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| Cab |
Wrath and the Aftermath, how things unfurled in my campaignStarting this off in a new thread, as its likely to be a fairly involved commentary taking several posts. This is as much for my own benefit as anyone elses, so please bear with me!
Alphatia won. Sort of. The war dragged on sporadically for years afterwards though. Most of the first part of this is straight out of the book with only a few tweaks, what happened after the war is how things continued in my campaign. Losing the greater part of their offensive fleet in the Great Fire of Aasla, the empire had little choice but to prepare for a long and bloody war. Slowly, slowly, they moved towards taking Thyatian colonies on in the Isle of Dawn. Eventually, after years of fighting, they had taken the whole Island; Ochalea and the Pearl Islands took their opportunity to declare independence, leaving Thyatis exposed; the great and proud Thyatian empire had no choice but to seek terms for a surrender in which they could salvage some pride, and Alphatia, having no real desire to destroy Thyatis, offered those terms. Thyatis agreed to respect the independence of their former colonies on the North of the Isle of Dawn, and in the Southern seas; that set up 'buffer nations' between the two Empires, which Empress Eriadna sought for stability. Alphatian armed forces would be given free passage through mainland Thyatis, in return for which Thyatis would remain an Empire; they could expand freely to the West and South, as long as they relinquished any claims on independent nations and Alphatian interests to the North and East. Alphatian troops (finally, after years of hard and bloody fighting, rganised into well armed, well equipped military units) started disembarking in Thyatis, preparing for the overland march to Glantri. Alphatian Beluga class high altitude airships embarked on bombing the City of Glantri. Emissaries from Alphatia arrived in Darokin and the new Shadow Elf territories (formerly Alfheim) to offer no-aggression pacts, i.e. allow our forces to pass, and we will respect your territory. Nothing now stood in the way. The immortal Rad (also known as Etienne D'Ambreville) now had no option but to activate the Radiance to use the 'doomsday weapon' he had constructed. Aiming squarely at Sundsvaal, he drained magic out of the City Built by Magic, and out of the Prime Plane itself. This created the famous 'week of dread', in which all mortal magic on Mystara stopped working (again, remember, this is more or less staight out of the book; Alphatia finally defeating Thyatis, terms for peace, the Week of Dread, and the onslought yet to come, mostly all by the book). Alphatia was in disarray. Islands flying in the sky falling sedately to earth, low altitude flying vessels surviving by slowly landing but high altitude vessels not having time to land, monsters from magical zoos released and running rampage... and their entire capital city wiped off the map. Tens of thousands died, including the Empress (magically old, but killed by the tempest) and a proportion of the Grand Council who didn't get out in time. With no council sitting to choose a new emperor, Zandor (Eriadnas son) claimed the throne. Alphatian forces on the Isle of Dawn couldn't hold on to their conquests during this week, ending up barriacading themselves in to barracks; in Thyatis, widespread rioting erupted leaving Alphatian forces there in almost as much disarray as they were at home. When magic came 'back on', Alphatia was filled with understandable outrage; Zandor required of every mage capable that they now accompany him to Glantri; within three days, well over a thousand arch mages now teleported, flew into the air and started bombarding the city. Now, at this point things diverge from the published adventure rather more. The PCs in WotI are involved in a sub-plot, to investigate the source of the 'radiance' and to alter it, to prevent it from leaching magic away from the prime plane. While on one side of the great war you have immortals like Rad and Rafiel, along wiht Vanya and their allies, and on the other (Alphatian) side you've got Ixion, Valerias, Alphatia etc., right in the middle there is the curious immortal Benekander. The PCs, with benekander as their ally, eventually made it into the great chamber of the Radiance in time to see the destruction of Sundsvaal; after explaining to Rad that they had finally worked out how to change the settings on the Radiance (the old warp engine on the Beagle, on which Benekander had been chief engineer), they entered the Radiance and started working on it. With a clock ticking towards the destruction of Alphatia, with Rad having finally broken the immortal laws sufficient to justify direct action Ixion turned up to finally sort things out man to man; and with a thousand or more of the most powerful mages on Mystara high over the city of Glantri, the fate of the whole world lay in the hands of the PCs. I won't go further into the plots and sub-plots, but again, most of this is by the book. But in my campaign, the PCs managed to re-set the radiance and save Alphatia (I just don't approve of adventures which end in failure no matter what