Ideal Stomping Grounds for the Horsemen of Apocalypse

[SolCannibal]

Pretty much what says in the title. Since Africa beyond the Phoenix Empire is essentially a blank slate, i might as well homebrew the land based on the "needs" of the most notable force/threat to come out of the continent, eh?

In the case of Death, optimum scenario would be locales with cemeteries, mortuary centers, mass graves (sapient or animal) or any regions with a great quantity of corpses, if not a culture that puts some care in collecting &/or preserving them.

For War, the perfect territory to mess with should be technological states like the CS, NGR or Splugorth vassal/tributary states like Lagarto, with lots of high-tech gear for it to assimilate, hack or subborn the systems of through the use of its meld ability.

What are your thoughts on the kind of places that would be optimal for Hunger and Pestilence to exploit or prey upon with their capacities?

Trying to make some "worldbuilding" from the conceit that each one of them popped up in a not quite random spot, but regions that would appeal to their interests or favored prey/resources and writing up trouble spots for PCs to trudge and interact with locals from there.

[Hotrod]

I have a few suggestions for developing Africa and the Four Horsemen campaign more. I'd start with fleshing out what Pre-Rifts Africa looked like, and which regions would be most likely to dominate that Golden Age.

A major point of emphasis in the Four Horsemen campaign I'd make is to have Africans be the front line against the Horsemen and their minions/allies. The Gathering of Heroes should not be a central focus, but rather play a reinforcing and supportive role, like an auxiliary, to support and back up the locals who know the land, culture, language, et cetera take the lead. Where The Gathering might take a more central role might be after the early phases if/when a Horseman effectively destroys his region and unites with one of his brothers.

I would also steer clear of shaman-magic and cultural stereotypes. Instead, I'd adapt established magics and technology elements from other books or try to "look forward" and create new content appropriate and specific to each region's themes. I'd keep the Rainmaker and make it specific to Nigeria (weather control magic is a neat and useful specialization) and I'd keep the Necromancer (appropriate given the Four Horsemen and their death cults).

Finally, I'd develop the minions of the Horsemen and their secondary effects/tactics more. The Horsemen themselves are important, but they should be epic boss fights after wading through all kinds of nasty underlings, unraveling subplots, rooting out collaborators, et cetera. Each should have minions, death cults, and collaborators conspiring and fighting for that horseman.

In terms of language, I would follow the precedents established in earlier books and have a generic "African" language that's an amalgamation of many African languages (analogous to "Euro" and "American"), a common tongue that evolved in the Golden Age and is still spoken all over the continent. I'd also have most natives of the continent speak an appropriate local language (of which there are very, very many in Africa).

With those general guidelines, here's one way I might revise, expand, and develop Africa and the Four Horsemen campaign:

1. Mount Kilimanjaro is one of the best places to build a space launch facility on Earth due to its height and geographic position just 2 degrees off the equator. Thus, it and the region around it would be well-suited to become one of the preeminent technology centers on the continent in the Golden Age of Technology, creating juicers, crazies, cyborgs, and/or some power armor/robots. Being outside the Phoenix Empire's borders, the area around this dormant volcano could be a good region for tech-based societies and fractious city-states, fiefdoms, and petty kingdoms with high levels of specialized technology but little organization or unity.

War would be a good horseman to put in this region, driving villages, towns, and city-states to fight each other and reveling in the conflict. His human collaborators could include local warlords, mercenaries, witches, priests of darkness, and demons/deevils that revel in combat. War himself might try to create and run his own mercenary army, fostering and participating in one conflict after another as he seeks to lay waste to his region completely. Once he's effectively wiped out every settlement in the region, he and his followers will migrate and invade westward towards regions ruined by Famine or Pestilence.

If the people of the Mount Kilimanjaro region can defeat War, they will do so by setting aside differences and uniting against the horseman and his minions. This new, unified power can then become the preeminent technological center of the African continent. If War wins the regional fight, all these wonders and technologies will be smashed, buried, and forgotten.

2. Nigeria, "The Giant of Africa," is the richest, most populous, and most powerful country in Africa today, and it's had many civilizations within its borders. It seems appropriate as a possible place for a human nation, though its proximity to the Ivory Coast and the Splugorth City of Gorth would mean that the Splugorth would be a major threat. Rifts: Africa describes Nigeria as low-tech, with a debee population almost twice that of the human population (this is unusually high in Rifts Africa); alien and magic-based city-states might be a good choice here, with a particular emphasis on weather control to create an abundant food supply. Since they have a unifying threat, it might be natural for them to band together in a loose confederation/alliance against the Splugorth and the Four Horsemen, something akin to a Federation of Magic minus the evil overlord.

Famine seems like a good choice to apply to this area. With a large population, Famine's ability to ruin food supplies would be a major threat. Collaborators could include witches, priests of darkness, corrupted rainmakers (bad weather to ruin crops), and appropriate demons/deevils that specialize in wasting/hunger. Famine and his minions/collaborators will seek to lay waste to the whole region, and once victorious will either migrate southeast to link up with Pestilence in the Congo, east to link up with War around Mount Kilimanjaro, or south to link up with Death.

Victory over Famine will require the loose confederation to pool its resources and have neighbors helping out neighbors, and this will effectively create a new, powerful, and cosmopolitan nation far more capable of resisting and defeating Splugorth slavers. Defeat will turn the region into a dusty, empty wasteland and likely result in the Splugorth abandoning their stronghold due to a lack of available slaves to capture.

