D&D 4E D&D 4e campaign setting using Dawnforge

[daddystabz]

I am getting ready to start a D&D 4e campaign using Dawnforge as my campaign setting. From all I know about it it just seems it is screaming for 4e goodness. The entire idea of how the setting works seems to be very attuned for 4e.

However, I wanted to ask those of you that are familiar with both 4e and Dawnforge how you would handle using this setting for your 4e campaign? How would you think of handling Dawnforge's races, classes, magic, setting nuances, etc?

Any opinions/comments would be greatly appreciated and thanks in advance!

Here is a link about Dawnforge for those of you that want to learn more: http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/dawnforge.html and a video review by Game Geeks at: [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t5Oymfu2v50[/ame]

 

[daddystabz]

Anyone?

 

[Ghostwind]

Great concept. I'm not sure how to pull it off exactly, especially with some of the races.

 

[artmarks7]

I've been running a Dawnforge game for a while, and after I held off on 4E purely because I'm cheap and had enough invested in 3E, I'm coming around and looking at the same idea.

But not that much of the basic system seems transferable between 3E and 4E. The world and history can very easily be used, I think all you have to do is put a decaying kingdom of dragon born in the Tamerland and define the elves vs eladrin to be dawn vs night elves. Using just the basic 4E rules, you can use the regions and history with the 4E PC races and classes.

Yes, you lose alot of the races and legendary points and classes, but they don't transfer exactly. 4E action points and paragon paths kinda replace those concepts, you already have a bonus for success with extra action points and the classes all have specialized upper level paths to follow. Would action points that let a characer buy anouther action point slot so your PCs being able to have two action points after an extended rest overbalance the PC power?

If you really want to run monsters as PCs, haven't the 4E rules on that come out already? The monsters are still there as advesaries and can easily be used for an entire campain. Stop the orcs with goblin horde invasion, hunt the black circle operatives with white circle help, prevent the Yuan-ti counter strike on the dominion, etc. Gnomes can become elven mooks, and lizardmen become dragonborn mooks.

And as for the racial talents and transformation, 4E already has the level by level accumulation of power, so all you need is racial feats or powers to offer. Those books will be out eventually, or you could try making racial powers for each class as an alternative to the standard class powers. If you start adding powers and feats on top of the base class abilities you'll have to come up with your own method of increasing the 4E ecl based on what you let players get. Anybody got any idea what scale for granted power in a feat should be on the new 4E rules?

The way I'd do it is minimal work, make sure every one has the idea of early times, give the book for regions and history, imply a time of dragon empires before the rise of the giant empire drove them across the sea (giants hunting dragons is in the book), and have it's remnants in the tamerland be dragon born ruling over lizardmen, a newlly discovered legacy to add to the histroy from the book. This way you have the implication racial understanding is new, kingdoms are still rising and being established, war lurks on the horizon, but there is also a more in-depth concept of ancient history and empires to create ruins and old magic, etc. so you can more easily use new modules.

You've had months to try this, what happened? what did you try? anything not working or anything specific you'd like an idea for working in?

 

[Negflar2099]

This seems like a very cool setting. I'm not familiar with it myself but it seems to fit in nicely with the power system in 4e and the way that characters quickly become very powerful as they level up. I'm curious how the characters in this setting acquire treasure. I'm guess I'm so used to the model of finding treasure in lost ruins and exploring the decaying remnants of civilizations past. Without that I have a hard time imagining how you would justify the characters finding high level magic items. Are they expected to make all the items themselves? If not then who made them?

Also what about suitable challenges? That is to say, if there are no high level NPCs running around, how do you explain high level threats to the PCs? Is it just monsters and if so where have those monsters come from?

Anyway I will definitely be checking out Dawnforge. Fantasy Flight Games is a great company. I hope they start converting some of their stuff to 4e soon.*

*I know it's probably not going to happen but a geek can dream can't he?

 

[artmarks7]

The campaign world really isn't so different when it comes to treasure and such, it's just that the big powerful things are called immortals or legendary monsters. And just because the the normal races are just starting out doesn't mean you can't have old cultures, just that you have to be more creative. The history implies that the giants are a civilization in decline after the ice age where they hunted dragons to near extinction, expand on that and use magic item resizing and old giant ruins from when they dominated the continent before the ice and the civil war with the ice giants or however you want to spin it.

And with 4E I'd take the giants hunting dragons to a new level, every young society seems to replace an older declining one. Make the dragons have had an empire that devolved to civil war then was attack by the new and growing giant society. Have the white dragons ally with the ice giants to bring about the ice age and have the ginats push the dragons across the sea to the tamerland as the war escellated and food grew so scarce that dragons really were the best food source for ginats to hunt and eat. This idea of an old dragon run society is the perfect way to intro dragonborn and to give them a location and soiciety, or even a group of societies all dedicated to a type of dragon, and ready to reassert themselves and reclaim lands the giants forced them to abandon ages ago.

You can say that the civilization that produced the race or races that evolved into angels or devils/demons had a basis in this world not too long ago and fled into the planes due to a crisis, like the ice age or magical decline, or even aggressive attacks of a unified and aggressive society of dragons, nad create a series of strongly good/evil aligned ruins.

Use the ruins and old magic, just a little creativity or alterations to help change the perceptions from an old humanoid society remnant to something more in keeping with whatever history you want. Immortals should be more than powerful enough to justify the creation of any item, and eldrich wells of magic mean you can also just make locations like a pool of water that enchants the sword dipped in it because of the magic it's accumulated over the years, etc. However you want to do it, you don't have to change the rules, just play with the flavor of the details and it'll be believable or might even inspire a new plot line to follow.