Fantasy Arms Race, Round Two

[s/LaSH]

Earthquake will affect a 70 foot radius from a maximum-level caster. You need 72 castings to affect 1 mile of coast, and Ausel is 100 miles long.

It's just not practical at this stage, I'm sorry. (And isn't it 8th level, outside the parameters of Round 4?)

Be that as it may, the idea of mass-scale magic through combos is attractive.

So, what's the ultimate solution to this round? Looks to me like the formian armies are probably winning on the ground, but elitist conflict removes the leaders from virtually all sides... and the formians are the most affected by loss of leadership.

What thinks everyone else?

(I looked for the thread a few days ago, but I couldn't find it. (?) Thanks, Strangemonkey.)

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

That sounds about right to me.

I figure we'll go all Orson Scott Card on this and say the elite conflicts in Ausel, fueled by divine inspiration/intervention, eliminate the elder queen, but that the younger queen, with less than fully developed abilities remains alive and infused with the dispersed essence of the final battle between the elder queen, the avatars, and the dragon elders. Resulting in a much less aggressive entity. Though still with a lot of growing up to do.

Let's also say that the hideous encounters that end it all also create true dragon hatchlings who are taken off by the monks to be raised into beings of various sorts. And that the conflict has changed the nature of the gods.

In particular, the voices of the gods are silenced and Stempa, the Ta'jinn, and Cressia no longer have recourse to the level of divine quidance they had previously enjoyed.

Everything descends into an era much like the dark age of ancient Greece and we head off into the next round.

Or at least that's the general drift, anyone has any cooler ideas about how it all ends let me know.

But I think we can safely say that the Formians who are left are going to develop their own weird culture and a new specific role in the societies.

 

[s/LaSH]

OK, so we've got a massive battle in Ausel. Divine wrath and interplanar empires clash.

Yet this doesn't matter to the formian empire. They've lost a queen. Big deal, they've got thousands on each of their worlds. (I'm guessing queens aren't unique here - if they are, no formian empire could ever grow that huge.) However, they did come to an interesting conclusion when the young queen reported back after it was all over.

These 'humans' are interesting creatures - they seem chaotic, and they have no central mind like the formians. Yet when attacked, they adapted and banded together, forming surprising strength.

Sure, the formians could planeshift in ten thousand fortresses and forcibly assimilate everything in sight. But do they want to? The humans are no threat to their mighty empire. In fact, the formian philosophy is such that they see two outcomes:

First, these bipeds could squabble amongst themselves endlessly for the next ten thousand years, in which case they're obviously chaotic and in need of enlightenment. (Ten thousand years is long enough for the formians to wait, I'm sure. They've probably done this before.)

Or, they might evolve a society again, one which co-operates and has infrastructure. This is obviously Law coming to the surface, and this is good. If humanity evolves a coherent civilisation in ten thousand years, the formians will be pleased and treat them as equals.

In the meantime, the formians will maintain a nominal presence on Ausel and send wandering anthropologists to the far corners of the globe to check out on the state of civilisation. Most rural communities, therefore, can expect to see a formian expedition once every decade; major urban centers every day. These anthropologists are generally not to interfere with intraplanar affairs; a war between kingdoms is out of bounds, but if slaadi invade the formians will co-operate with humans to stop them, and if bandits waylay the formians they will be allowed to fight back.

Meanwhile, monks in distant realms begin to raise dragon whelps... a hobgoblin warlord tries to hold Stempa together... and the rest of the Heaven Region is pretty much leaderless.

Oh, and the collapse of the Auselen armies inadvertently released huge numbers of horrible monsters into the world, Things Man Was Not Meant To Pet and all that. I figure they'll spread across the world given five hundred years and no major water barriers. (Aquatic and aerial monsters the exception.)

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

Hmmm, I think that is a pretty good scenario for the Formian Empire as a whole. I would, however, like to posit the following permutations:

1.) The dieties are fairly rightly pissed about the massive incursion. Working with the divine powers of the Khanate they create fairly effective barriers against massive interplanar incursions. The Khanate's participation in this effort makes their society pretty quiscient. They become seemingly introverted as regards the rest of the world, halting all expansion, withdrawing from all international commitments not involving the destruction of extra nasty planar creatures, and becoming decidedly lawful good in outlook and organization. They become the inheritors of the paladin and wizard traditions of the Confederation.

