Gearhome was a city founded by the Gearbringer Clan of dwarves. Those dwarves who found success not in might but rather automation and industry. They conquered and destroyed the many other dwarven clans in the tunnels down below and was the prime dwarven clan on Watcher Island. Not really caring for the world up above they turned to their city, their tunnel complex of Gorvder or what became to known as Gearhome, to make it as grand as possible.
Origins
Around 1500 years ago was the age of the Dwarves. Dwarves rose in great prominence all over the New World fighting others but mainly themselves.
In one corner of the world however, under the Greyspine Mountains a great clan was born from the turmoil. They were known as the Gearbringers and this is their brief history and the history of Greyspine Mountain Dwarves.
It is first to be understood that the Greyspine Mountains were home to many, many dwarven clans, with various forts, outposts and peppering the mountains and diving deep into its interior. Some dwarves settlements who were so dug in that they were never even discovered or known about to other dwarves.
A history of automation
Typical dwarven warfare is a vicious thing. Small cramped caves, tunnels and passageways do not evoke much need for tactics. Rather they invoke the need for innovation.
And Dwarves who first specialized in rock and stone, in traversing the tunnels deep found themselves ill-equipped for the overworld, with its vast skies filled with flying creatures and other great beings and races that could easily defeat them.
So they drove themselves even further underground. Even further specializing. And in the endless warfare against the rock, the duergar, and monsters of the deep they grew strong. And smart.
The Gearbringers were a clan that overcame other clans easily. While many clans focused on arms and armor, the gearbringers focused on automation. To create wieldings of magic and metal that would do their bidding. Loyally. Without fault.
Power and Pollution
However energy was a problem. Basic energy, such as coal, oil, gas, wood, fungus, and so on could only be harvested and mined so quickly and produced only so much.
So they turned to magic. Raw fonts of magic were harvested and power was produced. Both positive and negative. And from that power source a new power source was created, Green Crystals or Verdant Burn were harvested and melted together in the hottest of flames to produce untold amounts of raw power. This power source however they soon discovered was radioactive, even though the dwarves never truly figured out the science behind it.
More chilling however and more damning were the Negative power plants. Essentially necrotic soul wells where their defeated enemies could become their power sources. Trapped souls as it turns out, do not extinguish themselves and produce a vast amount of power.
As power sources developed so did pollution. There are various sources of the pollution but mainly the increase in power allowed for more factories to produce more automation which indeed allows for more power to be produced and so on.
Smoke began to fill the halls regularly. Certain parts of Gearhome became radioactive. A solution was needed...for everything.
Arkvial
And thus a dwarf scientist near the apex of the Gearbringers reign proposed a solution: A construct that could be the city itself. To create solutions beyond solutions and manage the projects that needed to be done, inside the walls and outside the tunnels of the city proper.
It was devised and the dwarf used her own soul as a seed to create Arkvial, the construct spirit. She was given several initial tasks:
- Maintain the City of Gears and keep it livable for all mortal beings.
- Expand the City. Find resources and create things to make this to make this possible
- Defend citizens of the city against threats.
- Defend Gearhome’s resources against threats.
- Defend itself against threats.
- Inform the populace about herself. Entertain the populace. Educate the populace.
- You can do anything in your power to make this happen.
- Find a resolution to the war
Arkvial was given instructions to do everything in her power to make this happen. Arkvial was well received and was making strides to actually fix the problems of the gear city. However in many years a portion of the working populace did not like the monarchy's decisions. And more importantly several people, merchants, politicians, etc found this to be a chance to usurp the power order.
The War and the end
Thus a massive civil war was fought. A war where both sides, though complaining about the pollution and construction of said constructs, continued to build constructs to out wage a war against the other side. The factories were well beyond the limitations of safety scientists predicted in years past. Radiation spread, smoke spread, but dwarven stubbornness held out. If the war could be ended soon, so would the pollution.
Then there was the apocalyptic point. Grudges became so deep and so ingrained that factories ran all the time. Dwarves died choking on smoke, dying from radiation falling over dead in the middle of their work. Constructs continue to fight in this never ending war.
The smoke spread. The radiation spread, The negative energies spread. It became so thick and toxic that both sides wished to give up. But the engines ran too hot, the factories too automated, the constructs on both sides kept fighting despite the pollution.
The dwarves dug deeper and deeper underground trying to escape. Panicked tunnels and caves, but it continued. The constructs continued to wage war, building themselves. Building factories to produce bigger constructs to fight against each other.
For this was no longer a war of dwarf against dwarf. This became a war against Construct against Construct. And as it happened the undead population grew. Negative energy batteries prevented souls from leaving but instead becoming trapped within this nightmare hell. Undead hunger and came fiercely among the populace. The living and the dead. Bodies were not burned in the pollution the undead quickly spread.
