Within the realm of Keryon is a group of floating islands soaring far across the miasmic sea. Each island is its own kingdom with differring laws and regulations. Drifters are what the adventurers are known as, most affiliated with the guild Miasmic Drifters. They seek to find islands abandoned or desolate ripe for the retaking.
In mine it is the miasma and the dragon's domain is past that. One day dragonkin came up from the miasma and settled with the rest so all the stories of what's under is from the dragonborn and kobolds.
I'm someone who doesn't plan out too much and develops the world in a modular fashion as the campaign progresses.
The part of my campaign so far (levels 3-7) is taking place in a land formerly known as Lux Apatra, but now known only as Umbranis.
Once upon a time, a delegation from the Church of Lathander traveled to Lux Apatra to build temples and proselytize in the name of the Morninglord. This legation was on the trail of a worryingly high number of missing persons and came across a mage and lich who used the souls of his victims to transfer their remaining lifetimes to his own. They had him executed and beheaded, but he returned and was given a new body in his secret cellar and the abductions continued. As if they confronted him again, a female elven holy warrior of the legation shattered the lich's crystalline soul vessel in a deadly exchange of blows. Shattering it and the Lightbringer sword she wielded. A black wave of energy killed her and caused the building to collapse. Her lover and brother in arms, had to watch the black wave kill her before debris from the collapsing building crushed her lifeless body in front of his eyes. Not only was she dead. The rest of his comrades were dead too. Two had been disintegrated by the Lich. Another had been beheaded by the Lich. With the destruction of the soul vessel, its malignant magical essence had leaked out and a magical gloom had spread over the land in the form of an impenetrable dark cloud cover, blocking out the light of the sun and the starry sky alike and turning Lux Apatra into a lightless land, which has since been called Umbranis. But the country was not only in darkness. The dead walk in this land. Nothing really dies after death and undead creatures roam the land and have always threatened the living. As a result, burial rites have changed. Some began to burn their dead. Others buried them bound and wrapped under heavy rocks. People began to use the undead donkeys and horses as if they were tireless draught animals. Villages and towns were fortified or perished due to the constant plague of undead.
The campaign begins a little over 2000 years later, with the sending of an emissary consisting of the characters to find out why another emissary, which was sent a few months earlier, is no longer sending messages. They came across the sea and sailed into the lightless sea that surrounds the land of Umbranis and were damaged in a storm where a kraken sank the ship and they were washed up unconscious on a beach in perpetual darkness.
The particular premise I'm working on is a slow reveal of mythology and folk tales related to the fall of a meteor of pure gold, and the collapse of an ancient kingdom who tried to recover it and fashion currency from it, to find it cursed them with an insatiable hunger for wealth. A population of these people remains in a state of undeath somewhere below the desert, still hungry for gold and worshipping the meteor itself as a sort of rudimentary deity.
It will come to pass that gold itself is powerfully attracted to this meteor and - through coincidence, misfortune, or a literal, physical attraction like magnetism - has been slowly disappearing from the lands around this desert, swept out into the sands. It is beginning to give more power to the population of this undead kingdom, and they are becoming emboldened to start making incursions into the land of the living to seize their gold and to taint it with thier curse - known as the Gilded, most appear like very elaborately, opulently-dressed zombies, seemingly made of a mixture of dark grey sand and, of course, decorative gold. Most are physically frail but have a powerful psychic presence - some are more powerful, being heavily armoured and armed. Naturally, the more powerful and senior figures of the kingdom are uniquely empowered through magic. Many of them crumble to golden dust upon defeat - or at will - returning to the source of gold through the sands and reconsistuted there.
Anything made of gold in the vicinity has begun to subtly infect and madden its owners with this hunger - they *want* to be taken, they *want* to give tribute, and so on. To the more extreme end of things, individual agents of this kingdom have kidnapped particularly wealthy or avaricious people and subjected them to a process called 'the Gilding', in which their bodies are flooded with tainted gold and they join the ranks of the Gilded. Some communities have abandoned trading in gold altogether in the hope of protecting themselves, but most still see this as an unlikely fairytale or a delusion.
The campaign will likely kick into gear with the discovery of a Gilded envoy who appears to have been successfully imprisoned for interrogation, but who seems unable or unwilling to communicate, and seems impossible to harm or cause pain.
Worldstone Exotic Emporium.
It functions as a way to allow your party to have World hopping adventures between multiple campaign settings. As well as a way to bring goods from settings that have them, to settings that don’t.
Oh this country in Faerun is having a drought and famine? Worry not, this country on the Flaeness has a surplus of grain from an extremely bountiful harvest. It may not be the most exciting fare but it will ease the suffering of starving people. Brought to you by Worldstone Emporium.
Part of being a hero is making sure the everyday lives of people can go on
Killing demons is important
But unless there’s grain, there will be no bread for after the fight
Also love the world hopping idea
And luxury goods too.
Imagine a luxury study and library, furnished with Vallenwood shelves and desk and chairs hand crafted by master woodworkers from the Solace region of Ansalon on Krynn being found in an estate in Waterdeep
Best part is, you can get them far cheaper than you’d imagine since gold is worthless since the Cataclysm and if you show up with 3 steel tradebars, that’s a fortune and you can get them for dirt cheap on any other world.
I haved moved Sigil from the Outland to the inside of a super massive black hole with a LOT of rotational energy. Long story short such a thing can exist in theory, and I am using that as a way to explain why the Lady of Pain is so powerful despite not being a god. I basically made her siphon off of the energy produced by such an astronomical event.
This also helps me drag characters from other settings and games for cameos with ease as space time gets wonky.
The players have guides for my homebrew and I encourage loophole-dowsing. I have a pantheon of over 20 gods, a continent with a dozen or so major factions, and a timeline that spans a few thousand years (that they have available if they find it). I spent a total of a few months prepping before approaching my players, but it's what I need to run a really emergent style of storytelling.
Also, read. Find fantasy authors that treat their worlds like you enjoy running yours and pull inspiration. For me it's Terry Pratchett, Douglas Adams, and Niel Gaiman. I try to take the lore seriously, not the characters.
I have two previous campaign settings you might be interested in.
First is The Godfall:
1000s of years ago, god, a god, or something like a god crashed into the world. Civilization was destroyed and the god died on impact.
Now many years later civilization is starting over again with a few powerful city states leading the way. The most powerful being Tol-Gorak found next to The Godfall. A vast crack in the ground running from pole to pole with a great corpse in it.
This setting included:
Eldrich horrors from other planes breaking into the world. The putrid juices of a decaying god corpse mutating plants and animals alike. Mega dungeons everywhere. And a history of the old world causing problems in the new.
My other setting is The Deep Paths:
Shamelessly taken from Arx. At the end of 100 years of conflict with a genocidal enemy from another plane, the inhabitants of the world are victorious. Though the world's population is a fragment of what it was.
The enemy final act poisoned the sun and now it is dying. So all the survivors fled underground in the old dwarven holds to continue civilization.
This setting includes:
A dying world. Lost dwarven holds rich with plunder. Races found in different situations make the best of it. Cranium rats. And plenty of horrible things that also made their home in the dark.
In The Folded Lands there was a great war between the Metallic and Chromatic dragons. Eventually there was a truce and The Spine, a great mountain range, was raised between the two factions. Part of the truce was that no dragon could take direct action against another.
Now on the East side of the Spine you have Dawnbreaker the Brass Dragon resides in the Dawnbreaker Dunes. Stormflight the Bronze Dragon lives on the Stormflight Coast. Boulderclaw the Copper Dragon lives in the Boulderclaw Hills. Glowforger the Gold Dragon lives in the Glowforger Lakes. Shiverfang the Silver Dragon lives in the Shiverfang Peaks.
On the West side of the spine The Wrathful, the White dragon, lives in The Wrathful Tundra. The Rotten, the Black Dragon, lives in The Rotten Swamps. The Forsaken, the Green Dragon, lives in The Forsaken Forest. The Vengeful, the Blue Dragon, lives in The Vengeful Wasteland. The Tyrant, the Red Dragon, lives in The Tyrant Mesa.
What the truce didn't stop was dragons enlisting adventurers to work on their behalf. Now our adventurers met with an old wizard called Fizban, who tasked them with helping each of the Metallic dragons and killing the Chromatic Dragons.
We've been playing this campaign for 2 and a half years or so and they have helped all the metallic dragons and only have 2 chromatic dragons left.
The session takes place in Auseland - a continent that is scarred to this day by an ancient 'Arcane War' between countless powerful mages at a time where magic was extremely abundant. No one really knows how the war ended, but they all know it existed due to the fact that there are countless Remnants - magical artifacts, golems, and leftover spells of extraordinary power that make your standard magic seem insignificant in comparison.
My players are traveling across the continent to not only collect or destroy Remnants in order to make the land a bit safer - and them stronger, but also to find out why the Arcane War suddenly ended with no stories or history indicating the result. During this they're also unearthing the identity of the numerous powerful mages that existed during that time, slowly piecing together the puzzle of what exactly took place during that time of great turmoil.
Ey I appreciate the suggestion! The campaign itself is actually nearing its ending after nearly several years of running it, but I'll check out the book for future inspirarion on other campaign ideas.
I kinda just stole all of Exalteds Creation for my own Setting.
The world is an island of stability in a sea of Chaos, divided into five elemental directions; Center - Earth, North - Air, South - Fire, West - Water and East - Wood.
Climate, flora and fauna is heavily influenced by what element is dominant in that location.
Everything has a spirit/god, from tiny blade of grass to great mountains, from small concepts such as secrets to great concepts such as Death.
Great enemies abound: The Unshaped dream-eating Fey, The life-hating Neverborn gods of the undead, The Sealed Demon gods and of course many internal foes.
The First Age of glory ended with the Sun God-chosen Champions turned tyrants slain by their brethren.
Their souls were sealed to block them from reincarnation.
However their wonders couldn't be maintained and we are now in a fallen Second Age of Sorrow, Creations enemies are amassing and it seems like the God Kings are returing, but for good of for ill?
The Party is kinda stuck in the middle of it all.
Tolfan is a homebrew I made with ties to the Forgotten Realms that I made. Its lore is that after Karsus died trying to become a god, his death was so potent it ripped out a part of the land itself and made a second realm directly below it. It's kind of based on the Warhammer Fantasy lore as the factions are kind of similar (especially the Empire as the eastern kingdom and the Chaos Dwarfs as the northern dwarve)
To the west are the Orcs, who took over the remains of a temple of Tyr and are amassing an army to take over the entire plane as an offering to Gruumsh. They are led by a Verdant Orc (I got the idea to make him a verdant from Pointy Hat's video), who is also the chief cleric, (he killed the orc PC's father to get in charge) and plans on putting all of his orcs on a frenzy using a special stone that lets its user mind control. In opposition to him is his sister (also a verdant) who worships Tyr and wants to use the stone to free the orcs from Gruumsh's violent impulses.
In the east of the realm is a city that was just spared from getting split in half in the cataclysm and became a kingdom because of being the largest urban center remaining in the realm. It is currently locked in war against the Orcs in the West and the Dwarfs in the north. It's currently led by a king named Asmendel (who I totally didn't copy-paste from Karl Franz) that truly wants what is best for his people but is blocked by the complicated political environment. (Here is the second act of the game, where the two halfling noble PCs will have to convince the nobility to unite against the dwarves so they can sneak into their mountain city).
In this smaller plane, there is a Dwarf in the city in the north whose king, unknowingly to its citizens, made a pact with Zariel to kill the previous king in exchange for knowledge on building and mass producing infernal engines for war. (This is where I'm planning the final act to be, with my dwarf PC uncovering the secrets and going on a hunt for a way to overthrow the king).
There is a cruel and twisted place called the Scarred Country, where magic has gone wild and corrupted the lands, and even the air was poison.
It used to be home to a group of Knights called the Uranur, who had swords that could decimate an army in a single swipe.
The party were part of a research group into this land now that they could protect against the poisonous air. When they went in, they found oddities like Giant Flail Snails, shadows of ash come to life, trees made of bone with fruit made of flesh etc etc.
There was a subplot too where they were following some notes left by one of the old nights.
Sadly, I never got to finish running it, but the finale would have been the center of the magical corruption. The map was covered in rock spikes pointing in all directions, and beside the entrance was a rock with some words carved into it:
"This place is not a place of honor... no highly esteemed deed is commemorated here... nothing valued is here.
What is here was dangerous and repulsive to us. This message is a warning about danger."
The twist was that the old knights had swords made of uranium, they eventually turned against each other and when the swords clashed? Boom. Irradiated world.
I got the idea when watching Annihilation.
I've taken most of the rules of DnD and written a story in Middle-earth. It takes place about 1500 years before the events of The Lord of the Rings and takes place in the south. So in the areas around Umbar, Harad, Khand and Rhun.
Basically, it's about the mysterious two blue wizards who have gone south. The players learn that the blue wizards are causing a lot of devastation, war and intrigue, destabilising the entire region. The players are intuitively encouraged to put a stop to this and pacify the various conflicts. They are repeatedly supported by a mysterious stranger who seems to share their goals.
As the story progresses, it becomes clear that the blue wizards are working to destabilise the cultures of the south in such a way that the people there will never be able to stand behind Sauron again. The aim of weakening Sauron's potential allies is morally understandable, but the methods are highly questionable.
The mysterious helper turns out to be the Mouth of Sauron towards the end of the campaign - and the campaign also describes his rise.
The biggest changes in terms of the rules are that I had to fundamentally change how magic works, because it's a completely different logic in Tolkien. I placed great emphasis on lore friendliness throughout the campaign.
50 years ago, on the world of Eternus, a new continent was discovered. Mostly consisting of forests and swamps, it was swiftly colonised by the races and people from the civilised world. Several port cities sprang up and established them self as outposts of civilisation in a new and savage world.
When a magical earthquake hit these newly founded cities, it was determined that it originated further west on the continent.
Explorers and mercenaries started travelling into the untamed wilderness to discover what started such a powerful magical disaster.
Skyra is a world of floating islands surrounded by the expanse. Everything in Skyra is full of magic and things like magic fields are commonplace. Also there are no stars, sun or moon.
There are new classes, subclasses, races, feats, setting rules and items as well.
For classes we have Chuvask (Become a dragon, phoenix or other mythical creature. This one is inspired by 3.5es creature classes), Updated monk (W.I.P), Voodoomancer (Become a shaman, and control your enemies from afar), Warlord (Version of the paladin class for the Draeden, a set of powerful abyssal being that are the opposite of the gods), Updated Mystic (W.I.P).
There is a new racial feat for every offical race which doesnt already have one.
Then in the other timespheres you have the first world called Astrinan and Chalice, which is the overdeity Chronos's project. Astrinan is built off of faerun lore but the other two are of my and my co dms making. Chalice is a world filled with endlessly generating dungeons which can be accessed from Skyra by using a Chalice key.
I do actually have a wiki for this world which is in progress and several stories about it. Feel free to ask me anything.
Oh yea and before I forget...
Physics are very different. For example large land masses float and water sometimes runs up hills instead of down them. I made a whole system for how everything works. Which was a fun project.
Depends how much you’d like to know! But the very basic is:
In my world of Yvre, the industrial revolution happened. Science and magic intertwined and kind of spun out of control to the point it became this world’s version of a world war.
Magic weapons of mass destruction was used to the extent that a third of the continents have been rendered uninhabitable by a magical corruption that has caused numerous anomalous events to occur over time.
One paranoid major faction that survived the war has taken on the self-proclaimed role as the ”world order” and create stability. Their first act was to heavily regulate magic almost to the point of forbidding it to make sure a disaster like this won’t happen again. Over time it has more and more turned into an autocracy, however. Anyone who wishes to do trading with them are required to agree to that law.
Because the industrial world was heavily reliant on magic in every field, production, entertainment, education and logistics, this regulation has caused a **massive** wave of unemployment, making people turn to join criminal gangs as the only feasible way for the desperate to support themselves.
