Saturday, April 4, 2015

The events that led to the breaking.

So, I have come up with a rough idea of the series of events that led up to the gods breaking the world. Please be aware that this is VERY rough in terms of narrative and concepts at this stage. I am not 100% happy with it as yet, but I thought I would show it for now.

I haven't come up with a clear timeline as yet, but from the birth of Delan, to the breaking itself is about 40ish years.

  • Delan is born, a rare naturally psionic human.
  • once an adult, he traels to Sytheria and learns psionic techniques from the Ophiduans. He quickly masters them, and moves on.
  • Delan travels to Quesaras, and founds an ascetic psionic path that some elves follow to this day.
  • Travels on to Kerichticlan. Delan witnesses the fear that the people live under, as well as the horrific sacrificial rituals. He intervenes in one sacrifice, killing a priest of the Sun deity. As he frees the sacrifices, one of them who was a true believer grievously wounds him, and he barely escapes with his life. He learns that even those that suffer under the clergy can defend it.
  • as he recovers, he travels on through the hordelands and sees the savagery that many of the "lesser" races are reduced to. He teaches a few goblins some basic psionic techniques.
  • Travels to the Dwarven lands in disguise. He admires the dwarven focus on clan and family, but dislikes their xenophobia. He reveals himself, and is summarily tossed from the height of the wall into the desert of the Wastes.
  • Delan wanders the wastes, coming into telepathic contact with the Dromite Hive-mind. Curious, the Hive-mind invites him into the hive, and for 5 years they test each other and push each other to greater heights of psionic development, sharing techniques and testing ideas. Delan is intrigued by the fact that although the Hive-mind is intangible and powerful, it does not think of itself as a god, rather a sum of all its parts. They part on good terms when Delan surpasses the hive mind, both having increased in power.
  • Delan travels south into Northire. He finds the methods of the Magocracy distasteful, and sees their arcane power as a crutch. He gathers idealistic followers and leads a small rebellion, but it is quickly crushed, and he barely escapes with his life.
  • Delan decides that magic is a crutch of weak minds, and is used to oppress, whereas the Ophiduans and Dromite Hive-mind live peacefully. In desperation, he begins to Mind Seed middling mages, replacing them with personality copies of himself. He leaves these mind seeds to continue his work, and begins to travel the world again.
  • Delan travels around the continent. Any time he sees oppression, he violently opposes it, resorting to Mind seeding dozens of people in each nation. Unfortunately, he targets many priests, until the gods themselves begin to take notice. Many common folk begin to see this new movement in a positive light.
  • In a series of visions, the gods decree Delan and his followers to be heretics and to be put to death.
  • Open rebellion breaks out in northern Kile, as a priest begins to cleanse entire villages with divine fire. The rebellion is quickly squashed, and the Duchess Dorothea, a priestess, declares a crusade. Many clerics see this as a sign, and all over the world, cleansings begin. Some priests are horrified, and turn away from their religions and become disciples of Delan, giving up holy secrets.
  • Kile, having declared open war on "heretics" attacks the Caliphate of Bax, as well as the Duchy of Yole, which it sees as dens of vice and heresy. The duchies fall into civil war as they begin to take sides in this conflict.
  • Northire becomes an open battlefield of arcane/psionic warfare as the common folk are freely given training in psionics by the followers of Delan.
  • Astorina attempts incursions into the Duchies from the east in the name of "Regional Stability". Sensing weakness in the duchies and the expansionist desires of Astorina, Zynos begins similar conflicts in the west.
  • The duchies of Bule and Zene appeal for aid from the Republic of Mynar. The Mynarese have enough reasons to fear an empowered Zynos that they begin to invade southern Zynos to split the conflict along another front. They also send skirmishers along the western border to resist any incursions from Kile.
  • Despite their Sun Deity directly ordering aid to Kile via divine missives, the arrogant Priest-Kings of Kerichticlan decide that their own power base needs to be consolidated, and ignore the decree and declare neutrality. They know that their deity needs their support as much as they need his.
  • Kile begins to falter as its resources run dry and it is besieged on all fronts.
  • A faction of Ophiduans begin to join with Delan, leaning his new psionic techniques. This influx of highly trained psionics further empowers the freedom fighting movements that further destabilise the nations in conflict.
  • Northire further destabilises as the Arcane faction uses increasingly more violent methods against their own population, whilst the Psionics utilise hit and run tactics against vulnerable targets.
  • The Heirophants in Kile beseech their gods for direct divine aid, promising to turn the world into a theocracy dedicated to their glory. Having lost many followers and feeling their power waning slightly, the gods imbue great power into their heirophants, making them walking Avatars of divine power. Kile begins to turn the tide back.
  • Delan travels to the Cathedral divine and enters into combat with the Heirophants. The battle is long and destroys sacred altar, but the Heirophants are victorious, slaughtering Delan and decaring that all his followers shall be destroyed.
  • A week later, Delan's gambit pays off, as each hierophant falls to the mind seed implanted by his sacrifice, cutting off the flow of divine power, weakening the gods considerably and strengthening the revolutions around the world.
  • Kile falls as the armies of Zynos march in. The king travels to the Cathedral Divine, shattering all the altars and crowning himself the God-King of Thenaria in an act of hubris.
So there is the basic timeline of events. At this stage it is just a rough draft, and I would REALLY like some feedback in terms of any suggestions or requests for clarification. So let me know any in the comments below.

4 comments:

  1. A bit too Delan/Psonics = Good, Priests/Gods = Evil. Give Delan/Psonics some negative traits (nasty psonic villian-type of person/group or putting in some more serious faults for Delan) and give the Priests/Gods some positive ones (benign gods and charitable churches). The history will be written by the victors, but from the forming of it the facts of the matter would be better if they were less baised towards one group. Storytelling for each group (the psionic "freedom fighters" and what remains of the "faithful") will have their own twist on the facts, which could be fun to do later.
    Delan seems to be the only personality, although he is the catalyst there should be other antagonists. Of course you may be planning to do that already.
    The hordelands didn't start agitating during this?
    Is the destruction before or after this final event of shattering the altars? I think it would be after - the gods mustering their energy to go "Oh Yeah? Well... well... SMITE! Yeah, how do you like them apples?!... oh, dear... very tired.... but... so.... worth ... it......"

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    1. well,mind seeding people is pretty nasty, but yes I do see your point.

      The hordelands aren't a unified force, so no they didn't really start agitating

      The destruction definitely started AFTER the altar smashing yes.

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  2. Oh, also nothing much on what happened to wipe out arcane magic for good - I mean even with the rebel psionics in the Arcane dominant country, there would be the ability for people to access and channel arcane power during and after that rebellion. In that country and in all others.

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    1. The new post on the actual breaking is now up.

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