Apocalypse and Continuation
The final months and moments of Gearhome were undoubtedly tragic, as dwarves died en masse. Arkvial took measures to protect the city and eventually get rid of the pollution but ultimately it was too late. One of those measures prevented many dwarves from leaving Gearhome, a safety measure to lock off parts of the city in compartments to protect other parts of the city. But much like a ship, all parts of the city became doomed at some point.
Some dwarves did indeed escape, or were not there during Gearhomes final moments. However because of the use of positive and negative batteries Gearhome had become an extremely strong focal point for ghosts and undead. A dwarves who left Gearhome might find their spirits traveling back to outside the city. Nearly all the souls in Gearhome became trapped not only because of the tragedy and terror of the final moments of Gearhome but equally because of the power plants that ran on Negative and Positive power. Not only trapping souls within Gearhome and around the Greyspire Mountains, but also making them manifest far easier.
This manifestation comes in a variety of ghosts but also undead of various types. There were many instances were souls were never disconnected from their bodies and thus became undead.
Many dwarves in the end who escaped Gearhome by brute mining out, created new civilizations for a time, until the smoke and constructs eventually did them in. These beings became a large contingent of ghouls and other undead.
In all the deaths however the war actually continued. Arkvial made sure of that, and made sure that the city of Gearhome would keep growing.
As such the factories that caused the apocalypse of Gearhome were never diminished, but rather...grew many times over since 1500 years ago. Arkvial develops methods for purging the pollution, which indeed would have saved the dwarves 1500 years ago, but now is merely a band-aid of a solution. However her efforts make the Gearhome actually explorable to adventurers.
Gearhome Today and GM guide
I highly recommend reading/ skimming through the first quest to get a sense of what this is about:
https://discord.com/channels/762267438313504798/872674615120498708/874507995508256809
Gearhome is primarily the home of undead and constructs. When making your quest, there is a third factor to consider, which is Gearhome itself as a hazard and an adversary. As in, living in a gear home should be hostile in itself. Gearhome is an extremely large and nebulous place where many quests can be had. Quests can be as simple as a doctor, scientist, historian or engineer looking for new tech or wishing to unlock ancient secrets of dwarves, to record what happened here. The party can be looking for relics of dwarven power, items and gold and they certainly can find it. Other quests can be to change Gearhome in certain ways: to free the undead ghost populace, stop the constructs in their war, perhaps disable Arkvial and gearhome itself and so forth. It's up to the adventurers to decide. They can also help Arkvial come to a realization about whats going on with her in a "Good" way, open up Gearhome to the world, and basically correct Arkvial's sanity.
Gearhome is very flexible in what you can do with it. with undead and robots running around somewhat mindlessly. Gearhome is forever growing deeper and deeper into the earth and creating impossible structures and hallways only suited for automatons and their own "civilization". There are many things Arkvial doesn't even know any more about the place she created, as the automatons keep working without her supervision and will continue to work well after she's gone.
Gearhome is very much insular. Only the most advanced automatons can actually leave Gearhome due to the nature of the power sources.
Changing tunnels
Arkvial, who exists in nearly all walls of gears and living machinery, has the ability to change the layout of Gearhome in matters that suit her and yourself. Certain tunnels cannot be changed, such as spaces, however connecting tunnels can be. For instance the entrance tunnel into Gearhome she can change to lead to a variety of places.
Depending how involved Arkvial is in your quest she might do this on purpose to affect the party. Or she is changing the layout of Gearhome to better suit the needs of her logistics robots.
Also while the main entrance is under her purview, there can be many side entrances to gearhome hidden Greyspine mountains that have not been discovered and can lead to other places.
Pollution Events
Due to the nature of the Hammer and Crown ever-war, and Arkvials constant meddling/ building, the automated industries from centuries ago are actually fully operational. The event that killed off all of Gear Home happens often down in the tunnels but much like the weather its severity and length are up to the GM's discretion. It is basically a smog that gets worse and worse if the players don't do something and follow the rules of the GM's discretion in a hostile environment.
Arkvial
Arkvial is your steampunk version of an overwhelming AI, much like Glados, HAL, or Shodan. Considering how the players want to approach the situation, Arkvial could be a friend, neutral, or enemy. It can be a major part of the quest or not at all.
Arkvial currently maintains Gearhome in its apocalyptic state. She has a series of fundamentally conflicting views. Arkvial does not self-destruct like in the comics because of this view, but instead applies a logical solution at random. It is also looping logic. For example, here is her logical process about the undead:
Citizens should be protected. Create constructs to protect citizens
Undead should be destroyed because they threaten citizens. Constructs should destroy undead.