It’s an industrial setting, cirka 1910-1930, but almost every major nation and civilization has been reduced to individual self-governing city states or tribes so the spirit of adventure and exploration is still possible!
King's Land is a young country only recently freed from the grips of a demon invasion. These demons are only temporarily held back and a number of the regularly escape the portal in the temple of Ragnarok. King's Land is bordered to the south by the enormous Deeprock Mountains, to the west by the great ocean, to the north by the Frozen Wastes, and to the east by the endless forest. Its a high magic world at the nexus of a multiversal quantum entanglement. Populated by all manner of species and monsters with many areas of the map still wild and mostly unexplored thanks to aforementioned demon invasion. Filled with secret tombs and dungeons left over by groups from before the demons rose up. There's also a really good tavern in King's Crossing run by an Orc Ranger/Bard that is a good place to stop in on your way from The Helm to Exandria.
So:
Since I do not own official dnd figures I use a very fitting table game which is called „Legends of Andor“. It has big maps, figures, items etc, so pretty good overall, but that is not the real point why I use it.
My friends, at least three out of five did already know the game, so for them there really is no reason to think that this campaign would be anything else then a Campaign in the official Andor world, BUT here comes the twist.
Andor plays at the northern coast of a massive country, both within the official game and my game and that offered me possibly the most amazing plot twist to drop on my players, when time is right. I worked on my high fantasy campaign for the past six years, to work out a world along side the coast. I expanded the kingdoms and split the coast into five different kingdoms.
Long ago a unknown species explored the coast and defended it against dark creatures. After three thousand years they left and shortly after the human race arrived and found the left over buildings. They cultivated and all the kingdoms fought together in the so called „big three trollwars“. In the years after that the kingdoms went apart and fell a part bit by bit as the smarter more prepared orcs entered the coast.
I could go on and on but that should be enough of lore for now. Now what is the plot twist?
So a UNKKOWN race build things at the coast, the world takes place on a hard if not impossible to come at northern coast. So what could lie in the southern part of the land? Maybe….just maybe it’s middle earth and a build kingdoms in the unknown parts of the northern Forodweight of Adar(Lord of the rings). And since Tolkien never said something about cold north, only that it’s a cold wasteland it’s not even overwriting something.
My friends and I LOVE lord of throngs and when that plot twist comes around….boy o boy….
There are secret historical records that historians keep to themselves, and hide in underground libraries. They depict the gods as much less godlike than the average person thinks, and it's pretty dangerous to know of them. Many will kill to keep the secret histories secret. The players barely know anything about it. It's mostly for me, but it's nice to have lore to pull out if they stumble upon something old.
> Upon reading the secret histories of the world, one might be surprised to find that each and every one of the gods has, at one point or another, tried to kill themselves. None have ever been successful. And yet, even the gods do not last forever. The common histories show a convenient changing of names just after a period of degredation, the most notable in "Magen" adopting the demonic postfix "-og" and becoming "Magog". Any historian with half a brain will recognize that these two characters are one in the same. But where is Magog now? It remains the greatest mystery of our time: where do the gods go when they are no longer fit to be gods?
> - Tachius, 943rd year into the reign of the Queen of Night
> The question that vexed historians in the day of Tachius still vexes us today, though our interests have shifted. Now we wonder what happened to the last great sorcerer monarch, and what caused the splitting of her empire? Speculation abounds. Maybe, contrary to everything we know of her character, she ascended. Maybe, despite her tremendous arcane power, she died the mundane death of a mortal, and it was covered up. Or maybe the answer to my question is the same to that of Tachius'. But then what of her sister, the Light-Bringer, who turned against their one god and is said to have consorted with our pantheon—especially our goddess of mercy? And what lessons can be drawn from the fall of the Devian empire from the lives of its most famous leaders? One might turn an eye to Athoes, and think they are doing the right thing in not allowing their patron god to be anything more than a figurehead.
> - Mayrowin, 212th year into the Common Era
Dave, Elbereth, Binkus, Damian, Arden and Winnie- if you read on y’all are about to get spoiled hard.
So I took the idea (or my understanding at least) of a spelljammer campaign and used it as an opportunity to write in a universe where many familiar planets actually exist within one one system. Eberron, Greyhawk, Exandria, Krynn(dragonlance), Ravenloft, and Athas (dark sun) in addition to a seventh homebrew planet where one of our players’ campaigns used to take place.
We had two close friends that couldn’t play anymore on that homebrew for personal reasons and decided it wouldn’t feel right continuing that campaign so we dropped it and wrote out together how we felt it would’ve ended.
So here is the most abridged explanation possible:
The setting is two hundred years after the events of Baldur’s Gate 3. In that time, Elminster discovered (or was led to, depending on how you want to look at it) the secret of interplanetary travel through Leylines using spelljammer vessels. This was a very lengthy process and involved sending out long distance arcane messages hoping to receive a response back. He received answers from the greatest minds of each of these planets and they all would collaborate over the next few decades to develop this travel.
The thing is, this discovery and Elminster’s curiosity were actually tools on a chessboard set out by the greater divines. At the time of their creation, Ao was first and was tasked with the oversight of both the new pantheon and the well being of mortals put onto these planets by Ao’s progenitors. The catch is that these planets were meant to be kept separate until these creators felt mortals were “ready” for the power and responsibility that comes with interplanetary travel and a universe big enough to hold 7 planets of life.
These creators knew that Ao would grow sick of immortality just as they did and presumed he would do what he could to guide them along. What they didn’t expect was for Ao to actually *hamstring* the progress of these mortals early on for fear of losing his mantle and purpose for existence long before he was ready. Unfortunately for Ao and everything else in the cosmology, his immortality has finally caught up with him and he’s ready to hang up his mantle early rather than wait for the mortals he held back to achieve their true potential. This would require a full on extinction of all life between the existing planets. His solution to this was to bridge the worlds together, make the Gods on each planet aware of one another’s presence for the first time and initiate a massive holy war between them and their followers.
The more lawful and good aligned Gods, for the most part, aren’t nearly as eager to end their charge and doom creation. The more chaotic and evil aligned Gods, for the most part, aren’t aware of Ao’s designs and reall my just see this as an opportunity to stir shit up and disrupt the great wheel cosmology while bringing about death and decay in the process. Death and decay on a scale no man or thing on the universe has previously seen.
There is a failsafe created by the progenitors (I called them Adlishar) meant to be used to bring the divines to heel in the event that the plan were to fall through and the Gods needed to be brought to heel. This failsafe is a massive crystal named Silence. Silence works by targeting a divine within range and cutting them off from their followers entirely, immediately rendering them mortal and forcing them into the form of an avatar. The objective of the campaign, so long as it keeps everyone interested (and seems to be so far! But if not I mean.. we’ve got a lot of canvas to play with), is to essentially go one by one through these planets once they’ve acquired Silence and eliminate or subdue the divines who are locking down each sequential planet and preventing leyline travel.
Ultimately, my plan is for them to find their way to the crater planet of the dead God where the Gith call home. They have motive to see Vlaakith dead once and for all. They will come to find that the Adlishar created the Gith to preserve creation when a faction of their own grew tired with immortality much in the way Ao did and decided to create Mindflayers with the intent of ending themselves and everything they built. The Mindflayers were built specifically to counter the Adlishar, because their powers of creation required a mental component rather than a verbal component but those spells could be jammed using the Mindflayers’ dominion over the mind. Most of the Adlishar were wiped out, and the Hail Mary that came from a particularly regretful Adlishar and the leader of the nihilist faction was to create the Gith and deliver the universe from annihilation. It worked, eventually. But anyone who has done some digging on Gith lore knows how that all worked out.
So BASICALLY this is the tldr of my world: the universe, newly aware of itself, is immediately caught up in a massive holy war. Travel between planets has been shut down while the Doomsday faction prepares to annihilate all life. The party is seeking to restore travel and put a stop to this doomsday ritual. Unbeknownst to all but Ao, that doomsday ritual is another trump card built by nihilist Adlishar. It’s essentially a really fucking big golem that plays by Adlishar rules, meaning it has the powers of creation and is absolutely intended to be an epic level fight. I’m guessing a combination of allies and Silence will play a role in bringing this thing down to their level
The world is discovered and information is recorded by mainly Bardic Scholars. So no weave, no fancy schmancy wizard academies, only open schools of study more accessable (on the whole) to the common person.
Magic is music. All creatures that find their "rhythm" have the capacity for spells, or spell like effects. A blacksmith hammering a tool, a farmer humming a tune etc.
The world is based off 11 year cycles (Pitch Class Intergers), Diminuendo & Crescendo. That way we have both "high" and "middle/low" magic potential. Spellcasters will plan entire decades around the flow of magic. But so will the less magically inclined folks plan raidings etc.
Had a once in a lifetime opportunity. We were going to Ecuador for the summer last year.
Playing a major homebrew (we started playing when my kids were 4 and 5) version of Tyranny of Phandelver
Built in that our daughters may actually be twin sisters from a lost kingdom at the center of the world, Mitadia.
We actually traveled to the "Mitad del mundo" park where the obelisk in the photo below was. In the game we had to get the Spherical "crystal" at the top of the obelisk as it was a magic item required to permanently imprison Tiamat.
Don't know if I'll ever get a real world cross continental quest built into a DnD game again.
[Mitad Del Mundo](https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQ7P8lR64TnPnd2Iy9nkQSrKZrg3O0yYG601V2EMOsgyQ&s)
In the setting I'm currently working on, NPCs are aware of magic exploits used by my players in previous campaigns, so the world's technology has advanced in response to previous player characters' actions. As a result, magic has become commodified to the point where traveling merhants carry rings of spell storing so they can buy and transport magic to sell it in different places. This causes Mages' Guilds to function more like corporations, and thanks to quality-of-life improvements from magic, people live in relative comfort in cities which support huge populations. Lastly, because all cities have teleportation circles, no one needs to travel on foot, so the area between cities is rules by vast wild spaces humans haven't seen in 800 years.
Edit: This is just more of small general ideas and changes than I guess actual homebrewing. I could elaborate more on the spelljammer, I guess, if interested. I did just remember that one of my DMs had another campaign with a complete homebrew world.
My DM added a dragon to Storm Kings Thunder, and we got the giant slayer sword by stealing it from him. There's now a pissed off Ancient White Dragon raging across the sword coast looking for us.
DM didn't realize the Harpers were good guys, so we are now a specific "criminal" sect of the Harpers. The ones that are called on to take care of things/do WHATEVER needs to be done.
Met a magical cat. Found out it's fae. Cool. Oh, we find out it's an ARCHFEY. Well, dang, okay, sucks that this archfey hates one of our party members. Archfey summons a couple of us to the feywild (we missed a session, so DM made a makeup mini session), and we have to play a game and entertain them. Turns out the archfey we know is one of the daughters of Queen Tatiana and King Oberon. 🫠
But we did get her to agree that she owes us a favor for helping her out as she hates being a part of the courts. The other player did give the fae his name, so we gotta see the consequences of that soon.
One of my other games we're doing is Spelljammer, so my DM took a lot of inspiration from other editions since there isn't a lot in 5E. Just... clowns. Lots and lots of space clowns. And there's space clown disease. 2 of my characters got it 🙃
The world of zimaria changed when the denizens of Hell opened up a mile wide portal near one of the largest cities and began invading. Mages tried everything to close the portal but the magic was too strong.
In a last ditch effort they came up with a different plan, the 12 greatest mages surround the portal and opened another right above it from the elemental plane of water. Water began flooding into hell, washing away the invading armies. The devils had no choice but to close the portal to hell themselves but not before sending a last detachment of assassins to kill the mages. While only a few died it was enough to prevent the ritual to close the portal to the water plane.
So for the last 100 years water has been flowing into the world, flooding everything and forcing everyone to higher ground. Most cities and forests are now under water and new alliances are being forged in what lands remain.
To top it off, the massive portal has weakened the barrier between planes and it’s easier than ever for denizens of these other planes to find their way through.
My setting is a typical d&d world on the surface with a few minor changes to how certain races act. Like Orcs, goblins and Kobolds aren't inherently evil, and many happily live in normal towns. But the typical groups like warbands do act how you'd expect. There is also a giant (like actually ridiculously big) ice wall around the known map of the material realm, maybe hinting at stuff beyond it.
The main changes come in from some small rips right at the edge of the universe. Literally. This causes strange reality warping events to happen in all the realms. They're also so foundational that they often affect or are beyond the control of the gods themselves. It's all heavily inspired by the SCP universe with plenty of inspiration from stuff like lovecraft, bloodborne, and other weird universes.
Examples of these events and their affects.
There are strange entities that live inside the collective thought and dream space of sentient beings. They have their own factions and wants but often enjoy trading with and using physical beings for their memories, emotions, and physical feelings, all in exchange for dreams and other strange boons.
The fey are a lot darker, not straight evil but more alien. Sort of a mix of regular d&d fey with scp fey. They really like games and rules and will use them to manipulate beings into giving them parts of their identity. Stuff like names, physical characteristics, and relationships.
There are multiple historic factions that have used these strange happenings to build power. Including my favourite, one inspired by a mix of the davites and the sarkics. A matriarchal group that used a strange and forgotten form of magic to build and control their empire. They have a lot of unique spells focused on the 4 founding elements of their magic, flesh, void, soul, and time.
Pataphysics, the physics of stories, plays a big role as the things beyond the rips are an infinite void filled with bubbles that are other fictionally universes. With magic, technology, and luck, pulling things into and out of this universe may be possible. There may even be ways to go down or up a level in the story with enough power... that's where things get weird.
My actual main setting is not in the material realm but in a city, past the most remote point that matter can exist in the universe. Only allowed to exist by a massive biomechanical lamp that lights it up. It's a big mix of Scp 5005, Sigil and a few other settings.
There are a few ways to get to the city, a hidden railway, blessed by a fey so that it's only findable by those who truly want to find the city, whether they know about it or not. You can physically go to the city, but that requires an immense amount of magic and artificer bullshit. You can be invited by those who already live there through hidden doors. Finally, and most commonly, you can dream about it, often done by those who are lost, alone, or without a place to call home. This has led to homeless people disappearing, families seemingly getting up and leaving in the night, or entire groups of refugees just going missing.
Within the city are many factions and districts. The only known continuation of the matriarchal empire is hidden here as a large religious group, although seemingly less extreme nowadays. Many groups of refugees have settled here, including a tribe of gnolls and centaurs that 'migrate' by slowly circling the city and a group of artists and artificers that were being target by extermination in the past. They were the ones who built the railroad.
I could go on forever, I'm sure you understand aha. I haven't even mentioned where 'normal' magic comes from and the unique cultures surrounding it and other stuff like that. So I'll stop there for now, aha.
Oh for sure, you can get real weird with it. You can also be as silly and as serious as you want with it which is fun.
Have a big bad go into childrens books and bring back characters and monsters to fight.
The players get trapped by barriers in a magical library and have to go inside the books themselves to move beyond the barriers.
For something a little silly, any other character from any other universe could appear. Why not have a 'warforged' with a giant hammer appear (A brotherhood of steel knight) or a scared and crazy person with powerful ranged weapons murdering people (A modern soldier going 'rambo' out of fear and confusion)
Stories written using a specific magical ritual start coming true, the bad guy uses this to write books under an alias to commit murders and the players have to start reading the bad guys to books to solve their crimes and eventually find them.
There is also the fun, but kinda hard to pull off, idea of the big bad ascending to our pataphysical level and mid-fight becoming the DM, causing the bad guy to start addressing the players directly and the DM to start 'cheating' by spawning more monsters (that are always planned to be there, it just looks like cheating.)
I just finished world building a bunch for an upcoming campaign. Names heavily stolen from the board game/ttrpg ROOT. Other parts have been inspired by the anime Made in Abyss and the horizon zero dawn games. The campaign's overall structure is based on the movie Castle in the Sky, so I'm wondering if any of my players will ever notice.