3. South Africa could be a particularly interesting case; it's just behind Nigeria in terms of population and economics, and it has a history of military technological development. It's also a "rainbow nation" with a wide variety of cultures, ethnicities, and languages. There's a large minority Afrikaner white population and a history of segregation and ethnic conflict between them and black peoples like the Xhosa, Zulu, Swazi, Tsonga, and many others. It might be interesting to work up a vision of South Africa in which the Afrikaner population is a close ally and interdependent partner with the other ethnic groups, where each group specializes in one form of power/human enhancement (magic, psionics, guns/armor, biological enhancement). I think it would also be interesting to juxtapose this racial harmony with xenophobia and human supremacy, making this "rainbow nation" into something not entirely unlike the Coalition States, Triax, or the Republic of Columbia, where debees are second-class citizens at best: crowded into ghettos and either shot or deported north if they resist the government. I'd treat it rather like the Coalition was before their war against the Federation of Magic. This would probably be the best-organized and strongest human nation prior to the arrival of the Four Horsemen.

I would put Death in South Africa, where he will lurk and use his minions to wreak havoc. His chief human collaborators will be necromancers, witches, priests of darkness, and death cultists. His minions will include undead terrors, as well as demons and deevils that delight in the macabre, like Ghouls and Nasu. However, Death will not try to thoroughly wreck the region he appears in like his brothers will; his goal will be to either keep the South African region too busy with fending off his minions to bother with troubles in other parts of the continent, or else to corrupt South Africa and turn it into a massive death cult. Death himself will not take much direct action until two or more of his brothers unite, at which point he and his minions will move steadily towards the other horsemen and their hordes, likely being the last to arrive. Once Death joins his brothers, they will seek out and destroy some Millennium Trees as they ride north to the city of Rama, where they can join at the super-nexus of in the Phoenix Empire.

South Africa will likely survive and weather the brunt of attacks from Death's minions as long as the Four Horsemen are ultimately defeated. However, the way that it survives will shape its future. It may become so focused on hunting down the agents of death that it embraces a culture of inquisition, presuming guilt and bringing death to debees and dissidents. If this happens, then Death will be able to remain and will become a driving force in this region for generations to come. Alternately, it may reach out and seek to help and unite and liberate other human peoples in Africa from the threat of the Four Horsemen and the oppression of evil debees, adapting an expeditionary mindset. If this leads to violent expansionism and imperialism, Death will also remain and become a driving force in this region and beyond. If this is more focused on diplomacy, trade, and cooperation, then Death will vanish when the last of his brothers falls.

4. The Congo is a huge region in Rifts that takes up almost half the continent. I'd develop a biology-centric trio of cultures/nations there based on genetic engineering, Mystic Herbology, and Biomancy respectively.

A suitable horseman to oppose these people would be Pestilence. Devouring swarms of locusts and the diseases they bring would be a natural fit for the Congo and the bio-centric nature of the locals' power. Collaborators could include witches, priests of darkness, biomancers and genetic engineers, and minions could include the beetles that Pestilence produces from his staff, engineered/biomanced superbugs, and demons/deevils that specialize in pestilence (demon locusts, for example). Having laid waste to the Congo, Pestilence will either head northwest to seek Famine, or east to seek War.

If the three nations of the Congo defeat Pestilence, they will emerge stronger and united, forming a new Congo nation. If Pestilence defeats them, then the region will be laid waste, and the Congo itself will become a withered husk. Even if Pestilence is defeated later and other humans attempt to recreate the rain forest, it will take generations of work on a massive scale to reestablish the Congo to even a shadow of its former glory.

Uganda is uniquely described as being fairly intact as a country in Rifts: Africa. Lying as it does on the southern border of the Phoenix Empire, this wouldn't be a good place for a Horseman to appear (too easy for the Phoenix Empire to get to), but it could be a major crossroads for demons, minions, and collaborators moving north and south. This could lead to a lot of hunts, skirmishes, and non-boss battles as the locals take on interlopers and invaders. Should Death unite with War and/or Pestilence, this would likely be one of the next places they would go, and it could potentially be the site of a final major battle. It's tech levels are described as low; I would interpret this to mean that it relies on the Kilimanjaro city-states for weapons to defend against the Phoenix Empire and other hostiles.

Some key events to consider including:
The Summoning: The Giza Pyramid, in Rama the City of Doom
Pharaoh Rama-Set planned and prepared for this moment for over a century. At a moment when dawn coincided with a lunar eclipse, thousands of demons would complete an elaborate ritual, and he would summon forth and unite the Horsemen. He planned for everything, psionically blocking the event to all would-be observers and clairvoyants, setting up barriers and force fields around the pyramid to keep out interlopers, and creating elaborate ruses and cover stories to keep the ritual's true purpose secret to all outsiders. Then, at the moment when the Horsemen began to emerge from the great Rift he'd created, some saboteurs blocked the critical flow of magic energy from the pyramid and released it in a titanic wave that flattened most buildings near the great pyramid. The Four Horsemen's arrival was delayed by a few years and scattered across the continent. The rage of Rama-Set and his demons was immense, and they vented it on the slaves and weaker citizens of Rama in a night of bloody slaughter.

The party could be in Rama when the initial summoning happens. If so, they will have to find a way to escape the wrath of the rampaging demon horde. In the days after, they could also work as spies and try to collect information about what is to come, where the Horsemen are expected to arrive, and what Rama-Set is doing about it. If they can get accurate information out to the free peoples of Africa, that will help the rest of the continent to better organize and prepare for the horrors to come.

