Epilogue - Fantasy RP

[Guest]

There were those who thought (Insert New Name here) was an eternal society. At the height of its powers, peace and prosperity flowed through it to distant lands and her swords and spells kept back the brutish and dangerous forces that lived outside its boundaries, uniting the many under a common language, culture and values. Under the guidance of the Emperor, highest priest of Itah, magic was practiced only under the strictest of rules, and always at the behest of the Empire itself.

Five hundred years ago, a civil war broke out between cousins as to who would inherit the granite throne of (_) Itah's choice, Anuros, was contested by Nalthuk, a rival deity who matched Itah's unmatched power with his own power and cunning, and his servant, Kollis, the cousin of Anuros.

The ensuing civil war was a clash of different parts of (_) as rebels and loyalists clashed, some out of belief and some out of thought for advancement on both sides. When the sad affair was over, Kollis and Nalthuk both were slain, but at a catastrophic cost to (_); Itah was mortally wounded. The only way for Itah to survive long enough to set the affairs of the Empire in order for the next age to come was to anchor itself into the mortal body of Anuros, with the understanding that Anuros would give up his own free will to allow the patron deity of the Empire to live a few centuries more.

While both managed to rule long enough to try and set things in order, the day would come where the frame of Anuros, despite the life-proloning magics and power of Itah, would give out. And with him, the Deity himself, spent.

Knowledge of Nalthuk's death, while celebrated as a herald of a great new age, turned sour and bitter as smaller powers proliferated in his place, the successors to his monolithic and primordial reign as a name to evil. Where there was one great power there were now many smaller powers, heirs to the great evil, contesting and growing stronger by the day. And as Itah's power waned, their power grew, even within (_).

The magic that once helped keep the lands tame and the cities clean and the empire safe is mutating dangerously in the hands of those that practice the wild or chaos magic, while those who practice the traditional arts find themselves losing their powers. As a result, chaos descends -- sicknesses go uncured and become epidemic, old construction starts to crumble and old bastions become vulnerable against an onslaught. There are some among the magus who make alliances, in secret, with beings that spawned in the wake of Nalthuk and undermine the Empire from within.

Five hundred years after the battle of Phekaeus, the Empire is finally at an end; the corruption from the center weakens it and the strength of the people at the borders threatens to be overwhelmed as the New Kingdoms spring up outside its border, hungry for the wealth within, knowing that the Empire has a hard skin over a soft, ripe middle and that even within the Empire, there are allies and those that would make accomodations.

The Citadel of Volund is one of the border regions, the shield of the Empire against the so-named "Savage Frontier," its garrison and people descendants of criminals and settlers and barbarians who came into the Empire for safety, who have fought increasingly harder to hold the Empire against foes from without. Despite this fight, the Empire falls. Now, they face the foes from within and the hardest foe of all; time itself, no longer content to be held at bay.


--

I honestly see this one as set in an era similar to the end of the Roman Empire and the start of the Dark Ages, with a significant reversal in theology; in Roman times, the paganism of the Empire gave way to monotheism for the most part, while here there is an evident trend toward polytheism, though mostly for opportunistic and amoral sorts that'd make pacts with demonic sorts of entities that sponsor the various small kingdoms and city states that exist outside of (_) and...well, probably will break out on their own inside (_) as things continue to decline.

Characters will be part of the Volund Citadel in some fashion, be they nobles, soldiers and so forth and will have to face down the things that come. I do have the skeleton of a plot figured out to help guide things, but I think in many senses, I want to encourage people to take things into their own hands more than I usually do in many RP's.

Magic used to be a very stable thing, almost another science, but now it is spinning way out of control.

It's hard to say everything that needs saying for the setting, except that while (_) at large is falling apart, the focus will be on this outpost community and how they cope and what they do. Characters can be from all sorts of places, from varying degrees of urbanity and barbarism in their cultural origin. There is a sophisticated economy there yet, but it is in decline. Meanwhile, the New Kingdoms stalk outside, hungry for what Volund guards.

I'm not sure what direction to take it all beyond the direction already set in the initial brainstorming, but I think that will depend on what some of you guys think of.

