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View Full Version : The Siege of Kaz-Telnok [Help a DM write one last adventure!]



KiwiImperator
2009-10-23, 04:38 AM
Alright folks, sorry about the maaaaaaaaassive block of text that is to follow, a brief summary will be included afterwards for those less fond of the obligatory wall of exposition.

“The Ruvian Empire was founded six hundred years ago. Six hundred years is a long time to forget the lessons of the past. Our ancestors migrated north to escape the great scourge over the sea, where they left the great forests burned and salted, and every scrap of wood was used to construct the great vessels that carried them. For two hundred years, we have lived in fear of our cursed foes, somehow spinning glass into ships, or finding new trees to grow into vessels in which to pursue us. We found the great new land of Oasa, we found the elves and the dwarves, and together we built the great wall. We unraveled the riddle of steel, and forged great armies with broad shields and swords, and built great fortresses of stone and wrought iron on the coasts, every cliff and beach barricaded and armored, every tower manned constantly with watchful eyes and fearful hearts, lest the great enemy once again appear upon the horizon.
For two hundred years, we watched vigilantly. War brewed in our own homeland as we looked to the sea. The dwarves grew wary of our mining, and the elves grew fearful of our hunger for wood and land. Factions within our own people who had moved far away to expand the wall further began to rebel, and seek independence, confident that the great enemy was no longer coming. The Emperor turned the great armies inward, and began pacifying his fortress. Treaties were signed with the elves, and they went back to their forests, never to be seen again. The Dwarves sealed themselves up in their mountains, and took with them much knowledge that might have been ours. The provincials were crushed and returned to the fold, and the wall was left empty...
...And nothing happened. The people forgot about the great enemy, and the walls fell into disrepair. The rebels returned, and armies were sent forth. The rebels returned again, and the armies were sent forth once more. A dozen times, and each time, less men returned to the walls, to watch the shores, until eventually... None were sent at all.
And then, as harsh lessons are oft to, they came without warning, right when our defenses were rested. Four hundred years later, from the north swept the great enemy. The bow-legged Khull, the hungry-eyed Oruk, and the hideous Cursed Men came to consume our empire, riding leviathans from the deep, hideous monsters that could swallow entire ships. Aided by their allies, the Deep Ones, they struck at our wall where it was the strongest, and with none there to guard it, they walked over it like it wasn't there. The capital fell, with only a token guard, and the Emperor burned in his keep. The enemy had returned, to finish what they had begun centuries before.
Those of us who escaped the capital fled towards the woods. We were not welcome there, and were sent away. We fled to the hills and the mountains, but found the stone doors cold, and dusted over with disuse. The dwarves had no place in their hearts for us. We fled to our bretheren pacifying the provinces, and told them of the horror. Quickly, they made peace, and told the rebels of what had come, at last to destroy us. By then, it was too late. Weakened and spread, our armies combined were still no match for the enemy that moved ever-north. The elves found their forest burned, and the dwarves found that their mountain homes were broken into and plundered by the light-hating Khull, and they too fled by underground routes to the meeting places of old, where once their kind and the elves had conferred in the far north. Our leader, General Maximilian, went with them to speak of alliance, while the rest of us held our castles and holdfasts against the scourge that had pursued us from the south, for reasons long forgotten.
The beasts came, brandishing weapons of stone and bone and gleaming glass, complemented by weapons stolen from our homes and our fallen warriors. They threw themselves at our fortress in their thousands, and one by one the points of light in the gathering dark were extinguished, 'till at last we fled further north, to the last great fortress at which the meeting-place stood, the Black Mountain, a fortress at the end of a canyon, protected by seven concentric walls, backed against a great mountain that was itself a keep, and flanked by unscalable cliff faces. What lies further north of here, in the great cold, not even the Dwarves will speak of, all that they will say is that we cannot venture there. Now, with the slow of us hewn down as we fled, and the bravest of us dead, we number less than ten thousand, Ruvian, Rebel and Elf alike. The Dwarves number scarcely twice that, for they are a people slow to breed, and long lived. So now, we sit, beleaguered and besieged by an army numbering perhaps in the millions. Of men, we have perhaps four thousand who can fight. Of elves, perhaps a thousand. Of dwarves, six thousand are prepared for battle, and another four thousand beardless, forbidden by unbreakable oath to wield weapons, but forgesworn to craft and enchant them. We prepare for the last battle of our people. A titanic struggle for the very fate of our races, against an enemy we still do not understand. Three scarce months we have to train before they are here, through trickery and craft the elves have delayed them that long. Three months to prepare for an inevitable death. Beside men who we considered enemies, enchanting elves whose names we once spat to hear, and dwarves who had cursed us to stay forever in the lowlands, we stand. The general, and the kings of the fair folk and the scions of stone have left us, pursuing “another option”, which says only that our cause here is hopeless. We have few heroes, and fewer hopes. But we shall stand. We shall give an account of the strength of our arms and the stiffness of our necks. The line shall be drawn here, this far and no further, on the walls of Kaz-Telnok.

To make use of a common adage, TL;DR Alamo: Sword and Sorcery style.

This is my next, and possibly last campaign. The PCs shall play the last great heroes of the three races, holding off the inexorable tide of monstrous conquerers who have come to destroy them once and for all. I have, fortunately for me, a player who likes elves, a player who likes dwarves, and a player who likes humans. This is intended to be a one-off campaign, lasting maybe half a dozen sessions in which the players try to hold off an endless tide of enemies, falling back one wall at a time, and rallying and organizing the defenses to keep the people from breaking. I have three excellent players, and this is sort of our good-bye game, because we are all leaving for separate colleges in spring (except for one who's a year younger, and is staying here), and have agreed that online gaming just isn't the same for us.
I'm the one who gets to run this, which opens a hundred cans of worms. I was leaning towards D&D, but 3.5 has the ever-present spellcaster problem, and 4e just doesn't feel right for it, PCs are too survivable and recover too quickly, and it generally isn't gritty enough.
I'm thinking of going all-out and using Riddle of Steel, which is a very mortal and realistic system, to try and simulate the dire nature of the battle the PCs are fighting.

But that's not why I'm posting this, and I doubt anyone here has much experience with RoS. I've got some more universal questions for the creative minds in the playground. What sort of events can I use to make this campaign more than simple violence? I'm thinking of letting the PCs train the troops, or prepare the defenses, or do various things to make the men and walls more effective, and devise strategies for falling back, etc, but that only goes so far. What sort of crisis can break out that the PCs can work to resolve? Should I guarantee a bad-end, or allow them to actually break the enemy army if they survive long enough? I don't want their victory (if they have one) to feel like a cop-out, what are some good options?

Thanks for the help, I don't normally post about my campaign plans, but I want this one to be special, and you guys are a good, friendly, helpful community for the most part, I don't expect to be disappointed. :smallwink:

And for those of you who caught on, yes, I am an enormous David Gemmell fan. I've bought each of my friends a copy of Legend as a going away present (and one reverse going away present for the guy who's staying.) I know it's not tremendously original, but last stands sort of strike a chord with me.