Ubiquity - Leagues of Gothic Horror - Guide to Faeries.pdf

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Leagues of Gothic Horror
Guide to Faeries
by Mr. Paul “Wiggy” Wade-Williams
Lead Editor: Anthony Boyd
Graphic Design: Robin Elliott
Typesetting: Paul Wade-Williams
Cover: Mateusz Wilma
Illustrations: Simon Todd
Ubiquity Rules System Design: Jeff Combos
Dedication: To Lauren, thank you for giving me my words back.
www.tripleacegames.com
First Published 2020
978-1-908237-34-7
1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
Printed in the USA
This game uses the Ubiquity Roleplaying System, developed by Exile Game Studio (www.
exilegames.com). Ubiquity Roleplaying System, Exile Game Studio, and all associated logos and
trademarks are copyright, Exile Game Studio, LLC. Used with permission.
©2020 Triple Ace Games. Leagues of Adventure and all related marks and logos are
trademarks of Triple Ace Games. All Rights Reserved.
Table of Contents
Chapter the First: Infernal Origins............................................................... 3
Prehistory.................................................................................................. 3
Pre-Classical World.................................................................................. 3
Classical World......................................................................................... 4
Medieval World........................................................................................ 5
Early Modern Age..................................................................................... 5
Modern Age.............................................................................................. 6
New Talents.............................................................................................. 7
New Leagues............................................................................................. 7
New Occult Texts...................................................................................... 7
New Occult Relics..................................................................................... 8
Chapter the Second: The Nature of the Damned........................................ 9
Creation..................................................................................................... 9
Identification........................................................................................... 16
Protection................................................................................................ 17
Destruction.............................................................................................. 18
Chapter the Third: Forsaken Lairs............................................................. 19
Associated Locations.............................................................................. 19
Refuge Resource..................................................................................... 20
Fairyland................................................................................................. 21
Chapter the Fourth: Diabolical Powers...................................................... 25
Common Abilities................................................................................... 25
Other Powers........................................................................................... 26
Weaknesses............................................................................................. 30
Chapter the Fifth: Catalog of Fiends.......................................................... 31
Common Abilities................................................................................... 31
Optional Flaws........................................................................................ 31
Chapter the Sixth: Princes of Darkness...................................................... 55
Faerie Villains......................................................................................... 55
Balor........................................................................................................ 56
Erlkönig................................................................................................... 57
The Esoteric Guild of Ironsmiths............................................................ 58
Morgan le Fay......................................................................................... 60
The Morrigan.......................................................................................... 61
Puck......................................................................................................... 62
The Wild Hunt......................................................................................... 63
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Chapter the First:
Infernal Origins
“Leprechauns are not twee beings dreamed
up by the tourist board, but warriors of leg-
end. That name comes from the Celtic god of
commerce and war, Lugh. Their mission, their
life’s work, is to protect the gold. What better
way to hide it than to become a joke, a story
nobody takes seriously?”
—Kathy
Bryson,
Fighting Mad
The nature of faeries has long vexed the
Ghost Club. Some scholars of the occult have
argued that faeries are not a separate class of
being, but should be grouped with appari-
tions, demons, or vampires, depending on the
supernatural powers and mores.
Given the proliferation of fairy stories, many
see faeries as purely a European phenomenon.
Proponents of the Euro-centric view argue that
talk of faeries was distributed across the world
by colonists and immigrants. Critics of that
view insist that a variety of spirits in native lore
can be equated to faeries.
Note that while the standard British name
for these mysterious entities is spelled fairy,
the Ghost Club prefers the more archaic spell-
ing faerie (plural: faeries). Depending on one’s
preference, faerie can also be replaced with
fae, fay, or fey.
written or pictorial evidence. Arguably, some
faerie tales are truly ancient, with names and
locations changed to suit different audiences.
Scholastic conjecture is that our primitive
ancestors followed an animistic view of the
universe. That is, every object and place has
a unique spirit. It might be that faeries were
seen as nature spirits or personifications of
elemental forces. Likewise, it is also possible
that ancestor worship did not involve appeas-
ing and calling upon the apparitions of dead
kin, but rather interaction with faeries.
Some scholars have argued that cave and
rock paintings depicting anthropomorphic
humans or humans with antler headdresses
actually show faeries.
