A quick clarification question to make sure that I am applying the rules correctly.

Since Firearms deal Dramatic Wound in addition to normal wounds, filling the Death Spiral should proceed in the following fashion.

A character with no wounds is shot for 1 raise. A single normal wound in the first section the the first dramatic wound are filled on their death spiral.

Then when they are stabbed for additional 2 raises, the empty normal wounds in the first sections are filled, they do not get skipped straight into second section just because a dramatic wound is filled.

So I've been running my second campaign after years of a hiatus (1st was around the time the kickstarter shipped). That first campaign, I kinda fiddled around to make the game work...but it never felt right to me. It left me wanting something that I could never figure out.

So when I started my second campaign, I was hoping I could come in with a different mindset and make it work better. I could not. I came here for help. Googled the heck out of questions....and I found this:

https://www.reddit.com/r/7thSea/comments/1j4jr65/struggling_with_consequences_and_opportunities_in/

While u/blusponge toots his own horn :D , his product sounded VERY useful. So I bought them.

HOLY HELL I wish I found these earlier.

By having a physical card deck to work with, I found myself laying out VERY satisfying combats and dramatic scenes. By putting the cards down in front of everyone, ALL of us could see the consequences and opportunities. So cut and dry.
In addition, it gives so many ideas on how to make a scene compelling and challenging. AND it lets me shoot from the hip to make things even more interesting.

For example, my players had to get aboard the Atabean flagship, the Onyx Deep, to grab the maguffin. They found it floundering in a heavy storm....about to sink. Just flipping through the cards, I can add a time limit (before it sinks), disorientation (heavy rain, darkness, and chaos), revealing a secret (that they were NOT part of the ATC despite the stolen flag they flew to get in close), and injury (I simply said there were going to be 20 wounds taken among them if they didn't try to mitigate them).

The funny thing is I didn't even know how I was going to rule the Disorientation if they didn't try to overcome it. I was thinking like they would each lose a die for their next roll.
And I could just add more and more stuff until I felt they were challenged enough.

Another thing that was cool was the players could flip through the opportunities deck and add their own stuff if they wanted.

Amazing work, my dude!

P.S. Here is a direct link for the product! https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/217308/cards-on-the-table?keyword=cards%20on%20the%20table

Hello everyone! My name is Ellie and I'm a professional game master! After some changes in my schedule I'd love to start some new paid, professional high quality high passion 7th Sea groups with excited players. I know all the books (12 of them) by heart and I will teach and help anybody new to the system. I have many ideas for campaigns, both with a metaplot and tailored to a group of characters. I offer an inclusive, dedicated, passionate experience and to delve with me into the lore of my favorite system. For more details please contact me on DISCORD - Shyercaulfield And check out my Startplaying.games profile for prices and for more descriptions about me. https://startplaying.games/gm/7thsealover Thank you so much!

Title explains it all. I am looking to try this system, 1st or 2nd edition (though I have more knowledge of 2nd) and I am here to see if anyone has a game with an open spot

Guys what is the difference between a session and an episode?

Hi everyone, I'm gonna play 7th Sea for the First time soon as GM and I need some advices in: how can i build a background session? What part Of the Life of the character I should do, I can do all his Life until the events in the present, but It Will be very long and hard. Some help or advices? Thank you

Hello there! My name is Ellie and I am posting on behalf of a group of 3 players including myself looking for a refined, fun experience of 7th Sea 2nd edition.

I am a professional GM myself and a certified 7th Sea professor (obsessed fan who knows all 12 books by heart) and my other 2 friends are my long-time players. However, while my games are running, we decided we want to play another game, with the three of us as players together under another GM.

We like heavy RP games, with good dynamics between PCs, NPCs and players and GM, meaningful combat and drama and lots of plot twists and intrigue. We have a strange but fun dynamics together and are all LGBT. We also want to find a GM who knows the system rather well for a smoother experience for us all.

For more details please contact me on DISCORD - Shyercaulfield

Thank you so much and hope to hear from you!

As the title suggests, I've been wanting to play 7th Sea 2e for over a year, haven't managed to find a group to play with, and was wondering if anyone knew where would be best to look for an online group? I'm in GMT timezone, in case that makes a difference?

So considering it's 17th/18th century we know that they existed, what would be the best solution? Obviously best used against brute squads to damage multiple targets in a squad as opposed to having to be creative with firearms (like shooting down a chandelier, tree branch etc.)