the PCs do). But the Radiance was still activated, blacking the sky out in Glantri and turning the Alphatians magic upon themselves; the mages were forced to flee, but the Radiance was now repaired, no longer draining magic away from the prime. For the rest of the nuances here, get WotI. Now, Alphatia wasn't exactly in ruins, but it wasn't exactly intact either. After this massive campaign, the Mylertendal factions soon encouraged Alphatia to be more pacifistic again; they retreated into their shells. Thyatis reclaimed the Dawn territories, but did not immediately reclaim Ochalea or the Pearl Islands. The Heldannic Knights (who had been having a whale of a time during the great war) were still active, and Glantri, thoguh battered, had survived. Alphatia hadn't really won anything by the war, but the primary objective of neutralising the negative effects radiance had been achieved. Thyatis had lost, but had survived and would be strong again. The Shadow Elves had defeated the followers of Illsundal, who now retreated to Wendar and Ataughin to plot their revenge... and all the time the Master looked on from Hule, biding his time, biding his time. The next major plot to unfurl was in Alphatia, but more of that in another post. |
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| Cab |
Here I'm heading WAY out of the published versions, and I'm going to re-post information that is now stored over at the Vaults. But this is just about the most important information in my campaign, and only now are the PCs (third or fourth generation of PCs on this plot!) getting to the truth of the matter, and only now are they going to be in a position to resolve it all...
The Master of Hule Part 1 The Master of Hule is a mysterious character, with his origins lost in the mists of time. Here I propose a new origin for the Master, one that makes him older and more potent than ever before. The Master is none other than the Egg of Coot, fabled nemesis of the Blackmoor civilisation. The destruction of Blackmoor also destroyed Coot; although his lands were never fertile, they eventually became a barren wasteland after the fall of Blackmoor and the shifting of Mystaras polar axis. His physical form destroyed, the Egg drifted as a disembodied, entity for an age, before finally settling in a remote region to the North of the Savage Coast. Originally only able to manifest as a feeble vision, the Egg only slowly built up the level of support he needed to form a new physical body. Civilisations came and went, and the malevolent cult of the Master of Hule slowly grew. First, the Master took control of the lands around his new Temple, then he warped the people and culture of the land in his own officious, callous image. Slowly his armies amassed, and his scouting parties ranged as far afield as the Arm of the Immortals, the Yavdlom divinarchy, and Darokin. And eventually he found what he was seeking; the remnants of Blackmoor. He slowly became aware of the presence of two powerful, functioning artifacts of that civilisation, namely the flying city of Serraine and the Nucleus of the Spheres. He tentatively probed outside his borders for ways to reach the Nucleus, finding his armies blocked to the North by a great mountain range, and to the East by the Plains of Fire and then Sind and Darokin. He tried sending an army underground, and discovered another forgotten remnant of the great Blackmoor disaster, the shadow elves. Now he struck upon a plan to seize what was, in his mind, his legacy. He fed information to the Shadow Elves that above them, the nation of Alfheim had become decadent and was ripe for conquest. He fed information to the Dwarves of Rockhome that their fabled holy city of Aengmor was defended only by some rag-tag tribes of orcs, and waited for the inevitable. He foresaw the invasion of Alfheim, he foresaw the Dwarven-Shadow Elf war for Aengmor, but what he didn't see was the Immortal Storm. The Master of Hule Part 2 The Master did not appreciate the lengths that Mystaran immortals would go to over the Nucleus. His relationship with Mystaras immortals being strained at the best of times (more on this later), he underestimated the sheer destructive potential of the great war. While he delighted in the chaos and slaughter, he lamented that his plans were necessarily pushed further back by the presence of thousands of Alphatian, Thyatian and Glantrian troops in the Known World, and the interest that the Heldannic Knights were showing in taking Serraine for themselves made any successful invasion of that city quite unlikely. Still, his plan to encourage a Shadow Elf invasion of Alfheim worked well. Agents of his high in the court of King Doriath in Alfheim aided the retreat of Doriath's elves into Wendar and better, from the Masters perspective, into the lowland forests of Atruaghin. The Masters timely invasion of Sind, together with threats from the East encouraged Darokin to remain Neutral in the war between Alfheim and the Shadow Elves, worried instead for their own borders, and the attentions of all other Known World nations were elsewhere. Doriath, and the elves of Alfheim, stood alone, to fester in their misery and anger, with only the sympathy of distant Wendar. After