So, to sum things up real quick:
I'm writing a campaign setting from scratch. I'll be using a lot of the PC playable (but not source) races quite liberally. For instance there will be a race of humans, a barbarian tribe of Catfolk/Orcs and half orcs, etc. Most of the factions, while having a mix of different races, will be primarily formed by the government of one or two specific races and their cultures.
For the setting, I'd like one evil faction to have invaded out of nowhere. Originally I was going to use drow, but now it's seeming kinda cliched to have the Drow be a driving force in all of this, rather than just be along for the ride.
So basicly, I need some ideas for an invading new faction that has either hid underground up until now, or has gone unnoticed for some reason up until they invaded. Any thoughts?
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So basicly, I need some ideas for an invading new faction that has either hid underground up until now, or has gone unnoticed for some reason up until they invaded. Any thoughts?
A threat that went unnoticed could be represented by a race or culture that previously was no threat at all, but has changed abruptly with the death of a ruler and ascension of a new more belligerent one, who leads the culture / race into a war with their neighbors.
Foreshadowing might include gossip about queen thus-and-such dying, and her four sons breaking into factions in argument over who has the best claim to the throne, with rumors of civil war. Neighboring countries may be caught off guard with the speed at which one of the sons assassinates his brothers (or allies with another to jointly kill the other two, or whatever) and unites the nation in a patriotic fervor to invade their long-term ally to the east, to distract his people from any very real concerns they might have over his right to rule. (Perhaps he frames the neighboring nation for the assassination of his elder brothers, or even for the death of the beloved queen!) "I've got a wife to kill, and Guilder to frame for it!"
Other examples of a change in leadership could be a vast plains occupied by feuding nomadic peoples, generally seen as a big empty nothing by neighboing lands. And then, a 'kha-khan' unites the warring tribes and forges them into a seemingly endless army...
A change in the faith of a nation or culture could similarly result in a formerely harmless seeming people changing, seemingly overnight, into a threat. The best choice would be a culture that already reveres an evil diety or an 'evil-ish' diety, like Wee Jas, from Greyhawk, who may be terribly insular and not seem 'that bad' to neighbors, but under a more fiery-tempered high clergyman could enter a violent expansionist phase, stirred by religious fervor. Nidal or Geb, in Golarion, for example, seems to be consumed with oppressing their own people, and don't appear to have any expansionist plans. That could change in a heartbeat.
Even a nation that worships a good diety might go on a 'crusade' to convert or redeem or 'save' (at the point of a sword) their neighbors, if they regard them as having fallen into wickedness.
Even a nation that worships a good diety might go on a 'crusade' to convert or redeem or 'save' (at the point of a sword) their neighbors, if they regard them as having fallen into wickedness.
I find these the most fun. For one thing, it provides the opportunity for adventurers to go up against "good" enemies. Let's face it; how often do you get to fight a paladin outside of mistaken identity scenarios?
A Demonic invasion might be a bit cliché, but it's also an option.
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A Demonic invasion might be a bit cliché, but it's also an option.
Depending on the demon lord you pick, it could be very non-traditional.
An invasion by Cyth-V'sug could be spear-headed by evil treants, vegepygmies, corrupted fey and plant-infested-template animals and humanoids (using something like yellow musk zombies as a base, only with every infested creature gaining the hive mind trait, as they are all linked to the avatar of Cyth-V'sug, at the center of the infestation).
An invasion by Anghazhan would be led by awakened fiendish and half-fiendish gorillas, dire apes, baboons, girallons, etc. leading armies of enslaved humans, and have a 'Planet of the Apes' vibe to it.
A nation that has come to be ruled by a monster also could work. If the 'great khan' who has united the warring tribes of the endless plains is an ogre magi, that will offer a different way of ending the threat. (If his twelve sub-chiefs are *also* ogre magi, that could make it harder to expose him...)
Rakshasa are perfect in this sort of role, but even a dragon could take on a human(oid) form and unite the fire giants, hobgoblins, etc. in his volcanic region, and forge them into a 'fire nation.'
Actually, someone pointed out Naga's, which led me to read up on Lunar nagas and made me think of a sort of Cthulu cult. A cult of evil stargazers uniting a bunch of less inteligent races could make for an interesting start.
My real requirements are that I want this to be a unique race, but a humanoid one. They must be traditionally evil (I'll hold that much of the cliche together) and intelligent enough to form a working society (possibly lawful evil).
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Grr. Site froze and post vanished.
Short(er) version.
A Cthuloid invasion, riffing off of War against the Chtorr, could include ecological effects, with the presence of the outer worlds taint causing local flora and fauna to become infested and transformed. Plants become black and bulbous, dripping a reddish sap that smells sickly sweet. Animals begin mutating, losing their hair and growing chitinous exoskeletons. All become increasinly less nourishing to untransformed life, although quite capable of devouring each other, as the 'ecosystem' is tainted and replaced. The cultists of the Old Gods have a special potion that causes someone to collapse with terrible stomach cramps, and recover a day later, able to digest the 'new life,' allowing them, and those that swear to follow the Old Gods, to adapt to the new ecosystem, and giving them a built-in motivation to help spread the new ecosystem, as the more the otherworldly taint spreads, the better the world is *for them,* and the less useful it is to other native species, who find their own foodstuffs increasingly tainted and transformed and less nourishing.
Neighbors slash and burn infected fields, trying to stop the spread of the corruptive growth, and even otherwise harmless creatures are transformed into dangerous alien predators, with field mice, for instance, replaced by swarms of chitinous mildly toxic beetle like creatures (treat as a spider swarm).