“ A casual remark by one of the party about something met on a previous adventure leads to a summons to and grilling by the Mages' Guild (or equivalent), probably resulting in an expedition back to that area to recover the things for study by the Guild. The party's presence will be 'requested' for this expedition.”
“ Go Beyonde
Wiz 1
For one full round, a gate to another dimension is opened. That Dimension is called Beyonde. It is a place of eldritch horrors but if you are careful, movement there for every 10 feet there you cover 1 mile here. It is very dangerous and creatures will attack). near instantaneously upon your arrival. in practice, you can roughly cover about 300 miles(after this point you will be subjected to overwhelming attack.Brave(Foolish?) peeps attempt to send armies through, that is very iffy. you can only get to approx. D^ miles of where you want to come out(requiring another casting of the spell.
Basically you have teleportation available to L 1 Wizard's , this would shake kingdoms to the core, if an enemy army could appear at any moment,D6 miles from a target. Warfare becomes very fluid and much smaller forces are scattered about the countryside.”
“ The monarch used to have absolute powers until the disappearance of King Henry V. A 'temporary' replacement was put on the throne to hold it until King Henry returned, and he would have only one vote on the governing council of nobles and no other powers except persuasion. More then 50 years have passed since then and everyone knows King Henry is almost certainly dead-but the nobles don't want to go back under the rule of an absolute monarch, so the kingship is only 'temporary' until King Henry V returns to take back his throne.”