Prehistoric Campaign

[hunter1828]

An OLD issue of Dragon (back in 1e) had an article on fantasy ice age games. Don't remember the issue number, though...have to check the Dragon Archive CD-ROM.

hunter1828

 

[Alzrius]

There was also some issue of Dragon that talked about a prehistoric (rea: era of the dinosaurs) campaign via time-travelling your PCs somehow. I don't remember much, save that it said that clerics might find themselves unable to regain spells, since its quite possible they are in a time that predates their gods! (after all, how can there be human deities if there are no humans?) And that wizards might have trouble finding certain spell components.

I would recommend that, in a caveman campaign, druids definately be around, since Nature could be revered as a force. Likewise, you may want to begin to have the very first clerics appear to some proto-demigods that are just forming as humanity begins to realize that concept. Dragon 213 (or somewhere around there) featured several characters from the video game Primal Rage as demigods in this respect...beings that represented parts of nature, barely sentient and granting spells unconsciously.

EDIT: Eighteen years later, let me go back and fix that error I made: the Primal Rage-inspired demigods are from Dragon #223, not 213. My mistake, there.

 

[aurin777]

Dinosaurs. Mammoths. Trogs/Lizardman going after humans for slaves.
You can't go wrong.
Just to clarify: DINOSAURS! GWAR!

~~Brandon

 

[Yellow Sign]

I can see two sort of settings.

1. You could do a tropical jungle and dinosaur sort of thing. That would mesh well with your repilian adversaries.

or

2. A ice age theme with giant mammals such as sabre tooth tigers, mammoths, and the like. Gnolls would be a neat hostile race with a sub-human cannibalistic orge tribe thrown into the mix.

 

[mythago]

Very low magic.
Barbarian, (possibly druid,) fighter, ranger, rogue are the only classes available.
Stone age weapons.
Almost no treasure (except food).

Uh, don't forget clerics. God-talk man very big big.

Seriously, there should be a lot of magic that's low-level or that doesn't have immediate effect. EVERYBODY remembers to walk out of the cave backward to trick the hungry spirits, they always spit on the blade of a new weapon, etc.

I think "no treasure" is a mistake. There is plenty of evidence that prehistoric peoples decorated their items and had things other than food that were valuable. Weapons, good blankets, the right to hunt a particular area first, carved amber, a hunk of good flint--those are *major* treasures. And, unlike gold pieces or pretty helmets, they can mean the difference between life and death.

 

[hunter1828]

An OLD issue of Dragon (back in 1e) had an article on fantasy ice age games. Don't remember the issue number, though...have to check the Dragon Archive CD-ROM.

hunter1828

Found it:

"Thrills and Chills: Ice Age Adventures" by Arthur Collins in Dragon #68 (December 1982).

hunter1828

 

[BOZ]

actually, there was quite a bit of prehistoric campaign advice in dragon mag, including articles with dinosaur and early mammal stats, and the like.

 

[Roy Drake]

Last night I got an idea for a campaign.
CAVEMEN.

The PCs would be humans in their little cave village when they are suddenly attacked by troglodytes or lizardmen or something. Think Chrono Trigger.
The lizards would be all like, "Lousy humans, we were here first. We should kill them."

Departures from standard D&D:
Very low magic.
Barbarian, (possibly druid,) fighter, ranger, rogue are the only classes available.
Stone age weapons.
Almost no treasure (except food).

Can anybody help me think of a more engaging storyline? Has anyone done something like this before? What did you do differently?

I've had the same idea too and I'm wanting to make a campaign about this type of setting. What I was thinking of was maybe having different kinds of tribes like either having a dragon born tribe and an orc tribe where all the races are there but just in very early development or if you want just more of basic humans scurrying around then that works too with all the different sub races of humans there are. I really like the idea of the lizardmen trying to kill you since they would probably work really well in this type of environment. You could also have the early Yuan-Ti that sacrifice humans to their god/gods. Also you'd need flint to light fires and instead of buying rations you'd need to go out and hunt animals for food along with hunting them for their hides to use as armor and their bones as weapons. Like a mammoth toe hammer or something. So far that's all I've thought of but it's really been on my mind lately.

 

[Dioltach]

A prehistoric thread about prehistoric campaigns ... 17+ year necromancy, not bad!

 

[Dioltach]

On-topic, though, you might want to look at West of Eden, by Harry Harrison. I don't remember much, since I read it back in the 80s, but it's about a version of Earth where humans and lizard people had evolved side-by-side.