Malleus Maleficarum

Malleus Maleficarum (The Hammer of The Witches) is a Dark Fantasy JRPG with elements of Lovecraftian Horror and Low Fantasy. Set in 1589 DR in the fictional Sanguine Peninsula, Malleus Maleficarum concerns itself primarily with witch hunters, and the witches that they hunt. Its historical-religious basis is in the Spanish Inquisition, and its historical-geo-political basis is the medieval Balkans. 

I anticipate that I am going to need a lot of playtesters for this one.

DISCLAMMER: Malleus Maleficarum deals with religious themes, 

as well as non-explicit sex & graphic pixellated violence.

In the past, I have spent hours and hours and hours and hours on game threads for forums like this one, only to see all that work vanish instantly with a single mouse click. As unlikely as that is, I'd really like to avoid it ever happening again. For that reason I intend to keep the initial submission of this thread to the moderation queue relatively bare bones/just the basics, and add additional information about the game later on.

Camila (Mila to close friends and family) is a poor peasant girl from the poor peasant village of Vaasa on the central-eastern Sanguine Peninsula, just on the northern border of Szargovia. She is entirely unprepared for the enormous power that is about to find her and invest itself in her, let alone the responsibilities and enemies that power comes with. Chax--the mysterious embodiment of that power--likes her to think she is the chosen one. But the truth might owe more to pragmatism.

Sir Beatrix Bernadotte hates every confounded, convoluted reason that her title is "Sir" but at least she's doing the work she was born for, destroying evil in the name of the Lord.

Women are not allowed to join the Szargovian army, of course. But the sacred texts of Holy Mother Church allow for any lay servant of the Church to join the Inquisition, and to even bear arms and armor as an Inquisitor if they can pass the requisite tests. Her father, Duke Bernadotte, "humored" his daughter by pulling the right strings so that she could take the tests--and then pulled other right strings to ensure she would fail it, so he could say he had given her a fair chance with her wild ideas before she settled down and started being a proper noblewoman.

In spite of her father's meddling, Beatrix passed her text with flying colors. Duke Bernadotte took the necessary political steps so that Beatrix could retain her noble rank and title of Marquessa--some less well-connected Inquisitors must forego theirs. However, there are no Marquis in the Inquisition, so her title there is "Sir", the highest title that the inquisition's men-at-arms are allowed: not that she's actually a MAN at but a woman-at-arms. 

There is one other woman in the Inquisition, Sir Cailín Salem, and she is, in Beatrix's considered opinion, dangerously insane.

Beatrix has a higher opinion of the Inquisitors she actually works with. Father Rickard Hardin is a venerable, fearless, and experienced Inquisitor who has never asked Beatrix for anything but competence, and has come to feel protective of her. Frater Wendel is probably a genius, although Beatrix would never admit it to his smug face; as a Plague Doktor, his knowledge of medicine, alchemy, herbs, and ailments of the body is far beyond anything Beatrix has ever seen before, although the strength of his faith is sometimes a cause for concern.