Bright Souls: WIP

[Rusty Spoon]

A world in balance - sea, sky and stone. A world at peace - more or less. A world about to break.

Without warning the heavens turn red, and dark clouds rain blood, fire and lightning for three days and nights. When the skies clear, the few survivors will see no sun, no moon, and cold, unfamiliar stars hang uneasily in the darkened sky.

Welcome to Bright Souls.

I'm throwing together a campaign from a variety of inspirations, and gonna be keeping my notes here. I've got a few weeks before any actual gameplay, probably, so expect revisions and additions.

The Basics:

Respawn on Death: Ripped straight from Dark Souls, and inspired by The Curse of Artaith, characters will respawn on death.

Fantasy Apocalypse: Terrible storms, magic failing, unquiet dead, dark and creepy landscapes, etc and so on.

Now let's do some world building!

[Rusty Spoon]

Places of Interest
Even before the apocalypse, we're looking at a Points of Light style setting. Most of the smaller settlements will get wiped out early on, allowing for creepy monster infested ruins to explore.

The players will start in the small town of Askalon, during a celebration in honour of Mergwinn. This will conveniently link them to a sacred spring that acts as a respawn point.

The Golden Tower, an observatory and temple to Ohreah, probably the first point of call after the apocalypse. Built on the ruins of the World Tree, which the gods destroyed to prevent access to the Hall of Creation by pesky mortals.
Now powerless, the priests of Ohreah will be in disarray. It will be a challenge to get any sensible advice from them, but they know about the falling star, and may have records that hint at the secret histories of the world.
There is also a small faction of undercover cultists, slowly growing in power as they convert, assassinate and scare off the loyalist priesthood.

We also need a large-ish city, let's call it Bayar, which is now in a state of bedlam. This mostly stone-built harbour city will have fared better than most in the fiery storms, but their power structure will still be falling apart, so the wealthy merchants and savvy politicians will attempt to get the party's protection against an eminent military coup. A good place to seek superior quality equipment.

In the Southern Deserts, a Sacred Oasis provides shelter for any travelers brave enough to seek the Fallen Star of Ill Omen. The meteorite brought with it strange creatures and spirits from outside this reality, one of which corrupted a local priest when he came to investigate.

The Gods:
Ohreah, Ruler of the Heavens, deity of the Sun, Moon, Sky, Fire and Death.
Arakis, the Earth Serpent, guardian of the depths and darkness.
Mergwinn, Monarch of the Ocean, who brought forth life.

The Cult of the Stars, performed a ritual that brought them great power, but at what cost? (The Apocalypse, that's what cost. This is why you shouldn't talk to strangers.)

Spoiler: Origin of Gods

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In the beginning, yada yada, chaos, gods create the world and split dominion to prevent fighting. Walk among the humans who get needy, retire to the Hall of Creation in its own demi-plane accessed above the World Tree.
Humans keep bugging them, so the Tree gets the chop. No more direct interaction with the world, but priesthoods are created as intermediaries.

Spoiler: TWIST!

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The gods didn't create the world, whaaaaaaat? Nature spirits used to do the day to day that gods are now responsible for.
When the First Men lived in harmony with the Spirits, all magic was freely accessible. The current gods are ascended mortals who managed to monopolise the magical economy, and sealed off their power in the Three Pillars that uphold the Hall of Creation. The Hall was sealed away to prevent any change to the status quo, but is still accessible through shenanigans- most notably from the world between worlds where naga live in secret.

Spoiler: How Far does the Rabbit Hole go?

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Arakis, unlike the other gods, was never mortal. They are an amalgam of powerful earth spirits, and entered an uneasy truce with Ohreah and Mergwinn. Resentment at the situation caused Arakis to allow the invasion of outsider spirits via meteorite. Unfortunately, this will inevitably lead to their corruption and death at the hands/claws/tentacles/etc of the Beasts from Beyond.

People of the World:
Humans, scattered through the world. Maybe some Greco-Roman influence in certain places, some Egyptian in others.
Nagas, the daughters of Mergwinn, living halfway between this world and the next. Spoken of only in myth as guides to the afterlife.
Centaurs, nomadic scholars, not sure exactly what to do with these folks, but they'll definitely be here. Playable. Probably keep a secret oral tradition of the true history.
Halflings? Maybe. Maybe not.

Magic
Divine Miracles are the only way to access anything related to the gods. Fireballs, healing, shapeshifting, anything flashy like that.
Sorcery is more subtle, divination and enchantment type effects.

[Rusty Spoon]

A Rough Timeline

An Omen of Peril is seen in the skies - a fallen star crashes somewhere in the southern deserts. Astrologers, priests and scholars argue about what it could mean.
But none of them expected...

The Apocalypse kicks off when Ohreah is killed. This causes the sun and moon to disappear, terrible storms of blood and fire, and the rules of death to go a little wonky.

Unquiet Dead start to rise, if not properly disposed of. Ghosts, zombies and skeletons at first, but they may mutate into more grotesque abominations if left alone for too long.

Slumbering Spirits start to wake. Terrible creatures from myth and legend appear - dragons, giants, elemental spirits and more.

The Death of Arakis, the Earth Serpent, is probably not avoidable, unless someone acts quickly. This will cause earthquakes, and terrible Beasts from Beyond to invade the world. Different realities may bleed over into this one, making travel strange and even more dangerous than before.

Mergwinn Stands Alone against the Beasts. A deity of Life is hard to kill, but when the laws of creation are as badly warped as this, anything is possible.
One way or another, the world must be remade, and a few eggs are probably getting broken along the way.

[Rusty Spoon]

Okay, so that's my rough outline. I have ideas in mind, but mostly I need to flesh out the world with more locations.

I'm here to iron out any plot-holes, so questions and tidbits of advice are more than welcome.

[KatteLars]

No sun, so are we talking perpetual night? If so, do plants and crops still live on in some fashion? And how?

[Rusty Spoon]

No sun, so are we talking perpetual night? If so, do plants and crops still live on in some fashion? And how?

Good question! We are very much running on Fantasy Rules^TM here, so the Ocean deity (who also rules over plant and animal life) will be pulling overtime to keep things running, but that will definitely start failing as the campaign progresses.
And yes, very much Eternal Night.
Plants and animals will start dying off or getting twisted into creepy mockeries of themselves by outside forces at the Speed of Plot.