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View Full Version : Idea for homebrew for new campaign



Name_Here
2008-02-14, 11:18 AM
I'm working up a new campaign that more than likely I'll never get to actually play but since I love just writing up new worlds and situations I figured I'd go ahead and have a ball with it.

Lay of the land: the Human nations are fighting a war against extinction. Elves in their immense and powerful republic have decided to launch a genocidal campaign against all the other races. They've already destroyed 85% of the Dwarven population as well as a large portion of the Halflings. Both populations have resettled to Human lands where they attempt to help the war effort as best they can. Gnomes, Goblins and Kobolds were nearly wiped but it's impossible to wipe them out completely as the other races learned over years of cullings so small groups eak out a small community under the radar of the Elves. The Orcs have been enslaved and are used as a labor source and as expendable shock troopers by the elves.

As it is the war isn't going well for the Humans. The Elves using magic and slaves managed to win battle after battle with the Humans only winning when they had a significant advantage in troops and in a few isolated cases of singularly brilliant commanders winning the day with unexpected fients and fallbacks. However in most cases the magic that the elves use freely defeated the magicless humans. Since then they've managed to hold out for 14 years and are down to a fraction of the land they originally held and each year the land grows smaller as the Elves push them back step by step.

But the humans realized almost immidiatly why they were losing and started trying to find ways to use the magic that has cost them so dearly on the battlefield. And they succeeded in finding individuals who were naturally able to channel magic and began training them in earnest. Only recently have their trials begun to really pay off and this year it is expected that the mages will finally be able to take part in the war.

How I see the campaign working: I think the PCs will be a group of 3rd sons of nobles who will have been given a small out of the way town to guard and train. However due to their status as both agents of the court due to their nobility and soldiers in the army they start getting pushed into various life threatening situations by people who either are unaware of their other position or want to use it. Negotiate a treaty with the Desert people so that western Garrison can be freed to support the spring's offensive, Help a noble expand his texttile trade so that he has more money to give to the war and maybe even a few nasty jobs like rounding up disserters or collecting the prisoners from a city so that they can be used as a disposable rearguard. And of course the more jobs they do for the high command the more high command comes to rely on them and the more likely they are to be used in the next suicidial mission.

Homebrews I'm considering: I want this to be a pretty low magic campaign so in the beginning I won't allow any of the players to play magic classes in the beginning since they are too valuable to the war effor to waste guarding some small town. Also I'll be keeping the gold and equipment they aquire down to a bare minimum since very few Generals would have magic equipment no way some monster is going to have one. Also I would like them to have wear and tear happen to their weapons so they have to keep a spare of their favorite weapon over even stoop to using what ever piece of scrap the Orc was using. But these I'm willing to let go of if people think it would involve too much book keeping and a lose of fun to the campaign.

The big change that I'm thinking about is Changing the Druid, Cleric and Sorcerer classes which will be the only classes that the humans have access to since wizarding is soley the realm of the Elves. The Sorceror I'm thinking of would have the ability to switch 1 spell known per day though it would require him to drain half the spells at that level. Is that too harsh or too light? Also I think that they should be able to know more spells at each level. Would increasing the # known by 1 be fair or should it go off of their Charisma modifier? Also I'm taking away the familiar. Should I allow them to use the Sorc alternative in the PHII or is there another alternative that is also good?

Clerics and Druids would take the new sorceror class and switch spell lists. Maybe adding a animal companion to the Druid. Is this a good switch or should they have more or a differences in the way the classes play?

And is D+D the right system for this? It's the system I'm most familiar with and that I think I can force into the kind of campaign that I would like but I can see how WHFRPG would be superior in many aspects that I would like.

Dr Bwaa
2008-02-14, 11:47 AM
That's a cool concept. I really enjoy low-magic, low-power games of that sort, and the premise is really cool.

For sorcerers, I'd say either the Metamagic Specialist in PHBII or, if you think that's a little strong for what you're looking for, allow them to prepare a metamagic spell at the expense of a spell slot (ie. homebrew a little bit of wizard into them to reduce versatility of spells/day but allow metamagic: essentially, make them have to prepare the metamagic aspect of it ahead of time, and not be able to spontaneously cast in that spell slot.).