[NSW-Fic] The Liberation of Atlantis (Outline of a Modern-Day Tabletop Campagin)

[SilentScope001]

I had this idea down, but I have not been able to flesh it out. This is supposed to be for a modern-day tabletop Campagin, you know like a d20 Modern game, except without the d20, just the modern. But I haven't gotten around to fleshing it out. Here is the Outline. A note: This has a LOT to do with time travel and paradoxes. So, let's go.

 

Prolouge:

You, and the 5 other random members of your party get into a room and meet up with this mysterious person...the Breifing Officer, who give you the lowdown.

 

You see, all of you descended from the Atlanteans. A long, long time ago, there was a small little island off the coast of Greece known as Atlantis. It was the only land that was owned by Posideon, and Posideon, happy God that he is, gave Atlantis magic powers and good winds. Atlantis soon embarked on a conquest to take over the whole world! It took over Egypt, Asia, and most of Greece except for Athens. However, one day, Atlantis got so cocky that they declared war on Posideon.

 

Posideon therefore declared war right back at Atlantis and flodded the whole island. The Empire of Atlantis quickly collasped, and the suriviors banded together and hid, so that the angry people who were once enslaved by Atlantis won't go and lynch them to pieces.

 

Why you haven't heard this story? Because it is being suppressed by an hidden and evil organization, who hates all Atlanteans, which is quite, quite bad. It is also being backed by Posideon, who also hate the Atlantenas. Basically, they covered the whole incident up, declaring it non-history, while hunting down the last followers of Atlantis. You, of course, descend from that line...

 

This Breifing Officer is also an Atlantean, and he wants to find out more about this evil organization. Promising you guys power and help (as one fellow Atlatean to another), you decide to go and inflirate the evil organization, and find out more. He also wishes for the day when "Atlantis would rise again".

 

1. "I'm from the FBI":

The Breifing Officer tells you that the Government is hosting a job fair for covert operations. If you can prove your loyalty, you can go and get hired by the Federal Government, and then from there, start spying on it. "I just know the government is connected to this anti-Atlantis organization."

 

While you are walking, the players learn that there was an assaination yesterday of the Mayor of this city.

 

So, you go over to the Job Fair, and meet up with an FBI Agent. He ask you questions, ask on you to tattlate on your other members to find out if they are indeed loyal, and give you very, very werid tests. You go and fufil them, and then you hand over your resume when...

 

A Police Officer, Harry, storms into the room. "Stop, murderers! You are under arrest for the murder of our Mayor! We will shoot if you do not surrender!"

 

Harry is a Police Commissioner who is a friend of the Mayor. When the Mayor was killed, he vows to find the Killers and bring them to justice. He is under the impression that your party are the Killers, and will do whatever it takes to stop them.

 

Your party therefore has to go and escape from the cops while they send lots of agents in order to arrest and capture you.

 

Obivously, your players have been framed for the murder of the Mayor...by Harry (the reasons for doing such a thing will be revealed later)...

 

Once you get captured, or even if you don't, the FBI stage your execution, and then secretly hires you. After all, anyone that could kill a Mayor has proven himself for being a very great spy, and deserves to be in the ranks of the FBI.

 

2. "Time Scrolls"

Now, the FBI Agent takes you into a secret room...and tells you something shocking...about the history of Atlantis. Yes, the players has heard it from the Breifing Officer. Let see if they can sustain the bore-fest.

 

What the FBI Agent reveals new is that there is some ruins of an Atlantis Temple underneath the Sea...and that in those ruins...lie a "Time Scroll", one of the many magic spells that Posideon gave to Atlantis.

 

"The Time Scroll can allow one to move across the axis of time, allowing you to travel back or fowards in time. It can only happen once...and only for a limited period of time...and then the Scroll disappers forever, but you are able to affect the future...The Atlantis Army used the Time Scrolls to travel in the past to secretly undermine their foes and then returned to the present to wipe them out. There are those who are skilled in actually creating Time Scrolls out of thin air, but it is a shame that we do not have such fine art. This is a highly dangerous weapon and it must be secured at all costs."

