New One-shot in alternative khoras

[Laurent MEKKA]

Hello,
Today we'll try 13th age RPG.
It's a variant D20 game (like D&D) but with a bit of narrative stuff.
There's "icons" that are shakers & movers of the world and important characters. PCs need to determine their relationship with some icons and it affects the game (at the start of each session, your roll 1d6 per relationship and if you roll a 6, the followers of the icon (or anything else related to it) will give you something benefical. If you roll a 5, something benefical BUT with a disadvantage.

So, this is a non-canon Khoras where a Cataclysm destroying the two moons has also "shaken" reality, mixing for an instant the material plane with elemental planes, hell, heaven, and all the other planes. Parts of the world changed, a lot of outsiders now live in Khoras and civilisation was hurt, even destroyed in places. Demons rules some places and have enslaved humanity, some places are still connected to elemental planes and have become colder, hotter, earther (lol) or airer (...)...
50 years later, Arkalia is not a great country anymore. Only Strathon and 2 other cities are Arkalia, with an useless king and the power behind the throne, Jon Tenral, that turned the Knighly Barrinor cult into something more cruel and more like an inquisition. "New" Arkalia is safe from monstrer but not from inquisitors and injustice.

The game will start in Stirling (again !). Malcolm Teroth is undead (but players don't know). He rejected Barrinor for Kael, in order to fight harder against the enemies of Stirling.
His son, first Knight, is still faithful to Barrinor. The place is now haunted, because of the influence of the negative energy plane and a witch that came back from the dead. Sadie Lone (from my old campaign... it's like American Horror Story, new setting, same actors..). Second threath, a demon that rallied a saurian tribe after having tamed Black Claw (from my old campaign...), a young black dragon venerated by the saurians.

As the game is "supposed" (we'll see ) to be only a one-shot scenario and not a campaign, I chose to make only 7 Icons (right from google translate...)
Heroic icons
Queen Erelicia Syntha (Queen of Cyrell's Elves) [Guardian of Nature in Exile]
Queen Erelicia Syntha fights the demons that infest the Cyrell wood. She fled the capital and runs the operations remotely, moving in secret. She has developed a gift for military strategy and alone is able to establish a defense and reconquest plan at the level of her entire nation and beyond. She is a target for demons, who, if they managed to eliminate it, would greatly disrupt Cyrell's defense.

Dorian 1st, the Unbreakable (Sovereign of the Underground Kingdoms - Ulkran) [Purifier of the Underworld]
In the underground world of Ulkran, the Dwarves reigned as masters. Until they are invaded by aberrations that literally dock their caverns with caverns that seem, like vessels, able to move in the earth's crust. But it is without counting on the courage and tenacity of the dwarves who have practically won this war, even if there are pockets controlled by aberrations and there are regularly new assaults. Dorian needs allies on the surface, and to recover the relics stolen from the dwarves to put an end to the invasion.

Morlokk (desert wizard, relic guardian) [Protector of the Irenni Legacy]
Morlokk knows, Morlokk sees. And Morlokk is convinced that to cleanse the world and that every being, every thing, every place finds its place in its original plane of existence, it needs the relics and knowledge of the now extinct Irenni civilization. Each artifact, each legend, is one step closer to its goal. War is not a lasting solution. Put everything back in its place, if.

Ambiguous icons
Great Bishop Jon Tenral (supreme religious authority of the Church of Barrinor) [Turned the worship of Barrinor into inquisition, the power behind the throne that runs Arkalia]
Jon Tenral had to overcome a great crisis, when his King did not rise to the height, when the precepts of his God bridled the noblest knights, in a fight against unscrupulous and immoral enemies. The power behind the throne, the man of the shadow, that's what he's become. And it is only he has rewritten the word of his god, his precepts. Harder, harsher, less chivalrous. The new cult of Barrinor seen by Jon Tenral purifies (with the hammer of war) at the slightest supposition that the innocent can become evil. And all those who do not worship Barrinor can become evil.
He is the one and only responsible for the reunification of Strathon, Newcastle and Corrington, the new great nation of Arkalia, free, relatively safe and strong, although for some, it is a lesser evil of living oppressed by his peers that tortured by demons.

Vurai Bodikur, mayor of the Free City of Ithell (Protector of the City of Splendor, young scholar elf) [Think only of the interests of his city to the detriment of others]
Ithell, the City of Splendors, the Mecca of culture and the arts. Now, an impenetrable vault, neither by men, nor by demons, nor by any other creature. An Eden in a destroyed world. And Vurai will do everything to keep things that way. Even if it is done at the price of the rest of the civilization. It is said that he made a pact with the underworld to protect his city. It is said that he sold the rest of humanity to protect his city. That does not prevent, that sometimes one finds his agents in defenders of the humanity on the other end of the world. Guilt?


Bad icons
The Seven Lords of Dread (High Priests of Barulda) [Dream of a Undead World]
The seven high priests of Barulda, neither quite alive, nor quite dead, were able to revel in the destruction of humanity, the awakening of the dead, the influence of the world of the dead on that of the living . Demons and other arrivals from other plans are both an obstacle and a playground. If they were able to convert them to their pleasures of torture and self-mutilation, they could certainly create a paradise...

Queen Sillar, the Merciless (Demonic Majesty, Queen of Shadows, Eastern Scourge, Light-Bane of Light - Duthelm) [Wants to see the world crumble in chaos and blood to reshape it in her image]
Queen Sillar wanted to see the world burn, humble men and conquer the entire planet with her troops of orcs, ogres and goblins. But the Cataclysm has changed its plans. Chaos is now his enemy. Or a beast to tame. Allies to find, new victims to enslave. Collaborate with the strong, eliminate the weak. Then conquer the world.

[David Roomes]

Wow. That sounds like a great adventure idea. The changes to the environment are really cool. A shattered world where demons rule in some areas. Lots of plot hooks there.

I love that Khoras can be a spring board for new ideas. That's great. Love how you're using it.

Best of luck with the adventure! I'm sure your players will love it!

[Laurent MEKKA]

It was fun to revisit Stirling and see "known" faces in an alternate setting.
Players started in jail for having been involved in a tavern brawl, and they needed to find a patron in order to stay in town.
They choose to ask Jathor Teroth and he agreed if they could to something for him...

13th age is a pretty epic game (the barbarian twice killed 2 zombies with one axe swing, on level 1)  and it was fun. They are in the sewers looking for a smuggler abducted by ghouls to make a sacrifice, we'll see next week... 

[tanis]

I concur, this does sound like a cool setting for a game or three. I also like the sort of Song-of-Ice-and-Fire-esque "Great Man" setup with certain pillars of the setting being the principle movers of the wheel of history.