I've an idea for an adventure. It's adult in nature, that deals with the darkside of the reconstruction. The PCs are Prisoners of War about to be released from a brelish prisoner of war camp. They are the last to be released over a two year period. The "heroes" are given new clothes after they have completed their release with the proctor -- a member of House Sivis.
After being released, they find a town that has regressed from the progressive renaissance era back to the middle ages. The PCs have a choice, to return to their nations of patriation or follow the instructions they have been given and deliver a package to a Citadel agent. If they choose the latter, they are immersed into a world of intrigue, lies, and shadow, a campaign of epic proportions, as they uncover the real secret Breland sued for peace. . .
Are you looking for players, or for ideas for the campaign?
If you can tell without breaking CoC, what is adult abouts its nature?
How has a single town regressed in technology if the rest of the world has not?
Are there any reasons the Citadel would employ (former and potentially future) enemies to deliver a package, rather than relying on their own, trusted people?
What happens if the PCs take the other choice, and return home?
Allow me to flood you with some questions:
Are you looking for players, or for ideas for the campaign?
If you can tell without breaking CoC, what is adult abouts its nature?
How has a single town regressed in technology if the rest of the world has not?
Are there any reasons the Citadel would employ (former and potentially future) enemies to deliver a package, rather than relying on their own, trusted people?
What happens if the PCs take the other choice, and return home?
1. I'm not looking for players, it's just an idea I'm trying to work out. It's for my online portfolio to show how I can work with the web.
2. CoC -- how adult, lets see. I imagined that after two years, the border towns would be ravaged by the last war. You have women selling themselves as prostitutes in order to buy food to feed their children. In some towns, you have regressed back to Norman England rather than continue as Regency England, the effects of the social fabric means that people have sold themselves into slavery for a bit of food. Then there are the towns around the northern shore of Lake Brey. It's not like going to the red light district of Sharn. Its like the Last War was when the world ended.
The first map of Breland may have been a mistake, but all mistakes have interesting stories around them. The borderland there is in dispute with Thrane under this scenario.
3. While there was a lot of scientific innovation during the war (the Warforged) and Arcane Innovation (if you call improved Karrn skeletons and Zombies innovation), wars can bankrupt country governments. Especially those that last a 100 years. You also have the Swords of Liberty that are operating in the area, terrorizing the outlying farms.
4. Although they are recorded by the proctor, they are deemed as non-entities. Or "non-factors", free agents. As enemies they are given an opportunity to help clean out corruption in Breland.
5. if they are from other nations, then they are repatriated. The group breaks up, they return home, and they live out their dull little lives having seen the world. And the game ends. If they are all from the same country, they can band together and go adventuring.
The PoW angle is interesting. If you have not already done so, you might want to browse the Bound by Iron novel for the background of one of the characters, who was a prisoner of war for a time. Novels are not canon in Eberron, but there's some interesting stuff that might be of use. However, if the area is in disputed territory, and the PCs are PoWs, what happens if they are Thrane nationals? Would they be able to work against Breland?
Showing the dark side of the post-war world, with people driven to desperation to sell themselves (and, as happens unfortunately all too often in poverty-stricken areas, their children) to serfdom/slavery is also interesting - I can definetly see members of the Aurum exploiting this, along with a number of sects, from self-interested gurus to actual religions such as the Cults of the Dragon Below (as happens in the Cyran refugee ghetto in Sharn). Breland in particular strikes me as very 19th century capitalist nation, with a heavily impoverished proletariat, which might make literature from that time (Hugo's Les Misérables, Zola's Germinal, virtually all of Dickens) useful for ideas.
As regards the Swords of Liberty: do they have sympathisers in town? After all, all of this misery is the result of a couple of monarchs having a family dispute, and couldn't we all have avoided this by doing away with monarchy?
I am rather curious about the "real secret Breland sued for peace", too!
Okay, thanks for the clarifications.
The PoW angle is interesting. If you have not already done so, you might want to browse the Bound by Iron novel for the background of one of the characters, who was a prisoner of war for a time. Novels are not canon in Eberron, but there's some interesting stuff that might be of use. However, if the area is in disputed territory, and the PCs are PoWs, what happens if they are Thrane nationals? Would they be able to work against Breland?
Showing the dark side of the post-war world, with people driven to desperation to sell themselves (and, as happens unfortunately all too often in poverty-stricken areas, their children) to serfdom/slavery is also interesting - I can definetly see members of the Aurum exploiting this, along with a number of sects, from self-interested gurus to actual religions such as the Cults of the Dragon Below (as happens in the Cyran refugee ghetto in Sharn). Breland in particular strikes me as very 19th century capitalist nation, with a heavily impoverished proletariat, which might make literature from that time (Hugo's Les Misérables, Zola's Germinal, virtually all of Dickens) useful for ideas.
