You should look in Amazon or Ebay and see if anyone is selling the books. You might get a deal!
I did look on Amazon and did find a great deal on the books! Sadly, even though the price is very cheap, I am in such a sorry state that I can't afford even the slightest financial frivolity. I am waiting for my tax return to pre-order the 4th ed books.
My root world is a bit of melting pot, a little bit from most sourcest hat I can't help but enjoy when it coems to fantasy.
In the west there is an island group where the paths between the material world adn the Feywild seem to litter the landscape so that nearly every village has some connection to that other realm.
Far to the north is the Snowfall, a barren waste of a tundra where Barbarians rule tribes of hard men with the wisdom of their shamen.
To the south, there are the sun blasted lands of shifting sands and deserts without end.
To the East, the only great empire that has yet to fall. The Jade Empire, Empire of the dragon, it is called many names but little is known of it save those tales told by the brave adgenturers that survive the long passage through great mountains, monster filled valleys, and warlord controled plains, and the few wandering monks that have come from this land to teach their ways to the people of the rest of th world.
Into all of this the heroes find themselves drawn from other worlds. Using what ever published world they want as their home world (Ebberon, Greyhawk, or Forgotten Realms) they create a character that went to sleep after an adventure or mission, only to dream about a strange creature of increadible beauty who asks them for help. As soon as they agree to help in some way or form they wake around a small camp fire int he ruins of a temple in the middle of a dark forrest.
They can leave the forest goign any direction they want, but the direction they choose will take them to a different village and lead to finding one of half a dozen great threats I have been working on that is trying to destroy the world.
I am seriously considering running an "Elric of Melnibone" style setting for our first delve into 4e (if we go there, we haven't really decided if/when/etc...). but my sons and I really like the Elric books.
I'm thinking I will have the PCs start out in the young kingdoms and really limit their exposure to any Melniboneans until I get a handle on creating races in 4e - or maybe, if I have to have a Melnibonean, I'll just gently tweak the Eladrin. In explaining the presence of Tieflings, I was thinking of using the Melniboneans penchant for summoning demons as a good segueway into why Tieflings are here. Perhaps they are the descendents of Demons & human melnibonean slaves, or perhaps they are a lesser powerful type of demon who, through generations of living away from the abyss have lost most of the dark powers... or maybe something completely different, I don't know.
Overall, though, I am excited about starting something new, but so far - without having seen the core material - I'm still not 100% where I'm going to go in setting, or even if I'm going to readily adopt 4e. I'll peruse the books, and the forums, and then see if we'll take the plunge.
[INDENT][/INDENT]The world of Antillus is broken up into 6 human kingdoms, 2 half-elf states, 3 elf protectorets, 2 dwarf principalites, 5 halfling river lands, 3 dragonborn states and 1 dragonborn kingdom, eladrin live mostly in my magic dominant human kingdom, and Tieflings are nodadic. [INDENT][/INDENT]The humans in the six kingdoms live in a current state of peace. The kingdoms are The Republic of Purn, The Kingdom of Keldore, Goardia (currently run by a military dictatorship), the Magical Meridian (magocracy), The Holy Land of Paxrom (theocracy), and the Allied States of Silika (city states/monarchy). [INDENT][/INDENT]Dragonborn are divided up into 4 colors, the green of Certif in Keldore, the steel colored of the wastes in Goardia, the dark brown/light green of Shaps in Meridian, and the copper/tan of the Shifting Sands. [INDENT][/INDENT]As far as monsters go most have been pushed in to the shadowlands but from time to time a small pocket of before unknown monsters may spring up. Goardia and Meridian being on the border of the shadowlands are the first lines of defense. [INDENT][/INDENT]The Shadowlands are currently being run by the drow using the orcs as shocktroops, the goblins as scouts, and the hobgoblins inbetween. Most gnomes live on the border of the shadowlands and act as traders to the nonshadowland races and guides to the shadowlands. [INDENT][/INDENT]Other races-Warforged guard a region that borders Meridian, Paxrom, and the shadowlands, known as the outlands, a mountainous region of bandits, heritics, and political exiles.
If you hve any ideas to add to this let me know and I will take it under advisement.
I'm looking at creating a world similar to the Camulod Chronicles by Jack Whyte. The series starts out with a man foreseeing the fall of the Roman Empire and he gathers the best people he can find to live at his villa to help stem the tide of darkness that is to come. It's a great series and I highly suggest reading it if you have not already. It's a great point of light reference. If you wanted to base it around this world, it would definitely be low fantasy but it wouldn't take much to move it to high fantasy.
I haven't got much yet, only some ideas and part of the history.
