The Tindalean Lords
A race of long-lived humanoids who have mastered travel through time and dimensions, with the use of advanced technologies.
The Lords
An aristocracy of reality-shapers who rule over the bridges between universes. They are both timeless and fractured, their existence bound to the shifting currents of the multiverse. They hold dominion over the paths that should not be walked, and they command the Hounds of Tindalos, semi-human hunters who track those who defy the boundaries of existence.
History
The origins of the Tindalean Lords are obscure and disputed, even among themselves. Some claim they are the first travelers, beings who discovered the lattice of paths connecting universes and claimed dominion over them. Others whisper that they are descendants of the Architects, inheritors of a forgotten law of reality. There are those who believe that they are prisoners, trapped in their role, bound to the great cosmic currents they seek to control.
Regardless of their true origin, they have always been—or so they insist. Their histories are rewritten as needed, and the past is a flexible thing for those who navigate the edges of causality. If they did not exist before, they do now, and to them, that is enough.
The Lords once ruled with absolute power, their dominion unchallenged. They established the Great Concord, a set of laws governing interdimensional travel, forbidding reckless incursions into fragile realities. But something has changed. A rot has set in. Fractures run through their citadels, and there are whispers of an unseen adversary eroding their control. The Lords speak of an impending Chrono-Lapsarian Epoch, a time of unraveling. They do not fear Finality—but they fear losing their place within it.
Goals and Philosophy
The Tindalean Lords see themselves as the keepers of order across the multiverse—but their interpretations of “order” vary:
- Some are rigid, lawful stewards – They maintain the balance between universes, ensuring that entropy does not claim the paths between worlds.
- Some are manipulators of fate – They believe that power belongs to those who seize it, and they shape the course of history in whatever reality they choose.
- Some have abandoned the cause – Dissolute Lords who indulge in decadence, cruelty, or apathy, residing in shattered palaces outside time.
- Some see the End coming – They fear Finality, and they seek a way to survive beyond the death of all realities. To be a Tindalean Lord is to exist in a paradox: they claim dominion over the paths between worlds, yet they are bound by them, unable to truly escape the currents they command. Their rule is absolute—until it isn’t.
They use the Hounds to trace Refugees and discover Echoes, which they consume. They seek out any Carcosan infestations and work with others to contain them.
Aesthetics
The Tindalean Lords are noble, powerful, and fractured, existing somewhere between regal splendor and temporal decay. Their aesthetic reflects both the grandeur of an empire and the entropy gnawing at its edges.
- Most often robed, they tend to wear clothes shaped from the eras of other realities.
- Their faces are often obscured, wearing masks with shifting features.
- Beneath their robes, they commonly wear ornate fractal armour.
Architecture
They dwell in impossible citadels, great palaces set on the thresholds between worlds, usually with gates to multiple realities within. This makes them labrinthine fortresses, moving constantly through the flows of reality and exerting influence where they join another reality.
Symbolism and Heraldry
The most common symbology is that of the Spiral.
The Hounds
Hounds are the hunter servitors of the Tindalean Lords. These semi-human entities are their enforcers, their assassins, their iron gauntlet and their velvet glove.
The Hounds of Tindalos are the hunters who track the scent of the impossible, the enforcers of the Tindalean Lords, and the nightmares of those who have fled where they should not go. They exist on the edges of angles, waiting for the scent of a Reversion scar, for the unnatural bends in reality where prey has passed. They are not fully human—perhaps they never were. They are born from the Hunt, shaped by the forces that govern the realities they inhabit, and once unleashed, they do not stop.
Physical Form
Their bodies shift—sometimes human, sometimes lupine, sometimes something in between. Their bodies are long and slender, and they do not move as things should move. They are commonly surrounded by a blusih glow, as a result of constant friction with reality, unleashing Cherenkov radiation.
Senses and Abilities
- They smell Reversion scars, the wounds left in reality when someone flees across universes.
- They can track across time as well as space—a Hound does not need to follow a trail in a straight line.
- Angles betray secrets to them. A perfect corner, a sharp turn—they can pass through these places, slipping from one reality to another.
- They do not need sleep or rest. The Hunt sustains them.
- They can speak, but their voices are wrong—echoing, distorted, layered with things that should not be heard. They cannot pass for human.
Vulnerability
If a hound does not hunt, it begins to lose definition. Even Hounds which have been released by their masters (for good service or bad) still feel the need to hunt. Their mental faculties fail first, reducing them to mere beasts.
Playing a Hound
Players in MALPERDYS may take on the role of a Hound, particularly under the Hunter archetype.
- You are not fully human anymore. You were something else once—perhaps a traveler, a seeker, or a servant of the Lords. But the Hunt changed you.
- You are bound to the scent of the impossible. You can feel the scars left by Reversion, the places where reality has been torn.
- You are a relentless pursuer. But what happens when you begin to wonder why you chase? When you begin to question what you will become?
- You do not escape the Hunt. Even if you refuse to chase, something will chase you.