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

86 – Wuxia Adventures in RPGS (Daniel and Metanoia/Ithasen) Setting the Stage, Campaigns for D&D and Other RPGs

I interviewed Daniel, my cohost of the Tabletop Community Spotlight! Daniel created his own setting called Ithasen with an in-progress wuxia TTRPG system called Metanoia to go along with it. Ithasen has a spiritual force known as Ren that pervades the world. Ren is a magical manifestation of the user's, or Rennim's, will upon the universe. Rennim that cultivate their will grow stronger and capable of more amazing feats as the concentrate their power and force of personality.Within Ithasen there are seven lineages of people that decide what type of Ren they can use. Anamor use conversion Ren. Elkyr use flux Ren. Janim use elasticity Ren. Nyl use influence Ren. Okoi use recurrence Ren. Haqol use harmony Ren. Finally, Daruner use use coalescent ren. The two races lineages that drive unique politics in Ithasen are the Daruner and the Haqol.Daruner children absorb the Ren talents of both their parents, becoming a perfect blend of Daruner and another lineage parent. Through this mixing, a Daruner family could potentially include all other lineages within itself. This power has placed Daruner as the nobility of Ithasen.Haqol's power of harmony allows them to amplify the Ren powers of others. This puts Haqol in a vulnerable position as unscrupulous people will do anything to incorporate Haqol lineage into their bloodline. Haqol have experienced something akin to a genocide as their lineage has been consistently absorbed by other lineages and diluted over the centuries.There's a whole lot more than that so strap in!Daniel has a fully setup GitHub Wiki for information on Metanoia and Ithasen that you can explore.There's a Metanoid Discord server you can join to discuss the rules and setting with other fans.The occasional musing on TTRPGs can be found on Daniel's blog, Tabletop Discourse.GoCorral YouTube Channel for watching the Tabletop Community Spotlight.Vote in the CRIT Awards! Voting is open until August 23rd.Check out the Setting the Stage website!Want to be on the show? Fill out this survey.Join our Discord!Support Setting the Stage on Patreon! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
  1. 86 – Wuxia Adventures in RPGS (Daniel and Metanoia/Ithasen)
  2. 85 – Medical Doctor D&D (Justin and Oops! All Healers!)
  3. 84 – Horseback Riding D&D Camp (Michael and SaddleSnaps)
  4. 83 – Call of Cthulhu's Garden (Hem and The Sprouting)
  5. 82 – Tarot Ghosts (George and Fears & Fortunes)