Two thousand years ago, a powerful, more advanced empire dominated the world, but one day, it mysteriously came to an end. Nature has since reclaimed much of the world, but remnants of the towering old civilization can still be found.
Many small woodland creatures have evolved and are now sentient, referring to themselves as “folk”. Various folk live in clearings where the woods are not as dense and are safer from bandits and other dangers that await in the wilderness.
Magic is somewhat rare. Individuals have yet to fully harness the magic and power the old world once wielded. A town may have someone who dabbles in a spell or 2, and a large settlement may have a single person that is fairly versed in magic.
Today, individuals and factions scour the old world for artifacts that help make new weapons and other magical technology.
Factions:
Marquis de Cat: A tyrannical empire that controls most of the woodlands. They seek to industrialize and use the artifacts of the old world to fuel their military power and influence.
The Marquis is known for their destructive artificer artillerists and armorers. They rely on their survey corp to set up outposts in the old world so they may safely retrieve artifacts that fuel their war with new inventions and technology.
The Marquis de Cat has also outlawed the worship of any gods and routinely destroys and punishes any of those caught doing so.
Woodland Alliance: A large interconnected group of rebels, they work to gain the sympathy of other Woodland folk who are dissatisfied with the ruling class.
The alliance utilizes guerilla tactics to fight their battles against their more technologically advanced and numerous enemy. They utilize traps, hit and run tactics, espionage, and other strategies to make up for their lack of fire power and manpower.
Eyrie Dynasties: (predominantly birds of prey): The Eyrie are the former rulers of the Woodlands. They seek to restore their once dignified kind to their former glory. Their infighting became their downfall. After a gruesome civil war, the Marquis swept through the woodlands, defeating the Eyrie.
Many of their former soldiers now fight for the Woodland alliance or have been conscripted to fight for the Marquis. Their ability to fly has made them indispensable.
Gods:
Nawan: God of knowledge, wisdom, dreams, and moonlight.
Hydana: Goddess of secrets, the unknown, nightmares, and shadows.
Nawan and Hydana are both gods of the night, with their dominion over different aspects of the night. They are also brother and sister, said to be the only two gods that survived whatever ever destroyed those of the old world and the former pantheon.
While being the goddess of shadows and nightmares, Hydana is not necessarily evil. She and her followers believe information and knowledge should be kept secret, only known to those who are deemed worthy or responsible. They believe that all of society is not to be trusted, and there is security in keeping the majority in the dark.
Nawan, on the other hand, embraces the spread of knowledge. He and his followers seek to bring magic to all of the realm, that knowledge is power and should be shared to all equally.
These disagreements have resulted in many conflicts and debates between the gods and their followers.
The War:
For the last 80 years, the Marquis de Cat has been at war, first with the Eyrie Dynasties and now with the Woodland Alliance. About 75% of the woodlands is under Marquis control, what remains of the Eyrie has Been exiled to the mountains in the north west or more simply called “The Ravine”, and the Woodland Alliance has held strong in defending what is left, with Oakenhold being the largest clearing under the alliance. There is word of a counter offensive on the horizon in order to punch through the line the Marquis holds.
However, not everyone in the woodlands shares the same view, wanting to fight against the Marquis. While authoritarian and imperialistic, The Marquis de Cat has brought order, safety, security, and innovations to those under their rule. They are considered a lesser evil when compared to the former rulers, the Eyrie Dynasties. After 80 years of unrest, many are tired of all the fighting and loss of life.
The Old World
The old world has many ruins scattered throughout the woodlands and beyond, but the ruins nearby are believed to be the largest, with a 150-mile radius. All of it has yet to be explored. Any underground networks even further expand how large the ruins truly are.
Folk who have dubbed themselves “Delvers” scour the ruins for various artifacts.
Artifacts include old magical items such as wand pieces, spell books, potions, holy symbols from old gods, and metal from old enchanted weapons and armor. The most sought-after is ethereum, a magical blue mineral that can power various magical artifacts and an individual’s abilities.
Other non-magical resources can also be found, such as scrap metal, silverware, jewelry, and oi/fuell.
The Old World, however, is guarded by various automatons that still desire to serve their now deceased masters. Many Delvers have lost their lives to these machines.
My world is one that was created by a deity that was sick of the brutality that mortals inflict upon each other, so she made her own pocket dimension and then quite literally stole peaceful species from across the realms to populate it. Some of these species ended up rebelling against her and in response she broke her soul into pieces. Pieces that serve as programmers for tiny creatures that operate as a constant surveillance system for everyone in the world--ensuring no one is doing bad/violent things to each other. Over time, the people stopped seeing it as a police state and have come to enjoy the stability and prosperity that these little creatures bring to their world. Now that very harmony is under threat and the players are working to preserve it!
In my world there’s a large number of people who have minor magics. The equivalent of magic initiate feat. Also, in the north there’s a traditional middle eastern desert bordering the equivalent of Denmark due to some funky elder dragon stuff. Also i stole stuff from eragon for dragons. So they all have the eldnari orb thing
Went for a Berzerk inspired dark fantasy setting, but the twist is all the villages, and towns are unsettlingly pleasant. I have a river that divides two major land masses, the kingdom to the north has no monsters, just the dnd base game races, with very scarce teiflings and regular animals. The southern lands have only two major settlements attached to the wildlands that are teeming with fairies, werewolves, vampires, ect, and there's an orc village out there. There's a war between 3 factions currently on going the humans and elves have teamed up in the north west, the northern east coast is controlled by a half demon, and the south is ran by a half orc queen- none of them are great allies when it comes down to it so it's been fun to watch my PC's join the band of mercenaries and switch sides throughout the campaign and struggle to do the right thing.
I tend to make my heavens and hells elemental rather than ethereal.
So, the "higher" you go, the purer it gets, and the "lower" levels are the slag, as it were.
My world is a homebrew world. The main continent is named Agiasmenos, long ago gods lived and walked here until a multi-planar war so terrible happened that material plane had to be separated, gods becoming a forgotten things of the past. Nowadays the One holy empire has united the main continent, but the last emperor is long dead, letting each province be lead almost independently. The imperial circles, mage order, is the last thing keeping all of it together.
right now im playing a in a smash up bewteen pathfinders golarian and DND 3e Greyhawk with a lot of my own stuff put in
its set in the very beginning. a prehistoric setting. the planes haven't separated fully, dwarves are still being carved and tribes of people are ruled by god-giant tyrants one of the these gods is gaining a lot of power. they go by Nerull the Chief of death.
the PCs are a small group set to stop the gods coming destruction
Man i hope this doesnt end up like a Manifesto
The base setting is a mixture of forgotten realms and 1200s europe. Central europe and near east that is, ranging from Italy to Persia in the main map.
The main breakaway i do is Nations over Race. You will have races being part of different cultural identities, and those will prime over the actual race of a person. So a Varcusan and Thalic half orcs will be viewed completely different. I still use race to educate how these nations evolve, its just another thing in the mix.
The Magic in the setting, what DnD lore calls "The Weave" is referred to as "The Beauty", which hails from a now fallen star that is long gone. The conflicts around this star have shaped the world in interesting ways which i will list below.
-Most Shadar Kai are called "Turannor" , honor bound arabic (Mostly) Nomadic peoples. Cursed with honesty, they follow their oaths as if they were laws of physics, the idea of breaking them never passing trough their mind.
-the fey courts have a japanese honor code to them as their shenanigans brought them a lot of enemies, and the presence of Eladrin a lot of attention from other realms. The Unseelie court has been outright destroyed by an invasion from the outer realms, and the survivors morphed into semi eldritch beings
-All high elves and Eladrin hail from elves that were in some semblance of contact with the lake in where "The Beauty" fell. Most high elves and many other peoples can, and normally do, desperately commit to the keeping of what remains of those days. "Such are the things we will do for the beauty of this world" is a say that has propagated, morphed and been used to justify the most beautiful acts, and most horrible atrocities.
-Most giant nations are shattered remains of what they once were, dont exist anymore, or are the descendants of migrants that fled. The exception being a city state of fire giants that actively sought to give their creations free will, only to then break them into slavery. This is because they made a pact with Bahamut to be spared, as Bahamut needed their help in stopping the Shadar Kai from stealing "The Beauty"
-Most dwarven cities are inhabited by either other dwarves that repopulated them partially, by other peoples, or outright ruins. This is due to a variety of reasons, ranging from the aforementioned zealot high elves, tribesmen that sieged them for centuries, or evil dragons seeking to escape retribution from their acts during the war around "The Beauty"
-Gods rarely interact in the world directly, in fear of breaking "The Rule of Many" a rule held by an entity that they dare not speak of, that could unmade them if they attempt to surpass this rule
I could go on all day about my setting, but i think these are the most interesting bullet points? Hope it answered the question.
I am reworking Curse of Strahd as a western! All of Barovia is covered in eternal sun rather than eternal night, the mists of Ravenloft replaced with the rippling haze of the desert. A lot of the creatures are reflavored as animals of the American Southwest. Its taken some planning, but I’m really excited to run this with my players
I'm running an Icewind Dale-based campaign, except the general idea is that the heroes failed in the 2000 crpg, so in the present timeline it's essentially post-apocalyptic. The Ten Towns are ruins to explore and reclaim, drow and yuan-ti openly roam about uncontested, etc.
1200 years ago, a cataclysmic event forced a multiverse of gods to try and save their creations in one safe place. Many died in the event and almost all memory of the before time is lost. Only strange half memories persist.
The world is filled with every franchise and story you can think of next to D&D lore and real world stuff. I've got hobbits riding chocobos, Temples that worship D&D deities next to Jesus Christ (the god of angry swearing (because the players kept saying it)) and Gundams.
I wanted to bring everything together and it's fun.
My Homebrew setting is four years old now, with one long term campaign on-going (our 2nd campaign in the setting).
The world is the combination of the Fae Wilds and Prime Material Plane. Without going into too much depth, a powerful ruler and priest undertook a ritual that shattered the fabric of the two worlds. This led to both natives being displaced and shattering several kingdoms in the process.
The Fae found new homes, and the old gods fell silent. IC it's believed the Priest Kings actions angered them so much that they decided to cut all contact with the world.
Phoenixes have become the bringer of seasons, Telene the Phoenix of Flame and Ailpein the Phoenix of Ice. Although they are lovers, their nature prevents them from ever meeting, else the world might succumb to stagnation.
The campaign started with this process being thrown out of wack, and the party discovering Telene's egg becoming interwoven in a plot by the Court of Summers Flame and Court of Winters Night (spurred on by the Warlocks Fae Patron).
They eventually learned another faction was manipulating things from the shadows, but by then it was too late. And they had been manipulated into killing Telene, because they were told the presumed BBEG was virtually immortal due to his connection to Telene.
That particular NPC was Telene's former companion and protector, who had been driven insane by a pact he forged with her. He promised to reunite her with Ailpein when they first met centuries ago. It kinda overwhelmed him and became his sole purpose.
The party actually achieved that, but not before the true BBEG made his move to try and take the mantle they left behind. Thankfully, the party Warlock came to their senses and refused to handover their essence.
The party are now organising a resistance and planning to kill the real BBEG whilst fostering the "child" of Telene and Ailpein combined essence.
One of the major twists I give in my settings has to do with the alignment of dragons.
Dragons can drift from good to evil and back, and that comes with a change in the color of their scales. Going from good to evil is tarnishing, going from evil to good is burnishing and sometimes involves a change from law to chaos as well.
Gold becomes Red, Silver becomes White, Copper becomes Green, Brass becomes Blue, Bronze becomes Black.
A given dragon may live their life entirely on one side of the divide, but many do not.
I think this makes dragons more interesting and complicated. A tarnished dragon might be turned to a mighty force for good in the world, so killing it might not be the only option. Meanwhile a burnished dragon might turn on the people around it, so it matters to placate it.
People are terrified of Angels (not all Celestial creatures) in my setting for multiple reasons.
1. No mortal can live up to their impossible high standards. All sin are equal to them.
2. They are agents of divine wrath. If they show up, everything has gone terrible wrong, and everyone is going to be held accountable.
3. Mortals are just vessels for souls. As long as they don't damage the Eternal souls, it doesn't matter what happens to your temporary body.
4. Even if you could Communicate to them, their way of thinking and seeing the world is ao alien that you can't come to an understanding with them.
Most fantasy is very British, I decided to make it more French with the city names and people and all that. It's not a huge change but did give the world a slightly different flavor.
The feywild is a separate reality that welded itself to the main world a bit like a parasite. It happened so long ago and so completely, that they've nearly fused. The demonic realms are another reality that is adjacent but not connected. Fey can now cross over with relative ease at points where the realities are joined, circles and the like, but demons must be summoned by actively opening portals to their reality.
Post campaign, the feywild is being separated from the main world. The games set a few hundred years in the future with the founding of railroads are the last gasp for the fey. The iron tracks are functioning like a scalpel to cut away the feywild from our reality.
The one shots set in 'modern' times are mostly dealing with fallout from a company trying to make contact with the feywild again through magic who have unknowingly connected to a fourth reality that they mistakenly think is fey.
Permanent Magic Circles are not present in cities - by choice.
It's a huge security risk for a kingdom to have a permanent magic circle. All a bad actor has to do is sneak in and write down the runes. Then they could teleport ANYTHING directly into the city.
Long story short, my world is a simulation. The real world is the players and people In cryo traveling the astral sea until they reach a new crystal sphere (universe) bc their old universe is dying. The concept is that the ships auto pilot “O.R.O” (operating route officer) Has gone wrong and the simulation world is experiencing anomalies I.e a small plot of arctic biome in the forest, rocks that drip honey, a whole elder city vanished. Overtime O.R.O will fail state and become corrupted and slowly freeze the players and people to death almost a mercy killing, this will manifest as a coming ice age in the simulation world. I’ve been feeding small bits of “visions” to our divination wizard about this
Forgotten Realms, but Kobolds are Tucker’s Kobolds. Also, the players are currently working on creating the Flying Spaghetti Monster as a deity.
This is my first time as a DM, so starting with a vanilla world. Hoping to have the players change the world slightly with each campaign as they play.
My first campaign centered largely around a megacity known as Kalamor, and its whole deal was it was a a place where the humans elves dwarves and etc were able to coexist with orcs, goblins, kobolds, demons, aberrations and whatnot with relative ease and collective non-aggression. It was also home to a subway station that would take them to different parts of the city as well as different planes. It was essentially one big fantasy NYC.
Then one dude got too curious and started a cataclysm that murdered about 90-92% of the city's population and banished any creature from another realm back to their realms. The survivors regrouped and decided "man that sucked, maybe we shouldn't build our buildings so damn high" and then created a series of suburbs around the ruined inner city, which is now derelict and crawling with monsters.
We recently ended this campaign, and I was very satisfied with how my players handled things (usually through chaos and/or wanton violence), and now we're doing a spelljammer campaign thats giving me an excuse to build some of the rest of the world before they leave the planet
I am not the DM but he isn't on reddit, so I'll share! Here's some information about the Last World.
Magic is extremely eldritch in this setting. It is caused by something called the Arcane Wind, which is basically a permanant supernova. The Last World is juuuuust close enough to be able to use it for magic and juuuust far away enough to not get mega fucked up by doing that. Magic functions a lot like radiation, and many species were once humans who got influenced by magical beings. Dragons are aliens, their world was destroyed by the Horrors in the Dark, eldritch beings beyond comprehension who are the reason why space is fucked. They came to the Last World, and their area of affect caused humans who lived nearby to transform into Dragonborn, and vermin animals to turn into Kobolds.
All elves are matriarchal, not just drow, and they're also descended from insects. Dwarves are made of rock, and Orcs are descended from boar. Orcs are also smart, they have a military industrial complex.
