Guest Article: Zombie Sky Press – The Faerie Ring (Pathfinder)

The Faerie Ring
By Scott Gable

Forest-SceneOne of the most important parts of The Faerie Ring are the new fey playable races. You can play as fir bolg, bitterclaws, darklings, goodfellows, wyrd, putti, twilight children, black hats, far darrig, kitsune, matabiri… maybe sidhe! We wanted players and GMs to be able to truly immerse themselves in our faeries worlds, to actively partake in courtly politics, to deal with fey logic and customs and treachery, to wield supernatural abilities. We wanted players and GMs to feel like they have a personal stake in their fey lands. And to play fun, complicated characters with likely short life spans.

The fir bolg, for instance, are warrior fey adapted from Celtic myth. They can invest themselves with aspects of nature. They were once a cohesive, proud race of fey with culture and conquest to call their own. But they were nearly destroyed by the Morrigan and her sidhe, and that confrontation left them decimated and fir bolg women cursed to become like their own fey hounds (or cwn annwn, like Mallt-y-Nos, the Dog Mother) once they’d given birth. Now, they are scavenging nomads, wandering with the hounds they live and die with. The fir bolg are nothing if not survivors, though, and Slaine, their king, has returned with the Wild Hunt close behind. Now, they are focused on their enemies, the sidhe.

The putti, on the other hand, are a particularly odd and original race. They are born of plants and engineered by Korapira to retake the planes for all plantkind. But these precocious fey that resemble purple-skinned human babies and float through the air are not the bloodthirsty champions that Korapira was hoping for. Instead, theirs is a willful intelligence and active imagination. They are a whirlwind of activity and incessantly curious, always hungry for new experiences. They wield a wide array of psychic abilities and want only to drift through the multiverse and discover the worlds within.

Then there are the twilight children, or changelings. Misplaced souls at the edges of society, weaving their shadows to keep others away. Theirs is a struggle for acceptance and a constant search for identity. And the goodfellows are pixies serving Mab. Fun-loving pranksters, each wields a magic designated by a flower, corresponding to its medicinal effects or mythical associations. And the bitterclaws are slightly less sociopathic versions of gremlins. And there are more!

Each race presents its own set of strange endearments and hurdles to cross. And each has specific ties to a fey lord and the multiverse and each other, whether they want to or not, which will all make for some tough decisions. All just to make their lives more complicated and present a different experience for roleplaying. One with intrigue and treachery, treaties and courtly consideration, rites, oaths, and destiny. All in wonderfully rich otherworlds that the fey call home with odd new fey creatures and fanciful locations to deal with and something entirely unexpected behind every corner.

You can back The Faerie Ring Kickstarter here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1557256029/the-faerie-ring-for-pathfinder-roleplaying-game

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