The Council of Affairs

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Sat, 2011-05-14 09:36

bahne

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The Council of Affairs

Having never GM'd in planescape and with a limited knowledege of it all I wanted to toss up my campaign story and see if anyone likes it and has good ideas for me as im abit hit by writers block atm.. my story has grown bigger and more elaborate than anticipated and it's just a mere background story for the campaign. Now my biggest challenge is how to let this story seep into the game sessions and revealing it to the players bit by bit and slowly change the characters lives... again..
(note: I might have taken a few liberties with canon subjects to make them fit my story)

I was inspired by the old campaign - rod of seven parts.

Obsidian Portal Campaign wiki: http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaigns/shadowcircle (last update 2010, the Obsidian portal has not been embraced that throughly by the players and as such I have not maintained it properly since sometime in 2010)

It all started with the council of affairs, a group of 7 gods/powers, neither good nor evil. How the council came to be is shrouded in the grey mists of ancient history. Other powers and deities could hire the council to act for them in planes otherwise not accessible to them or planes and places where the power of the contractor would be so diminished that they would not dare venture there themselves. In short, the council possessed the ability to retain all their power no matter where they went in the multiverse, where normally you lose power the further away from your own plane you travel. The catch was that the council could not operate in their own interests, the cosmic powers would not tolerate misuse of their powers.

The council became suspision of one of the members and his plans, they feared he would jepodize the whole council and decided to ban him from the council, thus fulfilling their own fears as he was filled with hatred and a lust for revenge. He set about concocting schemes and plans to destroy the council and steal their powers and cheat the cosmos. Through careful planning he began planting seeds for a war, a war he would use to prod mighty powers into creating weapons to be used in the war. Weapons he would steal and reforge into one mighty artifact designed to enslave the council and thus indirectly steal their powers, bend them to his will and force them to enact his desires where ever he wanted.

The war that he started was a war between law and chaos and to draw out some of the most potent weapon crafters he got the demons and devils involved, this proved to be more fruitful than he had hoped and this gave birth to what later would become the bloodwar. But not only demons and devils was tricked into this great conflict, beings of either chaos and law was easily drawn into lesser conflicts which fuelled the greater war bit by bit.

The proxy of the ex-council member was to use the mighty artifact against the 6 other proxies and through their connection to the other council members defeat the gods with the weapon. The 6 proxies of the council was very chaotic in nature, they had a thing for defying laws and this essence of chaos mingled with the power of the artifact when used against them. The result was scewed and not as anticipated, the council gods was put into a slumber and powerless but not enslaved and the proxies was shattered, cast down to the prime planes in a misshapen state.

The 6 proxies are the party of heroes in this campaign, they have no recollection of their lives as proxies nor any powers from that time. They have lived countless mortal prime lives, each life draws them together in a group and somehow they end up searching for 7 shattered fragments of the ancient artifact that destroyed them. If all the fragments is found and reforged the artifact can either fulfill the original plan of enslaving the council and in turn destroy the proxies, creating new ones with no free will or it could be used to wake the council and restore their powers and reshape the proxies to their former glory.

That is the core story of my campaign..... the players are about 10th-11th lvl.. they know nothing of this story so far.. they have 1 fragment and have learned that it is part of a greater artifact that was a mighty weapon in an ancient struggle between chaos and law, in the wrong hands it could be devastating. They have been assaulted by both chaotic and lawful monsters searching for the artifact. I plan on taking them to Sigil for a short trip soon... to escape a prison on the prime a former ally of theirs from Sigil shows up and takes them to Sigil where he will lead them to another portal back to their prime.

the plan now is to somehow reconnect them with some of their former lives in the planes while they are in Sigil, their ally will have a small stash of equipment they had left with him for such an occassion but on the way from the portal they escape through to his place they lose him and are left on their own... this is where im stuck

As the proxies they would have been well travelled in Sigil and have an abundance of contacts or enemies or allies in Sigil..... so being abit of a clueless berk with planescape and sigil im hoping someone might have some good ideas or tips to kick my inspiration back into gear

cheers

Sat, 2011-05-14 16:32

Hyena of Ice

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Re: The Council of Affairs

This is just my own materials, but it's possible that group would be Protogenoi, the race of elemental-like beings (not just of the fundamental elements, but also of things such as darkness, light, and even abstract qualities such as sorrow, etc.) that preceeded the Titans, Draconic, and Giant pantheons. The Protogenoi include beings such as Ptah, Kossuth, and Chauntea, though it should be noted that these are beings spawned from near the beginning of creation, before the formation of the Outer Planes, and in many cases, before the formation of the Astral.
This race went to war with the Draeden (planet-sized aberrations left over from the end of the previous creation cycle whose preferred habitat is a void) over the rights to the Outer Planes, leading to a loss of 1/3rd of both the Protogenoi and the Draeden. The Draeden lost and decided to simply go into hibernation and await the destruction of the current creation cycle-- at which point the gods would no longer be around.
It should be noted that a good majority of the Protogenoi no longer exist in their original form-- they have either transcended into something else more fleshy (and often more alignment-specific), or their essence was subsumed by other powers.
A good example of this is Liga, the Protogenos of Oerth's sun, which was subsumed or fractured into many powers, the most famous of which is Pelor.
The Protogenoi fell from power when Uranus was overthrown by the Titans. Similar wars may have occurred concurrently in other groupings or pantheons.

Feel free to make up more of your own, but here is a list of the Protogenoi thus far.
(note: Protogenoi is a term from Greek mythology, but being Greek/Latin, it is generic-enough a term to refer to powers of all pantheons from that era. Protogenoi is plural. The male form is Protogenos, while the female form is Protogena.)
Bear in mind that none of this is canon. It's an adaption based on Greco-Roman myth (though elemental-like beings also appear in Egyptian myth)

