There exists alongside this “mundane” world, an alternate dimension of limitless magic and wonder, called the “arcane” world. Like The Feywild in more traditional D&D settings, the arcane world is geographically the same as the mundane world, but it is a place of bright colors, elves, dragons, fey beings and more.
Once, these two worlds were in alignment, and passage between them was easy. However, at some point in the distant past, the passages between these worlds began to disappear. Eventually, passage was limited to a few special places on The Earth (Stonehenge, Sacred Cenote at Chichen Itza, Uluru, Irminsul at Heresburg, etcetera), however, even those were destroyed or eventually closed. The ancient rituals that once opened them were long-forgotten.
One day known globally as “Calamity Day”, the Arcane and the Mundane were forcibly joined into a singular dimension, as they were at the beginning of time. As if that wasn’t enough for the poor, arcane-ignorant populace of The Earth, two other great disasters occurred. All fossil fuel stores around the world vanished at once, and all electronic transistors failed. This caused a near-total collapse of the modern era, and propelled humanity into an era of technology resembling what it was at the end of the 19th century.
On Calamity Day, legends came true, sleeping gods awoke, fire breathing dragons as large as any 747 took to the sky, and humanity was no longer the objectively supreme race of Earth. Nobody knows why or how, but wild theories abound. (I have an explanation, but I am keeping this to myself while I develop the setting with my players. I'd be happy to discuss in PMs.)
In this setting, it has been seven years since “Calamity Day”. Globalization as we knew it has vanished. Billions have died as a result of diminished agricultural capacity; in most of the Northern Hemisphere, (human) populations are at a low that hasn’t been seen since before the industrial revolution.
All myths are (more or less) true. Vampires stalk the night, gods walk among mortals, Elves live in hidden conclaves in the wild, and magic blossoms.
Although there are a lot of similarities to Shadowrun, I came up with this setting WAY before I was allowed to play video games… My little sister and I used to tell amusing stories about what it would be like if the characters of old myths were suddenly dragged kicking and screaming into a modern world. (Most notably, there would be an official “Devil of Lawyers, Contracts and Vampires”; various gods would demand tribute or royalties for use of their names, Christianity would lose its shit, and Lord Dracula would have an unmotivated, stoner son who thinks the world is just greaaaat… So long as he has his Playstation.) I’ve been thinking about this for a while, and I’d like to someday run a D&D campaign in this setting, now that I’ve worked out some of the initial issues. (In my original version of this, bullets and firearms were not scarce, and electronics still worked, so D&D was not a good fit.)
I have set this in the USA, because that's where I'm from. I have a few vague ideas for what this setting would be like in other countries, but I will not flesh that out for some time.
The United States just lost a costly war against the Amethyst Dragonflight, and their tributaries. Although the war still rages across Mexico, and Central America against the Emerald Dragonflight, hostilities have ceased in the U.S.A. (Canada and the Diamond Flight were remarkably able to settle things fairly bloodlessly).
I am ignoring some of the ways that nuclear weapons could have been deployed, as that invalidates a premise of my setting. Also, who the hell would legit authorize use of nukes in The Homeland?
Among the many concessions that the U.S. government had to make
The states between The Missisippi and The Colorado rivers are almost completely depopulated. As one may be able to imagine, there were a number of die-hards who remained right where they were and happily waved good-bye to their former government when the evacuations began. Most of them live beneath the notice of the ruling dragons. There are also a number of communities that have remained as subsistence farmers in small villages throughout the conceded territories (now known as “Tir’Nan’Og”); so long as they pay tribute, and do not cause trouble, they are permitted to stay.
The protectorate territories mentioned in the treaty belonged to the dozens of First Nations that, spurred on by the awakened spirits they once worshiped, declared their allegiance to the Amethyst Flight. As they had capitulated early on, and their numbers were not of a density that posed a threat to the dragons, they were allowed to keep their lands, property and livestock.
Elves, First Nation Humans, Orcs and Aarakocra live throughout the wilderness of Tir’Nan’Og, unmolested by the ruling dragons. Several circles of druids actively work to dismantle the sprawling cities that have been left behind.
