| #1AeonOct 13, 2009 13:08:43 | My current campaign is going to be in a homebrew setting that is run by factions instead of countries, similar to Ravanica from MtG or the factions in Planescape.
I am currently trying to develop a theme behind the factions that run the world. So far I have the factions based off of the different power sources in 4ed: Arcane, Divine, Elemental, Martial, Primal, Psionic and Shadow.
I would like a secondary or even tertiary theme to help me develop the overall theme that is the structure of the factions. I am looking for 10 - 15 factions and power source overlaping is fine. Any ideas the community could help me with would be appreciated? |
| #2Fox_ReeveheartOct 13, 2009 13:26:50 | You can think of them in terms of mtg colors with the sources
primal = green
arcane = blue? red?
elemental = all colors
martial = all colors, since you can run the gamut with martial. A stealthy rogue could be black per se... chilvalrous fighter could be white. Etc. etc.
shadow = black
divine = white
psionic = red? blue?
Then you can overlap, like green/white. Primal characters worshipping the civilization goddess Erathis? Divine characters of nature gods? Stuff like that.
White/Black? O_o i forget what that one was but i liked the name if I could remember it, plus it had gargoyles and stuff. |
| #3AeonOct 13, 2009 13:38:41 | Thats good but my Archfey are already based on the MtG colors/lands. I do like the combining of colors though. I might use some of that for lesser factions of Archfey.
My Darklords of the Shadowfell are based off the seven deadly sins.
My Primordials are based off of natural disasters. |
| #4Bobfred21Oct 13, 2009 15:41:35 | Well I just lost a big post on this subject, let's see if I can summarize:
I think having one faction devoted to each power source isn't very practical. In a world with dragons and magic and demons and whatever else - you need diversity so any faction limited to a certain power source is likely to be at a detriment. Not to mention, what would the purpose of these factions be in society?
There are certain factions where it can make sense - for example, an arcane university is perfectly reasonable, as is a specific primal faction as the power sources have very different and specific agendas - they're identifiable as having their own goals and purpose in society. Martial and shadow on the other hand, what role do they serve?
Some Martial Guys:
"Hey, we like to fight."
"Yeah!"
"Oh, I have a great idea! Let's make just this big faction full of people who like to fight and that way we can all fight together."
"Yeah that sounds like it would be super productive and useful"
The problem with a martial faction is that it becomes too much of a club - sure, some people probably do like to fight, and those people will probably find each other. Maybe they will even have their own club - but there's not real purpose other than the fact that they have stuff in common. You could swing it into a "hire us to go fight things" guild but then the faction becomes a faction of mercenaries, and as far as mercenaries go if you're being hired to go kill something it's probably best to have a well rounded pool of mercenaries to draw from which supports the inclusion of other power sources, and really at the point that you become a mercenary faction there's not much reason to stick with the whole "Martial" theme. Also, I would think a mercenary faction a little too one dimensional - they go to the highest bidder. A faction needs it's own personalities and drives. It's fine to have a minor mercenary faction but I think you want more developed factions to be the ones holding the real power. Also, the only thing you can really do with a mercenary faction is have them hired by someone and then at a critical moment have them turn on whoever hired them because the bad guys paid them more - your players WILL see this coming because it's the only thing any book has EVER done with such a faction. They're not very useful.
Moreover - think about what you're factions want. A lot of settings seem to go with the idea that all these different factions focus on perfectly different areas of society. Maybe one is all about communication, one is about travel one is like a hospital faction (Eberrons dragonmarked houses). Although it can be done well (as is the case with Eberron) I believe this option to be a much poorer option to go with than making your factions compete for the same markets and resources. Make them want to kill eachother, they just cant because there are laws against it.
