This is an attempt at a historical game, set in real world Earth in the late 8th century in northern Europe. I am trying to make it as close to real history as possible.
Game Background
The year is 782 AD. Karolus Magnus (Charlemagne, Charles the Great) is King of the Franks, Lombards, and ruler of most of Western Europe. He is well on his way to becoming the first "Emperor of the Romans" since the fall of the western Empire in 476. Frankish society is flourishing under his rule. He has instituted reforms in monetary policy, education, writing (despite being illiterate himself) and the Church. In his mid thirties, he is a victorious conqueror and one of (if not the) most powerful men in the known world. Even Pope Adrian I is beholden to the great king.
Charlemagne's campaign to conquer and Christianize the Saxons has been raging on and off for a decade. The last two years (780-782) have been peaceful, with the Saxons under Frankish rule. Charlemagne was away in Itlay, on campaign. Upon his return to Saxony he instituted a new code of law and appointed new Counts (Grafs), from the ranks of both loyal Saxons and Franks. The laws prescribed death for pagans who refused to convert to Christianity. Under the draconian laws, conflict flared up again. In autumn of 782 Widukind, the former war leader of the Saxons returned from his exile in Danemark to lead a new revolt. They burned Frankish churches, and slew the priests.
A graf named Theodoric, a relative of the king, as well as a force of lesser nobles and their army were dispatched to deal with the rebels. Theodoric's army and the nobles' army met up and arrived at the Süntel mountains together, where the Saxon rebels were camped. Theodoric set up camp with his men on the south side of the Weser river, while the nobles' army set up on the north side. The nobles were on the same side as the Saxon camp. They were worried that if they stuck to Theodoric's plan and waited for him, all the glory would go to him. So, instead of waiting for Theodoric they attacked alone. The results were disastrous. From the Revised Annals of the Kingdom of the Franks:
"....Each individual seized his weapons and charged with as much speed as he could muster, just as fast as his horse would carry him, upon the place where the Saxons were drawn up in battle-array in front of their camp; they acted as if their task was to pursue a fleeing foe and seize booty rather than to take on an enemy standing marshaled to face them. Since the approach had gone badly, badly also went the battle; for when this was joined they were surrounded by the Saxons and killed almost to a man. Those who were able to make their escape even so fled not to their own camp, from which they had set out, but to Theodoric's, across the mountain. The loss to the Franks was greater than numbers alone, however, for two of the legates, Adalgis and Cailo, four counts and as many as twenty other men of distinction and nobility were killed, as well as others who were in their followings and chose to die at their sides rather than survive them.
When the king [Charlemagne] received news of what had happened, he judged that there must be not a moment's delay; swiftly collecting together an army, he entered Saxony and questioned the primores of the Saxons, all of whom he had summoned to attend him, as to who was responsible for the rebellion which had taken place. And since they all declared that Widukind was the author of this wickedness but were unable to deliver him up in view of the fact that he had taken himself off to the Northmen once the deed had been done, no fewer than 4,500 of the others, those who had fallen in with his promptings and committed such a gross outrage, were handed over and at the place on the river Aller called Verden, at the king's command, all beheaded in a single day. Thus was punishment executed; and the king then retired to winter-quarters at Thionville, where he celebrated both the Lord's birthday and Easter in the customary fashion.
The result of the bloody day was to galvanize Widukind and his followers. It would be total war with the Saxon rebels. This is where you step in. You are a member of a newly formed unit of knights (for lack of a better term). War was a yearly occurrence for the subjects of Charlemagne, each spring he gathered an army from across his empire and attacked someone. According to law, Freemen with three or more manses* are required to join the army as knights. If you have two manses, you are to partner with another two-manse landholder and equip one of you to represent both. Three one manse landholders must choose one from their number and equip him. For those with only half a manse, 6 men select one of their number and help to arm him. You are from one of these poorest of landowning families. You control half a manse. Your lord has clumped you together with five other half-manse owners. The others chose you to represent them, and paid for your armament. The law requires that every knight have a shield, lance, sword, dagger, bow and quiver with at least 12 arrows. There is no requirement that one fight with all the weapons, merely that they posses them.
With winter coming, proper war cannot be waged. However that will not stop the Saxon rebels from burning every church they can get their hands on. You are under the command of Graf Theodoric in what is current day Minden in Nordrhein-Westfalen. You will be trying to protect the loyal Christians of the area until Charlemagne can return with an army in the spring and wipe out the rebels.
The feudal system is only just beginning to form, and there isn't yet a codified system of nobility and titles beyond King, Margraf, Graf (Count), and Lord. The knightly class is emerging as a way for free peasants to move into the lower nobility, and granting of hereditary lands to successful knights is becoming commonplace. You inherited your half manse from a male relative, and are only the second one in your line to hold it. The recent adaptation of the stirrup from the Moorish Muslims in Spain has allowed for the development of the devastating cavalry lance charge.