--Aether: The second-generation protogenos of light. He is the son of Nyx and Erebus.
--Akadi: The Elemental Lady of Air.
--Amun/Amaunet: One of the hermaphroditic Ogdoad, and Protogenos of creation and secrets. After suffering severe injuries in the Draeden War, he went on to become the Egyptian solar power Ra.
--Ananake: A protogena of innevitability and eternity. She is the mate of Chronus.
--Atropus
--Baccob/Al-Zarad: The current incarnation of a protogenos of balance and the laws of Greyspace (and the Multiverse).
--Beory: The earth Protogena of Oerth.
--Chauntea: The earth Protogena of Toril
--Chronus: A protogenos of time, not to be confused with the Titan Cronus.
--Erebus/Scotus: A protogenos of darkness. He bore a small number of Protogenoi and cacodemons with his sister Nyx.
--Eris: A protogena of discord, and the most powerful of Cacodemons (beings unleashed from Pandora's box). She is the virgin daughter of Nyx, borne asexually. Like her mother, she has also borne many children asexually, all of them cacodemons. She is one of the few Cacodemons to ever reach deity status.
--Eros: Aka Eros-Phanes, the protogenos of procreation, not to be confused with the winged Olympian god of the same name.
--Gaea: The protogena of earth, and mother of the Titans.
--Grumbar: The Elemental Lord of Earth.
--Hemera: The second-generation protogena of day, daughter of Nyx and Erebus.
--Huh/Hauhet: One of the hermaphroditic Ogdoad, and Protogenos of eternity and infinity.
--Hydros: The protogenos of water. During the Draeden war he was sundered in two, into Oceanus and Pontus.
--Istishia: The Elemental Lord of Water.
--Kossuth: The Elemental Lord of Fire.
--Kuk/Kauket: One of the hermaphroditic Ogdoad, and Protogenos of darkness.
--Liga: The first incarnation of Pelor, originally a 2nd generation Protogenos of neutral alignment. Pelor is the fifth incarnation of the deity.
--Lunitari: A third generation protogenoi of one of Krynn's moons.
--Nu/Naunet: One of the hermaphroditic Ogdoad, and Protogenos of primordial water.
--Nuitari: A third generation protogenoi of one of Krynn's moons.
--Nyx/Nox: A protogena of the night. She bore a few protogenoi with her brother Erebus, but also bore many cacodemons asexually.
--Oceanus: A second-generation protogenos of the sea. He would later side with the Titans against his own people.
--Phanes: A protogenos or protogena of creation and positive energy, who eventually split into several beings, such as Eros, Phusis, and Thesis.
--Pontus: Oceanus's freshwater equivalent.
--Ptah: The protogenos of creation, associated with Amun and Ra, though it is unknown if or when one came before or after the other, or what their exact relationship is.
--Selune: A third-generation protogena of Toril's moon.
--Shar: A third generation protogena of the new moon; she is the twin sister of Selune.
--Solinari: A third generation protogenoi of one of Krynn's moons.
--Tartarus: A protogenos of the dark pit. He was either slain or forced into a dormant state by the Draeden, and the remaining Protogenoi built the prison plane Carceri over his body. Whatever the case, his essence remains intact on that plane and is vaguely aware, though Erebus stole some of his divine power and subsumed his portfolio.
--Thalassa: A third generation protogena of the sea, daughter of Aether and Hemera.
--Thesis: A protogena of creation, split off from Phanes. She was slain during the Protogenoi-Titan war and her portfolio subsumed by the titans Metis and Tethys.
--Uranus: A protogenos of the heavens/sky. He and Gaea were the progenitors of the Titans.

It's worth mention that the above list is not complete.

Sat, 2011-05-14 17:43

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

Very interesting stuff, I am already playing with the primordial era somewhat in a later campaign twist... we are using Faerun setting and I am continuing my campaign after another GM's campaign where another playergroup had to sacrfice mystra and selune to recreate magic as Shar was successful in destroying the weave. here is where my thoughts come into play.. mystra and selune had a pact with something i have named "the elemental kings" beings older than creation, cunning, wicked and ruthless even gods whisper words of warnings among each other when the topic is dealings with the elemental kings. This pact allowed the mortals of toril to recieve elemental magic instead of the weave magic, but the elemental kings had a backdoor sneaked into the pact and will use this to claim toril prime plane as their own kingdoms and rule it ruthlessly. When the player group have assembled the rod of 7 parts, rescued their former "masters" and reclaimed their memories and powers as proxies they will be in a position of power to try and prevent the elemental kings from claiming toril as their new kingdom.

but the council of affairs, I have already settled on some home made deities based on my perception of the player characters throughtout our previous sessions.

My most basic thought with all this was to create a story of heroes that unlike your typical heroes were not lawful.. but chaotic .. and not necessarily good .. maybe alittle evil .. mostly neutral though..

but where im stuck is... what to put them through when they enter sigil for the first time... I only plan on having them stay there a short while before taking them back to Toril and then later i will bring them back to the multiverse as the rod is scattered all over it on different planes etc..

we have players who doesnt even know what the multiverse is, even as player knowledge... real life multiverse berks and clueless.. so I want to introduce them to it and make sure i get some of the right atmosphere and feel of things.. all the while leaking some of the background story into the game. Im just not accustomed to writing anything in planescape...

Sat, 2011-05-14 18:20

sciborg2

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Re: The Council of Affairs

One thought immediately comes to mind - Let the players go to the Sensorium for "entertainment" by a wealthy business partner or some such, and while there they experience memories. The sensory stones show each player a different prior incarnation, but within these lives each one catches a glimpse of their original existence as a proxy.

So, for example, one character might recall being a dragon, soaring through the sky with five other dragons, and then suddenly have a flashback to some detail of their life as a proxy.

Another might recall being a child in a slave ship with five other children, and in a fever recalls their time as a proxy.

And so on. The idea is to start hinting at the larger destiny of the characters. By the way I really like the idea of the reincarnation through lifetimes.

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Sat, 2011-05-14 18:30

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

this is uncanny.. i was just chatting with a m8 on MSN before i read your last post and what i wrote to him was.... "hmmm maybe have them meet a palm reader .. or a sensate who can tap into past lives memories
and the name of the battle where they were cast down is revealed"

through the name of the battle they could investigate who was present and through them who organised the ambush and having learned of the proxy of the ex-council god they might learn about the council itself.. i would like to keep them abit in the dark about them having anything to do with the council still...

but the absense of the council's proxies would have been noticed .. and someone might recognize their auras or essences or souls or something along those lines..

Sat, 2011-05-14 19:01

Palomides

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Re: The Council of Affairs

Forgive me for restating what I believe you stated:
Stripped down, you have a number of characters that are proxies/avatars/manifestations of these ancient gods but who have been seperated from and forgotten their planar roots. Over the long haul, you want to reveal their secret histories to them as they go on their quest

For the introductory outing, I think any simple adventure in Sigil would suffice (with maybe a very small sidetrek to a plane or two). I would imagine the real trick is to
1) install the appropriate sense of wonder.This is applicable for any introductory Planescape adventure...(I have a personal rule that if the PCs start thinking/acting like they understand the workings of the planes, I throw something at them that has them second-guessing themselves)
2) [and for your campaign, this may be more critical] create a sense of deja vu for the PCs and/or the people that interact with them.

I guess I would also recommend that once the PCs reach Sigil, their companion is quickly removed (captured, killed, disappears because he wants to avoid some angry debt collectors, etc.) Being plopped in Sigil without a convenient resource to answer their questions or explain things will make the PCs feel much more clueless.

So just off of the top of my head, your PCs get rescued by their friend (whom I'm envisioning as a roguish mage) and taken to Sigil. After a very brief explanation of where they are (just a simple statement or two from their rescuer to the effect of "This is the crossroads and trading center of all the planes of existence"), the ally runs into some enforcers for a merchant or a faction that the roguish ally had promised to deliver some goods.
Because the ally didn't deliver the goods as promised (or didn't place the item/s under sufficient protection), they were stolen by a rival faction. The ally is forcibly taken into the custody of the faction that he disappointed.

