The Capital Parkland - Part 02 - Castledowns: The Realm of Faux Chivalry

 

Once a quiet mid-northwest suburb, Castledowns now encompasses nearly the entire northwest quadrant of the city. Blanketed in rolling green fields, reflective ponds, and oddly well-maintained brushland, the region has evolved—or regressed, depending on who you ask—into a dedicated reenactment kingdom. Locals call it “The Shire That Survived” or more formally, The Castledowns Confederacy.

After the Hodgepocalypse reshaped the world, survivors in this area adopted a lifestyle and aesthetic reminiscent of a perpetual medieval fair. A visiting historian once called it, “an everlasting renaissance fair, a cosplay conference, and a survival commune rolled into one, with surprisingly good plumbing.”

Castle Keepers

 

The denizens of Castledowns proudly refer to themselves as Castle Keepers. Dressed in everything from hand-stitched doublets to salvaged sports padding retrofitted as knightly armor, they live out a daily fantasy of courtly drama, feasting, and gallantry.

Despite the aesthetic, they embrace certain conveniences:

• Refrigerators disguised as ale barrels
• Solar-powered ‘torches’ that flicker with artificial flames
• Electric kettle-cauldrons
• Drone messengers shaped like mechanical ravens

But outsiders beware: all visitors must speak in the olde tongue (a theatrical version of Shakespearean English) or risk being “banished to the Goblin Moors” (which may involve sleeping outside city walls, near the dangerous brushlands).

Culture

Bureaucratic Nobility & Reinterpreted CSA

 

• Castledowns loosely models itself after a bastardized version of the Canadian Service Agency (CSA)—only their version is a chivalric order of civil service.
• Titles include:
• Knight of Infrastructure (handles bridges and sewer maintenance)
• Lady Postmaiden-General (runs the raven-drone mail system)
• High Marshal of Health and Mead (tends both the sick and the drunk)
• “Ministry Scrolls” are ceremonial permits and writs—half-public records, half-mystic contracts.

Ceremony over Sense

 

• Every duel, trade, or trial must be preceded by official ceremony, no matter how urgent the need. Even signing over a goat requires a “heralded exchange.”
• Speech is elevated and archaic, especially in public or formal settings. Slang is frowned upon unless spoken in the “tavern cant.”
• Guilds, knightly orders, and noble houses constantly feud over the smallest perceived insult, escalating minor offenses into bardic-reported sagas.
• Bards and Jesters are government officials and often serve as judges, diplomats, or even assassins (if you're following the "Court of Shadows" tradition).
• The Quest Board at every major gate lists available “epic quests” ranging from repairing old radio towers to tracking down rogue automaton dragons.

Belief in Relics

 

• Items from the pre-Hodgepocalypse are considered relics and can grant status, especially if they’re old tech mistaken as magical.
• A working air fryer might be a “Dragon's Breath Cauldron.”
• A fluoro jacket from the 1980s may be the “Mantle of Sir Visibility.”

The Codified Melee

 

• Jousts are law enforcement. Rather than imprisonment, disagreements or accusations are settled with “trial by lance” (on bikes, horses, or mutant moose).
• Weapons are ceremonial. You may only carry specific arms if you've passed a guild test, tournament, or “been dubbed.” This includes foam swords for novices.
• Winning a duel doesn’t guarantee truth—it just means you're “favored by the code.” Outsiders find this infuriating.

Feast Culture

 

• Disputes end in banquets. Whether a duel, marriage, or peace accord, it’s not final until the feast.
• Exile is not death—it’s dishonor. Being “uninvited to the harvest table” is a common punishment.
• Mead is sacred. It’s brewed by ritual and blessed by the Guild of Brewers and Beekeepers, who maintain secret honey vaults.

Performative Truth

 

• Theater = Reality. A well-performed lie or cleverly disguised truth may be taken as fact if told in rhyme or song.
• Bards are witnesses. Their presence and memory are considered as binding as digital surveillance elsewhere.
• Masks and roles define identity during certain festivals—if you wear a mask, you are whoever the role says you are, no matter who you really are.

·       Trial by Combat (or Dance) is a legitimate form of dispute resolution.

Power and Tech Ritualized

 

• Solar panels are painted like stained glass and treated as holy relics.
• Generators are “dragon hearts” and only tended by those trained in “electrical alchemy.”
• AI or data archives are called “oracles” and must be communed with by sanctioned “cyberclerics” wearing tabards and EEG helmets.

Festivals of Pageantry

 

• The Founding Faire (early spring): Celebrates the myth of Castledowns’ founding with plays, duels, jousts, and the crowning of a new "Seasonal Lord."
• The Candle Quest (deep winter): Entire households go on quests lit only by candles, reenacting survival tales in exchange for blessings and free heating coal.
• Mock Invasions where nearby baronies “invade” each other with foam weapons and sabotage, followed by a peace feast.
• “The Great Pageant” is an annual event where regions of Castledowns compete in storytelling, magic shows, theatrical duels, and culinary wizardry for the favor of “The Crown,” a ceremonial leadership position that rotates yearly.

