Opening Scene

The campaign begins in the middle of the night in the village of Ostlin in the Western Borderlands.

The player characters are all prisoners, having been convicted of various crimes in the kingdoms of the Heartlands to the east. They are part of a caravan heading west to the fortress of Shadow's Gate, the seat of the Shadowguard who are sworn to protect the civilized lands of Thalorin from the wilds of the Western Reaches that lie beyond Shadow's Gate and the Blackthorn Pass. The prisoners will be sworn to the Shadowguard and the protection of civilization, under penalty of death.

The caravan has stopped in Ostlin, the first stop of many within the Western Borderlands. The leader of the caravan, Nabilo Venwos, keeps the prisoners caged with the exception of allowing a handful out at a time, under guard, to stretch and relieve themselves several times a day.

Additional Character Knowledge

If any additional in-world knowledge comes to light as part of character backgrounds, it will be added here and can be readily assumed to have been shared between the characters on their journey west from the Heartlands.

For those that wish to keep and publish their own session summaries, character journals, works of fiction, or information that is learned in-character about the world, please feel free to either leverage the journal functionality within Foundry, or write them up in whatever tools you find most convenient, and then point me towards them or send them to the GM, and they will incorporate them into this site.

Creation Process

The campaign will start with a gauntlet-style dungeon crawl where each player will have a roster of 4 level-0 characters - you can randomly generate them, or you can build them following the character creation process outlined in the core rulebook.

Allowed Sources

Players may choose any character options available from the core rulebook, as well as any of the Cursed Scrolls “zines”. For now we will not be playing with third party options such as “Unnatural Selection”.

Character Generator

You can use the Shadowdarklings character generator to quickly create 4 random level 0 characters (or to manually create them). The link above will automatically apply the character options discussed here.

Alternatively you can create your characters manually, or you can reach out to the GM via Discord to schedule a time to create them in Foundry VTT.

Character Art

Feel free to share character art (portrait, token, etc.) on Discord. For art you want to have added in Foundry, please use a black and white line art aesthetic similar to what can be found in the Shadowdark RPG books so that we have a consistent look and feel.

Moving Forward

Players will choose one of their surviving characters to level up to Level 1 and play as their PC for the campaign.

Optional Rules

• We will be playing with real-time torch timers, though the timers will automatically pause when we pause Foundry, so they won’t tick down when we take breaks, etc.

Additional Rules

• We will be playing with a rule such that, if a party has not made it back to “base” by the end of session, each player will roll on a table to determine their fate on the return. Depending on everyone’s comfort level, that table MAY include a small chance at death.
• Anyone contributing to the sharing of information - be it via the notes channel in Discord, or via contributions to this site - will be awarded Luck to start their next session.

Organizing an adventuring party and scheduling a session is left to the players in a West Marches style campaign.

Organizing

• Players can discuss on Discord who will form a party and what their target for the session will be (eg. “Hey, last week some other adventurers discovered a set of ruins in the nearby forest, lets go explore those before someone else does!”).
• No-one is required to attend where they cannot, or where they are not interested.
• An effort should be made, keeping the previous point in mind, to ensure that everyone has equal opportunity to play, and that “cliques" do not form (i.e. it’s not always the same party composition).

Scheduling

• The GM will provide a standing availability via Discord (i.e. assume it is the same week to week unless the GM says otherwise).
• Once players have organized a party and decided on a target, they schedule a session with the GM based on the GM’s availability.

Commitments

• Sessions must be scheduled with a minimum of 3 days notice. This shows respect for our fellow players, and it also affords the GM enough time to prepare an adventure for the chosen target.
• Obviously life is unpredictable, and should be prioritized over gaming; but, every effort should be made to follow through on a commitment to attend a session once it has been scheduled.
• A minimum of 3 characters must be in attendance for a session to be run.
• A maximum of 5 characters can be accommodated in a single party.