>It is the year 20XX and the outer gods from beyond our universe have finally broken in and will devour all life. >Just before they encroach on the earth, a shining light erupts from everywhere yet nowhere, a host of trumpets sounding as winged figures in silver armor materialize and begin attacking the horde. >It turns out that God is real, and its finally time for him to enact phase two of his master plan. >He knew the elder gods had been coming ever since the big bang, when he was nought but an omniscient Boltzmann Brain who had not yet achieved omnipotence. >Needing an army capable of withstanding the reality-shattering horrors the outer gods could inflict, he found worlds of living beings and took the role of their god. >Those few who could pass his many tests ascended to heaven, where they would be imbued with divine power (for he would only trust the most pure and worthy with such power) while the rest went to hell. >However, Hell is not merely a place of punishment. it was in fact a spiritual boot-camp that would inoculate the souls within against the outer gods and their torments by making them numb to all manner of pain and horror over millennia without the risk of divine empowerment going to the wrong people. >Now the time has come, and the universe's sinners are given a second chance: Should this war be won, all sins will be forgiven, and they shall reside in paradise. >The legions of the damned return to the mortal world and fight as the expendable masses while supported by famous saints and heroes like Moses, Joan of Arc, Jesus, ect against various eldritch horrors from beyond reality.
Is this a viable campaign and what system would be best to run it? Please understand that I have no intention of treating the source material with any dignity and intend to get as crazy as I possibly can.
Question; do the earthly leaders mount any serious resistance to the elder gods? Also, whats the situation with the great old ones who are already on earth, or the outer gods, who definitely know about earth by this time?
Ryder James
Its basically a full "the stars are right and they are all either here or going to be be here soon" situation. Luckily the ones already here aren't as bad as the ones that are coming so a bit of order can be restored. This will probably be the first part of the campaign.
The earthly leaders probably mount a paltry resistance, but mundane weaponry isn't much help compared to divine stuff. This probably changes when God shows up. I'd also imagine most of the people who died and are recoverable during this time either go to hell and (because time is fucky down there) come back out more or less ready for action and the ones that are good/die heroically and stuff are inducted into the heavenly host. Basically being alive is at best a temporary thing and the real conflict is between the resurrected dead and the eldritch horrors, with people who still haven't died yet basically living on borrowed time.
Jack Reed
What is azathoth's status? How does god compare with azathoth and yog-sothoth in power-level / stats?
I think this could be a cool idea, but I suddenly had the thought that they are in some sort of jack chick-ian universe.
Nolan Howard
Both are omnipotent and omniscient beings and basically hold each other in check while their lesser underlings try to take each other out. The overall strategy is to destroy or banish the opposing side's forces and then mob the opposing godhead because infinity still loses out to infinity+1, sort of. This is the best way of explaining it to mortal minds.
Isaac Flores
In that case, this is very important; is azathoth a blind engine of power, or did nyarlathotep rejoin azathoth (thus giving it an INT score again)?
Michael Allen
Azathoth is basically sleepwalking and operating on primeval instincts while Nyarlathotep is working as the active leader/herder/point-at-targeter of the Outer Gods while Jesus serves as the commander of the heavenly and hellish forces, with the disciples being the generals and the various saints, prophets, and martyrs being superpowered ass-kickers with thematically appropriate abilities deployed to the most wartorn areas.
Jason Diaz
Is there any possibility in the current timeline of any members of the eldritch things surviving the war? Or any timeline yog-sothoth could shunt everyone to in which they win or survive?
I'm picturing Yog-sothoth as being one of those "HAH! you think you one? Lets reload a save file!" shitheads.
I have actually not thought about this but I will probably make it a plot point.
I'm stealing this.
Nicholas Hughes
Yog-sothoth is co-terminous with all time and space, it is definitely aware of every possible timeline, and most likely travels through time as effortlessly as you or I pop round to the tentacle-and-virgin-and-cultist-and-robes-and-bagpipes-and-fiddler pub on Tuesday night.
Samuel Long
That might be an issue for God to handle. Maybe that's why he can't help directly. He rivals Azathoth in power but at the same time his intellect allows him to outplay Azathoth, but that part of him is kept in check by preventing Yog-Sothoth from fucking around with timelines. And maybe this could add an element of time to the mix, since it is unknown how long God can hold off two outer gods of such power at once.