Outsider Missteps

• Outsiders often get into trouble by:
• Refusing to bow before local officials
• Mocking the pageantry
• Breaking the “Law of the Feast” by eating before a toast
• Speaking plainly when they were supposed to rhyme
• Drawing a weapon outside the arena or ritual zone

Notable Factions of Castledowns

The Boar’s Brotherhood

Community: Canossa

Role: Peasant Militias, Beast Tamers, Reluctant Heroes
Overview: A loosely organized alliance of halflings, deerfolk, and humans who defend the outer districts. Known for riding mutated boars and armadillo-dogs, they scoff at nobles but protect the realm.
Motto: “No one roots deeper.”

The Court of Broken Oaths

Community: Griesbach

Role: Judges, Duel-Mediators, Exiled Nobles
Overview: This arena now acts as a court for settling grievances. A failed noble or knight may plead their case here, but if they lose in combat or song, they are exiled or worse. Justice is delivered by blade, riddle, or vote of the crowd.
Motto: “The code lives longer than the crowned.”

The Greasehold

 

Aka The House of Zahr al-Nar (Flower of Fire)

Community: Baturyn

Role: Culinary Cult, Political Neutral Zone, Saucebound Knighthood 

Overview: The Greasehold of Castledowns is a neutral culinary stronghold where feasts settle disputes, sauces seal pacts, and flaming grills burn brighter than banners. Perched at a key crossroads between rival baronies, it serves as sacred ground for warriors, wanderers, and would-be diplomats, all bound by the unspoken laws of the spatula. Governed by the flame-crowned Greaselord and defended by Feast Knights clad in fryer-basket mail, the Hold blends ritual, hospitality, and fierce frying traditions into a culture where loyalty is measured in scorched steel and sacred condiments.  They are the most expansionist of the factions as they have “Franchise holds” across Strathcan and the remains of Canada.
Motto: “What we burn, we bless.

The Guild of the Copper Cross

Community:  Chambery

Role: Tinkerers, Black Market Brokers, Smugglers
Overview: Originally a transportation hub, it is now a forge-trading hall where scrap, weapons, relics, and secrets are exchanged under watchful “gearwardens.” Their politics are flexible, their loyalties bought, and their wares dangerous.
Motto: “Trade binds stronger than chains.”

The Knights of Dunluce Rampart

 

Community: Dunluce

Theme: Stoic Highlanders

Role: Traditionalist Nobles, Border Watch, Duelists
Overview: Considered the oldest and most rigid of baronial factions. They serve as militant peacekeepers, maintaining the façade of medieval law. Their honor duels are frequent, bloody, and filmed on ancient VHS cameras for posterity.
Motto: “Steel does not bend. Nor shall we.”

The Meadhall of Hearthwood

Community: Caernarvon

Role: Brewers, Farmers, Scribes of Law and Lineage
Overview: This faction believes civilization begins with mead, food, and kinship. They keep detailed “lineage scrolls” and provide food for the realm in exchange for social power. They operate marriage courts and harvest rites.
Motto: “From root to goblet, we endure.”

The Order of the Rusted Tower

Community: Lorelei

Role: Knightly Order, Fitness Monks, Youth Trainers
Overview: This old “training hall” has become a fortress-monastery where squires are trained in the Art of the Body. Its inhabitants wear repurposed gym pads and wield dumbbells like warhammers. They believe physical perfection is a divine pursuit.
Rival of: The Scholarchs of Elsinore
Motto: “Steel the body, forge the will.”

The Scholarchs of Elsinore

 

Community: Elsinore

Role: Scribes, Lorekeepers, Magewrights
Overview: Believing they guard the secrets of the "Old World’s Knowledge Scrolls" (i.e., textbooks and electronics), they hoard USB drives and smartboards as relics. They enforce literacy like law and use scrolls both for study and binding pacts.
Motto: “By pen or fire, truth shall reign.”

The Painted Court

 

Community: Beaumaris

Role: Masquerade Nobles, Jesters, Assassins
Overview: A hedonistic and mysterious court where identity is fluid and reality is optional. Their masked nobility change names with the seasons, and it is said they rule only through rumor. Beaumaris Lake is surrounded by staged pavilions and whispering willows.
Known for: Controlling secrets, bard assassins, surreal justice.
Motto: “Truth lies beneath the mask.”

The Serpent Banner

 

Community: Rapperswill

Role: Cultists, Medusa Nobles
Overview: A mysterious faction believed to commune with bio-mutants and underground spirits. Their banner is the image of a coiled, smoke-breathing serpent. Their festival dances are mesmerizing and often induce hallucinations.
Motto: “The world sheds skin. So too must we.”

Key NPCS:

Baron Haldric Dunluce the Fourth

 

Faction: Knights of Dunluce Rampart
Wearing a rusted crown and bloodstained VHS armor, Haldric claims lineage to a long-forgotten local councillor. He commands duels with poetic flair and believes dreams foretell honor debts.
Plot Hook: One of his dreams predicts a bloodline usurper among his squires—he’ll need the party to investigate secretly, or to take part in the Trial of the Mirror Shield.

