The flower of the Renaissance has blossomed into the Enlightenment across Europe. Absolute Monarchs flirt with liberal ideals while punishing dissent with torture and death. High-handed philosophers speak of equality, liberty, and fraternity while the majority of the peasantry lives in bound serfdom throughout the lands. The zealotry of the Reformation, Counter-Reformation, and Wars of Religion which so-dominated the previous centuries have ground to a halt as new secular ideals come to the forefront.
Modernity has dawned, but ancient horrors are not content to quietly slink away from the ever-encroaching light of civilization.
Instead, the splintered remnants and shuttered cabals culled to near-extinction by the unrelenting pressure of the crusades, witch-burnings, persecution, plagues, and other catastrophes now see the dawning Enlightenment as a ray of hope. Tradition and Revelation are no longer the sources of Truth. It can only be through Observation and Repetition of Results that Truth is revealed.
It is the Year of Our Lord Seventeen Hundred and Fifty.
In the Ancien Regime of France, Louis XV reigns as an absolute monarch over a prosperous kingdom which stands as one of the continent's great powers. The church, the nobility, and the commoners underneath his rule each seek different idealized forms of the future. The commoners seek upward social mobility within a strict class system that has bound them to their daily work and toil for far longer than living memory, no matter their monetary gains or aspirations. The nobility, in turn, seeks to put a halt to these expansions of social mobility, especially the insidious purchasing of titles and interbreeding between wealthy commoners and impoverished nobility that they see as corrupting the ancestral heritage of their elite group.
The church, too, advances a different agenda. Since the conclusion of the Thirty Years' War a century prior the temporal power of the Pope and the Catholic Church in general has been on a steady decline. Even France, long a bastion of Catholic dogma, if not to the same extreme as Spain, has begun making moves towards a more secular state. Church properties and buildings, some hundreds of years old, are now in danger of the same repossession seen in England during the Anglican Schism. Many within the church wonder if there is a way to reverse this terrible trend...
...when, in point of fact, it is simply a small part of a larger shift in dynamics across the continent and beyond. The Enlightenment has taken firm root in the philosophies and teachings of Europe, expressing and empirical and objective view of the world centered on the observations of humanity. The Earth, in these days, no longer revolves around the sun as Galileo once stated, but around the human experience of its revolution.
This new wave has even gone so far as to wash ashore in the Russian Empire.
Tsarina Yelisaveta Petrovna, Empress of Russia and daughter of Peter the Great, known in the west as Elizabeth, rules the largest expanse of land in the world. Although she, like her father, has embraced many Enlightenment ideals, the truth is that her nation is still largely medieval. Only one in twenty of her people live in what could generously be termed a 'city,' while the majority of the remainder are slaves in all but name. Bound to the land, which is in turn bound to the noble families, some of which stretch back half a millennia.
Here, too, the dominant religion faces problems. Never having truly known the supremacy the Catholics saw in western Europe, Eastern Orthodoxy has generally been subservient to the will of the ruler, a truth which has become more apparent since Peter the Great's disinclination to appoint a new Patriarch. The choice to divide the power of the Church amongst several equals instead of a supreme religious authority undercut the worry of a rival. Even now, though, many in Russia whisper of cutting the church's power even further and stripping them of the lands and wealth they have enjoyed for so long.
Between the two great powers of Europe, though, lay unsettled concerns. The Germanic powers of Austria and Prussia, old and new respectively, vie for dominance. The peace of the previous war, the War of Austrian Succession, decided little and raised more questions in the following years. Now, things look to come to a head again...
...caused by a conflict in a foreign land.
In the New World, the Kingdom of Britain's Thirteen Colonies strain at the agreements binding them to the border of the Appalachian Mountains. Settlers looking for a new future in untamed wilderness, regardless of the indigenous peoples, push further into territory nominally held by France.
The people of the colonies have grown irreverent of the rule of their king, George II, and know that the reach of his authority is limited to the area overseen by the colonial governors and their token military presence. Fringe ideas of self-governance and self-determination have begun to take root as the immigrants push west to attain freedoms and a lack of social strictures alien to Europe.
