The Legions of Death (game)

The Legions of Death was the fifth of the seven standalone fiction modules released as books by FASA as tie-ins to The Doctor Who Role Playing Game. The book included a basic Plot Synopsis, as well as more detailed breakdowns of various stages of the adventure (including a prologue and epilogue written in full narrative prose, and scene breakdowns in "The Adventure" and "Gamemaster's Notes"), and background on the various characters and other worldbuilding elements.

As per standard for these stories, the plot was presented as able to support multiple combinations of player characters, including the Third Doctor as well as two other Time Lords: the Colonel and Leora, and their respective companions. These protagonists were pitted against a new regeneration of the War Chief, who was, in this account, depicted as a distinct renegade Time Lord from the Master.

Publisher's summary
The legions were on the march…

…but Rome had never faced an enemy like this one. An evil renegade Time Lord has allied himself with British tribesmen to lure a Roman army — and a Roman Emperor — into a deviously plotted trap. History will be changed and an army of fantaic conquerors loosed upon the Galaxy if a Time Lord and his Companions cannot stop the renegade's sinister plan.

As time runs out, the adventurers race to their final confrontation with The Legions of Death.

Introductory Story
It's 43 AD, and one of Emperor Claudius's Roman legions,, led by Legate Vespasian, and also including young but valiant Tribune Marcus Cornelius Falco, is debating whether to enter the wooded area known as the Sacred Wood to the local Britons, fearing an ambush. Falco's scouting has instead reported that the Britons are fearful of these Woods, who they believe to be inhabited by a dark god. Vespasian chooses to press on with a small cohort of twenty-five men, but after penetrating deeper into the woods they find themselves paralysed by a hypnotic thrumming sound while, beyond reach, they hear the rest of Falco's forces be with the Britons. Vespasian's agnosticism is further shaken when a tree up ahead splits open to reveal a "sunlit courtyard" within, from which steps out the supposed god of these woods, a malignant man wearing a silvery suit and a golden helmet. Recognising him as Vespasian, the villain mockingly informs him that he is destined to become Emperor someday before making him fall unconscious by changing the frequency of the hypnotic tone.

Temporal Anomaly
While in flight through the Time Vortex, a TARDIS — either the Third Doctor's ship or the Colonel's own — detects a mysterious temporal anomaly coming from Earth, 43 AD, a pulse-wave which evidences the unauthorised, static presence of an Eye of Harmony-powered TARDIS in this era. Checking the TARDIS's computer files, the time-travellers confirm that there are no High Council- or Celestial Intervention Agency-mandated missions in this era. Either at his own initiative or because they reported the anomaly to a CIA Coordinator, the Time Lord in command of the ship decides to investigate. Unable to pinpoint the exact location of the rogue TARDIS, they can only land within a few miles of the pulse-wave's source, in what turns out to be southwestern Roman Britain, somewhere between Londinium and Camulodunum.

Field of Battle
The TARDIS lands on a battlefield, strewn with the bodies and other debris of the fierce clash between the Fifth Cohort of the Second Legion, where the Romans were eventually overwhelmed by the more numerous Britons. However, they are cornered by a group of fifteen Roman survivors, led by Falco. Though able to persuade them that they pose no threat, the time-travellers cannot prove themselves to be anything more than strange, barbarian travellers, as they find that their TARDIS key no longer works due to the pulse-wave's interference. Thus, they are forced to journey with the Romans until they can put an end to whatever is going on.

Falco's Story
As they walk, Falco explains the situation to the travellers. Following the defeat of Cattigern and Caractacus, the Roman army (led by Emperor Claudius and his army commander Aulus Plautius) had been on good course to take Camulodunum when, two days prior, a mysterious new barbarian army began gather ahead of the Roman line of march. Falco and Vespasian's Fifth Cohort was sent ahead as a scouting party, only to be jumped by the Britons; now they are cut off from the main body of the Claudian army, unable to warn them of the danger of what they've discovered: a well-organised force, seemingly greater than Caractacus's army was. When he mentions that "legate Titus Flavius" has already been lost, the time-travellers, who consulted historical reference material onboard the TARDIS before they landed, recognise him as the future Emperor, and realise that a serious divergence from established history is underway.