Now there are a couple of options:
-The PCs can try to steal the item/s back from the rival faction (possibly needing to align with a third faction to do so - and the PCs might run into problems if they don't understand which factions are somewhat aligned) and then take a trip to another plane to actually deliver the goods (this will also be a good introduction to the nature of portals and how they operate)
-Alternatively, the ally might be imprisoned for a lengthy time. In which case, the PCs are trapped in a VERY strange city with no idea how to get home. They have to pick up various small jobs (statring with a few internal to Sigil, then some with jaunts to other planes) as they learn the politics of the city, the nature and operations of portals, the nature of the Outer Planes, etc. Until they get enough knowledge (or enough money to pay for the knowledge) to activate a portal back to their home world (hopefully somewhere near their regular stomping grounds - unless you want to be cruel and place them on the other side of the world)

For the clues to their connection to the planes, I would suggest at this stage to just throw out an occasional odd encounter. Imagine one of your PCs is an avatar of some force of chaos. Then imagine that the party runs into an encounter where a slaad is running wild tearing apart everyone and everything in its path when suddenly, it locks eyes with the PC, gives a look like it sees something it hadn't expected, then quietly backs away.
The people surrounding you won't understand what just happened any more than the PC will; but after that, most of the populace whisper amongst themselves whereever the PCs go. It shouldn't affect things too much. Maybe the Xaositects are a bit more helpful towards that PC, perhaps some group corners the PC and demands to know the "secret" of how to stop a slaad in its tracks, etc. But for the most part, the PCs will still have to struggle to get money and the information to get by

I would think that at first, the PCs should be confused by these seeming connections they have to greater power. Then this might prompt them to take action to hunt down the clues (such as the excellent suggestions of hunting down specific experiences at the Sensorium and finding the sense of deja vu and higher purpose growing stronger with each clue)

Sat, 2011-05-14 19:23

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

Ahh palo.. I like your thinking... I do not plan on keeping them in sigil for long tho, but yes i imagined the rescuer to get lost somehow, leaving them on their own.. but soon reappearing to take them back through another portal back to Toril... the slaad idea is excellent .. i have been thinking about such random odd things but havent been able to get something out of my mind, but yes that is along the lines of how i would like the story to unfold before them.. slowly oddly with the enviroment around them having deja vu's and them not knowing whats going on but somehow sensing that something bigger is afoot that there is something they should be knowing but isnt...

I think i will use the slaad as you wrote it and throw in one or two sensory stones... somehow falling into their hands, nothing that will reveal anything yet but something to get them aquainted with sensory stones for the future.. and they could encounter the slaad again somewhere, maybe force some answers from it..

very nice thank you !

Sat, 2011-05-14 23:25

Hyena of Ice

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Re: The Council of Affairs

What relation do these so-called elemental kings have to the four Elemental Lords (Kossuth, Istishia, Grumbar, and Akadi)? Is this a 4E campaign? Because I'm afraid that even 4E Forgotten Realms has little continuity with previous editions (Planescape was 2E, bear in mind). It gets far worse if you take anything from generic 4E, including the whole mess with the Primordials, the Astral Sea, Elemental Chaos, etc (4E doesn't even have a Great Wheel anymore)

Also, you state that the Elemental Kings predate creation. Do you mean to say that they're a holdover from the previous creation cycle? If so, then how were they able to survive the destruction of the previous multiverse?

Sun, 2011-05-15 03:52

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

I havent gone into alot of details yet with the elemental kings as such, only a general idea and yep i know Planescape was 2nd, i still like the whole idea behind it. I havent read a single piece of 4ed tho, im just going by my own head mostly, to be honest i haven't looked into how planes were created or anything of the sort. I just had this idea of them being very old beings with great power, the kind of being even gods fear.

predating creation could easily just be some sort of rampant misleading rumour about them

Slowly they are creating portals to their planes around the world of Toril, causing what would appear as natural disasters and letting lose more and more of their servants onto the prime through those portals, preparing the world for their rule.

I imagine these kings are not of any specific alignment, they are somehow above such things.

systemwise we started with 3ed and are gonna switch to WRM..

Sun, 2011-05-15 21:56

#10

Hyena of Ice

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Re: The Council of Affairs

to be honest i haven't looked into how planes were created or anything of the sort. I just had this idea of them being very old beings with great power, the kind of being even gods fear.

In Planescape and the core settings, the Ethereal and Inner planes were created first, THEN the first gods/powers were born. The rule of thumb in D&D pre-4E is that the gods don't actually create planes or cosmologies, they merely establish small strongholds within certain regions or layers of these cosmologies. They are responsible for the creation of many races and some substances, but as a general rule most substances and lands came about either as a result of the Ethereal or due to the beliefs of mortals. With the exception of the Outer Planes, all planes begin life as pocket demiplanes on the Ethereal. If they acquire enough mass, they usually become full-fledged planes of their own-- this is how the Inner, Transitive, Prime Material, and Astral planes came about, along with the vast majority of demiplanes.

I havent read up on the elemental planes yet, as this is far into the future of the campaign. But my idea was that they rule the elemental planes with a cunning ruthless hand, somewhere along time ago i stumpled upon "the elemental courts" with dukes and all that and found it interessting, I can't find it again tho but that was more or less what inspired the whole Elemental kings story.
What you are referring to are the Genie lords, Mephit Lords, and Archomentals. They are not true rulers of their planes, merely de-facto rulers, and in reality they only hold sway over certain regions of their plane.
The true rulers of the Elemental Planes are the four Elemental Lords, Kossuth, Istishia, Akadi, and Grumbar, and all four are of true neutral alignment. There are no "true" rulers of the Paraelemental or Quasielemental planes, merely dukes, archomentals, etc. as mentioned above.

Sun, 2011-05-15 22:18

#11

sciborg2

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Re: The Council of Affairs

There are also lots of things one can do with fragments of memory, or powers that connect to the domains of the proxies' gods.

I think it might be more interesting to have memories that surface relate to the portfolio the proxy was the god of. For example, one of the PCs was the proxy of a Fire God, so memories of past lives center around fire - cooking, dragon fire, lighting a torch, a burning tree or bush...

Also, the relationships between the PCs can change across time as well. Perhaps in one life they are all siblings, in another two are married and the rest are children. Perhaps in another life they are all sworn enemies, led to hate each other by the machinations of rival powers.

Fragments of memory could also influence the relationships they have now. Like one PC dreams another one is his/her lover though current sexuality/species/gender doesn't allow for such intimacy, or another PC dreams that another one murdered him in one life but was his sister in yet another life, and so on...

Also, I love Palo's suggestions on the Slaad and Chaosmen and if the past lives extend into different planets/crystal-spheres/cosmologies I can see Hyena's protogonoi coming up as well as creator gods to different worlds. Also, any primordial beings old enough to remember the Council will likely be at minimum curious about the proxies - an interesting question might be the idea that without the Council divine politics has taken a turn that some see as better and others see as worse...

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Sun, 2011-05-15 22:20

#12

sciborg2

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Re: The Council of Affairs

Also, what if the artifact of the banned councilor is one of semantics-mathematics rather than a physical thing? Or what if it shifts between identities - sometimes an equation, a poem, a beast, a sword, the script of a mystery play that must be performed....

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Mon, 2011-05-16 02:23

#13

Hyena of Ice

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Re: The Council of Affairs

Now THAT is an interesting concept of an artifact.

Mon, 2011-05-16 04:25

#14

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

Sciborg: I like your line of thought on the artifact... could you elaborate on the semantics-mathematics? not to mention the other ideas, also gives more variation in how the pieces are hidden and how to find them instead of a regular object.

the fragmented memories is a nice thouch...I deffinently wanted to play around with showing them that they have had previous incarnations.. maybe even have them play some of them, go back in time somehow and have the oppertunity to alter the events and thus get their hands on memories and one of the pieces maybe or be rewarded with clue to a piece.

