Ortloh Factions

Introduction

Over the years, Ortloh changed greatly. In the current ages, it is organized in 12 factions, five of which are official, two are known, but not recognized, and five only exist underground.

Note that the Ortloh Factions are mainly a belief system. The political landscape is different as various powerful nobles and kings own various pieces of land which may cross the lines between the Ortloh Factions.

Official Factions

The Ortloh official factions are found around the Ortloh land.

Nature (West)

The Nature faction is consider to be one faction, but over time a gap has matured between the people of the West and the people of the Hills. For this reason, two factions are defined, although these two still count as one faction.

Nature (East)

Although the Nature West and Nature East count as one faction, this faction has some different venues and these differences are big enough that many scholars consider this faction as different from the Nature faction of the West.

Magic

The faction of Magic is toward the North of the land of Ortloh. It is composed of many magical beings such as Elves and Faeries.

Cavaliers

The faction of Law and Order in the South of the land of Ortloh is ruled by various Knights and Paladins.

Destiny

The South East area has many futuristic characteristics. It hosts many Artificers (see Tasha Cauldron of Everything) and some say Aliens have blessed their land with their presence.

Elements

In the South East, the four elements, water, fire, earth, and wind rule.

Unofficial Factions

The following two factions are known but rarely recognized as real orders by the five official factions.

Necromancy

The old City of Ice, built at a very high altitude in the center of the Ortloh land, in the cold Mountains of Blue Ice, has had many problems with Earthquakes. As a result, it was abandonned by all but a few who like to practice Necromandy.

The Eartquakes created so many deaths, that the place is auspicious for necromans.

Although this faction is not recognized, it is well known and most do not like the place. Especialy, the faction of the Cavaliers has been trying to ban this faction for a very long time.

Fluff

Many of the clouds of Ortloh are ancient homes of Cloud Giants. These clouds are accessible with magical beanstalks. Whenever a magical beanstalk grows and attaches to a cloud, it anchers it giving people a chance to access the cloud.

Since most of these clouds do not host giants anymore, they instead got the Fluff People living there.

The faction is not recognized because it is very difficult of access and the clouds are not land locked. That means the Fluff People could have rights of any of the Ortloh land, which is not acceptable by the other factions.

Underground Factions

The underground factions are acting in the dark. Two are on land and three are actually underground. These factions are maintained by high ranking villains. Since factions are such large organizations, it is pretty much impossible to get rid of one altogether.

The Hook Order

The Hook Order is the faction of thieves and assassins. This faction is found nearly everywhere, at least in places with many inhabitants (any city with over 1,000 people living in it).

Many people know that there are thieves and assassins, but except for people living in it, they have no clue that they are organized in a very large faction.

Character Limitation: Because of this faction, in Ortloh, a character player should not be multiclassed Rogue / Paladin unless they were Paladin first and pretty much drop their Paladin way of life when multiclassing (i.e. never get additional levels as a Paladin). The Hook Order does not accept that someone becomes a Paladin. Someone who does pursue their Paladin endeavors will have to lose all benefits from the Hook Order. It is very likely that a spell will cast on her to remove all memory of the existance of the Hook Order.

The Elders

Under the Mountains of Ice lives the largest group of Drows governed by the Elders. This faction thinks that the Drows were the first and only race of intelligent beings on the land of Ortloh and their entire faction is based on that concept.

The Drows rarely venture outside of their Under City of The Elders. Those who do never speak of their city.

The Drows are adept of all sorts of black magic. They often work with The Hook Order when they want someone over to be assassinated or kidnaped.

Red Cultists

Living underground, a large set of people believe that daemons are to save them and they adorn them day and night.

Once in a while, one of the Red Cultist is actually able to summon daemons, demons, and devils. This is when heroes have to intervene to save the Land of Ortloh.

In most cases, the Red Cultists live in long forgotten undercity tunnels.

Yoralm

Named after the Elf Yoralm, this faction has people following krakens. Yoralm, some 1,250 years ago, found a baby kraken which he helped. The kraken survived and was named Squidarma.

Squidarma and Yoralm became very close friends and Yoralm made many acolytes join his rank in helping kraken grow safely. After a few hundred years, this has become a faction of its own, but it remains hidden under the Seas of Skitabo (between the Island of Skitabo and the West Coast of Ortloh.)

The kraken rarely make themselves seen, except for boats going over their sea.

The existing acolytes all have the ability to breath underwater.

Popholoth

The Illithid Brain Popholoth has always lived on Ortloh. It lives in the South East in a very deep underground dungeon not too far from the big city of (Name?), which is a great source of brain.

The faction includes cultists who think that the Illithids will give them total freedom once the world is liberated of impure souls. They work in the cities and villages to gather innocent people and bring them to the Illithids as food and once in a while as hosts of Illithid larvae (see ceremorphosis in Volo's Guide to Monsters).

The Illithids are very discret and very rarely come out of their dungeon. The cultists do not generally meet with them. Actually, the captives are not directly offered to the Illithids so it would be difficult to discover the Popholoth Faction.

The Illithids also have inter material world vessels (spaceships) and are the aliens that so many people have met over the years.