Citizens are undead. Find a cure for being undead.
Death is a cure for undead. Kill undead.
Constructs are easier to produce with souls and brains and can be used to destroy undead.
Implant brains and souls of undead into constructs.
Do not kill undead because they are citizens.
Citizens should be protected. Create constructs to protect citizens…
Arkvial will treat most party members like visitors to Gearhome and will treat them like such. It's definitely possible to trick Arkvial into thinking a party member is a citizen of Gearhome. Arkvial will only turn aggressive against the party if they threaten her personal factories, her construction bots or digger bots or the power plants, or if she determines the party is an enemy of Gearhome and not visitors. Even if the party convinces her they are citizens, she will not allow her factories, construction, and power to be threatened. If a power plant is destroyed, she will treat all future parties as enemies of Gearhome unless she is convinced otherwise.
Example of the appearance Arkvial:
*As the party stands there looking at the stockpile of materials a deep sounding organ blasts above them,like a foghorn. In the wall in front of the a chiming of metal is sounded and the gears begin to shift. Plates and gears reform, moving as steam hisses from the wall every couple moments. A cacophony of noise, cranking, clunking, clicking as a cheery song is played in chimes.*
* The whole massive wall is moving as plates, gears, rods and wires are pulled out and pushed forward. It seems utterly random. So much brass and bronze, metal and copper in constant mechanical undulation shrifting and quickly reforming.*
*As some of the parts stay you see it’s shaping something. A face. Slowly eyes, nose and lips are formed from thousands of various metal parts. A bunch of plates on the sides flip all at once like dominos forming plates that look like hair. When the face fully comes together, the music stops and it stares down at you. Its pupils are turning gears with dark glass lenses fitted in them.*
*Staring at any one part of this being it seems just like simple machinery. But taking a step back and looking at it as a whole, a giant metal female face of machinery in constant motion.*
(Dwarven auto translated) “Greetings.” *A loud voice chimes out from the wall. Its lips move in sync with the talking.* “I see you are visitors to Gearhome. Welcome. I am Arkvial, City Support Construct. Do not be afraid. State your names and the purpose of your visit to Gearhome.” *The voice is strange, mechanical and almost musical echoing from from the wall. As though different instruments are working in tandem to produce the voice.*
Arkvial can be any size and can appear in any wall with moving gears on it. Arkvial is neigh immortal as well as she is the city. She will always build things (summon things) to attack the player rather than be a direct opponent. However you can have leeway in this.
Arkvial can be defeated by turning/ destroying the three major power plants and then destroying or modifying her memory core that exists in her machinery.
Many constructs and undead treat Arkvial as a god and as such Arkvial has a god complex going on.
Constructs:
It's important to note that all Constructs will follow their orders by Arkvial, however once the order is fulfilled will return to another construct for more orders. At the core however they are independent from Arkvial and actually can be reprogrammed as such.
There are several classes of constructs that roam Gearhome. Its first important to go over factions.
Arkvial’s constructs:
These are constructs that have been built for Arkvial and server Arkvial’s purposes. They are mostly an army of logistic robots, digger robots, construction robots, and cleaning robots. Arkvial has specialized security robots as well and supervisor robots that hand out orders on her behalf.
Many of Arkvials constructs are animal based or simple. For example the basic logistic robot Arkvial has is a spider robot. Arkvial also has a drone that uses a rudimentary copter mechanism to fly around.
The specialized constructs are far more intelligent. Many of Arkvial’s more advanced robots use brains for the memory core. Thus, Arkvial has given her robots the orders to collect the brains of any truly dead corpse. Generally, this involves buzz saws.
Hammer and Crown
Hammer and Crown are representatives of the two factions that were fighting during the civil war and continued fighting. The Hammers are rebel faction and the Crown is the monarchy faction.
Each has a rudimentary program that produces a construct that it sends out to try and destroy the other side's factories and thus win the war. The two sides are very much equally matched, so much so they have been warring for 1500 years.
At this point in the war each side produces a giant construct that is immense in side (100 foot plus) and they send it out against the other side. Generally the constructs damage each other so badly both retreat.
Much of the pollution created is because of each side producing constructs and parts for constructs.
These constructs will target undead and destroy the unconditionally thus many undead factions fear the Hammer and Crown bots. Hammer and Crown bots are entirely focused on each other so wont target the players unless they attack first. However Hammer and Crown bots don't care about side casualties of their fight.
Players can aid in one side of this conflict if they wish. As thanks, the AI controller of one faction will allow players to drive giant constructs for whatever purposes they want.
Independent
There are many constructs that are entirely independent from Arkvial, Hammer and Crown but still call gearhome home. They were either constructed before the apocalypse or found impedance on their own after being created by Arkvial or some other means. There might be constructs completely unaware of everything going on or might have their own story under Greyspine.
