My first GURPS campaign- Dark sword and sorcery with stone age elements.

[Rskennan]

Hey everyone,

I just emailed this to my new game group. I'm a first time GURPS GM and this will be hard, but this campaign has been begging to be run for a while. It would be great to get your opinions on the write up and what I might be leaving out for a fun campaign, and help about what to keep in mind when running the game. I'd like it to be cinematic but grim.

Thanks in advance, I appreciate it.

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BACKGROUND

It is a merciless age of bronze, stone, and blood, when demons that wear flesh reign and mankind's fate will be decided by those with the will and strength to seize power.

Here, life is struggle, from the warring stone age clans of the wilderness who must contend with fiend-blooded terrors, to the deadly politics and corruption of the demon-controlled city-states. For most, the world is bleak and terrifying-promising only pain and early death-, but for the few, untold power and riches await.

MAN

The world is filled with rich and exotic cultures, both in the wilds and the cities. Every tribe or clan, and every city has its own culture driven by the unique forces at work in the world. From the northern beast clans that trek across the glaciers, to the jungle tribes of Karkala, the desert slave kingdom of Solehar, and the seagoing race of Tharlun, mankind has adapted to fit every environment.

SPIRITS

Spirits are primal beings comprised of pure sorcerous forces. Most spirits are either too weak, too unintelligent, or too alien to create vessels for themselves. Even without form, some possess staggering power. Spirits often have power over the natural forces of the world, be they elemental or spiritual. They are less likely to actively seek the destruction of life than Demons (see below) but they are hard to control and can cause suffering simply by acting within their natures.

DEMONS

A demon, simply put, is a spirit within a vessel. They come in a multitude of forms, bloodlines, and dispositions, intelligent and unintelligent. Some are bestial, and some are refined. Most sentient demons see mortals as inferior beings to be enslaved or destroyed, but some are benign. Some take forms like those of men or animals, while others are like nothing else in existence. They come in all power levels, from the lowly Nallock- a demonic shellfish with a deadly poisonous barb- to the mightiest god commanding armies from the city-states. Demons can attain a more refined control of sorcery than spirits usually do. While a spirit might command the forces of air to blow down a city wall or fire to burn a forest, a demon might command the power to make men die for her or to stop time.

Demons often mate with mortal creatures, to create subject races or to fulfill their dark lusts. Their halfbreed descendants are more suited to survival in this brutal realm than their mortal parent. Each is gifted with sorcery in some way, possessing strange powers and enhanced capabilities. Some human half-breeds can become true sorcerers, called Castigators, who are able to command the primal spirits of the world to cast true spells.

GODEATERS

Man cannot naturally use magic. Only those who have come to the brink of death and been brought back by sorcery can hope to command it. Such men and women become Godeaters, with the ability to take the souls of defeated demons into themselves, and if they survive the ensuing battle of wills, to command their power for their own ends. Power doesn't come without a price, however. With the bonding of souls comes a cacophony of wicked voices inside the Godeater's mind, and all of the weaknesses, needs, and desires of the enslaved demon. Some demons require blood sacrifices before they can do their work, others feed on emotions or pain. Every demon is different, and the Godeater is always faced with a difficult choice before taking a spirit in.

A Godeater may face minor sabotage from his host of demons, but it is in their best interests that he ultimately survive. Unless the Godeater releases a demon, their fates are forever intertwined.If the Godeater dies, so does the demon, and so an intelligent demon will try to ensure its host's survival or to secure its own release.

YOUR ROLES

You may play a normal human, a Godeater, A demon-blooded mortal, or even a full demon (if you have a *really* good concept). All of you will have the same (pretty high) point value, which I haven't fully decided on, and GURPS is well balanced, so there will be no *inherently* optimal choice- only trade offs.

I should note now that there are differences in the available powers between Castigators and Godeaters.

Castigators generally (but not always) have a more primal power at their disposal, but it takes training and personal sacrifice. They must devote character points and the energy of their own soul ("Mana" in the GURPS rules) to the effort of commanding the spirits that achieve their ends. They use this energy to inflict pain upon spirits in order to make them submit. Unlike Godeaters, they don't receive the disadvantages of the spirits they command.They use the more straight forward (but not necessarily weaker) spells from the GURPS Magic system with some flavor tweaks.

Godeaters, on the other hand, potentially gain access to more sophisticated powers than Castigators do. They also don't need to invest the energies of their own souls to achieve their ends. Since they don't ever run out of mana, they always have any powers at their disposal that the demons within them possess, provided they can maintain control or perform the required ritual. They use the GURPS advantages, disadvantages, and Powers rules.

Make your decision based on your character concept- if you want a mundane barbarian type who survives on martial strength, feel free to choose a "normal" human and know that you won't be at a disadvantage compared to a Godeater or Demon. There is a bit of thought required in building your character- it's possible to build a character that doesn't use his or her points well, but I'll try to help and will offer respecs for the first few sessions. The game will be gritty but cinematic, meaning that you can expect a lot of danger, but I'll give you enough points to deal with it, and the rules I use will favor exciting action over grim realities (at least for PCs).

