Week 0: Shadows GatherThe withdrawal of the church leaves the Fringe in chaos. Many outposts, monasteries and fortresses have been abandoned, or are held only by a skeleton force. Beasts and monsters, once nearly driven to extinction by the church's constant patrols and vigilant heroes, are sighted once more. Nobles ignore church-brokered agreements, seeking vengeance for past sleights or simply wealth and power. Bandits too take advantage from the sudden chaos and vanished patrols, harassing travels and traders alike.
It won't take long for the local powers to adjust and sort out their troubles, but in the chaos of the sudden withdrawal, there's plenty of opportunity, if one knows how to find it.
Event : Chaos : Bonus to planning for all people.
The local population maintains some interesting myths about your new home. Many are about it's purported origin, attributing it's construction to Gods, ancient heroes or evils. Some say it was build by men, but cursed. Others claim it has always been there, an outcropping or growth on the cliff upon which it stands. Some say that the tower itself is a living entity. One interesting myth, or well a prophecy really, says that the tower has been host to many people, but that it only ever had 1 master. Everyone else, every petty ruler, hero, commander or priest was merely a Guest, tolerated and served, but a Guest nonetheless.
All quaint tales, but they may serve your purposes. For you, however, the primary benefit is that it's empty, sturdy and a perfect spot to practice magic.
Name: Johann Vrax
Archetype: Wizard (Master of the Magical and mundane: strong bonus to plotting)
Race: Human - of all the civilized races, perhaps the most prone to lofty ambition and through it, the temptations of evil.
Infamy: 0
Gold: 2000
Resources: 100
Magic : 3
Minions: (5/5)
- 1 Apprentice
- 4 Serfs
Base:
Description: A remote and ancient guard tower, predating even the Crusades. Cleansed and occupied by the Church, it has for centuries watched over the surrounding badlands for the taint of evil. With the withdrawal of Church forces to their heartlands, the tower was reluctantly abandoned, and has since found a new owner.
Traits:
- Shadowed Past : no-one knows who built this tower, for what purpose, or even when. Even after centuries of Church investigation, it still has secrets left to tell.
- Solid Construction: This tower has stood for centuries, and survived being stormed or seiged numerous times. Whoever built it clearly intended it to last, and knew what they were doing.
- Imposing location - atop a rocky outcrop, the tower commands views of miles around, dominating the surrounding land.
You awaken in a town whose name the world has forgotten. Once it was ruled by a strict Lord with a dark secret, but he too has been forgotten. Ages ago, the church found this place, discovered the secret, and purified everything. They burned the town to the ground, grew forests over it's once lush fields, and erased it's memory from the world. Then, you were already dead, of course. The purification tore away the rituals that bound you, and almost exiled the essence that corrupted. But divine power is not so easily overcome.
The times are changing, and as the flows of magic grows ever more turbulent and chaotic, your life returns to you.
Name: Vivian Powell
Archetype: Monster (This is not my final form)
Race: Human, once, now corrupted and change into something similar, but vampiric, by the goddess they follow.
Infamy: 0
Gold: 4000
Resources: 150
Magic : 2
Minions: (5/5)
- 1 Vampiric Bandit
- 4 Thralls
Description: Vivian Powell was long ago the third born daughter of a declining noble family. She had the teaching one would expect a child of her status would have, learning composure and proper speech, but she cared very little for such things. She was more interested in watching the guards training, stories of adventure, and freedom along with a few other things not considered proper for a lady mostly thanks to her father whom died when she was 8. However, sometime after her father had passed, her mother found out about her desires, and was very strict with her, but still this didn't dissuade her and if anything had the opposite effect, only making her more interested and even made her want to run away and be free, only to have her escape attempt foiled resulting in being under constant observation by the guards.
Eventually, at the age of 17, she was to be married off to someone she never met by her mother in the attempt to create ties with a stronger family and stop their own's decline however on the trip the carriage was attacked by a group of poorly equipped and trained bandits. The guards naturally took care of them quickly but while they where distracted she managed to escape after being chased by the guards a bit. The reason this was even possible was mostly due to the guard that was watching her having been lightly armoured and having taken a blow to the back of the head when he made the unwise decision to turn and try to see what the commotion out of the carriage was.
Once she was a fair way away and sure she was safe from being captured by her own guards, she tried to find something to use as a weapon so she could follow her dreams, though all she was able to get was an old spear she took from a dead body after about a day of searching. She actually struggled to get food or even find a village for some time, living on her own. At first she was worried as she didn't really know too much about survival, only hearing bits and pieces from the stories she loved, but eventually she understood some basics and loved every moment of it.
When she finally found a village, she asked around if they had any issues, but the only ones where a lack of cattle and people to work the fields. Naturally upset, she would ask individuals if they needed anything, only for them to request menial and uninteresting tasks. Eventually night came, and she rested in town until morning came and she went on her way to the next village.
Some time of travel, she was attacked by bandits, although they weren't like the ones who attacked her carriage, instead they where proper deserters. She tried fighting them, getting only broken bones and bleeding cuts for her efforts, along with everything except the clothes on her back and her spear, which the bandits thought of as worthless, taken. After a few years, at the age of 23. Things weren't going well for her, and she was starving, forced to steal to live, becoming not a hero like the stories but a bandit. However she didn't mind, she created her own action and she enjoyed that, however she didn't enjoy starving, and unfortunately no small group of anyone ever seemed to come by, just large ones she couldn't steal from.
She would eventually find herself extremely thin, her body malnourished and suffering until she found a nice looking town, large and bustling. She would have entered it and stolen plenty of food over the course of a few months, but she would be caught eventually and thrown into the dungeon, only for her to be taken by the lord of the town, and from what she heard from the nearby cell, he only took people who wouldn't be missed, and they never came back. She would have died down there and her body put in a crate in a hidden room underneath, but something spoke to her, something changed her, moulded her, and something kept her alive. And after many many years, it was time for her to wake up again.