I'd like to believe someone in the community has worked to make them fun but not trivial.

Specifically adding 5 to the target number.

Is this some sort of artifact from when the rules made more sense? I mean, the only thing I can do is add 5 points to a combat or a dramatic scene before the players roll?

So instead of adding their dice up to 10s to get raises, they need 15s? Thus making the ENTIRE SCENE harder rather than just one roll?

This is my second campaign using 2e and it STILL feels clunky as hell.

Hello, Freunden. I have a question for the lit of you. I recently found out that Cities of Faith and Wonder had a few things that didn't make it to the final cut, these things including Character Backgrounds for Iskandar, Ship Backgrounds, Sorcery for Iskandar, and Advantages for Iskandar. Does anyone know if there was anything (like above) cut from the rest of the book? I know Vaticine City has Advantages and Sorcery that made it, but I'm hoping for Backgrounds and or Ship Backgrounds from there or any of the above for the rest of the book. Thank you for the help!

I have an upcoming 7th sea campaign with some university friends. We are using the standard Corebook and Navigavia, an Italian expansion with new sorcery types. I wanted to play a Hexe character but there is this other sorcery from Navigavia that has some features that are thematically interesting for my Hero so I wanted to ask if, according to the rules, it was possible to mix sorcery advantages and, in a way, “multiclass”.

I’m still having trouble wrapping my head around 7th Sea as a system, and one part in particular really slows my games down:

Step 2: Consequences and Opportunities – After hearing the players’ Approaches, the GM is supposed to present the Consequences and Opportunities, including when they occur and any Time Limits.

In practice, I struggle with this step a lot. It slows down my games because I find it hard to come up with everything in advance. But then, when I read the Action Sequence Example in the rulebook, the GM doesn’t seem to front-load all the Consequences and Opportunities. Instead, it feels like they react more organically to what the players do.

So, am I misunderstanding how this is supposed to work? Should I be setting everything up in advance, or is there room to be more flexible? Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

Hi!
I was wondering - has anyone tried to perform a herculean task and create/sum up a 2nd edition timeline of Thean history? I mean, main events, wars, etc.
I know half of it is loosey goosey, the war in Eisen was over either five or twenty years ago, but it would be grand to have some kind of unified table for reference. Maybe someone tried doing that?

I recently acquired the final few books in print to get everything on this 7th Sea 2nd edition list:
Core Rulebook (2016)
Pirate Nations (2016)
Heroes and Villains (2016)
Nations of Théah Volume 1 (2016)
Nations of Théah Volume 2 (2016)
Crescent Empire (2017)
The New World (2017)
Lands of Gold and Fire (2017)
Secret Societies (2020)
Cities of Faith and Wonder (2022)
Land of 1000 Nations (2023)
Khitai (2024)

I've also backed the Kickstarter for the adventure module The Price of Arrogance.

Besides the 10 Adventures book, is there anything else currently in print for the 2E line?

Has Chaosium announced any plans for any new products for the game?

I'm looking for more ideas for moowoo tattoos. Anyone make any, or have some ideas?

I understand this is an existing product that just got translated, but my group loved L5R4, wants to try 7S, so I just finished reading it.

Spoilers:

I thought it felt a bit long, especially when there's a painful gross debuff stacking to make sure you never feel good about making progress. Doesn't seem like a suitable intro to the game since it whisks you away from home fairly fast. I have limited patience for tangled-web-of-conspiracy-who-can-you-trust scenarios just generally, so when they dropped one of those just before the home stretch I was like "ugh, no, skip".

Upsides, they seem to have thought about how to get the PCs to follow the story without feeling too railroaded, they try to give you enough about the NPCs that you and your group can understand what they want, and the art is uniformly nice.

They have a lot of sections where you can add flavor of three different types - supernatural, intrigue or progress - which seemed kind of neat. So you could get a scene like (I'm making this up)

• supernatural: a spirit attacks, if you defeat it it vanishes but [a letter] is left behind
• intrigue: the baroness sexily invites you to a game of cards, if you're debonair enough she gives you [a letter]
• progress: you find a mechanical puzzle box; if you manage to open it you find [a letter] inside

People with actual experience, what did you think?

