So I'm creating a World for D&D 5e.
General idea is this:
Players start in a city with no connection to the outside world a mysterious barrier surrounds the city in a circular shape and continues vertically leading to the great blot in the sky. The barrier supplies constant light for the inhabitants.
The city's main knowledge base is what remains of a vast library. Book burnings and other things have occred. Mysteriously these books constantly talk about Wizards and Sorcerors, Clerics and the magic they can all cast. But no one has ever seen such a thing in the city. The closest thing is the Urn that supplies all the water needs for the farmers and the people it just endlessly creates water.
People can not see through the barrier at all. The city has been this way for over 2,000 years. The strain on resources and small living quarters has lead to constant civil wars. Regime changes and population qoutas. The population and the city is very much in decline the gene pool has faded and they are worried.
First session starts with players as children and they get a quest from a farmer to go see why water has stopped flowing. As they investigate BOOM CRACK the sky begins to crack and warp.
Suddenly the great Blot in the sky falls into the center of town and from their vantage they see it is a massive cork. Suddenly the entire city begins shaking violently and suddenly the barrier is gone above them they see a blue sky and white blots that dot it.
Also the cork in the center of town is still there.
This would lead into a timeskip of 10. People began discovering magic consulting the old tomes from the Library as they rebuild.
The world at large from the various explorations done is dangerous with lots of monsters and orcs around. They have yet to discover another sign of civilization so far and question why was the city sealed away. Now the party yearns to answer these questions and find out if they are the only civilization in the world.
Continued below
>>43826549
>Now the party yearns to answer these questions and find out if they are the only civilization in the world.
This is where you made a critical error.
Don't ever assume the party is interested in something. They will only betray your expectations and find interest in something incredibly pointless and asinine.
>>43826549
As you can probably guess the City was in a bottle. The general idea is the players while questing and exploring may find the bottled cities while adventuring and can uncork the bottle to release the city trapped within.
Essentially the players can do what they want with the cities but the bottles are indestructible and the center of gravity for the bottles are always made so that turning it upside down won't kill everyone inside
The reason the cities were sealed in the bottle is that there was a massive war with Dragons by all the civilized races which resulted in the Dragons summoning their primal gods. (Semi-Custom Pantheon. Gods are created by peoples faith and can be summoned with enough magical power/sacrifice into the Prime Material they still have their own little spheres of power and what not)
Dragons are more forces of nature in my world slowly turning into elemental beasts.
Red Dragons into Magma
Blue dragons with their association of sand and lightning slowly grow carbon shells and grow crystals that arc electricity
Green Dragons have ecosystems growing on them.
Black Dragons become quasi-undead as they are beings of decay and darkness.
White Dragons become cloaked in Permafrost
I might drop the metal dragons... Maybe they could be mechanical monstrosities or something opposing Nature
>>43826580
Eh your sorta right. I do plan on having the main thing be exploration of the world in a way similar to Rollplay: The West marches if you've heard of it.
The city is "large" in the sense that it once was but a lot of it is in ruins and the population is maybe 100 or so people. I do plan on having them be able to upgrade it and what not.
>>43826695
Sound's strange, wierd and diffrent, as fantasy shounld be sometimes.
I like it.
>>43827454
should*
>>43827454
I took inspiration from
Guild Wars 2(Elder Dragons for the primal force of nature aspect)
Dragon Quest 7(The world is only a single island at the start but the player works to restore it by exploring the lands and finding pieces of magical maps to unseal the land)
A archived thread about Giants shaping the world and shit. The giants in my setting shaped a massive Mystical Mountain to imprison the Dragon Gods
>>43826695
100 or so people is hardly a village.
Honestly, the entire setting looks to me ridiculously convoluted for no other reason other than to be ridiculously convoluted.
I get that you want your world to be mysterious and unknown... but that needs to be done subtly, not by literally dumping it into a bottle.
Also, there is no reason for an infinite water source. It can rain inside a construct as large as your amazing bottle.
>>43826549
>>43826695
I don't know, seems a bit sterile to me, the cities are even neatly sealed. And the separation of cities would make it to episodic for my taste. Find city, uncork, this weeks bottled episode is... "Porcelain utopia... or not?", "Have a sip of zombie apocalypse", "In Decantistan communism is you"
>>43827726
I did forget to mention that there would be unsealed cities that popped out at varying times.
Also a human Theocracy who is trying to gather all the cities they can to create avast empire.
The area they are in is essentially untamed wilds and at the beginning it would be a bit episodic until they find civilization.
Also I intend for things like investigating ancient temples from before the sealings and etc.
Also some of the cities were timelocked so they would be entirely safe. Mainly they would getting cities from exploring ruins and shit the idea isn't that they are exploring every city but some will be explorable
>>43827876
This was intended for
>>43827760
>>43827726
Frankly i didn't think there could be a weather system in a enclosed environment like that but okay.
>>43827911
Why does no one remember why the city was sealed?
>>43830010
2,000 years of on and off regime changes removal of intelligent individuals to prevent power grabs. Occasional book burnings and other things.
Could have it be that they know it was sealed because of some massive threat but they don't know what the threat was
>>43827911
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2267504/The-sealed-bottle-garden-thriving-40-years-fresh-air-water.html
Due to heat from both within the bottle and sunlight outside, water can evaporate. When the overall temperature near the top cools enough it rains in the bottle. Plant-life performs photosynthesis while the animals/microorganisms perform respiration. A healthy and stable water cycle and atmosphere is established and maintained, all using the exact same amount of water and air as was initially in the bottle.
Of course a bottle-city that had less water when it was sealed would have a much harder time of surviving. One with more water may wind up as an "island in a bottle", tropical climate, or something like London where it's just raining all the dang time.