I'm hoping that people that sign on for this are willing to do it for the long term and want to do some of their own setting development. I'm trying to avoid being too Greco-Roman in culture beyond the bones of the setting, and want to avoid deriving far too much from any particular culture -- half the fun of a good high fantasy is mixing things up so you can't tell where it all came from and it all takes on a distinct character.

The eventual point of the setting will be how the outpost becomes a kingdom of its own, and how the ashes of the old brings in the new, but that need not be done anytime soon. I'd rather get a lot of RP out of this.

I can put up name generator codes and information on character creation and so forth, but I want to make sure there is an interest in this first before I go beyond a small stack of index cards and a flow-chart or two. The idea sort of just hit me about an hour ago and I had to start writing.

Addendum: I haven't figured out where races and species figure into this. I mean, I tend to think 'human first!' because my degree says "History" and I think in terms of human nature and human motivation. I'm not sure where to integrate 'elves' and 'dwarves.' In a way, I don't want to and would rather create new races (without getting outlandish) or go back a bit to the origin of these concepts in mythology and play with the roots of the modern historical depictions and come up with something different based on those roots.

I suppose I will if people express an interest in that sort of thing, as I have the prose Edda and Bullfinch's nearby, as well as the Iliad, the Odyssey, Gilgamesh and God knows what else. I suppose that will come if this idea is taken up by others.

[Mustakrakish]

This looks really good. I have an affinity for all things historic in nature, and while this is only loosely tied to actual events, I have become inticed to sign on.

Consider yourself having at least one willing and able participant.

[Guest]

Very loosely inspired by history. Basically, I took the fall of Rome and the retreat of Rome from Britain and kinda just spun the rest of the stuff around it.

But either way, in is in. In is good.

[Guest]

Hah-hah.

So why did "Denethor" sound so familiar? Because it was in Tolkien somewhere, and the word popped into my mind without me having a clue where it came from. Sounded good, but I scrapped it. I'll name the Empire something else when I have time to think it through and play with vowels and consonants and so forth.

Glad I caught it before it went into RP stage, but that's the peril of brainstorming. You never know when something comes to mind, a name for example, because it was in use somewhere else.

I once did the same thing with the Siege of Alesia, which was the great battle where Julius Caesar finished Vercingetorix and the Gauls.

[Crain_S]

Hello...I am also interested in this RP, but I am a magic user to the core...do i have to be corrupt to use substantial magic? Cause i will go there, if I have to, but i prefer to remain neutral.

[Guest]

Hello...I am also interested in this RP, but I am a magic user to the core...do i have to be corrupt to use substantial magic? Cause i will go there, if I have to, but i prefer to remain neutral.

No, your character wouldn't have to corrupt. But I want to hold back what's going on with that until a later date. Your character might have to wrestle with the idea, as far as they can tell, that they might have to do that or give up practice all together though.

[Crain_S]

So the whole "does the ends justify the means?" Lovely. I will put some thought into this...

[Guest]

So the whole "does the ends justify the means?" Lovely. I will put some thought into this...

Definitely one of the themes for the setting, yeah. I kinda brainstormed this in a day during lunch at work, but it developed into a huge part of the setting.

[Sighlent]

Would you still be wanting more people? If so, I'm definitely in. If you'll have me of course.

[Guest]

Yep. I'm still recruiting. I usually keep recruiting in my RP's, because I hate to lose an opportunity to bring someone else in.

[Sighlent]

Well goodies.

[Guest]

I'll set up an OOC thread where we can shake out a few things and so forth.

[Sighlent]

Shake out a few things? Such as?

[Guest]

Shake out a few things? Such as?

Setting stuff. I think I'm going to try to fit the setting around the characters and their backgrounds, to a degree. The particulars of the rights of nobles, citizens and that sort of thing, and the role spellcasters would take in society. I'm figuring that there is some sort of certification and accreditation for spellcasters, but since spellcasting is going downhill as the Empire knows it, their position in the scheme of things is increasingly shaky.

That's just a few things. Once I do a little editing, I'll set up the OOC and lay out the issues in a coherent fashion.

[Sighlent]

Sounds ace! Just let me know if you need help with anything.

[Guest]

Okay, the OOC is up Here.

[Guest]

Yeah, I'm in. I will need to think up a suitable character though.

[Guest]

Sorry, the link I gave said the IC is up, I meant...the OOC is up. Durrr-duuhhhh.

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