8th Century Culture
Your character is a Frank or a member of one of the ethnic groups conquered by the Carolingian Empire before 782. They are Roman Catholic and medieval in outlook and belief. There is no magic, but they believe in magic (and that it is the work of demons and Satan). They believe in the literal truth of the Bible as dictated by the Catholic Church, the Pope and king Charlemagne. They cannot read (probably), and have no conception of a scientific worldview. Everything that happens is because God or the devil wants it to. Medicine is primitive and largely ineffective. Classical Roman and Greek culture have been lost, you live amongst the hundreds of years old ruins of Roman society. Women are inferior and cannot participate in politics, war or public life in general. They can marry, become nuns or become prostitutes. There are no other paths available to them. Non Christian peoples are viewed as dangerous devil worshiping barbarians who are worthy only of conversion or death. There is no real art other than that sponsored by the church, and its main purpose is religious instruction. Many children die. If they survive childhood, the average person might live to 40 if they avoid a violent death. Peasants tend to die younger than the nobles. Without strong governance and societal institutions, personal honor is very important.
Starting at 1:50:00 of this podcast Dan Carlin starts talking about the Franks who lead up to Charlemagne, and then Charlemagne himself.
This map shows the names of places we'll be using
This map shows the current extent of the empire
Very informative article about Charlemagne's Military
Piecemeal Armor
Wounds and Vigor
Healing Surges - A number of times per day equal to 1/2 a character's level plus their Constitution modifier a character can take a moment to rest, refocus and regain some vigor. With one use of this ability, a character can heal 1d6 hit points of damage for every two levels they possess. Using this ability is a swift action that requires no free hands. A character may only target themselves with this ability.
Treat Deadly Wounds:Modify the "treat deadly wounds" use of the heal skill as follows:
Treat Deadly Wounds
Note: You must expend two uses from a healer's kit to perform this task. You take a –2 penalty on your check for each use from a healer's kit that you lack.
When treating deadly wounds, you can restore wound points to a damaged creature. Treating deadly wounds restores 1 wound point per level of the creature. If you exceed the DC by 5 or more, add your heal skill rank to this amount. A creature can only benefit from its deadly wounds being treated within 24 hours of being injured and never more than once per day.
Time: 1 hour.
Level - 1st (The most bad ass person on earth might be level 5 or so. See Calibrating Your Expectations).
Races - Human only (duh)
Ability Scores - 20 point buy. You guys are way cooler than normal people.
Classes - Fighter, Barbarian, All the Tripod Machine Classes here (No other classes allowed, including Cavalier, don't ask!)
Traits - Two from different categories, reflavor to fit Earth as necessary. Earth appropriate drawbacks are also fine, but only one.
Starting Wealth - 300 GP. You must buy a lance, shield (any), sword, dagger, warhorse (light or heavy), bow (any) and arrows.
Here are the Armor and Weapons available at that time (if it's not here, you can't buy it):
shields - wooden large and small (no tower)
armor- leather, hide, chain, or scale (nothing else, remember we're using piecemail armor)
weapons - gauntlet*, dagger, club, shortspear, longspear, quarterstaff, spear, sling, throwing axe, handaxe, short sword, battleaxe, longsword, scimitar*, greataxe*, greatclub, lance, longbow*, composite longbow*, shortbow, composite shortbow
*These weapons are new technology, or rare, thus they are double price.
other gear - Many technologies didn't exist at the time. Try to keep your gear simple, if there's something that wouldn't have been around I'll let you know.
Languages - Latin, German, Italian, Czech, Dutch, Frisian, French, Slovene, Sorbian, and Polish (Slightly anachronistic I know. Just trying to make things easy. German is "common".) You can't read or write unless you spend a skill point in linguistics. Then you can learn to read/write one of the languages you speak. Spending a skill point in this way does not grant an additional language.
Feats - Feats from Tripod Machine stuff will be accepted on a case-by-case basis.
For me to consider your submission you need to create an alias for it, and put all their stats in the profile using this format. All the messageboard formatting is there, all you need to do is copy paste it and then fill it out. See Devan, Dorian, Eugeni, Ferit or Gorou for examples. You need to complete a background and the personality section, as well as their physical description.
Keep in mind the avaerage guy was probably about 5'7" tall and 150 lbs. back then. Charlemagne was around 6' (according to 2010 X-Ray and CT Scan of his tibia) which puts him in the 99th percentile of tall people in the period. At 6' he was considered a near giant. So I don't want to see 6'7" 300 lbs on your character sheet. You eat mostly bread , cheese/butter and some veggies. You might get some meat a couple times a week if you're lucky and it's probably salted pork or some kind of bird.
