Today we’d like to introduce one of our upcoming additions to Vagrus, the Ruinous Supporter Pack DLC, a small cosmetic package that gives you Companion skins for supporting Lost Pilgrims. Our art team has been hard at work on it for some time now, and we’re excited to share the cosmetics in more detail soon. You can find its store page here, where all the cosmetics in the pack will appear soon, and you can wishlist the pack for the time being.

The Noxious Lakes are sizable bodies of green, phosphorescent fluid near Kadaath that emit poisonous gasses. When one allows their gaze to scan the landscape, large objects are visible farther away, jutting out of the surface of the lakes. What could they be? Piles of scrap metal? Remnants of ancient buildings? Perhaps a wreckage of sorts? And more importantly; what treasures could they hold? Is it worth risking one's hide to find out? Definitely hard to tell at first glance. Either way, venturing into the suffocating fumes and acidic ponds without adequate means to survive would be ill-advised and foolhardy at the very least, suicidal even.

As you may know, terra supra, the northern part of Xeryn, is dotted with perilous and deadly places most people tend to avoid. Now, we are going to take a look at these, focusing on the ruined cities of yore. Embark with us upon a dread journey into the most dangerous ruins in the Riven Realms. Be warned, though, they are not for the faint of heart!

With the Finndurarth miniatures tucked away in Collectors’ and Emperor’s Editions on their way to their new owners as I’m writing these lines, I thought it would be prudent of us to write a bit of a painting guide. Well, two painting guides, to be exact. The first one uses some relatively advanced techniques while the latter goes for a sharper, more “box-art” style. The guides were written with the assumption that they will be used by hobbyists, so the techniques are listed along with the paints we used but not explained in detail. Luckily, the internet is chock-full of all sorts of guides; you can even learn about beginner techniques fairly easily should you wish to paint your mini without previous experience.

Commerce in the Riven Realms is held by the iron grip of Trading Houses through official monopolies or the control of locations that produce valuable goods. A simple merchant who deals in smaller quantities of wares can not begin to imagine what profit these factions work with, especially compared to what the actual manufacturing or harvesting costs. Yet there are considerable expenses involved in these operations, too. If the hardships of travel over the accursed wastelands were not enough by themselves, factions regularly wage bloody wars for resources, mostly in the shadows but often openly as well out on the frontier - and these are astonishingly expensive.

Should the darkness cruelly whisper,

Call upon a kindly sister

Sister, sister, blood drops glister

Revoke now your cruel dark whisper

- From an Imperial children's rhyme

Kindly Sisters are members of the Nosferatis Sisterhood, a coven of mystics and sorceresses who delve into the deepest, darkest arcane secrets one can think of. The organization is one of the Pillars of the Empire, a religious order that serves the realms in an important capacity, although in the case of the Nosferatis, most Imperials have no idea what this service entails - except that it is most ominous. The wise seem to believe that it involves espionage, magical warfare, and arcane research. Members of the coven worship Bal-Ur-Kaal the Demon Prince and Ahskul, King of the Underworld, which is quite telling in and of itself.

'Colorless fellows, these Ashmen. But what else would they be, livin' out on that damned, grey wasteland. Naught but ash, silt, and starvation. No wonder they keep comin' south, keep pushin' into our realm. It spells trouble for all of us, I'm tellin' ya.'

- Bultok, mushroom farmer, deep in his cups

'There is no 'Ashman-problem' as far as Imperial authorities are concerned.'

As the new Trading system was shaping up for Milestone 5 alongside the emergence in our storylines of some of the less lawful factions (such as the Loader's Guild), we figured we would need a sub-system for smuggling goods as it makes sense that these organizations would be willing to hire a vagrus to do just that.

Once beautiful Madrigos, a city famous for its wealth and hospitality, is now a forsaken ruin called Scorponar, dwelling of the Scortaur, a race of savage scorpion-men who hunt all other races mercilessly and uncompromisingly on and around the Plains of Bone. Only a handful of fortunate wanderers can tell the tale of seeing the city's shattered buildings and old walls at the heart of the wasteland. Those who did see it talk about bone scaffolding and fortifications, flayed bodies hanging from battlements, and banners fashioned from human skin. Scorponar is a place of horror and despair, with the old white stone of Madrigos peeking out from under the colorless sands like broken teeth or shattered bones.