Divine politics will have felt the lack of the council, powers now have to use their own people to get things done or hire lesser mercenaries. I agree some will think this is for the better, easier to navigate the politics if you know what limitations your opponents have. Many will have been annoyed and frustrated by the abilities of the council and they might even have been a source for paranoia amongst the powers. This goes well along my lines of thinking atypical heroes of chaos instead of law. The forces of Law would have an interrest in putting a stop to these interlopers breaking the laws of the planes like that.

And im deffinently gonna use the slaad encounter idea, love it.

Hyena: Sounds like my elemental kings are those lords you speak of, I will prolly take some artistic freedoms with their powers and influence etc... they will dominate the dukes and barons of the demi and quasi planes through ruthless politics/diplomacy backed with brute force. Do you know where one could dig up some text on the political/diplomatic workings of the elementals?

really appriciate all your input

Mon, 2011-05-16 07:37

#15

Hyena of Ice

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Re: The Council of Affairs

The Inner Planes book would be the best resource for that, it's long out of print, though (though findable) Other good books would be 3E Faiths & Pantheons, 2E Faiths and Avatars (both are also out of print though) which deal with the Elemental Lords only (but in detail).

Mon, 2011-05-16 07:51

#16

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

aha!
i will put all my minions to work on getting a copy of those!

Really am enjoying you guys' input here, really sparking my inspiration and with exactly the kind of out-of-the-box thinking I would expect from planescape.. i love it!

Mon, 2011-05-16 14:18

#17

sciborg2

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Re: The Council of Affairs

Well, I was thinking of something along the lines of a living spell from Eberron, but more a living collection of poetry and mathematical equations. Thinking further on it, perhaps the artifact is a means of rewriting reality because it alters the foundation - the mathematical and poetic truths under the Wheel. It is a weapon the weakens reality, makes it more subjective than objective - as in more like Limbo. Reality becomes malleable to will, or perhaps whimsy, or half-remembered dreams from past lives...

I know several comic and fantasy writers have posited that idea - viral words that jump from mind to mind, mathematics that rewrite reality. Creatures made out of language. Grant Morrison says the words of the shamans, "are not just names for things but ARE things."

There are also the Spellweavers, who like the mindflayers (if i remember correctly) had a plane spanning empire. The empire of the spell weavers was a docile one, if I remember the Dragon magazine article, they observed the planes from their floating fortresses until one day a magical backlash destroyed them. Their magic was based on semantics as well - I personally posit they spent too much time on the objective meanings of things and left out the subjective, poetic meanings. As in they tried to transcend using computational linguistics, in a sense, but their programs couldn't grasp the poetic variability of the planes.

For good measure, I'd throw in the words in the ruins of Pelion, such as the Last Word that kills gods - used by Orcus though it ended up harming him as well.

=-=-=

I love the PCs going back in time and altering events. Perhaps the Council's freedom to move via the Temporal Prime is what made them so effective and also so annoying to the gods of Law. I also like the idea of shifting history, perhaps not by huge amounts but little shifts.

One idea is that by shifting history one of their genuine friends ends up betraying them - I think a twist like that shows them how dangerous altering time can be, and then they have to decide if the revival of their Lords is worth it. What I like is that I don't think there is a right answer to this question.

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Mon, 2011-05-16 15:07

#18

sciborg2

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Re: The Council of Affairs

Thinking about the shifting nature of the artifact - well Moorcock had his Grail always changing, altering itself into different forms though not into a play as I recall. That was more from Mage: The Awakening.

I think the nature of the artifact at any given moment (or if its "pieces" are stretched across time we might have to have levels of time so here we're talking about meta-moments) determines how to piece it together.

If it is an equation, its pieces needed to be gathered and solved, or perhaps one needs to journey through time and the planes so that necessary prior research/proof-logic is done to ensure the equation is created.

If it is a play, then one needs to gather and inspire the playwright(s?), stage crafters and costume makers, players (some of which I am guessing would be the PCs). I like the play because the moment the acting begins suddenly you can have the play become a chance to alter the past - something similar was done in the Planescape Blood War Trilogy by JR King.

If it is a sword, one must ensure a certain vortex to the Plane of Mineral is created, a certain blacksmith is born - the blade must pass through a certain version of history - perhaps the sword alone isn't enough and it needs the blood of certain beings upon it, in a certain order. This doesn't necessarily demand killing the beings.

Basically, the assemblage of the artifact requires rewriting reality on a spacial and temporal level each time, and each time you get closer to the ideal reality when the artifact's full power can be used to revive (or perhaps destroy) the six slumbering gods.

This constant rewriting of reality likely means the Elemental Kings and beings akin to Hyena's protogonoi end up invested along with the gods and planar lords.

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Mon, 2011-05-16 15:50

#19

Palomides

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Re: The Council of Affairs

sciborg2 wrote:

Well, I was thinking of ...a living collection of poetry and mathematical equations...a means of rewriting reality because it alters the foundation

This made me think of the Anti-Life Equation of Darkseid in DC Comics (although "anti-life" has been redefined there as a meaning the suppession of free will)

We're probably veering far from what was wanted, but a lot of the terms Sciborg batted around stirred up some ideas for me. You mentioned a subjective vs. objective (or poetic) split in reality.
This reminded me of the Iron Shadow(?) from the "The Infinite Staircase" module which saps all the creativity from the planes. A great formless threat that alters reality and makes everyone/everything dull and apathetic.

Your comments also made me think of a solidifying vs. evolving split in reality (i.e. will the multiverse maintain a status quo or will it change into something completely unrecognizable from today's arrangement? - and if so, are these the ultimate goals of the primordial forces of Law (stablity) and Chaos (evolution)?)

Mon, 2011-05-16 17:05

#20

sciborg2

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Re: The Council of Affairs

Palo - like your mentioning of the Anti-LE, the Iron Shadow, as well as stasis vs evolution, though I'd say evolution is more like ordered/channeled Chaos -> the randomness is used to produce an end.

One other idea I was thinking of throwing out were NPCs that reincarnate alongside the PCs for different purposes, as different characters do in Hindu Mythology. Some might try to take revenge on PCs for actions in a past life, others perhaps swore an oath that can only be paid back across lifetimes of service. Like maybe the PCs, in a past life, saved a race of saurians by preventing an Ice Age (thinking of Nights of Villjamur which I just started) and their Emperor promised to serve them across seven incarnations...

Also thinking of Ko the Face Stealer from Avatar: The Last Airbender. NPCs that live long enough to meet multiple incarnations of the PCs. One of these characters harbor grudges or cling to loving a past incarnation, while others are so radically changed the PCs might be surprised when allies in the present were enemies in the past - and vice versa...

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Mon, 2011-05-16 18:42

#21

Palomides

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Re: The Council of Affairs

sciborg2 wrote:

NPCs that reincarnate alongside the PCs for different purposes, ... others perhaps swore an oath that can only be paid back across lifetimes of service. Like maybe the PCs, in a past life, saved a race of saurians ...and their Emperor promised to serve them across seven incarnations...