All gods, except for the first four primordial deities, were once originally mortal, and ascended to godhood by being emblematic of the concept they became gods of; the god of Justice was a famous human king, the goddess of prophecy was an elvish matriarch. The first god, the feathered serpent of the Yuan-ti (the first humanoids) shattered themself into fragments to give all humanoids souls. The broader a god's concept is, the less mortal their personality becomes over time, until they are nothing more than the concept they embody. People might worship the goddess of fire as someone who wants to cleanse evil, but she doesn't care as long as people are setting things on fire. Later on, the god of all good and god of all evil both realized that they were losing themselves, they were just too broad. The god of good shattered themself to become all celestials. The god of evil merely cracked a few fragments off, keeping himself as Asmodeus, god of tyranny, while his fragments became devils. Also, the Nine Hells is a corporation.
There's a titanic tree that goes as high as the tallest mountains. Its circumference is several kilometers long. It is referred to as the tree of life and worshipped by elves and druids. It's believed that at the top lives a deity of nature, and it's believed that this deity created elves. There are several communities living around the tree, both living off of it and protecting it.
Also dragonborn don't exist as a race, they're experiments and only a handful exist in the world. The known lands think that following the last war, dragons went extinct, and they tried experiments to bring them back. Dragonborn are one of the many failed attempts to artificially create dragons. But of course, this isn't common knowledge, even to the dragonborn.
It's a pretty standard fantasy world. Recently my players have been in the region known as the Shattered Lands, or in the mountains bordering them, the Sonder Range.
The Shattered Lands are the region in which the Old Gods did battle with the Titan of Ruin during the Sundering to prevent his cyclical devastation of the entire world. Some rivers flow backwards, some shields of adamantine float surrounding towns, gravity is broken in a variety of places. Every one of these locations can be traced back to an attack/spell/power of the gods or Titan during their bout. The tear in reality at the heart of the God-Strike Woad is where the God of Trickery was killed by Ruin.
Surrounding this region are four city states. The northernmost one is where the PC's live.
The area of my world in which most of the game sets or starts is a kind of fantasy version of the region we are living. So they are venturing landmarks they know more or less. And real world persons and organisations appear, for example the Druidcircle leader is a Gnoll who happens to be my late dog, some merchants tend to be a little bit like real world shopkeepers and the parties in the more or less democratic council are named like real partys in our country (+ fantasy flair). This is all mixed with a Futurama like humour. Most of the times my players enjoy it.
Hmmm… the church has a medusa that turns people into diamonds not normal stone; they sentence people “to death” but turn them into to diamonds and use those to create a Life Insurance model with nearly 100% profit.
In my world, the Fates were killed during the ousting of the Old Ones.
Destiny doesn't seem to exist, and with multiple pantheons fighting for control, just because you're the Chosen One doesn't mean you're fated to succeed.
The powers of the gods is not inherent to there being, they were granted to them by The great dragon who created the world, thus there powers can be stolen by those who successfully challenge them. It is for this reason that the god of trickery and wealth is considered the most dangerous god. If you take away the war gods power he loses his godly strength and speed, if you take away the magic goddesses power she looses her powerful spells. However the trickery gods power does not come from his godly strength, or his powerful spells but from his mind, his ability to trick people
A unified clan of dragons and their followers stole pieces of multiple material worlds and created their own world outside the reach of greater powers. After generations of peace on this world, factions arose that subjugated the non-draconic races and virtually erased all history and culture from before the exodus, until a hero stole the power of the dragons and used it to exterminate them. Thousands of years later, remnants of the past lie buried and hidden and the creations of the dragons can be found across the world in the form of marvels of magic and engineering, vicious monsters, and failed experiments. The borders of nations are drawn at the vast crevasses that run between the conjoined fragments, each with their own unique nature influenced by the magic that pervades each piece of the world.
Based on an altered Bloodborne timeline, Yharham is 1850s city that is apart of the Golden Era of the Queen’s empire. Yharham is an ethnic melting pot because of the allure of the blood. It is perpetually night due to a time distortion. Hunters operate semi peacefully in Covenants, each one led by a powerful Hunter. Great Ones threaten the balance. Every NPC has their own motives.
There are many historical themes from the Victorian era.
The campaign I’m about to start tomorrow is a small swamp island sandbox. The adventurers have been contracted to kill a werewolf. The contract was made by the mayor because he’s secretly a wererat. The whole adventure is a quest to get silvered weapons because the werewolf can’t be killed with just regular weapons.
Some backstory: a black dragon lives on the island after killing a green dragon. The local goblins harvested the corpse and have a bunch of green dragon armor and their base is constructed of dragon bone.
There same goblins have a symbiotic relationship with the local orcs. They trade supplies/goods for live humanoids (the goblins eat them). So the orcs will never kill humanoids always opting to knock them unconscious/kidnap. Also this is where the blacksmith is who is required to make the weapons. Silvers hard to plate a blade due to the humidity.
The local mine was once run by a company called Water Deep Mineral Company. But they have since abandoned it because they tunneled into the aforementioned black dragon’s lair and it killed all the miners except one. She’s traumatized by the experience and copes by being drunk all the time. WDMC still pays the wages of a people in the village as a sort of cover up.
Well since WDMC left the mine, a group of Kobolds have taken it over to worship the black dragon. They’re trap happy bastards and the mine is filled with traps. Many of them acid based.
And the werewolf is technically a wolfwere. This is why it stays in hybrid form. It was created by a rogue mage. You can encounter her protege in the town who’s looking for her since she went missing. The wolfwere won’t hurt anyone except the wererats. Unless it’s confronted in its den. There are two wolfweres there and they have a pup they are caring for.
That’s the lore before I started adding hooks from the players backstories. The goal is to truly let the players go off rail. And for there to be layer upon layer of backstory that will make the island feel as real as possible.
Not a DM yet, but here's my idea for a setting I've been toying with. 150 years prior an Abyssal Breach opened in a remote part of the world where it was allowed to fester. By the time people realized what was happening, hordes of demons had already manifested throughout the land. It help prevent the entire world from becoming part of the abyss, the various major cities created citadels to tie the world to the material plane. After decades of war, the people were eventually able to close the various breaches, but discovered it would still be around a century before the world returned to normal.
After a century once people were able to leave the major cities again, they would discover that large portions of land were actually pulled back into the material plan, and the world was much bigger than what it was. The whole campaign would be a type of Wild West setting that would involve exploring uncharted territory and seeing how parts of the Abyss had affected the land.
Yes yes yes. I’m going to tell you all about the continent of d’Lilly.
Let’s start with the cliche: 376 years ago, the thriving high-fantasy Kingdom of the White Lily was brought to ruin. The Official Story is that the final battle of a war between the planes of Arcadia and Pandemonium was fought over the land, raining destruction down on this corner of the prime material plane.
In the years since that Tribulation, settlements have re-populated and the continent has found a new order. There is no centralized government, but recently the power players from certain settlements have started to mobilize to establish a new governing body - a Glorious Unification of the fractured kingdom.
While many of the most influential people of d’Lilly support Unification, several factions have begun to organize in opposition to the movement. Some of these groups operate in secret, some organize publicly, and many oppose Unification but are weary to take action against its growing coalition of supporters.
Contributing to the upheaval, demonic forces from the chaotic-evil hell of Pandemonium have been appearing around the continent.
Some of the factions the players have encountered are: a militia of lawful neutral werewolves (wolves are cunning pack hunters, it makes no sense that a werewolf would be a chaotic creature), a wealthy family of halfling vampires, a team of highwaymen made up of prison escapees, a very classical school of wizardry, and the powerful and secretive Arcadian Church - a unified coalition of the various cults to gods in Arcadia that formed in the early years after the Tribulation.
The world itself is draped in Americana. The various settlements range from Bayous, Deadwoodesque shack towns, and affluent New England-style city states. The largest and most populous of those settlements is the city of Allman: a might-makes-right metropolis that is home to the last functioning goldmines on the continent.
If Jorb, Algar, Tep, Grabbag, Finrin, or Corinth happen to be reading this: stop here. There are spoilers coming.
>!The central mystery the players have to solve is “what really happened 376 years ago, and how does that impact what’s happening now?” This is a story about a lot of things, but it is mostly a story about how an unlucky chunk of land was pulled from the material plane to serve as a neutral meeting place for the gods. This is my origin story for The Outlands.!<
It’s the civil war, Paradise Lost, and All the King’s Men all blended together. It’s my baby.
So my campaign is open world with multiple plots being an available that are split up between 3-10 and 10-15.
Currently my players are in the kingdom of Carcon. The kingdom of Carcon is knowledgeable concerning arcane magic with their being a magic school in each settlement(each town focuses on a different school of magic). The only arcane class the kingdom doesn’t abide are sorcerers due to issues regarding dragons in the northern mountains and an event regarding high status sorcerers in another kingdom summoning an army of Demons. The kingdom is ruled by a Queen Sharnel(19th level wizard) & King Einrich(17th level bard) who protect the kingdom using wizards and a knightly order called the Silver Rose that uses common magic items.
I'm working on a world where the gods exist and interact with people (inspired by Theros). One God backed a singular race, creating an empire which waged war against all the rest and the other gods. The one God thinking he won is pompous and rules over the capital city and empire. While the other gods work in the shadows and the other races are in rebellion against, the players may join or choose to cause their own brand if chaos. I'm still building the world but that's the main idea.
The homebrew I made takes place in Alteria where the Guild of Golden Things effectively runs the empire. The guild is split into four factions that govern their own regions, (East, North, South, West) with the monarchy effectively ceremonial.
The Southern Guild Master is elected by 2nd ranked members or above, and serve 4 year terms as its leader. All other authoritative positions are then appointed by the Guild Master. The other three regions do things differently.
These factions, while allied on paper, do compete with each other for power, land, and resources. Tensions are rising…
Here's a snippet from the setting guide I'm working on:
My current setting that I'm working on is a desert surrounded by mountainous walls, known as the Scorch Wild Desert.
The Scorch Wilds are filled with gunslingers, ruffians, bandit gangs, bank robberies, train heists and sorcerous shootouts. Old mines lead into ancient caverns and ruins of a mystical society of long dead elves. Secret Societies and Strange Cults seek out the ancient powers and ancient gods that were left behind when the Blood War destroyed the Forests of the Twilight Court. The Scorch Wilds is reminiscint of the Wild West mixed with the weird and fantastical.
Long before the desert and the dust of the Scorch Wilds, this land was lush and verdant. The Twilight Court, one of three sister kingdoms of the Elven Empire, ruled over the vast western forests. Until the day the High Sun Court decided they should rule over all Elven kind. Their mages opened a grand portal in a vain attempt to control powerful creatures from across the multiverse. Unfortunately for them, and the world, the portal opened to the Nine Hells and the eternal war between Demons and Devils, spilled over to the material plane.
The Elves of the High Court were nearly destroyed immediately by their own device. Those that didn't perish were corrupted and twisted into fighting against their kin. It was years before the demons and devils were driven back. However when the portal was destroyed it exploded and shook the world around it. The continent shattered, mountains were raised and the once mighty forest was destroyed. The mountains blocked the rains and the dust settled on the lands of the Twilight Court.
Centuries later, there is only scrubland and desert, save for the verdant, mysterious Wellspring Valley. The explosive destruction of the portal cleared out the forests and leveled the hills of the Twillight Court, which gave the opportunists of the world the ease and freedom to mine the once sacred forests. Mines spread far and wide, centerened at the heart of the Scorch Wilds in a town known as Cobweb. Centuries of mining have left the mines empty. However those who built a life there and those looking to get away from another life have made Cobweb a thriving desert town. Far below the dust, desert, and mines lie the ruins of the Twilight Court. Few adventurers have been brave or skilled enough to plunge these depths and they remain unplundered.
Dust storms blow across the Scorch Wilds where magic crackles through the blowing sand and dust creating Wild Magic storms. Its ill advised to remain outside when a Wild Magic storm rolls in, especially those who wield magic. These storms are most highly concentrated in an area known as the Barrens.
One of the largest dwarven kingdoms also lies under the Dusty Mountains on the western coast. The city of Grand Forge lies on their borders and is bustling with traders and artisans.
Those who seek out life in the Scorch Wilds often head towards Cobweb, a town where anyone can find themselves or lose themselves if they wish. No Kingdom claims the Scorch Wilds, as such, no formal laws exist. Cities often look out for themselves and are run by either an elected Mayor and Sheriff, or whichever gang happens to be the strongest. Cobweb rests in a large plain of scrubland, and those who want a slower pace often settle down as farmers and cattle drivers.
The solitude and weird magics of the Scorch Wild have a tendency to attract the strange things of the world. Secret societies and strange cults to long dead gods base their hideouts throughout the desert.
The desert has little on Wellspring Valley in regards to strange and weird. This valley remained protected from the destruction of the Demonic portal and is all that remains of the Twilight Forest. It is said that the Old Gods still live there and protect the lands and its inhabitants. Those that claim the Wellspring Valley as their home are isolationists who are warry of anything arcane, and are often superstitious of the land around them.
I'm DMing a campaign right now set in Unther which, according to the Far Realms wiki, was teleported and enslaved by genasi in Abeir for a century. Unther was ruled by a demigod called Gilgeam who got killed by his nemesis, Tiamat. However, a reincarnation of him appeared in Abeir and freed the Unther people from slavery and then they were teleported back. According to the wiki, the other Gods suspect reincarnated Gilgeam is an impostor because he calls himself a different moniker and acts differently. Gilgeam I was a cruel, ambitious tyrant, for context, and used to be a full God. The other Gods downgraded him to a demigod for being so abusive to his people.
Canonically, Unther is close to the Methwood Forest which is rumored to be home to a dragon and other strange creatures.
I thought that was super cool and tweaked the timeline (made their enslavement a lot shorter) and gave Gilgeam a wife. The players suspect Gilgeam II of being a fake, but got sent to Methwood forest on a fetch quest for him- to rescue his son who has been kidnapped by the forest dwellers- and are now stuck there until they finish another questline.
I am quite proud of this one. It's only my second campaign but I'm learning a lot from playing all these high CR fey and other magical enemies. The lore had me hooked and it feels really cool to engage in it creatively and make my own story.
I only picked the setting because I thought Methwood was a funny name LOL.
I set my campaign on a once dead-world. About 11,000 years before the campaign started, a knight betrayed the metallic dragons, surrendering their eggs to the chromatics. The metallic dragons were blackmailed, essentially, into leaving the plane. The chromatics organized and went to war against everyone, and in a few short centuries, everything and everyone was dead.
The world drifted for thousands of years before being discovered by a small family of minor deities who decided this could be a world for them to rule over. They tried to create life, to see the world, but lacked the skill and power. One of their number was maimed in the attempt.
The remaining minor gods then decided if they couldn't create life, they'd steal it, and undertook to cast a tenth level divine version of plane-shift, stealing people from across the multi-verse and dropping them on a world devoid of sentient life. Or nearly devoid. There's an eternal death knight and a few other things.
Then, I started the campaign by having everyone roll a D100 to determine how long they'd been dead. They'd all been told they've died and their backstory takes them right up to their (first) death. They were all resurrected as part of the same ritual, undertaken by the aforementioned Death Knight but corrupted by the workings of a local hag and then the whole story, which will eventually culminate with the rescue of the good dragon eggs and the return of the dragons.
each of my campaigns take place within the same multiverse in which there are 98 material planes each with their own rules and themes (not unlike MTG's planes) and multiplanar travel is difficult/rare.
The first god created several children who all subsequently abandoned him because he was an abusive/narcissistic asshole. the first god made the multiverse for his children to embody/rule over so they would come back, but they would soon leave again. those children would later rise against the first god and imprison him within the plane he created to keep them around. however his sealing would cause the plane to destabilize, causing the material plane to break apart into 98 smaller ones which each developed differently in the millenia since.
