Sup Veeky Forums. My players are going to enter a magical wasteland in our next session. Old cliche of a former magical civilization that was destroyed in a great war and left uninhabitable.
What things would you expect a party to encounter in this sort of environment?
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Nothing of note. It's a wasteland after all.
More cliches, obviously. Such as arcane artifacts of amazing power that no-one in the last 10,000 years has picked up. Because of terrible monsters that have infested the ruins for the last 10,000 years.
Etc. etc. etc.
Living spells
Giant bugs
Devolved humanoids
Muslims
Mad Max
Candy Mountain
Wraiths or other spectral undead would be obvious. Perhaps other barrens wildlife, but mutated.
Add environmental dangers, like magical-effect storms and phantasmal mirages. Any oasis water the players find may have random potion effects.
They should find;
1) Sites of the last remnants, be it them standing against the end, trying to stop the apocalypse, fighting each other or trying to rebuild. All dead, all mummified by the sheer magical energies present and on occasion hordes of undead citizenry and guards, bearing weapons and tools.
2) Sites of intense magical energy, like a lake. Dangerous to remain (debuffs and monsters) in but instantly refilling their mana.
3) Fallen adventurers, be it those who fell to the hordes of the dead, to the foul magic energies or to more mundane threats like betrayal.
4) Travelling magical storms, mobiles spells fed by the present magical energies. Be it a rain-cloud dropping shards of ice, lightning strikes, beams of light and anything else.
5) Foul creatures, twisted by the maleficent, the mad, the disaster and it's fallout. Some dangerous and others merely wretches from their exposure to the wastes.
6) Places trapped eternally in the day of the disaster or after it, living through it again and again no matter what the players do. They can talk to the people in it, interact with them but it must always end as it started; with them as corpses.
7) The broken guard; the golems they set to preserve order, to maintain the checkpoints, to fight the end. They failed yet some still stand, guarding their posts, keeping all back by whatever means needed. They come in many forms, from possessed suits of armour to statues and even busts that launch forth spells.
8) The survivors; insane, lucky or dammed by god to live in such a hellish place, they might help or attack any outsiders. Never found in large groups, out of fear of being detected by the many threats of the wastes.
Though usually not too dangerous it should be noted they can pass the broken's checkpoints because they are the children of the citizens. They even on occasion can direct them and wield the old weapons, weapons far beyond mere swords or bows.
I've read a short story like that, called Locusts, all about a faerie plague that leaves the world a hellish place of terrifying magic, where there's no safe place, and nothing left to eat. Unless you want to eat one of them, and you don't want to eat one of them.
Now I have Zanarkand from Final Fantasy X in my mind...
if its Eberron, Warforged and constructs. Lots of them are probably going to be hostile as their programming breaks down, but others won't give a shit about you.
>Unless you want to eat one of them, and you don't want to eat one of them.
Why?
That's a really cool wasteland image, do you have any more OP?
I must know as well.
>7
How do guards survive so long after an apocalypse in most settings, anyway? Wouldn't they break down and fade away within a decade or two tops?
Eating these things is like drinking a potion that has a random magical effect. If you're very lucky, something nice will happen. But odds are it will do something horrible to you.
One of the survivors ate one, she's not quite herself anymore, and is now barely recognizable as human. The others have to watch her to keep her from eating any more, because she's hungry and they're not sure she understands these things anymore.
It was just something I grabbed off a quick Google search. I wish I had more desolate landscapes. Most of the ones I've found usually have modern buildings and ruins everywhere.
Hunger, thirst, exposure to harsh weather, possible radiation.
Not every potential-TPK challenge needs to be combat.
Sandworms Sandworms and more Sandworms
Look up all kinds of fucked up shit that was left over at nagasaki and heroishima, convert to magic fucked up stuff.
>people with burn imprints of dark pattern sections from their clothing
>desiccated zombies with spell book print remains burnt into their skin
>one doctor survives, tries to open and run red-cross tent on his own for days
>one medical automaton survives, still running a medical emergency room, but has gone insane with grief
>leaving two surviving american pilots tied to a bridge in the rubble, japanese survivors stone them to death
>ruined bridge over ashes with two corpses in faded armour chained to the side, when the wind howls through their broken jaws they chatter horrible laughter and prophesies of ill portent
stuff like that
This place is a message… and part of a system of messages… pay attention to it! Sending this message was important to us. We considered ourselves to be a powerful culture.
This place is not a place of honor…no highly esteemed deed is commemorated here… nothing valued is here.
What is here is dangerous and repulsive to us. This message is a warning about danger.
The danger is in a particular location… it increases toward a center… the center of danger is here… of a particular size and shape, and below us.
The danger is still present, in your time, as it was in ours.
The danger is to the body, and it can kill.
The form of the danger is an emanation of energy.
The danger is unleashed only if you substantially disturb this place physically. This place is best shunned and left uninhabited.
Mad Max magical dust storms, with crazy irradiated mutants with a fucked up martial heirarchy
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