Venatus: West Marches [ EDIT ]

For centuries, the only known land was a continent called Civis. Civis has been under the thumb of civilization for eons now and has thousands of years of history: empires, nations, republics, dictatorships rising and crumbling to give way to the new regime. Wars upon wars have been fought there. Finally, about 50 years before our game picks up, Venatus was discovered by Civisene geographers, who realized through magic that there must be a continent on the other side of the globe from Civis. This was announced to the land and, about 30 years ago, a conglomeration of people from various races, classes, cults and guilds joined together to attempt the harrowing journey across the sea to the unknown continent. But as they were making their preparations, Civis began to experience greater and greater seismic and volcanic activity. Finally, shortly before the settlers set sail, the entire continent began to crumble from the center, crashing beneath the waves. Receiving word of the impending disaster, the pilgrims set sail quickly, realizing that their only hope was the new world. They watched from their ship as the entirety of Civis sank beneath the waves, taking thousands of years of civilization and thousands upon thousands of souls down with it. The ships did what they could to rescue some, but the water was generally too dangerous due to the disturbance the crumbling of a continent had caused, and they finally had to turn their bows towards the new land. After nearly 6 months at sea, the settlers were caught in a huge storm and carried quickly across the sea and to the coast that was their goal. But alas, the storm did not lay them gently on the beach. Their ships were run aground by the crashing waves and, though they managed to get most of their equipment and supplies out of the vessels, the huge ships that had been necessary to make that journey were smashed to bits by the pounding surf. Disheartened but determined, the pilgrims fought their way inland until they came upon a small valley nestled among the foothills. Here they stood successfully against the goblinoids which had been pursuing them and, realizing the defensive potential of the place, they settled there, erecting wooden defenses to keep out the monsters which lurked without.
Over the past 20 years, the pilgrims have strengthened and established their little hamlet, fortifying the wooden palisade that surrounds the valley three times over and keeping constant vigil on the walls for when monsters come lurking. Life within the walls is happy and peaceful, but the wilderness outside the walls is beyond their power to attempt to tame. Only a small corps of hand-picked, specially trained warriors sally forth on occasion to push back the beasts and bring in timber and meat. Overall, life is flourishing, if not expanding. Until now.
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This is a West Marches style campaign, and one which we hope will encompass a large part of the GP community. It will be mostly player driven, and has room for multiple DMs. Refer to the discussion page in the Games Tavern for further details, and if the 50 slots fill we will add more! We can't have too many players.