This might make a good parallel to the slaad scenario above. Imagine the PCs gain a "normal" saurial henchman that joins the party. After a long time serving as a normal henchman, the party falls into a situation WAY out of their ability. E.g. a platoon of pit fiends comes swooping down on them (after they "acquire" a piece of "minor" artifact from a devil's horde) but something extremely disproportional to what they would expect. Things look extremely bleak, then the saurial steps forward and unleashes a barrage of magic and/or bad-ass-ery that levels the playing fiend to a fair fight. Then as the saurial lies dying, its last words are "Now, the emporer's debt is repaid".

This leaves the PCs with three mysteries:
1) why did the "ordinary" magic item they went after provoke such a huge response when it was taken?
2) why was such a powerful saurial hanging out with the party?
3) who is the emperor and what is the debt that was owed?

Even better (perhaps), instead of an emperor, have the saurial reference the "Radiant Lord" or some such title that if the PCs bother to research, turns out to be a title to a major god. How did a god become indebted to a bunch of mere mortals who don't even worship that pantheon? If that doesn't get the PCs curious, I'm not sure anything will

Mon, 2011-05-16 20:10

#22

Hyena of Ice

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Re: The Council of Affairs

While it's pretty advanced and complicated, after you get done reading the resources I mentioned, you might want to mosey along to my "We Need more special materials" yadda yadda "let's Brainstorm!" topic, where I go in-detail on elemental physiology and culture (the topic is a mess and you'll have to do a browser search for the words "Physiology" and "Gaiaism"*

Tue, 2011-05-17 02:39

#23

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

I just love reding you guys brainstorm over this !
awesome stuff !

I got my hands on both books, thank god for RP playing friends eh ;D

Tue, 2011-05-17 11:13

#24

sciborg2

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Re: The Council of Affairs

Hey bahne - out of curiosity, what are the portfolios of the seven (six + traitor) Council gods?

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Wed, 2011-05-18 01:22

#25

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

I havent fleshed out specific details.. I have names and "titles"...

Master of Blades - assassin
Master of Secrets
Master of Knowledge
Master of Arms
Master of Beasts
Master of Wealth
Master of Schemes (traitor)

im at work so dont have the names on me... the titles and gods are inspired by the people in the party, for instance we have a ranger her god is the master of beasts.. I was lacking inspiration

Wed, 2011-05-18 01:58

#26

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

the background story of the current incarnation party is the following....
Faerun - silver marches and the sword coast regions:
a mighty group of adventureres known as the silver circle got wind of Shar's shady plans of destroying the weave, through a series of adventures they discovered that mystra and selune had a backup plan. The weave was beyond saving, Shar's plan succeeded. But Mystra and Selune wanted the mortals to sacrifice the two gods and set about their backup plan for restoring magic to the mortals and restore balance between shadow weaves and weavers. The elemental magic was infused into fearun, the ancient pact with the elemental kings was brought into motion. At the beginning of these troubles, all the mighty heroes of faerun was gathering in Waterdeep to discuss what was happening around the realm (the weave deteriorating) and a most horrible and impossible thing happened... Waterdeep vanished.. and left a huge crater behind it, while taking along with it the mightiest of heroes who swore to protect the innocent and uphold order. (all this was another party and GM.... I continue this story with the new party and me as GM)

The Shadow Circle:
General Galen of the Zentharim along with his right hand mage, the elf known as "hawk" had put together a special team of soldiers. They gave them special training in being covert and sneaky, a special operations unit. This unit was used to infiltrate, assassinate, harrash, distract and so forth... at one point the group had enough and saw an oppertunity to fake their own deaths, they were operating in Waterdeep at the time. They were leaving just when the big vanishing happened, so they vanished into the night.

For surviving they took to what they had learned and knew... they formed the shadow circle, a group for hire by anyone, criminals and lawabiding alike. They operate out of a secret hideout in Everlund in the Silvermarches.

The new elemental magic is taught and trained at the new academy in north keep where the new king of silvermarches resides after the fall of silverymoon and lady alustriel. The 5 heroes of the silver circle are the foundation of the new magic, without them it would not be. They are the companions of the new king and also resides and teach in North Keep.

The current party is the shadow circle, the silver circle is our previous playing group and can still be played on email to me the GM and thus giving them the chance to indirectly affect the setting around their current group. I also use the silver circle as hooks sometimes, as they will have taught you at some point if you know how to use magic.

Wed, 2011-05-18 02:01

#27

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

I have set up a campaign at obsidian portal as well... forewarning tho.. it is a mix of danish and english writing there

http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaigns/shadowcircle

we have played about 1½ year so far i think... they are about lvl 10-11... now we are switching to WRM rules as I was getting tired of the long and tedious D20 fights.. want more motion and flow.

Wed, 2011-05-18 10:44

#28

sciborg2

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Re: The Council of Affairs

1) I really like the Silver and Shadow Circles.

2) What part of Denmark do you live in? (your profile says Denmark, no worries I'm not stalking you...though if you were in the States you might have found me knocking on your door late-later at night asking if you wanted to talk about past life connections to the foundations of reality... ;P)

3) I like those portfolios actually, they cover a good amount of domains that would make the Council useful. Perhaps little intuitions about the planes based on the domains would be interesting:

Master of Blades - poisons, assassinations, but more broadly anytime murders go unnoticed or the culprit cannot be found. This character might be rather disturbed when traveling through the Hive, or in Hell where political machinations create a meat grinder of a society. But also martial arts - a connection to the Cadence of the Transcendent Order?

Master of Secrets - Might have dreams of hidden artifacts, affairs, secrets that have deeply affect relationships between friends, lovers, relatives (thinking of Game of Thrones if you've read it). Perhaps hears whispers when trying to sleep...

Master of Knowledge - Education, Teachers, the process of learning. The drive of the alchemist for his flesh golem creation, the alienist seeking to peer deep into the Far Realms, the humble child learning how to read.

Master of Arms - War, blood, the forge. Sometimes gets the history of a weapon by touching it. Perhaps there is a world where all the iron swore not to harm her in a past life, and when the PCs get there they are surprised when arrows and blades bounce harmlessly of her skin.

Master of Beasts - This just calls for an episode of touching the minds of cranium rats, and the mind of Ilsensine in the Caverns of Thought. Perhaps one day he accidentally opens a portal to the Beastlands, or perhaps manages to open an existing portal without the key.

Master of Wealth - Lots of fun can be had with this, given the notion of currency depends on where you are and what is used as exchange. Perhaps rare scents are used in the Plane of Air, and the burning of different alchemicals is how a nation in the Plane of Smoke mints its "coins"

Master of Schemes (traitor) - The well executed plan, the intrigue of noble houses, the paranoia that perhaps turns out to be correct. A brilliant tactician, and a lunatic who plans and plans until he becomes a wyrm swallowing his own tail. Perhaps his proxy hounds the others across lifetimes, continually causing them to be betrayed or to betray each other.