2.) Almost entirely isolated from the larger Formian mind, the Formians on the world begin to develop a radically different Formian culture particularly as the new queen matures without the instruction of another queen or very many myrmachs. The Formian community is still very tight, but they proove unable to produce very many dominators and develop a much more cooperative approach with other groups.

The Empire allows both of these events to occur considering that the Formian will not unduly influence the development of the world and is not a significant part of the collective at any rate. They are also interested to see what will occur with the hybrid queen.

The Cressian, Stempan, and empty quarter cultures enter chaotic periods aggravated by the appearance of Ausel refugees/raiders fleeing their homeland and the monsters who pursue them.

The Chaos actually causes all of these cultures to expand rapidly in this period as they attemp to outrun and outgrow their troubles during a period untroubled by any sort of centralization.

 

[ajanders]

After the comet passes between the earth and the moon

I can certainly see a massive devastation of Ausel, with minimal survivors, but I find it hard to believe the destruction of civilization worldwide is the result of even the most vicious of wars at this point.
Economically, if I understand things correctly, our societies have just barely begun to specialize. Just about everybody still has a kitchen garden, hunts, or does animal husbandry to provide some basic food and clothing.
Even if the capital cities were utterly destroyed, there's still probably a network of villiages that are pretty much unaffected and can maintain the same standard of living they had before.
The Stempans may be in trouble because of their concentrated urban populations, but the nomadic Ta'jinn simply move someplace a little less charred and smouldering and the Cresians simply let nature grow back...to druids, this is just one of the less pleasant parts of the circle of life/wheel of time, but nature will grow back, just like it always does. So will the Cresians.

The Ausel, of course, are in trouble. We are likely to see their monsters get loose and make all kinds of trouble, but unless they can fly or swim, they won't get far. Auselen is an island: by definition it's got significant water barriers around it.
Any Ausel can can leave are likely to do so immediately, before the owlbears and wolf-headed hydra come by to discuss their displeasure at their new lifestyle.
These individuals might become blue-water boat people, but are more likely to try and manage landfall and try to blend into the local populace. The only ones with any hope of making it are going to be the ones who get to Stempa.
Auselen becomes known as an even more cursed and unpleasant place than it was, unless the Formians can settle it, which would be difficult: if they do, it's likely they will have a fulltime job just controlling the escaped Auselen monsters, never mind expanding law and order.

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

Less specialized civilizations actually have a higher possibility of collapse since the dependence on the specialized components that remain is greater.

This collapse would be very different from the social collapses we're used to seeing in our era. Very low likelihood of mass starvations and the total destruction of functional local infrastructure. More like the collapses you see at the end of the Mycenean era in Greece or the collapse of the Roman Empire.

There's still a lot going on, but the centralization that characterized the prior era is compromised as our most of the institutions that provided the hard core education.

Interesting point about druids. I would think that the death of the high level mentors and the relative silence from the gods would put them in a nasty spot in terms of maintaining the highly ecologically structure civilization that was Cressia at its height. On the other hand I imagine that even a few high level druids are much more capable of sustaining an area's civilization than the equivalent number of wizards or clerics due to their increased mobility through wilderness. So I don't know. I would guess that Cressia would certainly loose much of its ability to govern its people, and that the culture would become broader and shallower as a result.

I think the Formain/Ausel invasion, the destruction of much of the government, civil strife, and the high number of mauraders/refugees caused by the fall of Ausel would certainly represent a civilazation shifting event for near everyone involved.

I don't see the Ta'jinn as becoming collapsed simply quiet as they turn their attentions to the new goal of defending the near planar territories from incursion. Probably also a little Xenophobic what with the marauders/refugees listed above.

 

[Tonguez]

Interesting point about druids. I would think that the death of the high level mentors and the relative silence from the gods would put them in a nasty spot in terms of maintaining the highly ecologically structure civilization that was Cressia at its height. On the other hand I imagine that even a few high level druids are much more capable of sustaining an area's civilization than the equivalent number of wizards or clerics due to their increased mobility through wilderness. So I don't know. I would guess that Cressia would certainly loose much of its ability to govern its people, and that the culture would become broader and shallower as a result.

Great conclusion to the Formian Invasion people - pity I missed it!!!