Player Options
The adventurers must decide what to do: there are two equally-major historical divergences to prevent, namely the Roman army being attacked by the new army, and the abduction of Vespasian in the woods. The "optimum flow" of the adventure is for the adventurers to agree to try and go back to the Roman camp alongside Falco to warn them of the threat, putting off Vespasian's rescue, but other possibilities exist, such as the party getting split up as some attempt to escape. The journey, if they choose to undertake it, can either be done through the forest, or through the marshes, with the former involving more encounters with Briton warriors, and the latter more natural hazards.

Under Compulsion
If some of the adventurers are captured by Britons on the way to the Roman camp, they are taken directly to the Sacred Wood and into the doorway in the sacred oak tree in its centre. In the depths of what turns out to be the War Chief's TARDIS, they are outfitted by the War Chief with a hypnotic helmet. When they wake up, they find themselves in a completely different adventure, convinced that what happened up to this point was the illusion and they have now pierced through into the "real" plot. The War Chief appears to them as the Third Doctor (whether or not the Doctor had been involved in the adventure up to this point), who explains that they are on the Sontaran-occupied planet of Zintorra, where the Brigadier (or some other trusted companion of the Doctor's if the Brigadier is among the companions who have been captured, naturally) is being held prisoner in the Sontaran camp. In actuality, the War Chief is priming the captives to infiltrate the Roman camp and abduct Emperor Claudius under the guise of "rescueing" the Brig.

In the Roman camp
Eventually, the time-travellers, or whatever fraction of them made it through the arduous journey without death, capture, or otherwise being separated from the group, make it to Emperor Claudius's camp. If they arrive on their own and try to explain the situation directly, they will be captured as spies and questioned by "a specialist in physical persuasion" before the Emperor about the fate of Vespasian's scouting cohort; if they present themselves as barbarian defectors, they are more likely to be listened to calmly, though not necessarily believed. Their chances are best if Marcus Cornelius Falco made it through the journey as well, and is there to vouch for them. Regardless, they are eventually able to get through to the Emepror, but even after hearing the news of Vespasian's capture and the new army,, Claudius, a weak-willed man, is hesitant about what to do.

The adventurers are forced to involve themselves in the politics of the camp; Aulus Plautius, the commander of Claudius's army, is willing to hold off the march, both because he doesn't want to march against a potentially greater foe without forewarning, and because he still hopes Claudius will get bored, return to Rome, and leave him to finish the conquest alone, increasing his personal glory in the event of victory, whereas Claudius will get the praise if he's still present when the conquest of Britain is decided. Claudius's freedman eunuch advisor Posides, on the other hand, is eager for Claudius to press on, and believes the adventurers' warnings to be lies planted by Plautius. Lucius Geta, head of Claudius's personal guard the Praetorians, sides with Posides due to his genera paranoia regarding plots against the Emperor. Nevertheless, Claudius ultimately agrees to delay any military action by at least a few days. However, the adventurers are, either way, confined to the Roman camp until further notice.

Shadows in the Night
Once their parlays with the Emperor are over, the adventurers are given sleeping quarters in the Praetorian Guard's zone of the camp so that Lucius Geta can keep an eye on them. They are awoken in the night by a mechanical-sounding humming sound, which turns out to be produced by a salvaged Sontaran recon drone. Equipped with advanced sensors and powerful weaponry, it mows through a few Praetorian Guardsmen, but, either through working it out from observation, or drawing on prior experience facing the Sontarans, the time-travellers figure out that having to deal with two simultaneous threats from opposite directions short-circuits recon drones, and are able to put it out of commission. Analysing the drone, they find that it has been tampered with from the base Sontaran design, adding holographic technology and a hypnotic rho wave relayer.

This disturbance soon gives way to another as other Praetorian Guards sound the alarm. Three men were caught trying to get into Claudius's tent, and are attempting to escape. The time-travellers are instrumental in their capture, earning them some trust from Claudius. The three turn out to be under hypnotic control, and were trying to abduct Claudius rather than assassinate him; among them may be Britons, captured Romans from Vespasian's cohort, and-or any members of the adventuring party (including time-travellers and Falco) who might have been captured on the way over and then hypnotised as per Under Compulsion. After being brought out of hypnotism, the victims relay hazy recollections of going into the Sacred Wood and losing control of themselves before being taken through a hollow tree into an underground "maze of tunnels" where they met the mysterious "god", a man in dark clothing. The Third Doctor or Colonel believes the Master is involved, and the adventurers become determined to go investigate the Sacred Wood themselves — either persuading Claudius to let them go for that purpose, or needing to escape, possibly with Falco's help.