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Wed, 2011-05-18 12:04

#29

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

the wealth proxy's player has turned down playing anymore, so he will leave the shadow circle and strike out on his own.. I will begin using him as an npc... he will have a part in the grand scheme of things.. if he will be supportive is yet unclear to me... perhaps this will be determined by how much 'wealth' there is to gain from it.. this player and his character is abit greedy and speculative currency wise "whats in it for me"..

the traitors proxy have been hounding the proxies' shades for several incarnations, I have this idea that the traitor god and proxy are lawful and the rest are chaotic and this lawful alignment hinders the proxy from interfering too much and his god's ways of scheming also affects him greatly so he is perhaps nerously bound to plot and plan his interfering with the proxy mortals. He HAS to achieve his goals with them through plans plots and schemes and they cannot know... obsessive behavior much?

and its quite funny how you turned to the time traveling bits... coz i had this idea.. that to gods.. time is not liniar as we see it.. so they see time and timeline completely differently perhaps as one big painting instead of a string... thus .. the ex-councillor would scheme across time to manipulate the turn of events... this is how he sowed his seeds of war and nudged them and cultivated them .. sending his proxy across time, across planes..

now... inspired by your brainstorming regarding the time travelling and your ideas about the artifact.. i have been thinking about... and you might have said something very similar... i just have been having all this wonderful brainstorming rumbling at the back of my mind and its starting to simmer and take shape slowly.. each piece of the artifact represents a moment in time the god manipulated and somehow the party has to find out where and how... go back in time .. sometimes, not every time, slip into another incarnation and turn previous defeat into victory... however... manipulating events so the artifact doesnt get created would result in them losing their current incarnation and the experience along with it... story wise that is boring, you end up not evolving and go back to the start... hmmmmmmmmmmmm
thinking.... the purpose of going back could be.. not to interfere.. but to observe and learn secrets about the creation.. and the whole background story.. to begin with they dont know their own complete involvement in what is going on, they just think they are spying on some god who is creating an artifact but as they spy on more and more pieces they learn how it is all connected to them and what consequences there will be if the council is destroyed or saved. If destroyed the ex-councillor will try to maintain the council's facade and use it for his own gain, in essence becoming a powerful player in politics of the planes as nobody knows it is just him but think they are dealing with the whole council.

this time spying.... will be when they find a new piece and solve that piece's puzzle i think...

damn.. I need to get cracking on this drow city.. maermydra from city of the spider queen... we are playing friday nite.. the prologue for next session is that they have been captured by drows and one of them is a drow female. She will be interrogated, this will be done by live roleplay I have tasked the rest of the party with playing drows and interrogating her. Gave them a liste of topics they would want to know more about... then they are gonna exact a cruel punishment on her, she is very nimble had 20something dex in D20 as we are going to WRM the player didnt want to keep the nimble aspect he didnt feel he could achieve the same with the new rules so we agreed his drow girl was gonna have a serious injury in her leg so she would skip jump and hop so much anymore. ME being me... im gonna take it to the extreme, the ex-councillors proxy will be present in the room where she is interrogated and he will order the drows to cut off her one leg at the knee, knowing how she loves to dance and be nimble this is his way of hurting her.

Then their gatekeeper is gonna appear in the cell and take them to Sigil, there is a mystery force surrounding this guy he sometimes gates to the proxies when they need help. In Sigil he will lose them for a bit, they will be approached by a sensate who notices the maimed leg. She will ask if she could harness the sensation of the missing leg/the cutting of the leg in a sensory stone. While this happens the Slaad will come tearing throught the street maiming an cutting, roaring and smashing lock eyes with the proxy of the master assassin (the guy who is most chaotic in the party) and back away quietly. The gatekeeper will come back and tell them to hurry and follow him there is not much time, the gate they need is temporary and will vanish soon. He will toss them a backpack with some gear they have left at his place in case of such an emergency (i will strip and steal all gear they had in D20, including spellbooks) so this is a way to control new items and spells from the new rules. Then back to Faerun, they will appear in maermydra and the white banshee has another piece of the artifact, im actually considering that the piece is inside the undying temple or a part of it

the city should keep them busy one or two nites

then i gotta work on the rest of the pieces... one of them will have something to do with a ravenloftesque realm with werewolves.. a scenario the previous GM has made and wants to GM with me as an npc

other ideas for the pieces were... one piece is trapped inside a dream world and a certain vampire or lich wants it, but he is prohibited from entering the dreamworld. He does not know the full story of the item, but knows its powerful. He will recruit a group to go in a trance and into the dreamscape to get it for him and once they emerge with it he plans to kill them. In this dreamscape they would be someone else completely...

not to mention im also playing with their minds... sometimes instead of waking up in the real world they wake up in dreamscape... a place i call the waste it is a warped world based on the wizards double standards and lack of owning up to things and generally being a spineless blaaaah.. so i took a cue from his behavior and shaped this realm.. a place where they have no gear, they can create anything with a will power check .. they need to navigate a dungeon where they find runes that has a word attached to it... each encounter is special and has a meaning about the duality of the wizards spineless double standards and lack of responsibility etc... they will face a half demon half angel called halfwing, who constantly switches between his dual natures and constantly asks questions like "dont you know me", "so confused", "dont you see?", "im doing this for the right reasons", "ash lord wills it"... Ash lord is the wizards core .. his conflicted nature.. he wants to do the right things but he also wants to be bad and follow his impulses without regard for the right way... a great example is .. the party meets a band of hunters who is poaching the land for food for the nearby zentharim keep, the land has been severely affected by their poaching.. without thought on pure impulse the wizard flames them dead with a fireball.. later they encounter a group of zentharim soldiers, spares some to interrogate and sets them free ... this dreamscape is created by the first piece of the artifact that he carries on him.

ohhh all these plans, plots and schemes.... I'm the ex-councillor!! hahahaha

Wed, 2011-05-18 12:07

#30

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

oh and i live in a city called Naestved

Wed, 2011-05-18 19:05

#31

sciborg2

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Re: The Council of Affairs

Many thoughts, but real quick for now - How about they do change defeats into victories but this actually changes the artifact as well rather than destroying it. The artifact is a function of time and matter -> It is simultaneously a series of events and objects - items, plays, songs, poems, children, gardens - resulting from those events.

This way rather than passive observers the PCs also get to change history for their own ends. I bring this up because I think getting to change past failure is one of the great incentives of Time Travel. Tying this into past lives adds to the feeling of empowerment that I think is important in role playing.

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Thu, 2011-05-19 03:16

#32

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

I do imagine we could have some far out convo's about mortal life, fabric of reality and god's interference with time mixed with a bucket of various philosophies

I find that I am enjoying the concept of planescape more and more... so much more room for the "thinking man"

Thu, 2011-05-19 03:23

#33

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

I agree ... activity.. im just trying to get my head around what they would have to change and what results would be usable for the story... and im getting all... back to the future dizzy hahaha...

Thu, 2011-05-19 10:44

#34

sciborg2

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Re: The Council of Affairs

Well what you've got is definitely some great ideas. The idea of changing the past is something that will resonate with people, though I might actually have them face Back-To-The-Future type scenarios where they trying to change an event and see it make massive shifts to the present. Just for fun, I'm guessing this could get aggravating after awhile...

Perhaps start off with observation - how did the present end up like this, what are the key events that shaped it? They can ally with the enigmatic Time Elementals (from an old Dragon if I recall) and see the threads of time stretching out. Also gives you a chance to throw in a phanes from 3e's epic level handbook, an abomination the book states can sometimes be imprisoned in a far distant future. Might be cool to have the phanes be an ally, seeking to bring the Multiverse to the possible future in which it is trapped so it can be freed.

p.s. Love the statues I've seen in photos of Copenhagen.

