Picking Your Brains: The Respin

[Jim Hague]

Not too long ago, I wrapped up a 4 year campaign. The characters didn't exactly win outright, though they prevented the world from being destroyed by one very, very powerful elder wyrm with a serious jones for nihilism. The hordes of Hell were thrown back. In the end, two PCs destroyed their mortal bodies channeling the power of their gods, the rest retreated across a vast desert to lick their wounds and plan for the future. Meanwhile, back in their homeland, the wyrm, now possessing the body of the current Queen, made its own plans...

Now I'm planning a respin. Premise:

It's 500 years later. The reign of the Eternal Queen, the Empress of Iron, has continued. The Queen has made war on neighboring lands, conquering them with a combination of spell and steam technology. Dissent is ruthlessly punished by the Queen's myrmidons, but dissent is rare.

This is an age of high adventure and high magic. Comissioned adventuring companies roam the land, subduing rebels, savage monsters and collecting lost artifacts for their Empress.

But there's a dark side to it all - through spell and propaganda, the Queen has created a lie. Few realize how their Queen came to power, and fewer still remember the legnds of the heroes of ages past, the warriors of prophecy called 'Nightstalkers' in the common tongue. The land lies beneath a shadow, despite the belief that a new age has dawned.

There are those who have not forgotten, not entirely, what has gone before. Far from the great cities and floating fortresses, they remember that before the Age of Iron, there was a time when the races of the world were free. They hide, recalling the great tales of the Master General, the Thief of Fate, the Weeping Mage. Wherever they are found, these sects are ruthlessly destroyed...but like hope, more always spring forth. This far from civilization, there is little the Queen can do but send her adventurers forth to punish the heretics.

And this is where the PCs come in. Their village was heretical, anathema to the Queen. This time, it was not adventurers that came upon it, but a full battalion of the Queen's mymidons. The village is gone now, razed to the bare earth, and the PCs, along with the survivors from their home, have been thrown into a vast prison beneath the surface. Left to their own devices, they must escape, first facing the dangers of the prison, then the surface world, entirely different from the lives they have known.

Scattered across the world and the kingdom are weapons, tomes of power, great artifacts left behind by the Nightstalkers to prepare the way for those that would come after them. With these, perhaps, the reign of the Iron Empress, can be brought low, and the races of men freed from her influence.

*whew*

Sketchy right now, but I'd like to pick folks' brains. I don't want this to be bog standard D&D. Here's some of the books I'll be using below. Any suggestions, plot twists, campaign ideas and such would be greatly appreciated.

*Conan RPG (not the background, but the system, subbing out for the PHB)
*Hollowfaust, City of Necromancers
*Elements of Magic (?) - I've read the teaser, I like the concept. Anyone used it in play?
*Possibly some of the Iron Kingdoms books.

So help me out - where would you folks go with this? I'm thinking of new core classes, magic system...let's be honest, I'm considering ripping the guts out of D&D and see what can be done with them.

 

[Ferret]

First the dragons, then the Giants ( I think ), and now this. EN World has amazing ideas.

 

[Jim Hague]

Glad you like it.

Thinking further, there's a few plot elements worth mentioning:

*The variation and expansion of magic in the campaign world rises directly from the betrayal of the gods of Light by the goddess of Magic, who was, at best, always portrayed as a neutral figure. Once her deceit was revealed, said goddess was exiled to the netherworld, taking over for a recently-deposed ruler of one of the Hell planes.

*The premiere paladinic order, owing allegiance to the god of Justice, has been shattered. Only a few scattered priests teach the catchecism of the Lord of Swords, and are considered heretics by the Church of the Eternal Queen. These are slain out of hand instead of exiled to the prison.

*One of the nastinesses of the prison is that, at its bottom, lies the body of an undead god (a la Scarred Lands' titans), and the original denizens of the place (the dark elves/drow) still live within. Thus, it's a dungeon crawl to get out into the wider world.

I'd considered Dawnforge for a lot of this, but given that I'm wanting to change the mechanics up as regards characters classes, races and magic. This is supposed to be the reverse of the bog standard D&D campaign - this is the age of High Magic, thanks to the Eternal Queen. But under the gilt, there's rot and ruin.

 

[Nightfall]

Mm Hollowfaust AND an undead god of drow. All we need now is a sect of rangers hunting for the Eternal Queen and we're in good shape.

 

[Jim Hague]

Mm Hollowfaust AND an undead god of drow. All we need now is a sect of rangers hunting for the Eternal Queen and we're in good shape.

Nah, the Nameless is just an undead god, not the goddess of the drow.
That honor goes to the undead god's former lover, daughter of the goddess of the surface elves. And the drow here aren't spider-based, but serpentine instead. Their degenerate descendants live in the blasted waste above the Rift. Yuan-ti, don'tcha know, though I take more from Howard's Serpent Men there than the standard D&D types.

Which brings up another semi-random thought - how much influence do the gods have in the world? I'm thinking less than originally, since they broke their own covenant to not interfere directly in the affairs of their mortal children. Long story there, involving the Nameless' minions hunting down the runes that comprised his Name and assembling them. The Runes of the Name fell ultimately into the hands of the Nameless' lieutenants, who spawned entirely new types of undead...

But that's another story, too.

 

[Rl'Halsinor]

Jim, I think you will do well with the "otherness" feel for this world. As I read the thing that struck me was the mutation/transformation from "what was to what is now", al la Scarred Lands (which I noticed you will at least incorporate some of its ideas). It indeed reads like a shattered world. The use of various information from a myriad of sources will, IMO, definitely give your players the idea very, very quickly that they're not in Kansas anymore. Here are some things that just popped in my head. I'm "thinking outloud" so to speak:

If this is the age of High Magic with rot and ruin just below the surface, how will this taint affect spells? And, is it only spells that it affects, or will those who wield such magic be corrupted themselves? Is there a price to pay as one gains expertise?

