Turakian Age: Changing the Future

[Alcamtar]

The TA setting is intended to be set in earth's past, and the impending conquest of Kal Turak is an important point of continuity leading to the Valdorian age and others. (One reviewer noted that in only ten years Kal Turak conquers the world, putting a finite time limit on any campaign. But it is a slow conquest taking hundreds of years, so there is time enough for multiple campaigns.)

The biggest aspect of this metaplot is that if the heroes oppose Kal Turak, they cannot succeed. There are lots of adventures to be had amid various wars, many victories and defeats, but any victory is hollow and temporary; you may save a country for this generation, but their children are still doomed. This unavoidable doomsday scenario may be heroic and tragic, but it is extremely pessimistic and directly contradicts the two core tenets of epic high fantasy:

1. that with courage and determination, You Can Make A Difference

2. the good guys always win in the end

I'll grant that good may still win... but not within the timespan of any normal campaign, even one spanning multiple generations of heroes. Even if the campaign endures to see the "end" of Kal Turak, Ambrethil is essentially destroyed.

Ultimately, I think this makes the Turakian Age a Swords & Sorcery setting in disguise. It has an undercurrent of [future] science fiction, an ambivalent universe (neither good nor evil seem to win, though evil usually has the upper hand), and ultimately the heroes are insignificant. These are all hallmarks of S&S.

Anyway, all this got me thinking about changing it: what if the heroes defeat Kal Turak? There would be no Takofanes, no Valdorian age, maybe the gods would not go away, and ultimately no "modern world."

What if Kal Turak is an "eternal villain" like Morgoth/Sauron, never succeeding in conquering the world, but never being finally defeated either? I like the idea that the war with Kal Turak goes on for hundreds of years and maybe even leads to a "dark age", but maybe he is thrown back, the world continues on and eventually rebuilds, etc. That is the classic cycle of epic fantasy.

Or, what if Kal Turak is temporarily defeated, and in the power vacuum another dark lord arises? Then when Kal Turak returns to power, he finds he is opposed by an equally powerful rival, and the rest of the world is caught in the crossfire as the two duel for supremacy.

Or, what if Kal Turak goes up against the priests of Thun... and loses? Perhaps the Thunnites awaken their dark gods, who are even worse, and Kal Turak goes on the defensive?

Has anyone played around with ideas along these lines, or based a campaign on it? I'm having a hard time with the idea that the heroes are destined to lose. Losing fair and square is fine, but having no chance of success because of the meta-story feels wrong.

Or maybe Kal Turak is just a local villain; he conquers the northern parts of the map before running out of steam, but the Westerlands are never taken and more distant regions are unaffected. I kind of like this idea: he will conquer the world if nobody stops him, he can be defeated but more likely will only be contained. This leaves room for multiple supervillains: Kal Turak in the north, Thun in the south, etc. The whole "stalemate" concept seems to be a classic trope in epic fantasy as well -- we cannot defeat the bad buy so we contain/imprison him and then watch carefully for any disruption in the status quo. In time people forget, wards fail, etc and a crisis breaks out, until some hero steps forth to deal with it. And so the cycle repeats.

[Lord Liaden]

Here's the premise I would use for this purpose: the future does progress as outlined in the Hero timeline. In the cataclysm of magical forces unleashed by Takofanes' defeat, Ambrethel does indeed cease to exist... in this world. But in the process a major portion of the world of that era - landscape, races, nations - is translated to the Land of Legends, where it continues to endure and progress on its own apart from Earth.

There is a Hero Universe precedent for this kind of event. When the magic goes away from the universe in the year 2020, the undersea kingdom of Atlantis is threatened with the loss of the enchantment that transformed its people into water-breathers. So Marus, ruler of Atlantis, crafts a final great spell to move his entire kingdom to the Land of Legends.

[CourtFool]

I am not a huge fan of the official time line. Not that I do not enjoy the settings that are put out, I just see no reason to try and contrive how they flow from one into another. If I ever used The Turakian Age, I would use it as its own setting whose future is unknown.

Let the characters be significant in their world. We can all be insignificant in this one.

[PhilFleischmann]

I agree with the general sentiment: it's depressing to know in advance that Kal-Turak will conquer the world no matter what you do, and even if you defeat him, he will rise again as Takofanes and conquer the world again, and even if you defeat him, it will cause a cataclysm that will destroy the world. It annoys me to play in a world where the future is determined. When I GM, I use my own world.

