The Dark Age of Brythunnia

The year is 964 AC, or After the Crowning. A threat of civil war and conflict with its neighbouring kingdoms looms over the head of the Brythunnians. The old King Aedin the Second has died, and his only lawful son Duncan has inherited the throne, holding his court in the city of Lundine. But Duncan's hold on power is meagre at best, as his father left many illegimite sons and daughters, and many of his nobles would like to replace Duncan. How will you react to the situation? Will you start playing the game of power politics, or will stand in the sidelines, compromising and adapting to the situation? The choice is yours, and yours only.

The Dark Age of Brythunnia is a character-driven RPG á la Game of Thrones, Witcher and Dragon Age, main point being realism and gritty world. I have drawn inspiration from A Song of Ice and Fire, the Witcher series and Conan, and slightly from real history, mainly from the early medieval Europe after the fall of Rome and before the Crusades.

There will not be much magic or supernatural elements, and I would like to point out that make your characters three dimensional. I want to see some effort on that regard. Make them feel real.







Rules

The forum rules apply. Be a friendly person and keep me informed of your activity, and we will come along just fine.
The regions are ruled by a select few of people, and the first come, first serve. If you want to make a character that rules a certain region (Heartlands, Highlands and Dragon Mountains), then be quick about it. You can also make a minor noble who just rules a castle or a town in a certain region. A rule of thumb for towns and castles: towns provide higher taxes, but also a great number of low-grade troops to be levied, while a castle provides a smaller number of taxes and a medium amount of moderate to good troops.



If you have questions, improvements or suggestions, I'll be listening. This will be the first RP I am managing, and created this post to see is there anyone interested something like this, so be straight and honest. If this gets enough attention, I'll start expanding the world.

I'm certainly interested in this. I've been looking for something with a gritty feel to it.

Is your intent for us to play Lords and Ladies? Or are we virtually free to create anyone as long as it fits within the scope you outlined above?

I would like to play one of the kings illegitimate sons. Though, I imagine him growing up in the Dragon Lands acting as a Ranger/Scout of sorts. A real gruff, realist sort of person.

Would the illegitimate daughters and sons of the King have been taken care of financially? Or more of a out of sight out of mind?

_____________________________
Name: Jaden Cain

Gender: Male

Age: 22

Occupation/Title: Woodsmen

Appearance: Jaden is a spitting image of his father. (Will add more once I know what the King looked like)

Personality: Having grown up far to the West of Lundine in the capitol of the Dragon Mountains, Edithburg, Jaden has taken on the ‘miners personality’. He isn’t afraid of a hard-days’ work and expects people of all types to pull their weight. It was no secret who his father is and so Jaden has taken to the life of a woodsmen, preferring to be alone in the Mountains and only come down when he has furs to trade.

History: To Come.

@ShidenBlades You can play as anyone from lord to peasant if you like, but I recommend picking someone from the upper classes. I'll update non-player characters and lore as the game goes. The world is still quite bare, but I plan to flesh it out more this week.

I have an idea for a lower class character turned upper class by the nature of her profession. An assassin in the employ of the king, mascarading as a lady within the castle. Possibly attempting to sway politics towards a shadowy agenda, and forever trying to hide her identity. What do you think?

What might your policy be regarding a Northern raider/trader/viking-type character be? Are you allowing only Brythunnian characters, or are we allowed 'foreigners'?

@Ozymandias I have an idea of a nation north of Brythunnia that could cause a threat to Bryhtunnia in form of raids and small attacks. And I am okay with your suggestion.

@Sonatina Sounds good to me.

Great! Does the Northern nation have a name (for the sake of my CS)? I have Northern jarl or karl (earl or freeman) character in mind, depending on how much 'power' our characters are allowed to have.

Is the king going to be a played character or an npc?

@Ozymandias Not yet. I have been slightly busy a couple days, and I haven't thought about the name very much. And speaking of power, I don't want the characters having too much power without a good reason. Afterall, this RP is inspired by Early Medieval Europe, where nations' power was mostly local and nobles had to rely on social relations and small professional guards to boost their power.

@Sonatina The young king will be mostly used as a NPC. I will a CS about him and his father to act as reference.

That's almost exactly what I was looking at RPing. A regional noble (jarl/earl), who might have a few hundred followers and a few dozen ships at most. I can limit that for the sake of balanced writing, of course, but you see where I'm coming from.

I'm interested in this. I was thinking of a female regent of the Heartlands who'd be under a great deal of pressure to marry someone that would bring additional wealth and prosperity to her homeland. She'd have a son who stood to inherit the territory, but he's currently too young to rule.

EDIT: Also, would it be possible to get a timeline of events? I know some important events are mentioned in the first OOC post, but, when you have a moment, an actual timeline would be incredibly helpful in outlining histories for our characters.

@Lexicon I am going to detail the world more deeply this week. I believe by weekend you guys and gals have more indormation and lore to work on.

Excellent. And is my rough character idea acceptable within the setting? I'll hold off filling out a sheet until we get more information.

I have sketched the map on paper. It contains only the Kingdom of Brythunnia and I renamed Rikain to Rivania.

Is there a dominating religion in this world? I have a main plot point in mind for my character regarding initial raids on monasteries/significant religious sites, akin to the raids on Lindisfarne in 793.

@Sonatina, @Lexicon, @Ozymandias and @ShidenBlades, the RP is now live. Start sketching your characters to the OOC tab, and after I've read and approved them, you can move them to the Characters. I have compiled quickly a brief timeline, and I will start writing the religions section tomorrow. If you have wishes/ideas, now would be a good time.

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