Starting a new story

[Alatain]

I am possibly going to be starting a new game for a group of people that I am deployed with (if this is you, stop reading now). We do not have a whole lot of time, but I am starting to feel the need to game, and that is taking precedence over sleep...

Anyway, I was looking at going for a story involving the reestablishment of the Spring/Autumn courts. The way I am looking at it right now, the Spring court will be the focus of the action.

I have a player looking to play an Emissary of power for an oath keeper/Law deity and one that wants to play a Winter Court changeling. I am going to start it with the changeling being tasked to welcome and assist this outside contractor (literally) with finding out why the Winter Court is loosing power more quickly than usual with the turning of the seasons from winter to spring.

The reason being that an ancient pact is renewing and the balance of power is shifting. The Spring Court is starting to take over the early summer months and is drawing away power from the Winter Court. I am thinking that the Summer Court would secretly be supporting the Spring Court in order to diminish Winter holdings. The way I am seeing it, is that Summer defends the nascent Spring Court against a large Winter attack, which weakens Winter enough for a Summer counter-attack as the power shifts.

I can see the players being a large deciding factor of whether the Spring Court gets off the ground or not. They could support the ancient pact and change the world, or crush the new saplings before they can get their start. Of course, there is also the machinations of the secretive Autumn court to deal with as well...

Well, sorry for the long post. It helped get my thoughts together, in any event. I am looking for any ideas, critiques, or just thoughts on the matter. It may never get run, but I will probably eventually use the idea somewhere...

[Sanctaphrax]

Sounds good to me.

Do you need some kind of help?

[Alatain]

I was started writing that post with nothing specific in mind. It kind of just helped me conceptualize where I wanted to go with the idea, so I have no specific questions. If you or anyone else has any ideas, story hooks, or interesting links to get the creative juices flowing, they would be appreciated, but if no one has anything particular to say on it, then I am happy with just having gotten the concept in a written form. I find that it helps me to try and explain what I am thinking to someone in order to organize my thoughts.

[DFJunkie]

A couple thoughts I had while reading your post:
1) You say that the reestablishment of Spring diminish Winter, but wouldn't it also diminish Summer?  Or maybe you meant more tangible assets like territory in the Nevernever and Fae who swear (three unsuccessful attempts to spell "allegience") fealty to Spring.  Would Spring, and presumably Autumn, draw metaphysical power from the same sources as Winter and Summer?
2) Would events arrange themselves so Autumn returns as well, to balance the power of Spring?  If not, would that mean there's a lot of power sloshing around that other parties could take advantage of?
3) I don't know how obsessively you read WoJ, but according to Jim the Erlking's origins are in Summer, but he represents the dark counterpoint to the otherwise warm/light way that Titania's court is portrayed.  You could call him the Summer King.  Similarly, the Winter King (Santa Claus, no joke) represents the less harsh elements of Winter.  It's quite possible that, should the players be assisting Spring they'd find the Winter king helping them, while the Summer King worked against them. 

[Alatain]

Interesting questions there, DFJunkie. I was indeed thinking that the return of spring would draw power away from both Summer and Winter. However, the return would be crucially set during Winter's decline and Summers resurgence. Thus, Winter would fight any encroachment of their power, while the instigator of this event, an ambitious Summer Fae, would back Spring long enough to use them to wear down Winter. Then after the first major battle, go on the offensive to deal a crippling blow to Winter holdings.

Yes, the return of Spring was going to necessitate the return of Autumn. I was trying to pin down exactly how that was figuring into things now. I currently see it as an after-the-fact, balancing act. They would come about from the imbalance of power towards the end of the next summer.

I will have to go back and re-read WoJ (oh, woe is me). I was thinking that the rulers of Spring and Autumn would be male, to offset the female aspects of Summer and Winter. I am a bit fuzzy on the Erlking and Santa though. I will have to take a look again.