Barbarian Ambush
Free of the Roman camp, the adventurers seek to make their way back to the field holding the TARDIS and from there to the Sacred Wood. They do so either through the woods or through the marsh, depending on what route they took previously. Though better forewarned to the dangers of either terrain than during their first go-around, they are eventually ambushed by a party of over fifty Britons. Either the whole party or some of its members are captured and taken to the Briton camp.

In the Briton camp
The adventurers who have been taken prisoner by the Britons are taken to their camp, which is less advanced, but homelier and humane, than the "ant-like" discipline of the Romans. There, they are taken before a council of the leaders of this alliance of tribes, including Calagundus, Cunovellasus and the young, female, but politically powerful Branimandua, from the Scottish lowlands. All of them are leaders of distant tribes from the North and West, who were not historically meant to involve themselves in the present war. After a fairly perfunctory interrogation, Calagundus orders them to be taken to the Sacred Wood and delivered to the alliance's "chieftain". Branimandua, however, does not trust this "war chief" who claims to be a "god of war" but did not warn the alliance about the dire straits in which Caractacus had fallen until it was too late to intervene. Furthermore, she speaks of what she glimpsed from the edge of the Sacred Wood, including that the god-chieftain keeps Roman captives as bodyguards. Those of the tribe-leaders who have been officially allowed into the Sacred Wood as part of initiation into "the Inner Mysteries" are outraged at her eavesdropping, and deny what she describes, claiming that from what they have seen, the god is attended only by Druids and Briton warriors. Even though some were willing to hear her out at first, her apparent blasphemy causes the argument to turn against Branimandua, and the final decision is indeed to take the prisoners to the Sacred Wood.

The Sacred Wood
However they came to it, the various time-travellers finally enter the Sacred Wood, without guard even if they were brought there by their Briton captors — who daren't enter themselves out of religious awe. Indeed, all humans who enter the Wood get a sense of some kind of aura of power within it, though the Time Lords cannot sense it. As they make their way in, they periodically hear the same humming sound the recon drone made. Eventually, they are confronted by hypnotised Roman soldiers armed with laser pistols, a scene covertly observed from the bushes by Princess Branimandua, once again spying on the Sacred Wood. After taking them prisoners, the hypnotised soldiers take them to a dark clearing with a guarded oak tree in the centre of it. A door opens in the middle of this tree, revealing it to be a TARDIS, and the prisoners are led into it.

The War Chief
Now dressed in black (with red and silver trim and a silver-grey helmet), a gloating War Chief, revealing himself as a Time Lord but not the Master, greets the prisoners. Being in "an expansive mood, inclined to boast", especially to fellow Time Lords, he expounds upon his background, summarising how he tried to help a race called the War Lords to take over the universe using time travel technology. The plan was uncovered and foiled by the Second Doctor, but, having escaping both the War Lords and the Time Lords' justice, he has been in hiding, rebuilding his strength. Having been particularly impressed with the discipline of the Roman soldiers who participated in the earlier "War Games" plot, he now plans to take control of the Roman Empire itself and, outfitting it with advanced technology, to use it as a starting point for planetary, and eventually galactic, domination. To do this, he intends to capture and hypnotise Emperor Claudius. If he fails now, however, he will simply fall back on hypnotising the already-captured Vespasian and bide his time a little longer until it is time for Vespasian to take the throne.

When asked by the adventurers why he is telling them all this, the War Chief cryptically gloats that the humans will soon willingly help him, while, with their own life or lives and those of the humans in his power, the remaining Time Lord(s) will be forced to cooperate or die. He soon reveals what he means: he possesses hypnotic equipment which traps its victims in an illusory world, such that the Roman soldiers interpret him as a general and the TARDIS as a Roman camp, while the Briton leaders see all his Roman minions as druids and barbarian warriors. He intends to make the human companions suffer the same treatment and use them as "willing" pawns within his plan. However, he cannot attend to their processing just yet, and has them thrown in a cell while he wanders off.

