply that all these continents are island continents, approximately Talislanta's size. That cannot be true of Altarus, under its own rules (see below).

Alcedon

In the 1990 book it's a land of eternal warfare associated with mythic Alhambra. Nowadays, Hotan's History says it's the flying island uprooted from the Sinking Lands of Talislanta. Castle Sanctum is on it.

Altarus

Another continent lies past the Azure Ocean, mentioned in old Talislantian legendry. Per Hotan's History this hosts Kharistan and Randun, who fight wars against each other (or maybe just tournaments). Chronicles (2005) associates it with mythic Alhambra. The 1990 book said Altarus was uprooted from Talislanta's Sinking Lands; but the canon now insists no, that's Alcedon.

Celadon

Green paradise. The dendrads are plants by day, humanoids by night. Morrigan promised a Celadon gazetteer [Hotan's History, 283] but that didn't happen.

Draknar

The world used to be ruled by reptile giants; those giants only have this continent now.

Temesia

Beyond the Sea of Madness, or in it, is the "large island" Temesia. On it is a brass mountain with liquid mercury rivers. Probably why that sea drives people nuts. Panic demons live here.

Simbar is another island likely past Temesia, so isn't often visited. This has, or had, a rich civilisation.

The Darkness

Across the Midnight Sea, is the Darkness alias the Midnight Realm. This is by far the best-documented external realm. Morrigan Press, who had the Talislanta licence in 2005, published a whole thing on that. Which also has much to report on the Lower Planes en passant.

The Darkness is a hellish demiplane, and yes Morrigan was not above floating the word "grim" in this context. Its land is in two masses, a larger northeastern one and a smaller southwestern one, connected by a narrow isthmus.

The big sub-island used to be the civilisation of Thanatus. Now it is the Fallen Lands - so called because there's a massive rift to the AbyssDemonrealms there, which wasn't plugged in time. This place has gone full Iuz, even Worldwound. Rivers of molten iron, that sort of thing.

To the extent the Darkness has civilisation, that would be in the southwestern sub-island. Here are the Nine Princedoms. This is run by Tarterans, Talislantese for "tieflings". Tarterans have a caste society, as Lawful Evils do, so it's not exactly rainbows and puppies here either.

The Lower Planes

These are largely the D&D planes under another name, sometimes even the SAME name. Asmodeus rules "Oblivion" which is the Lawful hell, the Demonrealms are chaotic, and the two sides meet in the Riven Lands which totally isn't the Blood War.

One difference is that the Demonrealms have a hell of their own: the Void. What crumbles into the Void falls ultimately to the Dark. And that's the end.

South of the Demonrealms is the Raging Sea; south of that is the chaotic Nether Dimension. The Sepharans are from there. They've got a lust for the Nether Ones from the Void. Think of the Nether Realm as Talislanta's Leng.

There's also The Underworld, which is your classical Sheol, not necessarily evil. This features the city Ebon; whose residents are tall, dark, and undead. The Malum now in the Iron Citadel in Talislanta are Ebonites back to the world of the living.

The Dark Dimension, not to be confused with the Dark or the Darkness (we didn't come up with these names, leave us alone), is its own horrible thing, riddled with canyons and pits under a manta-infested black sky. It mainly interacts with other planes by way of the Brood.

Versions

Talislanta started in 1987 with a Chronicles lorebook. This was in the bad old days of D&D, when TSR weren't keen on supplements they couldn't control. As a result the earlier editions used their own systems - or stuck to lore. Its fourth-edition (2005ish) books go with Morrigan Press' "Omni" RPG rules. The Darkness and Menagerie use Omni.

Under the blessed light of the Open Game License / d20 system, in 2005 Morrigan Press produced a d20 rulebook, also. Unfortunately the Morrigan lads didn't much TEST said rulebook - nor even proofread it. Over the next three years one Paul Cunningham Got Shit Done and produced twenty pages worth of errata for that.

For the d20 aficionado, some Morrigan books do offer appendices to convert the systems, like Menagerie. Also, there are plenty of lorebooks for this setting that don't bother with stats: like the Morrigan edition of Chronicles of Talislanta and its followup Hotan's History (Dec 2006).

External Links

• The main website for Talislanta (under construction)