Years of Bronze At the beginning of the world, if we can trust the words of our shamans, all the celestial spirits fought a perpetual war. Their motives for fighting this war are unknown to us mortals, but the dark elves have kept an accurate history and deep in their libraries their are still some accounts of the war. At one moment a spirit, known as Valorem, discovered how to make bronze weapons and his armies quickly became more victorious is battle, but it did not take long before the knowledge of bronze spread to the other factions and the war lasted for seven years more.
Years of the Trickster The war ended when a young and cunning spirit, known as Callidus, tricked the others and murderer all the warlords of the other factions. The remaining warlords were very grateful and Callidus became their new leader. His reign lasted for nine years in which he brought peace and justice amongst the spirits and his reign would have lasted longer if it wasn’t the nature of the spirits to be forgetful. They had forgotten all the good things that Callidus had done and became envious of his power and his status. Callidus was murdered.
Years of light With the death of Callidus two new factions had appeared. The dark elves, former supporters of Callidus, tried to resist the influence of the light elves, supporters of the murderers. The light elves had chosen a new leader, Sxino, who now ruled over the spirits. He founded an order of knights with the mission to find all dark elves and kill them. Many dark elves tried to hide and many fled into the shadow realm, never to return again, but many more died a horrid death by the blades of Sxino’s knights.
Sxino’s journey to the underworld Sxino aged slowly, but when he became 257 he started to fear death and that is why he gathered his men and with a small army he started a journey to the underworld to find out what laid ahead of him. The journey first took him through the shadow realms, home to the dark elves, pale of skin, like a corps and dark black of hair. Consumed by envy and a craving for wealth these nomadic elves travel through the shadow realms after they were banished from Sxino’s kingdom. The shadow realms are a barren desert of dark grey sand and, except for the occasional rock or pool of dark black poisonous water, there is nothing. Sxino and his army got lost in the everlasting desert and eventually Sxino turned insane and he was killed by one of his guards. He never reached the underworld alive.
The elven homeland During Sxino’s absense his empire collapsed and with it the entire race of light elves began its downfall. Younger races, those of men and changelings, started to colonise former elven territory. The light elves almost completely died out and nowadays only a few human bloodlines exist that call themselves “elventouched” as they have some light elf ancestry. Magic Every object, living or dead, is inhabited by a sentient spirit. Spirits differ in strength, sentience, age and alignment. Some mortals can control these spirits, increase their power, or even kill them and use their power for their own doings. Others make pacts with certain spirits and by doing that gain control over some of the spirits powers. Yet again there are others who learn to manipulate our own spirits, these people are capable of healing and some can even resurrect the dead.
Mechanics:
Elventouched use the stats of Half-Elfs
Dark Elves are Eladrin and Light Elves are Elves
Warlocks: Make pacts with natural spirits to gain supernatural powers
Wizards: Manipulate natural spirits to gain supernatural powers
Clerics: Manipulate the spiritual energy within themselves and within others.
PC races will be Human, Elventouched, Dark Elf, Light Elf, Weretouched (Shifter) and maybe some other races. I think I will not include dwarves or halflings. I am interested in including both Tieflings and Dragonborn.
After reading the prereleases, Races & Classes and Worlds and Monsters, things started clicking. It's mentioned that humans do not have a patron god, their creator, who mysteriously disappeared long ago. W&M tells of how their design team discarded an idea in which Zehir (then known as Set) killed the human god. It also tells of the ruined human empire of Bael Turath, which spawned the tieflings. And R&C states that the biggest human flaw is corruptibility.
Disjointed, I know, but let me try to connect the thread. It stands to reason that any race mirrors it's creator, so the human god, too, was corruptible. Following the battle in which the gods beat back the primordials, the human god desired to be more powerful than his contemporaries, and formed a shaky alliance with the primordials. Many of his followers did the same, striking pacts for more personal power and gain. They then waged a war of extinction against the dragonborn, and when it was over, the human god was much weakened.
The other gods decided that this could not continue, fearing that once the human god recovered, he would train his sights on them. So Set, with reptilian coldness, did that which the other gods spoke, he killed the human god. Concerned with the ramifications should this ever be discovered, a cover story was put in place about a ruined city called Bael Turath and accounting for the presence of the tieflings. And Set became Zehir.
Although there was never a city called Bael Turath, there was an empire of Bael Turath. The name of the now deceased human god? Bael Turath.
This does two things. First, it removes the dragonborn from the world, whom I didn't like as a PC race. Secondly, for me, it better explains the presence of tieflings, who, although a separate race, are now part and parcel in human society.