On the other hand, let me be productive and offer some cool factions you might like to use:
Primal: Please don't do a "we're hippies who love trees and you can't even cut your lawn in front of me or I'll freak out" - It's overdone, and honestly, not very exciting. You might want to take a page from Eberron - the druids of Eberron are dedicated to propelling an external threat which wants to invade and basically destroy the natural world as it is. Ancient evil, yadda yadda. OR you could take a page from the Tales of Series of games where arcane magic actually has long term negative consequences for the planet - the problem is that the common person isn't aware of this and the planets population relys on magic like we rely on technology. It could be anything, just give them a reason to be active and to hate someone else (Arcane is often the way to go) - of course they cant break into open conflict without a solid reason cause society would be all like "what the hell man?" but they can certainly subtly work to undermine the efforts of whoever they see as hurting the planet (And again, in more than just a "hey I dont like those guys who are chopping down trees" kinda way, that angle has been more than covered).
Arcane University: Maybe this faction is a bit smaller but filled with influential people and has a lot of money. Only the richest of the rich can afford to be a part of the university and as such there's a certain prestige attached to the name. In addition to their conflicts with the primal group, maybe some of the universities inner circle is involved in some less than legal proceedings. Maybe some of the magical experiments they're doing put them at odds with another faction, perhaps the leader of a faction of holy knights happens to know that the university is guilty of consorting with demons, but because of corruption within his church and connections between the university and some of the more powerful members of his church he can't openly speak against the university. Maybe the university needs to procure difficult to acquire spell components via the blackmarket and is tied up in intrigue there as well.
Church Number 1: As with any religion, it's followers are not completely composed of any one power source (Although, very likely religious organizations do have higher numbers of people who use the divine power source). The church struggles against inner corruption and high ranking members who abuse the political power afforded to them by their station in the church. In fact, many high ranking members of the church are involved with some kind of black market or seedy underground, providing all manner of unseemly services to those with the money and inclination.
- Connected Faction: Some sort of Papal Knights which started as knights who's main function was to protect the leader of the religion, but as the organization grew it became more of a weapon of the religion and as it grew past that, and people rose in rank it became almost a seperate faction unto itself though it's still closely tied with the church. The bottom line is it's big enough that a seperate set of commanders has to oversee it's operations rather than the religious leader itself. Due to corruption in the church and fractures in the organization over time the chain of command has begun to blur resulting in tension between the commanders and the leaders of the church and could lead to interesting conflicts based on loyalties and doing the right thing or following orders.
Church Number 2: Perhaps there's not just one dominant religion and the religions are constantly vieing for dominance - maybe this one puts a lot of economic pressure on the other because it doesn't have the same military power as the first church.
Maybe there's a set of races that have been the victim of racism and now they're tired of it, they've banded together to push their agenda into the politcal eye.
Maybe there's multiple governmental factions vieing for control - the remnants of several countries moulded into one at the end of a catastrophic chain of events?
Maybe one of these governmental factions is a group of dirty peasants who want to radically restructure society to be more fair no matter what they have to do.
Maybe there's a bank faction - which excercizes political control in the form of VAST economic resources and contacts. |
| #6cwestOct 15, 2009 3:36:51 | Im working on bringing the Mercykillers from Planescape's city, Sigil into my Forgotten Realms campaign setting. Since I was just informed Sigil can be connected anywhere it's safe to assume including it in the realms wouldn't be a bad idea. Thus I'll be connecting it in some way, but I will also have a 'secondary' home-base for the Mercykillers, and now they'll be followers of the Raven Queen...maybe we can collaborate on something if you're up for it... |
| #7shydmOct 22, 2009 19:56:51 | Hey, I know I'm very late to the game on this, but I saw your thread last week and remembered it this week while I was playing Tales of Vesperia. Tales of Vesperia is a video game j-rpg set in a world beset by hoards of monsters too powerful for the average citizen to handle. Instead, most people live in cities or towns that use a giant magical barrier to keep the monsters at bay. While the big government figure is this empire, the other leaders of the world are all guilds of people who are unaffiliated with the government. There's many different guilds, including a guild that is commisioned to hunt down powerful monsters, a guild that establishes a vast merchant network, a guild that focuses on crafting well-made weapons or mundane objects, and a guild that excavates ruins for magical artifacts.
So maybe not every faction in your world has to be a primal faction, but instead a guild that establishes safe travel routes that don't disturb an area's natural inhabitants, or instead of an arcane faction you have a performer's guild that doubles as an information network. |