This chapter describes some of the important organizations found on Oerth. It is principally focused on the main campaign region, the Kelltic nations, but, as it expands, it will cover other, distant organizations as well.
There is one significant divergence between Oerth's cultures and our own medieval period: there are two types of knighthood on Oerth.
One is a "royal" knighthood, which is a grant of nobility, not always hereditary, that entitles an individual to be called "Lord" or "Lady". This type of knighthood is equivalent to making an individual a lord in terms of precedence amongst the nobles. Such grants are done for service to a king, or to the kingdom, and includes membership within a royal order, such as the Royal Order of Cartographers.
The second type of knighthood is a military knighthood, which entails years of training and dedication to learning the military arts. Membership in a Military Order is not granted by royal decree, but is instead earned based on the criteria established by the order's charter. A military knight earns the honorific "Sir" or "Dame", although higher ranks in the order may use other names. A military knight is not necessarily a noble knight, and there is nothing that prevents membership in both types of orders.
Those individuals who are both a noble and a knight (military) may use both honorifics - such as Lord Sir Kasey Bittrand of Sulster. In these cases, the ordering of the honorifics is the choice of the individual, but convention holds that the honorific closest to the name is the most important of them. For Kasey, his status as a Church Knight is more important to him than his status as a Lord.
Military Orders
The military orders here are the major military orders of knights that are not under royal control. These orders are independent of royal control. Some kingdoms have found such military forces within their kingdom unnerving, but neither order has interfered in the politics of their hosting nations except in cases of extreme duress.
- {ln:cunnicks-regiment 'Cunnick's Regiment}
- {ln:Knights of Kells}
- {ln:Knights of the Sun}
Secret Organizations
Secret Organizations are so named not only because few know of their existence, but because few people know much about the organization, as well. In some cases - such as the Sword of the Church - the organizations existence is denied, but a number of individuals outside the group have deduced that it exists. In other cases, such as the Thieves' Guild, many people know about it, but few know how to contact the organization or interact with it.
- {ln:Circle of Mages}
- {ln:Dark Prophecy Warriors}
- {ln:Sword of the Church}
- {ln:Thieves Guild 'Thieves' Guild}