The truth is that the Black Kingdom isn't known in the current political environment, because it hasn't made any kind of visible move in over 800 years.

The Kingdom may be found on an atoll named Necropolis. Ruled by the Black Crown and his underlings, it is a place only for the dead and the undead.

The army of this kingdom is composed of several types of units.

First off are the skeletons. There are two main varieties and then several anatomically modified versions. The most common are the shock troops. These are made from ancient remains culled from any source found along the way. The next variety are the purpose-built soldiers. Finally, there's the modified versions. These come in all shapes and sizes.

Then there's the zombies, again two main varieties. The first are shock troops culled from fallen enemy soldiers and slain peasants, basically any living thing that the army can kill along the way. Zombie animals and monsters are common. Hordes of zombie rats generally accompany the army. The second are the purpose-built soldiers.

Their commanders are sentient undead of all kinds. Several intelligent skeleton and zombie varieties have been seen in the past. Vampires are rare, as they don't generally choose to serve, but some few are attracted by the readily available sources of food.

Special purpose units include bone golems, draco-liches, death knights and many other ominous varieties of undead.

The usual tactic the army uses is to press an opposing army back to their fortresses and then lay siege until they starve to death. While they lay siege, the purpose-built soldiers dance outside the walls in perfect sync with each other. No one knows the purpose of this. They do it without being ordered. It usually has the effect of seriously creeping out anyone that sees it. It's almost as if they're hearing a beat that no one else can.

To get from island to island, they mostly employ ships that have been sunk and raised from the bottom by zombie and skeleton labour. These seem to sail on unseen winds. Others seem to be ships that were lost at sea and have very ghostly properties.

They raid passing ships on a regular basis. As they approach, the natural wind dies, leaving their target dead in the water, while they still sail on their ghostly winds.

When required, the army will march on the bottom of the ocean. This takes a great deal of time; sailing is simply much more efficient.

The black shroud is the messenger and diplomat for the kingdom. He is often sent to deliver ultimatums. He's very good at keeping himself alive.

The Black Hand is the visible ruler of the Kingdom, but the truth is that each is merely an intermediary to protect the Black Crown. Each and every one introduces themselves as the Black Crown.

Over the years, there have been many Black Hands. Each was thought to be the true ruler of the kingdom and the same individual. Most were slain for their failure to follow the orders of their master. Some were slain for conspiring against the Black Crown.

The current is a powerful necromancer, Melthus the Black-Heart, once a member of the Crusaders of Light. He sought out the secret of becoming a Lich. He encountered the Black Crown along the way and pledged his soul to him in exchange for immortality. He serves willingly, despite the magically binding oath that the Black Crown extracted from him. He is actually the favourite servant of his master thus far.

The Black Crown is the true ruler of the Black Kingdom and the creator of the demiplane that houses the Archipelago. He's a Lich, an undead wizard approximately 2000 years old. He has spent most of that time hidden away, researching new magic.

Through magic, he witnessed the rise and fall of the Old Kingdom.

Unlike most liches, his body has not decayed, due to a magic ring that regenerates and maintains his body. Being a Lich has managed to halt his aging, however. In his natural form, he appears as an elderly human with the full powers of a Lich.

On rare occasion, he travels, dressed as a peasant, walking among the commoners, learning covertly of the current affairs of the Archipelago. He uses illusions and/or shape-shifting magic to conceal his true identity.

He has never shown himself in any way that might associate him with the Black Kingdom, instead acting through those intermediaries listed above.

The Black Crown is seeking ingredients for a powerful spell. He needs the souls of legendary heroes (400+ points) to complete it. Specifically, he needs three. The intent of this spell is to make him omniscient, at least when it comes to the Archipelago.

To this end, he has been instructing the Black Hand to prepare for war. The idea is to provoke a situation that only an adventuring party could handle. The Black Hand doesn't know the purpose behind his orders.

On the other side of things, the Black Crown was instrumental in setting up the League of Adventurers. He spent ten years posing as an adventurer, gaining the trust of the original group that started the League. The idea for the League was his. After the ball was rolling, he faked his death and returned to Necropolis. This has made the “ingredients” he needs more common.

His next move will be to begin manipulating the rulers of the other kingdoms. The first stage of this will involve sending the Black Shroud with an ultimatum: surrender and become undead or your nation will be converted by force. The intent is to anger them. After a few battles, they'll know clearly that they cannot stand against the undead horde alone. This will undoubtedly lead them to seek the aid of the League for a surgical strike against the supposed leader of the Black Kingdom.

Even if not sought out, the League is likely to try this on their own. They hate wars and always seek to end them before they begin.

Only the most powerful adventurers have any real chance of success, as the Black Hand is very careful with his personal safety.

To give adventurers that pass the first few phases of danger a good reason to seek out and destroy the Black Hand, the Black Crown will be capturing their family members. Next, he'll magically clone them and transform the clones into undead. This means that they will repeatedly encounter them, working with the Black Army in one capacity or another, uniformly twisted and evil. Finally, they'll encounter the real ones, but by this point, they'll be so conditioned to kill them on sight that they'll likely kill them without a second thought. At this point the Black Shroud will appear and inform them of what they've done. This should ensure their undying hatred of the Black Hand and give them the drive required to get close enough to destroy him.

The Black Crown's long term plan is to become a god. Limited-range omniscience is the first step in this plan.

As for personality, he's extremely paranoid about his personal safety. To that end, he has bound the existence of the Demi-Plane the Archipelago is inside of to his phylactery. If someone manages to defeat him and then destroy it, the entire plane will destabilize, resulting in a state similar to the campaign setting variation, Ethereal Pain. Basically, his phylactery serves double duty as the plane's world stone.

Anyone confronting him to defeat him will be greeted by an amused and very polite arch villain. He'll introduce himself, bow and ask to talk before conducting the business at hand, as he claims he has information of value to the PCs. He'll inform them that killing him will result in the deaths of millions, including everyone they hold dear. If they don't believe him, then he'll prove it, by cutting his own finger off, telling them that it's bound to a particular island. He'll invite them to watch the fate of the island via scrying magic, either his own or theirs. If Sora, of the Crusaders of Light, is present, she will insist on killing him, refusing to believe that he's telling the truth. It is, however, very true. I'll have to arrange this encounter to include some kind of infallible lie detector that the PCs can definitely believe.

I'm toying with the idea of giving the Black Crown some limited ability to produce avatars. Killing him would require eliminating all of them.

One very old version of the Black Crown from a campaign I never quite completed years ago was a time traveller. If I were to use this idea again, then future versions of the Black Crown are in the present, helping himself out. Furthermore, these future versions are likely from alternate futures where his lust for power destroyed every living thing in the Archipelago. Their goal is to guide their younger self down a less destructive path (that still leads to god-hood), since there isn't much point to being a god of an entirely lifeless pocket dimension.

The future selves are not the real body, but are instead avatars of the Black Crown's final form. They would be every bit as powerful as the present Black Crown, but when destroyed simply melt away as the remains snap back to the future.

I'm not certain I want to use this idea, but writing it down helps me remember, just in case…

• Skeleton Shock Trooper
• Skeleton Soldier
• Zombie Shock Trooper
• Zombie Soldier
• The Black Shroud

• Skeleton Shock Trooper.gcs
• Skeleton Soldier.gcs
• Zombie Shock Trooper.gcs
• Zombie Soldier.gcs
• The Black Shroud.gcs