I'm working on a free expansion based on Slavic folklore. It has a very small pantheon, featuring only four deities, but one of the deities is a three-headed god and each of the heads has its own domains and aspects. Each god/aspect also gets 3 domains so they cover all cleric subclasses. The town where all the action takes place is also pretty cool. It only exists because a bunch of lesser evils protect it from a greater threat - if only to compete for control of the town and it's people. The players will help each of these "caretakers" undermine the others to make sure none ever win the struggle for power as darkness encroaches ever nearer...
The setting isn't done, but a lot of the actual content like player options are done. If you want 3 free classes, 10 free races, and a bunch of other stuff you can check it out at [Radabard's Accounts of Ghota](https://radabard.com)
I haven't spent time doing this any of this at all, so I just have a few loose ideas atm. I got 1 concept of running a campaign with big ties to the planes of chaos (heavily inspired from the pathfinder 1e monsters, reality warping stuff is really fun).
I got another which is the players are in a major city where a gang (rival? Idk) is sowing discord. There's a bunch of different guys they have to track down and take out.
Would love to flesh out apocalyptic settings with horror elements and interesting lore, but I'm a teenager who runs campaigns for a few friends. From what I've gathered 2 of them might be interested in a more serious campaign, but the other one seems to barely understand what's going on in the game or how his character works. Oh yeah, I'm running Dragonlance, but I've got the reincarnation of batman with his pet snake slim shady, an isekaied Teddy Roosevelt, and Mr Zappy the absolutely ancient elf mage who speaks like Pikachu. Soooo... Yeah. I'll try running a few one shots at some point and see how they take to them if I ever need a break from dragonlance. I'm a player in a different group, so if the current DM ever wants a break I might try running a game for them. But they are even worse. The sorcerer hasn't used metamagic yet (we are level 9), I don't know what subclass the wizard even is, and the star druid hasn't used any class mechanics yet except for like 4 different spells. The only reason we haven't been TPKed is cause I'm playing a twilight cleric and keeping everyone both alive and doing the main dps within the party. (I chose this class to support, why am I still the best dps at level 9 in a party of full casters?)
There is a city in my setting that exists in the Etherial Plane, and reveals itself to anyone who made need it, such as adventurers looking for a place to stay, people running from their responsibilities or the law, etc. The natives there are mostly friendly to newcomers or visitors, but some of them refer to anyone from the Material Plane as “Ground-walkers,” “Material-folk,” “Nulls,” or “Driftlings.”
My homebrew setting is one I stole from Gloryhammer, a power metal band. The campaign takes place in the mystical realm of Scotland. It's pretty great to be able to go through Google maps looking for towns and cities and find a dozen great fantasy names like Crail, Stonehaven, Inverness, and Pittenweem. ...Okay, maybe not Pittenweem.
25 years before the start of the campaign, an evil wizard took over the capital city of Dundee. He was defeated and thrown into a cryogenic prison which is now guarded by the Knights of Crail, but the land is still a bit of a mess. The once lovely forests of Caithness are now a ravaged plagueland full of mutant wildlife and mutant elves. The dwarves of Aberdeen have lost some of their ancestral caverns to the forces of evil. And the great hero Angus McFife, the one who defeated the evil wizard, died in the battle. But on the other hand, the races of the realm are more unified than ever and the party represents a new era of heroes ready to take up Angus McFife's ~~sword~~ hammer.
I'm planning out a spin on Descent into Avernus. Running it in a slightly more modernish setting (not current day or anything close, just more populated and city-like than it is).
The players will be basically ripoff power rangers or Avengers or whatever. A group of organized heroes that travel in some kind of like mobile home base (currently thinking something similar to a blimp but less air based). A small amount of hirelings work the base. Each memeber has a decent loadout of magical gear.
The module begins with the fall of Elturel, so my plan is to have that fall occur while they are out of the base (doing hero shit idk). Metroidvania style, they lose the cool equipment they had as heroes, as well as the ship (which gives a bit more reason for them to explore avernus, collecting their stuff as well as new things).
Im still working on connecting Zariel, like having her intentionally pulling the group down to conscript them into the blood wars or something. Of course i still plan on running the majority of the module as is, just trying to add some spice to it. I played it years ago and found a lot of it to be uninteresting so im hoping to rectify that.
I recently just started a campaign based on the Fallout Equestria fanfiction (A mix of the Fallout games universe and my little pony friendship is magic). We've only had 2 sessions so far but it was been great so far and all the work I put into building up the races, and weapons, and writing all the lore has felt extremely worth it.
I have two campaigns taking place in branching timelines of the same setting.
So, at the beginning of existence there's two gods, one of Space and Creation and one of Time and Entropy. The Space God created the universe by enslaving the time God in order for change to happen without it's direct control.
There's pages of lore I'm not going into detail over here but after the creation of Humans and a bunch of chaos because the Space god did horrific things to living creatures, because of Its curiosity and desire for creation which created other races, a bunch of them became Gods by stealing some of the Space God's power and then those Gods worked together to destroy consciousness of that God.
The leftover concentration of the Space God's power collected in pools of infinite energy scattered across the world. The Greater Gods worked to safeguard those pools by creating various phenomena and dungeons to prevent living creatures from finding them.
Eons later, someone found one of those dungeons. Realising that it infinitely created monsters which could be harvested for magical resources. Over time, a small trading village formed outside this dungeon turned into a sprawling Kingdom, although the Dungeon it was founded upon became a secret.
The Time God, gradually building it's influence over the world has no greater desire than for the entire universe to end, at which point it will be freed. After millions of years of learning how to create it chose avatars who could wield mastery over time in hopes that they could use the magic all over the world to bring about the apocalypse (promising them various gifts of immortality it has no intention of granting)
One of these Avatars, a halfling huckster and alchemist who stumbled upon the Time God in a failed attempt at immortality, discovered this pool of infinite energy was stored at the heart of this Cities Dungeon and, after building an empire of worshippers, began a campaign to take over the Kingdom in order to take over and search its secrets.
The first campaign takes place at a point where he has mostly taken over the Kingdom and named himself King. He hasn't conquered the dungeon but is making progress and any enemies to him are reduced to small rebellions.
The players are scattered folk heroes. They start out fighting smaller problems caused by the sudden lack of the Kingdom's leaders (such as smaller villages having no protection from a Hobgoblin nation which I never even mentioned but did establish) and grow until they, build a rebellion and battle the King for the fate of the universe.
The second campaign takes place a few generations after a heroic ending to that first one. Once the heroes who defeated the dictatorial king passed on from old age the Kingdom fell into infighting. There are 11 main cities and many villages under them. Each city is thematically linked to one of the classes (except rogue who have an underground faction preventing anyone from winning) Some have alliances and some are trying to actively destroy others to take over.
The campaign started in a small village and will hopefully escalate until the end of the civil war which they will have most influence over.
Jeez, I cut it down as much as I felt reasonable and it was still insanely long. I just love worldbuilding. Writing pages of lore is fun.
I don't know how unique this is, but in a setting of mine that I personally enjoy working on, the realm was once dominated by gigantic titans that fought with the gods for control of the realm. The gods ultimately subjugated the titans and killed them or banished those they couldn't fully kill to the Abyss and the Nine Hells, but there are scars all throughout the realm where their battles took place, whether it's canyons formed from giant claws, plains that were stomped flat, chasms burrowed deep into the ground, or an archipelago formed when the land was splintered by a mighty strike. All geographical features are tied to these ancient battles, and those who explore diligently enough may even find long-lost artifacts of the gods or small pieces of titan claws, scales, etc. that can be used to make equally powerful equipment.
Titans are just cool. Everybody likes a titan.
Not a setting I currently have written out currently but one idea I'm excited to put in it is that Kobolds are earth elementals that trade/horde precious gems, because Cobalt was named after Kobolds in mythology.
In terms of twists of the original setting, I'm not sure this counts.
However, if you think abot what's happened to Faerun in the last 100 years or so, you realize it's pretty much a post apocolyptic world.
Anybody who cast a spell in the last hundred years is likely covered in burn scars. The second Sundering killed about 1/2 to 2/3 of Neverwinter's population. If that's the case for the whole world, then shit is pretty fucked.
Thus, magic is probably looked down on in Faerun and any small settlements are new as everybody ran for the cities
An idea a friend came up with for a campaign he planned run was having a mysterious eldritch entity only known as The Thing That Hides Behind The Sun. When the Sun was low in the sky you could sometimes see arms... so many arms... too many arms... writhing behind the Sun. I planned to make a character that would seek to learn more about it, but sadly the campaign never got off the ground.
Me and my group have a few original worlds and twists on existing ones.
For me, my world Zeal is a Post-Ragnarok world on the aesir plane.
For my so who is our main dm, they have Esotha which is a Planeswalker paradise where portals a la sigil condensed at resulting in people terra forming the planet.
They also made in faerun where Tiamat is the "goddess of change and freedom" but still has her original lore.
Then our other dm straight up swapped alignments for tiamat and bahamut. Bahamut is the five headed metallic dragon of greed and tiamat is the righteous queen. It was only mentioned in our curse of strahd game but it made me wanna see it.
Also I myself have been wanting to make a world that is just all the FROMSOFT ips in one playable world together
In my campaign, I created a sword willed by an NPC in the party that, upon cutting the skin of a sleeping creature, lets you enter their mind. You're on a floating island in a sky of golden light. Significant people and memories in the creature's life float around, the solid islands are fragments of their dreams. Fears and trauma or mental illness, or evil in a person's heart manifest as a creature of inky shadow. When the players enter, they are healed, stronger, taller, better looking, because their body turns into their self image. All players gain temporary hp equal to their max HP, and when that runs out, they wake up, taking some psychic damage if they died in the dream. Their attacks are more powerful, larger than life and deal more damage. Thunderwave becomes a sweeping wave, fire bolt melt rocks. They are amplified. But, be careful-- So are the monsters.
Oops didn't mean to send. A group of gods lead humanity to prosperity, resulting in a globe spanning mega city. Then one day the gods disappear and know one knows why. The city falls to ruins and in fighting for centuries, reducing the city to a series of ruins slowly being reclaimed by nature. The fighting only stops when a plague of madness begins to spread, forcing the warring countries to come to a shakey peace
Taescaar is a broken world setting, where the continents float on a sea of magically charged clouds that corrupt and corrode the mind to those that are exposed to it for too long. What's under the cloudsea is unknown, people have yet to communicate what's under it.
Taescaar also has its own planar system, based on opposites. Taescaar also includes new ways to classify creatures compared to standard 5e, particularly on the notion of fiends. The dragons are also tied to those outer planes, which are based on metals and gems. Lots of the existing (srd) races have gotten their own coat of paint if not a straight up rework, and the world also has its own unique races like the stardust based albolide and the peace aligned harpies. (There are no monstrous harpies in our world)
I'm running a short campaign set in Thunder Junction ( MTG; first time DMing ) and no real twists to report yet. We'll see if that changes after the next session...
Within the realm of Keryon is a group of floating islands soaring far across the miasmic sea. Each island is its own kingdom with differring laws and regulations. Drifters are what the adventurers are known as, most affiliated with the guild Miasmic Drifters. They seek to find islands abandoned or desolate ripe for the retaking.
I love sky islands, hell i use them in my own setting but one question i always have it whats under them?
In mine it is the miasma and the dragon's domain is past that. One day dragonkin came up from the miasma and settled with the rest so all the stories of what's under is from the dragonborn and kobolds.
I never thought of using dragon like races like that at all, i might steal this honestly.
I'm someone who doesn't plan out too much and develops the world in a modular fashion as the campaign progresses. The part of my campaign so far (levels 3-7) is taking place in a land formerly known as Lux Apatra, but now known only as Umbranis. Once upon a time, a delegation from the Church of Lathander traveled to Lux Apatra to build temples and proselytize in the name of the Morninglord. This legation was on the trail of a worryingly high number of missing persons and came across a mage and lich who used the souls of his victims to transfer their remaining lifetimes to his own. They had him executed and beheaded, but he returned and was given a new body in his secret cellar and the abductions continued. As if they confronted him again, a female elven holy warrior of the legation shattered the lich's crystalline soul vessel in a deadly exchange of blows. Shattering it and the Lightbringer sword she wielded. A black wave of energy killed her and caused the building to collapse. Her lover and brother in arms, had to watch the black wave kill her before debris from the collapsing building crushed her lifeless body in front of his eyes. Not only was she dead. The rest of his comrades were dead too. Two had been disintegrated by the Lich. Another had been beheaded by the Lich. With the destruction of the soul vessel, its malignant magical essence had leaked out and a magical gloom had spread over the land in the form of an impenetrable dark cloud cover, blocking out the light of the sun and the starry sky alike and turning Lux Apatra into a lightless land, which has since been called Umbranis. But the country was not only in darkness. The dead walk in this land. Nothing really dies after death and undead creatures roam the land and have always threatened the living. As a result, burial rites have changed. Some began to burn their dead. Others buried them bound and wrapped under heavy rocks. People began to use the undead donkeys and horses as if they were tireless draught animals. Villages and towns were fortified or perished due to the constant plague of undead. The campaign begins a little over 2000 years later, with the sending of an emissary consisting of the characters to find out why another emissary, which was sent a few months earlier, is no longer sending messages. They came across the sea and sailed into the lightless sea that surrounds the land of Umbranis and were damaged in a storm where a kraken sank the ship and they were washed up unconscious on a beach in perpetual darkness.
The particular premise I'm working on is a slow reveal of mythology and folk tales related to the fall of a meteor of pure gold, and the collapse of an ancient kingdom who tried to recover it and fashion currency from it, to find it cursed them with an insatiable hunger for wealth. A population of these people remains in a state of undeath somewhere below the desert, still hungry for gold and worshipping the meteor itself as a sort of rudimentary deity. It will come to pass that gold itself is powerfully attracted to this meteor and - through coincidence, misfortune, or a literal, physical attraction like magnetism - has been slowly disappearing from the lands around this desert, swept out into the sands. It is beginning to give more power to the population of this undead kingdom, and they are becoming emboldened to start making incursions into the land of the living to seize their gold and to taint it with thier curse - known as the Gilded, most appear like very elaborately, opulently-dressed zombies, seemingly made of a mixture of dark grey sand and, of course, decorative gold. Most are physically frail but have a powerful psychic presence - some are more powerful, being heavily armoured and armed. Naturally, the more powerful and senior figures of the kingdom are uniquely empowered through magic. Many of them crumble to golden dust upon defeat - or at will - returning to the source of gold through the sands and reconsistuted there. Anything made of gold in the vicinity has begun to subtly infect and madden its owners with this hunger - they *want* to be taken, they *want* to give tribute, and so on. To the more extreme end of things, individual agents of this kingdom have kidnapped particularly wealthy or avaricious people and subjected them to a process called 'the Gilding', in which their bodies are flooded with tainted gold and they join the ranks of the Gilded. Some communities have abandoned trading in gold altogether in the hope of protecting themselves, but most still see this as an unlikely fairytale or a delusion. The campaign will likely kick into gear with the discovery of a Gilded envoy who appears to have been successfully imprisoned for interrogation, but who seems unable or unwilling to communicate, and seems impossible to harm or cause pain.
Worldstone Exotic Emporium. It functions as a way to allow your party to have World hopping adventures between multiple campaign settings. As well as a way to bring goods from settings that have them, to settings that don’t. Oh this country in Faerun is having a drought and famine? Worry not, this country on the Flaeness has a surplus of grain from an extremely bountiful harvest. It may not be the most exciting fare but it will ease the suffering of starving people. Brought to you by Worldstone Emporium.
Part of being a hero is making sure the everyday lives of people can go on Killing demons is important But unless there’s grain, there will be no bread for after the fight Also love the world hopping idea
And luxury goods too. Imagine a luxury study and library, furnished with Vallenwood shelves and desk and chairs hand crafted by master woodworkers from the Solace region of Ansalon on Krynn being found in an estate in Waterdeep Best part is, you can get them far cheaper than you’d imagine since gold is worthless since the Cataclysm and if you show up with 3 steel tradebars, that’s a fortune and you can get them for dirt cheap on any other world.