When The Calamity War started going south for the U.S.A., Texas seceded and negotiated relatively gentle terms of their own surrender. It remains a democratic protectorate, under the rule of the Amethyst Queen. Other than the granting of citizenship to all non-Dwarven races, and the appointing of several Dragon Lords to co-rule the major cities alongside democratically elected mayors, little has changed in Texas' governance. Many Texas citizens are permitted to continue to carry firearms, which is unheard-of elsewhere in the former United States. (Depite allowing the populace to keep their gun and ammunition stores, no further production of ammunition is allowed. There is a thriving market for bullets, which are worth many times their weight in gold and rarely fired.)
Although the Protectorate of Texas enjoys a relatively high standard of living and autonomy, they have suffered the same depopulation and lack of electricity that plagues the rest of the world. Due to the expanded citizenship laws, many gnomes, city-elves, and orcs live in the metropolitan areas of Texas.
Refugees from the continuing war against the Emerald Flight in Mexico and Central America trickle northward, with tales of human sacrifice and the return of Quetzalcoatl; the dreaded vampire-serpent.
Life in the Eastern U.S.A. resembles much the same as it was at the end of the 19th century. After several years of famine; a result of the death of fossil fuels, the displaced people of the Midwest and Western states have brought a much-needed labor infusion. Distrust of dragons, orcs, elves and other “non-humans” is very high in The East. The Government has begun to rebuild infrastructure, and has even established a rudimentary Morse code network along the old analog phone lines. However, as electricity generation has been severely weakened, the Morse code network is generally only used the most important business.
Natural enemies of dragons, the dwarven tribes gladly lent their strength to humanity during The Calamity War. Now that the war has ended, dwarven townships have begun to crop up in Appalachia. Dwarves are one of the few non-human races to be granted full citizenship within The USA.
Life in the states West of Tir’Nan’Og (California, Oregon, Washington) is very different from The East. Without efficient trans-continental communication, the governors here have found more stability from the local Eladrin nobility than they have from their own government. Whispers of secession ripple through these lands. Many Eladrin have been granted conditional citizenship, in return for their aid in various matters.
Dragons are hermaphroditic shapeshifters. Although most have a preferred sex, there are individuals that will often shift between sexes. Dragons have been seen to to freely be able to sire offspring with most other races, but they can seemingly only bear full-blooded offspring. Most dragons live in a rigid caste system that is based upon relation to the flight's reigning king/queen.
There are several dozen "Dragonflights" that name themselves after their respective gemstones. The active ones in the U.S.A. are Western Emerald, Diamond, and Amethyst. (They will roughly correspond to the stat blocks used for dragons in Tome of Beasts and MM)
Dragonstones are (sometimes) large, gem-like stones that are held within a dragon's forehead. It is widely known that cracking or breaking this stone will inflict a mortal wound upon the dragon, and that no matter what form a dragon takes, its stone is always visible in the middle of its forehead. A stone that is liberated (whole) from a dragon's skull is an artifact of immense power.
What is not widely known is that a dragon's stone contains its very being, and connection to the rest of its flight. The dragon stores its memories, personality and magical power within this stone. It can sense other dragons, especially those within its flight, through this stone. Upon contact with the forehead of another dragon, two dragons can rapidly share their experiences with one another.
A flight's king/queen is the central power of the flight, usually the oldest, most powerful member of the flight, and the direct offspring of a previous king/queen. The king/queen guards a much more powerful version of a dragonstone; a centralized stone that houses the souls of the flight's dead. The hierarchy of a flight is a rigid caste system centered around kinship to the queen/king.
Because I want this setting to be something of a mystery, and place of discovery for the players, I am personally going to limit player character race to human. (Unless, they want to be a 6 y/o half-something). Here are some race considerations for this setting.
Tieflings - Adult Tieflings are exceedingly rare, and should only be high-level fiend warlocks that have taken on the appearance of their patron. Young Tieflings could be demon/human hybrids.
Dragonborn - Dragons are hermaphroditic shapeshifters. Dragonborn are the result of a dragon siring a child with a member of another race. There is considerable physical variance between individual Dragonborn, depending upon the race their mother came from.
