The tests you have undergone recently have been… odd… to say the least. At first you were brought in as part of large groups, but as many of the others were dismissed, for some reason, they kept coming around to you. Physical exams, psychological surveys, and many other tests that you can’t even begin to guess what they were trying to measure.

And still you remained as the field around you shrank further and further and the equipment used got more and more outlandish. All the while, you couldn’t help wondering how any of this was going to help the war effort. You’re losing, badly, and high command decides to waste time and resources like THIS?

Then, finally, you were only one of a handful left, and your entire group was led into the briefing room.

The screen flares to life with a bare-bones presentation that catches your eye for the reddish orange UTLRA SECRET - CODEWORD ONLY marking blazoned across it. The really unusual feature of the room, though, is the presenter. Grand Admiral Toro herself. Not an aide or an underling, but the supreme commander of a fleet comprised from dozens of solar systems.

“I’ll start by informing you that you have all volunteered for an experimental and dangerous mission, and that no word of any of it can ever leave this room. To be clear, YOU HAVE NO CHOICE IN THIS MATTER.”

Without even a pause for breath, she pushes on. “Approximately 34 cycles ago, we had an extremely successful espionage mission against the Enemy. We believe the information was obtained without the Enemy knowing that they were penetrated, which may prove to be our only hope. Our original intent was to try to find out opposing strategy or identify weak points that we could exploit, but at first we were disappointed in what we learned because it sounded, well, like complete nonsense. However, we studied it and have since discovered what we believe to be how the Enemy always seems to be one step ahead of us.”

“Our strategies always seem to backfire. Post-mortem analysis could never find a satisfactory reason for this until coupled with the information we obtained fro our agents. Only then did we discover the pattern - our plans always have a key component where they were based on knowledge that turns out to be completely wrong or a resource we relied upon turned out to be missing. Now, working under the assumption that we are not idiots and simply terrible at planning, we came to one unmistakeable conclusion:”

“The Enemy is altering the past to affect the present.”

“The concept of reincarnation has been debated for millennia. Well, for those of you who believe in it, congratulations - you are correct. But while certain schools of philosophy have speculated that one could access certain memories from previous lives, as far as we can tell only one person has ever had the knowledge and resources to link these lives together, bind the consciousnesses, and act in concert across the ages in common purpose. That person was Phillip Norman Neufel, a scientist researching temporal mechanics who was dismissed from his research post due to his experimentation with mind altering drugs. But you know him better as the Enemy. Unsurprisingly, we have no record of this person beyond what we obtained from his own records. What changes he has made from the original time stream have also managed to remove any trace of his original identity."

“We now know the drugs were part of his research. He made unannounced breakthroughs in temporal physics, and through the use of hallucinogens and other drugs, was able to expand his mental presence across time, touching the minds of his former selves and using their collective knowledge and abilities to affect the course of time itself, nudging things along so that now, in the present, he has all of the information and resources he needs to take control over everything. When we do manage to surprise or outsmart him, he uses his former lives to affect the past so that our plans fall apart.” The admiral makes a wry face. “His records on the matter are quite detailed.”

“Now, here’s where you come in. Part of the information we retrieved allowed us to partially reconstruct this technology. Our tests have determined that each of you is present - well, a former version of yourselves, that is - in specific times and places as the Enemy. We are going to link you to these past lives, and your orders are to stop or hinder the Enemy in any way possible. That may mean disrupting his plans or discovering some weakness that we can exploit. Note, I say ‘his’, but there’s no guarantee the Enemy will be the same race or gender as the one in the present day.”

A door opens to a side room. “This way. As I said, you have no choice in this mission, and there is no point in any delay.” You are ushered into a room not dissimilar from some of the testing facilities. “I am told there will be no pain, but the experience may be disorientating. In a matter of minutes, you will be functioning normally, but also linked to a former life. Good luck, and remember that even a tiny effect in the past may be magnified in the present and that secrecy is essential.”

With that, you are seated in a chair, a device placed over your head, and you feel a needle enter your arm. Your mind swims and you grow dizzy…

And then your senses clear, though the smell of incense still lingers. “Did the divination give you the knowledge you seek?” says the temple cleric as you slowly get up from your seated position in the circle and start picking up your weapons and backpacks.
This message was last edited by the GM at 21:44, Thu 05 Jan 2023.

Across The Ages is an admittedly ambitious campaign (or more to the point, campaign setting) that I'm testing out to see if it's as fun to play as I hope it is. Be warned: THIS IS A PLAYTEST. Things may get changed as the game progresses based on what I learn.

Using D&D 5e and supplemented with 3rd party and/or homebrew material as needed, the characters will engage in a time-bending series of adventures over a variety of periods and settings, with the end goal of finding a way to change the "present" (which is actually one or two thousand years in the future from the players' perspective) through their actions in the "past".

I'm not going to lie - there will be a lot of paperwork to keep track of in this campaign. You will need a different character sheet for each time period, and it may even require a mixture of different systems and varieties of power levels or specialty rules even within each system.

The game will require a good amount of flexibility and creative thinking - both by you, the players, and by me, the GM. There isn't a fixed set of objectives set out in some kind of linear plot, but instead I'm coming up with a system that will take into account what you decide to do and your relative successes and failures in doing so; and from there determine what the effects are throughout the timeline.

Note that there will likely be cases where the objectives of the meta-plot may be in conflict with what your characters in that time period may have as their own priorities or goals. These situations - and how to handle them - are intended to be part of the fun and challenge of the game.

What I will choose:

   * The time periods you will find yourself in
   * What the character options are in each time period based on the specific setting
   * (Secretly) who the Enemy is in each time period and what his/her/its agenda and capabilities are
   * When the jumps between time periods occur (at least in the beginning)

What you will choose:

   * Everything else

While everything is still fluid, a list of potential time periods/settings I'm playing around with are:

   * High fantasy (starting period) - traditional D&D with all creatures from myth and legend
   * Late fantasy - D&D but in an era where humans have taken over and many of the legends have gone away
   * Renaissance  - think "three musketeers" era
   * Western
   * Modern
   * Near future/Cyberpunk
   * Futuristic - sci-fi setting as mankind has expanded to the stars
   * Far future ("present day") - galactic empire

It's possible not all of them will be used, and I may slip in others as I think of them and can port the mechanics (e.g., maybe some form of seafaring settings, or feudal Japan, or...) - it depends on inspiration and the time to research the settings. The beauty of this campaign setting idea is its near infinite flexibility and expandability.
This message was last edited by the GM at 21:40, Thu 05 Jan 2023.