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Thu, 2011-05-19 19:31

#35

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

The ranger... will after having visited Sigil, feel a tingling sensation as if an energy is building up inside her. If she attempts to harnesh and release this energy she will summon one of her 2 animal companions, make it materialise in a golden dust cloud.

I will also use the idea about the Master of Arms... if the dwarf touches the dagger im handing out she will learn something about it instantly. When they are in the ruined drow city, she will know exactly how many weapons are scattered in a certain radius and what quality they are.

The leader of the hidden rebel drows in Maerimydra will be a previous incarnation ally, still mulling over how this will come to show and affect the session and story...

The slaad encounter will be used, as well as the sensory idea.. as the sensate tries to capture the sensation of having the leg cut off she will stumble upon the memory of one of this players 2 previous character that have died (yes, he is now on his 3rd character in the shadow circle:P).

The wizard, a fire savant, will be watched intensely by a Fire Genasi who will have no interrest in talking to him at all.

The first piece of the artifact was in their posession, but is now in the hands of the white banshee along with a second piece unbeknownst to her. The party will learn that she has the first piece, from "the hidden" rebel group in the city, they have heard the soldiers talk about it. That should give them a motive to confront her.

The chaotic demons serving the white banshee (a drow priestess of the drow goddess of undeath) will break of attack on the party, recognising them as agents of chaos.

A Githzerai will appear out of thin air in the middle of a combat, with a nod to the party he will even the odds and just before he disappears again he will leave a letter behind. The letter will explain that a second piece of the artifact is locked inside the undying temple that has been erected in the city, a structure that exists both on the ethereal and material and at its core is a giant orb of negative energy directly connected to the negative plane. (still buzzing on what exactly this second piece is gonna be and what they gotta do).

thats roughly my plan for the first session in six months

Sat, 2011-05-21 13:46

#36

sciborg2

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Re: The Council of Affairs

All this sounds great - let us know how it goes!

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Sat, 2011-05-21 15:38

#37

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

the evening went quite well... they really got into the live roleplaying, one of them even had torture tools along

Sigil went fast... and fun... they tried to get the sensate to take them somewhere "anywhere" but i had their gatekeeper come back just at that moment, couldnt have them wander all over right now

I didnt get to use the Githzerai just yet, nor did I implement any recognisation on the hidden leader, by him or them... other than they felt some kind of deja vu with the greeting he gave them "If you have it, you want to share it. If you share it you dont have it." he uses it as a saying, a greeting... it is also a riddle to which the answer is "secret".. but I might get to the 'revealing' next time..

I got the master of arms ability in there, sensing weapons throughout the plundered drow city, the beast master ability of summoning the animal companion as well, the first of them have now experienced a memory of a past incarnation (not the proxy life though) and they were informed that they had been to Sigil before many times although not told anything else. The slaad incident left an impression, although im not sure they realised the importence of it, but they might when they revisit Sigil.

I am tempted to push it further along, reveal things faster... but that might spoil the whole thing... They still dont know much about the artifact only that is was part of a chaos & law war and that its powerful and not to be left in the wrong hands. They know there are more than one piece to collect but not why or where, neither do they yet know their own involvement in its history or the consequenses it could have if its reforged... Nor do they know their present fate or being condemned for re-incarnation in a neverending quest to collect all the pieces...

Tue, 2011-05-31 14:04

#38

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

another idea just hit me...

the party is currently in the drow underground city of maerimydra, its sacked plundered and in ruins. Following the silence of Lothl a cult of Kiriansalee followers usurped the city leaders and killed off all Lothlites and their priests.

The ex-councilor's proxy is in the city, in the central house named maerimydra caslte, he is there with the leader of the kiriansalee cult. Her name is the white banshee, an albino drow high priestess and chosen of Kiriansalee. He has the first piece of the artifact, which he stole from the party earlier on. The white banshee was granted a powerful spell by Kiriansalee as a reward for her work in Maerimydra, the summoning of The undying temple which exists both on the ethereal and material plane and at its core is an orb of negative energy directly connected to the negative plane.

now here the kicker... across time, the ex-councilor knew that a piece of the artifact would manifest into or inside something called the undying temple. So in order to control the events surrounding the undying temple, he had his proxy take on the persona/identity of Kiriansalee and thus creating a deity and have him work on creating a following. The true power behind Kiriansalee and her spells granted to the followers were the ex-councillor, so the deity Kiriansalee never truely existed as such but was a mere front (puppet) to control and harness power. With enough worship the undying temple could be created and by guiding the white banshee it would be summoned onto the material plane where the proxies incarnations are. All in order to draw them inside the temple so they could release the piece of the artifact, for the ex-councillors proxy cannot himself it has to be the party.

So the white banshe, kiriansalee, the undying temple, maerimydra... all part of the same plan... to lure the party to the second piece of the artifact and to release it so the ex-councillors proxy can snatch it from them.

Im also toying with the idea that the ex-councillor's proxy somehow cheated Lothl and stole her portfolio or something, that his trick is the reason for her silence so the events that transpired in maerimydra could come to be.

second swift kick to the bollocks... the party has to go back in time and stop the proxy from creating kiriansalee and her followers and their worship, thus preventing the undying temple from being summoned and force the second artifact piece to take shape as something else.....

how does that sound?

Tue, 2011-05-31 16:18

#39

sciborg2

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Re: The Council of Affairs

Aweome. I think this will give the PCs a chance to glimpse the mind bending scale of your plot - time travel, gods battling...what I like is that the PCs don't have to be epic to be swept up in the epic events.

Perhaps they could also go back and create a real Kiransalee to do minimal damage to the Time Stream...as I recall she was a drow necromancer helped destroy an entire planet to achieve apotheosis, which would an interesting being to have as an ally. Or perhaps this is just a dangerous temptation for the PCs, that if they follow does serious alterations to the time stream...

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Wed, 2011-06-01 04:15

#40

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

dude!
i just love how you feed off my ideas and brainstorm something awesome
next thing i need to work out tho is how to implement this scenario idea in pracsis instead of theory.

Wed, 2011-06-01 04:20

#41

Munin

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Re: The Council of Affairs

I dont know how I missed it, but its great to see another dane on planewalker! (even if you're on one the islands).

Wed, 2011-06-01 05:17

#42

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

hahaha

Wed, 2011-06-01 13:46

#43

sciborg2

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Re: The Council of Affairs

Yeah, heh, definitely feel like we feed off each others ideas - hats off to you for coming up with such a cool campaign!

Another idea - an entire planet is overrun by the fiends. Which fiends? Well, how about it takes three tries to fix so you get to run through major races - demons, devils, loths (you could add a fourth (or more) try with gehreleths or night hags or shadowfiends or Far Realm monsters...).

Perhaps the final one requires nothing less than the destruction of the world, to show that there some problems time travel cannot fix...or at least not without the characters becoming more powerful or awakening their respective gods.

What might be a good kick in the teeth is they might not even be able to fix things the last time around and have to just abandon the world and promise vengeance at some later date...

