This is where I put random thoughts on how to tweak or modify my RoA campaign. They might not all make it into the final campaign.
Illithids
Illithids were created by the Azlanti who using aboleth magic transformed themselves into long lived creatures when their continent fell beneath the waves. They originally saw themselves as the last line of defense against the aboleths and those humans on the surface. They eventually learned that the aboleths spanned across multiple worlds and so they built their own starships and sent Illithids aboard them to hunt down the aboleths wherever they dwelled.
As the Aboleths-Illithid War spanned across stars, the Illithids were captured by the aboleths in many conflicts, experimented upon and in some cases, released. Illithids slowly mutated from their original purpose and became a blight upon the stars. They colonized worlds where they created Elder Brains.
At the end of time multiple illithid worlds performed powerful magic to send colonies back in time to the beginning of the universe. This has allowed the Illithids to have a presence across multiple galaxies before their birth on Golarion.
At the bottom of the ocean is an Azlanti/illithid base filled with thousands of Illithids in stasis awaiting slaves to power their ships (same design as from Spelljammer) for them to go out across the stars. These Illithids have been corrupted by the aboleths. The ghost of one of the mages who created the illithid race (including transforming himself) is haunting the bottom of the ocean. He can be put to rest only when the illithid base is destroyed along with all the Illithids inside. He can provide the PCs with cursed treasure if they agree to do this (curse is lifted once they complete the mission) or perhaps information to help them (he was alive in the days of the Azlanti). Picture for this guy could totally be Davy Jones from Pirates of the Caribbean.
----
If the PCs fight a kraken, make it an illithid kraken. It could be quite bestial and so have minimal psychic powers. It would not be able to feed on medium sized creatures.
[EDIT]: Azlanti weapons were falcata (known in Azlanti as a kopis) and a xiphos (use stats for a gladius, but emphasize how sophisticated the hilt is).
I really like that idea, John. Some good stuff for bringing illithids into the campaign (those slimy buggers have always been one of my favourite bad guys, right back to old 1st Edition AD&D! :) )
Regarding the Azlanti weapons - I hadn't really thought about it, but I think the idea of Azlant more-or-less-equals Atlantis, and therefore heavily vested in Greek mythology, makes sense.
Maybe throwing in a macuahuitl analogue somewhere could add the "Aztec-ish" feel that also seems to be part of the Azlant.
Thoughts?
Daronil: Exactly my thoughts on Atlantis. I'm not sure how much canon will support that interpretation but it's the direction I'm going for my campaign. Add in round shields and longspears as well.
You have (accidentally?) also created a foreshadowing of the Azlanti Star Empire in Starfinder, if some non-transformed Azlanti Humans also managed to make it out along with the Illithids . . . .
You have (accidentally?) also created a foreshadowing of the Azlanti Star Empire in Starfinder, if some non-transformed Azlanti Humans also managed to make it out along with the Illithids . . . .
Heh, so I have. That one I didn't include on purpose.
Here's a bit more on Azlanti and foreshadowing the Azlanti Star Empire:
In the years immediately preceding the destruction of Azlant, small cults of terrorists formed up, decrying the end times were coming and that Azlant was doomed. Calling themselves the Voice of Groetus. They took to attacking military and government facilities in suicidal attacks that ultimately did very little damage.
Most Azlanti of the time dismissed these cultists, pointing to one passage of the (Pharasmin? Desnan?) prophecies that said "the sun shall never set on the Azlanti Empire". They took this prophecy to mean that the Azlanti Empire would never fall. They held onto this belief right until the continent was destroyed.
(The Voice of Groetus cult was first formed during the Earthfall and were in fact traveling back in time in order to try to warn the Azlanti of the coming end times. They failed to make any significant difference to the timeline. The prophecy technically did come true in that the Azlanti Star Empire has spanned sufficient worlds that there is always somewhere in the Empire where it is day).
Here's some more information I'm seriously thinking about introducing as a subplot that will allow the PCs to romp around in Ancient Azlant before the campaign is over.