Conspiracies, Cults, and Chaos
Prior to the Horsemen arriving, Rama-Set will send out demons and emissaries to try to prepare things for the horsemen: establishing death cults, building hidden temples, setting up conspiracies to destabilize regions, and assassinating key leaders and figures across the continent. This will be a time of whispered rumors, secret meetings, and acts of terror across the continent. Violence will swell across the continent, but most of the violence will be on a small, personal scale.

Meeting this threat, heroes will rise in Africa to uncover and fight these demons, cults, and collaborators. Other heroes will come from around the world and across the Megaverse to help, called and guided there by forces they do not understand. There will be no single Gathering of Heroes at this point; these efforts will be spread out and uncoordinated as these heroes root out the conspiracies of the Horsemen's followers and try to learn as much as they can about the horror to come. The more they expose, the more likely these regions are to unite and cooperate with each other against the coming threat.

Regional Wars
After the Horsemen arrive, Rama-Set will send demons out as scouts, guides, and minions to attend to and assist the Horsemen, and their minions and collaborators will come out of hiding and put their plans into action, openly declaring themselves for the apocalypse demons. Battles will rage across the continent, most of them being fights between Africans defending their homes and the minions and collaborators of the Four Horsemen. Well-organized heroes and regional forces may attack a Horseman directly, and this is the best time to do so, before they can amass their horde, lay waste to the region, and gather. The famous Gathering of Heroes in the north of Africa will happen, but it will come too late to help with most of this fighting, at best showing up just in time to help with a final fight against a Horseman. More likely, the bulk of the Gathering will likely arrive in force only once two or more of the Horsemen join forces and prepare to attack Millennium Trees.

Battles for the Trees
Once all the Four Horsemen (or as many as are remaining on Rifts Earth) have gathered, they will head towards Egypt. However, they will not head there directly; instead, they will seek out, attack, and destroy 1-3 millennium trees on their way to the super-nexus in Rama. This will be a large-scale, direct assault. The Horsemen themselves are immune to the magic of the Millennium Trees (including their defensive explosions), and their weapons do triple damage against the trees and their gifts. Millennium Tree weapons will work against the Horsemen, just not any direct attacks or actions from the tree itself. Their followers are similarly protected, though they are not immune to the trees' defensive explosions. The Horsemen will focus on killing the tree; they will not retreat, and will only fight those who get between them and the tree. Their minions and collaborators will focus on holding off the tree's defenders. Each tree assault will be a big, climactic fight that draws every hero in the area and gives them a chance to concentrate their efforts and destroy one or more of the apocalypse demons.

The tree itself will know that the attack is coming well in advance and will send out pleas for help via dreams and psychic visions, which may draw the Gathering of Heroes to it. The tree will attempt to heal its defenders and provide gifts of weapons and armor to anyone willing to defend it, but every gift and healing diminishes the tree. Even a successful defense will likely leave the tree marred and diminished for generations to come.

Once the Horsemen cut down the tree, it is slain, and the Horsemen and their followers will work their magic to corrupt its remains, creating many thousands of corrupted Millennium Tree items, making their armies all the more powerful and rallying more to their cause.

Armageddon
Once the Horseman have killed enough Millennium trees (one for each horseman, and remember, there's a weak, easy target in Rama: the Tree of Sorrows), they will make for the Pyramid of Giza, where Rama-Set and his demon army will unite them into the Apocalypse demon (sacrificing their mortal collaborators in the process).

Whatever is left of the Gathering will engage the Horsemen and fight to the death, and it is unlikely to prevail. The player characters may join this fight or may be tasked with some other desperate idea: nuclear attack, opening a Rift to the Xiticix homeworld or other hellish dimension, or any other longshot idea the player characters can think of that might prevent or interrupt this final ceremony.

----------------------------
Ok, I went a little overboard with this, but it's been on my mind for a while since someone on one of the FB groups posted a rather negative review of Africa. Anyway, those are my thoughts on how I might improve it. Happy to read yours.

[Captain_Nibbz]

Ok, I went a little overboard with this, but it's been on my mind for a while since someone on one of the FB groups posted a rather negative review of Africa. Anyway, those are my thoughts on how I might improve it. Happy to read yours.

I wouldn't say overboard, so much as actually making me want to re-read the source material and use it. These are some fantastic ideas!

[Daniel Stoker]

I... well crap anything I was gonna say now pretty much pales to what Hotrod said. So what he said! (Seriously that's really well done and thanks for sharing it here.)

I will so I really like his ideas, but one of the ones I had ignoring the 4 horsemen but going with adding to/revamping Africa was the idea of tossing in the equivalent of a Splicer's house in the Congo and them using the variety of plant and animal life as well as alien life forms to build their army.


Daniel Stoker

[Hotrod]

Wow, thanks! I made a few edits today to my first reply, adding Uganda and fleshing out the sequence of events a little.

Africa seems to get a lot of flak. I've heard lots of reasons from plenty of people, and I respect the critiques I've seen and heard. What drove me to do this now (besides this thread) was this very negative video review that deconstructed the work, cover-to-cover, dubbed racist, and finished by the dumping the book in a garbage bin. Deconstruction without some suggestions on how one might improve something is something that bugs me, and I had been pondering if it might be possible to revise and/or expand on what we see in Rifts: Africa that could address the issues I've heard while keeping the core themes of the book intact: a vast and varied land embroiled in a continent-wide conflict with four godlike apocalypse demons who want to wipe out all live everywhere.

