Continuing in the tradition of S&S one page products is A Swiftly Falling Empire. These rules add a dimension of political play, warfare, and the saga of the grand campaign to your S&S adventuring career.
The North Eastern Empire of Great Velkar, the last bastion of Law on the world of Kyrthandria, is besieged on all sides by the powers of Chaos. Weakened by many years of decadence and infighting, the imperial armies are now no match for the dark hordes that stream across the empire, leaving fire and ash and black magic in their wake. Nothing can stop the darkness now.
Except, perhaps, your stalwart PCs!
A Swiftly Falling Empire is a simple, randomized, programmed system that simulates the war between the last empire of law and the powers of darkness. Though it will contain a lot of surprises, the system is set up such that the empire will eventually be defeated, unless the players prevent it with clever and heroic actions in the dungeon, upon the battlefield, and in the halls of power.
A Swiftly Falling Empire adds in a whole new realm of "political treasures", that allow the actions of the characters to have a progressively greater effect upon the fortunes of war, and, if the norns are with them, to perhaps turn the tables on the invading servants of the enemy.
Warfare is handled in a manner that does not disrupt the player's gaming, with large scale battles handled in a completely abstracted manner if the PCs are not present, or as a small scale critical skirmish action if they are.
A NOTE FOR SECOND EDITION
First, why do we need a second edition? Well, near as we can figure out, real role playing game publishers publish all kinds of new editions every twenty minutes or so, and we're trying to look like a real role playing game publisher.
Second to that, we did come up with a few changes in additional play-testing that greatly improve the game.
As the campaign goes on, both sides ramp up war production, and put yet greater numbers of armies into the field. This means that, if the PCs delay too long, chaos eventually becomes overwhelming, and will simply get past their abilities to defeat it. They have to act fast and decisively, lest the empire be destroyed.
Also, based on the requests of a few players online, we added in optional rules for outlaw PCs to raise armies even while disgraced by the Empire, adding in yet another level of political and strategic considerations.
Other than those two, just a couple of changes to clarify the rules were made. A SWIfTLY FALLING EMPIRE is going to remain a campaign printable on one page.
We hope you continue to enjoy.
An updated version of this title is now available.
THIRD EDITION S&S
Considerable revamp has taken place in third edition SnS. Among the most important new rules:
Hosts: These represent monstrous ARMIES that can be placed on the battlefield or in the dungeon. Think in terms of the masses of goblins and trolls that ultimately chase the Fellowship out of Moria. Hosts are a convenient way to represent the "40-400 Goblins/Kobolds" or "30-300 Orcs" that could be encountered in original D&D without actually having to place hundreds of pieces on the map, or keep track of hit points for them. They are also a more effective way to represent the armies that appear in the field battles of A Swiflty Falling Empire.
Monster Sidekicks and Boon Companions: I had occasionally toyed ith the idea of coming up with rules for recruiting henchmen and hirelings in SnS, so that lone adventurers -and SnS is very good for solo play- could build up a stalwart warband.
But this really never sat well with me. After all, Samwise Gamgee, Moonglum, Hermione and Chewbaca didn't just get hired for 1d20 gold pieces at the local tavern, they had backstories and entered the action by means of the action itself.
Sounds to me like pretty much how you find a treasure.
So, the Boon Companion and now the Monster Sidekick have come into play, both entering the game in exactly this manner. You never know who you will get, or when you will get him, but he is bound to be faithful, capable, and have a few "gruff but loyal" quirks, just based on his type, and interaction with sidekicks and companions of different types. Have fun integrating these fellows into your games.
Monstrous Adventurers: Interestingly, the thief was NOT THE FOURTH CHARACTER CLASS ADDED INTO D&D. "WHAT?" you ask, "HAVE YOU GONE COMPLETELY MAD, SIR?" Well, that's debatable, but if you'll check out the original rules, Men & Magic, page 8, you'll find the following:
"Other Character Types: There is no reason that players cannot be allowed to play as virtually anything, provided they begin relatively weak and work up to the top, i.e., a player wishing to be a Dragon would have to begin as, let us say, a “young” one and progress upwards in the usual manner, steps being predetermined by the campaign referee."
Now, that is arguably a throw-away, but it certainly does provide the basic structure to make a PC class out of any monster all.
So I've decided to systematize this in S&S, and thus to add somewhere between 36 and 172 more class/races to the game, by what I believe is a minimalistic but workable system.
So, you want to roleplay a dragon, wraith, harpy or leprechaun? Now you can, and with only a minimum of GM intervention.
Ofequal importance, players who want to extend SnS into the truly epic/gonzo levels now have their wish, with the addition of the Kyrthandrian Legendaries.
These are mythical characters (potential allied heroes and villains both) operating as always, under the SnS philosophy that minimum statistics added to tantalizing minimum descriptions set the GM's mind churning far better than do reams of paper with endless verbiage.
Vastly powerful elder monsters, clever and daring npcs, and even new spells -up to the 10th level- can now enrich the game, though only through adventuring.
Other modifications and additions also appear, such as the companion guard companies of Velkarian generals and admirals, the purchase of imperial offices, a system that allows Renown to be earned by those PCs who dare to take on Hosts single handed...
All of this and more await the adventurer who dares the twilight glory of Kyrthandria.
I sincerely hope you enjoy.
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