I am running the campaign Tomb of Annihilation for D&D 5th but with several house rules (i.e. heXPloration) and a shift in the setting, as I have placed the adventure in the Mystara setting. This here is my presentation of the adaption so far.
My favorite D&D setting is the Mystara setting, thus I prefer to place my campaigns here, and in order to do so, some adaption has to be done, though I try to keep adaptions minimal in order to keep my extra work at a minimal.
Tomb of Annihilation takes place in Chult in Forgotten Realms, bit I have chosen to adapt it to Mystara, and have placed the area on the northern coasts of Davania, since a part of that region is not too far off the map from the adventure, as I am using the Chult map for the adventure. There is not much canon material on Davania and less on the region, that I have chosen, so new material must be added. Other fans of the setting have through Vault of Pandius created new material, but it did not fit my vision of the game, so it is not in use.
The Great Evil
In the official campaign an evil entity sucks life and souls to it, in order to become a divine being, and this is causing resurrected people to wither away.
Since my players my spot this blog post in the forays into the web, I will not reveal too much here, but in general the same curse has hit Mystara, however, the origin is of another nature, and one that the Immortals are silent about.
Another consequence of the curse is that, creatures that extend their life through magic, has also begun to wither away. This has great consequences for nations such as Alphatia and Glantri, where wizards live for a long time through the application of magic. They too are now dying, and they have an interest in finding and stopping the cause, but their foes and rivals are tempted to let the curse run its course in order to hurt Alphatia and Glantri. The Hattian Order of the Storm Soldiers for instance have in interest in stopping anyone trying to end the curse (and in the campaign the order replaces Order of the Flaming Fists).
Davania/Chult – Some Notes
As long as the campaign lasts the map from Tomb of Annihilation takes precedence of the normal maps of Mystara’s continent of Davania, and certain cities and areas are thus changed, and some of these deals with the nature of the campaigns evil.
Hattian Storm Troopers have a presence on the continent, as they try to interfere with anyone trying to stop the curse.
Heldannic Knights are present as well (they replace Order of the Gauntlet), and they are explorers of the region – for reasons for now kept secret – in part because a strange phenomenon in the jungles stops their flying ships from working, and the knights needs to know how and why.
The wreck of the flying ship The Star Goddess is now a wrecked Sky Gnome flying ship from Serraine stranding a small colony of Sky Gnomes in Kastellos, where they patiently await the return of Serraine and try to fund an expedition into the jungle to retrieve their wreck.
Kastellos/Port Nyanzaru – The History of the City
Build on top of ruins from a former unknown civilization (remains of the Milenian diaspora into the Davanian continent; was abandoned when the empire collapsed around 50BC), the Thyatian Empire established a farflung colony here during the reign of emperor Androikus II late 400 or early 500 AC. The colony was named Kastellos, and though chroniclers mention the ruins, they have no knowledge of the builders, nor their name.
During the 700s the nation of Hule begins expanding its influence in to the northern coasts of Davania, and this isolates Kastellos and its sister colony Garganin from the Thyatian Empire, and around 750 Garganin briefly becomes a colony under Hule control, though around 800 the Yavdlom Divinarchy returns to power and wrestles Hule’s control of the region from it. Garganin becomes independent again, while Kastellos remained independent during the whole period. An influx of Yavdloms to both Garganin and Kastellos begins, and when explorers in 852 from the Minrothad Isles discovers the sea routes to Kastellos and Garganin, they describe the two city states as populated by Yavdloms.
Kastellos and Garganin enters the sphere of influence of the Yavdlom Divinarchy, and they become two satellite states culturally and politically aligned with the Divinarchy, but also still independent cities, and they become places for Yavdloms to emigrate, if they do not want to accept the governing style of the divinarchy. In Kastellos – which is called Nyanzaru or Port Nyanzaru in the native tongues of the Yavdloms – a governing style inspired by the Minrothaddian traders consisting of a council of Merchant Princes arise, and one that is at odds with the divinarchy as it openly uses divination and welcomes rogue diviners from the divinarchy.
In 965 Thyatia returns to the Davanian continent as colonies are established in the Hinterlands, but no new relations are established with the still distant Kastellos or Port Nyanzaru, however, the city still contains a considerable minority of descendants from the Thyatian colonial period 500 to 300 years earlier, and they begin dreaming of returning to Thyatis as an official colony causing a schism with majority of the city’s population. The Thyatian descendants have not been in contact with the empire for 300 years, but that is about to change.
During the latest outbreak of lycanthropy some 40 years ago as large community of Minrothaddian wererats chose to leave the islands, rather than suffer through another Night of the Long Knifes, and at the time they chose to establish themselves in one of the most distant trading ports known to Minrothaddians, and thus they fled or moved to Port Nyanzaru, where they brought their knowledge of ship building technology with them, and became famed ship builders in the city state – and no one knew, what they brought with them. The wererats seek to keep a strict control on their hereditary and infectious lycanthropy and often forbid their members to marry outside of their ranks causing much grievance and rebellion amongst the youth.
At present in the year 1004, Port Nyanzaru is mainly populated by emigrant Yavdloms and their descendants, who has left the divinarchy and set up a council of merchant princes inspired by the Minrothad model. In the city is also a minority of emigrant Minrothadians, many of whom are wererats or related to people suffering from the curse of lycanthropy. The city has a minority of Thyatian descendants many generations removed from their ancestor’s empire, though they dream of returning to the empire, which they have no knowledge of beyond tales told innumerable times.
Of the original founders, the Milenians, there are no trace, as they are completely lost to history, but the foundation of the city is build upon their city – and perhaps there are people in Kastellos or Port Nyanzaru, who knows the earliest history of the city?
More on the city and continent, as I begin my write-ups on the campaign’s game sessions.
Roles, Dice and Fun 