The Timefinder Society
A few thousand years following the Gap that shook literally the entire universe, time travel technology started to become widespread. The technology was nothing new. It had been invented and discovered over the millenia any number of times. But each time it was discovered, the civilization either wiped itself out or it voluntarily agreed to stop using it and to hide the secret of time travel away in a vault. This time was different.
A number of opposing interstellar society's had successfully gained the secret to reliable time travel. The result was madness and ultimately the very fabric of reality weakened as a result. Blackholes consumed a number of star systems before finally most responsible governments had agreed to stop using it.
However it was too late. The knowledge of time travel had been too widely disseminated. Criminals, tourists and researchers were all using it as an every day part of their lives, and they simply refused to stop. Any effort to clamp down on the technology saw it simply move to another city or another planet. It was the most widely flouted law in the galaxy.
Finally one time traveler made a discovery. Absalom, the sole surviving relic from lost Golarion had been rediscovered in a pocket dimension at the end of time. Establishing a corp of time travelers known as the Timefinders, these self appointed defenders of the universe created a set of guidelines in which people could safely time travel and began establishing lodges throughout time and space where it's agents could operate out of in order to enforce the guidelines. Their justic was merciless as they saved the continuum and the very fabric of the universe from being destroyed.
However more than mere enforcers, timefinders were also scientists seeking new discoveries both sociological and scientific. They learned new technologies to help them in their duties, as well as the truth behind many mysteries. Their guiding principle was to make no change that would change the course of history. This meant watching and documenting the fall of many civilisations including Ancient Azlant, Thassilon, the Roman Empire and others. It also meant they watched terrible atrocities occur all throughout history, not only refusing to stop them, but actively seeking out time travelers who were trying to stop it and to ensure they did not succeed.
Throughout history the number of timefinders is uncountable. But the one thing they all have in common is that they have wayfinders. Devices which are used to help the timefinder to always know where in time they are and to help them get back to Absalom, the Last City.
-----
How I'm planning on having the timefinder society introduced is to have the corpse of an elderly person with an extremely strange Wayfinder (with the pattern of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ouroboros running along it's edge)found on the island of Ancorato in book 1. This person should ultimately prove to be one of the PC's (which certain magic would reveal, hence why it's important they find him early in the AP).
The final doomsday weapon will have one small tweak: Whatever it was designed to do, it does it, but it does it through the timeline (so if it was designed to wipeout the aboleths, than it doesn't just destroy them, it erases them completely from the timeline so that history happens as if they never existed). Of course, the weapon never worked and Ochymua is trying to use the weapon to travel back in time. However after Ochymua has fiddled with it what happens is that the person gets sent back to one of their ancestors (or if they were alive, then back into their own body). Alas, for poor Ochymua, his body was already in stasis for the period he keeps jumping back to. And try as he might, he can't get the weapon to go back any further than it currently is).
Fortunately for the PC's, the timefinder that is stationed in the city they keep arriving in is in fact one of the PC's. So he is willing to bend the rules (because in truth the rules were already bent in his own past which is the PC's future) and so when the tidal wave hits Azlant he quicky gathers them, puts them in the tower of the lich from Book 3 or 4 in temporal stasis with the lich given strict orders not to release them until a certain date.
In this way, the PC's could have the final showdown with Ochymua several times (and if they're clever enough, they could try to subtly alter the battlefield in the past to try to give themselves the upper hand in the present).
One upside of this is that I can have Ochymua seem to know how to counter the PC's tactics throughout the entire AP, and that is because Ochymua has gone through the series of events in the AP twice by the time the player's start their first run through.
Dunno how much of this makes sense. But that's one idea I've persistently got running through my head for this campaign. Happy to explain any portion of it for those who have questions.
Thought it through some more. The Timefinder agent can't be one of the PC's from a previous timeline. But everything else fits. And Ochymua could also still totally be metagaming all throughout the campaign (although to be honest, only to a minor degree or else it's not very fun).
I don't have the Ruins of Azlant, but if you want Ochymua to be able to metagame more, have it be in a way that has exploitable flaws (like, Daemon-Spawn meets Sideshow Bob).
if you want Ochymua to be able to metagame more, have it be in a way that has exploitable flaws (like, Daemon-Spawn meets Sideshow Bob).