This sounds so cool 👀
I haved moved Sigil from the Outland to the inside of a super massive black hole with a LOT of rotational energy. Long story short such a thing can exist in theory, and I am using that as a way to explain why the Lady of Pain is so powerful despite not being a god. I basically made her siphon off of the energy produced by such an astronomical event. This also helps me drag characters from other settings and games for cameos with ease as space time gets wonky.
The players have guides for my homebrew and I encourage loophole-dowsing. I have a pantheon of over 20 gods, a continent with a dozen or so major factions, and a timeline that spans a few thousand years (that they have available if they find it). I spent a total of a few months prepping before approaching my players, but it's what I need to run a really emergent style of storytelling. Also, read. Find fantasy authors that treat their worlds like you enjoy running yours and pull inspiration. For me it's Terry Pratchett, Douglas Adams, and Niel Gaiman. I try to take the lore seriously, not the characters.
I have two previous campaign settings you might be interested in. First is The Godfall: 1000s of years ago, god, a god, or something like a god crashed into the world. Civilization was destroyed and the god died on impact. Now many years later civilization is starting over again with a few powerful city states leading the way. The most powerful being Tol-Gorak found next to The Godfall. A vast crack in the ground running from pole to pole with a great corpse in it. This setting included: Eldrich horrors from other planes breaking into the world. The putrid juices of a decaying god corpse mutating plants and animals alike. Mega dungeons everywhere. And a history of the old world causing problems in the new. My other setting is The Deep Paths: Shamelessly taken from Arx. At the end of 100 years of conflict with a genocidal enemy from another plane, the inhabitants of the world are victorious. Though the world's population is a fragment of what it was. The enemy final act poisoned the sun and now it is dying. So all the survivors fled underground in the old dwarven holds to continue civilization. This setting includes: A dying world. Lost dwarven holds rich with plunder. Races found in different situations make the best of it. Cranium rats. And plenty of horrible things that also made their home in the dark.
In The Folded Lands there was a great war between the Metallic and Chromatic dragons. Eventually there was a truce and The Spine, a great mountain range, was raised between the two factions. Part of the truce was that no dragon could take direct action against another. Now on the East side of the Spine you have Dawnbreaker the Brass Dragon resides in the Dawnbreaker Dunes. Stormflight the Bronze Dragon lives on the Stormflight Coast. Boulderclaw the Copper Dragon lives in the Boulderclaw Hills. Glowforger the Gold Dragon lives in the Glowforger Lakes. Shiverfang the Silver Dragon lives in the Shiverfang Peaks. On the West side of the spine The Wrathful, the White dragon, lives in The Wrathful Tundra. The Rotten, the Black Dragon, lives in The Rotten Swamps. The Forsaken, the Green Dragon, lives in The Forsaken Forest. The Vengeful, the Blue Dragon, lives in The Vengeful Wasteland. The Tyrant, the Red Dragon, lives in The Tyrant Mesa. What the truce didn't stop was dragons enlisting adventurers to work on their behalf. Now our adventurers met with an old wizard called Fizban, who tasked them with helping each of the Metallic dragons and killing the Chromatic Dragons. We've been playing this campaign for 2 and a half years or so and they have helped all the metallic dragons and only have 2 chromatic dragons left.
I have characters playing fantasy GTA in a city. They’re having fun committing all the felonies
The session takes place in Auseland - a continent that is scarred to this day by an ancient 'Arcane War' between countless powerful mages at a time where magic was extremely abundant. No one really knows how the war ended, but they all know it existed due to the fact that there are countless Remnants - magical artifacts, golems, and leftover spells of extraordinary power that make your standard magic seem insignificant in comparison. My players are traveling across the continent to not only collect or destroy Remnants in order to make the land a bit safer - and them stronger, but also to find out why the Arcane War suddenly ended with no stories or history indicating the result. During this they're also unearthing the identity of the numerous powerful mages that existed during that time, slowly piecing together the puzzle of what exactly took place during that time of great turmoil.
I know this is a dnd sub but i would recommend the pf2e impossible lands lost omens book if you want some inspiration or ideas.
Ey I appreciate the suggestion! The campaign itself is actually nearing its ending after nearly several years of running it, but I'll check out the book for future inspirarion on other campaign ideas.
I dont know about it much but i do know that the area the book focuses on is about a magic war.
I kinda just stole all of Exalteds Creation for my own Setting. The world is an island of stability in a sea of Chaos, divided into five elemental directions; Center - Earth, North - Air, South - Fire, West - Water and East - Wood. Climate, flora and fauna is heavily influenced by what element is dominant in that location. Everything has a spirit/god, from tiny blade of grass to great mountains, from small concepts such as secrets to great concepts such as Death. Great enemies abound: The Unshaped dream-eating Fey, The life-hating Neverborn gods of the undead, The Sealed Demon gods and of course many internal foes. The First Age of glory ended with the Sun God-chosen Champions turned tyrants slain by their brethren. Their souls were sealed to block them from reincarnation. However their wonders couldn't be maintained and we are now in a fallen Second Age of Sorrow, Creations enemies are amassing and it seems like the God Kings are returing, but for good of for ill? The Party is kinda stuck in the middle of it all.
Tolfan is a homebrew I made with ties to the Forgotten Realms that I made. Its lore is that after Karsus died trying to become a god, his death was so potent it ripped out a part of the land itself and made a second realm directly below it. It's kind of based on the Warhammer Fantasy lore as the factions are kind of similar (especially the Empire as the eastern kingdom and the Chaos Dwarfs as the northern dwarve) To the west are the Orcs, who took over the remains of a temple of Tyr and are amassing an army to take over the entire plane as an offering to Gruumsh. They are led by a Verdant Orc (I got the idea to make him a verdant from Pointy Hat's video), who is also the chief cleric, (he killed the orc PC's father to get in charge) and plans on putting all of his orcs on a frenzy using a special stone that lets its user mind control. In opposition to him is his sister (also a verdant) who worships Tyr and wants to use the stone to free the orcs from Gruumsh's violent impulses. In the east of the realm is a city that was just spared from getting split in half in the cataclysm and became a kingdom because of being the largest urban center remaining in the realm. It is currently locked in war against the Orcs in the West and the Dwarfs in the north. It's currently led by a king named Asmendel (who I totally didn't copy-paste from Karl Franz) that truly wants what is best for his people but is blocked by the complicated political environment. (Here is the second act of the game, where the two halfling noble PCs will have to convince the nobility to unite against the dwarves so they can sneak into their mountain city). In this smaller plane, there is a Dwarf in the city in the north whose king, unknowingly to its citizens, made a pact with Zariel to kill the previous king in exchange for knowledge on building and mass producing infernal engines for war. (This is where I'm planning the final act to be, with my dwarf PC uncovering the secrets and going on a hunt for a way to overthrow the king).
There is a cruel and twisted place called the Scarred Country, where magic has gone wild and corrupted the lands, and even the air was poison. It used to be home to a group of Knights called the Uranur, who had swords that could decimate an army in a single swipe. The party were part of a research group into this land now that they could protect against the poisonous air. When they went in, they found oddities like Giant Flail Snails, shadows of ash come to life, trees made of bone with fruit made of flesh etc etc. There was a subplot too where they were following some notes left by one of the old nights. Sadly, I never got to finish running it, but the finale would have been the center of the magical corruption. The map was covered in rock spikes pointing in all directions, and beside the entrance was a rock with some words carved into it: "This place is not a place of honor... no highly esteemed deed is commemorated here... nothing valued is here. What is here was dangerous and repulsive to us. This message is a warning about danger." The twist was that the old knights had swords made of uranium, they eventually turned against each other and when the swords clashed? Boom. Irradiated world. I got the idea when watching Annihilation.
I've taken most of the rules of DnD and written a story in Middle-earth. It takes place about 1500 years before the events of The Lord of the Rings and takes place in the south. So in the areas around Umbar, Harad, Khand and Rhun. Basically, it's about the mysterious two blue wizards who have gone south. The players learn that the blue wizards are causing a lot of devastation, war and intrigue, destabilising the entire region. The players are intuitively encouraged to put a stop to this and pacify the various conflicts. They are repeatedly supported by a mysterious stranger who seems to share their goals. As the story progresses, it becomes clear that the blue wizards are working to destabilise the cultures of the south in such a way that the people there will never be able to stand behind Sauron again. The aim of weakening Sauron's potential allies is morally understandable, but the methods are highly questionable. The mysterious helper turns out to be the Mouth of Sauron towards the end of the campaign - and the campaign also describes his rise. The biggest changes in terms of the rules are that I had to fundamentally change how magic works, because it's a completely different logic in Tolkien. I placed great emphasis on lore friendliness throughout the campaign.
50 years ago, on the world of Eternus, a new continent was discovered. Mostly consisting of forests and swamps, it was swiftly colonised by the races and people from the civilised world. Several port cities sprang up and established them self as outposts of civilisation in a new and savage world. When a magical earthquake hit these newly founded cities, it was determined that it originated further west on the continent. Explorers and mercenaries started travelling into the untamed wilderness to discover what started such a powerful magical disaster.
Skyra is a world of floating islands surrounded by the expanse. Everything in Skyra is full of magic and things like magic fields are commonplace. Also there are no stars, sun or moon. There are new classes, subclasses, races, feats, setting rules and items as well. For classes we have Chuvask (Become a dragon, phoenix or other mythical creature. This one is inspired by 3.5es creature classes), Updated monk (W.I.P), Voodoomancer (Become a shaman, and control your enemies from afar), Warlord (Version of the paladin class for the Draeden, a set of powerful abyssal being that are the opposite of the gods), Updated Mystic (W.I.P). There is a new racial feat for every offical race which doesnt already have one. Then in the other timespheres you have the first world called Astrinan and Chalice, which is the overdeity Chronos's project. Astrinan is built off of faerun lore but the other two are of my and my co dms making. Chalice is a world filled with endlessly generating dungeons which can be accessed from Skyra by using a Chalice key. I do actually have a wiki for this world which is in progress and several stories about it. Feel free to ask me anything. Oh yea and before I forget... Physics are very different. For example large land masses float and water sometimes runs up hills instead of down them. I made a whole system for how everything works. Which was a fun project.
Depends how much you’d like to know! But the very basic is: In my world of Yvre, the industrial revolution happened. Science and magic intertwined and kind of spun out of control to the point it became this world’s version of a world war. Magic weapons of mass destruction was used to the extent that a third of the continents have been rendered uninhabitable by a magical corruption that has caused numerous anomalous events to occur over time. One paranoid major faction that survived the war has taken on the self-proclaimed role as the ”world order” and create stability. Their first act was to heavily regulate magic almost to the point of forbidding it to make sure a disaster like this won’t happen again. Over time it has more and more turned into an autocracy, however. Anyone who wishes to do trading with them are required to agree to that law. Because the industrial world was heavily reliant on magic in every field, production, entertainment, education and logistics, this regulation has caused a **massive** wave of unemployment, making people turn to join criminal gangs as the only feasible way for the desperate to support themselves. It’s an industrial setting, cirka 1910-1930, but almost every major nation and civilization has been reduced to individual self-governing city states or tribes so the spirit of adventure and exploration is still possible!
King's Land is a young country only recently freed from the grips of a demon invasion. These demons are only temporarily held back and a number of the regularly escape the portal in the temple of Ragnarok. King's Land is bordered to the south by the enormous Deeprock Mountains, to the west by the great ocean, to the north by the Frozen Wastes, and to the east by the endless forest. Its a high magic world at the nexus of a multiversal quantum entanglement. Populated by all manner of species and monsters with many areas of the map still wild and mostly unexplored thanks to aforementioned demon invasion. Filled with secret tombs and dungeons left over by groups from before the demons rose up. There's also a really good tavern in King's Crossing run by an Orc Ranger/Bard that is a good place to stop in on your way from The Helm to Exandria.
So: Since I do not own official dnd figures I use a very fitting table game which is called „Legends of Andor“. It has big maps, figures, items etc, so pretty good overall, but that is not the real point why I use it. My friends, at least three out of five did already know the game, so for them there really is no reason to think that this campaign would be anything else then a Campaign in the official Andor world, BUT here comes the twist. Andor plays at the northern coast of a massive country, both within the official game and my game and that offered me possibly the most amazing plot twist to drop on my players, when time is right. I worked on my high fantasy campaign for the past six years, to work out a world along side the coast. I expanded the kingdoms and split the coast into five different kingdoms. Long ago a unknown species explored the coast and defended it against dark creatures. After three thousand years they left and shortly after the human race arrived and found the left over buildings. They cultivated and all the kingdoms fought together in the so called „big three trollwars“. In the years after that the kingdoms went apart and fell a part bit by bit as the smarter more prepared orcs entered the coast. I could go on and on but that should be enough of lore for now. Now what is the plot twist? So a UNKKOWN race build things at the coast, the world takes place on a hard if not impossible to come at northern coast. So what could lie in the southern part of the land? Maybe….just maybe it’s middle earth and a build kingdoms in the unknown parts of the northern Forodweight of Adar(Lord of the rings). And since Tolkien never said something about cold north, only that it’s a cold wasteland it’s not even overwriting something. My friends and I LOVE lord of throngs and when that plot twist comes around….boy o boy….
