Underground Hollows, Faery Gold and Goblin Fruit

[Eldagusto]

I'm thinking in my next game I'm going to have Fae have Underground infrastructure that connects the various Freeholds/Fiefdoms within a Duchy or County. The basic idea being going with the many stories of Fae living below ground all over the World. This means fae keep their nature close to the vest in the Mortal World but Freeholds will have a tendancy to dig tunnels below them and local Chimera squat and live in the tunnels finding them as a haven against the banality above ground. These Chimera naturally expand the Tunnels and the local Lords make a point of connecting their Tunnels with their subjects. This results in rural Areas with secret undertowns, old Cities with Catacombs with Kinain and enchanted that rub shoulders with derelicts and Nosferatu, and levels that expand secretly into even older larger catacombs below. Sewers under New York that reach into abandoned WWII Tunnels that expand further into a secret Underduchy. This provides room for a lot more secret citizens of the Kingdoms like Denizens, Chimera sworn to the Courts and Kinain. It also provides an outlet for wild born Chimera to drift down below the city rather then die or go into the Dreaming.

There would be chimerical tunnels that are solid to unenchanted.
For all these Underground infrastructures I would also include things like Hidden Forest Glens, Abandoned Mines, and even The Lady of the Lake's Lake, so an estate mortals believe is a lake but its liveable for the training of a dude like Lancelot. I also have things like Goblin Fruit and Faeiry Gold as things, so magical fruits and minerals that are conventional matter with a chimerical aspect located in places never blemished by unenchanted hands. Often Faery Gold appears as things like Pyrite when mortals encounter it and spoil it with Banality but if harvested by Fae like Chimera or Kithain they are items with Chimerical miens with special properties. Goblin fruits will be like magical fruits with blessing and Curses like in Changeling the Lost but when spoiled by Banality they just revert to poisoned berries and sour wild fruit and crabapples.


Maybe there could be Backgrounds to represent these, like Hollow to represent Underground Lair, since they are not as potent as Freeholds they are more secure but similar and combinable with Freeholds. Hollows could have access to Raths and Trods and connections to nearby Hallows of other Fae. And then Goblin Fruit and Faery Gold Representing access to hidden resources.

[MythAdvocate]

Oh yes. This is also of great interest to me. Hollow Hills, hidden grottoes and tunnels are excellent "go to" concepts for fae holdings.

[Eldagusto]

Oh yes. This is also of great interest to me. Hollow Hills, hidden grottoes and tunnels are excellent "go to" concepts for fae holdings.

Like how you worked on material about Faery Gardens and Forests and made Botany, I like the idea of Fae Underground material along with an Underground Art Chthonics.

[Erinys]

I can't see fae rubbing shoulders with Nosferatu, except maybe the pro-Fomorian faction. But Unseelie with tunnels that link up to Ratkin spirit tunnels and their nests, for all kinds of chaos...

[Black Fox]

While I don't run Changeling games, I do try to map out where the other supernatural critters are in a general sense for Vampire and especially Werewolf. And because I like it to reflect as much real myth and legendry, I am much more inspired by that then actual published material which I feel is too much its own thing as opposed to fitting those legends. So I do just what Eldagusto says here.

There are different kinds of Elf-Lands out there, but one that is underground where the Little People live is certainly one of them. In the games terms, this is simply a region of the Near Dreaming and doesn't map well to its physical counterpart except in places where there are Grottos and similar Freeholds to link them. This is mainly in the wilderness, and not urban areas. I think the game has way too many faerie holdings in urban environments. However, I do allow some urban freeholds and such, and in these I do have a kind of Under City that is heavily inspired from Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman. In most cities, this would be incredibly small - perhaps non-existent except for a few boltholds and connecting tunnels. But in large enough cities that have subterranean architecture and lots of legends concerning them, it would be much more substantial.

I don't have such Fae interact with the Nosferatu - unless there was something very specific I was doing. But this along with other things like Pits and Penumbral Wyrmholes and possibly Nihils in the Underworld, are sensed to various degrees by Warrens of Nosferatu who know there is something down there with them.

[Lian]

This seems pretty much what the Near Dreaming is for? The Tunnels being trods of various degrees of "safety" Known Mines being Freeholds that sort of thing. That would explain why no other supernatural is seeing much of the faries.

[Eldagusto]

Jesus Christ my phone at my first damn response I hate that!

But the tunnels would lead to raths and trods but they are in the Autumn world. Along with some chimerical tunnels only Fae can use their would be chimerical lights that appear as rocks, junk and mushrooms to mortals but to Fae they illuminate the tunnels as Fae lanterns, Faery fires, mini stars, and phosphorescent fungi.

They aren’t all rubbing shoulders with the Nosferatu but they can’t help that it’s very common for human cities to have the first under layer like the sewers claimed by the Nos and Ratkin. So they try to secretly build an even more hidden Faery layer under all this. The Nos and Ratkin will only really catch a few Kinain and enchanted that dwell just outside the Fae layer and think they are madmen and witches. And the Fae will try to slip past unnoticed.