As regards the Swords of Liberty: do they have sympathisers in town? After all, all of this misery is the result of a couple of monarchs having a family dispute, and couldn't we all have avoided this by doing away with monarchy?
I am rather curious about the "real secret Breland sued for peace", too!
Well, Cyre can't be the only reason to sue for peace. Boranel hates talking politics, and he's the Lawful Sovereign of Breland. So there had to be something else that went on. Keith and the other writers went into depth why King Kaius sued for peace, and it was all deeply personal for him (reclaiming his Lawful Sovereignty over Karrnath after it was forcibly taken away from him). Breland's reasons are much, much more murky, so it's up to us to explain how it went down.
I'm using GURPS Illuminati for an explanation of what happened. So it's an Illuminated campaign. I have to also build an Illuminated myth for Eberron. A myth so secret that even the Quori don't understand what really happened with the humans. The undersea city of Atlan -- I mean Aventus (Secrets of Sarlona, page 107) -- is a great place to start with it. Also, the actual Creation Myth of Earth's Illuminati is also a great place for inspiration (the Illuminati Creation Myth is so fantastic its hard to believe -- but there are to many sources who can back it up).
As for the Swords of Liberty -- I see them not like the Sons of Liberty, but the Liberte' movement in Late 18th Century France, before they captured Louis XVI and beheaded him.
Silk, Changeling SlaveAlignment, Sex, Race, Class, Level: NG f changeling egoist 2
Feats of Note: Psionic Talent, Skill Focus: Bluff
Skills of Note: Bluff, Craft (Needlepoint), Knowledge (Psionics/Arcana), Knowledge (Royalty and Nobility), Perform: Sexual Techniques, Profession: Administrator
*Silk is from the adventure, she's called that when she was captured*
Psychology: Although the child of a Passer, Silk has the potential to be a becomer. She is so secure in the fact that she could copy anyone that her latent psionic potential is heightening control over her body.
Background
Silk was born to a passer Changeling in Aundair. Since the passer took lengths to pass as a Kalashtar, her mother exchanged her for a boy of a somewhat more influential family after she was weened. Silk the "Changeling" child was changed into a copy through subtle telepathic nudging, taking the identity of Chaz ir'Kinlar. As she grew up, she wanted to know more about herself, and started playing "I'm You" with her siblings against her parents. She would turn her adoptive parents on her adoptive siblings at times, until her parents grew too suspicious and outed her out as a Changling. They changed her name to Chazrine, and Silk grew into Adolescence to be bolder with her changes.
However, it was during the Last War, so the noble family couldn't persue her biological mother. Silk, however, soon became known as the Black Sheep of the Family. Although she retained her mischevious nature, she lacked the ambitions of her adoptive siblings as they grew up. She soon saw that the family politics was getting more heated. She watched as one of her brothers pushed another brother out the window of a five storey tower. She watched a sister turn the murderous brother into a vulture. And she watched another brother offered a wizard's duel, and he came away from the duel with scars on his chest that healed, but were a constant reminder of his folly.
to protect her from family politics, and as it seems, Silk/Chazrine didn't have any Wizardly potential, she was sent to a Girls' School in Fairhaven. There, she learned how to be a proper noblewoman for the next five years. She grew up in the Girls' school from a pre-teen (11) to a fine, young lady (16). Her friends were Candy Aarland, Agate Serontain, and Sein Theil. The four were inseperable and the four helped each other out in their finishing lessons. They would eat together, play together, talk about boys together, and meet boys together (and Chazrine played "I'm You!" with them at times).
As the Last War was finally drawing to a close, rumors of a Thranish army was going to come against Fairhaven. Making sure that the girls were safe, the headmistress evacuated the school and led them into safety, or rather danger. Eventually, the girls were led into a slaver trap, all captured and taken away. Screaming, the girls were taught to forget their old lives and accept their new lives as slaves. But justice was sweet at last, as the finishing school was finally outed as a hot bed of slavers and was shut down by the Queen.
The girls were trained as slaves, and it didn't take time for the slavemaster to discover that Chazrine was a changeling. He renamed her "Silk," and started training her strictly as a pleasure slave, destined for the Red Light District in Sharn. The training was harsh and ugly. And Silk sent out unconscious, telepathic pleas for help. Pleas heard by her brother -> Alan ir'Kinlar the Scarred Mage -> who is trying to find his Changeling adopted sister, whome he adored and protected. And pleas heard by her birthmother, who sent her son and Alan's true brother -- the one known only as the Red Fox (he keeps his identity a secret to prevent the Dreaming Dark from discovering his true identity) --> along with his Warforged companion Tash.
Two years after the Last War, they stopped in Hatheril, in Breland on the way to Sharn where she would be sold to one of the brothels in the red light district. Although she has become a capable egoist, she is first and foremost a noble damsel. She is hoping that a good man would buy her and save her from a life of prostitution, so she could come into her own potential. Little does she know, though, that Alan and the Red Fox are trying to find her and bring her back to Aundair.