Agon: Post Your Islands Here

This is an island from my nascent Agon campaign, First Among Equals. If you are a player in that game, don't read this too closely. Or do. It won't help you.

THE ISLE OF ARKANAM

Arkanam, a strange jagged rock of a place, harsh, pitted with caves and twisting passages. Some say the passage to the underworld is found here. An old and strange brass city caps one of its highest crags, and the hidden heart of this place still rumbles with the fires of Hephaestus.

The 'political' climate here:

Bazantanam, The Great City of Brass and Shadow. Strange ancient devices churn behind the walls and beneath the ground of this strangest of cities. The people there wear only metal, and use the strange machineries to gather the knowledge of the dead into their library. They have used the knowledge of their fallen enemies to wage a constant, effective defensive battle against those who would come to destroy them. In the bowels of their many-layered city, there is a great brass gate, locked to all passage and never once opened, which leads into the underworld of Hades. Bazantanam is building a temple to Apollo.

The stalemate of old has lead the Bazans to offer a notion of peace to Ukron, the Great Gorgon King of the Phost, a race of warlike giant-men who live on the far side of Arkanam. Ukron has tentatively accepted the truce (though no one is buying it), but confident that he can stop worrying about Bazantanam for the short term. Instead, he turns his eye towards Iliana, a smaller, verdant neighboring island populated by a pleasant fisher-folk favored by Poseidon. The machinery of war begins to point towards Iliana.

QUEST ONE: (6 objectives)

Hermes commands the heroes to travel into the land of the dead, and release Niktaros, the Shadow Steed, from its bondage under Hades' rule. The steed must be returned to the living lands.

* Find how to get into the land of the dead.

* Acquire the Amulet of Opening (key to the land of the dead) from the Black Circle sorcerers.

* Face the trials of the dead, where each hero must answer to those he has killed.

* Actually ride/master/tame the Shadow Steed long enough to get it to stay with the heroes and follow them out of the underworld.

* Evade the attention (and wrath) of Hades during the escape.

QUEST TWO: (6 objectives)

Apollo commands that the new temple being built in his name in Bazantanam, and the architect in charge of the project, be defended against those who would stop its construction. Three attempts will be made to destroy it.

* Find safe passage to Bazantanam (it is across vast and treacherous terrain, full of painful pitfalls and other challenges).

* Convince the lead architect to accept help. He is too proud for this.

* Determine who is trying to destroy the temple, and stop them:

* The Phidaros, a proud nomadic tribe evicted from this spot in ages past, servants of Artemis, and outraged that Apollo is taking the spot as his own.

* The Morlokai, a vast army of underground cannibals

* The Kraxes, a trio of chimaera hated by Apollo for their betrayal, cast out of Olympos ages ago.

QUEST THREE: (4 objectives)

Poseidon commands that the heroes slay Ukron, the Great Gorgon King of the Phost. Slain, one of the heroes must take Ukron's place upon his throne and return the Phost to their ageless war against Bazantanam. This quest is front-loaded with the kill of Ukron. The question afterwards is how to deal with taking command of the Phost.

* Kill Ukron, the Gorgon King. Not easy.

* Take command of the Phost, by facing their trials:

* Defeat the ten best of the Phost in contests of strength.

* Recover the Crown of Ukron from Nonos, the Keeper of Blood.

* Recover the Scepter of Ukron from Fokron, his elder brother, the gorgon living in the heated heart of Arkanam.

STRIFE TOTALS: 16 objectives x 5 = 80 strife per player involved. I'm looking at 3-5 players, for a budget of 240-400 strife.