Campaign idea - throw your advice/ideas into the pot

[Gilladian]

I had a sort of "vision" for a new campaign world - I have no idea if I'd ever develop it into anything, but it was fun enough I want to discuss it.

It starts out like this; a smallish?, isolated continent. A dozen or so very powerful wizards, all mad with power-lust, each desiring to rule (why? I don't know but something drives them to do this). Each wizard (or cleric, etc...) rules a city-state. The whole purpose of each city is to serve the wizard's drive for dominance. So you have hundreds of servitors of the wizard, peons slaving for the wizard, armies marching out to battle other armies, etc...

I can imagine some really cool strongholds; some might be flying, or mobile, while others could be dungeons, and others huge multi-towered structures towering over the countryside.

Adventurers could be of several different types (though I imagine all the PCs would be best grouped into one pool for a given campaign): servitors/apprentices of a given wizard, trying to climb to power - after all, someone has to succeed said wizard when his time is up! Or they could be spies sent to form a cell and work to overthrow an enemy wizard. Or they could be more common adventurer types who form a group to explore and recover items in ancient fallen wizard towers/cities for their own wizard-ruler (or to overthrow him). Or they could be escapees who fled a wizard's city and are attempting to find a rumored "safe haven" outside the control of the wizard-cities and their insane rulers.

The region/continent would be pretty devastated by the constant war. It might be mostly wasteland, and the residents only survive because the wizard/cleric ruler and his minions create the food that allows them to live. Or it might be richly fertile, teeming with food and creatures, such that while it is easy to find food, it is impossible not to have to constantly engage in battle to defend oneself from monsters who want it from you (or prefer to eat you). Or anything in between. Or maybe there are regions that meet each of these descriptions.

So, if you were creating a setting like this, what would you do? What problems do you see, or questions does it raise? What would your answers to those questions be? Does it sound at all like a place you'd want to adventure in?

 

[GMMichael]

I'd avoid answering as many questions with "it's done with magic" as possible. If the land is not fertile/scorched/war torn, your armies of slaves should be undead or golems, or flying monkeys. But not people. Magical food is probably bad for digestion.

Monsters need stuff to eat too. If they're a little high on the food chain, they'll quickly do what people do, and kill everything they can catch. Not so good for your continent's ecosystem. If you want to go this route, you should probably send your power-hungry wizards out for frequent monster-hunting trips.

At least one of the wizards should have a luxury condo on a hillside, with an infinity pool.

 

[BigVanVader]

Speaking as a player, I would want to make a Martial/technology based character, to destroy magic as he sees it as the root of all evils in this world.

I'm already planning stuff for your campaign and I'm never gonna play it. That's a good sign.

 

[Samloyal23]

I like the idea of floating cities or fortresses. Maybe there is some kind of ore that can be charged with energy to levitate, like cavorite, and the wizards know how to make artificial islands out of it. They can steer these through the air, hover over a battlefield out of catapult range, and bombard the ground with rocks and spells.

Hmm... Why not flip the whole party structure on its head, have each player be a high level wizard with his own Flying Fortress and they compete against each other to become the new emperor?

 

[Herobizkit]

Eberron, but wizard schools instead of merchant houses.

And I would play a Cleric/Druid charged with keeping the rampaging magic in check and repairing the land.

 

[Gilladian]

I've been thinking more on this and have come up with this idea; a thousand years ago (lost in the mists of time) there was an empire/large kingdom here in this region. It fell to civil war. During the war (maybe the cause of it?) meteors rained down from space. These meteors contain great magical power, and anyone who possesses one of the meteorites can tap into it (if they're a caster). But they are also corrupting. Why? Does it matter? They just are. Maybe they're from an evil god's chariot... or whatever, but the user of the power always falls into evil, eventually. So each of the cities that now exist are powered by one or more meteorites, and of course the wizard rulers want MORE power and want to seize meteors from the other cities. So they war. And because the wizards are so powerful, everyone else serves them or tries to hide from them, or wants to take their place. And thus the constant warring.

I'm thinking that maybe the PCs are from a city where the old, evil wizard has just been removed from power, and a new, "good" wizard has replaced him, and swears to do better, and to bring peace and prosperity. And maybe he does, at first. But of course, corruption follows... and the PCs can watch it happen as their benevolent new ruler slowly turns into a mad despot. Will they aid him, stop him, flee, take over themselves, or what? Will they ever discover the source of the evil? And if they do, how will they react?

 

[Ryujin]

This brings to mind two very different cinematic worlds, for me. The first is the post apocalyptic world of "The Terminator" and the second is the corrupting green ball from "Heavy Metal." Maybe re-watch those two for ideas?

The 'meteors' could be a source of magical power, corrupting psychic influence, temporal power (as in the metal is capable of being made into superior weapons), or a combination of all three. You could populate the continent with people who are scratching among the ruins to survive, perhaps along with a few subterranean refuges in which technology/magic is used to produce light, food, and provide safety? The characters could be servants of the rulers, wandering survivors who are just trying to get by, or people from the sanctuaries who are trying to overturn the apple cart completely and rebuild.

 

[Samloyal23]

Did you see Meteor Man? I like the idea of osmotic learning, where you can touch a book and learn everything in it temporarily. Just take that and add a stolen spellbook...

 

[Gilladian]

Did you see Meteor Man? I like the idea of osmotic learning, where you can touch a book and learn everything in it temporarily. Just take that and add a stolen spellbook...

Yeah, could be cool!

Your inbox box is full, by the way...

 

[sgtscott658]

Howdy-

Why not a a campaign based in a small town? Was watching Hart of Dixie and thought, hmmmm, there is campaign material right there. NPC's would most certainly be colorful and with some interesting plots too. I would call the town Green Bell but would still keep the same name for the town bar called the Rammer Jammer. The town would be set along a coast and usually be hot with a slight scent of mold.

For campaign ideas, you could introduce the PC's to Green Bell via a Seven Samurai type scenario IE they come in to save the town from mourouding goblins . Then find perhaps something sinister is afoot as some towns folk have gone missing at the nearby swamp and so on.

NPC's, If the DM is an animated type and hopefully does not have the personality of a dead fish, could really have some fun with the players with the various NPC's that inhabit Green Bell, like the sorority of Green Bell's or the Crimson Tide sociaty and so on. Basically campaigns can be epic but in the simplest of places too.

Scott