Building Bhakashal - Playable Groups 

I played bog standard AD&D for many years, loving every minute of it, but for the most part I played humans. The main reason for that is that I adored Lord of the Rings, read it when I was 12, but I had no desire to play my favorite characters or their poor cousin analouges. LOTR is like mythology or religious text to me, it isn't for gaming. So I saw a lot of elves, dwarves and halflings, but generally didn't play them.

Then in college I played in a game where the ref allowed lizard men to be PCs. He had seen the Rogues gallery and seen that boss Jeff Dee lizard man character (pictured above).

It ends up that the people who MADE the game played centaurs and lizard men and stuff.

What the hell!

I was hooked.

I want Bhakashal to have a sword and sorcery/Vancian vibe, so much like Talislanta I dumped the Tolkien elves, dwarves, etc. and tried something different. 

First off, the use of “race” to describe what would otherwise be called species created a lot of confusion, so Bhakashal does not have “races”, it has “playable groups” (PGs).

The mythology of Bhakashal has gods with animal / human forms, and many chimerical beasts. Bhakashal exists billions of years in the future, and it is assumed that at some point, humanity created both artificial intelligence and became able to evolve animals into sentient, bipedal, tool using form. The AI evolved and transcended this reality, they are now the gods of the setting. Some of the sentient groups of evolved animals survived and grew in number, and over the billions of years intervening developed sustainable populations. 

Now no one knows which group came first, that knowledge is lost to the mists of time.

Bhakashal is populated by 10 playable groups:

Playable Groups - Bhakashal

Chitin - Insect People (C) 

Garudin - Bird People (G) 

Humans - Primate People (H)  

Jugyi - Turtle People (J)  

Kutya - Dog People (G)  

Malu - Fish People (M)  

Rakasta - Cat People (R)  

Saan - Lizard People (S)  

Togmu - Frog People (T)  

Vodnik - Castor People (V)  

Bolded groups are the most common, and the Saan are the most numerous of those.

Each PG in Bhakashal is differentiated in certain ways. If there is to be any point to playing something other than a human, there should be some ways of showing that difference in the game. However, rather than create detailed, elaborate cultures for each, Bhakashal uses 11 points of differentiation for each to achieve the role-playing goal of making the PGs different enough to be interesting, but similar enough to be playable. Some contiguity with familiar motivations is necessary to make adventuring possible.   

Note on Alignment: There is no alignment for PGs. Each PG will have institutions and structures in their societies that create factions, and factions in Bhakashal have alignments, but no PG has a dominant or common alignment.

Playable Group Features

1. Physical Description - Each PG has variation in physical description within that group. So for example, the garudin are “bird people”, but some are bipedal hawks, falcons, swallows, chickens, ducks, etc. Chitin are “insect people” but some are ant-like, some grasshopper-like, some bee-like, etc. This applies for every PG, including humanity. 

Players may choose their variation.

2. Ability Bonuses - Though there are no ability score penalties, there are ability score bonuses associated with each PG. They reflect obvious features such as size and structure, and the way folklore/mythology/literature have treated the various animals they are evolved from. 

3. Class  - There are no class restrictions, any PG can be any class. However, each PG will have one or more classes associated with it, e.g. these classes are popular within that group, but PCs may be of any class and PG combination. 

4. Skills - Each PG will have common skills historically associated with that group, players can take those or roll for skills at skill assignment.

5.  Abilities - Each PG will have abilities related to its morphology, e.g. turtle people will be able to breathe underwater and swim well, bird people can fly, etc. But there can be exceptions, for example, just like there are flightless birds there can be flightless garudin. But the default abilities will be listed. 

6. Appearance - Each PG will have a style of dress and appearance that is popular with that group, again, players may choose to ignore this and dress and appear in any way they like, but it is a starting point for the ref.

7. Technology - Each PG will have two or more technologies, one usually a weapon, historically associated with that group. Players can take that technology or take others when generating equipment. When using a preferred technology they will gain a +1 (or +5%) on any rolls associated with it. 

8. Custom - Each PG will have a custom associated with them. Of course, every group will have many customs, this is only a single example to use as a role playing prompt and to inspire other customs for that group to be created in the game.

9. Art - Each PG will have a form of art that is highly valued in their group. Of course, different forms of art are valued in all of the PGs, but this particular form is held to be important by the majority of this particular PG. The ref and the players can riff off of this to determine what other forms of art are important to that group if they like.

10. Gods - No one god is worshipped exclusively in any PG, however, each PG has a god or group of gods that are most commonly worshipped. 

11. Virtue - Each group has a virtue that is held in high esteem within that group. The idea is that the sentient groups will have members that exemplify all of the various virtues (and vices) to some degree, but with respect to one particular virtue, each of the PGs tends to hew to it closely. There are of course exceptions, but they are just that, exceptions.

Here is an example of one of the PGs in Bhakashal, the Garudin (bird people).

Garudin 

Physical Description - Garudin have arms separate from their wings, and wingspans of 8 to 16 feet depending on variations. They all have beaks/bills, some have head crests or body crests, and all have large eyes. All are feathered, not bat-like or dragon-like.

Ability Bonuses - +1 to DEX and +1 to INT

Class - Popular classes amongst Garudin are Mercenary, Jinx and Spider.

Skills - Popular skills/trades amongst Garudin are Musician, Trader, and Bowyer/Fletcher

Abilities - Garudin can walk at 9” and fly at 36”, have 3 natural attacks per round (CCB) 1-2/1-2/1-3, SA: dive attack = 2 point AC penalty and +4 to hit, x2 to damage, excellent vision, when in air are surprised on a 1 in 6 and surprise others on a 3 in 6, and get +10% on all thief skills. They will wear no heavier armor than leather or a metal breastplate with vambrace/greaves.

Appearance  - Garudin wear loose, baggy clothing on their bodies, and prefer lightweight, thin fabrics. They do not have tattoos but they do wear jewelry, though mainly on the hands and arms. They prefer colors that compliment their plumage for the most part, tending to exemplify what is there rather than contrasting with it. 

 

Technology - Garudin make high quality harps and stringed instruments, and most garudin will have a +1 to hit with the crossbow.

Custom - Garudin will extend their wings when wanting to appear important or to signal approval. 

Art - Garudin love music, many are musicians instrument makers (particularly stringed instruments), but all are interested in and knowledgeable about music. Those with an intelligence of 15 or higher act as sages with a minor field in musicology.

Gods Mohlk (god of birds, communication), Uvir (god of the air, wind) and Qonru (god of the sun) are popular amongst Garudin. 

Virtue - Garudin Society values clever wit and wordplay, elaborate jokes, mocking the powerful and humor that highlights hypocrisy are all popular. 

 

How it Works

To be clear, in each case the player can choose to adopt these features if they want, these are meant as baselines to flavor the game world, not essential features. The cultural features represent snapshots of how these groups behave when the players enter the game world. Over time, in the campaign, the ref and the group can change any of them, as they would change over time on their own as groups change. 

So if the referee and players are so inclined they could have Garudin fashion change and different kinds of clothing become popular, none of this is set in stone. If a Garudin PC wanted to wear heavier, gaudier clothing that’s fine. These are meant as generalities of the same form as, “Many Canadians wear jeans”. 

These are meant primarily as role playing prompts for the players so they can flavor their PC, they can choose to ignore them, or riff off them with the group and the ref to build that aspect of their character and in doing so create the lore of these PGs for their version of Bhakashal.