World/Campaign Setting Themes/Flavours

What is the flavour of your homebrew campaign setting/world?


Well it's a combination of a lot of things: Swords & sorcery, Medieval, Renaissance, Arabic, future/scifi, set on Earth, and low fantasy. Yeah, they don't SEEM to go together at all when you list elements like this but it works because it isn't completely any one of those at any given time.

It's intended to be much slower than standard PC advancement - half or maybe even less - as well as not anticipating PC's getting far into double-digit levels. In fact for purposes of the campaign "high level" pretty much MEANS double digits. It's sort of an incarnation of the old-school notion of "title-level". In any case that pretty much makes it low fantasy when compared to most campaigns.

By and large the trappings are Medieval as with any D&D game, but the technology in particular will occasionally will range into Renaissance levels as will some of the political attitudes. The Arabic elements enter in mostly just because the known regions of the world are largely arid if not desert and so some of the dress, architecture, and such will often seem more Arabic than Medieval European.

The Sci-fi is of course present in the form of artifacts and a few relics for the most part, but there is a TRAIN that operates in one little corner of the world with some fantastical justification for its existence. And while the world itself isn't REALLY Earth, it certainly has some kind of connection to Earth. It may be post-apocalyptic Earth, it may be cross-planar in explanation. I don't know which and don't much care at this point. I won't until the PC's begin to care, but they will encounter definite pieces of Earth as we know it: a long piece of freeway hidden in the jungle or forest; Mt. Rushmore; a few buildings or bridges; or other man-made, concrete & steel constructs that would reasonably survive lengthy abandonment.

And of course I participated here just to try to skew the poll. :)
 

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I've come up with a few, though my own laziness has prevented me from doing much in the way of running games in them:
  • Island chain exploration (at a Renaissance-era technology level coupled to a political system derived from late Republican-era Rome) bringing civilisation into contact with tribal societies and the ancient secrets of which both halves of the colonial conflict are ignorant. If I could have pulled off a Wild West feel to the shipbound exploration it would have been hilarious.
  • Rural village Gothic horror - a Ravenloft feel with a more restrained "palette" in terms of the kind of horror creatures and challenges. Ghosts, vampires, werewolves, and curses rather than the whole schmeer of possibilities.
  • The urban horror of decadence - cults, ancient perversions and pervasive evil in a sprawling metropolis going to ruin. Probably something close to the original city-based Conan stories by Robert E. Howard, especially in the arse-kicking department.
I like horror. Why is it that I want to insert Lovecraftian corruption into everything ever?
 

I selected both "high fantasy" and "futuristic/sci-fi" as the setting I'm putting together focuses on an interstellar nation with lots of magic, and I mine content from any source I can find. Ideally, I'd like to use material from Dungeons & Dragons, StarGate, Magic: the Gathering, Marvel Comics, Star Wars, Animorphs, The Seventh Tower, The Legend of Zelda, ReBoot, Thursday Next, Futurama, Alternity, Shannara, Monty Pyhton, Pern, StarCraft, those Mario video games, and probably many others.
 

The Darkened Land is the result of the PCs failing to save the world in my very last 2e campaign. It's post-apocalyptic D&D, where the sun has been destroyed, civilization is in ruins, and evil beasts stalk an endless night in search of prey (the PCs!).
 

Though I don't actually use it at the moment I have a homebrew setting - currently in an early mediaval/crusades type period - so incorporates the arabian knights stuff I like.
 

My homebrew (of which we're taking a break right now because I wanted to play Eberron for a change) is high fantasy - one major epic conflict, involving a cabal of necromancers and demon worshippers (three factions trying to get the upper hand - and at times it seemed like all three would succeed...).

In addition to being high fantasy, it's kind of medieval/renaissance, probably more of the latter. And sword&sorcery. All in all, it's pretty traditional - I didn't want to do something different for its own sake. (And my main goal was to put the player characters into the spotlight.)
 



Homebrew Theme

My homebrew is based on a Celtic theme - wilderness, bogs, charriots, big axes, low technology, small populations, druids - based in Europe wrapped in an Ice Age. I try and make it gritty but with some high magic points, i.e. a few artifacts strewn amongst the treasures the PCs find. Portals and gates are a big feature too so plently of scope for getting a few outsiders involved...
 

I tend to have sword+sorcery/low magic but with a more modern culture type. For instance massive companies whose power rivals that of states.
 

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