The Border Kingdoms: Frontier (Arc)

Border Kingdoms: The Frontier

In the north, on the edges of civilization lies the Frontier, home to the Border Kingdoms. The Border Kingdoms is a fragile piece of land, a hostile and unforgiving place where any man, whether he be a landless son, a bastard, an adventurer or a simple peasant can make a name for himself and rule a piece of land as his own.

Name: Border Kingdoms
Gameworld: Transylvania area northwards is the Frontier, everything else is owned by GM controlled Kingdoms.
Premise: Every player picks a hero and begins at two staging points of entry into the Frontier, usually the bridges that lead to Transylvania and the human island as a port. Players choose which place they spawn and can RP with each other and npc 'adventurers' (feudal levies controlled by the GM, which can be given to players if they persuade them)
The guards then warn the players that there is no going back if they go to the Frontier and will be killed on sight if they do. The players are then left to build a place for themselves in the Frontier and defend themselves from the evils.

GM Controlled Opponents: Any creep, beastmen, orc, barbarian, etc
Player Opportunities: Usage of pallisade walls and buildable keep decorations should be used alot in this theme, with the combination of these two custom settlements and cps could be given to the players.

This theme can be used through multiple arcs with 10 or so years being the gap between every game, this works with the theme since the Frontier is fragile enough for new people to take over and old kingdoms to die.

Jay's Border Kingdoms Arc
Year 1000
First settlers into the Border Kingdoms, barbarian nations forged in the mid-north, holy men and relic-hunters to the east find a holy city, the south was controlled briefly by settlers but in the end most settlers ended up being routed by beastmen hordes.
Feudal Kingdoms in the middle and east are created.

Year 1010
Next major batch of settlers, many short lived settlements come and go, mostly owned by knightly orders. Brave Knights of the Black Tapestry and the Wolf Settlers of the southern Frontier get pushed north by beastmen. Daemon worshipping barbarians push from west but dont make much ground, the east is settled by crusader once again but are eventually beaten by beastmen.

Year 1015

The Empire has expanded their borders to incorporate the Transylvania-esque area, but only really control the eastern pass with the west becoming a beastmen haven. The numbers of beastmen in the rest of the frontier lowers but barbarian raids have risen.
Three major kingdoms were prominent at this time, with the eastern one being the old wolf kingdom (comprised of settlers and native eastern barbarians) and the other two being major settlers who improved the infrastructure of the land. Another small settlement of note was a small western village who flourished to create the Border Kingdoms Trade League, which dealt fur to the outside and the rest of the Frontier.

This period is mostly known for the "First Imperial Invasion" where the Empire unsuccessfully invaded the Border Kingdoms.
The main battle was 'The Battle of the Triple Towns' near Midderisk which proved that a combined Border Kingdoms Army could defeat the Imperial one, eventually the Empire razed many surrounding settlements and managed a white peace with the Border Kingdoms Coalition.

Year 1020

This was a largely peaceful period, the frontier grew into a well populated and dense place with many new settlements all across.
One major event was a near spark of war between the Empire and the Frontier again when an Imperial Convoy was attacked, but that was soon averted. Eventually, two major kingdoms in the Frontier became Imperial Colonies.

Due to a large Imperial offensive in the southern old-frontier, the beastmen hordes were pushed back north via the mountains where they ended up ravaging much of the west and northern frontier.

Year 1040

The Old Frontier's developments was wiped out by the beastmen horde who have again fled south. All the Imperial colonies died out with the only two surviving independent Kingdoms being Rorkhal and Shear-point. The Akahelmos line returned once more to capture its previous place, with the East stuck in a permanent state of war between new settlers.

Two major events was the Imperial Prisoner Convoy incident which saw the release of gnolls, orcs and criminals to the Frontier with the other major event being the Rise of Keberak the Red.
The Red Dragon emerged shortly after the Convoy incident and managed to ravage most of the Frontier, burning down and destroying many of the new developments. This was an age of heroes and strife under the Red Demon.
There were several notable leaders that faced Keberak such Sulvez Akahelmos, son of the previous Akahelmos ruler, who managed to retake his father's lost lands a long with King Barius, known as Barius the Bastard and also Barius the Mourner (as he had lost his pregnant elven life to dragonfire), who ruled his Kingdom of Shear-point for many years and ended up inheriting the Kingdom of Akahelmos after its ruler Sulvez died of unforeseen circumstances.

The Frontier became a dragon-burnt wasteland with many refugees leaving for the Empire. The Frontier would also become known as Dragon Country, a desolate land unavailable for resettlement and development.