Baron Zahran the Sizzled, His Radiant Greasiness

 

Born of flame and franchise, Baron Zahran the Sizzled is the enigmatic founder of the Greasehold and high protector of the Sacred Sauce. Once a humble fry-cook descended from a chain of rogue burger barons who defied fast-food empires after the fall, Zahran united scattered fry pits under one greasy banner through a mix of culinary duels, backroom deals, and outlaw diplomacy. Rumored to possess the Original Menu—an artifact said to contain divine burger ratios—he commands with the flair of a showman and the cunning of a spice warlord. Though beloved by many for preserving food culture in a world of ash, whispers persist that Zahran maintains control through secret sauce-based oaths and fryer-fueled intimidation.

Plot Hook: A rival claims Zahran stole the true Original Menu during the Fry Wars and intends to challenge him in a public Trial by Burger. Zahran hires the party to uncover this rival’s secret ingredients—before they reach the grill.

Gran Tulla of the Rooted Boar

 

Faction: Boar’s Brotherhood
A stump-backed halfling matriarch with tusk piercings and a riding stick made from a hockey stick shaft. She commands respect from her burly clan and once rode a rabid moose into battle.
Plot Hook: Her youngest grandson vanished near the wild fields chasing a “glowing squirrel spirit.” She suspects the Painted Court or worse—the “Wicker Folk of the Brush.”

Lady Faerynne of Thirteen Masks

 

Faction: The Painted Court
No one knows her true face. Each day she dons a new mask and name, playing roles from innocent maiden to wrathful queen. It’s whispered that behind the act is a Feylin who made a pact to live every possible life.
Plot Hook: She’s being blackmailed with a “true name” discovered in an old playbill. She’ll hire adventurers to recover or destroy it—before the Serpent cult uses it in a performance summoning ritual.

Magister Gorram Bellringer

 

Faction: The Court of Broken Oaths
Once a disgraced squire, now the high arbitrator of oath disputes. Gorram carries the shattered sword of his dishonored house and judges all with unshakable neutrality. His trials are theater—his rulings, legend.
Plot Hook: A trial involving two rival barons is scheduled, but someone has stolen the ceremonial “Gavelblade.” Without it, no prosecution may proceed—and war may break out instead.

Master Clatch “The Coin-Splitter”

Faction: Guild of the Copper Cross
A smirking gnome with cybernetic fingers and a patchy cloak, Clatch brokers deals from a mobile scrap-forge. He can make anything—if you pay enough or sell him something “unique.”
Plot Hook: He’s looking for an intact “credit card reader” from a pre-Fall gas station, rumored to open a vault of digital relics. Problem is, the place is crawling with feral Transband raiders.

Meister Joff “Foamspeaker”

 

Faction: The Meadhall of Hearthwood
A mead alchemist with a barrel strapped to his back, Joff brews memory-infused beverages. He keeps the Book of Bloodlines under his stool and offers sage wisdom between hiccups.
Plot Hook: A corrupted batch of mead is causing hallucinations and riots. Joff swears someone poisoned it using a rival druid's ghost, and needs the party to track it through the dream-brew network.

Mistress Velloria of the Burning Quill

Faction: The Scholarchs of Elsinore
Clad in a circuit-woven robe and powered monocle, Mistress Velloria keeps a “Library Cathedral” built from fused Kindles, schoolbooks, and VHS tapes. She insists all visitors take a vocabulary exam before speaking to her directly.
Plot Hook: She needs someone to investigate the disappearance of a rogue Scholarch who broke into a bunker labeled “EDM Public Wi-Fi Mainframe.” The last message he sent was, “The Oracle speaks in memes.”

Sir Kettleborn "The Flexing Flame"

 

Faction: The Order of the Rusted Tower
Once a humble personal trainer, Sir Kettleborn rose through the ranks by body-slamming a mutant bear in front of a crowd during a festival. Now he trains squires in both bench-press and battlefield etiquette, preaching the sacred trinity of discipline, protein, and posture.
Plot Hook: He believes a rival gym-fortress in West Edmonton Mall houses a forbidden relic: the Sacred Stairmaster. He’ll sponsor adventurers to retrieve it—through highly publicized trials, of course.

Syrella Joansdottir, the Coiled Seer

 

Faction: The Serpent Banner
Once known as Sarah Jones in the past, Syrella Joansdottir has now embraced the curse of the Gorgon and walks the wyrm-path as a prophetic Medusa. Her hair of living serpents whispers secrets from a thousand timelines, and her suburban cadence—warped through ancient tongues—gives her riddles a strangely homespun charm. Syrella rides a sleigh drawn by a massive, frost-scaled serpent named Mortgagebane, and her scaled tattoos ripple with forgotten memories of lives she swears she hasn’t lived yet… or hasn’t lived again.
Plot Hook: A serpent-shaped constellation has appeared in the heavens. Syrella believes it's a dire omen from her future incarnation—a warning that she will return as a world-ending prophetess. She begs the party to help her prevent her reincarnation before it’s too late.

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