Currently, her hair is black as pitch, skin white like a dolls and eyes red. She is similar to what she looked like before her death, or rather, what should have been her death, but obviously, the colour of her skin, hair and eyes where different. However she is unlikely to stay looking that way for long, most likely changing in the future, if she isn't vanquished anyway.
Base:
Description: An out of the way decrepit and crumbling fortress in a cold land surrounded by the ruins of a town or city. Once a thriving center of civilization it was destroyed and abandoned long ago and left to face the relentless force of time. Plant life has taken over a chunk of the town, yet the inside of the castle has a few secrets, leading to places more well maintained.
Traits:
Hidden Entrance
The ways of the Wood elves are primitive, outdated, archaic. An oppressive society, dominated by elders obsessed with maintaining "natural balance", or rather, their own power. So when you challenged that precious power of them by taking just one of their sacred fruits, they banished you, and threw you out of their precious forest. But you worked your way through the world, and now, by right of Gold and steel, you have returned, and taken back your forest. They cried when you threw them out, but you paid them no heed.
After all, it's just business, isn't it.
Name: Tervra Malvine
Archetype: Merchant (Eye for gold)
Race: Wood Elf
Infamy: 0
Gold: 5500
Resources: 100
Magic : 2
Minions: (5/5)
- 1 Wood Elf Trader
- 4 Wood Elf Servants
Description: Tervra Malvine never took to the frugal living and balance with nature that was supposed to be her people's way even as a child. There was a sense of worth to be found in large pile of material possessions. It was an accomplishment to have a sizable stash of things she liked. But the things she gathered, made and hoarded were taken from her by her family as they chided her for taking more than she needed from the forest. The more her brothers and sisters pressured her to conform to their ways the more Tervra rebelled. Against their wishes she met with human traders and learned of the subtle power of gold, something that could be traded for anything else. An object that potentially could be converted to any other object. It awoke a fire in her. She desired the stuff more than anything else she had encountered. At first she sold furs, fish and berries but as she grew into a teenager she found that grew her well hidden stockpile of gold much too slowly. She needed more. She had no aims to use it for anything other than hording it but it was like an addiction seeing that small pile of coins grow larger. That was when she stole one of her tribes sacred fruits and sold it to outsiders for a kings ransom in gold coins. There was no question that it had been her who had stolen the fruit. Such an act could not be ignored, such a desecration could not go unanswered and so her family turned on her. With beatings and thrown rocks the people she loved cast her from her home and into exile.
She had kept hold of the money the outsiders had paid her. In anyone else's hands it would be used to settle down and make a new life. But in Tervra that fire still burned, that addiction still gripped her. She had talked often with the human traders and learned much of how they did things but now she had seed money of her own, it was time for her to become a trader. Using the skills her estranged family had bestowed she moved goods through dense forests impassible to most other traders. She exploited the ancient knowledge of her people for profit. Her hoard grew. She bought out other merchants and began expanding her business. When merchants wouldn't sell she'd pay for goons and mercs to muscle them out.
Years would pass before Tervra would return to the grove of her home. She had bought the deeds to the forest out from under them and had come with armed men and eviction notices. She watched with a wicked smile as her family was cast out of their homes and driven from her forest. And what a plentiful forest it was too, this place was going to make her so much money.
Base:
Description: Tervra's base is located in the branches of the Mothertree where her clan made their home. It is a giant tree with a number of structures nestled gently in it's branches. Tervra has installed stairs and walkways cutting into the living wood of the Mothertree at points. The Mothertree is located deep in a dense forest but Tervra is working on clearing a route so she can bring in work crews easier.
Traits:
- Secrets of the forest elves: The forest hides many trees, though exploiting them may take a significant amount of work
Ancient myths among the Bedouins talk about a mysterious oasis near the desert, filled with the most opulent treasures. The myth speak of wealth, curses, ancient artifacts, of monsters and labyrinths. They speak of unparalleled wealth, of immortality, of death and eternal torment. Many people have been led astray by the desert mirages, or disappeared in the desert without trace in search of the treasure.
All things consider, you have a rather big reputation to live up to.
Name: Adjari
Archetype: Merchant (Wealthy Business)
Race: Djinn
Infamy: 0
Gold: 6500
Resources: 100
Magic : 2
Minions: (5/5) [1 Social, 4 Regular]
4 Djinn Regular
Base:
Description: An opulent-looking palace (or the rather sparse beginnings of one) located in a sheltered oasis valley in the desert.
Traits: 6000
- Protected Oasis
- Ostentatious Palace
- Illusions of Wealth
- Mythical Palace
- Deadly Desert
- Major Trade Route
Many things lurk in the forest. Bears, wolves, trolls, wargs. Often people fear the largest, ignoring the many smaller and just as lethal creatures that scurry underneath. A snake or spider can kill as easily massive bear, but only an experienced ranger knows to pay proper attention to the former. Even they however, may be taken unaware by a Halfling bandit. The small, often goodnatured halflings are rarely considered a great threat, which is what has allowed this particular group to stay unnoticed for so long.
Name: Dyrn Bleakwoods
Archetype: Overlord (Undying Loyality)
Race: Halfling
Infamy: 0
Gold: 2500
Resources: 125
Magic : 2
Minions: (5/5)
5 Regular Halflings
Base:
Description: A small wood fort off in the woods, which expands farther below ground then above.
Traits: -4000
- Underground
- Secluded
- ?? (Suggestions are fine)
Author
Topic: The Third Age of Darkness: Fantasy Villainy (Read 3393 times)