updated version of campaign ideas

Ideas for new campaign

-1 continent for western Europe, another few continents for other inspired cultures.

-6 major culture areas in the western continent, with subareas for each:  Medania, Annoria, Callania, Enthalia, Nordenia, and Ilenia.  These would correspond roughly to Spain, Britain, France, Germany, Scandinavia, and Italy.  So there would be the Four Kingdoms of Medania, the Eight Kingdoms of Annoria, the Kingdom of Callania, the Grand Imperium of Entalia, the Three Kingdoms of Nordenia and the Principalities of Ilenia.

-Demihumans exist but their settlements on the western continent are small, so they are rare in the west.  They do not generally like to live around men for various reasons.

-The races will be somewhat simple.  The Northmen are the people of most of Annoria, Entalia and Nordenia, as well as part of the other three kingdoms.  The Southmen are the people of most of Medania, Ilenia, and Callania.  The Southmen do not generally live in the North, even though the Northmen have moved in some numbers to the south.  The Southmen are more mixed as they also have mixed with the Desert Men of the continent to the south. 

-History:  There were once two great empires of men on this continent.  The Stone Men in the North and the Cavern Men in the south.  However, these bronze age civilizations were lost and no one knows how to read their writing, so not much is known about them – except for the fact that they are probably the predecessors to the modern Northmen and Southmen respectively.  To further complicate things, another population known as the High Men came from the east after the ancient empires fell and set up other empires.  The northern one split into warring groups and eventually fell, while the south became more and more powerful.  It eventually conquered much of the continent, as well as lands on the continents to the east and south, ruling over the Desert Men and the Civilized East.  However, they eventually were more or less assimilated into the local populace and in an ill understood period of chaos the empire collapsed.  Some people have attributed this to invasions from warlords originating in Entalia and Nordenia, but this is only part of the story and may not have been decisive in the collapse whatsoever.  Nevertheless, it seems clear that many modern aristocratic houses descend from either Northern warlords or High Men of the last age.

-Races:  High Men (mostly assimilated but some aristocratic houses are relatively unmixed), Northmen, Southmen, Hillmen (uncivilized tribes of the south), Clansmen (uncivilized tribes of the north), Men of the Holy Realm (northern Civilized East), Men of the Great Cult lands (southern Civilized East), Nomads of the Steppes and Wastes (East), Desert Men, White Eyes (Far North peoples on western and eastern continent), etc.

-Organization:  Each realm has its own traditions of rule, and these can be quite different from one another. 

In Annore, since the Keirlans of Waldaine (in Callania) united the formerly warring petty kingdoms, the feudal nobility is powerful with the Dukes (formerly Kings) being like to rulers in their own right.  This owes to the compromise that Richard Keirlan made early on in order to keep the kingdom he had built cohesive.  Yet few of the Dukes, despite their power, will openly rebel against the Crown unless given good reason.  It is currently ruled by House Lynnethe, descendants of House Keirlan’s maternal line, with their paternal line deriving from Angelon in Callania.

In Callania, the system has developed to have a strong king, whose power comes at the expense of the nobility.  In earlier times, Callania was very fragmented, but over the years, House Cassian has consolidated its power and established a strong and centralized rule.  The Cassian Kings, like the Tescelin Kings before them, are the main force that keeps an otherwise fractious land well in order.  Unlike in Annore, where the Kings rely on the support of regional Dukes that are rival noble families, the Callanian Kings choose Dukes from their own family whenever possible and try to put down the power of local nobles.  However, some of the old nobility are still quite powerful and resist the King’s agenda, such as the Counts of Chamelon.

Enthalia is called the Grand Imperium but this is a misleading name in most respects.  While the area has been more or less unified in the past, it has always had a powerful local nobility.  And in the past centuries the decentralization has increased.  Though there is an Emperor, who is nominally the ruler of the country, in reality he depends for most things on the nobility and is only as powerful as his allies – who will vary depending on his personal charisma.  The country is dominated by local nobles, powerful merchant cartels, and the clergy. 

Nordenia has the shortests tradition of Kingship.  Formerly it was a land of warring Jarls, but in the last few centuries it has become more and more ‘civilized’ though it still seems like a rough frontier land to the men from more cultured regions.  The nobility is powerful here, although Kings have been able to maintain order.  Slowly the area has coalesced into three major Kingdoms and a few minor states as well.