Pre-Classical World
Celtic lore, which covers France as well as
Ireland, Scotland, and Wales, is replete with
entities that have come to be grouped in with
faeries. Oral history, written down for the first
time in the Christian era, speaks of the
aos sí,
a race of supernatural beings said to live under
the ground or in a world coterminous to ours
but which few humans can see. The Tuatha Dé
Danann (“tribe of the goddess Danu”) once
ruled Ireland as gods, but have since been
demoted to faerie status. The Welsh word for
such entities is Tylwyth Teg (“Fair Family”).
Until the Roman Empire crushed Celtic pa-
ganism under its hobnail sandals or civilized it
before adopting it into its own religion, knowl-
Prehistory
Whether faeries have always been known to
humanity is difficult to pin down with any cer-
tainty—our distant ancestors left scholars little
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Leagues of Gothic Horror: Guide to Faeries
edge of the fey was transmitted by the bards
and druids. Under Roman rule, many original
stories were lost, while others were relegated
to folk memories that quickly became confused
and corrupted.
This is not to say that faeries were known
only in Europe at this time. The earliest de-
finitive written evidence for genies is found
in the Koran (7th century), but they existed
centuries, if not millennia, before Mohammed
was born. Rather than being sources of venera-
tion as some scholars have proposed (though
possibly there were a few cults), early genies
appear to have served as muses for poets and
storytellers. In other oral stories, they are also
the source of madness.
Scholars of faerie lore will undoubtedly
recognize this attribution—there are multiple
instances of folk lore concerning mortals who
become either poets or lunatics after an en-
counter with the fey.
moved into caves or constructed crude huts,
and hunted animals to cook and eat their flesh.
By doing so, iron flowed into their veins, they
shed their immortality and became mortal.
Critics of the idea claim the story is a warped
version of the Garden of Eden and mankind’s
fall from grace. Supporters of the story insist
the Biblical tale is a vague race memory of hu-
manities’ fall from fey to mortal.
Classical World
Fairy tales have existed for millennia, first
as plays and later in written form. As well as
a form of entertainment, fairy tales are moral
folk stories featuring supernatural entities and
magic objects or spells. Whether they are ul-
timately derived from historical events or not
cannot be determined, due to the evolution of
the tales down the ages.
Even to this day, many encounters with
faeries involve talking animals rather than
diminutive beings with gossamer wings. It is
perhaps no surprise that the earliest written
fairy stories involve them. Take, for instance,
The Golden Ass,
a 1st century Roman novel, or
Aesop’s Fables.
Further afield,
Panchatantra
(“Five Treatises”), a 3rd century Indian text,
forms a longer narrative through linked stories
of talking beasts.
The skirmishes between mortals and fey
became open warfare at this time. This is
clearly evidenced by Rome’s violent attempts
to destroy the druidic faith and impose a new
religion on Europe.
The Coming of Iron
In Northern Europe and Gallic France, the
fey were synonymous with the old faiths. Some
walked among mortals as living gods, others
served as messengers bearing word from the
other realm or were sent to punish transgres-
sors of the ancient pact that had bound fey and
mortal in harmonious coexistence from the
time of the first humans.
Around 1200 BC, mankind unlocked the
secret knowledge of how to smelt and fashion
iron. Iron is anathema to all things magical,
and the bearing of iron amulets and weapons
signified the beginning of the mythic age and
the advent of the modern, mundane world.
Whether it was an accidental discovery or a
deliberate attempt to give humanity the upper-
hand in future dealings, the working of iron
brought fey and humanity into open conflict
for the first time.
As an aside, there is a school of thought
that humans and fey were once a single race.
At first they were the caretakers of nature and
lived as one with it. Later, some humans began
to dig into the earth, to extract minerals and
to work them into tools. No longer content to
live beneath the stars and eat vegetables, they
The Rise of the One God
The strength of iron to harm the fey was
given a huge boost at the Crucifixion, for the
nail’s hammered into Christ’s mortal flesh
were of iron. Through the ancient laws of sym-
pathetic magic, all iron came to be touched by
Christ’s blood.
Similarly, the new religion growing in
Rome’s underbelly brought a new set of mun-
dane laws into the world, laws that turned the
people away from the pantheistic beliefs of
their ancestors and into the light of one god.
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