Apocalypto Gladiator

Post/Author/DateTimePost
#1

zombiegleemax

Dec 09, 2006 1:22:46
Since I'm converting the plot to Apocalypto to Dark Sun, you bet your Kanks there's spoilers here.

So, basically, the PCs live in a hunting village in a forest near the moutains. They have lives, families and social ties to their village. Then one night a slaver raid comes in. The ****, kill, torture and capture the PCs as slaves. Everything the PCs had in life is now gone or harmed. They are taken out of the forest to the desert. They travel many days, maybe even a month or two until they reach something they have never seen before, a city-state. The women and children are sold into slavery whereas the men are taken to the arena. There, they will face gladiators in a death sport. They will either live, or die. If they live, they will become gladiators if they don't escape before hand. They will be changed.

There is a lot more going on here than just a Gladiator match. The city is on the brink of ruin. Drought and poor resource management has caused a famine. The nobles, who live lives of decadance have wasted away the city. The Sourcerer King is desparate to keep control of the city (note: This adventure is really for the first Dark Sun, before all the other stuff happened. The SK is a sourcerer who is king, not an immortal dragon(Dark Sun was perfect before all its secrets were spilled)) and a blood sport keeps the population entertained, least they plot rebellion.

If the PCs free or are freed, will they try to find their enslaved kinsmen in the city? Or will they flee back to the forest?

Will they stay and help a growing resistence movement against the government? Will they fight in the eventually overthrow of power? You can't have a city-state that can't feed itself.
#2

zombiegleemax

Dec 11, 2006 15:05:48
The Sorcerer King is not, in fact, thousands of years old and immortal. He is in fact, a sorcerer that is very politically clever. He did not found the city-state as he claims. He is just older than living memory. Maybe over a century of life. Originally, he was an adviser to a long forgotten king. When that king died, his weak son fell from power leaving the city-state in the sorcerer's hands. At that moment, he became a Sorcerer-King.

The Kingdom is dying. Famine has plagued the land. The only thing that keeps the population from revolt, are the blood sports in the arena. There are only so many citizens that can fight in the arena. They have to look else where for "Fresh meat".

They also don't wonder where the bodies of the slain go or why the upper class always has a fresh supply of meat.