 

The Breifing Officer is very happy at the finding...but does not want you to give the Scroll to the FBI Agent. Rather, the Breifing Officer want the scroll to be delieverd to HIM. After all, this Scroll can allow them to warp into the past, and then change history! You can save Atlantis and stop the destruction of Atlantis by Posideon. No more will they have to resort to hiding..."If this work, I'll give you total power in the new world order..." It would be good to get the players to agree to this idea.

 

Meanwhile, Harry is upset that the Party has not been caught and punished for the "murder of his Mayor". But soon, players will learn that Harry is using it as a cover...he's working for that evil organization that The Breifing Officer tells you about.

 

Harry does not want the Players to gain the Time Scroll, and therefore, "leaked" info of the Time Scroll to...well, every oppressed group that wants to change history. When you finally land on the Temple, with surivial kits and advanced guns that fire underwater, so will a bunch of wild-eye loonies wanting to steal the Time Scroll for themselves. An example of what you are facing today:

--Neo-Nazis wanting the Time Scroll to return back to 1943 to kill off Aldof Hitler and replace him with a better German military leader so that the Third Reich can win World War III

--Arab terrorists wanting the Time Scroll to return back to 732, to win the Battle of Tours and thereby destroy the Franks and secure takeover of Europe

--Communists wanting the Time Scroll to return back to 1923 to install Troskty instead of Stalin into power of the USSR.

 

There are others, but basically, it's going to be a huge battle...over a McGuffin. Even military troops from other nations are getting into the act...other nations would like to have that Time Scroll to furhter its needs. Meanwhile, Harry and his group of men are on the sidelines, waiting for the other people to battle it out, and then to spring in and take out the weaklings and then keep the Time Scroll for himself, so that nobody can use it.

 

So, you battle against all the Crazies who want the Time Scroll, battle Harry and his goons, and then finally grab the Time Scroll. When you do, you teleport...

 

3. "I'm A Hero"

 

You teleport into Ancient Greece, outside of an Atleantan compound, laying seige to Athens. Just like the Breifing Officer said...

 

The Atletantians are quite pleased, they are very happy that you are here, since you must be a gift from Posideon. Plus, they never seen a gun before.

 

So, you march off into battle. The Athenian army quickly get mowed down by your guns, and it looks to be a total conquering when...you see Harry.

 

Harry claims that he has the ability to create Time Scrolls, and can warp into and out of eras. "I know things that you would never even dream of." He admits that he framed you for the murder of the Mayor, so that he has a reason to hunting you down. "You Atleantans are sick, you all should die...die for the crimes you have done." You have a final gunbattle between Harry and his goons, who is seen by Athens as a gift from Athena,...and you and your party. Harry dies but utters the curse "May you live in interesting times."

 

Because of your victory, you get invited over to meet up with the King of Atlantis. Over at dinner, the King said "You know what? Let's break the alliance with Posideon and take over Mount Olympus!"

 

...Your players then scramble in an attempt to stop the King from making Posideon mad and flodding Atlantis. You do so, and in the process...finds out that the King is actually Harry. But this Harry is a younger Harry than the one in the past, and does not recognize you at all. Regardless, he is a Harry. He admits that he killed the King and replaced him so that he can cause a diplomatic incident with Posideon. By making Posideon mad, he would hope to undermine Atlantis and therbey destroy it.

 

Harry gets murdered...again, and a new King is appointed. You are given the title of "Mythical Savior of the Atlantis People" before the Time Scroll wears off and you return to the Present.

 

4. "There's NO Un-do Button?"

 

Welcome to the Present-Day...the entire world run by a huge Atlantis empire. The Atlantnats live in total prosperity...while everyone else be slaves. Think of a dystopia future, and that is what this Atlantis Empire looks like.

 

When your players meet up with the Breifing Officer, he does not recognize them at all. He is a noble...the "Mayor" of this city, and he is upset with the 'riff-raff' attempting to talk to him. Attempts to prove that you are actually Atlantean meets with utter failure. You are thrown into the dungeons. Oops.