Escape
Imprisoned in a large room of the War Chief's TARDIS, the time-travellers find none other than Vespasian, who has shaken off the War Chief's hypnotism twice over, leading the villainous Time Lord to confine him here instead until further notice. Every few hours, hypnotised soldiers arrive to collect one of the time-travellers from the cell and subject them to the hypnotic equipment, putting them to work building laser weapons in another room, putting a time-limit on how long the adventurers have to formulate an escape plan. They might manage to do so and overpower the guards bringing them food every few hours. Alternatively, they may be rescued by Princess Branimuanda, who turns out to have slipped into the Sacred Wood after the adventurers. She is reunited with them some other way over the course of the escape if the adventurers take the initiative before she finds her way to the cell.

Ending the Adventure
After escaping the cell, the adventurers make their priorities the safe return of Vespasian to the Roman camp in order to safeguard the future on the one hand, and, on the other, the destruction of the War Chief's hypnotic equipment, which, once it is achieved, leads directly to the undoing of all hypnotees' brainwashing. The War Chief himself, however, is likely to escape capture, either by managing to take off, or possibly by using a SIDRAT he had stored somewhere within the TARDIS if the protagonists cut off his escape route back to the TARDIS control room. One possibility, for example, sees a gunshot from Roderick Mitchell narrowly missing the War Chief as he escapes back into his tree-TARDIS after the battle had moved to the Sacred Wood itself.

After the battle is over, Branimuanda invites the time-travellers back to the Briton camp as friends, and they manage to persuade the alliance to disband and return to their own areas of the land, so that they will no longer pose an obstacle to the Roman conquest of Camulodunum. With everything resolved, the TARDIS-block is also lifted, and the time-travellers are able to leave — possibly joined by Branimuanda, Marcus Cornelius Falco, or both.

The Sybil's Prophecy
Back onboard the TARDIS, the Colonel takes off, only for Leora to point out that Falco has stowed onboard. Falco begs not to be taken home, explaining that when he was a boy, the Sybil of Cumae predicted that he would one day "see wondrous places and things, things no Emperor would ever see", and he now sees becoming a time-traveller with them as the fulfillment of that destiny. The Colonel is initially tempted to wipe his memory, but Leora talks him out of it, and he reluctantly agrees. "Well, Marcus Cornelius,” Leora said, "now you'll get to see the Sibyl's prophecy fulfilled. You've already seen the grouchiest being inthe known universe, so it's al downhill from here. Welcome aboard!"

- Leora

Characters

 * Branimandua
 * Calagundus
 * Sandra Cathcart
 * Emperor Claudius
 * The Colonel
 * Cunovellasus
 * Third Doctor
 * Lisa Drake
 * Marcus Cornelius Falco
 * Lucius Geta
 * Jo Grant
 * Sven Langbard
 * Leora
 * Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart
 * Roderick Mitchell
 * Mikhyl Nevenskoi
 * Aulus Plautius
 * Posides
 * Liz Shaw
 * Sarah Jane Smith
 * Titus Flavius Vespasian
 * The War Chief
 * David Worth

Mentioned only

 * Mark Antony
 * Azmael
 * Borusa
 * Boudicca
 * Branimandua's sister
 * Julius Caesar
 * Caractacus
 * Dio Cassius
 * Cattigern
 * The Colonel's son
 * Christopher Columbus
 * Cunobellinus/Cymbeline
 * First Doctor
 * Second Doctor
 * Drax
 * Flavia
 * Crassus Frugi
 * Gnaeus Geta
 * Germanicus
 * Hannibal
 * Cliff Jones
 * K'anpo
 * Colonel Martin
 * The Master/The Monk
 * Messalina
 * Narcissus
 * Nesbin
 * Antoninus Pius
 * Pompey
 * The Rani
 * William Shakespeare
 * Suetonius
 * Suetonius Paulinus
 * Susan
 * Tacitus
 * Tamozar
 * Titus