Dwarves - Dwarves believe themselves to be the firstborn children of Mother Earth and Father Sky. They always thought that humans were descendants of their mythical half-sibling, who was (unfortunately) raised by Father Sky. Dwarves are happy to ally themselves with their unfortunate relatives, and considered it a sacred duty to help them defend against the evil dragons. Dwarves enjoy the blessings of Mother Earth, and greatly revere her. Dwarven society is very matro-centric; with females holding most of the “white-collar” jobs, while males toil away in “blue-collar” jobs. Most “adventuring” dwarves are males, who are out to do/gain something impressive for a girlfriend back home.
Barbarians, Druids, Rangers - Inspired by the newly awakened Spirits of The Land, there are dozens of druidic circles arising across North America. To the surprise of the more nature-oriented Elves, many humans have readily attuned to The Power of The Earth.
Bards - Bardic magic always remained with humanity, in some small form. Certain musicians, who secretly preserved something the old ways in their songs, have awakened as masters of Bardic magic. The leader of the (once-secret) Orphic College is a revered bard who was instrumental in negotiating the end of The Calamity War.
Clerics & Paladins - With the awakening of humanity’s lost gods, many humans have been chosen as representatives of various deities; displaying acts of power that would have been impossible pre-Calamity. Of course, the contemporary gods, whose worship was maintained, have their own representatives.
Fighters & Rogues - Uh. No difference.
Sorcerers - Bloodline magic has apparently been silenced in humanity; no verifiable case of sorcery has been identified in a full-blooded human, yet. (There are reports of half-dwarf, half-orc and half-elf sorcerers, although these are very young.)
Monks - Not much difference from the PHB. Although, monastic orders in the USA would be fairly rare.
Warlocks - Warlocks are shockingly common among humans. Born out of the desperation of a losing war with The Amethyst Dragons, many humans (especially within the military) bargained for powers from Fey, Fiend and Unknowable sources.
Wizards - Humanity is only beginning to grasp at the magical wonders of this new age. Novice wizards, often taught by Gnomish, Eladrin, Elven or Dwarvish mentors have begun to crop up. Although no human has yet achieved the rank of arch-mage, many of the elder wizards acknowledge that it is only a matter of time.
Notable NPCs
A few people have PM'd and they wanted some notable NPCs. Here y'all go.
Jason Goldman -
Jason Goldman was once a nebbish, scrawny IRS agent and part-time tax accountant who enjoyed writing fanfiction, tabletop games and Magic the Gathering. Then, The Calamity happened. Thankfully, Jason had always been a prepared and knowledgeable man, and, as luck would have it… He had a genie on his side!
Jason made himself strategically useful to the US leadership during the seven years of chaos and war that followed The Calamity. He was changed for the better, and enjoys his new life of wonder and adventure. He is a confident, persuasive and politically powerful man who sits on The President’s cabinet as Secretary of Arcane Affairs. Although he has an unusually extensive knowledge of wizardy (for a human), his class should be a high-level mastermind rogue. He is in his late 30’s and very “average looking”.
In regard to Nadiya, he cannot be tricked into wasting his last wish. He established early on in their “relationship” that his wishes would only be presented as documents, handwritten with a certain type of ink on expensive hand-made parchment.
In games, he could be a high-level quest hub who dishes out orders or missions for the players to go on. If anyone can figure out what caused The Calamity, surely it is him.
The Genie Nadiya -
Nadiya is Jason’s secretary and constant companion. A sufficiently arcana-trained player should be able to identify her as a genie. She speaks multiple bronze-age languages, and can be persuaded to be helpful to the PCs. She is constantly frustrated that her master has never made his third wish, and will freely gripe about that fact… However, she will never discuss what he spent his other two wishes on.
Although you can have genies in this setting, Nadiya should be uniquely powerful. She is the last of the “Elder Genies” that were chained to lamps at the beginning of The Cosmos. She has almost earned her freedom, but must grant one final wish before she can join her kin beyond the stars.
Nadiya is extremely knowledgeable about all matters arcane, but must be convinced to share her knowledge. She should not have the stats of a MM genie; she should have stats comparable to a 25th – 30th level Wizard. She is incapable of disobeying Jason.
