Opening Scene, Roll Credits:

Welcome to Jake's Game,

In a time when Babylonian, Greek, and Norse myth are more fact than legend, after the Pangean supercontinent had separated, but dinosaurs still roamed the earth, civilization was flourishing in harmony with nature, to a degree.

We let the jungles be, because we bypassed most necessity for wooden tools and items, most everything being made from stone, metal, or even... bone... negates a lot of the need to deforest large portions of landmasses.

There are five inhabitable land masses large enough to be considered continents, these are:

North America, known as Reinardeh, Speaking Common and English
South America, known as Tenochtitlan, Speaking Common and Mayan
Eurussia, known as Babyl Lateuros, Speaking Common and Latin
Asia(Asia, Japan, Australia, most islands in the Pacific Ocean) known as Goguryo, Speaking Common and Coptic(Egyptian)
Africa, known as Tasmania, Speaking Common and Aboriginal

As you can see, many of the names are similar to ones that would be found in todays world, the common language, common, is more common than the second most common language, Mayan, which is more common than English, then Latin then Coptic then Aboriginal.

The main reason the Aboriginal language is spoken so rarely is few people have reason to travel to Tasmania, due to the silly(albeit somewhat true) superstition that it is haunted constantly by devils.


A bit more about the setting:

There will be such a hodgepodge of gods and deities, as you've only seen in bad science fiction.

Guess what?
Heh.

There will be appearances of gods and ideas from Aztec, Norse, Greek/Roman, possibly some monotheistic religions, perhaps some of the Indian religions. A character speaking to a statue in the form of a snake with a man's legs sticking out of its mouth, for the hell of it; and having Quetzalcoatl respond, that the character should probably be reading a book instead of talking to statues of snakes with legs sticking out of their mouths, may be fairly common place.

Climate is a little different, as this is an alternate history and alternate Geography, we still have polar ice caps (in fact bigger than current day) but the tropics (Between the lattitudinal lines of the Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn) will be completely sweltering, nearing 130+ degrees Fahrenheit during summers, perhaps more. Most living beings are adapted to living anywhere from 0 degrees Fahrenheit to 150 degrees Fahrenheit, much warmer than we're used to in present day.

Outside of the tropics, it stays "moderately tropical" to temperate, almost all the way up to(or down to), the ice caps, it's almost as if something innately magical creates a barrier where it goes from sixty degrees Fahrenheit to zero, crossing about a mile of ocean(or in some cases, a few hundred yards of Tundra).

Cities: Imagine if you will, Shinra's view of Midgar, where instead of mako energy and lifestream tapping, we've got coal mines under the upper residential levels, and this is actually an urban planning and architectural structure that is used for multiple cities.

http://www.ffodyssey.com/wallpapers/ff7/ff7_midgar_1024x768.jpg is a
visual example. All credits for said visual go to Squaresoft and FFOdyssey.com

This style of city or life has been used in a lot of science fiction, from Metropolis(both versions) to Castle in the Sky, and many video games, because it "could almost exist." If it weren't for the fact that most urban planning happens after people have settled in an area, and are too stubborn to move out for construction.

We will however replace that sort of stubborn person, with the intelligent gnomes, who realize: That mountain over there probably bears a large lode of ore, we should build a town around or over it, for the people who will have to work there, let's use Urban Design A for comfort and safety.

There is one green kingdom that uses the normal human methodology: "Find source of water, gather near and colonize about the source of water, farm the land, inhabit the land, castle up/defend and control the land, expand city to meet needs of populous." This is in Babyl Lateuros.

Most of the campaign (unless the player characters get antsy) will take place in Tenochtitlan. The capital of which... is... yes...
Tenochtitlan. The second largest city will be Midgard(Urban Design A.)

I just realized this is getting rather lengthy, and as I'm at work, I should probably finish my break and head back to work, before I go, there are some things to mention to future players(And to anyone playing with Magic... or Demons):


Racial Packages:
I'll post my campaign rules notes on another occasion, to give specifics, but each character is requires to take a racial package (The cheapest one being humans, which actually gives a benefit to skills oriented characters.)

Magic System:
Currently there is a one point talent required to be magically apt "Magical Aptitude" as well as a skill required (basically replaces the 'power' skill required for a VPP) boughten as a 5 point skill based on either your INT or EGO roll, whichever is higher, in one of the five schools of magic:
Abjuration
Alteration
Conjuration
Divination
Evocation

One can buy more than one school of magic, but as we're running a low campaign, those five points hurt when trying to build that VPP or Elemental Control, or Multipower.


For fairness and balance, I think I'll have to tweek the demon's powers to be in line with other power constraints put on the system for other magic users, either implementing a 45 active point cap, or asking that they be put into a power framework similar to the ones London or Matt have created, if we have to limit them like everyone else, think of it like the racial packages, all "Demons" as a race, simply have the magical package built in to their cost, and must take it to exist in their natural form, just like all humans are good at a couple of things, all Halflings are short and sturdy... etcetera.
I've got an encounter rolled up to test the balance already though, so if the demons are done before this message is read, don't sweat the small stuff, Gnomes for example.