The Iron Kingdoms: Protectorate of Menoth

The followers of a vengeful god have created a haven for themselves in Western Immoren.  Menoth, the True Creator of Man, has called forth his chosen.  In recent times, followers of the True Faith have heard the call of the Creator and migrated en masse to this new land, a holy land.  Now, the world shakes with the power of Menoth's armies, and the ranks of the believers continue to swell.

Once (and not so long ago), the the lands now known as the Protectorate of Menoth were a part of Cygnar. Following the Cygnaran Civil War in 484 A.R., Cygnar ceded the eastern portion of the capital city of Caspia.  The Menites renamed their portion of the city Sul, and the new kingdom on the eastern bank of the Black River began to flourish.  With their warcasters seemingly empowered by their Creator god, the worshippers of Menoth began a campaign of expansion that now includes lands as far north as the Llaelese city of Leryn.

The people who dwell in the lands of the Protectorate are invariably faithful adherents to the Canon of True Law, the holy writ of Menoth.  Almost all of the original inhabitants who lived in these lands were driven out if they accepted other gods, and as Menites from other kingdoms began to arrive and settle in the new promised land there became less and less room for the unbelievers.  Now the land is populated by fundamentalists, extremists and zealots.  The onward grind of the Menite war effort does not lack for enthusiastic volunteers.

Worship of other gods is outlawed in the Protectorate, which is problematic given the state of affairs with the more open-minded Kingdom of Cygnar.  No other god is above Menoth, and it's not uncommon for travelers who are openly reverent of other deities to be murdered by angry mobs frothing with religious zeal. Indeed, few are the fools who travel to the Protectorate without Menoth in their hearts.

The other Iron Kingdoms keep the Protectorate at arm's length, diplomatically speaking.  It's a state of open war with all other kingdoms as far as the Menites see it, and this does much to continually widen the gap between their new state and the other nations of Western Immoren.  As things are now, the state of affairs is only poised to worsen.  Yet even as the other Iron Kingdoms are forced to deal with them militarily, the might of the Protectorate of Menoth grows with each new pilgrim that finds their way to Menoth's holy land.

This short treatise is the second part outlining one of the Iron Kingdoms background for our players who have been on the edges of the club's game.  Check out the earlier background segment for Cygnar, then choose a warcaster and help us build a fantastic narrative!

Terrain Log: 40k Manufactorum

Today we have another piece from the Jerry Wargate collection.  This is a Games Workshop Manufactorum, the kit for which can be had from their online store.  Our building here was actually part of an Imperial Sector that Jerry obtained second-hand and we broke apart into it's constituent kits.  You can check out the first part of this story here, in our last Terrain Log.

We wanted to get more "intact" buildings with these kits, so we set up a few bases and took a look at what made a good footprint for a building that could be stored with the others we already have here most easily.  This is one of the pieces that always seems to make it onto the table for some reason.  Folks just seem to like it.

This building was painted a flat black to evoke the gothic feel of some of the old Warhammer 40,000 artwork.  Details were picked out and the whole thing painted by Jerry Wargate, after I had constructed it and the base (which is just a cut piece of masonite).  After he was done with the building, I affixed it to the base and played with some different basing materials I had managed to accrue.

The Manufactorum is quite nice and large on the board.  It blocks line of sight quite well, and since it's a closed building presents a different challenge than your basic ruins.  Although it's swabbed all over with the iconography of the Mechanicus and the Imperium, I think it works quite well for a lot of different games where weirdness is bountiful.

Still, there are two more buildings in this set that have not yet been built!  We have a lot of terrain to talk about in the Terrain Log, and I especially want to get to the ready made Battlefield in a Box stuff we've obtained for the club.  Also, sorry about the long wait this time between posts - it's been nearly a week.  Time for Bone to get with the program!

Dragonlance Adventures!

Takhisis, Queen of Darkness.

We've been preparing for the next leg of our tour of the Crystal Spheres with a definite classic:  Dragonlance Adventures!  Say what you like about the saga, about the quality of it's adventures or the mary-sue connotations of the novels - but I'll say this for certain:  Dragonlance definitely has it's own feel when put beside the other AD&D 1e settings.  Most of my players have never read a Dragonlance novel, and after putting a session together I realize that those that have won't have any special advantage over those that haven't other than knowing a little more of the background.

We put it on the table which game would be run after our Greyhawk debacle, and it was decided we would stick with AD&D 1e, true to form, and go on to Krynn.  Like the other 1e campaign, this is all designed to bring us up to date in the world with regards to how systems and modules have evolved.  However, Dragonlance differs from Greyhawk greatly not only in terms of setting, but atmosphere and style as well.

For the next several weeks we'll be playing the original modules with the original ruleset.  Next Sunday will be our second session, and I'm looking forward to it greatly.  Of course, I've collected and read many Dragonlance novels over the years, but last year I passed them on to a friend so he could experience the saga as well.  Yet, I never actually had a chance to play the original modules.  All that shall be rectified this year!

Good luck to our adventurers...there won't be as many "respawn" options in this campaign.  The saga deserves more than that, so there's a healthy metagame aspect to this series as well.  If too many important player characters get killed off - well there's not really anything to be done about it.  Consider this hardcore mode.  Meanwhile, you can check out the new adventure log in the Dragonlance State of Play!

See you on Game Day!