Richard “Ricky” Apollo -
Ricky Apollo is the Lord of the Bardic Tradition of Orpheus… But that’s a mouthful, so he just prefers “Lord of Bards” or even just his given name.
His father was none other than the international music legend Lucas Apollo. His mother…? Lucas was always silent on the matter, and only said that his mother was Lucas’ greatest inspiration. Not even the pre-calamity tabloids were ever able to dig up much on her.
Other than the mystery of who his mother was, Ricky grew up wanting for nothing. As a child, he proudly joined his father on stage again and again… When Ricky was of age, his father taught him the old ways; the songs that channeled the last scraps of magic that remained to pre-calamity humans.
Then, the Leukemia hit. In a matter of months, Ricky wasted away. For all his wealth and fame, Lucas could do nothing for his son. One night, when the specter of Death hung over him like a cloud, Ricky fell asleep, certain that he wasn’t going to wake up.
In the morning, Lucas was dead in his recording room, and Ricky was well.
Ricky, and the public at large, never had much time to process what exactly happened to him. The Calamity happened a few days later, and once vampires started stalking New York, Ricky didn’t give his recovery much thought.
In the years since The Calamity, Ricky has led other Orphic Bards in aiding humanity against the strange threats. The ancient songs that Lucas Apollo had meticulously taught his son were suddenly filled with real, stirring power. Ricky was also chief negotiator on behalf of the USA when the treaty with The Amethyst Queen was made.
Ricky himself is a famed wizard, who has shown a particular affinity for manipulating the souls of the dead with his melodies. There is talk among the arch-wizards that Ricky ought to be the next arch-necromancer, if he outlives the current one.
Ricky is a celebrity, and he knows it. He is supremely confident, and generally relaxed. Aside from Jason, he is the human with the most extensive knowledge about arcane matters. He has a very dark sense of humor, and can often come across as somewhat creepy or over-the-top. He sometime tours and performs shows where he imbues golems with the souls of (willing) long-dead musicians. When not touring, or traveling to exorcise unsettled spirits, he lives in Gothic mansion in remote Maine. He is in his late 20’s. He has dark-olive skin, black hair and blue eyes. He should be a level 15-20 Wizard/Bard.
The Amethyst Queen -
The feared Queen of Amethyst dragons, who led her flight in the Calamity War that compounded the collapse of the United States.
Her given name is Morgann/a, but only her consorts and fellow flight leaders address her as such. Despite the apparent aggression that her flight exhibited against humanity during The War, she has no ill will towards humans. She was simply carving out a place for her people within this new world they found themselves in.
She considers herself immensely merciful for allowing The US to concede as they did; after all, she could have burned more of their cities, and commanded the Human Chiefs to offer human sacrifices to her.
She is committed to ruling fairly, according to the draconic morals that place dragons as the supreme race. It is the duty of the more powerful to protect those below them. She firmly believes that by taking the children of the Chief Humans hostage, and giving the a properly civilized education within her palace, she can erase the vile animosity that the small mortals apparently hold towards her race.
She has four female consorts, and a single male consort. Although she has sired a dozen children with her female consorts, she has yet to bear a child of her own body (highly unusual for a dragon that largely presents as female).
Queen Morganna is very cunning and calculating. She hates the King of the Sapphire Flight (Lancel), and is closely allied with the Emerald Flight. She is friendly towards Ricky Apollo, as she believes he is a wise and charming human. As a shapeshifter, she does not have a fixed appearance. Her most often used “human” form is that of a 7-foot tall pale woman with black hair, purple eyes, and a large amethyst in her forehead. She lives within The Amethyst Palace; a sprawling aerie somewhere within The Rocky Mountains.
The Emerald King -
He is the male consort of The Amethyst Queen, and her staunch ally. His given name is Leir, but most do not use that name for him. His flight is largely based in Scotland, where they live (more or less) bloodlessly alongside the human populace. He is trying to re-unite his fractured flight, which split at the death of his sire “King Lot” some 900 years ago.
The Western Emerald Flight is the bane of his existence; he will see his cousin King Quetzalcoatl dead.