the war, normality started to return to the Known World region, again with the Masters agents in several countries pushing for normalising relations with the Shadow Elves; this pariah state had to be brought into real diplomatic being to further alienate and isolate the elves. That, and a plague in Wendar, traced ultimately to a disease contracted during the Shadow Elf invasion, further alienated the elves loyal to Doriath's cause from other nations. Doriath set about making what friends he could, but the weakened state of Glantri, Karameikos and Darokin somewhat restricted his success on most fronts. The humans of Atruaghin began to benefit from trade with the elves, and new roads built by the elves started to increase trade through Atruaghin, bringing some prosperity. But still, the desire of the elves to re-take what was theirs consumed all. The betrayal of the elves by their human allies would not be forgotten. The Masters envoys, at this stage, could finally make their move. In return for passage through Atruaghin, on the newly constructed roads (which would take the Masters armies to within 50 miles of the City of Darokin), the Master would offer his forces for a full scale invasion of the Shadow Elf territories. A two pronged attack was proposed; Wendar would assault the Northern borders of the Shadow Elf territories, with the consent of the Erewan elves from Glantri for crossing that nation having been given already, while the combined forces of elves and the Master would attack from the South. With the Masters forces already in Darokin, on the poorly defended Atruaghin border, that nation would rapidly fall, leaving the Master free to assault Glantri and reclaim the Nucleus at a later date. With the combined wealth of both Sind and Darokin, the Master would be almost unstoppable. The Master of Hule Part 3: Ancient History The Master was originally of a primitive species not entirely unlike the roper. He was 8' tall, with many tentacles, a large, gaping, toothy mouth and a single eye. He was, in fact, of the same species as Zargon, ancient 'god' of the lost city of Cynidicea. Although the culture, history and even name of this species has been lost to time, three individual members of that species are noteworthy. The first was Arik (of which more later, and see module B3), the second was the Master (at that time known as Hosadeus), the third was Zargon (see B4). All three of these beings rose to prominence as followers of the Outer Beings, serving to guide the Carnifex (first introduced to us in one of the Masters modules) to their own ends. All three strove individually to attain immortality, at a time when the dividing line between immortal and mortal was still poorly defined. One 'position' in the immortal ranks was offered, by an as yet unknown entropic sponsor, and all three creatures competed for this place. Arik won out, reaching full immortality in the sphere of Entropy (in the process creating the Beholder race, being an improved and more dangerous version of his own body form) long before the rise of Blackmoor, defeating his rivals (the Master and Zargon) in the process. Zargon was driven mad by the loss, and retreated into his own region, eventually becoming the almost immortal patron of the lost city of Cynidicea. What he remembers of the ancient past is unknown, but outside of Cynidicea he has played little part in Mystaran history. The Master continued to oppose Arik, but he was soon defeated, his life force being dispersed by Arik. Eventually, some humanoid creatures discovered his teachings, and he coalesced around a nation known as Coot, building a new identity as the Egg of Coot, together with a body form more in fitting with the now dominant humanoid species of Mystara. He began plotting the demise of his nemesis, Arik. But Arik had his own agenda; during the time that the Master had been gone, he had allied himself with the outer beings, who had once again waged war against the immortals. For his crimes, Arik was forever banished to the Dimension of Ice (a far away, inaccessible prison plane) and his servant race, the beholders, scattered far and wide. So to gain his revenge, the Master would have to build his own power, and eventually release Arik from his prison, that he may be killed. The Master has many flaws; he is not one to forgive an insult or a sleight, however small. He is almost incapable of comprehending mercy or compassion. He is no ordinary creature of evil; he prefers corruption to delay and cruelty to death. But he has one important virtue; he is patient. He built the nation of Coot for the purpose of driving a rival nation to a point where it could produce what he needed to reach Arik and destroy him. That nation was Blackmoor. |
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| Cab |
And more later... | ||||||||||||||
| Cab |
The Master of Hule, part 4: Blackmoor