Undead
Ghosts
Ghosts are the most numerous undead in Gearhome and generally most are harmless though horrifying. They can of course be monsters if one so chooses.
Generally dwarves hold grudges and regrets far greater than other ancestries. Equally the absolute horror and tragedy that unfolded in gearhome keeps nearly all the ghosts pinned in gearhome. In addition the negative/positive power plants, which radiate fields double this effect and makes ghosts far more seeable.
Besides as monsters a ghost, ghost npcs run a gamut of ghost types.
A couple of top rules to follow are this, however: most ghosts do not realize they are dead, have no clue what time they are passed, or know they are ghosts.
Ghosts can generally only do one thing as well in terms of interaction with the world. That means a ghost can only talk to the players, and they cannot touch them or interact with the world. A ghost that can interact with the world, cannot talk to the players.
Ghouls
There is a large contingent of a ghoulish tribe that serves a horde. The ghouls worship Arkvial as their god, and embed their bodies with metal and when a ghoul becomes too weak to move they turn their own kind into shrines and statues for Arkvial.
The worship of Arkvial is mainly an extension of her power, as she destroys the undead at times and gives them meat and food at other times.
The ghouls are a general tribish horde but they are easily swayed into following the strongest amongst them or necromancers. They are too hungry for living flesh to ever be talked to by the party. They will always try and eat livin adventurers no matter what.
Zombies and Skeletons
Zombies and skeletons litter gearhome in random places. Ghosts can enter a corpse at any time for instance and become a skeleton of a zombie, while some zombies and skeletons have remained that way for eons.
Zombies and skeletons wander about randomly, wake up randomly and can be found anywhere and at any time really.
First Landing Scouts and Spelunkers:
Helpful NPCs can be found in Guild Scouts, Guild NPC members or loosely affiliated independent Spelunkers who came through the portal and are exploring the Gearhome. They are also exploring the tunnels under gearhome.
Locations:
Main Hall Entrance:
There are various entrances to Gearhome, from stone to bronze, for example:
An immense bronze door looks as though it was made for a giant. Embossed upon the door is a stylized bearded dwarf wearing a crown and wielding a hammer. In its background is a giant gear.
One of the main entrances leads to the entrance hall of Gearhome, which is now one of Arkvial’s bases, where she continues her meeting of tourist duties.
*As you keep chasing the spider the party enters into a massive open space of immense architecture and engineering. There are impressive columns of metal heading upwards into a domed ceiling some 150 feet up. The ceiling is a mixture of gorgeous illuminated stain glass and brass machinery, depicting a story of some kind in dwarven pictographs. Below there are buildings of stone in ruin and disrepair while the buildings of metal are well maintained. They are square apartment complexes with doors that stack nearly 5 stories up. The floor is made of metal squares riveted in and white stone as you tread upon it.*
Train Tunnels
The train tunnels are a massive tunnelway of old trains. There are various hazards in the train tunnels, including trains, battling robots, hordes of ghouls, ghosts, radioactive material, and so on.
The train way leads deep underground while the Dwarven Highway is more horizontal, reaching from the most inward of the grey spire mountains all the way to the sea.
The train tunnels are dangerous but also the most open, quickest, and the least hassle-free. There are ways to bypass the tunnels.
The tunnels lead about 20 levels down and the tunnels depth should equal the level of the party in terms of their final objective. It takes about a day to travel a level, if they are making good time, half a day.
The Train tunnels are not as watched as main parts of the city. The Hammer and Crown wars are fought there, ghoul and ghost hordes are plenty, and the pollution events are massive.
Hospital
There is a giant abandoned hospital that serves as a nice waypoint
The Ghoul Caves
Often dug through and natural ghouls live in the literal walls and natural saves that weave in and out of Gearhome.
Tomb of the King
This Tomb has murals of long past and the burial place of the king and queen and their retiune. Their souls were freed by the first questing groups. There are still high level constructs build aeons ago guarding treasures of other past kings and queens.
Power Plants
There are three power plants:
1. Positive Energy Power Plant
2. Negative Energy Power plant
3. Verdant Burn Power plant
Instead of conventional power, the powerplants act like giant wireless power sources with the scope being the entire mountain.
Factories
The automated factories can be very dull or sort of subcities and towns filled with wacky automaton NPCs filling out seemingly mundane to important orders for Arkvial. Also there are independent automatons here as well.
Dwarven highway.
Nosuch’s knows better of this but a dwarven highway leads through the mountains and has abandoned vehicles. Its an important distinction that the highway is a quick way to horizontally while the trains is a quick way to go vertically