If you're running your own homebrew setting, not a published or licensed world, tell us a bit about it here, what's the gist of it?

RPGPundit

My current setting I plan to publish. But been using it for a while so I think it still qualifies as a homebrew in this case. Basic overview is the world was once dominated by a massive ogre civilization. Mortals had no access to magic, that was the sole domain of the gods. One of the ogre kings acquired the means to kill their deity (the gods in this setting are worldly) and take its power. He aborbed all the gods soul and became the first wizard. The other gods reigned a  storm of hate on him and ogres everywhere. Ogre king was killed and the god-energy unleashed. In the coming years the fragments of the ogre deity were reborn into a small number of mortals, ushering in an age of wizards.

That is the basic gist of the setting. After the wizards started appearing, and after ogre civilization collapsed, the more standard fantasy races moved in and set up shop on the ruins.

While there is a western european style region in the setting, the focus is really on a more mediterranean area and culture. The halflings run a fairly advanced maritime republic. Elves are a little more aggressive than in standard settings (bit still recognizably elven). Orcs are much more advanced and have a growing empire.

I'm running, on occastiona, a Top Secret campaign that's been running for 30+ years under at least three different gamemasters.

Started off as a pretty standard CIA game, in the 80s, the tail end of the cold war. First (multi-year) campaign arc was chasing a Russian nuke that had been stolen by a SPECTRE like group, who were trying to sell it to the highest bidder.

That story arc ended (successfully) around the time the Soviet Union collapsed, and became our friends. The characters were recruited by a multi-national anti-terrorism group, funded by the US and run mostly by Soviest. Spent a couple of years on a story arc chasing a particular high-tech terrorist. GM basically got tired of the concept, and had the international group collapse under less than optimal conditions (involving our base in the Agean Sea being nuked), and death warrants put out by every major first and second world government, so the characters went underground.

Phase three got us together again in the Los Angeles area (where the players all live in real life), with assumed identities of various qualities, under the auspicies of a private detective agency. That developed in to, essentially, an independent (as in, vigilante) spy organization not much different than, say, SPECTRE, except we're usually smart enough to see the value of law and order, and are thus more likely to be on the side of the good guys.

The agency's charter defines its purpose as being to protect (in order of importance) the lives, well being, and comfort of its membership. It views itself as something of an antibody for the rule of law. When someone games the rule of law efficiently enough that they can't be stopped by the system, we step in (and usually go on a killing spree, or blow shit up). Terrorists are popular targets, as are evil corporations. Lately, the more ongoing story arc has been towards Chinese espionage, which is more industrial than political, but backed by the government.

It's been a fun setting, for a long time, and is very versatile.

Pax Novus Roma

Kingdom Settlement Pattern: Coastal/Riverine
Active Volcanoes: rare
Earthquakes - Frequency: Common, Intensity: Moderate
Seasonal Variation: Moderate
Climate: Coastal Tropical Rainforest, High Mountains on the Northern Frontier

Neighboring Kingdoms: The Snake Peoples, Serpens Populus (West), The Flying People, Volatilis Populus (North) , Thaxal's Province (East), Saurians (West), Parven the insect men (North over the mountains)

Government: Military Oligarchy ruled by three Legionary Legates. Government officials are appointed to serve the needs of these military commanders first. A republican senate composed of magus, business leaders, prominent citizens, and retired military commanders see to the needs and justice for the general civil population.

Alignment: Nuetral Evil

The Three Legions
IX Legio Brittainnia (Original Main Legion)
I Legio Falchodia (Western Legion)
V Legion Neptuni (Neptune, The Marine Legion)


Locales

4) Kaldatcha's Templum, Kaldatcha's Temple
Population: 1,512
Subsistence: Hunting / Gathering
Secondary: Light Agriculture

Canals

Fortifications: Centuria Castra

Organizations:

Wealth or Poverty: Wealthy
Unusual Building Styles: Roman Style Villas and Fortifications
Resources: Baker, Brewer, Butcher, Hostel,  2x Inn's, 3x Tavern's, , 3x Blacksmith, 3x Merchants/Traders, 2x Cobblers, 2x Cooper, 2x Leather Workers, Mason, Miller, Potter, Tanner, Weaver, 3x Woodworker, Armorer, Bookbinder, Bowyer/Fletcher, Chandler,  Furrier, Goldsmith, Silversmith, Bronze Smith,  Seamstress/Tailor, Tile Maker,  Weapon Smith, 2x Boat-for-Hire, 3x Carter/Teamster, Cartwright, Porter, Shipwright, Stables,2x Barber, Barrister, 1x Guides, 2x Fence, Healer, 3x Laborers, Minstrel/bard, Navigator, 4x Priest, Wizard.