Worldbuilding

 * Quinctilius Varus was once ambushed in the Teutoburgerwald in a similar manner to what Titus Flavius Vespasian fears upon wandering into the Sacred Woods.
 * Vespasian also recalls "mad Gaius Caligula"'s claim of godhood.
 * As of 43 AD, Sontaran recon drones "will not be developed for another 1000 years or so".
 * The War Lords selected humans as the subjects of their War Games because out of the Galaxy's most successful races, they were "more flexible than Daleks and more stable than the Sontarans". Victims of the scheme included "armies from the World Wars, from the Crusades, from the great English, American and Roman civil wars, from Napoleon's era, and from the days of Alexander and his successors. The Normans, the armies of the Renaissance, and the tercios of Spain were represented, along with soldiers kidnapped from Korea, Vietnam, the Sinai, the Cuban War of 1995, and the Martian Civil War of the 22nd century".
 * When wondering which Emperor of Rome to hypnotise and suborn, the War Chief concluded that "Augustus had too much support from family and friends to be dominated without a civil war", Tiberius was too aloof and remote, Caligula and Nero too erratic", the "adoptive Emperors" Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus and Aurelius were "all too strong-willed to be easily controlled", as were the "early Flavians" Vespasian and Titus, while Domitian, "the Third Flavian Emperor", was "too paranoid to be approached". Galba, Otho and Vitellius's 69 AD reigns were so short-lived that any interference with their reigns would "immediately call CIA attention to his manipulations".
 * The Colonel is in his fourth incarnation.
 * He owns a walking stick which conceals both a sword and a TARDIS Remote Computer Link.
 * The Colonel was a Prydonian Cardinal at the time of the Prydonian Academy Revolution, and later became a scientific advisor to UNIT/North America, or UNIT/NA.
 * Some have commented that the Colonel's "crusty" demeanour makes "the Doctor's first incarnation" look like "a sweet-tempered psalm-singer".
 * Leora is in her second incarnation.
 * The Third Doctor's vehicles Bessie and the Whomobile are mentioned.
 * Jo Grant's birth date is given as 1959, and Sarah Jane Smith's as 1949.
 * It is claimed that Susan was 16 during the Doctor and Susan's escape from Gallifrey.
 * Rho waves, or rho patterns, are "intangible mental signals unique to al living and semi-living things". Because TARDISes are "semi-living", strong rho-wave broadcasts interfere with TARDISes' functionality.
 * Sontaran recon drones were "flattened cones, about 1 meter long by .75 meters wide and .25 meters thick, used for patrols and security work by the Sontaran Empire between 71500 and 72100", after which they were phased out in favour of the more intelligent, smaller, and more lethal Scout Seekers.
 * The list of known temporal interference on 1st century Earth includes, on top of the First Doctor's involvement in the Great Fire of Rome, the Celestial Intervention Agency foiling a plot by the Master to "alter the history of the Han Dynasty in China", suspected activity by the Rani related to the Jewish revolt in Palestine in 66 and 67 AD, a visit to 69 AD Italy by the Master and the Colonel. The eruption of Mount Vesuvius in Pompeii in 79 AD is blamed on Dalek time-travellers whose Inferno Bomb exploded early, and the Master is said to have "awakened a Silurian colony in Mexico" in 98 AD only for the Silurians to be defeated by CIA operatives.
 * Zintorra is "the fourth planet of Beta Hydri". Though Earth-like, it did not develop any native lifeforms, but was later colonised by a Third Zone scientific expedition in 72640 before becoming drawn into the Rutan-Sontaran War. The Third Zoners reacted by petitioning Gallifrey for aid.
 * The Colonel's TARDIS is a Model 65, equipped with the unreliable SID system.
 * Alastair Lethbridge-Stewart's birth ate is given as 1932, and UNIT's foundation is dated to 1978.
 * Presently Roderick Mitchell was born in the small town of Bay City, Texas in 1952 and is presently 28. After joining the army, he was transferred to Special Forces in 1985, and to UNIT/NA in 1988 under Colonel Martin.
 * Lisa Drake was born in Los Angeles, California in 1952 and is presently 22.
 * One one occasion, during a visit to 1490 Spain, Lisa ran into Christopher Columbus and accidentally mentioned his discovery of the "New World" to him.
 * David Worth was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1946 and is presently 32. He is more directly a companion of Leora than of the Colonel, having originally stumbled into her TARDIS in Los Angeles. He was also an amateur astronomer. Since becoming a time-traveller, he has "learned something of Gallifreyan physiology and other skills not normally learned by paramedics, such as how to hide from a Dalek and how to pass for a Thal security officer in a bad light".
 * Mikhyl Nevenskoi, likewise a companion of Leora's first and foremost, as she rescued him from imprisonment on a "small planetoid". He was born on Mars in the Soviet colony city Nova Leningrad, or Novelyn, in 2135. A "firm believer" in the writings of the neo-communist philosopher Borozhev, who "wrote a sweeping condemnation of Russian communism in 2028, calling upon the workers of the world to return to the visions of Mrax and renounce the false principles of Soviet government"; his revolutionary activities led to his imprisonment. He and Leora crossed paths in 2156 in the context of the 2150s Dalek invasion of Earth, when the Daleks invaded Mikhyl's asteroid-prison.
 * Mikhyl's revolutionary rhetoric accidentally inspired Spartacus's uprising during a time jaunt with Leora and the Colonel.
 * Sven Langbard was born in Norway in 975. When he first joined the Colonel on his travel following an adventure involving a crashed Sontaran, he hoped to "get a glimpse of Valhalla".
 * Lady Sandra Cathcart was born in London in 1826, the eldest daughter of the Duke of Marston. She became one of Florence Nightingale's patrons and followers during the Crimean War, where she encountered Leora, who was pursuing some "time-hopping Daleks".
 * Claudius was Mark Antony's grandson and, on the other, the grandson of Emperor Augustus's wife.