I think that, by fleshing out some specific regions, drawing more inspiration from how Africa might develop in a Golden Age of Technology and less from cultural/historical stereotypes, putting more emphasis on Africans, and putting less emphasis on the Egyptian gods and visiting heroes, this region could be as compelling a setting as Europe.

It might be fun to develop some of those regional cultures further in this fan revision.

[DD The Shmey]

i might as well homebrew the land based on the "needs" of the most notable force/threat to come out of the continent, eh?

In the case of Death, optimum scenario would be locales with cemeteries, mortuary centers, mass graves (sapient or animal) or any regions with a great quantity of corpses, if not a culture that puts some care in collecting &/or preserving them.
...War ... Famine and Pestilence ...

Trying to make some "worldbuilding" from the conceit that each one of them popped up in a not quite random spot, but regions that would appeal to their interests or favored prey/resources and writing up trouble spots for PCs to trudge and interact with locals from there.

The Four Horsemen were defeated in Africa, I am actually ready to hold off on bringing them back for a few more years.
Currently it seems like the best chance that they have to come back is through the Minion war on Rifts Earth with Hell Lord Zugard leading an army of Death Demons and actively is working to bring back the Apocalypse Demon. Death even imparted a fraction of his undead essence into Hell Lord Zugard (see WB35 Megaverse in Flames pg72). So... @SolCannibal I would guess that the most likely place for the Horsemen of Death would show up would be in New Mexico with Zugard. ... You know what? I got an even better idea, we should have Hell Lord Zugard be fought back during the minion wars, and forced to flee west until he reaches California, and right there - in Death Valley - that's where he's going to summon Death.

Africa seems to get a lot of flak. I've heard lots of reasons from plenty of people, and I respect the critiques I've seen and heard. What drove me to do this now (besides this thread) was this very negative video review that deconstructed the work, cover-to-cover, dubbed racist, and finished by the dumping the book in a garbage bin. Deconstruction without some suggestions on how one might improve something is something that bugs me, and I had been pondering if it might be possible to revise and/or expand on what we see in Rifts: Africa that could address the issues I've heard while keeping the core themes of the book intact: a vast and varied land embroiled in a continent-wide conflict with four godlike apocalypse demons who want to wipe out all live everywhere.

I think that, by fleshing out some specific regions, drawing more inspiration from how Africa might develop in a Golden Age of Technology and less from cultural/historical stereotypes, putting more emphasis on Africans, and putting less emphasis on the Egyptian gods and visiting heroes, this region could be as compelling a setting as Europe.

It might be fun to develop some of those regional cultures further in this fan revision.

Thank you so much Hotrod for this comment, and your lovely post above.
I have been thinking exactly the same thing for two years now, and dreaming of what an update to Rifts Africa would look like if it was really done right. I'd like to point you to another review of World Book 4, as well as an this old forum thread on /tg/ where they discuss African-inspired fantasy and the pitfalls that westerners have writing it without falling into reductionist tropes.

Since Africa beyond the Phoenix Empire is essentially a blank slate...

Quite honestly, the Phoenix Empire is itself almost a blank slate, with only a smattering of color and themes that came from the minuscule 10 pages of information dedicated to the vast empire (13 pages if you include Rama-Set's background & character info).

My musings on what Rifts Africa would be like have always been dominated by the huge looming shadow of the Phoenix Empire, which is without a doubt "Thee" super power of Rifts Africa. SoCannibal mentioned wanting to see some homebrew world building ideas in this thread, and I've got to say that for the last year I've been researching exploring and writing material on the Phoenix Empire. I am at about 70 pages now of material and notes on the Phoenix Empire including an indepth review of the 13 provenances (Governates), each with their own NPC's, internal conflicts, as well as a bunch of equipment and magic items. I feel like, since this is going a little off the topic of the Four Horsemen, I should make another thread to post the details of it, maybe drop it in a google doc.

I first jumped into the Africa topic after reading Glitterboy2098's thread "Rifts Africa - discussion and ideas" from two years ago where I came in a little late and left the last post. My post included a basic outline for my idea for a Phoenix Empire world book, as well as a summary of some cool ideas that had came out of the thread.
One of the ideas from that thread that I adapted to my writings was Wise Owls idea of a golden age mega project related to space like a space elevator, or long maglev track rocket sled launch system. He was thinking in the Congo, but I recently moved it to Mount Kilimanjaro for the exact reasons that Hotrod said above.

1. Mount Kilimanjaro is one of the best places to build a space launch facility on Earth due to its height and geographic position just 2 degrees off the equator. Thus, it and the region around it would be well-suited to become one of the preeminent technology centers on the continent in the Golden Age of Technology, creating juicers, crazies, cyborgs, and/or some power armor/robots.

It's funny less than a week ago I was comparing topographical images of Mount Killimanjaro to Mount Kenya to figure out which slope angle was better for a ram accelerator space gun (non-rocket space launch system) similar to the Quicklaunch system. The mountains are near the east coast of Africa too which would lessen the risk to civilian population since most of its flight plan the craft would be over the ocean.
Also just like Hotrod mentioned above I planned on having the space port be a center of technology during the golden age with large tech industry surrounding the launch complex. In my version the region was overran during the dark ages, but has been more recently (~50 years ago) explored and excavated by people from Kampala Uganda who have unlocked the secrets and experienced a tech revolution. The Ugandan's strategy to unlock the secrets of the lost tech involved the use of psychics and telemechanics, which has lead to the tech revolution having a branch of newly developed psy-tech with it. I thought about using Juicers or cybernetics, but we find tech nations using them all over the place, and I can't really think of any nation on Rifts Earth basing their military equipment and tech around a fusion between golden age tech and psi-tech.

