Welcome to my third post. I feel a certain way, because I started this blog to do some deep digging into some lore ideas I've been having. Writing up some folktales and myths and locations. But that isn't the case. Why? Because there's a lot of set up I have to do to get things ready, so that when these deeper pieces come in, they elaborate on the base.
So what do I have to set up? I've said I'm starting a new campaign for the summer. I've said a few bland, very broad ideas about the place. It's called the Everwood, which is one of the few known, great forests. And our adventurers are exploring the idea of Manifest Destiny! Yay.
Well, I've got more ideas on the campaign itself. Still basic stuff, but I'm beginning to understand the conflicts of the region.
This is a detective story. I enjoy detective stories. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, Chinatown, Who Framed Rodger Rabbit, Memories of Murder, High and Low, Rashamon, Seven, etc. I love a good mystery, and more than that, I love a good set of people searching for clues. I don't know why. Maybe I should figure that out. But for now I am saying that this campaign is a detective story.
It's being run in 5th edition, because I like it and I think that the encounter rules (exp and the adventuring day) can be EASILY translated into investigation. Combat will still be there but it's the background. Well, that's not entirely true. Combat is elevated to a dangerous level because the monsters here are not normal. I would equate them to monsters from The Witcher, which is a deadly game.
Okay, so it's a detective game being run with D&D 5th edition. Well, what else? What's the story?
The idea is that there are several big mysteries and they won't necessarily have anything to do with each other. Why? Because it creates urgency. The players have to choose which mysteries to look into. Which monsters to slay. Which areas of the Everwood to scour for clues.
Why can't they just solve all of the mysteries? Because they only have forty days. Which is at the heart of one of the mysteries of the Everwood. Why does it never stop raining? From misty drizzle to torrential downpour, it's always fucking raining. And in forty days the river will rise too high for anyone to escape the Everwood until it goes down. Which really doesn't mark the end of the campaign, but it does present a new challenge.
(My ideas on this are not too developed yet, but I'm thinking it has something to do with spirits. The water spirit or the sky spirit or something. There's an imbalance that needs correcting, or a wrong that needs righting.)
So that doesn't really limit them to the forty days, does it? But you are forgetting there are other mysteries. The big one, the one that really pulls from all of those movies I listed up above, is that children are going missing from the Gold Coast. There are too many reports of missing children and there are even more cases of sleepwalking, where the children are seen (and sometimes stopped) walking towards the Everwood. Why?
Fairies.
There will be an extended post about the roles of Fey in the Everwood, but all I'll say is that it has to do with Goblin Punch's take on the Tooth Fairy and an interesting character known as the Sandman.
Alright. So that's two big mysteries and that's really enough. But I want more. I want consequences. So that's why I'm dumping it a big WORLD-LEVEL mystery. Why is it that the night sky has been refusing to leave, extending its stay by mere seconds for the past few months? Now the moon and the stars look down at the Gold Coast for a few minutes more than it used to, and while it's not a problem, the Tower feels that the moon is up to something...that bastard.
Lunar specialists and werewolves alive have been noticing the changing gaze of the moon...It has turned slightly, just a fraction of a degree, revealing part of the dark side and hiding part of the light side. Using maths and magics, these specialists (and following their beastial lust) believe the moon is now looking at the Everwood.
So there. That is three big things and while the party can focus on all three and explore the possibilities, when those forty days are up, they will have accomplished very little and either die in the Everwood (ideally not, but it's a big possibility) or go back to the Gold Coast defeated. So a huge part of this is deciding which of these things need solved. Obviously, stopping the rain is very beneficial, but as of right now it is the only mystery that is escaping me. Meaning, I don't know how to fix it yet.
But also, it means that a lot of children will die by the hands of the Sandman, and also that the moon's sinister plan will come to fruition. As the moon turns tides change. After forty days (if the calculations are correct) the Gold Coast will belong to the merrow and sharks.
This makes this world sound kind of hopeless and honestly it is to a degree. But the whole ideas is that they are just one party in a new world trying to get by. Nothing is world ending, just world changing. Tides can be stayed, cities can move, children will be born again, and it rivers eventually unflood. But what do the players (and the characters) value? What defeat can they live with and which victory will bring the most glory?
Besides this there are a few side quests that will play a big part in the overall goal of Manifest Destiny! Or, exploring and conquering this unforgiving great forest. These will be things like Bounties given out by the Lookouts, the boy scout guild of the Everwood. There's a minor mystery (that might be involved with the moon) of the undead who walk the woods at night and only at night. There's the strange vortex symbol that keeps showing up (which might be involved with the children going missing). There's the druids and their fight with each other and their hatred for this new interest in the forest. There's a guild calling themselves the Un-Evil who are raising an army in the forest for unknown reasong (though they clain they are the good guys, I mean, their name is Un-Evil!). Plus the rumors of what happened to the city that used to exist out there. As far as the Gold Coast is concerned, the city just up and vanished. Bricks and all.
There's also a religious conflict happening all over the world and different forms of animism conflict with monotheism, and Buddhism. Some people believe that the everything has a spirit and they are uncaring, they merely exist and should be prayed to. Others believe that each spirit has a name an personality (they are named after legendary pokemon). There are some that believe the spirits have all died. And a few cultists believe that the spirits have a physical presence and should be worshiped like gods, such as the seasonal dragons, the weather dragons, Rayquaza the great sky dragon who began the Sundering.
Then you've got those you don't believe in the Sundering at all. They believe that there is only one god and that we are his dream. Giants typically believe this and they have taken to calling the god Morpheus.
And lastly you have the monks (who are less of a class and more of a culture) who believe in chakra and are very much like the Air Nomads in Avatar: the Last Airbender.
There's a lot in this world and I'm kind of hoping the players all latch onto their own things. I'm comfortable with them splitting up to dive into the various things. I think that will help me flesh things out.
Just so I don't make this too long, I'll make another post tomorrow detailing the players in the campaign and what they've told me so far and what they will most likely be playing as. Well, maybe this will come later as we are still chatting. But there will come a post where that information comes to light.
Anyways, that's all for now.
Stay fly,
Your DM
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