Coot wasn't all about being evil. Oh, there was plenty of evil to go around; the Egg of Coot wasn't in any way not evil. In fact he was the nastiest thing around at the time. But he wasn’t evil just for the sake of it, or at least not professionally. His goal was simple; he needed to create a power source sufficient to (a) bring Arik out of his prison, and (b) negate Ariks immortal magic after release, making him defeatable. Then the Hosadeus (now known as the Egg, later to be known as The Master) would have his revenge, and could in theory quest for immortality himself. Coot therefore wasn’t constructed for conquest or subjugation, it was built for one purpose, and one purpose alone; to encourage Blackmoor to develop into a powerful, technological civilisation. It was the Egg that guided Beagle down to onto Mystara. The Egg was patient, but he could not allow an opportunity like that to pass; it was his message that caused Beagle to come to Mystara, and it was his doing that the ship crashed. And it was with the constant threat of extermination from Coot that caused Blackmoorian scientists to push too far, too fast. But the Egg didn’t get everything his own way; a group of adventurers eventually (with immortal guidance) determined that the Egg was responsible for this advanvement, and in a desperate attempt to prevent the release of Arik, they destroyed a number of key reactors in the City of Blackmoor, unexpectedly leading to a chain reaction that decimated the City, and indeed most of the hemisphere. The explosion was so great that it eventually led to the planet shifting on its axis, in addition to completely destroying Blackmoor, Coot, and many other lands. But the Egg survived, although the physical manifestation he had at the time did not. And eventually, he coalesced into another form, that of the Master. |
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| alhoon |
Thanks for the effort.  Since this is your campaign I won't start arguing, but I will just ask:
Did you and your PCs enjoyed it? Comments: 1. I also hate adventures that the PCs are doomed to fail. 2. Thyatis couldn't claim back the Isle of Dawn so fast, even without Alphatia there... 3. The Alphatians would probably ask for more than just liberation of the colonies after such a war. 4. 1000 archmages? ! ? Where did Alphatia found such a horde? OK they are magicians and all the nobles are magicians, but did they sent all they powerful mages? Nobody remained in his tower/land/home? Even so, Alphatia really has 1000 magic uses 26-36 level? |
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| Cab |
Thus far, yes. The campaign ran in Nottingham for four years, then here in Cambridge for 7 or so. And before that I ran my Norwold based campaign in Lancaster and Gateshead (thats my home town). The Nottingham lot dealt with WotI, the Cambridge lot (the high level, 28th level ish party) are now on the cusp of solving the Master issue, or at least putting it off again for another few generations, and in the process may start a major war in the Known World or prevent one. It's up in the air, as it should be.
Everything Westrourke and Southwards on the Thyatian side was only too happy to rejoin the Empire. And the former Thyatian holdings to the North of there were obtained by classic Thyatian methods; treachery and assassination, which really boost the effectiveness of your armed services if you're good at them.
Thats by the book, its Eriadnas solution. Alphatia could seek reparations, but that wouldn't lead to a swift end to things and it certainly wouldn't leave stability, which was what Eriadna wanted when making such a deal.
No, Alphatia has many, many, many more than that. It has a ruling council of 1000 36th level mages, and thats only the ones who are interested in politics, there are many more than that. And yes, once again thats by the book. Incidentally, mainland Thyatis has, as published, something over 250. |
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| Havard |
I enjoyed reading about your campaign Cab. I have picked up quite a few details before, but I liked this presentation of it.
It makes me wonder though, if 1000 Archmages attacked a city, how much would really be left of it? Even if all the Princess of Glantri worked to defend it? I liked your explaination about Zandor being the architect of that crazy raid on Glantri though. It makes alot of sense. The mages probably acted extra stupidly because of the previous Week Without Magic. Your presentation just helps make sense of those events. IMC there are likely only about 1500 Archmages on the Planet of Mystara including the 250 in Thyatis and the 1000 on the Alphatian Council. Many of the remaining 250 also have connection to the Known World and the Alphatian region. Havard |
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| Cab |
Thing about 36th level mages is that they're never as good in a fight as they really should be 