[SolCannibal]

i might as well homebrew the land based on the "needs" of the most notable force/threat to come out of the continent, eh?

In the case of Death, optimum scenario would be locales with cemeteries, mortuary centers, mass graves (sapient or animal) or any regions with a great quantity of corpses, if not a culture that puts some care in collecting &/or preserving them.
...War ... Famine and Pestilence ...

Trying to make some "worldbuilding" from the conceit that each one of them popped up in a not quite random spot, but regions that would appeal to their interests or favored prey/resources and writing up trouble spots for PCs to trudge and interact with locals from there.

The Four Horsemen were defeated in Africa, I am actually ready to hold off on bringing them back for a few more years.
Currently it seems like the best chance that they have to come back is through the Minion war on Rifts Earth with Hell Lord Zugard leading an army of Death Demons and actively is working to bring back the Apocalypse Demon. Death even imparted a fraction of his undead essence into Hell Lord Zugard (see WB35 Megaverse in Flames pg72). So... @SolCannibal I would guess that the most likely place for the Horsemen of Death would show up would be in New Mexico with Zugard. ... You know what? I got an even better idea, we should have Hell Lord Zugard be fought back during the minion wars, and forced to flee west until he reaches California, and right there - in Death Valley - that's where he's going to summon Death.

Thanks, but you misunderstand my intent. I'm not planning on a "Return of the Four Horsemen", more like a remake/extended cut of the original Gathering of Heroes, story arc set in Africa during 103 PA, with multiple groups including an allied expeditionary force from NGR, Tarnow & New Camelot, a "devil-busting warband" led by Reid's Rangers & Demonbusters, an atlantean slave barge whose slave/mass sacrifice shipment to Rama mutinies and turns into the core of a slave revolt/liberation army in the Ivory Coast, along with some other stuff for color and complication.

Also kind of colating bits & pieces - the "Afrikankorps" from how a Borg became what he is, Cyprian's shenanigans after being gifted to Splynn by enemies in HU Earth, an Anubis-worshipping kingdom of Coyles & werewolves in Tunisia and part of Algeria, a Wormwood "colony" out of Ethiopia, the city-state of New Freetown in Sierra Leone (my Kingsdale generic) from past games, among other stuff - from backstories of multiple PCs in my group along the way, just for fun.

(Also, some extra good and evil gods & such who join the fray for their own peculiar reasons, but that's another story)

So filling out the battlefield with some quickly made-up city-states, kingdoms & such is most certainly desirable. For now i'm looking for some "themes" in locales to maximize the potential for trouble of the Horsemen specific abilities, in contrast to cults, witches & such, that truth be told, are generally applicable to any supernatural intelligence and some things that are not.

I'm basically taking the "where did the Four Horsemen appear in Africa" paragraph from page 158 as a starting point and making up as i go along, ergo, i have necromancer communities, mass graves and animal cemeteries in Southern Tanzania, the place suggested for Death's initial entry, and i'm going to set up a number of high-tech nations in either the Congo or Ivory Coast, as War supposedly appears in one of those (i'll pick one and make the other into a red herring threat so to speak, another force - evil, neutral or good, undecided yet - that gets mistaken for one of the incoming Horsemen), for examples.

There will also be some still undefined groups i intend to throw around in the future, like a "Mind Bleeder kingdom", a kind of evil psyscape/vampire-dominated city sort of hybrid so to speak, expanding Lalibela by adding two or three "demonic powers" to compete for power and territory with the Wormwood bunch, some reptilian DBees that kind of resemble Tautons, to explain the confusion with their numbers in different parts of WB4, a demonic cannibals kingdom (probably in the Phoenix Empire's southern border) and whatever i can make up from riffing and twisting material of the worldbook itself.

[DD The Shmey]

Thanks, but you misunderstand my intent. I'm not planning on a "Return of the Four Horsemen", more like a remake/extended cut of the original Gathering of Heroes, story arc set in Africa during 103 PA...

Ah, ok, that makes more sense. Like what would we do if we did a revised and expanded version of the original World Book 4 Africa. Retell the story of the Four Horsemen/Gathering of Hero's campaign. That makes sense. You know from a Book publishing sense I think I would split up WB 4 into two books, one would be a world book forcused entirely on factions in Africa and the background for a bunch of new factions, and then I would do the Four Horsemen/Gathering of Hero's campaign as a separate but related source book/adventure book.

... with multiple groups including an allied expeditionary force from NGR, Tarnow & New Camelot, a "devil-busting warband" led by Reid's Rangers & Demonbusters, an atlantean slave barge whose slave/mass sacrifice shipment to Rama mutinies and turns into the core of a slave revolt/liberation army in the Ivory Coast, along with some other stuff for color and complication.

