Premise: “The gods were good to us, they gave us the world, and asked only for our worship, our loyalty. But as humanity grew, so too did its ambition. With ambition came war, and leaders that spoke of themselves as gods. We grew greedy, bloodthirsty, corrupted by the evils within us all. The more we were consumed the more the gods grew tired of our heresies. Eventually they’d had enough. The gods of Olympus sought a solution through which to bring humanity back to the light without bloodshed, but no measure of peaceful solution swayed the warring warriors of Greece to turn back to the gods and abandon their heretical ways. Hades provided the answer to Zeus without a spoken word when he unleashed the monsters of the underworld upon the world. As Hades’s minions tore the world asunder, humanity resisted. Rivers turned red, the ground grew stained with blood. Hades showed no mercy or compassion and pushed humanity to the brink, the world made a hellscape fit for the underworld.
Zeus, deciding humanity had been punished enough sent Ares to keep Hades minions at bay while he constructed a place he called The Sanctuary, a place where the minions of Hades could not tread, but humanity had not earned the favor of Olympus and thus Sanctuary was Zeus’s only mercy. Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades met to provide a final solution to give humanity the chance to find redemption, or be exterminated. After days of deliberation it was decided that humanity could participate as gladiators in the arena of the gods, the grand coliseum, or lose their one sanctuary against the forces of the underworld and face their inevitable extinction. They would still be required to survive by their own means in the wilds beyond the walls of The Sanctuary, braving the monsters of the underworld to arm themselves for when they would be called to the arena. It was also said that those who turned back to their faith would be blessed.
The fate of humanity now hangs in the balance. Win in the arena, and move closer to peace with Olympus. Meet defeat, and step closer to damnation. Will humanity endure, or will it be destroyed?
Hello brave warriors, and welcome to the Theater of War. In this game you and 1-5 companions will face untold horrors and tribulations as you fight to survive in a world bent on your destruction. You will hunt great beasts taken from Greek Mythology such as cyclopes, minotaurs, chimeras, hydras, and more as you work to defeat the Emperor and banish the monsters that have ravaged these lands to the realm from whence you came. You will work to develop the sanctuary and your heroes to increase your chances of avoiding eradication.
The game is set in 4 core phases and take 1-2hrs to play per session:
Scavenging: Seeking a monster out to slay and gather resources from.
Battle: Engaged with a monster during a scavenging run.
Sanctuary: research and development for heroes and the sanctuary
Arena: fight in the Grand Coliseum
Heroes: Players can generate heroes that will grow and develop as they play to learn new abilities, feats, and specializations as well as equip themselves with gear, weapons, and armor to improve their odds in the hostile world before them.
Monsters: Monsters will have Monster Cards with core behaviors as well as a deck of actions to take during battle to ensure varied and unpredictable behavior of enemies.
Wounds function in a 2 part system. There are 4 hit locations. Torso, arms, head, and legs. These locations can sustain various degrees of damage before afflicting the player with debilitations targeting those body locations. The character also has an overall health level. When this is reduced to 0 any subsequent hits force the player to roll on the affliction table for serious wounds that can include death. Location health recovers during the Sanctuary phase, overall health must be healed via resting the character or using other developed means of healing.
Scavenging: Scavenging is performed on a random event table in conjunction with events specific to the targeted monster for thematic and immersion.
I'm open to feedback. I'd also like to know if there would be anyone interested in helping me design and develop this game for kickstarter or a publisher.
Thanks,
-William
P.S. I have another concept here called Containment, its currently on the backburner due to there being an issue with mechanics not really meshing well, my brother and I are pulling back on it and trying to figure out a new angle to approach it with.
Update: I've decided to deeper ingrain it in Greek Mythology.
For fighting they are like gladatorial boss fights with mythical monsters. Each fight revolves around a party of up to 6 characters fighting against a singular large monster such as a cyclops, chimera, minotaur, etc.
Hunting monsters entails exploring using a random event table and events tailored to the target monster before the inevitable battle with the target monster. This provides items for the characters, potential resources for The Sanctuary, or even problems to deal with for the chars and monster.
Development entails using resources taken from the monsters to make weapons, armor, and gear at artisans within The Sanctuary. Artisans and various innovations for The Sanctuary are earned through blessings or crafting via gathered resources. After a few cycles of monster hunting the players are called to the coliseum for a big boss fight battle with one of the bigger beasts of greek myth like the hydra, Ladon, and Basilisk. Hunted monsters would be things like a cyclops, chimera, minotaur, nemean lion, phoenix, etc.