new setting

Actually it is based on the old setting of Arkon in the old days, although I may come up with a new name.

Places

The current setting is the continent of Beron, which is the main continent.  It can be imagined as sort of a fantastic version of Europe.

Kingdom of Ennore
-Influenced by Great Britain, this country is an island kingdom and a constitutional monarchy with a powerful mercantile and industrial class that rules from behind the scenes; while the monarchy is not entirely without power, they do not assert their strength much and prefer to live an easy lifestyle and let others govern.

Heiligenreich
-The center of the Beron civilization for more than 1000 years, since the rise of the great lord Runo (successor to the Eleustrian Emperor Tescelin).  This realm has gone throug many permutations over the years.  Most recently, before PEregrine, it had been a collection of loosely organized states with no overarching rule.  After the reorganization that followed, it slowly moved toward unification, finally doing so after its leading kingdom defeated Angelin in a war.

Republic of Angelin (formerly Kingdom of Eleustria; Empire of Peregrine)
-This country was once, with Heiligenreich, the heart of Beron.  Its monarchy was overthrown in a violent revolution and a republic led by the Benite sect took over.  It proved too unstable to provide rule in the face of attacks by outlying realms afraid of its ambitions, which paved the way for the warlord Peregrine to seize power and attempt to totally conquer the other realms.  This attempt failed, and the country has seesawed between Imperial and Republican rule ever since.

Kingdom of Sacia
-This realm has a long and distinguished history.  It was once the heart of the Mesciel Empire, which once ruled large swathes of land both in and beyond Beron proper.  It also was, later on, a collection of powerful mercantile states under no centralized rule.  The city of Mesciel remained notable after the fall of its Empire, thanks to the institution of the Church.  The Great Father of the Church of Holy Light resides in this city.  However, after the schisms of several hundred years ago, the Church lost central power.  Then, around the same time, other kingdoms had set up an independent trade structure which led the states in Sacia to decline.  It is a constitutional monarchy, with strong differentiation between the north and south regions.

Empire of Aravos
-This realm was once a Tsardom that was the great bastion of the Eastern CoHL, which broke off from the Western long ago.  But it was overthrown in a revolution by an alliance between the peasantry and the Arogenian Order, who decided that together they could seize power from the declining lords.  Since then it has become powerful, but also increasingly bellicose and volatile.

Ideas

The setting is somewhat like postwar Europe but with a fantastic turn.  In some respects technology is similar to modernity, but there are also areas in which it is farther advanced due to the magic of the setting.  This setting might have some similarities to a mage ascension type setting, except that it represents more of a third position between technocracy and mythic than that setting did, which had the two very much in dualistic opposition.  Also, because of various reasons, religion did not decline in this setting to the extent it has in the real world, and religious sects wield great power as a consequence.

The countries were once united by a religion called the Church of the Holy Light.  This religion began to have internal problems which led to violent schisms several centuries prior.  However, it stayed a robust and powerful faith throughout challenges.  It was opposed by a heretical sect with some similarities known as the Arogenian Order which was once nearly wiped out, but began to gain in power after the schismatic period.  Another powerful sect arose during the great turmoil in Eleustria.  The Benite sect, a complete repudiation of the Holy Light religion, took control of the revolution there. However, it was unable to completely eradicate the power of the Holy Light and eventually was forced to come to a compromise with them after the fall of Peregrine.