However, you are certainly free to change things. A couple of thoughts: even if the world isn't destroyed in the cataclysm, it's still thousands of years between TA and VA, so all the people will have died of something anyway. Except for certain mysterious bits of evidence of a previous age, TA and VA can be considered separate worlds.

A thought I had, but will probably never have the time to actually do :( , is to have a multi-age meta-campaign. PCs in TA may be ultimately defeated by Kal/Tacoface, but they accumulate some knowledge and record it somehow. Then PCs in VA find it and create some powerful artifact which is then lost in the next cataclysm. In the modern age, superheroes battle Taco and eventually discover the artifact and use it against him, etc. So that even if the PCs of one age are unsuccessful, they accomplish something that PCs of future ages can use. So each age contributes to the eventual triumph over the big bad guy (perhaps not until the distant future). I think it would be cool to have such a huge, entire-timline-spanning story arc. I was even thinking about starting the story line back in the Illurian (sp?) period, with the rise of the Lord of the Graven Spear, or perhaps ever earlier than that. Maybe on that scale, Tak is a fairly small player, and the real enemy is the Elder Worm.

etc. The possibilities are unlimitless.

[Krieghandt]

In my timeline, I expect the heros to defeat the first version of Taco, else how can he come back as the undead dude? After beefing the players up to superhero levels, its all up to them to save the world. Or start an epic campaign to find "The Sword That Will Defeat TACO". Official time line? We dont need no steenkin time line.
Krieghandt

[Cold Steel]

Who is to say your heroes didn't defeat Kal-Turak and then he resurrects himself as Takofanes thousands of years in the far future?

Still Takofanes remaining "active" in the Valdorian age is a kickass idea. It lets you change stuff you never like about the setting and so on.

[Captain Obvious]

I'm kinda with the llama on this one.

I'm cool with the timeline as history, for those campaigns where it makes sense. In a Valdorian Age campaign, it's cool to know what the Old Ways were like before the fall. In a Champs campaign, it's cool to know the history, and maybe pull in details from Turakian Age for a scenario or two.

But it's not too cool to play in the Turakian Age knowing that the final battle with Kal-Turak will be a pyrrhic victory, and that everything you were fighting for will be lost anyway.

[Kristopher]

I am not a huge fan of the official time line. Not that I do not enjoy the settings that are put out, I just see no reason to try and contrive how they flow from one into another. If I ever used The Turakian Age, I would use it as its own setting whose future is unknown.

Agreed.

I think trying to shoehorn the various settings into one convoluted timeline was the one really big mistake that DoJ has made with the HERO IP.

[Susano]

I think trying to shoehorn the various settings into one convoluted timeline was the one really big mistake that DoJ has made with the HERO IP.

I'll second that opinion.

And it's worst for the superheroes -- everything they accomplish comes to naught in 2020 or so.

[Thia Halmades]

Well, look at it this way - to an extent, HERO is simply following the example set by everyone else. In d20, you do have multiple worlds - The Forgotten Realms, Greyhawk, Eberron, DragonLance, Ravenloft, and so on. Each of them has their own internally consistent storyline, and very often campaigns are set during specific periods. F'rinstance, I'm sure there are many FR campaigns that are still set in the Time of Troubles, when the Gods Themselves walked the Earth and completely upended the pantheon, destroying no less than four separate deities and creating two new ones. It was a mess, to say the least.

But it's all predetermined. To play in that setting and remain consistent means you can't stop Baal from being destroyed, or Ilmater from losing a hand, or Cyrus from being the Godslayer. There's nothing for it - these things happen.

In the HERO Metasetting, I understand that there's one major overlord (I've never read any of the setting material, I'm just going by what y'all post) and his rise and fall seems to dictate the ebb and flow of the universe, which makes him more of a concept (Sauron) than a villain (Darth Vader). I even grasp that the rise & fall of magick (an idea likely lifted by Shadowrun, although I don't know if they thought of it themselves or not) is a major concept that drives much of what happens. But - and this is a pet peeve, I suppose - why does anyone ever feel beholden to it?