Maybe some mercenary/adventure groups from NGR and Tarnow, or some government intelligence agents or long range covert scouts from those countries, but I would hesitate to involve those Nations in sending full military brigades that a true expeditionary force would imply, because I don't see the leaders of those nations putting much stock in magical prophecies. It would, however, be a good place for the NGR intelligence agencies to first come in contact with the Song Clan. The original Africa book talked a Merlyn trying to delay the involvement of the Nexus Knights in Africa, but suggested that they would likely show up in the later stages of the campaign.
If I understand correctly the original call for action for the Gathering of Hero's came independently from multiple sources, Chiang-Ku dragons from across the world had dreams and premonitions of the coming storm, there was the prophesy of the Edict of Planetary Distress from Plato in Lazlo, and although the Federation of Magic world book hadn't been published yet, I believe the Grey Seer's probably would have had prophesies of the threat as well. The Church of the Light also had some clues as to what was going on, since Isis became involved (and became Katrina Sun). Based on this I think the Nations and factions most likely to send any organized response would be the Song Clan, Lazlo/New Lazlo, and Dwemer (through the Grey Seers). For Lazlo I would like to see their upcomming world book to have a close look at kind of military/sub organizations exsist within the nation to figure out who might have came to join with Erin Tarn. For Dwemer, I imagine an elite hit squad of Battle Magi acting as commandos or magical special ops. Maybe you could even have a small group of Japanese Demon Quellers show up in Africa after stumbling onto some kind of premonition of the end of the world and join with the Gathering of Hero's.

Overall though, I think that Hotrod is absolutely right about making the primary response to the Four Horsemen threat be from native African nations. The majority of the Gathering of Hero's needs to come from Africa, the lack of agency from African people was a major flaw in the original book. And the African factions responding need to be cool, character classes that someone would actually want to play, and not a group of Pygmy Jungle Hunters.

...Anubis-worshipping kingdom of Coyles & werewolves in Tunisia and part of Algeria, ...

Not a bad idea, but does Tunisia and Algeria have any kind of historic or mythological connection to wolves?
Have you heard of Lycopolis translated as "the Wolf City" in Ancient Greek in central Egypt? I am planning on having group of werewolfs and Alu demons be based in the city along with temples to Anubis, as well as an underground Cult of Osiris worshiped by some werewolves and escaped slaves.

...a Wormwood "colony" out of Ethiopia, the city-state of New Freetown in Sierra Leone (my Kingsdale generic) from past games, among other stuff - from backstories of multiple PCs in my group along the way, just for fun.

A wormwood colony sounds cool given the known stable rift to Wormwood in the Ethiopia.

... i'm going to set up a number of high-tech nations in either the Congo or Ivory Coast, as War supposedly appears in one of those.

Ivory Coast is where Gorth is located, the major Splugorthian Port City. The books mention that most of the trade between Atlantis and the Phoenix Empire passes through Gorth, ... although looking at a world map, it seems like it would be a much shorter rout to just go directly from Atlantis through the Strait of Gibraltar and on to Egypt. Also the entire coastline of West Africa is said to be dotted with Splugorthian and Horune slaver ports and outposts, the city of Gorth just being the largest of them.
Splynncryth himself definitely opposed the Four Horsemen, so maybe you have the conflict be with the forces of Atlantis and Horune pirates on the Ivory Coast, but I don't think I would put a new independent faction of good guys near the Ivory Coast. Nigeria and Cameroon however have huge population of humans and D-Bee's living in them (combined 14 million humans and 25 million D-Bees). These numbers are larger than the Coalition States, and maybe even North America. There is bound to be multiple nations and factions here. Hotrod wasn't exaggerating when he referred to Nigeria as "The Giant of Africa", even modern scholars and economist are looking at the natural resources and population growth statistics of Nigeria and are predicting that Nigeria will likely become a major power in Africa in a few decades.

There will also be some still undefined groups i intend to throw around in the future, like a "Mind Bleeder
kingdom", a kind of evil psyscape/vampire-dominated city sort of hybrid so to speak, expanding Lalibela by adding two or three "demonic powers" to compete for power and territory with the Wormwood bunch, some reptilian DBees that kind of resemble Tautons, to explain the confusion with their numbers in different parts of WB4, a demonic cannibals kingdom (probably in the Phoenix Empire's southern border) and whatever i can make up from riffing and twisting material of the worldbook itself.

These idea's aren't bad. I thought the issue with the Tauton population was resolved with declaring that the 2.2 million mentioned in the R.C.C. description were the number of Tauton's directly serving Set, the number of "Tauton's Minions of Set", not the total number of Tautons as a species. Truth be told however, I have considered doing the same thing, substituting the Tauton's with another race of similar looking D-Bees, and the same thing with the 5 million Gallu Demon Bulls, reducing their number and substituting in Minotaur. In the end I decided to keep the numbers as they were written and try to come up with a backstory as to why the numbers are the way they are. My answer for the Gallu Demon Bulls involved making the Demon Bulls a sub-faction in the Phoenix Empire based around ancient Phoenician/Carthaginian/Minoan culture. All three cultures have examples of bovine headed beasts and gods, many with very dark backgrounds involving child sacrifice that could be easily tied to bull headed greater demons.

[Hotrod]

Agreed with DD, with one caveat. While I think the front line and main effort against the Horsemen should be African, I don't think most of them should be included in the Gathering of Heroes, because they're already on the front lines and in the fight when the Gathering starts (this is the interim period between the initial failed ceremony by Rama Set and the actual arrival of the Horsemen, the time I call Conspiracies, Cults, and Chaos). Each region might send a representative, but even that would be like pulling your star player from a match to go to go scout some foreign talent when you're already in the championship and everything is on the line. The vast majority of African heroes will have their hands full at home.