Back with a conclusion to all my ramblings about Sophia's Daughters, and how I'm tweaking the secret society for my game! Putting it all together from Part 1 (which is here) and Part 2 (which is here):

• There was a woman named Sophia
• She was connected to the First Prophet, but otherwise very little is known about her
• The Book of Sophia and its followers were declared heretical by the early Church
• A secret society persists to this day, named after Sophia
• We want this group to have a public agenda of “empowering women”
• Their True Mission feeds into that public agenda
• In Gnosticism, Sophia is a divine feminine energy vital to mankind’s salvation

Witness Sophia is a clear reference to Mary Magdalene, and the Book of Sophia is Theah’s equivalent to the Gospel of Mary, a Gnostic Christian text that was declared apocryphal and left out of the Bible.

So What Is Sophia Daughter's Big Secret?

I think, in a post-"The Da Vinci Code" world, this kinda writes itself: Sophia was one of Theus' Prophets.

There's several ways this could be done. Sophia could have been the real First Prophet, for instance, and the man we know as the First Prophet was one of her followers who died in her stead. Sophia could have been the lover or wife of the First Prophet, and made privy to secrets only he knew - and possibly even mother to his children, as in the Jesus bloodline theory, making the "Sophia's Daughters" title literal. Maybe she just had the most complete understanding of his teachings, and upon his death, she was given a divine revelation to continue his work.

My current favorite idea is that Sophia was the twin sibling of the First Prophet. She was vital to the movement, as they were both blessed by Theus with the same divine revelations, but he was the more gifted orator. Once he died, she carried on his message, sharing the final and complete revelations to their followers in what became known as the Book of Sophia.

Ultimately, their connection could vary from game to game, and maybe the truth is forever lost to time. But the group's Big Secret is that the man who we call the First Prophet was only one part of a pair – his full message could only be revealed by combining his words with hers.

Sadly, the Sophists and their message was intentionally suppressed by the patriarchal early church – refusing to believe that a woman could have had such responsibility, they had the Book of Sophia declared heresy. The full truth of Theus’ words were lost – or would have been, if Sophia’s followers didn’t keep them alive in secret.

Until her testament is shared, mankind will never be free of division, strife, sorcery, the Syrneth and the other myriad threats of Legion.

What Was Sophia's Divine Revelation?

I'm tying this into my ideas for 7th Sea's cosmology, which I talk about here. But my idea is that, beyond just a philosophical/theological message, Sophia was given a profound key from Theus to save all of humanity: she achieved physical and spiritual access to the all-powerful 7th Sea.

My concept for the 7th Sea is one tied to lots of Gnostic and alchemical ideas, but the short version is an extrapolation of what appears in the books. The 7th Sea is the prima materia, the aether of all creation. It is the thing that both alchemists and Vaticines are looking for: a direct connection to the perfect spiritual creator.

This would be the source of SD's Elixir of Life and other potions. Like the Rose & Cross, SD have some secrets to the alchemy of the human soul, but without the words of the true Third Prophet they can never perfect it. It would require both groups to take their secrets public for anyone to crack the true spiritual secrets of divine salvation that Theus has promised to mankind. And at the moment, mankind is just not ready to hear these messages. Both groups are trying to guide humanity towards that day, unbeknownst to one another.

But even with the Book of Sophia to guide them, the 7th Sea is still a font of uncontrollable power. The Daughters only use it sparingly, otherwise they are left vulnerable to madness. And maybe that led to a splinter faction of ruthless, immortal schemers, thinking they have been blessed by Theus when they've actually been corrupted by the false secrets of Legion ...

Sophia’s Daughters True Mission:

Whether or not they began as Sophia’s literal children, Sophia's Daughters have spent centuries acting in secret, subtly influencing the shape of Theah’s history where they can, and biding their time for when the world is ready to listen to the true, complete message of the First Prophet(s). And that can only happen when the world sees women as equal to men.

This goes back to their public agenda: empowering women. “Equality for all” is great, but vague; empowering women, who are still treated as property in much of Theah, is specific and political. And it’s directly actionable in a heroic game of swashbuckling adventure.

Knocking out a chauvinist Musketeer, robbing a sexist duke and giving his money to a convent that educates girls, rescuing a woman from her abusive husband and smuggling her to safety – all of these, individually, make someone’s life better. And big picture, you’re building towards a world in which Sophia’s words will be heard, and taken to heart as truth by the Church.