 

Then, reality changes...

 

You are back into a normal timeline. Nothing happened, no dystopian future, no terrible gulag, etc. You are merley outside of a building, with lots of people walking back and forth. Oh, and you possibly being hunted by Harry, who's alive.

 

When players get a grasp on this reality...then they switch back to the earlier reality. For example, the Players go in and get a book in the Normal Timeline...and then, in the other Timeline, they are actually going into the Mining Tunnels to mine for rocks. One mintue, the Player is talking to a Time Travel Expert in the normal world...and the next mintue, they are being chased out by Atlantaian troopers for being in the King's Bathtub.

 

Soon, your player learns what they are: They are the Reality Storms. When a non-experienced person time-travels (like your Players), they make huge errors and causes massive paradoxes within the universe. Obivously, such paradoxes have to be healed, so the universe decides to compromise and causes for two seperate timelines to be created. However, these two timeline exist within one universe, or reality. The universe adjusts by swithcing between two realities on a uneven and strange basis. The world continues regardless...a person friendly in one reality will change to being unfriendly in the next reality. Entire places may change, people you are talking to may disapper, and doors that you have opened may end up disappering. Luckily, items that you are carrying on your person remain with you when the sudden shift changes...but that means that you will end up being hunted by Atlantis when they realize you got an unauthrorized Knife.

 

Basically, nobody even KNOWS the Reality Storms are occuring...except you, the Players...the one who actually started this whole mess. Sooner or later, you realize that this universe is getting very damaged due to the many switches, so for sanity's sake and for the universe's sake, you better HEAL the damage...or run!

 

To complete this puzzle, you need to meet up with Harry in the Dystopian Atlantean World, and the FBI Agent in the Normal World. Both will at first not believe in Time Storms, but they do give you the information you need to fix your mess.

 

Harry, in the Dystopian World, is an Internal Security Officer who's secretly an non-Atleantan. He only stole an idenitiy of an Atleantan. Harry hates Atlantis for oppressing the human race and wishes to free itself. Therefore, he began learning the arts of Time Travel, and he hopes to travel into the past to "fix" Atlantis. He'll provide you with all the help you can in living in the Dystopian World, and he will be unhappy if you tell him that you were the ones that actually started up this Dystopian World. He does not believe in the Time Storms though, and possibly sees it as "hallucations and dreams" you get of the past world.

 

The FBI Agent tells you all about the Atlantis' files on Time Storms (the information on storms is above), and then tells you that the only way to fix a Time Storm would be either the destruction of the Universe, or to stop the event that caused the Time Storm to occur in the First Place.

 

The Breifing Officer is of NO use. He will only scream at you for not giving up the Scroll, and then turn on the Player. "You could have freed Atlantis, and could have saved it!" He summons some Atlantis troopres (similar to the ones you meet in the Dystopian Timeline) and tries to kill you.

 

Here is one ways of solving the crisis (The GM is allowed to come up with other ways, and is allowed to give more hints, via the FBI Agent and Harry). I don't have any other creative ways of solving this mess...but it does work.

 

1. Convince Harry to give you a Time Scroll in the Dystopian Timeline.

2. Use the Time Scroll in the Normal Timeline to warp back to the Prolouge.

3. Prevent the Prolouge meeting from happening: Say...by killing off the Breifing Officer. You could also kill off each of the Original Party Members (and, since you have more levels, you would easily defeat them), but this means you would fade out of existence too. Regardless of how you do it, the Time Storm is stopped...everything reverts to Normal Timeline. The Time Scroll expires, and you return back to the present, in a courtyard, at night.

 

If you haven't killed your party members, and rather killed off the Breifing Officer or interrupted the meeting in some other way..In the courtyard, you meet up with Harry, who is more than pleased with what you have done. "You have seen with your own eyes what the defenders of Atlantis want to do...they want to destroy everything, for their own reasons. You aren't hunted down anymore, we are allies, friends."

 

Harry then offers your Players up a job to join up with that anti-Atlantis organization.

 

THE END

 

(Moral of the Story: Don't play with time.)