Your Setting Evolved

[fiddlerjones]

My last major campaign was set in the apocalyptic end of the game world, and the PCs were sort of "chosen ones." They discovered over the course of the game that their task was not to prevent the coming end but rather to create the next world to follow that one. So, advancing that world 10 years leaves it still not existing.

The world they created? Well 10 years in they're probably still working on starting off the new humanity.

 

[Friadoc]

Oh, I can already given an example of such an evolution that almost happened, ironically enough, in the Arcana Evolved campaign that I play in.

In this campaign I play a runechild named Rathe, whose rune came into being during the course of his adventures as a litorian oathsworn traveling with some verrick, a sibeccai, another litorian, a giant and eventually a human. Oh, yeah, and this odd little faen that somehow got reincarnated into a living metal man.

*shrugs*

Anyhow, during the course of game play Rathe almost came into knowledge of the Verrick Secret (I won't put out the spoiler, but those who play the game, or have read some of the Return of the Dragons anthology, know what I mean).

Now it occurred to me, almost in a flash like when Galadriel was offered the ring, that if Rathe, being like he was, came into possession of such knowledge, it would be a very bad thing for the Verrick (well, some of the Verrick) since he would see those who treat those suffering under the secret as being a blight on the justice of the world.

Basically, Rathe would start a cause that would not stop until all verrick who opposed him were wiped out.

I'd lose the character, as he would suddenly have to be turned over to the DM as an NPC since the scope of his actions would go well beyond playability (for me at least) and his actions would take him away from our current question, to rescue a kidnapped runechild child (a runechild who is, basically, a child in age) from some bad people.

Fortunately, after some OOC talks and showing how this might be bad, the IC event was avoided, but our group is always looking at the big picture, so to speak, of campaign settings evolving, it's one of the reason we love AE/AU, it's meant to have the DM and players evolve it, not the publisher...per say.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

Modern-day Earth and the Creation of Exalted have become integrated with each other. Earth develops Essence-using technology, and Creation gets modern technology. Solars will squabble about ruling parts of Creation and Earth. It will be discovered that Faster Than Light flight is possible by moving starships through the Wyld.

Experiments are being made to turn ordinary humans immortal - or make sure that their reincarnations remember their past lives. A new Loom of Fate will be constructed for Earth to make sure that the people of Earth actually do get reincarnated...

 

[Moon-Lancer]

The world has been in suspended animation for the past three years, since the day the heroes vanished. Despite their low level, the world did in fact revolve around them. Prophecy (ok, wishful thinking) says that one day the heroes will return and the world will once again be in motion.

Or, as is more likely, the heroes will never return to that world and a new world will be created instead.

you need to find yourself some heroes. 3 years is much to long of a time.

 

[NCSUCodeMonkey]

A homebrew setting of one of my old DMs has been evolved twice: once by him and once by myself. After one party failed to stop the resurrection of a massive, world devouring undead worm due to a TPK, the campaign was advanced 30 some odd years to when the armies that had been raised by the worm descended on the equivalent of Hadrian's Wall. Party #2 destroyed the worm and scattered the armies before leaving to tend to other matters. I advanced the campaign another 15-20 years when the undead armies were once again beginning to regroup and ran yet another game.

It all worked out rather well and it was cool to see the constant evolution of the social/political situation in the campaign.

 

[Odhanan]

Last huge change happened at the end of our Seven Spires campaign.

These events are told on this ENWorld thread with pictures.

For short? Our Homebrew setting's cosmology was altered when the PCs defeated the campaign's BBEG. The fabric of their "reality" was then altered, and when they emerged from the subterranean levels of Laelith, they found out that it had changed into Ptolus. The Seven Spires had changed into Palastan, surrounded by the world of Praemal, and the Arcana Evolved/D&D hybrid set of rules we were using became a (mainly) straight 3.5 game.

Thus were born the Praemal Tales.

 

[DragonLancer]

In my Aereth campaign (assuming the party manage to stop the Age of Worms), I forsee in ten years an era of relative peace that is marred by the sudden expansion of the Scourge into the kingdoms surrounding their current holdings, and a civil war in Crieste as the Regent comes of age.

 

[DonTadow]

In the Pathfinder blog James Jacobs talks about taking something that happened as the results of PCs actions (or failed saving throws) and how it altered the setting and how, eventually, it led to the one in Pathfinder. Which got me thinking about how settings evolve, and can evolve, through player action. So, here is your challnage for the day: take your current campaing (or a favorite long running one from the past) and evolve the setting 10 years or more. If neccesary make assumptions about what player actions might result in such a possible future setting.

I will post one of my own later.

I've done that in and out of a campaign.

In the first campaign, which lasted 3 years, the players both took away and returned magic. In the current campaign, 200 years after the first, we see the effects of the pcs actions. (the campaign has not started yet but this is the stuff I've put in to show progession)

1. the psionic god's aura, whom they killed at the end of the campaign, has created far more psionic powered people in the world.

2. the mercenary company they are apart of, has created a free country on the western border to protect the world from the western necromatic lands (which were created when they let the two main lich bad guys escape at the end of the campaign)

3. the thieves guild that once existed in a small portion of the world now has outlets everywhere and is still ruled by the same mysterious leader (the players still don't know who this guy is--- i love a long lasting mystery that lasts multiple campaigns)

4. toward the end of the campaign, the defeat of the psionic god ripped a hole in time and space, causing the oceans to turn into planar voids. In the new campaign, these voids have become planar adventure zones for mercenaries, though few ever return

5. In the first campaign the players never dealt with New Mechanis, an island continent of angry forged bent on "cleansing the flesh". Between campaigns there was a war and the humans were nearly wiped out, thanks to other planes assistance, the forged threat was taken care of.

6. Whereas hte first campaign was fantasy, this campaign is fantasy steampunk. There are steampowered vehicles, better airships, and better commerse areas. Politics is taking the place of wars. Gold is no longer the only way to purchase items. Politicking and influence will get you more and farther.

 

[kigmatzomat]

My campaign has been running 6 years (IRL and in game). They have:


*Forgot they were targets of a dragon pogrom (!!!) and entered a dragon-run city. More appropriately, they presented the gate guards papers identifying themselves and requesting an escort to the palace. They only escaped by having a secret ally decry them as fakes and "reveal" them as an assassination attempt on the elven regent.

*Decided to go halfway around the planet to investigate another elven realm and managed to temporarily destabilize the mithral market when they liberated all the slaves working in the mines. They also made a killing on the mithril they managed to acquire.

*Unleashed literally millions of undead onto the world when they attacked a godling. (They were only supposed to asked the godling "which way did the human go?" but they didn't like the verbal abuse and crossed the warding circle to attack the godling. )

This one is the biggie as it resulted in massive deaths across the world, martial law for nearly 2 years, and lots of secondary problems.