Campaign Idea - The Expendables

[JonMonster]

The Pitch
MiB meets D&D. A small but wealthy secret organization is all that stands between Civilization and Certain Doom.

What do the players do?
Civilization is in the midst of a Golden Age; the church and government are strong and trusted, the borders are secure, and the necessities of life are cheap and abundant. But this long era of peace will lasts thanks to the efforts of noble and tragic heroes. Most folks of the Empire know little, if anything, about the dozens of threats to Civilization. There is always a treacherous adviser or diabolical uncle waiting to usurp the throne, the barbarian hordes lurk outside the gates waiting for a strong leader to unite them, and dark cults slither through the underbelly of society.

One organization, the Expendables, stands ever vigilant, turning back the forces of darkness time and again. This top secret organization, operating in secrecy, led by the mechanical mind of an ancient wizard, and authorized by the Emperor himself, is made up of experienced veterans and promising young heroes as well.

How it Works
The Expendables is a top secret organization operating in a cell like structure. The heroes are recruited by a Contact who issues them missions and offers what support he can. As they successfully complete missions they rise up the ranks of the organization, eventually able to command cells of their own and are introduced, face-to-face, with the leadership of the Organization.

 

[Steel_Wind]

It might work if your medieval society was strongly founded upon a religion and class structure that absolutely refuted the entire concept of magic or the planes.

If the Empire does not believe in it and could not function if this central precept was threatened...it mightwork.

The Expendables job is to not only protect society - but keep it ignorant about the force of magic and thereby keep it stable and prosperous. /me waves "Darth finger: No Revolutions"

That might give it a reason for being so secretive. Otherwise....why bother?

 

[Shades of Green]

I like this approach - this is a welcome break from the traditional freelance-adventuring concept.

A few thoughts:

1) This could possiblt turn the concept of treasure aquisition upside down: you don't slowly accumulate treasures from your adventures, you get issued (by the organization) the equipment you need to finish your mission. You receive a generous salary so you'll live well during the "downtime" between missions. You'd probably also be able to requisition additional gear for your missions, within reason. Also, the organization could raise dead/ressurect, but probably has a limited number of high-level clerics so you'll have to wait a while until one becomes available, AND you get a far bigger bonus for returning all alive and well.

2) I'd suggest that the heroes get introduced to the organization around level 3; before that they should either be freelancers or more direct employees of the Emperor, such as city watchmen or legionaires. Once they deal with some minor threat on their own (such as an infestation of undead, a werewolf or two, a small gang of wererats or something similar), they'll be approached by a Contact and recruited.

3) Large and complicated conspiracies and storyarcs work very well with this concept. A large portion of the (seemingly unrelated) missions will actually deal with branches, side-effects and subprojects of the archvillian (a powerful lich? a cabal of illithids? a demon-lord?), which will eventually be revealed. Ofcourse, some missions will be unrelated, too, but vast and far-reaching conspiracies work very well with this concept.

 

[JonMonster]

That might give it a reason for being so secretive. Otherwise....why bother?

Think MiB. The populace is sedate and content because they don't realize they are always a few days away from the Red Necromancer's Undead Hordes, or that the Brotherhood of the Damned is one virgin away from summoning the Demon-King Xur-Kol-Dan, or that there's a Karellian Death Ray pointed at them from the heart of the Plane of Shadow.

It's not they don't know about magic. They don't realize that the Golden Age is at the brink of destruction. And that it is always on that edge. And, like Agent K said, "a person is smart, people are dumb panicky animals." If word ever gets out then folks are likely to panic, riot, head for the hills, or worse.

 

[MarkB]

1) This could possiblt turn the concept of treasure aquisition upside down: you don't slowly accumulate treasures from your adventures, you get issued (by the organization) the equipment you need to finish your mission. You receive a generous salary so you'll live well during the "downtime" between missions. You'd probably also be able to requisition additional gear for your missions, within reason. Also, the organization could raise dead/ressurect, but probably has a limited number of high-level clerics so you'll have to wait a while until one becomes available, AND you get a far bigger bonus for returning all alive and well.

I like that. One option might be to import the gear-allocation system from Spycraft, using Budget Points to purchase mundane gear, potions and scrolls, and Gadget Points for all other magical items.

In fact, I could see whole swaths of Spycraft material working for a campaign like this, from the mission-based game structure to the goal-oriented XP awards.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

It might work if your medieval society was strongly founded upon a religion and class structure that absolutely refuted the entire concept of magic or the planes.

Oh, I think it could work together with magic perfectly well - even open magic.

All you need is some sort of guild structure to which mages must automatically belong, and which tries to channel any research into the "right" direction (or else discourages all magical research and only allows mages to learn spells by rote from its admittedly vast collection). Warhammer Fantasy has a similar attitude - its mages are only allowed to operate under firm strictures, like "do not meddle with the Forces of Chaos".

Of course, there is always some wizard who thinks that he is brighter than everyone else and meddles with Things Man Was Not Meant To Know. Cue the tentacles.

Basically, magic is too damn useful to be suppressed in general. However, part of the job of senior wizards and the Expendables is to conceal just how easy it is to conjure up some really large-scale disasters. Because if that became known, the public would turn against magic in its entirety and demand the outlawing of wizardry - but that would only make civilization more vulnerable.

And it's allright if the public knows of the planes. The planes are where the souls of people go when they die. However, the Expendables conceal the existence of other planes, where the Things From Outside lurk who want to gain access to our world to gorge themselves upon it.


Oh, and you absolutely should include faeries in the things that need to be suppressed. After all, faeries from myth and legend tend to be fairly vicious little bastards, and there are quite a few parallels to UFO myths in any case...


"That's fascinating, citizen. Now, could you please look at the tip of this wand?"

<blinding flash>

"Now repeat after me: There is no such things as faeries..."

 

[vulcan_idic]

I really like this idea and may well use a version of it at some point. I haven't seen it yet, but when I get my copy of Ptolus I may see if that setting might be amenable to adaptation to this sort of a plotline.

Of course the Expendables need not actually work with or for the Empire - they want whats best for the people - as long as thats the Empire fine, but if the Empire acts against the best interests of the people they work against the Empire - maybe something inspired a bit by the Empire/Foundation interaction of Isaac Asimov's Foundation books.

 

[VirgilCaine]

The Pitch
MiB meets D&D. A small but wealthy secret organization is all that stands between Civilization and Certain Doom.

I think you mean Delta Green meets D&D.

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

"That's fascinating, citizen. Now, could you please look at the tip of this wand?"

<blinding flash>

"Now repeat after me: There is no such things as faeries..."

Or even better: "Faeries are cute, cuddly, little sprites with butterfly wings..."

 

[Sound of Azure]

Adds this idea to the long list of game ideas Sound of Azure will never actually get around to running.

(Props to Jonmonster for coming up with it!)