Thus, it makes a lot of sense for the Gathering to be predominantly foreign/interdimensional/non-African, with maybe a few emissaries/guides to advise, assist, and guide them to where they can do some good (notably not North Africa, where I think the gathering happens in canon).

[SolCannibal]

Thanks, but you misunderstand my intent. I'm not planning on a "Return of the Four Horsemen", more like a remake/extended cut of the original Gathering of Heroes, story arc set in Africa during 103 PA...

Ah, ok, that makes more sense. Like what would we do if we did a revised and expanded version of the original World Book 4 Africa. Retell the story of the Four Horsemen/Gathering of Hero's campaign. That makes sense. You know from a Book publishing sense I think I would split up WB 4 into two books, one would be a world book forcused entirely on factions in Africa and the background for a bunch of new factions, and then I would do the Four Horsemen/Gathering of Hero's campaign as a separate but related source book/adventure book.

Damn, if South America got a pair of worldbooks, so could Africa too. And agreed, the Four Horsemen/Gathering of Heroes arc should have been a sourcebook and separate from Africa - but then i think the same could be said of Juicer Uprising, but it got away with it due to its much, much more restricted focus.

... with multiple groups including an allied expeditionary force from NGR, Tarnow & New Camelot, a "devil-busting warband" led by Reid's Rangers & Demonbusters, an atlantean slave barge whose slave/mass sacrifice shipment to Rama mutinies and turns into the core of a slave revolt/liberation army in the Ivory Coast, along with some other stuff for color and complication.

Maybe some mercenary/adventure groups from NGR and Tarnow, or some government intelligence agents or long range covert scouts from those countries, but I would hesitate to involve those Nations in sending full military brigades that a true expeditionary force would imply, because I don't see the leaders of those nations putting much stock in magical prophecies. It would, however, be a good place for the NGR intelligence agencies to first come in contact with the Song Clan. The original Africa book talked a Merlyn trying to delay the involvement of the Nexus Knights in Africa, but suggested that they would likely show up in the later stages of the campaign.

About the european powers involving themselves or not in the Four Horsemen matter and to what degree, i suggest you take a look at page 97 of Juicer Uprising for a "little" easter egg.

If I understand correctly the original call for action for the Gathering of Hero's came independently from multiple sources, Chiang-Ku dragons from across the world had dreams and premonitions of the coming storm, there was the prophesy of the Edict of Planetary Distress from Plato in Lazlo, and although the Federation of Magic world book hadn't been published yet, I believe the Grey Seer's probably would have had prophesies of the threat as well. The Church of the Light also had some clues as to what was going on, since Isis became involved (and became Katrina Sun). Based on this I think the Nations and factions most likely to send any organized response would be the Song Clan, Lazlo/New Lazlo, and Dwemer (through the Grey Seers). For Lazlo I would like to see their upcomming world book to have a close look at kind of military/sub organizations exsist within the nation to figure out who might have came to join with Erin Tarn. For Dwemer, I imagine an elite hit squad of Battle Magi acting as commandos or magical special ops. Maybe you could even have a small group of Japanese Demon Quellers show up in Africa after stumbling onto some kind of premonition of the end of the world and join with the Gathering of Hero's.

This, definitely. Several groups would be getting warning signs, with the degree of awareness and specifity varying according to (maybe. maybe not) closeness to the threat and one's intelligence-gathering abilities, to work out patterns and piece out a puzzle out of the multiple visions related to a variety of events major & minor. African populations would definitely be forewarned too, specially considering some of the OCCs particular to the book have abilities related to divination & premonitions, if memory tricks me not.

Overall though, I think that Hotrod is absolutely right about making the primary response to the Four Horsemen threat be from native African nations. The majority of the Gathering of Hero's needs to come from Africa, the lack of agency from African people was a major flaw in the original book. And the African factions responding need to be cool, character classes that someone would actually want to play, and not a group of Pygmy Jungle Hunters.

Heartily agreed. It's part of what i'm playing at, for good and for ill. You need places to both be trampled or bravely resist the Horsemen & their minions, people to despair, rally against incoming doom, make mistakes or snatch victory from the jaws of defeat, for things to have actual pathos and players to have emotional investment in the event.

...Anubis-worshipping kingdom of Coyles & werewolves in Tunisia and part of Algeria, ...

Not a bad idea, but does Tunisia and Algeria have any kind of historic or mythological connection to wolves?
Have you heard of Lycopolis translated as "the Wolf City" in Ancient Greek in central Egypt? I am planning on having group of werewolfs and Alu demons be based in the city along with temples to Anubis, as well as an underground Cult of Osiris worshiped by some werewolves and escaped slaves.

Honestly, no idea, just picked the first undetailed place in the border of the Phoenix Empire i saw on the map, so good for setting up a group with common themes but not quite the same. And your take of Lycopolis sounds like a fine place to toy with.

...a Wormwood "colony" out of Ethiopia, the city-state of New Freetown in Sierra Leone (my Kingsdale generic) from past games, among other stuff - from backstories of multiple PCs in my group along the way, just for fun.

A wormwood colony sounds cool given the known stable rift to Wormwood in the Ethiopia.

Some of that is still open to changes - the entry on WB4 seems to imply there are 3-5 stable/regular rifts, what could imply other powers to compete with them for influence through the country, but Wormwood should definitely be the leading group, considering DB1 speaks of a quite long-standing presence of agents of the Living Planet in the area, one long before the Host's takeover and possibly stretching back to the times before the Fall of Atlantis. Hmmm, i could make one of the other portals be in the hands of the "Forces of Light" in Wormwood, less stuff to make up from scratch, would make sense if they had a presence harkening through millenia and extends their factional intrigue further on Rifts Earth. Yeah, yeah, that works and even fits with there being uncertainty over the number of portals (it's at least in part a secret one).