Pegasus Reef, Farpar's Mine, Fen over the Farm, Small Tomb, Salkan Market
The town's main Forum is located adjacent to the Primary Basicalla, and the Main Basilica is located at the Main Avenues Intersection.

In addition the following major structures were constructed and placed as follows... Theatre, at the Main Avenues Intersection, Domus, in the slums, Insula, in a lower class neighborhood, Garden, close to upper class Villas, Barracks, adjacent to the North Wall, Termae, near river or a lake, Insula, part of an inner city block, Orchard, on a side street, Circus, near water or a spring, Warehouse, part of an inner city block, Temple, on the Main North/South Boulevard, Orchard, at a minor intersection, Water Fountains, part of an inner city block, Termae, adjacent to the South Wall,

This Charioteer's Library* contains the following features, Foruli and it is in a dead end alley

There is a, Triumphal Arch, adjacent to the Forum, Garden, close to upper class Villas, Termae, by the West Gate, Barracks, on the Main North/South Boulevard, Warehouse, at a minor intersection, Bridge, on the Main North/South Boulevard

The town includes the following additional features, a minor outdoor market, Statue of a Young Man, the Tomb of a Priest, a major foreign Temple, extra large Sewers, a Stream.

A Gritty Roman Style 0D&D type setting on a completely new world. The Dragons summoned Romans and Egyptians to be their servants and help them take over the known world of Falchodas. Tons of new beasts and encounters...


Qordas, a 12' Tall Wild Saurian, Artwork by Stefan Poag




Hadarn Val, The Nightbeast, Artwork by Stefan Poag

I wrapped up a campaign during the summer that was basically centered on a metropolitan cultural center for a Rome/Greek analogue. The PCs were all members of a major house/family in the city and got wrapped up in both the secret machinations of an underground cult and a growing rebellion sweeping across the country outside the city.

The setting was just I map a put together and started picking out countries and saying, "This is like Native America, this is like eastern Russia, etc."

My favor twist on it though, was having major upheaval in my Japan/China analogue and a ton of people coming across the sea as refugees to the city my campaign was centered on. So these people lined the port streets and let me create a Little Tokyo of sorts. It let me inject some ninja styling with my sword-and-sandal fantasy.

I've considered expanding it and revisiting it later, with maybe a second generation of the house or setting a campaign in a different area of the world. I've always loved the world-building, setting creation part of running RPGs.

In my current homebrew world, the planet is separated into different kingdoms, empires and tribes. Since I don't want to flesh the entirety of the world out just yet, I've decided to work on a parcel called the Ibis Empire. Player characters will hear about the distant lands, but will not come into contact with the area; I'm sticking with the concepts of J. R. R Tolkien's "distant mountains" philosophy.

The world is designed from the ground up to be a hex-crawl sandbox. Six major celestial movement in the sky that helps navigation each corresponding with one hex-side. I've also seeded the land with dungeons from the past. Many of the my players have never played the modules of old, so even a classic module would be fresh and new. My group is oblivious to the secrets of the Tomb of Horrors.

Most non-humans are non-sympathetic. They are designed to be killed. These creatures, the beastmen, are a disease on the land. No, seriously, they are a disease. They do not breed, but arise from the social (or sometimes physical) problems of society. You do not have to worry about slaughtering Orc children or women. They do not exist. Beastmen are "born" fully grown and ready to kill.

Each race has a different trigger. Goblins grow from the problem of miserliness. Orcs grow from the acts of war. Kobolds arise from the filth and mismanagement  of a rat population. Ogres arise from the overindulgence of alcoholic beverages.

The beastman epidemic affects each land differently. The Ogre population is very low in the Ibis Empire, for example, because alcoholic beverages are outlawed. Instead of taverns, the Ibis Empire have smoking bars. The Orc population, on the other hand, is dense.  The Ibis Empire is not a passive empire and a pollution surge of Orcs is worth stealing a little bit more of the neighbouring country's iron-rich provinces.

Religion is an oddity. The gods have never walked the land and no one has actually laid eyes on them. Many claim they are false gods. But the clerics deny the disbelievers words, for they do have magic, and it does work.  

Oh yeah, Elephant people are also a common player (non-Beastman) race.

