Real sources for fantasy campaigns

[alsih2o]

Has anyone here run a crusades campaign? One centered on pilgrimage?

It seems that crusading is a metric booty load of goodness waiting to be captured, especially with one side being able to be truly evil.

And pilgrimages, man but they are ripe with good stuff.

Strangely D+D seems to have avoided these two obvious and easy storylines, or have I just missed it?

 

[fusangite]

I think there is a real problem doing a crusades campaign and it's one that the campaign in which I am currently playing has confronted. It is very tough to have an adventuring party operating within the context of a larger military campaign. While individual solutions exist and can be employed effectively, after several episodes they become rather worn.

As for pilgrimages, great idea! I wish I'd thought of it. I think the only reason these types of campaigns remain unexplored is because of the skewed way D&D represents religion mechanically and the ideas of religion that can comfortably cohabit with it.

 

[Tonguez]

Wasn't ther a Crusaders supplement produced for an earlier version?

Also I once ran a game which involved a Pilgrimage to the Temple of the Goddess, the PCs were escorts to a Neophyte priestess who was going to gain the blessings of the Goddess. There was also an NPC friar and his ward (anyway the scenario borrowed heavily from Little Red Riding Hood and the PCs eventually discovered that the boy who was ward of the Church (named Micha)) was the reincarnation of an ancient Paladin.

 

[Mystery Man]

Strangely D+D seems to have avoided these two obvious and easy storylines, or have I just missed it?

The Crusades Campaign Sourcebook

Never read it, I just know about it.

 

[mythusmage]

I have it, I've read it. An historical supplement for AD&D® 2e. It covers the early crusading period and has mechanics for characters and magic in the milieu. High fantasy/low magic according to my scheme of things.

Another area I haven't seen covered as well as it could be is politics and internecine strife. A Medieval Players Handbook covers it to some extent, but not deeply.

 

[Darkness]

Has anyone here run a crusades campaign?

Where's SHARK when you need him...?

 

[Evilhalfling]

the closest Ive come is a gencon game where the players were trying to retrieve the relics of a long dead saint from a city overrun by goblins. They have to break into an old temple and end up recovering the bones of the saints dog (a small terrier) and his coller and leash.
One of the saints miracals was to drive all the rats from the city.
In the wrap up the remains were kept in a shrine in a differernt city, and pilgrims came to view it. The relics had no obvious or useable powers but every year after that the cities rat population decreased, and less of its food spoiled. The crops suffererd less from other pests as well and with more food the population begain to rise. The effects of this relic would be felt in the decades to come.
The book of exalted deeds has some holy relics - thighbone of a saint but they are amazingly lame.

 

[Desdichado]

I think there is a real problem doing a crusades campaign and it's one that the campaign in which I am currently playing has confronted. It is very tough to have an adventuring party operating within the context of a larger military campaign. While individual solutions exist and can be employed effectively, after several episodes they become rather worn.

Really? All you have to do is have the PCs be part of the "irregulars" -- common folk that just up and headed for the Holy Land when the Pope called a crusade. On the way, they hook up, do a little bit of mini-crusading and adventuring on the side while on their way to join up with whomever it is that's leading the crusade this time around. Sounds really easy to pull off to me.