... i'm going to set up a number of high-tech nations in either the Congo or Ivory Coast, as War supposedly appears in one of those.

Ivory Coast is where Gorth is located, the major Splugorthian Port City. The books mention that most of the trade between Atlantis and the Phoenix Empire passes through Gorth, ... although looking at a world map, it seems like it would be a much shorter rout to just go directly from Atlantis through the Strait of Gibraltar and on to Egypt. Also the entire coastline of West Africa is said to be dotted with Splugorthian and Horune slaver ports and outposts, the city of Gorth just being the largest of them.
Splynncryth himself definitely opposed the Four Horsemen, so maybe you have the conflict be with the forces of Atlantis and Horune pirates on the Ivory Coast, but I don't think I would put a new independent faction of good guys near the Ivory Coast. Nigeria and Cameroon however have huge population of humans and D-Bee's living in them (combined 14 million humans and 25 million D-Bees). These numbers are larger than the Coalition States, and maybe even North America. There is bound to be multiple nations and factions here. Hotrod wasn't exaggerating when he referred to Nigeria as "The Giant of Africa", even modern scholars and economist are looking at the natural resources and population growth statistics of Nigeria and are predicting that Nigeria will likely become a major power in Africa in a few decades.

Yeah, sometimes module writers can have weird ideas about how places in a world interact. The idea might be that most of the Splugorth slave stock sold in the Phoenix Empire actually comes from Gorth's plazas & stockades instead of Atlantis itself, but if so, it could have been worded better.

Well, my idea was having a number of tech-focused societies in that area, good or bad is up for grabs, truth be told my first idea was either bulking Gorth or making some buffer/vassal kingdoms, that do most of the slave-catching for the sploogs in exchange for shiny hardware.
That said, having some group playing "Shemarrian of the Eastern Atlantic" so to speak could be fun for a monkeywrench...

There will also be some still undefined groups i intend to throw around in the future, like a "Mind Bleeder kingdom", a kind of evil psyscape/vampire-dominated city sort of hybrid so to speak, expanding Lalibela by adding two or three "demonic powers" to compete for power and territory with the Wormwood bunch, some reptilian DBees that kind of resemble Tautons, to explain the confusion with their numbers in different parts of WB4, a demonic cannibals kingdom (probably in the Phoenix Empire's southern border) and whatever i can make up from riffing and twisting material of the worldbook itself.

These idea's aren't bad. I thought the issue with the Tauton population was resolved with declaring that the 2.2 million mentioned in the R.C.C. description were the number of Tauton's directly serving Set, the number of "Tauton's Minions of Set", not the total number of Tautons as a species. Truth be told however, I have considered doing the same thing, substituting the Tauton's with another race of similar looking D-Bees, and the same thing with the 5 million Gallu Demon Bulls, reducing their number and substituting in Minotaur. In the end I decided to keep the numbers as they were written and try to come up with a backstory as to why the numbers are the way they are. My answer for the Gallu Demon Bulls involved making the Demon Bulls a sub-faction in the Phoenix Empire based around ancient Phoenician/Carthaginian/Minoan culture. All three cultures have examples of bovine headed beasts and gods, many with very dark backgrounds involving child sacrifice that could be easily tied to bull headed greater demons.

Well, i would say the "Tauton's Minions of Set" explanation doesn't solve that much, considering what is the state religion of the Phoenix Empire, but let's leave it at that.

Me, i prefer to replace them with similar-looking races in both cases. I'm kind of leery of having MDC races counting on millions or more on principle, greater demon races, with a MDC and powers to match a dragon hatchling, even more so. Much, much more confortable with the greater part being from SDC "monster races", with a few tens of thousands of "the real deal" being fawned upon/worshipped as veritable demigods, along with some pact witch hanger-ons with Gift of Union to boost the ranks if need be.

[(SHIFTY)]

How about the Pecos Empire? That place seems to have a bunch of conflict and would be a ideal place where Death and the bunch could cause problems.

[SolCannibal]

How about the Pecos Empire? That place seems to have a bunch of conflict and would be a ideal place where Death and the bunch could cause problems.

Definitely, but then as said in a previous post, my focus is more in doing a remake of the Gathering of Heroes (and Africa along with it) than something like "Return of the Four Horsemen" (though Megaverse in Flames does throw some convenient hooks in that direction too, if memory tricks me not).

[Blackwater Sniper]

Do you want the players to actually go toe-to-toe with them, their battle minions, or even protect a town/area from their influence?

That may not affect the location, but it would affect the gameplay and who else is in the area.

Throw Pestilence up in Xiticix territory. While it can't control those bug-like creatures, the battle would be epic.

[SolCannibal]

Do you want the players to actually go toe-to-toe with them, their battle minions, or even protect a town/area from their influence?

That may not affect the location, but it would affect the gameplay and who else is in the area.

Throw Pestilence up in Xiticix territory. While it can't control those bug-like creatures, the battle would be epic.

As i said, i'm aiming more for "Gathering of Heroes Redux" and keeping things in Africa. That said there's nothing forbidding me of throwing a Xiticix or Dabugg nest there, since i'm working from an "Africa as plot-based blank slate to draw upon" perspective.