It's not the primary (or even secondary or tertiary) goal, but more of a footnote for a side-effect of what could be used to a very light degree.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
So here's another idea I've got for the campaign.
Sleeper Agents
During the days of the Azlanti, a program by the aboleths saw them plant sleeper agents among the Azlanti who could be activated and turned into loyal slaves to the aboleths. This could be negated by a simple will save, but unless of a high level it would typically fail.
Originally the aboleths implanted loyal servant personas into people, that was hereditary. This persona was linked somehow so it was not simply an ancestral memory, but the actual personality that could be tapped into. The aboleths (or one of their agents, typically a biological automaton) would utter a phrase that would cause the memories of the person's past lives along with the actions they took as agents up to the point of their death. They get 1 memory of a life back every round of combat (with a new save at the end of their turn). If they remembered all of their lives back to when the persona was first installed, the other persona would gain control of the person along with full access to the person's memories.
Once the persona was activated, they would be willing to carry out whatever was required of them, typically to their death. Death for the persona was never lasting and they know that they would eventually be called upon in the future in a new body (one from a descendant of the original host of the persona). The only restriction was a persona could not be active in two hosts at the same time (experiments where this did happen often resulted in both hosts going homicidal and mad).
Even following the fall of Azlant, automatons loyal to the Ochymua (and other aboleths) would be activated for specific missions in order to manipulate humanity's evolution (often towards conflicting ends). Their missions were carried out throughout much of humanity's history (assassinating people, rescuing others from prison, delivering a powerful artifact).
An unfortunate side effect was noticed though. For persona's that were activated the most often, their hosts started remembering their past lives even before getting activated. One host remembered so much of their past lives that they sought out distant relatives who were also hosts and together, along with a band of other warriors, paladins and priests, led a charge against an ancient aboleth city that saw the biggest massacre and blow dealt to the aboleths by humanity in all it's history. Following this incident, the aboleths sought out as many of the hosts as they could find and killed them. However the breadth of the program and the amount of time it had been active for meant that the aboleths could not eradicate them all.
The program was eventually forgotten by contemporary aboleths as they went on to meet their goals in other ways. Alas the ancient aboleths had a penchant for creating hidden bases for their loyal servants to carry out their tasks. Those that housed biological automatons could continue for millenia following the death of the aboleth they served, carrying out the duties that were originally given to them. Such automatons have continued activating sleeper hosts in order to steer humanity's history in particular directions. While these bases have been shutdown when discovered, some still operate from before the fall of Azlant to this day.
Unbeknownst to the PC's they are all hosts for these personas. While modern day aboleths have forgotten about the program and thus do not recognise such hosts on sight, the Ochymua does.
In the final confrontation with the Ochymua, the aboleth will use the equivalent of mass oneiric horror (level 8 wizard spell) but instead of the usual effect it gives the PC flashbacks of 1 past life per round. Now fortunately there have been generations since the fall of Azlant and so the persona they can host has been used many times. As such they should have 10+ rounds before they succumb to the end of the spell (with a will save each round). None of them should die from the spell (instead they should just get a lot of flavour text of past lives their ancestors lived). It will take them out of the fight, but in the same way that mass hold person would.
Throughout the adventure though I can give them will saves and if they fail they'll get flashes of memories of what Ancorato looked like before Azlant fell and of faces of people who once lived there. E.g. When they see the lich, they could make an instant will save and if they fail they'll see him as a smiling person who welcomes them with wide open arms (as the lich knew one ancestor from each of the PC's) in a very momentary flashback before they're brought back to the present and see the lich as a lich. That should help cause them to pause and wonder about the people they're about to interact with rather then just go in and KILL KILL KILL.
John Lynch - I. Friggin'. Love. This!!!! :)
I am sooooo stealing this idea for my RoA campaign (when I eventually get to run it...gotta finish Carrion Crown...then we're doing Mummy's Mask...then Strange Aeons...so I might get to teach Pathfinder to my great-grandkids with RoA!! :) )