Will the dieties restore covenant? Perhaps they won't, but I believe at least the good aligned ones would be pressed from inward convictions to do something. And, can "gods" truly go indefinitely without worshippers? I think it would be an interesting dynamic to have clerical dominions of magic creeping in as High Magic rules. Would the powers that be even notice at first? Just my 2 cents worth.

 

[Dogbrain]

Oh, re-SPIN, as in "spin again". Here I was trying to figure out what "the respin" was or were.

 

[Jim Hague]

Jim, I think you will do well with the "otherness" feel for this world. As I read the thing that struck me was the mutation/transformation from "what was to what is now", al la Scarred Lands (which I noticed you will at least incorporate some of its ideas). It indeed reads like a shattered world. The use of various information from a myriad of sources will, IMO, definitely give your players the idea very, very quickly that they're not in Kansas anymore. Here are some things that just popped in my head. I'm "thinking outloud" so to speak:

If this is the age of High Magic with rot and ruin just below the surface, how will this taint affect spells? And, is it only spells that it affects, or will those who wield such magic be corrupted themselves? Is there a price to pay as one gains expertise?

Will the dieties restore covenant? Perhaps they won't, but I believe at least the good aligned ones would be pressed from inward convictions to do something. And, can "gods" truly go indefinitely without worshippers? I think it would be an interesting dynamic to have clerical dominions of magic creeping in as High Magic rules. Would the powers that be even notice at first? Just my 2 cents worth.

Taint's a good question - I like how Conan, for example, treats magic as both powerful and dangerous...but it really only works in the context of Conan's universe. That, while excellent, isn't where I'm setting my campaign.

Magic in this context should be both powerful and somewhat dangerous - it could be more powerful, but the Eternal Queen siphons off much of it (secretly) to sustain her own ravaged body; mortal flesh isn't meant to sustain immortal draconic spirit, after all. And without the mitigating influence of the former goddess of magic, the power runs as it runs, a living force unto itself. The same force that, say, holds a city aloft can easily devastate the land below it.

Thus, taint should come in there, so magic is used carefully, but without hobbling the spellcasters. I'm open to suggestions on this, though Elements of Magic may have some ideas, as might Arcana Unearthed.

On the issue of the gods - it's not so much a matter of fulfilling their covenant, but that the gods' power has waned due to their interference in the mortal world. This was part of the plan of the Nameless and some of the Powers that rule Hell and the Abyss...but the gods still suffer the consequences of their actions, good and ill. Because of what needed to be done to prevent the rise of the Nameless, the gods are locked away, and the power of their followers is based more on the faith of the few, instead of divine conduits. I'm thinking that many of those who hold to heretic faiths draw on the ambient arcane power to bolster their faith.

Idea: Instead of clerics, you have 'Breakers', heretic faithful seeking to break the bonds that keep the gods at bay. Breakers use arcane magics, and have some access to traditionally 'divine' magics as well.

As for the oddity of the setting...I hope so. I want this to feel fresh, so the players, even though they're walking in the faded steps of their pervious characters, feel as if there's new challenges out there. Sure, there'll be some old standbys, such as the Rift and Rift Waste, the Empire of Akton across that Waste, and such...but even for a fantasy world, 500 years is a long time...things do change.

 

[Kareyev]

Reading your first post Simon Green's Deathstalker series came to mind. It is sci-fi, but has some concepts similar to what you describe, including a queen named the Iron "Female Canine" [name changed to protect Eric's Grandma] by the resistance. You might want to check it out as it probably has some ideas for you to borrow.

For example, one of the major fractions in the Deathstalker series was a bunch of Rogue AIs, that had decided mankind must be destroyed, who were in constant conflict with the Queen's empire. In fact she used the threat of the rogue AIs as a major reason for her harsh measures and to keep everyone to united behind her. As an extra twist, if I remember correctly, the AIs were the one power in the universe that had the power of teleportation which made their small numbers quite powerful. To de-scifi it switch out AI with constructs and you have a unique third powergroup. Imagine a rouge set of golems that have been awakened by a crazy druid/mage and given the power of teleportation! They fight the Queen. They fight the heroes. Perhaps they are used by the heroes or the heroes are used by them.

Good gaming to ya!

 

[Jim Hague]

Reading your first post Simon Green's Deathstalker series came to mind. It is sci-fi, but has some concepts similar to what you describe, including a queen named the Iron "Female Canine" [name changed to protect Eric's Grandma] by the resistance. You might want to check it out as it probably has some ideas for you to borrow.

For example, one of the major fractions in the Deathstalker series was a bunch of Rogue AIs, that had decided mankind must be destroyed, who were in constant conflict with the Queen's empire. In fact she used the threat of the rogue AIs as a major reason for her harsh measures and to keep everyone to united behind her. As an extra twist, if I remember correctly, the AIs were the one power in the universe that had the power of teleportation which made their small numbers quite powerful. To de-scifi it switch out AI with constructs and you have a unique third powergroup. Imagine a rouge set of golems that have been awakened by a crazy druid/mage and given the power of teleportation! They fight the Queen. They fight the heroes. Perhaps they are used by the heroes or the heroes are used by them.

Good gaming to ya!

Y'know, that'd never occurred to me - I liked the Deathstalker trilogy quite a bit, and know exactly what you're talking about with the AIs. I used a variant of that in the previous campaign - the whole 'Ghost Warriors' idea. Constructs powered by the souls of the fallen. There was a magical construct that literally harvested the dead from the field of battle and immediately sent them back in, clad in armored bodies...