There’s an event in Cimmerian history that I described to my players but never really detailed called the Dragon War.

It’s a turning point in the history of my campaign world. I have a basic outline of it, but managing the writing of it is difficult with the way I’ve set the blog right now.

Let me explain what the event is first.

My campaign is currently taking place around 400BCE. 500 years ago, around 900BCE, dragons ruled Cimmeria.

The dragons were definitely evil and nasty. They ate people, stole wealth, and burned crops just to watch people starve.

Ten brave heroes, who had accomplished many things on their own, joined together to lead a rebellion against the dragons.

The dragon’s slave armies were defeated and the heroes took the fight directly to the dragons.

Dragons come in ten varieties in D&D, Red, Blue, Green, Black, White, Gold, Silver, Bronze, Copper, and Brass. One for each of the ten heroes.

Death is only a temporary thing for divine creatures in Greek mythology so when the heroes defeated the dragons, they imprisoned the monsters instead of killing them.

A pair of dragons had ruled each of the colors. The heroes trapped one dragon of each pair in a mystical orb while the other dragon was set to guard the orb for all eternity. The orbs, infused with draconic might, give whoever holds them the power to command dragons of that orb’s color.

If you’ve played D&D, yes, these are the infamous artifacts, the Orbs of Dragonkind.

The heroes split the Orbs up and set further defenses around them. Additionally, instead of dying normal deaths, the heroes accepted a sort of cryopreservation. If the Orbs were ever broken and the dragons released upon the world once more, a hero would be awoken to renew the fight against the flying lizards.

One of my players, Zigfried, has a character who is one of these awakened heroes, Danar.

But back to the point of this post, why is it difficult to write about this for my blog?

The problem hinges around the heroes having “accomplished many things on their own” prior to working as a group.

If I write this as a Timeline post first, then I practically have to come up with the history for all ten heroes before even starting.

If I write this as Characters of Cimmeria entries, I still have to come up with the specific events of the Dragon War as all ten of the heroes would’ve interacted with that part.

I’m going to break away from the boundaries I set for myself a little bit and write about the events leading up to the Dragon War in a different way.

I’ll start with an unfinished Characters of Cimmeria entry for each of the ten heroes detailing their adventures during the time of draconic oppression before joining together. Once the events of the Dragon War are completely written I can go back and complete the Characters of Cimmeria entries along with the Timeline.

Zigfried already did a lot of work on Danar’s backstory. I’ll post an edited version of his work on Monday and start writing the others for the coming weeks.

-GoCorral

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I’m Isaac

Welcome to the GoCorral website! I’m Isaac Shaker and this is a place for me to write about D&D and occasionally other topics. I host a podcast called Setting the Stage that interviews different DMs about their campaigns. I’m currently focused on completing the Cimmeria campaign setting and turning it into a book.

Setting the Stage Podcast

71 – Aaron Ryan and Dissonance/The End Setting the Stage, Campaigns for D&D and Other RPGs

I talked with Aaron Ryan about two of his book series, Dissonance and The End.Dissonance is a near future world where aliens have attacked, killing most humans and animals on Earth and driving humans into hiding underground. Humans finally develop technology to fight back and the war enters a new stage while the characters also struggle to determine the motivation for the alien invasion and nefarious actions of the government.The End is a Christian End Time series based loosely on the events described in Revelations. A man calling himself Nero has risen to rule over the world and he has outlawed Christianity. Robots called Guardians hunt Christians throughout the world, murdering them on the spot if they don't recant their faith. A resistance movement works in the shadows against Nero, but things aren't looking good for them.We talked about the basics of those settings along with how they could be adapted for RPG campaign settings. My main recommendations were Ashes Without Number, Spire, and Blades in the Dark.If you're interested in reading Aaron's books you can find them at most any bookstore or library. Both of the series are also being adapted into movies, but aren't publicly available yet. Aaron's website is https://authoraaronryan.com/ for the latest updates on his work. Next up for Aaron is the Talisman series that covers events within the "Aaronverse" in the decades between Dissonance and The End.Our website: https://gocorral.com/stsWant to be on the show? Fill out this survey: https://forms.gle/U11TbxtAReHFKbiVAJoin our Discord: https://discord.gg/Nngc2pQV6CSupport the show on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/SettingtheStage Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
  1. 71 – Aaron Ryan and Dissonance/The End
  2. 70 – Sensei Suplex and Project Aurora
  3. 69 – Siix and Godstorm
  4. 68 – John and Tahlvaen
  5. 67 – John and Blittle League Blaseball