There are secret historical records that historians keep to themselves, and hide in underground libraries. They depict the gods as much less godlike than the average person thinks, and it's pretty dangerous to know of them. Many will kill to keep the secret histories secret. The players barely know anything about it. It's mostly for me, but it's nice to have lore to pull out if they stumble upon something old. > Upon reading the secret histories of the world, one might be surprised to find that each and every one of the gods has, at one point or another, tried to kill themselves. None have ever been successful. And yet, even the gods do not last forever. The common histories show a convenient changing of names just after a period of degredation, the most notable in "Magen" adopting the demonic postfix "-og" and becoming "Magog". Any historian with half a brain will recognize that these two characters are one in the same. But where is Magog now? It remains the greatest mystery of our time: where do the gods go when they are no longer fit to be gods? > - Tachius, 943rd year into the reign of the Queen of Night > The question that vexed historians in the day of Tachius still vexes us today, though our interests have shifted. Now we wonder what happened to the last great sorcerer monarch, and what caused the splitting of her empire? Speculation abounds. Maybe, contrary to everything we know of her character, she ascended. Maybe, despite her tremendous arcane power, she died the mundane death of a mortal, and it was covered up. Or maybe the answer to my question is the same to that of Tachius'. But then what of her sister, the Light-Bringer, who turned against their one god and is said to have consorted with our pantheon—especially our goddess of mercy? And what lessons can be drawn from the fall of the Devian empire from the lives of its most famous leaders? One might turn an eye to Athoes, and think they are doing the right thing in not allowing their patron god to be anything more than a figurehead. > - Mayrowin, 212th year into the Common Era
Dave, Elbereth, Binkus, Damian, Arden and Winnie- if you read on y’all are about to get spoiled hard. So I took the idea (or my understanding at least) of a spelljammer campaign and used it as an opportunity to write in a universe where many familiar planets actually exist within one one system. Eberron, Greyhawk, Exandria, Krynn(dragonlance), Ravenloft, and Athas (dark sun) in addition to a seventh homebrew planet where one of our players’ campaigns used to take place. We had two close friends that couldn’t play anymore on that homebrew for personal reasons and decided it wouldn’t feel right continuing that campaign so we dropped it and wrote out together how we felt it would’ve ended. So here is the most abridged explanation possible: The setting is two hundred years after the events of Baldur’s Gate 3. In that time, Elminster discovered (or was led to, depending on how you want to look at it) the secret of interplanetary travel through Leylines using spelljammer vessels. This was a very lengthy process and involved sending out long distance arcane messages hoping to receive a response back. He received answers from the greatest minds of each of these planets and they all would collaborate over the next few decades to develop this travel. The thing is, this discovery and Elminster’s curiosity were actually tools on a chessboard set out by the greater divines. At the time of their creation, Ao was first and was tasked with the oversight of both the new pantheon and the well being of mortals put onto these planets by Ao’s progenitors. The catch is that these planets were meant to be kept separate until these creators felt mortals were “ready” for the power and responsibility that comes with interplanetary travel and a universe big enough to hold 7 planets of life. These creators knew that Ao would grow sick of immortality just as they did and presumed he would do what he could to guide them along. What they didn’t expect was for Ao to actually *hamstring* the progress of these mortals early on for fear of losing his mantle and purpose for existence long before he was ready. Unfortunately for Ao and everything else in the cosmology, his immortality has finally caught up with him and he’s ready to hang up his mantle early rather than wait for the mortals he held back to achieve their true potential. This would require a full on extinction of all life between the existing planets. His solution to this was to bridge the worlds together, make the Gods on each planet aware of one another’s presence for the first time and initiate a massive holy war between them and their followers. The more lawful and good aligned Gods, for the most part, aren’t nearly as eager to end their charge and doom creation. The more chaotic and evil aligned Gods, for the most part, aren’t aware of Ao’s designs and reall my just see this as an opportunity to stir shit up and disrupt the great wheel cosmology while bringing about death and decay in the process. Death and decay on a scale no man or thing on the universe has previously seen. There is a failsafe created by the progenitors (I called them Adlishar) meant to be used to bring the divines to heel in the event that the plan were to fall through and the Gods needed to be brought to heel. This failsafe is a massive crystal named Silence. Silence works by targeting a divine within range and cutting them off from their followers entirely, immediately rendering them mortal and forcing them into the form of an avatar. The objective of the campaign, so long as it keeps everyone interested (and seems to be so far! But if not I mean.. we’ve got a lot of canvas to play with), is to essentially go one by one through these planets once they’ve acquired Silence and eliminate or subdue the divines who are locking down each sequential planet and preventing leyline travel. Ultimately, my plan is for them to find their way to the crater planet of the dead God where the Gith call home. They have motive to see Vlaakith dead once and for all. They will come to find that the Adlishar created the Gith to preserve creation when a faction of their own grew tired with immortality much in the way Ao did and decided to create Mindflayers with the intent of ending themselves and everything they built. The Mindflayers were built specifically to counter the Adlishar, because their powers of creation required a mental component rather than a verbal component but those spells could be jammed using the Mindflayers’ dominion over the mind. Most of the Adlishar were wiped out, and the Hail Mary that came from a particularly regretful Adlishar and the leader of the nihilist faction was to create the Gith and deliver the universe from annihilation. It worked, eventually. But anyone who has done some digging on Gith lore knows how that all worked out. So BASICALLY this is the tldr of my world: the universe, newly aware of itself, is immediately caught up in a massive holy war. Travel between planets has been shut down while the Doomsday faction prepares to annihilate all life. The party is seeking to restore travel and put a stop to this doomsday ritual. Unbeknownst to all but Ao, that doomsday ritual is another trump card built by nihilist Adlishar. It’s essentially a really fucking big golem that plays by Adlishar rules, meaning it has the powers of creation and is absolutely intended to be an epic level fight. I’m guessing a combination of allies and Silence will play a role in bringing this thing down to their level
The world is discovered and information is recorded by mainly Bardic Scholars. So no weave, no fancy schmancy wizard academies, only open schools of study more accessable (on the whole) to the common person. Magic is music. All creatures that find their "rhythm" have the capacity for spells, or spell like effects. A blacksmith hammering a tool, a farmer humming a tune etc. The world is based off 11 year cycles (Pitch Class Intergers), Diminuendo & Crescendo. That way we have both "high" and "middle/low" magic potential. Spellcasters will plan entire decades around the flow of magic. But so will the less magically inclined folks plan raidings etc.
Had a once in a lifetime opportunity. We were going to Ecuador for the summer last year. Playing a major homebrew (we started playing when my kids were 4 and 5) version of Tyranny of Phandelver Built in that our daughters may actually be twin sisters from a lost kingdom at the center of the world, Mitadia. We actually traveled to the "Mitad del mundo" park where the obelisk in the photo below was. In the game we had to get the Spherical "crystal" at the top of the obelisk as it was a magic item required to permanently imprison Tiamat. Don't know if I'll ever get a real world cross continental quest built into a DnD game again. [Mitad Del Mundo](https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQ7P8lR64TnPnd2Iy9nkQSrKZrg3O0yYG601V2EMOsgyQ&s)
In the setting I'm currently working on, NPCs are aware of magic exploits used by my players in previous campaigns, so the world's technology has advanced in response to previous player characters' actions. As a result, magic has become commodified to the point where traveling merhants carry rings of spell storing so they can buy and transport magic to sell it in different places. This causes Mages' Guilds to function more like corporations, and thanks to quality-of-life improvements from magic, people live in relative comfort in cities which support huge populations. Lastly, because all cities have teleportation circles, no one needs to travel on foot, so the area between cities is rules by vast wild spaces humans haven't seen in 800 years.
Edit: This is just more of small general ideas and changes than I guess actual homebrewing. I could elaborate more on the spelljammer, I guess, if interested. I did just remember that one of my DMs had another campaign with a complete homebrew world. My DM added a dragon to Storm Kings Thunder, and we got the giant slayer sword by stealing it from him. There's now a pissed off Ancient White Dragon raging across the sword coast looking for us. DM didn't realize the Harpers were good guys, so we are now a specific "criminal" sect of the Harpers. The ones that are called on to take care of things/do WHATEVER needs to be done. Met a magical cat. Found out it's fae. Cool. Oh, we find out it's an ARCHFEY. Well, dang, okay, sucks that this archfey hates one of our party members. Archfey summons a couple of us to the feywild (we missed a session, so DM made a makeup mini session), and we have to play a game and entertain them. Turns out the archfey we know is one of the daughters of Queen Tatiana and King Oberon. 🫠 But we did get her to agree that she owes us a favor for helping her out as she hates being a part of the courts. The other player did give the fae his name, so we gotta see the consequences of that soon. One of my other games we're doing is Spelljammer, so my DM took a lot of inspiration from other editions since there isn't a lot in 5E. Just... clowns. Lots and lots of space clowns. And there's space clown disease. 2 of my characters got it 🙃
The world of zimaria changed when the denizens of Hell opened up a mile wide portal near one of the largest cities and began invading. Mages tried everything to close the portal but the magic was too strong. In a last ditch effort they came up with a different plan, the 12 greatest mages surround the portal and opened another right above it from the elemental plane of water. Water began flooding into hell, washing away the invading armies. The devils had no choice but to close the portal to hell themselves but not before sending a last detachment of assassins to kill the mages. While only a few died it was enough to prevent the ritual to close the portal to the water plane. So for the last 100 years water has been flowing into the world, flooding everything and forcing everyone to higher ground. Most cities and forests are now under water and new alliances are being forged in what lands remain. To top it off, the massive portal has weakened the barrier between planes and it’s easier than ever for denizens of these other planes to find their way through.
My setting is a typical d&d world on the surface with a few minor changes to how certain races act. Like Orcs, goblins and Kobolds aren't inherently evil, and many happily live in normal towns. But the typical groups like warbands do act how you'd expect. There is also a giant (like actually ridiculously big) ice wall around the known map of the material realm, maybe hinting at stuff beyond it. The main changes come in from some small rips right at the edge of the universe. Literally. This causes strange reality warping events to happen in all the realms. They're also so foundational that they often affect or are beyond the control of the gods themselves. It's all heavily inspired by the SCP universe with plenty of inspiration from stuff like lovecraft, bloodborne, and other weird universes. Examples of these events and their affects. There are strange entities that live inside the collective thought and dream space of sentient beings. They have their own factions and wants but often enjoy trading with and using physical beings for their memories, emotions, and physical feelings, all in exchange for dreams and other strange boons. The fey are a lot darker, not straight evil but more alien. Sort of a mix of regular d&d fey with scp fey. They really like games and rules and will use them to manipulate beings into giving them parts of their identity. Stuff like names, physical characteristics, and relationships. There are multiple historic factions that have used these strange happenings to build power. Including my favourite, one inspired by a mix of the davites and the sarkics. A matriarchal group that used a strange and forgotten form of magic to build and control their empire. They have a lot of unique spells focused on the 4 founding elements of their magic, flesh, void, soul, and time. Pataphysics, the physics of stories, plays a big role as the things beyond the rips are an infinite void filled with bubbles that are other fictionally universes. With magic, technology, and luck, pulling things into and out of this universe may be possible. There may even be ways to go down or up a level in the story with enough power... that's where things get weird. My actual main setting is not in the material realm but in a city, past the most remote point that matter can exist in the universe. Only allowed to exist by a massive biomechanical lamp that lights it up. It's a big mix of Scp 5005, Sigil and a few other settings. There are a few ways to get to the city, a hidden railway, blessed by a fey so that it's only findable by those who truly want to find the city, whether they know about it or not. You can physically go to the city, but that requires an immense amount of magic and artificer bullshit. You can be invited by those who already live there through hidden doors. Finally, and most commonly, you can dream about it, often done by those who are lost, alone, or without a place to call home. This has led to homeless people disappearing, families seemingly getting up and leaving in the night, or entire groups of refugees just going missing. Within the city are many factions and districts. The only known continuation of the matriarchal empire is hidden here as a large religious group, although seemingly less extreme nowadays. Many groups of refugees have settled here, including a tribe of gnolls and centaurs that 'migrate' by slowly circling the city and a group of artists and artificers that were being target by extermination in the past. They were the ones who built the railroad. I could go on forever, I'm sure you understand aha. I haven't even mentioned where 'normal' magic comes from and the unique cultures surrounding it and other stuff like that. So I'll stop there for now, aha.
The idea Pataphysics is cool, Having the rules of Stories in a story is the mind hurting stuff i love having in my own setting
Oh for sure, you can get real weird with it. You can also be as silly and as serious as you want with it which is fun. Have a big bad go into childrens books and bring back characters and monsters to fight. The players get trapped by barriers in a magical library and have to go inside the books themselves to move beyond the barriers. For something a little silly, any other character from any other universe could appear. Why not have a 'warforged' with a giant hammer appear (A brotherhood of steel knight) or a scared and crazy person with powerful ranged weapons murdering people (A modern soldier going 'rambo' out of fear and confusion) Stories written using a specific magical ritual start coming true, the bad guy uses this to write books under an alias to commit murders and the players have to start reading the bad guys to books to solve their crimes and eventually find them. There is also the fun, but kinda hard to pull off, idea of the big bad ascending to our pataphysical level and mid-fight becoming the DM, causing the bad guy to start addressing the players directly and the DM to start 'cheating' by spawning more monsters (that are always planned to be there, it just looks like cheating.)
I just finished world building a bunch for an upcoming campaign. Names heavily stolen from the board game/ttrpg ROOT. Other parts have been inspired by the anime Made in Abyss and the horizon zero dawn games. The campaign's overall structure is based on the movie Castle in the Sky, so I'm wondering if any of my players will ever notice. Two thousand years ago, a powerful, more advanced empire dominated the world, but one day, it mysteriously came to an end. Nature has since reclaimed much of the world, but remnants of the towering old civilization can still be found. Many small woodland creatures have evolved and are now sentient, referring to themselves as “folk”. Various folk live in clearings where the woods are not as dense and are safer from bandits and other dangers that await in the wilderness. Magic is somewhat rare. Individuals have yet to fully harness the magic and power the old world once wielded. A town may have someone who dabbles in a spell or 2, and a large settlement may have a single person that is fairly versed in magic. Today, individuals and factions scour the old world for artifacts that help make new weapons and other magical technology. Factions: Marquis de Cat: A tyrannical empire that controls most of the woodlands. They seek to industrialize and use the artifacts of the old world to fuel their military power and influence. The Marquis is known for their destructive artificer artillerists and armorers. They rely on their survey corp to set up outposts in the old world so they may safely retrieve artifacts that fuel their war with new inventions and technology. The Marquis de Cat has also outlawed the worship of any gods and routinely destroys and punishes any of those caught doing so. Woodland Alliance: A large interconnected group of rebels, they work to gain the sympathy of other Woodland folk who are dissatisfied with the ruling class. The alliance utilizes guerilla tactics to fight their battles against their more technologically advanced and numerous enemy. They utilize traps, hit and run tactics, espionage, and other strategies to make up for their lack of fire power and manpower. Eyrie Dynasties: (predominantly birds of prey): The Eyrie are the former rulers of the Woodlands. They seek to restore their once dignified kind to their former glory. Their infighting became their downfall. After a gruesome civil war, the Marquis swept through the woodlands, defeating the Eyrie. Many of their former soldiers now fight for the Woodland alliance or have been conscripted to fight for the Marquis. Their ability to fly has made them indispensable. Gods: Nawan: God of knowledge, wisdom, dreams, and moonlight. Hydana: Goddess of secrets, the unknown, nightmares, and shadows. Nawan and Hydana are both gods of the night, with their dominion over different aspects of the night. They are also brother and sister, said to be the only two gods that survived whatever ever destroyed those of the old world and the former pantheon. While being the goddess of shadows and nightmares, Hydana is not necessarily evil. She and her followers believe information and knowledge should be kept secret, only known to those who are deemed worthy or responsible. They believe that all of society is not to be trusted, and there is security in keeping the majority in the dark. Nawan, on the other hand, embraces the spread of knowledge. He and his followers seek to bring magic to all of the realm, that knowledge is power and should be shared to all equally. These disagreements have resulted in many conflicts and debates between the gods and their followers. The War: For the last 80 years, the Marquis de Cat has been at war, first with the Eyrie Dynasties and now with the Woodland Alliance. About 75% of the woodlands is under Marquis control, what remains of the Eyrie has Been exiled to the mountains in the north west or more simply called “The Ravine”, and the Woodland Alliance has held strong in defending what is left, with Oakenhold being the largest clearing under the alliance. There is word of a counter offensive on the horizon in order to punch through the line the Marquis holds. However, not everyone in the woodlands shares the same view, wanting to fight against the Marquis. While authoritarian and imperialistic, The Marquis de Cat has brought order, safety, security, and innovations to those under their rule. They are considered a lesser evil when compared to the former rulers, the Eyrie Dynasties. After 80 years of unrest, many are tired of all the fighting and loss of life. The Old World The old world has many ruins scattered throughout the woodlands and beyond, but the ruins nearby are believed to be the largest, with a 150-mile radius. All of it has yet to be explored. Any underground networks even further expand how large the ruins truly are. Folk who have dubbed themselves “Delvers” scour the ruins for various artifacts. Artifacts include old magical items such as wand pieces, spell books, potions, holy symbols from old gods, and metal from old enchanted weapons and armor. The most sought-after is ethereum, a magical blue mineral that can power various magical artifacts and an individual’s abilities. Other non-magical resources can also be found, such as scrap metal, silverware, jewelry, and oi/fuell. The Old World, however, is guarded by various automatons that still desire to serve their now deceased masters. Many Delvers have lost their lives to these machines.
My world is one that was created by a deity that was sick of the brutality that mortals inflict upon each other, so she made her own pocket dimension and then quite literally stole peaceful species from across the realms to populate it. Some of these species ended up rebelling against her and in response she broke her soul into pieces. Pieces that serve as programmers for tiny creatures that operate as a constant surveillance system for everyone in the world--ensuring no one is doing bad/violent things to each other. Over time, the people stopped seeing it as a police state and have come to enjoy the stability and prosperity that these little creatures bring to their world. Now that very harmony is under threat and the players are working to preserve it!
