The Procrastinating DM - An Introduction to My Campaign

Welcome to the Chronicles of Shard -

    First, some backstory, about four years ago I started a campaign with some friends set in a re-imagined version of another friends campaign (Shard World, itself based on James Maliszewski's Dwimmermount). That campaign eventually ground to a halt because of scheduling issues being the sad victim of adults trying to find time to get together every Friday night. It was designed as a vehicle for me to use fun published adventures in a sandbox setting but with an over arching plot. I spent a bunch of time digging through my old Dungeon Magazines as well as my collection of B/X and 1st Edition Modules in preparation. I made a map in Hexographer and sprinkled the map with adventure locations. We played this campaign for nearly two years and the party fluctuated between three to eight players. I converted B5 Horror on the Hill, which was our first adventure site. The party had not gotten to any other sites before the campaign wound down because of the size of the map. But in addition to converting B5 I had converted The Keep at Koralgesh from Dungeon #2, and wrote three other locations based on maps I found online. One of which I found on Wil Wheaton blog and was inpired to populate. I also began converting B4 The Lost City. I believe I was somewhere on the 4th level before I stopped working on it. 

    After things ended I got to thinking about all my other abruptly ended campaigns and came to the realization I have never finished a campaign, either as a DM, or a player. I was saddened by all the work I had put into these various worlds and how that work would never likely see the light of day again. Then I discovered Matt Colville. His series on Running the Game was eye opening to me not because all of these concepts were new to me, although certainly a fair amount were, but because I was inspired by his mantra of steal the things you like and add them to your game. I had certainly done that once before when I based my campaign on a "what if" in my friends campaign and added a bunch of adventure seeds that others had written. But, what if I took all that time I had invested in my own world designs and applied that same principle? Then it was as if the flood gates had opened and I found myself excited to revisit old plots, NPCs, adventures and campaign worlds that had been relegated to storage boxes in the backroom.

Shard in the 4th Age -
Fire fell from the sky and sundered Shard.
The resulting earthquakes toppled structures.
Hurricanes pounded the shores
and a continent sinks beneath the waves.

The Campaign to End All Campaigns -

And so it came to pass that I dug out those boxes and mined my own creations to piece together a living world full of vibrant characters and locations that have history I am intimately familiar with. Of course all of these needed an adequate home and some of these were vastly different. After looking over my old notes and thought about the nature of my campaign world and the themes I hoped to bring forward I came to some conclusions. 

Firstly,  I wanted some ability to play other games and in some way tie them back to Shard. The intent is to allow different types of adventures and systems. The cosmology that I decided to reuse for Shard has some potential for this. Shard's creator, Aoanddar, fled the known realms to seek isolation and escape the petty bickering of the gods. A barrier was constructed of magical energies that prevent intrusion from outside, but that means their is an outside and that gives me a place to set adventures outside the normal scope that I don't want impacting the campaign world they will be set beyond the Void of Stars, which is my version of the astral plane.  However, with things that may have some impact I intend to use an age old trope... The Dreamlands! This seems perfect for my purposes because dreams can have an impact in the real world but generally don't and this is a perfect vehicle for weird games outside standard fantasy to take place. My own little Wonderland as it were.

Secondly, my various campaigns include steampunk and even a post-apocalypse setting and these have had a lot of time poured into them. So I determined right away that a timeline to separate different technological eras would be in order. I also had some events, written by James Maliszewski as part of Dwimmermount, that featured in my original plot line for Shard. *minor spoilers* Invaders from beyond Shard, such as the red elves of Areon. A necromancer uprising, such as the Thulians. A powerful warrior-mage king that sought divinity, such as Terms Turmax.*end* Of course Dwimmermount itself would need a home in the Shard timeline. As such Shard has seven ages planned.

Pre-history - The events before recorded history.

1st Age- The Age of Iron and Fire (0-4600): This age has humanity living in tribes and fighting just to survive against other races. Its when humanity learns metallurgy and begins to carve its place on Shard.

2nd Age - The Age of Magic and Rebellion (4601-6900): This age has the Eld of Tiriande invade Shard, humanity learns dark magic (necromancy) and overthrows the Eld, the stranded Eld create a pocket realm to avoid retribution.

3rd Age - The Age of Blood and Conquest (6901-7840): This age sees the rise of a warrior-mage king that conquers the known world, builds a storehouse of magical power, and sees the formation of numerous kingdoms and when a great cataclysm occurs it results in the destruction of others.

4th Age - Unknown (7841-9814+): This is the current age. I have two games in-development here. One is set in a kingdom called Ir'run in 9734. Another is set in the current year.

5th Age - Steampunk. Age of City-States, Clockwork Golems, Steamer Ships, Airships, Firearms, and some integrated magic & technology. This is considered the golden age of Shard. One might note there are a lot of similarities between this and Eberron. Fun side note. I wrote this material when WotC announced their setting competition in 2000, I think it was, but reading the fine print if you made it beyond the first round WotC would own your creation. Thanks, but no thanks. Ultimately it was Keith Baker's Eberron that made the cut so at least my instincts on the setting were good.

6th Age - The Great War. This age has a faction that hates science rise to power, called the Golden Court. Psionics are introduced, tech and magic are at their peak, and the fighting between the various factions is brutal.

7th Age - post-apocalypse/gonzo. Think Thundarr meets Gamma World. I have an idea for a game set here that has a bunch of work done as well.

Thirdly, I want Shard to both have a large variety of cultures and have room to add new ones as I think of or discover them so a large world seems to be the best way to facilitate that. Since the great cataclysm, as you can see by the picture above, Shard has literally lived up to its name. The chunks that are no longer part of the sphere are hard to reach but have the potential to introduce new cultures very easily.

Each of these topics and sub-topics could have their own posts so more as things develop. In the meanwhile, stay safe and we will continue the Chronicles of Shard another time!