Suppose you're a 36th level mage, and lets say that you're very intelligent but no genius (17 intelligence or less, so you can't cast wish). And suppose you've just had your capital city destroyed, and the world as you know it is in tatters; oh, and you're going to a meeting of the Grand Council. Suppose also you've got some of the same mage options as they have over in Glantri (I use most of those as general skills). The important one here is spell combination, giving you (by my calculations) 405 spell levels. Now, you're in an urban environment; you don't want loads of big blatty spells for your every day life. You take maybe a couple couple of fireballs, a delayed blast fireball or two, magic missiles aplenty (wonderful spell for a high level mage, machine gunning down peasants a-plenty), some power words in case of bigger foes, charms, utility spells, but of the big BIG structural damage spells you're only going to have a couple of disintegrates, maybe a meteor swarm or two, dissolve, move earth, that kind of thing. But most importantly, in that state of heightened fear you're well prepared with loads of defensive and escape spells like immunity, sheild, mirror image, projected image, statue, sword, teleport, teleport any object, dimension door, fly, haste, contingency spells. You've also got plenty of create monsters spells, timestops, forcefields and other walls... all the spells you'd need to distract foes long enough to take them out with direct damage spells. And you wouldn't leave home without Gate and Maze (the former is the ultimate escape, the latter is the single safest way to deal with anyone wielding a sword!) Make no mistake, if they all turned up at the gates of Glantri with loads of disintegrates and meteor swarms then they could make a right mess of the place, but as things stood, as an impulse attack, the damage might be quite surprisingly limited. Factor in three more things; firstly, most of the Alphatian mages aren't callous, heartless killers. They'll fireball an opposing army, sure, but they don't take kindly to being made to kill children in their sleep; the attack would be somewhat half hearted. Secondly, Glantri is well built in stone, so fires don't spread there; a thousand fireballs would certainly create a firestorm in a wooden city, but not a stone one. And thirdly, Glantri is a city built with massive waterways, its rather like Venice, and like Venice fires wouldn't spread. In my campaign Glantri was battered and beaten, and the death toll was horrendous, but the City survived almost intact.
Even at her most imperialistic, at her angriest, turning up at Glantri and blowing hell out of everything would never be Eriadnas way. Zandor, however, being completely hat-stand (and in my campaign under the influence of the 'wrong sort of people', as I hope to come to as I go further into this) is a different kettle of fish.
Thats a reasonable number, and if I were to guess how many are in my campaign it would be between that and 2000. Beggars belief, really 
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| Cab |
Okay... So much more to explain here, that I should really write down, but I don't quite know where to start. This delves into ancient history in my campaign, and its also some of the edited hilights of the last 15 years of gaming, pared down to the stuff that is still plot relevant. Really I'm typing this out for my own future reference, and because future and present players may find it handy. I may even see if I can get some of them here to correct me when I go wrong.
Okay, lets take a look at Arik first. This dips in and out of canon, and contains passing references to at least four classic modules here, for the observant 
Arik - The Eye Tyrant - his curse, his followers, and his eyes It isn't entirely relevant why Arik was exiled. It isn't even remembered really; it was long ago, before elves, men and dwarves roamed on the surface of Mystara. He, along with Hosadeus and Zargon, were amongst the first sentient beings on the planet, and Arik became immortal before the lines between mortal and immortal were so very distinct; in the great war between the Immortals and the Other beings (known occasionally as the Outer beings, it is difficult to know exactly who these creatures were although it is believed that the long lived animosity between the Draeden and the Immortals is linked to them) Arik sided against the other Immortals. On the losing side in that conflict he was banished, as were some of the powerful mortals who served the enemy (Ariks most loyal followers, the Carnifex). They were sent to a distant prison plane, reachable only by very complex and difficult magical means. There, they waited, and slowly began to plot. The Carnifex were not Ariks only followers, he had also created his own servitor race, the beholders, and they were already spread far and wide across the multiverse before the exile. While some few beholders contine to worship Arik to this day, few remember his teachings. That does not mean, however, that Arik has been forgotten, in fact there have been cults to Arik since ancient times. And it was one such cult that re-discovered the means to produce an Eye of Arik, a device attracting evil creatures and creating a small rift to the plane of Ariks imprisonment, also the first step needed to free Arik. Originally, they plotted their dark craft in caves in the Borderlands, near Castellans Keep in Traldara. Soon they were ready to experiment, and smuggled the ingredients they needed into Haven, where they brought a terrible curse upon the land. Delighted with their efforts, the evil priests of Arik returned to their caves, only to suffer an untimely demise at the hands of some young adventurers, 'led' by the mage Obsidian, including the priest Keithsara (metamorph, and priestess of Kagyar), Marilyn (manteis