Cheesy74
2011-05-03, 04:03 PM
I'm currently working on a plot for a campaign I'm starting this summer and would love some community feedback. Members of my campaign (Pat, Corey, Mitchell, etc) can stop reading now.
Relevant info on the campaign setting:
The D&D pantheon is split into the four Primal Gods that wrought the world (Pelor, Heironeous, Hextor, and Obad-Hai) and are widely worshipped and the Terran Gods, who were created by humanity's needs and less widely worshipped. Racial deities do not exist.
The world is covered with ley lines, which extend anywhere from a few feet to around the entire prime meridian and surge with magical power. Their intersections, nexuses, explode with magical potential, either sucking away magic around them or spewing it out into the surroundings, to the point that the area immediately around them is inhospitable to life. Dwarves have built foci atop most of the ones that can be reached that channels away this energy and makes the land around them habitable. The players begin in Doria, capital city of the Holy Croethan Empire, devoted to Heironeous, in the northeastern region of the continent. To their south is the hobgoblin nation Horagg (venerates Hextor), with whom they have a tense truce. To their west, the epicurean orc nation of Gromarsh (venerates Obad-Hai), with whom they have a long-standing peace.
My campaign begins shortly after the close of a war with Horagg that killed the brother of a high-ranking (and extremely vindictive) bishop of Heironeous. The bishop, inconsolable and outraged at his brother's death, is doing his best to reignite the war so he can have vengeance. When the Empire refuses, the bishop becomes gradually unhinged, plotting both to punish the Croethan Empire and to have his vengeance on Horagg's leadership for their crimes. He becomes the villain of the campaign, conspiring against the countries and eventually the entire region to quench his lust for vengeance. He seeks first and foremost to resurrect his brother if such an opportunity could arise, but as his body has been lost and (unbeknownst to him) burned, no cleric in the nation is powerful enough to revive him.
My players have a request that I haven't met, however. They're looking for a campaign with a magical feel to it, specifically a powerful and mysterious artifact influencing things, something this plot doesn't really provide. I'm trying to formulate something magical that would let the bishop resurrect his brother, but everything I come up with just seems like a giant macguffin.
Basically, I'm looking both for criticisms and potential subplots to go alongside this story, but I'm mostly looking for ideas or just springboards to ideas to give this campaign an arcane spin. If you have anything to contribute, please post. Nothing is worthless when I'm in brainstorming mode.
Relevant info on the campaign setting:
The D&D pantheon is split into the four Primal Gods that wrought the world (Pelor, Heironeous, Hextor, and Obad-Hai) and are widely worshipped and the Terran Gods, who were created by humanity's needs and less widely worshipped. Racial deities do not exist.
The world is covered with ley lines, which extend anywhere from a few feet to around the entire prime meridian and surge with magical power. Their intersections, nexuses, explode with magical potential, either sucking away magic around them or spewing it out into the surroundings, to the point that the area immediately around them is inhospitable to life. Dwarves have built foci atop most of the ones that can be reached that channels away this energy and makes the land around them habitable. The players begin in Doria, capital city of the Holy Croethan Empire, devoted to Heironeous, in the northeastern region of the continent. To their south is the hobgoblin nation Horagg (venerates Hextor), with whom they have a tense truce. To their west, the epicurean orc nation of Gromarsh (venerates Obad-Hai), with whom they have a long-standing peace.
My campaign begins shortly after the close of a war with Horagg that killed the brother of a high-ranking (and extremely vindictive) bishop of Heironeous. The bishop, inconsolable and outraged at his brother's death, is doing his best to reignite the war so he can have vengeance. When the Empire refuses, the bishop becomes gradually unhinged, plotting both to punish the Croethan Empire and to have his vengeance on Horagg's leadership for their crimes. He becomes the villain of the campaign, conspiring against the countries and eventually the entire region to quench his lust for vengeance. He seeks first and foremost to resurrect his brother if such an opportunity could arise, but as his body has been lost and (unbeknownst to him) burned, no cleric in the nation is powerful enough to revive him.
My players have a request that I haven't met, however. They're looking for a campaign with a magical feel to it, specifically a powerful and mysterious artifact influencing things, something this plot doesn't really provide. I'm trying to formulate something magical that would let the bishop resurrect his brother, but everything I come up with just seems like a giant macguffin.
Basically, I'm looking both for criticisms and potential subplots to go alongside this story, but I'm mostly looking for ideas or just springboards to ideas to give this campaign an arcane spin. If you have anything to contribute, please post. Nothing is worthless when I'm in brainstorming mode.