As for what you'll end up doing, there are a lot of possibilities- be it righting the overwhelming wrongs in the world, seizing power for yourselves for your own purposes, simply seeking fortune and glory, exploring and surviving... the list goes on.

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[Mailanka]

I dream of Ur

I like it. What's the point value? Seems to beg for mighty Gilgameshes and cunning Solomons. Certainly demon-blooded characters would be powerful, as would Godeaters (fascinating concept), but there's certainly room for legendarily skilled humans running around with huge stats and excellent skills (as well as plenty of luck).

You do lack a bit of mortal magic, though. It seems to me that, were I to play in a TL 0-1 game, that I would expect to see the beginings of what would be mortal magic. Godeaters and epically skilled mortals only take you so far. Historically, magic has been deeply religious, and I imagine, with wild and unpredictable Spirits, that mankind will want to find some way to call for rain during a drought, or attempt to appease the storm gods when they rage. If you don't want "real" magic where characters pitch fireballs without so much as a how-do-you-do, perhaps you should consider making mages characters with Spirit Empathy, some spirit-related social skills (Savoir-Faire being a fine example), and some spirits as Allies and/or Patrons, as the shaman/priest integrates himself into spirit society. His magic isn't really grabbing mana and working it, but rather, asking (politely) for a spirit to do something for him ("Hey, Copper Fire King! I brought your worship to many temples, and you owe me one! Bring down your wrath upon those who stand before me!")

EDIT: I seem to have missed the Castigators. Perhaps they deserve a more explicit reference in your Big List Of Cool Stuff

[Rskennan]

Thanks for the feedback. I really appreciate it.

So you're saying I should expand the Castigator concept to include Mortal humans? I might do that, but it changes the setting a bit. It's the setting I'm using for a novel I've been working on. The story will be the players' realm, of course, I'm not going to railroad them at all, just let them loose in my playground.

I'm thinking of starting characters off at 300 points. Is that good? I was imagining them being about a mid-career Conan's level of power.

[demonsbane]

Originally Posted by Rskennan

So you're saying I should expand the Castigator concept to include Mortal humans? I might do that, but it changes the setting a bit.

I like this.

This morning I just remembered I was going to use some "stone age" elements for my fantasy campaign, too, because it has elements of dark fantasy and the setting is mainly post-apocalyptical.

I like the Godeaters' need of a required initiatic death and "demonic" resurrection (needed for gaining some sort of access or link to non-corporeal cosmic orders, as hells, underworlds or upper realities) for gaining superhuman abilities. That fits with traditional data about shamans, sorcerers and sages in most real world cultures (despite the dark fantasy need of making that resurrection not spiritual nor transcendent but exclusively "demonic" in a negative sense).

Similarly, demons or demonborns already have links with astral-psychic domains so they don't need a "rite of passage" for gaining these links or non-corporeal (magical) capabilities.

Regarding the comment about a religious dimension own to the humans, you may use some religious background and it would "seem" more realistic (according to conventional standards), but if you do that, it is possible the "dark" adjective of your fantasy setting may be inconveniently attenuated because it is easy religions conveying some sort of hope, transcendence or other possitive ideas.

If I imagine your world, I don't see just one known world or epoch already studied by conventional anthropologists. . . but a different one, maybe a epoch or setting where religions don't work anymore due the demons dominance upon the world (and their hunger for political power can be explained by their need of acting upon the world at scope of entire civilizations). . . or where religion still remains in a potential state, awaiting to be discovered, perhaps after the overthrown of the ruling demons (and again, this could break the whole or part of the "dark" focus of the setting).

Both alternatives aren't extrictly anthropological, but IMO both would have a component of "fabulisimilitude", resulting in better immersion.

Perhaps you could work a bit the cosmological aspect of the setting for grounding even more aspects of the setting as magic, monsters and demons, thinking about different orders of existence besides the corporeal one (think about "Worlds within worlds" -Campaigns p. 521; "Above and Below" -Fantasy p. 40 and "Magical Realms" -Fantasy p. 34). If this is going to be hardcore dark fantasy above all, then any truly transcendent domain should be excluded because that could be the origin of non purely evil religions.

However it could be real, but still remain as a sort of Hidden knowledge, Things man was not meant to know (from the viewpoint of the demons and demonborn!) a mystery for posterior discovering being able to change the perception of the world, suggessting a different -or more complete, or more accurate- worldview.

[demonsbane]

Originally Posted by Rskennan

I'm thinking of starting characters off at 300 points. Is that good? I was imagining them being about a mid-career Conan's level of power.

Perhaps it is.

If I want a heroic fantasy feel (regarding the power level) for the PCs, I tend to allow Larger than life ammount of points for them (200-250-300) for them being beyond standard human capabilities, while I keep normal NPCs normal and "scarce" point values.

I prefer this way for settings as this, rather than allowing 100-150 CPs for the PCs while introducing some special "cinematic" or even silly game options only for the NPCs as "no defense roll allowed", "1 hit = a death" and such for making things easier for non really powerful characters.