Frankish Hairstyles. They may have also worn suebian knots. They were down with mustaches and beards.
I want to leave recruitment open for long enough that people can do a good job, and get familiar with the new classes. It will also give me more time to prepare the campaign. So have your submissions finished by 4:00 AM EST, Thursday February 20th. Late submissions will not be considered. If you've got questions, ask them.
Glad to see this getting off the ground. Will you be allowing archetypes of fighter or barbarian that suit the time period?
Also can anyone recommend a good source of authentic names from the time period (Frankish, or those of the other conquered ethnicities)?
Yes, archetypes that are Earth appropriate are fine. I guess I forgot but any rage powers that make you grow horns or do something else supernatural are also out unless they can be re-flavored into something mundane.
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Thanks Jelani. The simple name of Lo I rather like. How would you feel about the armour master archetype?
It seems appropriate enough; the only sticking point might be the fortification ability it grants at 9th level, although this considered an [ex] ability rather than a magical one in the text.
Better go listen to that podcast and get some context for this fellow, and some good ideas regarding backstory.
Armor master is fine. There’s no way we’ll ever get past 5th or 6th level. I’m guessing this game will last around 1000 posts.
What is the language of the Saxons?
Profile done. Please let me know if the format is okay, I know it's not 100% exact.
What is the language of the Saxons?
A dialect of German, so German rules wise.
What is the language of the Saxons?A dialect of German, so German rules wise.
Thanks. I gave him Greek to account for his many years of studying new Testament Scripture in the original language. I know it likely won't ever come up in play, but I wanted to make sure it was okay.
Profile done. Please let me know if the format is okay, I know it's not 100% exact.
Keep in mind he has to spend an extra language to learn to read or write a language. So if you want him to be literate in all these languages you essentially get half as many languages.
Hey Jelani
Couple questions:
1. In the Scout class, does the talent giving a bonus feat require the feat prereq? For example, the Precise Shot talent gives the Precise Shot feat. Would you need to have Point Blank Shot before taking the talent?
2. In the Hunter class, would the obvious Favored Enemy be animals or Humans? You mentioned before about segregating Humans to Saxons, etc.
3. In the Scout class, their targeting strike is NOT sneak attack, right? It's almost like Vital Strike, right?
cheers
1 - No.
2 - Yes. If you choose humans you must pick a nationality/ethnicity to go along with it.
3 - Yes, but only when using the attack standard action. So not on full attacks, not in conjunction with a charge, etc.
Profile done. Please let me know if the format is okay, I know it's not 100% exact.
Format is close enough. I’ll make a list of submissions once some more pile up.
Okay, Reolus gets 7 languages (1 base, 4 Int, 1 trait, 1 rank Linguistics), so I've divided them up as German (speak and read), Latin (speak and read), Greek (read/write only), French (speak only), and Frisian (speak only). Is that what you had in mind?
Jelani
Odd question: do you have issues with multi-classing?
cheers
Jelani
Odd question: do you have issues with multi-classing?
cheers
Of course not :P Multiclass to your heart's content if you feel it would better mechanically represent the character you're going for.
I've been working on a Knight, as well. He's an older fellow, fairly charismatic, and rather pious. Still working out all of the details; he's probably going to be from Austrasia, though I might make him from a more Roman-influenced region in the south instead.
More odd questions:
- Is one outfit below 10 gp free?
- What outfits are the knight's expected to wear: soldier's outfit, courtier's outfit, whatever?
- If a character has Handle Animal, can they combat-train a horse prior to the start of the campaign? Effectively, buying a non-trained horse but starting with a combat-trained horse.
- What's expected of the knights for providing food?
- You mention that it's winter. Should we buy winter outfits & furs?
cheers
Free clothes, yes. Check out what Charlemagne wore in the clothing article I linked to. Basically everyone wore the same thing, with more or less jewelry and embroidery. Maybe different cloth. You guys are pretty poor, so probably breeches a tunic and boots. Then a cloak and/or furs in the winter.
You can train your horse if you have the skill, yes.
Technically they were required to have a wagonn with three month’s provisions and tools as well as the gear I listed in character gen, but I was going to handwave that. This isn’t oregon trail.
It’s cold. If you want a bonus on your checks against cold, buy winter clothes, yes.
Here's work in progress. Still tweaking fluff and equipment.
Hope to be selected to play this great campaign.
cheers
Free clothes? There goes my excuse to ride around the countryside naked.
Is Blood Steed a bit too shamanistic for a real world game?
Free clothes? There goes my excuse to ride around the countryside naked.
Is Blood Steed a bit too shamanistic for a real world game?
I might be okay with it depending on where your character was from.
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I've got my character more or less figured out. He is a very young catholic Lombard who favours mounted combat in typical Lombard style (Knight Class) by the name of Fredegarh.