Continuity

 * The story's antagonist turns out to be a regenerated version of the War Chief following the events of TV:, which are summarised in the bio given for the War Chief. The War Chief is treated as explicitly a different individual from the Master, a position which would again be embraced by PROSE: and PROSE:.
 * Several plot points and characters also expounded upon in FASA's Master-centric PROSE: are featured, including the characters of Leora and the Colonel (the latter of whom would later be referenced in PROSE: ). This story's lore regarding the Master's involvement in the War Chief incident was foreshadowed in CIA File Extracts, which mentioned rumours of the Master's involvement but left their accuracy and significance ambiguous. The War Chief's TARDIS is referred to as a Type 42 at one point, as it was said to be there, though at another point in the game it is repeatedly described as a Model 43.
 * The Aliens are said to have called themselves the War Lords, in "mockery" of the Time Lords. This name was not mentioned in TV:, but was used in the Target novelisation, PROSE: , as well as in the later PROSE: and PROSE:.
 * The circumstances of Jo Grant and the Third Doctor's first meeting in TV:, and of Jo's departure in TV:.
 * The circumstances of Sarah Jane Smith's first meeting with the Doctor, during which they "defeated a Sontaran warrior in the Middle Ages", are summarised, in a reference to TV: . Her departured in TV: due to a recall signal from Gallifrey, and the fact that this recall signal was a fake transmitted by the Decayed Master as revealed in TV:, are also referenced, as is the fact that the Doctor later sent Sarah a a Mark III version of K9 as seen in TV:.
 * The hypnosound-based machinery employed by the War Chief is identified as a more advanced, more complex form of those employed by the Master in TV:, combined with the processing machines employed by the Aliens in TV:.
 * The Xeraphin Consciousness is mentioned as an example of a hive mind capable of avanced hypnosis, referencing TV:.
 * The provided list of Renegade Time Lords includes, among others, Azmael (complete with a summary of his part in the events of TV: ), Drax (complete with a reference to his encounter with the Doctor during the Key to Time quest i.e. TV: ), K'anpo (complete with a reference to the events of TV: ), Nesbin (complete with a reference to the events of TV: ), the Rani (said to have been "recently reported" to have engaged in unethical experiments on Earth in reference to TV: ), Susan Foreman (whose eventual marriage to David Campbell as set up in TV: is referenced), and Tamozar (giving the same biographical blurb as in PROSE: ). The Master naturally also gets an entry, which references his assassination of Lord President Pandar V and Chancellor Goth as per TV:, and his supposed death on Sarn in TV:.
 * The events of TV: are referenced as one of the known instances of Time Lord interference in the 1st century.
 * The Third Zone from TV: is mentioned.