King Leir is much more friendly towards the “small mortals” than his consort. He is compassionate towards them, and encouraged Morganna to seek an early peace (even if it meant they were unable to secure a death warrant for the dwarves). He has appointed his son, Prince Gawain, to be a liaison to the US government in their name. Leir can either be found at The Amethyst Palace, or at his own castle in Orkney. His “human” form is usually that of an imposing blonde man with green eyes.
Prince Gawain -
Prince Gawain is the dutiful son of King Leir. He is relatively young for a dragon, only 65 years old. He has a few ambitions for his father’s position as head of The Emerald flight, and seeks to improve his personal diplomacy skills in order to better manage the schism of The Emerald Flight. He gladly serves as liaison for the dragons of the Emerald and Amethyst flights.
He is not as well-spoken or as graceful in his shifted forms as his more experience parents are, and often bumps into things. He hasn’t quite settled on a favorite “human” form, and often takes the shape of the whatever action play star he most recently saw.
Implications of This World
I would love to discuss more
Plastic can no longer be manufactured. It is becoming a scarce, precious commodity.
No coal, no oil, no natural gas. Electricity is very hard to produce.
Billions of people have died globally, due to food and water shortages.
Due to how easy it is to transmute counterfeit dollars (just need wool, cotton or cloth), money is back to gold, silver and copper coins.
It’s funny to think of Texas seceding the first chance it got.
Whale oil is a viable source of energy, but whaling is quite dangerous... Poseidon, et al don't take kindly to whalers.
Edit- People keep PM-ing me saying "Well, what about solar, or wind or (insert non-fossil fuel electricity source)?"
I thought about that when I was originally writing this up. Anybody who wants to do a post-apocalypse setting should do a little reading about the real, historical apocalyptic societal collapses.. The tl;dr is that a stable society can easily collapse if a few key resources or institutions are suddenly removed from the system.
In this setting, I have decided to assume that a near-total societal collapse occurred due to the loss of fossil fuels and transistors. With the loss of transistors, you immediately lose the use of anything that has a microchip or a motherboard. Just assume that all computers instantly failed, and you can probably think of a few super-disatrous implications of that... Global banking, satellites, The Internet, weather prediction, cellular phones, radar, global positioning systems; all gone, and all way more essential to modern society than most people think. Honestly, I think that just the loss of transistors would screw things up pretty royally, but we're stacking something else on top of it...
Loss of fossil fuels. Suddenly, most of the USA's the world's power generation goes out, nobody's car can start, planes cannot fly, boats have no fuel. International trade would just stop. Sure, some places (especially not in the USA) are more reliant on alternate energy, but how are those systems faring with the sudden extra load on their grids, and the sudden lack of computers to regulate the systems?
In the United States, this is disastrous. Food cannot be easily transported overland (no trains, no automobiles, no fridges). People who have to drive more than 10 miles to a grocery store are absolutely screwed; the grocery store will only have a few days' worth of stuff, even if you assume there is no looting going on right now. (And, of course there is looting!) Millions of people will starve in the first few months, simply as a matter of being unable to get to where there is food. Millions more, who are reliant on a steady supply of medication, will also die.
As things settle down, and populations have relocated to where food can be easily acquired, there are still shortages. Food just cannot be produced or acquired on the scale it once was. Being short on nutrition means that you're less able to fight off diseases. If you're already sick with scurvy, because you live in Oklahoma and it's February, how are you going to deal with the flu as well?
Topping all of this off, there is a war going on. The Government has to deal with dragons burning down cities, and blowing up dams; they don't have time to maintain the new electrical grid, except maybe the very dangerous nuclear power plants. (Which I am not sure would fare well without computers. Somebody correct me?)
Eventually, yes... You would have magitech cars and lightning casters powering new electrical plants... But at the point in time where I recommend running this setting, society is only in the first stages of rebuilding. It's only been seven years. There are maybe 1 or 2 powerful human wizards. No sorcerers. Lots of warlocks, who are more beholden to their masters than they are to society... Lots of mistrust against The Government (remember, nobody knows what caused this calamity), and even more xenophobia regarding the new "alien" races that have shown up.