He was cared for by members of the church as a child after Charlemagne defeated the Lombards and is devoutly catholic. On hearing that the great King Charlemagne is going to war with the Saxons he leaves to join him to help bring the light of the Lord to them.
I'm just going to take a little time to polish the character up a bit before I post him here.
So finally done with Fredgarh and Ajax. This is Lord Zekk's submission. Very excited about this game. I'm a big fan of history and I got to learn a lot about a period I haven't really done much reading about. I always enjoy character creation but I have to say this is the most fun I've had with any application.
If you have any feedback I would be happy to hear it.
Cheers.
Still trying to put something together for
I managed to track down a copy of the 2nd ed. Sourcebook Charlemagne's Paladins but fear its take may not match up with Jelani more historical and grittier interpretation.
I managed to track down a copy of the 2nd ed. Sourcebook Charlemagne's Paladins but fear its take may not match up with Jelani more historical and grittier interpretation.
Actually it's got some good stuff, I find I must rather eat my words!
The history channel show Vikings takes place at roughly the same time period (ca 793). Yes, it takes place in Scandinavia and England, but the material culture is essentially the same. It probably gives more insight into the pagan side of things, but it’s definitely worth a look.
Thanks Jelani. I've been finding some good stuff this evening and my character concept's starting to take flight.
One question; would a scimitar be considered a sword under the auspices of a sword being compulsory gear? I'm thinking Lo may have inherited a scimitar claimed by his father on a Moorish campaign.
Yes, a scimitar is a sword.
So finally done with Fredgarh and Ajax. This is Lord Zekk's submission. Very excited about this game. I'm a big fan of history and I got to learn a lot about a period I haven't really done much reading about. I always enjoy character creation but I have to say this is the most fun I've had with any application.
If you have any feedback I would be happy to hear it.
Cheers.
The character looks fun. Reolus would be happy to guide such a young man on his walk with Our Lord.
One qualm, though: picking a drawback that only deals with saving throws against spells in a game world where spells don't exist seems a bit, odd.
Lo the . . . Foolhardy / Illfooted / Dimwitted . . .
You could keep it simple and go with "Letard".
Hey, DM, I noticed that Gozolon is not the only Dragoon. I may consider reworking him so you don't have a hundred knights.
With Avatars
Reolus of Fulda
Caedmon Fisc
Leodegar
Gunthar von Eschbronn
Fredegarh
Gozolon of Ulm
Interested
Transylvanian Tadpole
Jubal, I AM Reolus of Fulda, so you can take me off the "Interested" list.
Gozolon
I'm still new to the Piecemeal Armor rules. However, I understand that if you combine the chain shirt with any light or medium arm and leg armor, the suit is medium armor. That's not how I think you interpret it, right?
cheers
Hi, everyone. I am working on a spy character.
Thanks, Jubal. I am aware that my current armor configuration (chain shirt, leather sleeves, leather leggings) will count as Medium armor if I decide to keep it. I worked on that section earlier today before stepping AFK.
DMJ - wee question would you consider a Danish mercenary character background? Going through some ideas and this did cross my mind...
Widukind's brother in law is the king of Denmark, and Widukind was hiding out there before he restarted the rebellion. So, no. Charlemagne wouldn't hire Danish mercenaries.
Thanks for the list Jubal, I hadn't realized there were so many submissions already. Hmmm...two knights, two fighter (dragoons) and a scholar. The variety is overwhelming... (>_>)*
As for drawbacks that give bonuses against spells? No, that's not going to work. You have to pick one that actually will have a negative affect on you in game (potentially).
I wasn't sure if there was going to be any divine / mystical healing etc. I'll find another drawback.
Since we have so many knights, I thought I would change my submission to hunter. Would I be allowed to keep favoured enemy humoid:human since he will be pretty s$%# at combat otherwise and even with it he won't be anywhere near able to compete with the proper fighters.
You can choose human:Saxon. 90+% of the enemies will be Saxons.
Cool, that sounds fair. Crunch is done, I'm working on the fluff now. Both the knight sheet and the hunter sheet are in the profile.
This is Tadpole's avatar, although at this stage he's far from complete!
Thanks for the list Jubal, I hadn't realized there were so many submissions already. Hmmm...two knights, two fighter (dragoons) and a scholar. The variety is overwhelming... (>_>)*
I am thinking of changing class to a non-dragoon and/or specializing in ranged weapons. Gnome illusionist? :p
Thanks for the list Jubal, I hadn't realized there were so many submissions already. Hmmm...two knights, two fighter (dragoons) and a scholar. The variety is overwhelming... (>_>)*
Well, you squished my Cavalier/Ranger build, so I had to rethink. ;D
Okay so finally done and done. Fluff crunch and all. I would be happy to play the knight or the hunter. Thank you for your consideration in advance DM Jelani.