This is the world you are born into.
It is an appealing change from the years past.
Your elders have told you that it is still within living memory: a time when people with such leanings as you and your fellows would be burned at the stake for 'witchcraft' and 'heresy.'
The Renaissance, humanism, the proliferation of the written word and the skill of reading... all of these have changed the world rapidly and irrevocably. In these modern times, people have ideas that run against the grain of the establishment and short of butchery on a scale to beggar the imagination, the authorities of man seem to be at a loss as how to respond to the slow slide towards a less-restrictive world.
A world where those who possess hidden knowledge, knowledge which would be forbidden in ages past, may now move about with comparative freedom.
It is a luxury you and your fellows have come around to embrace.
...but it is now without its dangers. For, as the unifying force of the church has fragmented and zealotry faded over the course of the past centuries, so too have those groups which ferreted out ancient secrets begun to show cracks in their solidarity. The old rules of secrecy, of treaties and cooperation before violence... these ancient ways are experiencing their last gasps in this new age. Now groups which would have once intermingled and exchanged token pieces of wisdom horde even the smallest tidbits of power and magic. Before, where the halls of mortal power had been an inviolable taboo, now the lure of new secular authorities keen to dismiss 'silly superstitions' has begun to draw out tentative feelers.
Fellowships are consolidating.
Territory is being taken.
Lines are being drawn.
You live in a world of constant danger and change, the only way to survive is to adapt. You and your fellows know this. It is why, instead of the distant and far-flung series of like-minded individuals you have always been unto time immemorial, you are beginning to gather. You are seizing upon the new religious tolerances, the new accumulations of people within cities, and the waning power of the church to build a more tight-knit network.
You will, of course, need to be careful, as the monarchs who pay lip service to the ideals of the Enlightenment and humanism still maintain extensive secret police on the watch for sedition and treason. Even in the colonies, the idea of 'tolerance' would be truly tested against the revelation of your ancient, pagan beliefs.
You have chosen your new home carefully with that same understanding...
[ ] St. Petersburg, Russian Empire
+ Moderately Known Mythos Threats
+/- Expansive Territory to Draw From
- Enemy Mythos Organizations
[ ] Paris, Kingdom of France
+ Well Known Mythos Threats
+/- Stratified Society/Social Upheaval
- Strong Catholic Presence
[ ] Philadelphia, Proprietary English Colony of North America
+ Relaxed Social Structures/Mores
+/- Unexplored Territory/Unknown Mythos Threats
- Hostile Native Population
...which will be the best fit for an organization of your background...
[ ] Worshiper Cult
The most common background for a mythos organization. Individuals seeking power, control, and meaning in life beyond the meager temporal authority of mankind. You and your fellows are devoted to one or more of the ancient beings which the ignorant would term 'gods.' The Great Old Ones, the Outer Ones, the Other Ones... you will have favor with those creatures who are natural servitors of your chosen patron, but receive automatic enmity from those servants of other powers aligned against your own. Your aims will be to proselytize, indoctrinate, and accomplish missions assigned to you by whomever you serve.
[ ] Manipulator Cadre
A relatively new, or newly resurgent cast of mythos group. More common in the ancient world, your small group cares little for the eldritch nature of the powers that you deal with, merely that they are means to an end. The dealings and research you have involved yourselves in are aimed at controlling and directing the course of events in the mortal world. Greater truths and revelations are secondary, which in turn means that your mercenary ideology will allow you flexible standards when working with other groups, but your irreverence may put off potential allies. Your aims will be to enter the halls of power undetected and seize the reigns for yourselves... while honoring the debts you accrue in the process, of course.
[ ] Abomination Guild
A syncretist mythos organization, your group has sought to fuse the ideals of the scientific revolution with the ancient workings of eldritch magic you have inherited, bartered, or stolen. Like the Manipulators, your only true creed is success, but unlike those petty profiteers, research is its own reward. Temporal power, instead, is the means to an end. Your goals are the advancement of your organization's knowledge, the acquisition of ancient artifacts and knowledge, and control over the direction of human philosophical and technological development.