Kevin Barnes
Do tardises, deloreans, or any other means of human powered time travel exist yet?
Lucas Torres
Great concept OP. How do Satan and mythological figures from non-Abrahamic religions fit into this? And what about HP Lovecraft, given he knew about the elder gods centuries in advance?
Chase Martinez
I'd say probably not, but apparently there were some time-travelling Hindu monks/saints so I could have them assist the PCs in some manner for quest shenangians. I'm not sure I'd do outright time-travelling though but rather maybe some kind of fucked up higher-dimensional boardgame analog as the PCs and God try to outplay Yog-Sothoth somehow.
This is all very much in the planning phase if you haven't noticed. I'd be open to making it a full-on Veeky Forums project though.
Adrian Brooks
>omnipotence. >Needing an army
Nathaniel Ramirez
Satan was in on it and he is the basically the angriest drill sergeant you'll ever see, who wants to toughen up the sinners into jaded killing machines. Other mythological figures might be making an appearance as angels or demons that appropriated the culture of the pagans they found. So Thor is actually a personalized Seraphim and such like that. It'd be more focused on biblical figures and saints and such though. Like imagine Moses clapping his hands together and parting the Atlantic to reveal the army of Deep Ones to the waiting angelic artillery or maybe just a really angry Joan of Arc.
see
Andrew Gonzalez
I'm guessing azathoth would most likely scream like an enraged autist and beat against god's barrier until it eventually caved, it'd be yog-sothoth and nyarlathotep who would be sneaky bastards. I can see Yog-sothoth trying to bring back extinct beings to fight against the heavenly hosts, and nyarlathotep just being an utter dickhead.
The way I see it, if god decides at some point to take a direct role in the struggle, azathoth intervenes in some way and it's kill or be killed in a sub-dimension or some other place that isn't actually on the map, ending up in a situation where neither god nor azathoth is directly seen by any of the earthly beings or the dead hosts or the angels.
Kevin Harris
That's more or less the idea, yeah. So its up to the forces of good to move quickly and checkmate the big guys by fighting through all the lesser forces.
Carson Gray
Go home Derleth, nobody likes you!
Jace Martin
Probably a wise move, that way no players get patooty pulverized by god making a direct appearance or clearly losing in some way.
Daniel Walker
SIEG HEIL! THE WHERMACHT SHALL MARCH ONCE MORE, WE SHALL ENACT THE FINAL SOLUTION AGAINST THE ELDER GODS AND THEIR SPAWN
To be fair I am definitely going to portray the saints and apostles as high-level shounen characters with ridiculous moves and abilities and such.
Adrian Martinez
xth post best post
I was expecting an elaborate bait thread, I'm glad this isn't. Given that God is facing 3 other beings of equivalent power how has he not already lost? Or is that while God is omni-everything, Azathoth is omnipotent, Yog-sothoth is omnipresent and Nyarlathotep is omniscient and just very powerful otherwise?
Eli Peterson
Azathoth and God are evenly matched but God has intellect and strategy, so he can counter Azathoth's retarded screeching with ease so long as he concentrates. Yog-Sothoth is smarter but his power is less direct, he can't bring down hammerblows of unreality like Azathoth so God can take him in a straight fight. Combined they are about a match for him. Nyarlathotep is the general of the Eldritch side and the counterpart to Jesus. Both are focused on defeating the forces of the other.
Adrian Gray
>Like imagine Moses clapping his hands together and parting the Atlantic to reveal the army of Deep Ones to the waiting angelic artillery or maybe just a really angry Joan of Arc This is the buddy cop movie I never knew I needed.
David Carter
>And what about HP Lovecraft, given he knew about the elder gods centuries in advance? Oh I totally forgot to answer this. I'm torn between him being a prophet and a gag character. Basically whenever anyone brings him up, one either side, everyone just kind of stares awkwardly at the floor and says nothing. Because the thing about Lovecraft is that he was actually a perfectly normal human being. All his uncannily accurate predictions about the Elder Gods were little more than sheer luck. There is simply no reason for him to have known any of what he did and people just refer to him as "the anomaly."
what happens if the sinners die again? do we just have infinite lives? can jesus ride a trex?
Adrian Hill
>what happens if the sinners die again? do we just have infinite lives?
You get reborn but it takes time and resources and you need a temple for it. Less temples equals slower respawn times equals things start to go bad. Don't lose temples.
