A peak behind the development curtain!
Hello everyone!
It has been a while since I made a blog post and I have to say, I have really missed sharing with everyone! However, if you have been following our social media over the last month or so, you are sure to know why. Yes, Unlimited Realms are ramping everything up to eleven and jumping into the production of our very first DnD 5e supplement! Cyran’s Magnificent Walking Marketplace! Yes indeed, Dave and I have been hard at work creating something very exciting for all of you, in fact, we have had this in the works for the past 6 months. The book is an in-depth dive into shopping in Dungeons and Dragons and how to make what can be a rather laborious thing into something exciting for DMs and Players alike! With exciting mechanics and plot hooks to build an interesting shopping experience, over 200 new magical items to peruse, recipes and more character building options than you can shake an immovable rod at! (More on those in a moment) All shared with an exciting story, with characters and locations designed to fit in any campaign setting and art created by DnD veterans, talented community artists and new up and comers alike! We will have more details on our socials in the coming weeks, so keep an eye out.
Phantasia’s Store by Alexander Nanitchkov
In the meantime, over the coming months leading up to our launch, I wanted to share an insight into some of the classes and races that will be available in the book. I have been leading the mechanical design of these options and I wanted to share a little of my inspiration and thought process behind a few of these. I will be focusing on the options we have released online for open playtesting, so head over to our Facebook group, The Unlimited Realmwalkers to try out the first few levels for yourself!
Soldiers of Fortune
Weffalhyde's Flare by Brandon Welch
When we decided that we wanted to write a supplement based around shopping and commerce, I knew our character options had to reflect this. I wanted to create something that really reflected the power that gold can have over a campaign while giving players something they could really get excited about playing. It wasn’t long until I was struck with a memory, long ago, playing my first character in DnD (Half-elf Ranger, what can I say, I was basic!) We had broken into a treasure vault, deep within a dungeon. The whole place held more gold than Scrooge Mcduck’s personal spa and we all started getting pretty excited, we were only low level and this was more gold than we could have imagined! However, as we all started shovelling gold into our packs, I noticed a form moving up and out of the gold. A monstrous creature made of gold coins! It attacked us with fury and we only escaped a TPK by the skin of our teeth (And a dead Barbarian). The memory stuck with me and quickly took on a life of its own!
The Gold Elemental from Hearthstone
Gold or Treasure Elementals have been around for a while. With iterations appearing in TTRPGs and computer games past, but how to make such a thing work as a playable race? A swirling cyclone of gold coins is invocative but making such a thing balanced might be tricky, not to mention much of the lore for such creatures didn’t fit with someone that would become an adventurer. Instead, I looked at more contemporary inspiration. Playing as creatures of elemental origin is not new and the idea of a humanoid with elemental blood created the perfect middle ground for my idea. A Genasi, whose ancestors had been exposed to a Treasure elemental, rather than a fire elemental would create the option for players who really want to turn some heads on the battlefield. With this idea in mind, everything fell into place! Being made of metal would certainly create a hardy form (+2 to Con) and everyone would love to make friends with the being literally made of money (+1 Chr) and the spells and fire resistance just made sense as I followed that logic!
Savior of rare magical items
Great Sword of Waltz by Tatiana Yamshanova
I LOVE the Mummy films. The swashbuckling adventure, the brash and cool O’Connell played by Brendan Fraser at the height of his powers (all hail the Brenaissance). Is there any better representation of a TTRPG adventurer than the group of heroes from that movie? Always bickering, forever making their situation worse and somehow with luck and determination, coming out the other side with bags full of loot? But alas, 5e never feels like it has something to scratch that itch! Sure different classes could be adapted, but nothing felt right, so of course, I took that as a challenge, and the Treasure Hunter was born.
There was plenty to draw from, not just Mummy films, but iconic Treasure Hunters exist throughout geekdom. From Indiana Jones to Lara Croft, I researched (A great excuse for a movie night) and began to build fundamental ideas that should be in such a class. From these characters endless supply of luck to their need to return storied artifacts to where they belonged. I also took a look back at older editions, where characters could become experts in dungeons, finding them and surviving them. I couldn’t add the Dungeoneering skill back into the game, but I could find ways to represent it in the class, such as their “Adventure is never far away” ability.
Hopefully, you have enjoyed this first peek behind the thought processes of the book. Writing and developing all this has been a dream come true and I really cannot wait to share everything with all of you!
Until next time, take care!
Mat from Unlimited Realms