What Are We Keeping:

In many ways, SD remains largely the same:

• An underground feminist organization devoted to protecting and advancing women.
• Use of soft power, manipulation and sorcery to achieve goals.
• Underground railroad to rescue Fate witches (who in turn give access to their sorcery).
• Access to secret potions, including an Elixir of Life.
• Vast information network and details records from journals, kept in a great hidden library.
• Connection to the Rilasciare through overlapping social goals.
• Connection to water (but swapping out Scrying and Bryn Bresail with the 7th Sea)

What To Cut:

• Direct link to Sidhe. I don't think it adds anything good to either group: it makes SD less independent, reducing their agency, and makes the Sidhe more knowable and benevolent than I feel they should be.

What To Tweak:

• Their intentional engineering and releasing of the White Death plague.
• The Agiotage.

I think giving the White Death an occult origin is an interesting idea, and it does give SD an interesting moral complexity that is comparable to the Bene Gesserit of Dune. But I think if I were to retain it, I would make it the product of the Agiotage, reimagined as a radicalized, villainous splinter group of SD.

With their access to powerful secrets, and the infinite unknowable 7th Sea, the Agiotage may believe themselves above the concerns of mere mortals, and be willing to sacrifice millions over centuries to achieve their goals. They've accessed the 7th Sea recklessly, thinking they've been granted revelations far beyond their timid kin. But they've truly only left themselves vulnerable to the Demiurge-like corruption of Legion. All of their eugenics-like planning is obviously callous and calls for widespread deaths, in a supposed attempt to prepare the future for the Fourth Prophet and salvation of the chosen.

What Did Sophia's Daughters Accomplish Throughout History?

One of the big accomplishments of Sophia's Daughters was, basically, the Renaissance. After the fall of the Eastern Empire, Sophia's Daughters subtly but thoroughly re-introduced a lot of classic literature and writings from the old days of Numa, which had been thought forever lost to western Theah.

In real history terms, this is the massive influx of Latin translations in the 12th century. SD can't just outright release the Book of Sophia, but they could subtly influence this wave of enlightened learning from the past by adding tidbits here and there to new translations, etc. And the growing humanist movement directly serves their cause.

Another major milestone for SD was the trial of Jenny Malone. Thanks to massive efforts on their part, a female sex worker in Avalon was found Not Guilty for killing a nobleman in self-defense - which set a legal precedent across all of Theah. This was an absolutely enormous win, and only came about after massive exertion of influence, in politics and Sorte sorcery and centuries of subtle guidance from the shadows. Women, no matter their job or their class, were no longer seen as disposable.

I think that's it?

That's the gist of my plan to make SD a better fit in my own game. It's been fun to try and hammer out so far, even with it still being a rather vague and open-ended thing - I certainly don't have new game mechanics in mind, for instance. But I'm all ears for thoughts as always!

I was wondering lately if there was a big compendium "Book for the GM" about all the lore and secrets, and what's the big picture behind the veil ?

I know there was some pretty good and half-official GM secret book in the 1st Edition and a pretty good lore behind all that happens on the front scene, but I can't seem to find anything for 2nd Ed. I really love the system and the universe so far, but a lot of changes have been made compared to 1st Ed, on a lot of different matter.

(Stop reading here if you're not GMing, I'm gonna reveal some of the few plot secrets)

The Magics do not come from an ancient pact with the devil of the first ruling families but are cut in multiple categories : the bloodline magic (Porte, Sorte), the "chosen" (Glamor, Dar Matuski, Sanderis) and the dark knowledge (Hexen, Alqemia).

In the Secret Societies, Rose and Cross and DK seems to both have the knowledge that Legion took the place of the real 3rd Prophet, and try to protect the world now about that.

I see Dieva, Matuska (and her Husband) as "cousins" of the Sidhe (like same species), same as Aztlan's gods. Talking about Aztlan, we know that it was the birth place of the Syrneth (or their biggest empire) and that they banned ancient gods with machines, somewhere in the 7th sea.

There are few more little secrets too but I feel like all this is connected to something big that could give ideas to a mega plot but I can't find what it is. So I was wondering if any of you had any ideas or even theories to share that could make for a big story.

After untold months, Backers finally gotten word on the remaining Khitai stretch goals - they have been cancelled and those of us who paid money to get undelivered items will get a refund.

I am happy that Chaosium gave us an answer but admit I am still a bit bitter that the line ended in such a way.