As far as the physical world, I've decided to hang onto some of the old faves. The dwarven clanholds of the Ridgeback Mountains. Aarianii-aa-falai ("the forest of the sky" in elvish), an enormous magical forest, the wood of whose trees is lighter than air and allows for the construction of flying ships. In ages past, the entire forest ripped free of the ground (taking with it an incredible amount of earth secured by the tree's roots), and it was only the elves' great magic which restrained it's flight. It now floats hundreds of feet in the air, direct over where it was on the ground, and not moving with the wind. This is definitely going to be the principal area where the Feywild bleeds over into the world.
The area below this forest is called Uundarii -uu-falai (the land beneath the forest), and is a huge bowl which catches the rain runoff from the magical forest. This land is wondrous, with mushrooms growing as large as manor houses. The halflings which have taken up residence on the fringe of the mushroom forest have adapted quite well. Carving their homes from the fungus, domesticating and riding the creatures which live there, an elite few even using, as mounts, the giant bats which dwell beneath Aarianii-aa-falai. Some very interesting ecosystems.
As far as where I'm planning to start the adventure, I'm thinking in a plains community next to a river fork. Halfling water caravans foster trade between the human of the settlement, the dwarves of the Northern Rim, end the elves and eladrin to the west. In the spring, as the snows melt to the north, all trade is forced to a halt as the river swells. The timing of the new campaign will be just before the spring thaw, and will allow a selection of humans, tieflings, dwarves, halflings, elves, and eladrin as PC races. As I've said, dragonborn will not exist in my world, nor will warforged.
However, dragonborn existed at one time, so an expedition to one of their ruined cities is always a possibility, should the campaign call for it. Anyway, as long as this post was, it's only a fraction of what I've got. Perhaps I should get a trademark berfore revealing more...
Awesome stuff. My 4E campaign is going to be the first time my old gaming group has gotten together in almost 20 years, so it's going to start in a small town, just after the characters grew up together, and just like we knew each other in real life. I'm going to take the most simple premade adventures I can find and tie them loosely together, and see how it goes. Totally off the cuff, and as player driven as possible.
Races i'm still thinking about: Teiflings {probably} Gnomes Warforged {Small Chance} Fearie {possible homebrew of three foot tall flying magic people}
The humans abound in their villages on the plains and their Ports. The elves, tall fast warriors, hunt and wander through their forests, fascinated by nature, but no strangers to defending it. The dwarves work metal and mines, also mastering the art of warfare. The halflings live on and near water, in floating wooden villages and boat houses. The Dragonborn are pride filled warriors from a lost world. The Burks, a race of aquatic fish people inhabit the vast inner sea, fending off terrible monsters. The drow, a race of evil black skinned elves, live beneath the surface of the world, worshiping their evil god and doing her will. Most races share a neutral attitude toward each other {most of them hate the drow and orcs, though} and get along fairly well. Wars come and go, and shape the landscape of the world.
Other Stuff I'll include all core classes, with the adition of the warmage and scout.
Once, all there was to exestence was four gods-Earth, Fire, Water, and Air. They each existed in their own realm {plane} of existence, constructing their creations-Elementals. The Four gods existed in harmony for many eras, until they started to think themselves the best. They were plunged into the worst war in astral history, but also the creation of the universe. Elements went insane, waves of water colliding with walls of fire, air eating through earth, fire biting and burning earth, air blowing through water-it was endless chaos. Elementals of every shape and size battled in the greatest battle of all time. In this utter, destructive chaos, all Four Gods were destroyed-but the Universe was created. All these elements had formed into the stuff of the World, a place of natural beauty, and the other realms, where the new gods existed, and space, an empty place of mystery. The raw energy created by the war made magic, a new powerful element. Life came to exist in the World, the works of th gods themselves. After many, many ages {millions and millions and millions and millions and millions of years}, the world is in its present state.
Xearic The Continet that serves as my campain setting is Xearic, an ancient place of nature, magic and mystery, where dangers abide. The line between good and evil is blurred, and Xearic is a place of darkness and endless wilderness. Most of Xearic is either forests or plains, with a huge Inner salt water sea in the center. But, There is the great, vast, dry wastelands of the Sinyou desert in the far south, the vast jungles in the South East, the many tropical islands that dot the Inner Sea, the Hellspire Mountains, and the vast Bearspear tundras of the northern reaches of the world. Xearic is a place of wild and interesting Geography, populated by natural and bizzare things {often both}.
you obviously have put your heart into this world. So far, i am loving it. As long as you feel your campaign is 'natural/ cohesive' it will be easier to tell the story to the players. After all, the more comfortable and intimate you are with your ideas, the better you can express them. Buenos