Thinking about this, 200-300 points seems for me a good approach.

[vitruvian]

Most spirits are either too weak, too unintelligent, or too alien to create vessels for themselves.

Would the animals, trees, and inanimate objects that many spirits are spirits *of* not count as vessels, then? Or is there no animism in this setting?

[demonsbane]

Originally Posted by Rskennan

Most spirits are either too weak, too unintelligent, or too alien to create vessels for themselves. Even without form, some possess staggering power. (...) they are hard to control and can cause suffering simply by acting within their natures.

(bold letters are mine)

Originally Posted by vitruvian

Would the animals, trees, and inanimate objects that many spirits are spirits *of* not count as vessels, then? Or is there no animism in this setting?

The definition of Rskennan about his spirits shows three main problems for them supporting an animist worship. These are: 1) their alienness 2) their lack of intelligence and 3) being harmful due their very natures.

Here are some considerations about these three points:

1) Any animism would need the spirits -beings of a psychic or astral cosmic level- not being straightforward "alien" because that "alienness" brokes the cosmological continuum required in first place for a cultural acceptance of animist symbolism.

The "alienness" of these spirits means they aren't following the path of the chain of the Being nor its inherent cosmic gradation, what is the basis for allowing any being to reflect his existence simultaneously through different -but hierarchically related- cosmic orders. The sameness -contrarily to the "alienness"- resulting from the smooth and continuum nature of the chain of the Being is the basis for any analogic and positive relationship between different cosmic orders & beings of the universe.

For instance: a "spirit" is a "spirit" in the astral domain, and it is analogically or symbolically perceived or worshipped in the natural world through an ordinarly perceptible material form in some way associated with him as an animal, a plant, a stone, a mountain or an object acting as a symbol of the reality own of that particular spirit. The link between the symbol and the symbolized isn't other than the smooth continuum of the chain of the Being.

The "too alien" classification of "spirits" in this setting breaks the cosmological hierarchic continuum -the very foundation for any analogic relationship- needed for the symbols working by enabling some sort of relations between different orders and supporting in that way the animist approach.

It isn't needed to say, a dark fantasy setting isn't easily compatible with the chain of the Being, because the Being origin of that hierarchical onto-cosmologic chain is universally deemed as the Summum bonum (the highest good) and the pinnacle of the Intellect.


2) This last consideration brings to us other of the problematic traits of these spirits for being included in an animistic worldview: they are "uninteligent", too.

According symbolism they should be related to an inferior cosmic domain, "below earth", because intelligence is higher in the upper cosmic regions but more and more scarce as we go down to the inferior prolongations of the cosmical chain.

Being this so, these spirits being manifestations of lower intelligences should be very similar to demons, and any sort of animism around them wouldn't be very different to straight demonic worship. But I'm not saying straight demon cults shouldn't be suited for this particular setting . . .

3) "Spirits causing suffering by acting within their natures" renders them against that "Summum Bonum" (that is, in the inferior prolongations of the chain, where all follows mostly a sort of inverted reflection of its very origin) and again mostly in the side of the infernal, substantial and chaotic regions, being menacing and harmful to the biological, intelectual and cosmic ordered structure and stability of the word and its creatures due their very chaotic and dissolving "essences".

[Rskennan]

Thanks, Demonsbane.

vitruvian: demonsbane covered a lot of it- the spirits as I designed them don't really fit with animism, per se. Though they have power over nature, they are not nature spirits. I like the bit about "Fire Copper King", above- It really fits with how I see them- not as spirits of nature, but spirits with control over nature.

Also, I've used animism in other settings, but here it might make the world too just. If there's a reason for everything, the world doesn't seem bleak enough. I need the world to be a crucible, and if spirits can be appeased rather than controlled, it might dilute the theme.

[demonsbane]

I extended the answers because I like the setting and some points were already running in my head for using them in my own campaign.

Vitruvian's question was surprisingly suited here for illustrating some very particular things of a dark fantasy setting as this.

Rskennan:

Feel you free to post more info if your want, as some powers of the Godeaters.

Cheers

[vitruvian]

Well, it occurs to me that there's no reason you couldn't have spirits of the animals, trees, rocks, rivers, mountains, winds, etc., that while intimately connected with the natural world could *nevertheless* be very alien in outlook to human beings, capricious, dangerous, and very difficult to appease, if it's even possible at all short of measures like human sacrifice. In your setup, perhaps only Castigators would be able to ever command elemental and nature spirits with any success, or perhaps Godeaters whose consumed demons had some relation to/command of certain nature spirits. Most of nature isn't really all that friendly, after all - why should the nature spirits be?

We could coin a phrase and call this malanimism. Everything is alive, and pretty much everything is out to get you, too. The gnarled trees in the shadowed forest glower at you, especially if you happen to be carrying bronze cutting implements of any kind. The rivers and streams beckon you, hoping to pull you beneath and keep *your* spirit as their servant forever. The fire always seeks to lick beyond its bounds and consume you and everything you hold dear. The birds and squirrels chirp and rustle to each other all the time... plotting.