What kind of campaign world do you run?

[Redleg06]

What is your definition of "feel," then? I was refering to, for example, a faux medieval feel. Which is pretty closely tied to a culture, and thus wouldn't be found across an entire world (unless the world is very, very small).

Well, I would argue that Ireland in 1100 AD and France in 1100AD and Jerusalem in 1100AD were all "medieval" settings with SIGNIFICANTLY different cultures.

Unless you are saying that in order for two cultures to be different one has to be skinny with pointy ears and the other short with long beards?

 

[Agback]

Tuerny wrote:

So what sort of campaign world do you play/run? Is it typical middle-ages European fantasy or something different?

Tell us about it

You did ask.

I am currently running a campaign set in the early Classical Period of my fantasy setting Gehennum. You can read more about it on the Gehennum website.

But the brief story is this. Gehennum is a tropical archipelago with an economy based on the fantastic productivity of tropical wet rice agriculture. The wildlife is basically South-east Asian, and the people are of a quasi-Malay racial type. The non-human races are divers (who can breathe water as well as air), flyers (who have wings and can fly), leshy (immortal supermen), giants, and sprites (miniature people).

Society is based in part on mediaeval Java, in part on ancient Greece, and in part on Eighteenth-Century England: but all modified by the consequences of a complete absence of any riding animals cheaper than an elephant. Technology is generally equivalent to classical stuff (think Roman civil engineering, Hero of Alexandria, Archimedes), but with better metallurgy (equivalent to early mediaeval India), optics (Renaissance), and clocks & locks (post-Galileo).

Monsters and foreigners are rare curiosities: most conflict takes place between people, within society, and subject to the law. This makes for a much more romantical and swashbuckling style of adventures than the open warfare that is common in D&D worlds. In the Classical Period Gehennum has a political situation based on France under Louis XIII, Restoration England, and Regency Britain.

Gehennum also sports an Archaic Period that is more like Homeric Greece, with more warfare and monsters than you get in the Classical Period; and a Decadent Period that is more like mediaeval Japan.

I designed Gehennum around Christmas 1987, ran the first campaign in academic year 1988, and have been tinkering with it (and accumulating material) ever since.

Regards,


Agback

 

[Agback]

Well, I would argue that Ireland in 1100 AD and France in 1100AD and Jerusalem in 1100AD were all "medieval" settings with SIGNIFICANTLY different cultures.

Hear! Hear!

And what's more "mediaeval" also includes pagan Sweden in 500 AD, the Maltese fortress-state of the Knights Hospitallers in 1450, and Russia as a vassal state of the Golden Horde.

From Portugal to Russia. From Norway to Greece. From AD 476 to AD 1453/1485/1492. Early Christian, Pagan, Catholic, Orthodox, Jewish, Islamic. Germanic, Romance, Slavic, Turkish, Gaelic, Finno-Ugric, Arabic, and Basque. "Mediaeval Europe" is a thousand miles from east to west, a thousand miles from north to south, a thousand years from start to finish, and astonishingly diverse.

Its borders are not the Elbe and the Garonne, and it does not run from Excalibur to Ladyhawke.

Regards,


Agback

 

[Redleg06]

I could not have said it any better!

 

[Buttercup]

Medieval European fantasy with a twist.

The only playable race is human. No elves, dwarves, gnomes, halflings or orcs. No goblins either.

Humans are from another plane, and came through a portal or portals in waves. Other incoming races include matriarchal minotaurs with a vaguely Minoan culture, and a mysterious, frail, intelligent, flying, humanoid race that haven't been seen for over a hundred years. They are the source of some interesting artifacts, incuding the main portal through which most of the world's inhabitants came. The final group of incomers are some strong but dumb lizard people.

The indiginous people of the world are shapeshifters (dopplegangers, essentially) who are pretty angry that their lands have been overrun. They are at the 'kill 'em all and let the gods sort 'em out' phase in their outrage. The PCs have only encountered one that they know of so far, and since they were 1st level at the time, barely survived the encounter. They are now a bit nervous about these indigenes.

 

[Buttercup]

Wow, Agback! I know you from years gone by! Usenet, I think. rec.arts.sf.written? or maybe rast.b5.mod?

Of course we were both posting under different names back then.

Anyway, I've had a link to your Gehennum site in my favorites for years. You have some cool ideas.

 

[John Crichton]

I'm running a Floating Islands World (inspired by Skies of Arcadia) combined with mild magic world. There are very few airships and travel is done by flying beasts. There are slavers and mercs everywhere. The world is in basic anarchy and has been for years. No one holds control for too long.

Nothing about the land is very natural at all. Landforms are twisted and bend, water flows the "wrong way" and other weirdness. I'd say more but one of my players lurks here and I don't want to ruin any surprises.

BTW, I voted: Grrrrrrr.

 

[Tyler Do'Urden]

As of Saturday, I'll be running an ancient-history high fantasy game- al-Khemi, which some of you have probably read about over in the Egyptian Adventures! thread.

I'm generally not big on low fantasy, unless dropping the fantasy quotient results in an increase in the style quotient. I'm not big on the Forgotten Realms, but as for the magic- BRING IT!

 

[Tuerny]

I definitely agree with that.

I want my fantasy settings to feel like they are fantasy. There should be cities built on the sides of cliffs, waterfalls made from the colors of the rainbow, and great trees that are as big as mountains.


That is actually one thing I have to give the Scarred Lands major props for, they have lots of cool interesting cities that feel like they were built for a fantasy setting rather than a middle-ages Europe clone.

 

[Rune]

Guess which one I voted for.