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Message: <blockquote data-quote="MerakSpielman" data-source="post: 380550" data-attributes="member: 7464"> A little later on (to elicit more helpful responses) I added a bundle of more specific information:Some background on the new campaign:(if any of my players are here, stop reading).............At the end of the current campaign, the characters are unwittingly going to initiate a Huge Disaster in their attempts to save Civilization as They Know It. This disaster will simultaniously render the surface of the world magically uninhabitable and open a huge shaft (a mile wide) deep into the belly of my world's Underdark. I have initiated discussions with my players and they don't mind ending a game with the world still in dire straits, but they don't know in what form these dire straits will occur.Fast Forward 400 years.The Upper Races have fled the Disaster above ground via the huge shaft into the Underdark. All Upper Races have established at least one successful colony capable of fending off the dangers of the Underdark. All of these colonies are relativly shallow - the Drow and other dark denizens live far far deeper. The shaft (called the Nexus) has been sealed from the surface by creative application of druidical magic to keep the Underdark safe.Wizards have been driven into hiding - existing only as secret societies - due to the involvement of their old Cabals in the destruction of the Surface. Sorcerers are more common but almost as despised as Wizards due to the public fear of arcane magic. Worship of gods of Nature, Light, etc has diminished to the point where they exist only as semi-official cults. Worship of Dark Gods is increasing, though they are still widely (i.e., publically) considered evil and the bane of civilization. Alchemy is increasingly prevalent, and several dozen new alchemical formulas are available for purchase or creation. Druids are still around, and in fact vital for the survival of many of the Upper Races. Without a fertile world to provide food, the Druids have taken to cultivating large caverns with familiar plants and animals. Still, vegatable material is rare and these caverns allow the Upper Races just enough of an advantage to survive. It takes most of the Druids time and energy to maintain these havens, and they are guarded jelously by the Upper Races.Several factors of centuries of underground life are apparent in the economy. Things that one could find rather commonly several centuries ago are now very rare. Examples: Pearls (little to no access to oyster beds), Bows (good wood is hard to find - ranged attacks are less useful underground anyway), Rope (cotton is grown, but expensive) and other things. Items made of stone or metal are common and cheap. Gems are still rare and valuable. Interestingly enough, Quall's Feather Token: Tree have become worth a great deal.The Underdark is riddeled with so many tunnels, passages, abandoned colonies, secret shrines, access to the surface, accesses to the Depths, and natural caverns that is has proved impossible for the Upper Races to map more than a tiny fraction of it. "Trails" are marked clearly and patroled regularly. Everywhere you travel, there are side passages, chasms, and other openings that lead into the Unknown. Most who venture off the marked Trails are lost forever. The colonies are under constant bombardment by monsters and monsterous races that consider the civilized areas to be simply richer hunting grounds in their own territory. Rumors persist of creatures that no Upper Race has ever seen, lurking in dark, isolated caverns.The name of this Campaign is "Return to the Upper World" and the plot revolves around returning the Upper Races to the surface. Even the Deep Races want this to happen because having the Upper Races in the Underdark is a big hassle.All alignments are allowed, as are all classes. Races allowed are: PHB races, Drow, Svirfneblin, Duergar, Derro, Deep Halfling, Kobold, and Half Ogre. ECLs will be componsated for by increased personal challange to the character (Example: Drow have to follow the tenants of their House and are forbidden in civilized cities - those slave raids kinda made them a little prejudiced). All races that had normal vision now have low-light vision, and all races with low-light vision now have Improved low light vision (see 50% further) How the characters get together:Growing political discontent is preventing the races from working together efficiently, especially between the Upper and Deep races. The uneasy truce between Elf/Human colonies and the Drow has been strained to the breaking point. The Upper Races have started on the road to isolation and xenophobia, though still at the very early stages, even from each other.Noticing this, and realizing that the only hope for peaceful (or profitable) relations between the races is to return the Upper Races to the surface, where they can live as they have for eons, a secret, cross-racial group has formed known as the Recoverers of Destiny. Their goal has been for over 100 years to return things to the way they once were. The characters are all apprentices of these RoDs, who seem outwardly to be normal members of their society, often with significant political power. One day, they meet in secret near the Nexus with their apprentices and give some cryptic and incomplete description of their goals and explain that they need the characters to act as agents to accomplish the more difficult, exploratory projects. The RoDs, meanwhile, are keeping their governments in check and doing research to help the PCs.After the first couple (small, staged, to-get-used-to-your-character) missions, the RoDs all mysteriously vanish, without having explained the complete plan to the PCs. The PCs are left with very few clues and the ability to travel anywhere and do anything.The classes and races the character choose will significantly determine the nature of the RoDs plan (which races are involved, for instance) and alter the plot. The players will create their characters independantly from each other, with no input from me as to what classes the others have chosen. If we end up with all Drow Rangers with dual scimitars, then that's just the way it goes. The party will face the same challanges regardless (the world will already be created and more or less set). It is their responsibility to forge an effective party with their characters. Characters will be submitted to me with a rough history (which I will flesh out to make it consistant with the campaign) and a short Character-Concept detailing what PrCs or straight-multiclasses they are aiming for, if any, what their goals are with the character, etc... They will need a good, in-character reason to deviate from their life plan (more than, "well, we didn't have a cleric, and we're hurting for fast healing, so I took a few levels of Cleric"). The campaign probably will not take place completely underground, as the characters discover what has happened on the surface and try to fix it (assuming they decide that this is worth doing). I will map out the political situation for several game months in advance, only changing it if the characters do something directly to alter it (in which case I will simply re-map it). Cities (colonies) will probably play a significant role and be a major setting for important things to happen.What do you think?</blockquote>

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