Topic: Playing in the Past

[RandalThor]

I was reading over the timeline (again - more specifically the Emer timeline) and noticed a period in the First Era that could be fun to play in:

-16,000: Sa'kain comes by, disrupts the seal.
-15,000: Discovery of Essaence by the Althans. Creatures from other dimensions appear occasionally and the Althans have to deal with them.
-15,000 to -10,000: The Althans begin to develop magic-technology.

In this 6,000 year period (I would go with between -14,000 to -12,000, a period that is plenty long enough) the players could be part of an Althan team that deals with the other-dimensional creatures that come to Kulthea. Sort of like Special Unit-2 only they are Althan. With some adventures revolving around dealing with rogue Althan magicians and maybe going after some dissident political group that is summoning creatures to aid them in their plans.

Yes, it does say that the creatures are little more than a "nuisance" for the Althans, but that is on a racial level. On a personal level, it would suck to be the few score or even few hundred that got killed and eaten by that nuisance. (Plus it wouldn't be the first time that history was wrong.)

What do you guys think? Any ideas on how to make that a really fun campaign?

[RandalThor]

Something I thought of in the shower (where all the best thinkin' is done - cue banjo music ) is that the players can be humans from Earth (from whatever timeperiod you like -though I would do modern as it is the most fun to take them from) transported to Kulthea by a Flow-storm. This way you could give them each a little power or two (maybe not-so-little if you want) so they won't feel too inferior to the Althans and they would have a reason to help out - otherwise they are just too underpowered to be considered useful.

That could be a nice, modern adaption to the old planetary romance stories (i.e. the John Carter of Mars series by ERB or Lin Carter's Green Star series).

[Fidoric]

And why not have the PC be those extra-dimensionnal beings brutally torn from their homeworld, dropped into an unknown world and suddenly chased by dangerous Althan hunter... They would have to fight back, hide, find a way bak home... or simply try to best the Althan and take over their world...

[yammahoper]

...and those humans, desperate to survive, work with one of the demon princes, who melds them with captured althans to create a super althan, the ethnic orgin clan that will one day call itself the Kitaviir.

Humans rule.

lynn

[RandalThor]

All viable campaign options - though I do not like "dark" campaigns myself (in the sense where the PCs become or are the darkness). Personally, I would do it that they were accidentally pulled to Kulthea and they end up working with the Althan - though oppposing others at different times. Call me vanilla, but that's what I like. (BTW: for all of you who like chocolate over vanilla - remember a key ingredient of chocolate is vanilla.)

[DonMoody]

Slightly off topic but ...

While many chocolates do have vanilla, my favorite chocolates are usually dark chocolates, which more often that not have no vanilla (dark chocolate is cocoa liquor, cocoa butter & sugar; with cocoa liquor being essentially just the ground centers of cocoa beans which makes it - more or less - about half cocoa solids and half cocoa butter).

DonMoody

[RandalThor]

Y'know, I was going to mention that about a few specialized chocolates - but then it wouldn't have been funny (not that it was anyway  ).

Back on topic:

I was wondering how much damage to the actual world of Kulthea was there in the battle between the K'ta'viirs? Was entire landacapes altered? Could we use the same map or do we need to work on a new one for a campaign set in the ancient past?

[vroomfogle]

This is a very interesting idea.  I wish I played more and I'd give it a try myself, perhaps someday.

I dug out my SM books to check the timelines.  Assuming that SM present (480) is about 6050 Shadow World and also assuming that a Terran hour is the same as a Kulthean hour  then we can figure out SW time thusly:

- The H.G. wells quote at the beginning of Section 7.0 in the SM GM Book is from 1920.   Thus, our current time period (2007) is PreImp 9623, or 10,103 years in the past of the Imperium.

- SW has 350 days @ 25 hours = 8750 hours/year vs Terrans 8544 hrs/year so 1 Terran year = 0.976 Kulthean years.

- 10,103 Terran years in the past of Shadow World is 9860 years......thus our current year of 2007 is equal to Shadow Worlds Second Era 3015 (about when Namar-Tol was founded, the Y'nar came to Silaar, and Dulucaborn came to Vog Mur).

- Going back to the time of the Althans, or the first appearance of Sa'kain, is another 120,000 Kulthean years (122,950 Terran years) in the past.

Now, if you are going the route of a flow-storm or portal of some sort then how the time periods line up hardly matters but it is an interesting through experiment anyway.



- Vroomfogle, aka Super Nerdlinger

[Guillaume]

Something I thought of in the shower (where all the best thinkin' is done - cue banjo music ) is that the players can be humans from Earth (from whatever timeperiod you like -though I would do modern as it is the most fun to take them from) transported to Kulthea by a Flow-storm. This way you could give them each a little power or two (maybe not-so-little if you want) so they won't feel too inferior to the Althans and they would have a reason to help out - otherwise they are just too underpowered to be considered useful.

Already done and edited, read Stormriders.

(click to show/hide)

An Earth familly having familly problems is thrown in Shadow World through a rift and ends up in Quellbourne... the child is extremely magically active and ends up with your Favorite K'Ta'Viir ( Andraax )
the Wife ends up in an evil cult while her husband ends up on the side of the good guys. Adds up to that a Navigator that had his compass stolen, and a few plot twist. The books goes through all the things described in Quellbourne.

[RandalThor]

I have read Stormriders, but it is set "now." I was thinking of the distant past where the Althans still ruled a large part of the Galaxy and Kadaena is either not in existence yet or very young. (And, hence, not the Kadaena we all know and hate.)

Of course, a game set in the distant past need no "flow-riders" - it could just as easily be about a bunch of Althans dealing with all the stuff going on.