I think that the Dr. is correct that a cultural collapse is likely even if the Druids are able to maintain the Cressian 'technology' (and what affect does all that magic radiation have on the enviroment?). The Formian conflict saw huge amounst of devastation and the death and destruction of entire communities. The Gods have fallen silent and thus the common folk reeling from that destruction no longer have faith in their leadership. They thus become more isolationsist and turn to a more tribal culture made up of small village-based groups perhpas lead by a Druid or Deltane even.

The Tajinn Centaurs retreat and find new grazing lands leaving the Jinn humans ungoverned. The Stempan cities either fall or become isolated citadels against the chaos of the World

Any assertion of Centralised rule is rejected by the despondent villagers and leads to the rise of warlords who taking advantage of chaos begin terrorising the countryside (desperate times breed desperate people). This tyranny simply reinforces the rejection of centralised authority and escalates the decline of the Empire.

The Island of Ausel now an Ecological mess is declared cursed and the home of monsters. The Seas and Air are terrorised and a few other terrestial monsters manage to swim or hitch rides on floating debris. Yet others were already on the mainland having been introduced as war machines (and now breed true)

I like the scenario re the development of Formian anthropologist - lol- and Formian PCs (all Warriors of course)

- so next step?

 

[s/LaSH]

Well, why don't we jump forward a bit and throw in the previously-mentioned idea of undead legions?

Say a thousand years has passed, and our scope has greatly expanded again - let's look at a continental area five thousand miles wide. Or rather, an inland sea maybe 5000 miles by 1000 miles surrounded by fertile lands similar to Cresia. Another two thousand miles inland from each coast and civilisation is pretty much lost in wilderness (desert, ice, mountains, I dunno).

Basically the Mediterranean.

If we put Cresia in the middle of the north face of the sea, Ta'jinn extends off to the East. Ausel is somewhere in the north-middle of the sea.

I suggest that the North coast is largely similar to Cresia, with some regions forested, some fertile plains, some hilly, all fading into the northern mountains.

Then the South coast is more fertile, fading into southern desert.

It would be from the South that a new civilisation arises, one with a vaguely Egyptian theme, but modified somewhat by the Auselen Diaspora of a thousand years before. Because what fun is an Egyptian civilisation without (a) blue dragons in positions of power and (b) legions of skeletal warriors? Both things the Auselen Diaspora would have brought to the world, by the by.

Ausel itself is ruled by dragons and formians; it's largely off limits.

Cresia, Stempa and Ta'jinn are still somewhat barbarous. They're culturally assimilated now, although the hobgoblins still keep to the northern hills and the centaurs to the eastern steppes. Somewhat. The whole region is still lacking in infrastructure; rulers include warlords, druidic cults, and clerical cults of over two dozen deities (the Stempan, the Cresian, and the Ta'jinn, as well as various arrangements of pantheons depending on region). There are too many to itemise, at any rate, and the Cresian culture has spread in this form to neighbouring regions despite this apparent lack of infrastructure.

Somewhere to the northwest, a number of tribes of forest-dwellers (guess who?) tell tales of wanderers from distant lands who came bearing eggs a thousand years ago. Some tribes welcomed them, some didn't; those that were trusting found themselves dealing with rapidly maturing dragon whelps within a generation. This region is fragmented too; some groups of elves are independant, while others are dragon-dominated, the dragons and their monks recognising the elven talent for magic and fostering it as a new race of servitors.

Monsters are most common in Cresia, but by now they've spread to every corner of the world. Other magi have committed their own experiments, and the occasional extraplanar explorers have dropped by from time to time. Nothing major, but I think we can assume that just about anything from the core rules is running around ruining someone's life.

And does anyone else thing Egyptian dwarves sound cool?

 

[Tonguez]

And does anyone else thing Egyptian dwarves sound cool?

Do you meanBES - Egyptian Dwarf god

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

Sounds great, though I still think the Khannate should be going strong and doing its own thing. Say that Cressia has absorbed the bits of the Ta'jinn who were in the empty quarter and the near portion of the Khannate while the Khannate has limited itself to its admittedly vast other holdings and withdrawn from external affairs aside from the occasional merchant and adventurer.

I see the Khannate as becoming a very strange culture as a result of what happened in the last round. They view themselves as having partially triumphed over a great evil only to have seen their allies destroyed. They decide to develop their own internal strength, particular their incarnate divinity through the God-bloods and the Khans, without involving anyone else. They treat the new Cressian culture with a good deal of pity and regret, but will largely sit this round out.

I want to see how things will turn out with an observor race this round.