Hello Fellow GMs!
So this my first post on the forum, so sorry if this is in the wrong place.
It's wordy, and if you would like to get the gist of the problem, scroll down.
Anyway, I am a relatively inexperienced GM (only ran 1 game before for a few months of the old Firefly RPG and didn't do an amazing job. Not horrible but not great). I have played 1 full in person campaign of the Star Wars d20 RPG, and additionally have done some 1-shots and used to be quite active on some of the old play by post games (although a lot did not use dice). In a lot of ways, I am totally unqualified, but my friends have NEVER played in person and I want to get a game going.
Now that the unnecessary introduction is out of the way, I wanted to solicit some help on building my campaign setting. I am planning to run the old Invasion module from Dragon #309/Dungeon #100, concerning a Githyanki invasion into the campaign world.
So far, I've done an odd melding of Inside out and Outside in. I have ideas about the major important countries/empires/military powers, some ideas about the world history and mythology, etc. But two points are sticking for me:
1) The Deities of the world, which is its own separate post.
2) Magic. Age old GM question but here goes. What I am thinking with magic is that it is controlled by 8 continent spanning magic universities, that basically act as a magic guild. They lisence, certify, and train wizards and in turn take a cut/set rates/hire out groups of battle mages. In turn, they also hunt down rogue or evil wizards- but they also hunt down unlicensed wizards because those people are a threat to their power.
Their tuition isn't cheap and neither is a squad of battle mages, so they also in turn have become the continent's banks and banking system.
What this has led me to think is that the criminal underworld has a strong connection to illegal magic. Basically, who else could forge the proper certifications/bribe people at the universities, etc. to create fake credentials for wizards who didn't go to the university. This also explains why a Thieves Guild or what have you could exist- governments would have an incentive to allow an organization which got them below market rate wizards.
Where I run in to trouble is sorcerers. Part of my world's history is that a few thousand years ago, dragons ruled the world (having driven out the former Ithlids who ruled it)- as such, many people can do basic cantrips, or even cast 1, say, up to 3rd level spell once per day.
But sorcerers present a problem. They both challenge the guild structure of the wizards and they are unregistered and therefore uncontrolled (to an extent) magic users. So... logically, the universities would want to kill or neutralize them. Which seems a level of evil I'm not sure I want the world to have, but maybe it could work? (The more I type, the more I think maybe I should make the universities like the Catholic Church under the Borgias- super corrupt, s!+%ty, and decadent. Hell, wizards could be in a place where they are supposed to be celibate so they don't make any sorcerers)
Secondly, the whole war/kingdom question. Wouldn't there be a kingdom that tried to take in sorcerers? Or multiple kingdoms? A squad of sorcerers with fireball is basically an artillery battery! So... how would all that work?
So, that's what I'm trying to figure out. Should I make my world that dark, and how do I deal with the fact that there are some who would protect sorcerers?
There are some magic level questions I also have (Why doesn't every castle have a permanent alarm spell on it? It's 2500 GP. A rich kingdom would have most rooms warded. If so, how can the characters break in if needed?) but this is the main one.
TL;DR- Campaign setting based on the Holy Roman Empire, takes place circa 1480-1520. Running Invasion from Dragon 309. Wizards are trained at universities who have grown rich and powerful by acting as the guild that controls magic. How would they handle sorcerers? Would they just murder them? That seems logical. Would a kingdom or kingdoms protect them to have a group of battle mages on hand?
Should I make these universities like the very corrupt, pre-Reformation Catholic Church? Or is all of this murdering etc. a bit dark?