Ultimately the Ratkin will know somewhat their is a deeper Fae layer, their Wyldtouched madness more amicable to the dreaming. But only the Munchmausen are welcome as a whole to the Fae Tunnels. Some Sluagh, Pooka, and Redcap and the like will make contacts with the Nos and Ratkin and they will often divert attention from the Fae deeper layers while trading info. The Balorian territory and Thallain tunnels will often welcome Black Spiral Dancers Baali and Vhajunka. Only the Black Spirals though have long lasting ties and the others can often result in turf wars.

[Lian]

Why would there need to be "Autumn" tunnels? You get on i the right place.. or have portal passage and you're in the dreaming. It seems like everything you talk about would be covered by near dreaming stuff. Freeholds, trods. Just like there are natural shallowings into the umbra and Shadowlands. In the Dark the barriers between world fray.

[Eldagusto]

Why would there need to be "Autumn" tunnels? You get on i the right place.. or have portal passage and you're in the dreaming. It seems like everything you talk about would be covered by near dreaming stuff. Freeholds, trods. Just like there are natural shallowings into the umbra and Shadowlands. In the Dark the barriers between world fray.

Well they do extend into the dreaming in multiple points but why have anything in the Autumnworld? It’s so everything doesn’t have to always be in the dreaming all the time. A way for Chimera to hide and bolthole into the Autumnworld without dying, so you can have local ecologies based on the local fantasies of the town, and a mouth to the dreaming for the chimera that leave the Autumn behind. It’s so I can halve that hidden layer only Fae can see even if it can be stumbled upon by mortals and monsters. Ultimately it’s more stable then the Dreaming and also ultimately can be eroded by Banality of discovered.

[MythAdvocate]

At present, I am running a campaign set in Manhattan, with a strong presence from Goblin Town. So I am actually thinking a great deal on this subject. New York City has so many underground tunnels in our world, having an entire Undercity down there. With the addition of Nosferatu vampires, Black Spiral tunnels, Ratkin, and other denizens, there is quite the weird ecosystem going on down there. And with portals leading to the Dreaming, the Hollow Earth, Umbra and Shadowlands, things can get really weird.

For my game, there are a handful of trade towns, "safe" havens and travel routes underground that are maintained mostly by "mole people," who are a mix of kinain, kinfolk, ghouls, and regular folk. These places can be ramshackle shanty towns, but a few are surprisingly pleasant, though still odd. Banality in these places is pretty low (Localized Reality/Irrational Zones in Mage terms) and this are appealing to Changelings and Mages.

[Konradleijon]

Cool would you base the Goblin fruit on the ones from Changling the Lost?

https://whitewolf.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_Goblin_Fruits

[Penelope]

Like a faerie Underdark!

[Eldagusto]

I totally am being Influenced by Changeling the Lost and the 1st ed Goblin Fruits and Goblin Markets and Hollows. I love Goblin Fruit and their Mixed Curses/Blessings.

And the Underdark as a concept is fun in so many gamelines, like Dragon's Age, and even the Changeling Backstory with Underbridge.

At present, I am running a campaign set in Manhattan, with a strong presence from Goblin Town. So I am actually thinking a great deal on this subject. New York City has so many underground tunnels in our world, having an entire Undercity down there. With the addition of Nosferatu vampires, Black Spiral tunnels, Ratkin, and other denizens, there is quite the weird ecosystem going on down there. And with portals leading to the Dreaming, the Hollow Earth, Umbra and Shadowlands, things can get really weird.

For my game, there are a handful of trade towns, "safe" havens and travel routes underground that are maintained mostly by "mole people," who are a mix of kinain, kinfolk, ghouls, and regular folk. These places can be ramshackle shanty towns, but a few are surprisingly pleasant, though still odd. Banality in these places is pretty low (Localized Reality/Irrational Zones in Mage terms) and this are appealing to Changelings and Mages.

Exactly! Undertunnels/Undercities are huge in the Real World, like the Tunnel City under Las Vegas and the Huge abandoned Networks under New York. And in the World of Darkness I want it to be even grander. I was always a fan of localized superstition making localized zones of reality to effect the Consensus and also have lower then normal Banality. Didn't Hunter have the Crocodiles in the Sewers Urban Legend turn out to be Pooka/Beasties or something? Such major undercities I can see being a Mecca for Slaugh, Redcap, and Thallain from the Tunnels of America and the Paris Grand Catacombs or sunken Tunnels of Venice with the Premascines.

[Lian]

Well they do extend into the dreaming in multiple points but why have anything in the Autumnworld? It’s so everything doesn’t have to always be in the dreaming all the time..

Because that's the point of having the Dreaming/Umbra/Shadowlands. The Autumn world is meant to be generally mapable with the Real world. There's a reason even Nos Warrens stretch this(New Orleans really?) and you want to go even further. This is exactly what shallowings are for This is why the Hollow Earth is another world. So you don't end up with the weird DND sandwich of dwarves dig down and find the Underdark filled with drow. Drow dig down.. and find dinosaurs and glowing hollow earth.

[Erinys]

There's a reason even Nos Warrens stretch this(New Orleans really?)

To be fair, the leeches don't need to breathe.