In other words, how are you calling it a "mistake" when it's simply a matter of creating your setting, building the world and moving forward? If you want Superheroics to be "always on" in the setting, then you come up with a different reason for them to be active! It doesn't have to be "magick" and all evil in the world doesn't have to come from Kal-Turak/Takofanes. He may have his over-plot (Apocalypse, Dark Seid, etc.) but that doesn't prohibit you, the GM, from writing him out of the plotline.

My world setting (the one I'm doing right now, as we speak) has a major over arc meta plot to it, which is directly bound to the movement of the planes. But it has zippy effect on the PCs, except in so far as they get to the end of the story. Most of the histories for these things can be summed up in a single sentence - "... and then there was no more magic. The end. Enter Star Hero." Okay, fine! No problem! We change the sentence. "... and then there was a tremendous cataclysm, which permanently altered the operation of magic. The Old Ways - The First Ways - were now the only access, and the quick & easy path that man had taken was now forever lost." VOILA! Same result, different implementation.

I just don't see the point of worrying about it when it's so incredibly easy to fix.

[John Desmarais]

Interesting you should bring this up. In my Champions (yes, Champions) game the heroes were sent back in time and are currently running around in Turakia. There could very well be changes to the future (their present) as a result of their mucking about in the TA.

[SteelDoom]

I'm considering a plot line where Kal Turak was a normal mage who had a vision that a new type of magic would arise and when that happens the world as he knows it will be destroyed. So he sets to make himself as powerful as possible so he can divert this forseen future, at any cost. The campaign then starts with the players getting involved in the defence against KT and in the process come to the conclusion (with some prompting from divine sources) that only a new type of magic will give them the edge. This new magic will be able to cut through his defences and destroy him! Of course this is the very cataclysmic event that KT predicted. In the end, the final show down the players and KT have the decision to either fight or talk. The players will have to unravel the consequences of their actions and chose wisely because only the Game Operations Director knows which choice will save the cosmos!

Mwuhahahahaa...

[Lord Liaden]

In the HERO Metasetting, I understand that there's one major overlord (I've never read any of the setting material, I'm just going by what y'all post) and his rise and fall seems to dictate the ebb and flow of the universe, which makes him more of a concept (Sauron) than a villain (Darth Vader).

That's actually giving a little more credit to Kal-Turak/Takofanes than even he warrants. ;) During the Age that bears his name, when Kal-Turak arises, he unquestionably grows to be a Sauron-class threat, the greatest force for evil in the world. After his fall, though, he remains buried and forgotten for 65,000 years and the intervening Ages, until reviving in the contemporary era. Even then, although arguably among the biggest threats to Champions Earth, he is still only one of many. However, at no time does Kal-Turak's influence extend beyond the Earth (and the mystic realms adjacent to it). The rest of the galaxy and the universe appears to be oblivious to him as it blithely goes its own way. :)

[Twilight]

I always thought that the reason Kal-Turak didn't obliterate all who opposed him and keep on obliterating them untill people were too broken down to want to resist, was because he was that he was trying to extend his influence to the rest of the galaxy. Y'know, he was busy coveting the whole universe and thus not paying attention when the heroes showed up with Auriala to do him in. :)

[Basil]

Frankly, I say "kick the official timeline in the happysack." Start from wherever you like, and let you and the players shape the "future" without caring what the official timeline says is the result.

[Lord Liaden]

To make the timeline work into the present day of the Hero Universe without destroying the Turakian Age after Takofanes falls, all you actually need is a major planet-reshaping disaster to form the modern geography. As it turns out the destruction of Atlantis during the war with Sharna-Gorak provides one, and the sinking of Lemuria after the Mandragalore misfires provides another.

Since the Valdorian Age appears to leave fewer lasting influences on the modern world than either the Atlantean or Turakian Ages (perhaps because it had less magic), you could easily skate over it and just continue Ambrethel after Takofanes falls. The withdrawl of the gods from the world, and the decline of older civilizations that led to the rise of Atlantis as a world power, can be the result of any events you wish from your own campaign, but without the devastation of the official history. That would give you up to an additional 30,000 years to play around with. ;)

In the end, everything in the Champions Universe can be just as it is in published books: Atlantis, Lemuria, the return of Takofanes, etc. Except that Ambrethel can have a more optimistic future.