bard from North Norwold, or Caltia) and Beotach (warrior, and North Norwold barbarian), Squerglar (Bellisarian burglar extraordinaire) and Apophis (Thothian Paladin of Ra, a.k.a Ixion), and Eduardo Silverberg (or Ed, an assassin of complex parentage, but raised in the bleak city of Skyfyr in the Alphatian colonies on Esterhold). These adventurers killed the priests in their hideout and temple at the Caves of Chaos, and lifted the curse over Haven. It was, incidentally, the same adventurers who later discovered Rheddrian Benekander trapped in his own 'shield', which led them on a path that later put them in the right place at the right time (the Radiance) to save Alphatia from being sunk, but that is a story for another day. More on that later. What the party did not discover at that time was that the ringleader was a mage named Fredegar, who had been the first to rediscover Ariks teachings while on an adventure on the Isle of Dread (Master Terari himself, of the Collegium Arcanum in Sundsvaal, warned Fredegar of the dangers of those texts, but alas Fredegar did not listen); coincidentally, he was accompanied at the time by Marilyn, Ed and Keithsara, among others, and Obsidian would later have the same master that Fredegar served (Spirrel) at the time. Suffice to say that this earned them the never ending emnity of Arik and his followers; he later sent assassins to kill the party but failed, and after many years, and many skirmishes between his followers and the party, a group of priests finally managed to raise another Eye, only this time in Magan, a city in Southern Norwold, and seat of the Duke of Maganshire, an ancient wizard named Spirrel. Spirrel was, incidentally, Obsidians master, and several other adventurers already involved in this plot (Squerglar and Beotach among them) owed him fealty. That party of adventurers (now also having among its ranks Bethany, a dryad druid, and Singer Soulfire, an elven druidic knight) battled their way through the city of Magan (infested now with horrific monsters), into the castle, defeated Fredegar (who was forced to flee) and destoyed the new Eye. Having raised the curse, they discovered that Spirrel was unrecoverably dead, having died a final death battling Fredegars hordes. Beotach, most senior count in the land, now assumed title of Duke. Note: For reference, Beotach was an NPC who travelled with the party for many years, an NPC with a considerable history which will probably not become relevant here; Fredegar was a PC until shortly after discovering those texts, when the player moved away, all of the other adventurers named were PCs, including Obsidian, Marilyn, Keithsara, Apophis, Bethany, Singer, Squerglar... Other PCs like Diana and Juiven came and went from that group, but they were the mainstays for years. I like to keep old PCs in my games; Spirrel was a PC in yet another earlier incarnation of my campaign, which is littered with such characters. Also accompanying Fredegar, Marilyn, Ed and Keithsara were Gelbo Nimblefingers, halfling Berserker from Leeha, Rhodacter a mage native to Rainbow Park on the Alatian Islands, Thermon priest of Averyx (a non-canon immortal patron of Alphatian Imperialism) and Throm (a dwarf so stupid that he nearly drowned in an attmept to run down the hold of a sinking ship in full armour, to rescue his bag of gold - and who later became head of Maganshires income tax collection service. Later, I'll have to go into Keithsaras story in somewhat more detail, and also that of Fredegar. |
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| alhoon |
OK.... In case I'm not mistaken Alphatia has about 6-7 million people before it sank. 1000 36lvl archmages in the ruling council means:
1. About 1000 36th lvl mages locked in their towers, not giving a damn about the world. 2. About 1/3000 people in Alphatia is a 36th level magic user 3. 2000 36th level mages mean at least 10000 26th-36th level magic users or thatat least 1/600 people in Alphatia is a master mage, commanding the forces of the world. 4. The PCs get to 30 level after saving the world a couple of times, battling dragons the size of a castle etc... and they're weaker than every and all of 1000 people in the ruling council, and countless other nobles/scholars around the land. If I was a player, I would have been frustrated that I would be so... unimportant after so much work. Even gathering money from a county has its challenges (wars, raids, disasters, crazed people using artifacts that could sink a continent etc.) I certainly won't tell anyone how to run his/her campaign, but I just note that I respectfully disagree with these figures. I believe that a ruling council of 100 21-36th level mages for Alphatia is good enough. Along with 500-600 more high level noble mages or crazed guys locked in their tower around the land. I believe that Thyatis should have... 1/5th of the mages Alphatia has so about 60-70 magic users of levels 21-36th. But that's just me. |
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| Cab |
It simply isn't true that they don't give a damn about the world, its more the case that they care passionately about the bits they're interested in. Theres a good description of this mindset in DotE.
