Welcome to the campaign diary of what’s been codenamed Fantasy Avengers. A campaign idea of superheroes in a fantasy setting has percolated within my brain for aeons. I occasionally pretend I’m going to run it, which no doubt gets eye rolls at best or engenders much disappointment at worst when I never get around to it.
This campaign diary will work through how the campaign gets to the table and then, with hope and a prayer, morph into actual play reports.
The image is one of the heroes from League of Legends.
The struggle for definition
The elephant in the room around the whole Fantasy Avengers idea is one of definition. A definition that represents and shapes what it is. We’ve been working with the idea that it’s superheroes in a fantasy setting for a while now.
This was the original elevator pitch with some links back to its origins as being inspired by Exalted.
The challenge with using Exalted as a base is it becomes increasingly incongruous as the idea matures. As ideas and imagery form in my head, I’ve felt it’s further away from a fantasy. The good thing is more explicit definitions are forming.
The definitions we needed to address are the concepts of superheroes and a fantasy setting. This one deals with superheroes.
Are they Exalted or Novas?
I’ve been calling the superheroes Exalted for a while, and the grand assumption is they are my version of The Exalted from the Exalted role-playing game. The challenge is when ‘my version’ transitions to them being nothing like the Exalted in the role-playing game.
In the Exalted role-playing game, being Exalted tends to give you peerless, preternatural abilities in things that are extrapolations of normal human behaviour. This is especially true of most of the Solar Exalted, I can’t comment on the myriad of different types. They are epic heroes as might appear in Greek myths or an epic Wuxia.
This creates a fundamental difference. Are my Exalted like their original counterparts, or are they more like the X-Men, Wildcards (from the novels) or Novas (Aberrant role-playing game)? These influences seem more true as they are full-on superheroes with actual powers, not just preternatural skill levels. The Novas in Aberrant are a particularly apt reference as they also suffered an end related to their egotism and power.
Novas gain their powers from a special node in the brain, allowing them to manipulate the quantum forces in the universe. Exalted gain their powers from an exalted soul that allows them to manipulate the essence that permeates Creation.
What’s key about this mental transition is how it impacts how I see the campaign. How deep is the Exalted base? How true is it once you move from epic Greek or Wuxia heroes to total Aberrant superheroes in fantasy trappings?
We talked about the setting being split into ages and the fact there is a golden first age and a current age built on the legacy of the golden age. We can look at these eras in the context of actual superheroes. This is the part where I talk about superheroes and try to make comparisons based on all my secondary superhero knowledge rather than having read the material.
To the comic experts, I apologise, but I needed some anchor points.
A First Golden or Silver Age
The first age is the age of superheroes. We can see this through some very different superhero properties.
The First Age is like the fleeting glory days of the Novas in Aberrant, but it went on for centuries. The Exalted formed personality cults that swayed nations. They altered geopolitics through their presence and the direct influence of their powers. The concept of conventional war ended as a handful of novas could end it. The superintelligent artificers created new inventions, uplifting humanity’s perception of the possible.
For a time, this made Creation a glorious and better place for all.
Similarly, the end of the First Age was brought down by the hubris and power of the Exalted. They became embroiled in their pursuit of power. They started to see humanity as a distraction to the conflicts for power and influence between themselves. They ignored the plight of others to conduct their personal explorations and experiments never questioning whether they should just because they could.
You could also look at it like an epic version of those comics that feature a specific city that represents a sort of Silver Age reality due to the presence of the superheroes. The first age is the rise of the ‘silver’ age and its end.
The Second Planetary Age
The golden age is over. Creation and those who reside within it live on the legacy of that age in every way. I see the Second Age as one where everything is held together, but it exists on the edge of chaos and instability.
It’s an age of chaos of decay where crazy shit is on the edge of going down.
The Dragonblooded Empire is desperately trying to maintain the advances of the First Age. The advances of the First Age are now more ritual than understanding, held up by slightly lesser wonders of the First Age. As the Dragonblooded Empire’s enlightened-for-all position fades into distant history middle kingdoms and the elemental reaches also see the empire as being at its weakest and most brutal but still too powerful to overthrow.
It is a period of potential revolution if nigh on impossible to enact.
It is also a period in which grand threats can arise. Grand criminal organisations span the empire. A sinister cult is spreading throughout Creation. Some say an army of the dead is on the march. Who knows what threats exist out beyond the borders of Creation, laying in wait in the elemental tempest? What mysteries remain undiscovered in the archaeology of the first age?
I’m not saying this is anything like Planetary in tone or reality. Still, it has that protagonists enter the scene with the ability to engage with the crazy shit that’s about to go down as this age ends and also have a part in causing it. They won’t deal with small issues, but their canvass will be wide and epic. We might go more into this when we address the fantasy part of Fantasy Avengers.
I’m throwing ideas randomly out there; some may stay, and others may not. The critical point is the Second Age is one in which all stable norms have gone, and big-screen chaos is about to erupt, whatever it turns out to be.
And, Finally…
I’ve broken the link to the protagonists being Exalted only in name and the fact they have an altered soul. The better analogy is fantasy Novas. This allows me to focus the setting away from being too like Exalted, and this decision ripples through the whole fabric.
I know some people will see this as ‘dancing on the head of a pin’, but these things have significant impacts for me on how things are seen and portrayed. It allows me to lock things down and start fluently conversing in what I intend.
Whether a small step or a large one, it’s a good one.