After Winter's Dark

[HLHartman]

I just got my copy and was wondering how much of the background world you guys try to incorporate in your first few sessions?

In the past, with my own homebrews, I have allowed for the group to "explore" their way into local and worldly knowledge, but this setting is really rich in history. I'd hate not trying to bring in a portion of it from the outset.

How much homework should I do prior to our first session in order to make Aihrde seem fully vested in history?

[seskis281]

I started with making my party aware primarily of two big things - the idea that the culture was oppressed for a thousand years of the Winter Dark, and the mythology of Unklar, the Horned One, so that the essential idea of the "world reborn," but with vestages, fingers of evil left to be dealt with permeated the "feel" of the environment. As they went through my campaign, bits and pieces of the New Aenochian background seeped in, some history of Aufstrag and the Winter Dark wars themselves, but in starting I simply showed them the map and gave a 5-10 minute quick precis of those two things. I did look up some material specifically for individual characters - that's what the 2nd book in the Folio is good for. My wife's cleric wanted to support nature, so I handed her the info on Daladon.

We also started at the Blacktooth Ridge. Make sure you have some encounters and adventures to level up once before taking on the Vargolg - it can be deadly. Botkinburg became the center of our campaign ever since, and our party are now the "celebrated Heroes of Botkinburg," the Brotherhood of the Blacktooth (they call themselves "Bob"), and they're services are sought by many in the SE part of the Cradle.

Best of luck!
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John "Sir Seskis" Wright

Ilshara: Lands of Exile:
http://johnwright281.tripod.com/

High Squire of the C&C Society
www.cncsociety.org

[Treebore]

The only reason I didn't do it exactly like seskis is because the Runemark in my home game came into the game with world historian type fo background. So I handed my daughter the d20 Codex of Erde and told her to read it. What she remembers is what her character knows without having to go to the libraries and researching it.

A couple of bits she thought she remembered correctly have turned into some interesting twists, two of which she/they haven't even discovered yet because they still think she remembered correctly.
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The Ruby Lord, Earl of the Society

Next Con I am attending: http://www.neoncon.com/

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[cinderblock]

The more I read about the setting the more I'm Intrigued by it. Jeez, the Trolls are gonna soak me at Con. Its a good thing.

[Matthew]

Sounds like Seskis281 has the right approach to me.
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It is a joyful thing indeed to hold intimate converse with a man after ones own heart, chatting without reserve about things of interest or the fleeting topics of the world; but such, alas, are few and far between.

Yoshida Kenko (1283-1350)

[HLHartman]

seskis281 wrote:
I started with making my party aware primarily of two big things - the idea that the culture was oppressed for a thousand years of the Winter Dark, and the mythology of Unklar, the Horned One, so that the essential idea of the "world reborn," but with vestages, fingers of evil left to be dealt with permeated the "feel" of the environment.

Nice approach! Sold!

Thanks.
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A boy named Sue.