Another twist could be taking the elves from M:TG's Lorwyn who persecute creatures that they don't think are beautiful. Have them start taking over the entire planet, so even after all the time shifts what results is a world just as evil as one overrun by fiends but its mortals taking up the reins of the tyranny/slaughter...

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Wed, 2011-06-01 14:50

#44

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

.... the world is a piece of the artifact, corrupting everything on it because it has become a conflicting paradox of chaos and law bound together working against itself. The constant battle between law and chaos inside the piece manifests itself in its corruption of inhabitants of the world.

First they have to quell the uprising of chaos, supporting Archons and goodly beings... then law takes over showing no mercy and no less cruelty... and they have to usurp the very beings they helped last as law takes on its purest form in a twisted manner... then wrecked, flayed, maimed, shattered, broken beings lawfully chaotic breaks loose in a resident evil'esque flood... dealing with this last flood finally shatters the world and releasing it's core.. the piece of the artifact.. ??

and how/why should they find this world.... a random portal/teleport? hmmmm... quelling the chaos is a time travel, they meet the lawfuls and travels back to help them by preventing chaos gaining control come back to the present and find that lawful is twisted ..but why should they do anything about it...

what would be neat was if all these seperate artifact events... the undying temple (kiriansalee), the world shattering, etc... could all tie together into a larger picture .. a grander scheme/plan/plot...

im still tumblin with how im gonna implement time travel practically... should I use an npc to show them, explain to them.. or should it just sorta happen... hmmm maybe let the "wizard" feel a disturbance "in the force" and not completely knowing what he is doing he taps into the chaos power surrounding the artifact and unknowingly triggers the first time travel.. maybe it starts off with them being incorporeal witnessing various events and slowly they materialise back at the first event they saw .. hmmm

Fri, 2011-06-03 13:10

#45

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

..during their invasion of the drow castle, they will come across tapestries, paintings, books depicting Kiriansalee and her rise to demigod. As they confront her and the climax evolves into a fight, the party might be getting a can of whupass.. a portal materialises offering an escape. The portal takes them back 30,000 years to the world of Threnody, where Kiriansalee is a mortal Queen living side by side with her loving King. The nemesis proxy is in town, arranging a plot to frame the Queen for the murder of the king's brother, the setup being the Queen wanted an affair but when the brother did not she had him murdered by poison for fear of him telling the king of her desires. None of this is true, but it is part of the plan to get her to rise to demigod and 30,000 years later grant the summoning of the undying temple to the white banshee priestess in Maerimydra as the temple has been devined to contain a piece of the artifact.

The party's master assassin proxy will begin to develop an affinity for poisons, the ability to sense them and instinctively know which ingredients are used to make them. The poison used to kill the brother has some special ingredients that can be found in the storage of the real culprit whom is a hired assassin. When the real assassin is confronted he himself will be murdered by the nemesis proxy who curses the party and vanishes with a mystereous comment of there being other ways to get what he wants.

Preventing Kiriansalee from being banished by her king, will prevent her from raising an undead army scouring the world of all the living and she will not have to escape the wrath of the seldarine by fleeing to the abyss and becoming a demigod. Thus Maerimydra will not be controlled by the cult of Kiriansalee, but Lolth's silence will still have been and the arch mage will have taken control of the city with his summoned fiends.

The white banshee will not be a high priestess of Kiriansalee, instead she will be a follower of Ellistrae on a mission to hunt down a particular Lolth priestess who had resided in Sizth Morcane the outpost of Maerimydra, she fled down into the drown city now controlled by the arch mage and the Ellistrae worshipper followed and tracked her, she is in need of help as the party comes across her. The very same woman who moments ago in another 'present' tried to kill them, is now a goodly woman in need of their help. somehow she is the key to releasing the second piece of the artifact to the party... exactly how.. im not sure yet.... maybe she is the artifact.. a living entity.. once helped, assisted or killed... she will be released ..

Fri, 2011-06-03 15:47

#46

Munin

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Re: The Council of Affairs

Sciborg: 3 kind of fiends sound perfect, rule of three and all

Fri, 2011-06-03 18:20

#47

sciborg2

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Joined: 2005-07-26

Re: The Council of Affairs

About to step out for a bit, but wanted to say love the part with the white banshee serving Ellistrae. Perfect little stitch in time for the players. Definitely play up little things, or big things far away. Like before they travel through time maybe a kingdom has different borders, or certain townsfolk are married and then not, etc.

The world the switches between dominance of chaos and law, reminds me of some old Moorcock stories/ideas. The foremost in my mind is The Skraeling Tree - was amazing, absolutely amazing in my opinion, Ygdrasil depicted perfectly/beautifully.

The words "lawfully chaotic" reminds me of two things -

1. Chaos Space Marines from Warhammer 40k

2. The idea in Dragonlance, sadly never pursued due to events in Dragons of Summer Flame, that Takhisis - a chaotic evil goddess in the Abyss - could bring knights of honor into her service, knights that believed that she was the rightful ruler of the world.

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Sun, 2011-06-05 06:14

#48

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

you could argue that this council is abit lawful chaotic... they abide the laws by the cosmos that they cannot use their powers for own personal gains, but by abiding by those laws they are allowed to break other laws.

They even "hire out" their services and stand by the agreements they make, otherwise nobody would use them eventually if they cannot be trusted. But they have no rules regarding who, why, what, when, where these assignments take them etc..

so i guess they are a small paradox in themselves

Mon, 2011-06-06 14:58

#49

sciborg2

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Factol

Joined: 2005-07-26

Re: The Council of Affairs

Good point - might want to bring in other such beings like the Fey or Olympians - passionate, amoral beings who nonetheless are bound by rules that seem to almost allow for their power/freedom.

Another thing to consider is when beings have control over time, the question of morality can change. Imagine being able to continually go back and retry relationships, or college majors, etc. Then, on a multiversal scale, going back and saving Krynn instead of Toril then switching it up the next time around to see if you like those outcomes better.

The Multiverse becomes a game board, or even worse a videogame world centered on the checkpoints of a privileged few...perhaps this is why the Council was created, as a treaty between time-traveling gods and the rest of creation.

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Mon, 2011-06-06 15:27

#50

bahne

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Re: The Council of Affairs

hmm... the secrets of time travel was locked away, guarded... the ex-councillor broke in and stole it.. thus being the only being able to access all points in time as he wished, guiding his proxy to set his schemes and plans in motion by moving small pieces, prodding, probing, guiling, advicing, manipulating until the grand scheme of time was played out in his favor and allowing the artifact to be created and the pacification of the council...

however, old ancient unknown powers of the cosmos/multiverse perhaps the real creators behind the multiverse work against this time scheme by moving the proxy incarnations carefully about without too much obvious work almost unconciously or they would reveal the proxies and what they are doing... ?

Tue, 2011-06-07 00:43

#51

sciborg2

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Factol

Joined: 2005-07-26

Re: The Council of Affairs

heh, after that last post I think you should read Seven Soliders by Grant Morrison.

It doesn't have to be the creators of the multiverse (unless you want it to be) though - there are lots of temporal guardians in D&D. Personally I love the Time Elementals and those super-inevitables who guard godhood and time respectively.

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