I am running a Pathfinder game in an alternative 950 AD Europe. A dimensional gate opened about 500 years before, letting in elves and orcs and magical influences. PCs are within the March of Carinthia (Austria).

In Constantinople is the Order, members of which are the only ones sanctioned by the church to practice magic. The Order is constantly trying to acquire new magics, since they only have access to up to 6th level spells.

Low magic campaign, but high standards to work magic - characters must qualify for arcane or divine by having at least a 15 in the primary stat and be literate. Clerics are "saints" and may or may not be closely associated with the church.

The political background in Europe at the time is tense, and mirror the actual events of 950 AD.

Floodlands:





















The maps are copyright me you dirty hippehs, the rest of the images copyright various artists. I hope to publish it before too long, whenever me and the group can stop actually playing it for long enough to make that happen, its set after global warming does its worst, and is basically inspired by themes of science so advanced it could be magic.

Also swashbuckling, exploration, gritty detective novels, noir, Supernatural, Star Wars, Fringe, the x-files, Bladerunner, Firefly, the wild west, the Fifth Element, Predator 1 and 2, the Alien movies, the Bourne Conspiracy, Mission Impossible, and of course American Gothic...

Madripoor fans should feel right at home, and there may or may not be parallel dimensions. Its a massive future sandbox where any type of game should be possible from technohorror to high adventure.

Its cyberpunk but neither post apocalyptic nor dystopian, except in some countries. Its a bit like today but with added awesome.

Oh yes, submarines, lots of submarines. It explores the implications of having most of the submersible vessels on the market being untrackable, undetectable, and almost completely invisible deep beneath the ocean waves. Pirates!

I'm doing a star trek 2.0 campaign that is not my 'dark federation" idea (but that might be coming up) which, as I said, was based on that one image of a revamped original enterprise and uses more consistent, less cinematic technology.

I had to keep the transporter, but it has more clearly defined limits. Other things work differently. Like for one the first thing you usually send into a planet's atmosphere is a drone aircraft top gather samples and such.

It's also common to drop satellites into obit around planets around several stars in a circular patters, and then retrieve the satts after they've had a few days or more to gather data on the planet.

There are armored environmental suits that teams wear for first encounters with a new biosphere.

All in all it's more technologically plausible and limited in some ways but more consistent and like a good SF book series instead of a TV show made with endless compromises and writers.

At the moment, my players want something close to conventional:

The Empire broke up a few generations back, and most of civilization is on the far side of the horse-nomad-infested plains; here we have a pair of imperial rump states (Gothic/Roman conquests: a largish principality and a small oligarchy), a few remnants of the previous civilization (small Saxon/Celtic kingdoms), and the old folk up in the mountains (think half-elf berserkers ruled by lightning druids).

The Imperials' use of state-sponsored necromancy (less raise-armies-of-skeletons, more conjure-ghosts-for-interrogation or warding) does not endear them to the other cultures, any more than does their religious triumphalism and intolerance of hedge-witchery.

Since about the time of the characters' births, settlements further west over the mountains have been dropping off the map. Those in power are too busy with parochial struggles to notice, even if it's been a "cold" war for most of these last 30 years. The veterans of decades of raid and counter-raid with the plains nomads view the recent fashion of hiring large tribes as light cavalry with alarm.

Published setting are superior to homebrew settings, every time. Also you should only run modules.

Quote from: Gib;596486Published setting are superior to homebrew settings, every time. Also you should only run modules.

Really couldn't wait tilll April 1 for that?

Quote from: red lantern;596487Really couldn't wait tilll April 1 for that?

Don't fuck with my mojo. it needs time to steep.

I've been running my After the Dearth, campaign with Rolemaster for six months or so.

It's a generic fantasy world with a few twists.  In particular the nature of the gods, which were created by men as weapons against the trolls during the great darkness.  After that, during the age of the empires of man there was a concentrated effort to disarm / reduce the situation from polytheism to monothesism by the universal church.  This coming about through the careful, selective use of the powered by belief thing.  Eventually the gods fought back by preventing any human children from being born for thirty years leaving a stable block of eight remaining gods and a post apocalyptic situation for the humans.  The great darkness has been released back into the world and is growing in power.  The trolls have recovered their numbers (like elves they reproduce pretty slowly) and are beginning to make raids and preparing for the return of their demonic masters.  And a black clad band of rescued murderers is trying to create their own god of vengeance and slaughter.

Of course I am, but no-one gives a fart.

-clash