[ ] Apocalypse Agents
Your group seeks not merely to serve the occasional whim of an ancient power, but to actively seek out the final awakening of the horrible beings who cannot die. Human civilization is unceasingly corrupt and pointless in its childish imitation of the true society of wonders beyond the kin of mortal man. The only possible resort for your organization is the complete destruction of all institutions and the return of humanity back to the primitive cave-dwellers you know them to be, then they will be fit to bask in the glory of their infinite betters. Some cults will be sympathetic to your cause, others will be in contest for a reckoning under specific circumstances, but your primary enemy is the bulk of humanity itself. All who learn, progress, and strive for a better tomorrow are irreconcilable foes.
[ ] Exterminator Sect
The eldritch is a poison to human society, one which must be expunged at any cost. Your group seeks to further mankind's tenuous grasp on the temporal world by eliminating any and all manner of occult threats wherever they can be found. The mirror opposite of the Apocalypse Agents, you will find friends in the governments of man and the various Christian churches, most especially the Catholics. On the other hand, virtually every organization with any dealings in or with mythos beings, especially those who worship the fell deities, will be unrelentingly hostile given that is your automatically-assumed stance as well. Your goal is the safety and prosperity of humanity as a whole, even if cancers have to be excised and burned for that noble pursuit.
The QM is open to criticism, but all QM rulings are ultimately final.
Each turn in-game will cover five years.
Each turn will consist of two phases.
In the first phase, you will be presented with a choice between broad actions.
During the second phase, you will specify the details on how you want to implement those actions.
As an example, once the first turn commences you will have the option to 'Establish' your organization. Your options on how to implement 'Establishing' your organization will be what kind of face you present to the world around you. You can choose to present your organization as a School, a Hunting Lodge, a Church, or some other reasonable excuse to ensure few people become suspicious with how so many individuals are coming and going at all hours of the night. Obviously, the Starting Location and the Background Choice will help determine what kind of choices you get here, as the backgrounds of your 'clubs' members needs to mesh with the organization they're part of, publicly.
Another common option to come up in the first phase will be Recruitment. To give another example, if you choose to Recruit for a turn, you'll receive options in the second phase to pick what kind of people you want. Choice might include Aristocracy, Wealthy Businessmen, Clergy, Buying Orphans, etc...
Most actions will have near-certain rates of success. If they have a significant chance of failure, that will be noted in their descriptor.
Background dice rolls will occur. They will not be revealed, but you'll obviously see the results.
Certain actions and options (specifically and especially the background and setting choices) will have outsized effects on the later quest. There will also be certain advantages and disadvantages which will not be mentioned on quest posts. This is not a mistake on the part of the QM as he does not mean to be anywhere close to exhaustive in his lists. Hidden qualities are a feature of this quest, not a bug. Knowledge of history may help in some instances given this will start out as a close historical AU, but could be misleading in others. Feel free to indulge in paranoia and jumping at shadows.
Voting rounds will usually have a one hour moratorium (except for the opening vote), and a twenty-four hour voting period. After which, give me a day or two to post the next segment and we'll continue.
[X] Manipulator Cadre
[X] St. Petersburg, Russian Empire
No throne over such a vast land rules by just the laws of man, secret alliances, strings and manipulations keep things at peace. Mercenary? That is what you have to do to WIN after all.
...also Prussia be a lamb and send over Catherine? Thanks
Great to see you back Slayer, and this is quite an interesting premise... I also thought of going for Paris and Abomination Cult but... well that seemed a bit too Prometheus Unbound.
[X] Philadelphia, Proprietary English Colony of North America [X] Abomination Guild
As great as cloak-and-dagger intrigue stuff is, carving out territory and building a new civilization in the New World sounds even more fun. We'll see where this goes!
In large part, this quest will focus not on individuals, but on the organization itself, Big Events in history, and potential achievements and divergences within the AU.
Depending on how membership in your group is specified (there will be a vote to determine if it's meritocratic, inherited, nominated, etc...), I may recycle some family names, but...
Consider the organization to be the PC, not any specific character in the traditional sense.