Medania is broken into Four Kingdoms, but the Kings here have forged a cohesive agreement with local nobility and priests to the extent that they are quite strong and independent units.  There is less distinction between these three estates than there may be elsewhere, and this is a land of strong, and some may even say fanatical, religious faith.

-Notes concerning the families:

-House Keirlan originated from Nordenian raiders who settled in the Waldaine region of Callania.  The old Duke of Waldaine, Aldous I, had a highborn wife Yda who was unfortunately sterile.  He took a mistress, Hermesent, who was the daughter of a townsman in his family’s seat of Roche Verte.  She was a comely woman, and fertile, and gave him two sons, Richard and Theobald, and a daughter, Hugolina.  He was forced to break off the liaison and married her to a close friend.  But his sons ended up taking advantage of the long wars plaguing Annore at the time.  Richard, who grew to be a man of vast personal charisma and great military and administrative brilliance, managed to enter the land that had never before unified and conquer it in one long campaign.  There was only one rebellion, not long after he won, which he put down with ruthless efficiency.  But Richard craved conquest and he wanted to hunt an old firedrake that was said to live in the northern mountains, and his entourage took him there.  He never returned.  As conquest was his one true love, and since his bastard birth had made him reluctant to father any baseborn children, he died without issue.  His brother, Theobald, who had been by his side in the conquests and who was more cautious and measured, became King.  He ended up marrying Adelina of Valandor, who gave him 11 children.  Though his eldest son, Aldous, should have been legal heir to all the possessions, his father did not favor him and he was only given Waldaine, which led to discord.  Eventually, one of his brothers, Hildebrand I, defeated him and incorporated his realm into the Kingdom of Annore.

-Geography:

Apart from the isle of Annore in the west and some isles in the south and east, there is the large mainland continent of Lorene.  Another continent, Maurwen, is not far beyond the eastern isles, and it is much larger.  Similarly, there is a continent to the north which is almost at the poles, and the continent of Khine beyond Maurwen farther east.  There are also the continents of Tazarene and Soundia further south.

Lorene is divided fairly well by the Titanspine mountains which run north to south through the center of the continent.  Four smaller ranges radiate out from it, forming aa rough dual-k formation.  Thus there are five realms:  Callania in the west, Nordenia across the north, Enthalia in the east, Ilenia in the southeast, and Medania in the southwest. 

-History of Annore:

The pattern of settlement is similar to that found in other parts of Lorene, but with its own variations.  First were the Rock Men, who wandered and never settled.  Then came the Flint Men, who farmed and lived in villages.  It was in the age of the Bronze Men that the first civilization arose here, the great Stonebuilder culture.  Although these people were literate to some extent, no one has deciphered their writing.  They were the first people to establish the town of Fenne on an island in the mighty Layne river.  The Iron Men came later.  It was said that this was a violent conquest, but whether that is true is far from certain.  These iron men built fortresses and were not altogether dissimilar to those who had come before.  They became the ancestors of the Clansmen.  After this came the High Men, or Steel Men, who established the Northern Empire here.  However, it eventually fragmented and its weakened remnants were destroyed in the era of the Darkwatch.  However, it was ruled again for a time by High Men from the Southern Empire which had survived the Darkwatch and put an end to the Kingdom of Ebonfire.  But the cost of this was the death of both Empires’ trueborn lines and the Southern Empire was not able to hold together after their Priest-Kings had been lost.  A period of chaos ensued.  Only one brief period of stability was to be had for centuries, when the Annorean warlord Aron the Conqueror established a kingdom and eventually conquered much of the old Southern Empire lands as well.  Unfortunately this did not long outlast his death and the realm fell prey to the invasions of migrating Northmen.  Not too long after this, the Fisher Northmen, as they were called, adopted the Imperial Cult as their religion and established numerous small kingdoms in Annore.  They were occasionally disrupted by invasions from Frostsea Northmen.  This was the state of affairs that more or less persisted until the Unification of Annore by Richard and Theobald Kaerlan, at which point the petty kingdoms became Duchies and the invasions from the Frostsea Northmen began to fade away.

Places in Annore:

Crown Duchy of Fenne

Duchy of Percia (largest and oldest apart from Fenne)

Duchy of Lakelands

Duchy of Athelmark

Duchy of Cairnheath

Important Families in Annore:

House Lynnethe, the Angelon Norians and Kings of Annore

House Corcelle

House Maubrey

House Brynwell

House Athereon