This thread is going to be about Kara-Tur - The Island Kingdoms: Bawa. From this moment to its release, I will be tweeting things related to the project. I am excited, hopeful, and scared about this project, but I'm sure we will succeed.

#dnd #ttrpg #RPGSEA #KaraTurBawa

Let's start with that logo.

The word "bawa" is modelled from Kawi script, which was used prominently in Maritime Southeast Asia from 8th to 16th century. It descended from Pallava script of India.

And yes, the focus of this project is to develop one of the least known Kara-Tur regions, which is the Island Kingdoms, specifically the island of Bawa.

We are taking inspiration from pre-colonial Indonesia, and will try to stick purely to that influence (instead of others).

We will be expanding Bawa and turn it into an archipelago, just like Indonesia.

We will "retcon" some stuff to make it work, to explain the changes that happen to the topography and geography.

But how we're going to do that? Secret.

Understandably, pre-colonial Indonesia's culture and religion is heavily influenced by four things:
1. Hinduism
2. Buddhism
3. Islam
4. Chinese culture

But for Bawa, we will be putting emphasis on influences from local religion.

#KaraTurBawa

For religion, we will focus on two things. Hyang and Animism. The Hyang will be the main supernatural power or being worshipped by the people of Bawa. But Hyang does not directly influence their lives. Instead the spirits are the ones who do. That's why Animism will be prevalent.

Yes, there are things that have been established for Bawa in Kara-Tur: The Eastern Realm boxed set. We are taking the liberty to change things. There are problematic things, there are things that can be reworked, and there will be new things that we shall add.

The good thing is, the lore can still be expanded further without clashing with Kara-Tur/Forgotten Realms. For things that are too problematic and stereotypical, we are going to throw it away. There will be retcons for them of course.

#KaraTurBawa

But you might be asking, how are we going to expand the region when it's already established there's only one SMALL main island, with a few smaller islands. Well, it's easy.

Columbus thought he landed in India. The people of FR/Kara-Tur thought Bawa is only that one island.