Dunno, I'd have to have a good look at the demographics pre-WotI. Remember that as well as Alphatia theres Bellisaria, Esterhold, Norwold, the Isle of Dawn, and the Grand Council is made up of people from all of those colonies and others too. Add to the fact that any great mage from the Empire is going to keep an estate on the mainland somewhere, and yes, you've got completely skewed demographics.
Errm... Sort of. Remember, the trick to becoming a 36th level magic user is not dying. The lifespans of some of the example mages (look, for example, at the emperors) is in the hundreds of years. When that starts happening, all of the greatest mages get to very high level, whereas the others simply die at some point. That skews things more to the top level than I think you're looking at. But yes, greater than 1/600 people on mainland Alphatia would be powerful (name level ish or above) mages.
And the PCs get to do it in 15-20 years of adventuring, wheras a bookish (rich) archmage does it after 200 years or more of research, and after spending millions (or at the very least many hundreds of thousands) of GP in the process.
The thing is, the PCs are in principle less 'powerful', but a concerted effort from a bunch of 25th level PCs is something to be feared even by the greatest arch mages on the planet, and the PCs have something that most of the grand council never have; worldly experience. They're tough and resourceful in ways that most arch mages aren't. And remember, a PCs rise to prominence is meteoric in comparison with that of a stay at home mage. That makes them dangerous and unpredictable; a party of PCs will have abilities, weapons and spells available that make them impossible to predict, whereas a stay at home specialised mage has few surprises up his sleeve. But all of that said, yes, theres a heck of a lot of raw power in Alphatia.
Thats up to you. By the book, theres a council of 1000 36th level mages, and they're only part of the magical talent that Alphatia has. That stat was first introduced in CM1, and remained canon until Alphatia sank (and the setting then went 2nd ed). But you're certainly not the first person to see problems with that.
That hugely, hugely changes Mystara. It means that Alphatiaha has to be interested in the outside world to survive. In my opinion, it makes the Empire of Alphatia much more dangerous. I'll go looking for an article I saw over at Pandius that explains that. |
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| Cab |
Theres a lovely sumary of what is wrong with Alphatia, why this nation of potent mages never conquered the world, here:
http://www.pandius.com/truthalp.html Add to that the prevailent pacifistic philisophy of Mylertendal, and it all starts to make more sense. Alphatia is alien and quite nasty in many ways; that makes the Alphatian colonies very interesting places for adventuring, and it makes their interference in global politics really very fraught. |
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| alhoon |
Oh, I just don't like extrememely high levels, that's all. And yes, I know. When I used to play Mystara Alphatia was a strange land of powerful mages (That is name level and above) that was interested in the world beyond. Internal politics, usual magic user indeference for the world etc prevented Alphatia to take over the world, but they had a strong interest in expansion... and frankly of keeping Thyatis from becoming the dominant world power.
As for your interesting remarks: For mainland Alphatia 1/500 - 1/1000 people being 9th+ magic user is... acceptable I guess. For some magic-heavy colonies the figure would be around 1/1500 - 1/2000. But that is 9th+ not 26th+. NOTE: I never used the rule that gold gathered by your dominion give you XP BTW. Challenges in your rule on the other hand, give XP so many counts and nobles are 15th+. Good resource for Alphatia that. I kindly envisioned Alphatia that way. Although I disagree with some points and generally believe that the whole thing is an overstatement. Yes, in Alphatia you're nothing if not a mage, but that's better than in many other lands. And for every magic user working to perform a vile experiment that would bring him power there is another one that works to twart the scemes of his evil neighbor. |
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| Cab |
Such detailed demographics on RPG worlds never really interested me. To be honest, I don't think that matters as much as the actual scale; 1000 36th level mages as a ruling council is a gobsmacking number whether the population is a little over 7 million or whether its 70 million. I also tend to think that the population densities of rural areas on Mystara are underestimated (certainly early renaissance Britain had more people in its countryside per unit area than there are in, say Bellisaria), but thats a side issue unrelated here.
Remember that according to the RC and also the extra rules on research in the Gaz series, you get XP for that too. A wizard who has researched for three normal lifetimes length will be pretty handy.
Indeed, its a little over the top, but only a little. Alphatia is wonderful if you're a mage (or rich enough and powerful enough to shrug off the fact that you're not an aristoctrat). But otherwise, it can be rather unpleasant. I like to play on that when adventurers based in the outskirts of the empire end up on the mainland, its good to shock them with, to make them reconsider their allegiances.
Indeed, although whether he's actually 'good' himself is another matter
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