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Five Spheres of Mystara - The Principalities of Glantri

Mini Campaign Introduction

• D&D - Five Sphers of Mystara - 5th Edition D&D
• Group: Wednesday (D&D Week)
• Session: Session 41 to 44 (4 sessions)
• 21st September 2016 to 16th November 2016
• Players: Jeff – Gargamel (4), Nim – Kang Hohar (4), Nathan M – Covare mk1 (3), David B – Indigo (3), Annette – Char (2)

This was run from the 21st of September 2016 to the 16th of November 2016 over the course of 4 sessions. This is a storyline is used as an introduction adventures for the Wrath of the Immortals based in the Pricipalities of Glantri.

• Gazetteer – Glantri
• Timeline - AC 1000-01-01 – The mini campaign introducing Glatnri and its locations.
• Session Recordings - AC 1000-01-01 (W) – Introduction to Glantri – Audio Only Rocordings

The Setup

The characters started in the City of Glantri, as new students at the Great School of Magic on their first day at the school, all in the same intake.

As this is planned as a 4 year study in the Great School of Magic in Glantri City the characters each got to participate in classes about furthering their knowledge of magic.

Six players, each having backgrounds that fitted into the setting or changing the setting slightly to allow for the backgrounds to work. All characters are enrolled in the great school of magic and should have played either a wizard, a sorcerer or a bard in that order of preference.

Planned end to story arc: The characters were told that they would be given the test of sorcery at the end of four years in the school to determine how well they had progressed in their learning and where they would end up as member of society. For the intro section of the story they are expected to interact with the following:

• Gnometech: Links to the Gnomes and their wonderous inventions.
• Magocracy: A place where being a wizard is the only form of citizenship, and sorcerers are tolerated. Halfling, Dwarves and Clerics are not welcome.
• Secret Crafts: This is the inspiration of the secret crafts that have grown out into the 40 differnt crafts I have available based on the seven that are introduced in this setting.
• The Grest School of Magic: Learning in the school is meant to be the focus of the storyline and being students much like the new strixhaven which would have fitted in perfectly here.
• The Principalities: A visit to each of the various principalities and how their uniqueness to the region is what makes the area so vibrant.

The Campaign

Well it was fun working out the classes, and interactions between characters, as we roleplayed some of the classes, teachers and other students. They got to meet some of the true terrors of the setting, young teenagers with magical power. Elves and humans the equivalent mentality of a eight year old wielding magic in the classroom.

Using some of the basic adventure idea’s in the back of the book and tailoring it to the group of players and their characters on the night has been fun.

Characters got to create magical items, learn abilities beyond what other spellcasters from other nations are capable of, learn or create new spells, increase the size of their personal library and expand their knowledge on the identification of magical creatures.

As part of the semester each session I had a bunch of rolls to see how well each character participated in the school classes. Each semester I had the characters apply against those categories.

They spent half of each session seeing if their characters learnt anything that semester in the Great School, and the other half of the session doing side jobs for the professors, ranging from delivering packages, to scouring the nearby mountain peaks for rare herbs.

I had planned for two more semesters and then do the school’s test, but the players were not into it enough to justify another session so I moved up the test of high sorcery. For this session the players got to see what everyone else was doing, but not know what it meant. I would run each player and their character though the graduation test in the book and let it finish but not give the results until they all ran through the test.

There was two outstanding performances, one okay performance, and one disappointing performance. So it was good that the continuing players managed to graduate and gain employment with the government as citizens.

Notable changes to the setting during the story:

• Goliaths added to the mountains.
• Red Dragons with their dragonborn added to the mountains.
• War Forged allowed as a once off as a science experiment that gained sentience.

The secret crafts of Glantri all become feat progression to be taken in place of feats, though they were also thought to be downtime activities like the semester training except their abilities were more powerful and I did feel appropriate for a feat selection.

Referenced Publications
• D&D BECMI - B1-9 - In Search of Adventure (mainly used as a reference for this campaign, did not set any of the adventures here)

Timeline