Interest Check: Original Fantasy RP

Genre: Postapocalyptic fantasy

Characters: Half-demons (PC), dark elves(PC), dragons (NPC), lich kings (NPC)

Background: The Great War between man and elf tore apart the surface due to careless use of magic. (Imagine a fantasy take on WWIII.) Desperate human mages go the lich route while breeding human survivors with demonic outsiders in order to create a new race of humanity that might survive the destructive landscape. Elves in turn fled underground and maintained their culture and sanity underneath.

Two millenia later, the surface is divided into duchies ruled by the still active but no longer living mages, who are served by their tiefling (?) slaves. Many slaves eventually flee and form their own independant communities, but life is harsh on the surface, due to lich politics and the mutated wildlife about. (i.e. dragons.)

Elf society has remained somewhat static, though life underground is very Spartan. Resources are even more sparse than on the surface, and though there is little risk of violence, grudges and politics have survived the apocalypse. Regular 'expeditions' are sent to the surface, typically composed of those either deemed unsuitable for Drow society or the occasional volunteer.

This game will be set in one of the few fertile areas left, wherein tiefling refugees and drow explorers interact and argue/negotiate/scheme/annihilate eachother over trivial and not so trivial stuff.



(Will come back and make this sexier as we go forward.)

Magic: This is a very high fantasy environment, so things will be a tad more ostentatious than usual. We're operating under the logic that, yes, you can do some amazing shit, but the planet is still trying to kill you.

Currently, we're toying with the idea of a rune system for elves, who were naturally in tune with the wild once upon a time and made several contracts with many spirits. If you have a contract or know the secret name of some elemental creature/process/whatever, you have a certain amount of control. Earth-themed runes are obviously going to be big in drow society. The advantage of a rune system, I think, is it keeps magic a a bit more manageable while keeping a lot of whacky possibilities open. There's a tiny bit of debate over the 'science' behind runes.

We've also decided that, yes, necromancy is a thing, (obviously) and surface characters will have access to some form of it, along with a variety of various 'demonic' abilities. Have not fleshed this out yet.

Society: Elf society is democratic, though still very class oriented. Life in the Hollow Earth is very much a a struggle between the haves and the have nots, i.e. the families who have maintained their access to functional runes and those who rely on the first group. 

Surface life: Life on the surface is a nightmare. The spirits (think Avatar or Dragon Age) were once friendly and heavily connected with elves, the First Race. Then the Second Race, a short lived humanity that never quite found its place, developed forms of magic relying on forces outside our reality. Magecraft was a very rare and frightening thing among humans, whose bodies were not bathed in the Light of Creation like the first elf, and thus were easily distorted by these new influences. When the war for land resources grew tense between the two civilizations, the few truly competent human mages banded together and enacted a plan to harness the Aether, the outerverse, in a bid to summon strength and allies in their desperate war against the immortal First Race. Unfortunately, it worked too well, and the spirits of our planet's wilds were enraged and maddened by the breach of their home plane. The spirits of the air and water turned on anything living, percieving them as invaders in their fragile ecology.


Runes, the ancient contracts between elf and spirit from the First Dawn, still held sway, but it took centuries to master every single rune that would protect a family, and thus, the Great Hollowing began. Earth runes were used to turn caves into cities, and what few water runes were effective below exploited the few water reservoirs available. Elf society survived, but without exposure to light and the willing support of their ancient allies above, the elven lifes[sn shortened and their features shifted to suit their new environment. [still playing with actual Drow characteristics.

If I can't be a dragon, I'd probably for for a half-demon.

I could dig some high fantasy spectacle. I like post-apocalyptic stuff too. Only demons and dark elves seems pretty specific, though. Is there a reason why only those two, instead of your more traditional humans or the broader fantasy race grab-bag that often shows up in these settings? I'm also curious about the scope of your game -- are you going for a warring factions LoW type thing, a more traditional tabletop party on an adventure, or something else?

Also have to agree Liches are awesome. My back-pocket Lich idea has always been a lich king who gilds his bones in gold and presides over a court of hedonistic and debauched mortal subjects in order to live vicariously through the pleasures now denied him.

Edited some stuff in.

#elflyf
#necromancerunlyf
#tryandstopme

If I were a lich, I wouldn;t limit myself sorcery. Imagine an immortal swordsman or explorer while my phylactery's in my cupboard behind the flour back home.

Swinging around a sword when you have an undead army to do it for you seems a tad petty. The thematic element of he lich I've always loved is that it's scholarship corrupted, mages that became so obsessed with attaining knowledge that they requires multiple lifetimes to satisfy their need for it. A warrior or explorer lich would feel out of character. Part of the reasons love Horas' idea is because you could combine the corrupted scholarship with greed by saying the lich was once an alchemist that was obsessed with turning lead into gold and only achieved it after becoming a lich, forced to live the benefits of his exorbitant wealth vicariously through others. A warrior scholar lich could maybe work, but it seems like a stretch.

I also always figured a phylactery had to be near the lich, though I suppose it would depend on the setting in question. It certainly opens up options.

My laptop is still infected or I would.

Elite snobbery is nothing I'd associate with a lich. That sounds more like the trait of a vampire. It's not "someone who has it all and knows they can't lose it." It's someone who has sacrificed their humanity and every worldly pleasure in exchange for the infinite pursuit of knowledge, power, or whatever drives them. Obsession is the defining trait of a lich, with arrogance a common trait but hardly a necessary one.

Site's ready, if someone wants to RP.