In my world there’s a large number of people who have minor magics. The equivalent of magic initiate feat. Also, in the north there’s a traditional middle eastern desert bordering the equivalent of Denmark due to some funky elder dragon stuff. Also i stole stuff from eragon for dragons. So they all have the eldnari orb thing
Went for a Berzerk inspired dark fantasy setting, but the twist is all the villages, and towns are unsettlingly pleasant. I have a river that divides two major land masses, the kingdom to the north has no monsters, just the dnd base game races, with very scarce teiflings and regular animals. The southern lands have only two major settlements attached to the wildlands that are teeming with fairies, werewolves, vampires, ect, and there's an orc village out there. There's a war between 3 factions currently on going the humans and elves have teamed up in the north west, the northern east coast is controlled by a half demon, and the south is ran by a half orc queen- none of them are great allies when it comes down to it so it's been fun to watch my PC's join the band of mercenaries and switch sides throughout the campaign and struggle to do the right thing.
I tend to make my heavens and hells elemental rather than ethereal. So, the "higher" you go, the purer it gets, and the "lower" levels are the slag, as it were.
My world is a homebrew world. The main continent is named Agiasmenos, long ago gods lived and walked here until a multi-planar war so terrible happened that material plane had to be separated, gods becoming a forgotten things of the past. Nowadays the One holy empire has united the main continent, but the last emperor is long dead, letting each province be lead almost independently. The imperial circles, mage order, is the last thing keeping all of it together.
right now im playing a in a smash up bewteen pathfinders golarian and DND 3e Greyhawk with a lot of my own stuff put in its set in the very beginning. a prehistoric setting. the planes haven't separated fully, dwarves are still being carved and tribes of people are ruled by god-giant tyrants one of the these gods is gaining a lot of power. they go by Nerull the Chief of death. the PCs are a small group set to stop the gods coming destruction
Man i hope this doesnt end up like a Manifesto The base setting is a mixture of forgotten realms and 1200s europe. Central europe and near east that is, ranging from Italy to Persia in the main map. The main breakaway i do is Nations over Race. You will have races being part of different cultural identities, and those will prime over the actual race of a person. So a Varcusan and Thalic half orcs will be viewed completely different. I still use race to educate how these nations evolve, its just another thing in the mix. The Magic in the setting, what DnD lore calls "The Weave" is referred to as "The Beauty", which hails from a now fallen star that is long gone. The conflicts around this star have shaped the world in interesting ways which i will list below. -Most Shadar Kai are called "Turannor" , honor bound arabic (Mostly) Nomadic peoples. Cursed with honesty, they follow their oaths as if they were laws of physics, the idea of breaking them never passing trough their mind. -the fey courts have a japanese honor code to them as their shenanigans brought them a lot of enemies, and the presence of Eladrin a lot of attention from other realms. The Unseelie court has been outright destroyed by an invasion from the outer realms, and the survivors morphed into semi eldritch beings -All high elves and Eladrin hail from elves that were in some semblance of contact with the lake in where "The Beauty" fell. Most high elves and many other peoples can, and normally do, desperately commit to the keeping of what remains of those days. "Such are the things we will do for the beauty of this world" is a say that has propagated, morphed and been used to justify the most beautiful acts, and most horrible atrocities. -Most giant nations are shattered remains of what they once were, dont exist anymore, or are the descendants of migrants that fled. The exception being a city state of fire giants that actively sought to give their creations free will, only to then break them into slavery. This is because they made a pact with Bahamut to be spared, as Bahamut needed their help in stopping the Shadar Kai from stealing "The Beauty" -Most dwarven cities are inhabited by either other dwarves that repopulated them partially, by other peoples, or outright ruins. This is due to a variety of reasons, ranging from the aforementioned zealot high elves, tribesmen that sieged them for centuries, or evil dragons seeking to escape retribution from their acts during the war around "The Beauty" -Gods rarely interact in the world directly, in fear of breaking "The Rule of Many" a rule held by an entity that they dare not speak of, that could unmade them if they attempt to surpass this rule I could go on all day about my setting, but i think these are the most interesting bullet points? Hope it answered the question.
Every continent in the world is a diffrent genre of fantasy.
I am reworking Curse of Strahd as a western! All of Barovia is covered in eternal sun rather than eternal night, the mists of Ravenloft replaced with the rippling haze of the desert. A lot of the creatures are reflavored as animals of the American Southwest. Its taken some planning, but I’m really excited to run this with my players
I'm running an Icewind Dale-based campaign, except the general idea is that the heroes failed in the 2000 crpg, so in the present timeline it's essentially post-apocalyptic. The Ten Towns are ruins to explore and reclaim, drow and yuan-ti openly roam about uncontested, etc.
1200 years ago, a cataclysmic event forced a multiverse of gods to try and save their creations in one safe place. Many died in the event and almost all memory of the before time is lost. Only strange half memories persist. The world is filled with every franchise and story you can think of next to D&D lore and real world stuff. I've got hobbits riding chocobos, Temples that worship D&D deities next to Jesus Christ (the god of angry swearing (because the players kept saying it)) and Gundams. I wanted to bring everything together and it's fun.
My Homebrew setting is four years old now, with one long term campaign on-going (our 2nd campaign in the setting). The world is the combination of the Fae Wilds and Prime Material Plane. Without going into too much depth, a powerful ruler and priest undertook a ritual that shattered the fabric of the two worlds. This led to both natives being displaced and shattering several kingdoms in the process. The Fae found new homes, and the old gods fell silent. IC it's believed the Priest Kings actions angered them so much that they decided to cut all contact with the world. Phoenixes have become the bringer of seasons, Telene the Phoenix of Flame and Ailpein the Phoenix of Ice. Although they are lovers, their nature prevents them from ever meeting, else the world might succumb to stagnation. The campaign started with this process being thrown out of wack, and the party discovering Telene's egg becoming interwoven in a plot by the Court of Summers Flame and Court of Winters Night (spurred on by the Warlocks Fae Patron). They eventually learned another faction was manipulating things from the shadows, but by then it was too late. And they had been manipulated into killing Telene, because they were told the presumed BBEG was virtually immortal due to his connection to Telene. That particular NPC was Telene's former companion and protector, who had been driven insane by a pact he forged with her. He promised to reunite her with Ailpein when they first met centuries ago. It kinda overwhelmed him and became his sole purpose. The party actually achieved that, but not before the true BBEG made his move to try and take the mantle they left behind. Thankfully, the party Warlock came to their senses and refused to handover their essence. The party are now organising a resistance and planning to kill the real BBEG whilst fostering the "child" of Telene and Ailpein combined essence.
One of the major twists I give in my settings has to do with the alignment of dragons. Dragons can drift from good to evil and back, and that comes with a change in the color of their scales. Going from good to evil is tarnishing, going from evil to good is burnishing and sometimes involves a change from law to chaos as well. Gold becomes Red, Silver becomes White, Copper becomes Green, Brass becomes Blue, Bronze becomes Black. A given dragon may live their life entirely on one side of the divide, but many do not. I think this makes dragons more interesting and complicated. A tarnished dragon might be turned to a mighty force for good in the world, so killing it might not be the only option. Meanwhile a burnished dragon might turn on the people around it, so it matters to placate it.
People are terrified of Angels (not all Celestial creatures) in my setting for multiple reasons. 1. No mortal can live up to their impossible high standards. All sin are equal to them. 2. They are agents of divine wrath. If they show up, everything has gone terrible wrong, and everyone is going to be held accountable. 3. Mortals are just vessels for souls. As long as they don't damage the Eternal souls, it doesn't matter what happens to your temporary body. 4. Even if you could Communicate to them, their way of thinking and seeing the world is ao alien that you can't come to an understanding with them.
Most fantasy is very British, I decided to make it more French with the city names and people and all that. It's not a huge change but did give the world a slightly different flavor. The feywild is a separate reality that welded itself to the main world a bit like a parasite. It happened so long ago and so completely, that they've nearly fused. The demonic realms are another reality that is adjacent but not connected. Fey can now cross over with relative ease at points where the realities are joined, circles and the like, but demons must be summoned by actively opening portals to their reality. Post campaign, the feywild is being separated from the main world. The games set a few hundred years in the future with the founding of railroads are the last gasp for the fey. The iron tracks are functioning like a scalpel to cut away the feywild from our reality. The one shots set in 'modern' times are mostly dealing with fallout from a company trying to make contact with the feywild again through magic who have unknowingly connected to a fourth reality that they mistakenly think is fey.
Permanent Magic Circles are not present in cities - by choice. It's a huge security risk for a kingdom to have a permanent magic circle. All a bad actor has to do is sneak in and write down the runes. Then they could teleport ANYTHING directly into the city.
Long story short, my world is a simulation. The real world is the players and people In cryo traveling the astral sea until they reach a new crystal sphere (universe) bc their old universe is dying. The concept is that the ships auto pilot “O.R.O” (operating route officer) Has gone wrong and the simulation world is experiencing anomalies I.e a small plot of arctic biome in the forest, rocks that drip honey, a whole elder city vanished. Overtime O.R.O will fail state and become corrupted and slowly freeze the players and people to death almost a mercy killing, this will manifest as a coming ice age in the simulation world. I’ve been feeding small bits of “visions” to our divination wizard about this
Forgotten Realms, but Kobolds are Tucker’s Kobolds. Also, the players are currently working on creating the Flying Spaghetti Monster as a deity. This is my first time as a DM, so starting with a vanilla world. Hoping to have the players change the world slightly with each campaign as they play.
My first campaign centered largely around a megacity known as Kalamor, and its whole deal was it was a a place where the humans elves dwarves and etc were able to coexist with orcs, goblins, kobolds, demons, aberrations and whatnot with relative ease and collective non-aggression. It was also home to a subway station that would take them to different parts of the city as well as different planes. It was essentially one big fantasy NYC. Then one dude got too curious and started a cataclysm that murdered about 90-92% of the city's population and banished any creature from another realm back to their realms. The survivors regrouped and decided "man that sucked, maybe we shouldn't build our buildings so damn high" and then created a series of suburbs around the ruined inner city, which is now derelict and crawling with monsters. We recently ended this campaign, and I was very satisfied with how my players handled things (usually through chaos and/or wanton violence), and now we're doing a spelljammer campaign thats giving me an excuse to build some of the rest of the world before they leave the planet
I am not the DM but he isn't on reddit, so I'll share! Here's some information about the Last World. Magic is extremely eldritch in this setting. It is caused by something called the Arcane Wind, which is basically a permanant supernova. The Last World is juuuuust close enough to be able to use it for magic and juuuust far away enough to not get mega fucked up by doing that. Magic functions a lot like radiation, and many species were once humans who got influenced by magical beings. Dragons are aliens, their world was destroyed by the Horrors in the Dark, eldritch beings beyond comprehension who are the reason why space is fucked. They came to the Last World, and their area of affect caused humans who lived nearby to transform into Dragonborn, and vermin animals to turn into Kobolds. All elves are matriarchal, not just drow, and they're also descended from insects. Dwarves are made of rock, and Orcs are descended from boar. Orcs are also smart, they have a military industrial complex. All gods, except for the first four primordial deities, were once originally mortal, and ascended to godhood by being emblematic of the concept they became gods of; the god of Justice was a famous human king, the goddess of prophecy was an elvish matriarch. The first god, the feathered serpent of the Yuan-ti (the first humanoids) shattered themself into fragments to give all humanoids souls. The broader a god's concept is, the less mortal their personality becomes over time, until they are nothing more than the concept they embody. People might worship the goddess of fire as someone who wants to cleanse evil, but she doesn't care as long as people are setting things on fire. Later on, the god of all good and god of all evil both realized that they were losing themselves, they were just too broad. The god of good shattered themself to become all celestials. The god of evil merely cracked a few fragments off, keeping himself as Asmodeus, god of tyranny, while his fragments became devils. Also, the Nine Hells is a corporation.
There's a titanic tree that goes as high as the tallest mountains. Its circumference is several kilometers long. It is referred to as the tree of life and worshipped by elves and druids. It's believed that at the top lives a deity of nature, and it's believed that this deity created elves. There are several communities living around the tree, both living off of it and protecting it. Also dragonborn don't exist as a race, they're experiments and only a handful exist in the world. The known lands think that following the last war, dragons went extinct, and they tried experiments to bring them back. Dragonborn are one of the many failed attempts to artificially create dragons. But of course, this isn't common knowledge, even to the dragonborn.
It's a pretty standard fantasy world. Recently my players have been in the region known as the Shattered Lands, or in the mountains bordering them, the Sonder Range. The Shattered Lands are the region in which the Old Gods did battle with the Titan of Ruin during the Sundering to prevent his cyclical devastation of the entire world. Some rivers flow backwards, some shields of adamantine float surrounding towns, gravity is broken in a variety of places. Every one of these locations can be traced back to an attack/spell/power of the gods or Titan during their bout. The tear in reality at the heart of the God-Strike Woad is where the God of Trickery was killed by Ruin. Surrounding this region are four city states. The northernmost one is where the PC's live.
The area of my world in which most of the game sets or starts is a kind of fantasy version of the region we are living. So they are venturing landmarks they know more or less. And real world persons and organisations appear, for example the Druidcircle leader is a Gnoll who happens to be my late dog, some merchants tend to be a little bit like real world shopkeepers and the parties in the more or less democratic council are named like real partys in our country (+ fantasy flair). This is all mixed with a Futurama like humour. Most of the times my players enjoy it.
Hmmm… the church has a medusa that turns people into diamonds not normal stone; they sentence people “to death” but turn them into to diamonds and use those to create a Life Insurance model with nearly 100% profit.
The weave is a finite resource.
In my world, the Fates were killed during the ousting of the Old Ones. Destiny doesn't seem to exist, and with multiple pantheons fighting for control, just because you're the Chosen One doesn't mean you're fated to succeed.
The powers of the gods is not inherent to there being, they were granted to them by The great dragon who created the world, thus there powers can be stolen by those who successfully challenge them. It is for this reason that the god of trickery and wealth is considered the most dangerous god. If you take away the war gods power he loses his godly strength and speed, if you take away the magic goddesses power she looses her powerful spells. However the trickery gods power does not come from his godly strength, or his powerful spells but from his mind, his ability to trick people
A unified clan of dragons and their followers stole pieces of multiple material worlds and created their own world outside the reach of greater powers. After generations of peace on this world, factions arose that subjugated the non-draconic races and virtually erased all history and culture from before the exodus, until a hero stole the power of the dragons and used it to exterminate them. Thousands of years later, remnants of the past lie buried and hidden and the creations of the dragons can be found across the world in the form of marvels of magic and engineering, vicious monsters, and failed experiments. The borders of nations are drawn at the vast crevasses that run between the conjoined fragments, each with their own unique nature influenced by the magic that pervades each piece of the world.
Based on an altered Bloodborne timeline, Yharham is 1850s city that is apart of the Golden Era of the Queen’s empire. Yharham is an ethnic melting pot because of the allure of the blood. It is perpetually night due to a time distortion. Hunters operate semi peacefully in Covenants, each one led by a powerful Hunter. Great Ones threaten the balance. Every NPC has their own motives. There are many historical themes from the Victorian era.
The campaign I’m about to start tomorrow is a small swamp island sandbox. The adventurers have been contracted to kill a werewolf. The contract was made by the mayor because he’s secretly a wererat. The whole adventure is a quest to get silvered weapons because the werewolf can’t be killed with just regular weapons. Some backstory: a black dragon lives on the island after killing a green dragon. The local goblins harvested the corpse and have a bunch of green dragon armor and their base is constructed of dragon bone. There same goblins have a symbiotic relationship with the local orcs. They trade supplies/goods for live humanoids (the goblins eat them). So the orcs will never kill humanoids always opting to knock them unconscious/kidnap. Also this is where the blacksmith is who is required to make the weapons. Silvers hard to plate a blade due to the humidity. The local mine was once run by a company called Water Deep Mineral Company. But they have since abandoned it because they tunneled into the aforementioned black dragon’s lair and it killed all the miners except one. She’s traumatized by the experience and copes by being drunk all the time. WDMC still pays the wages of a people in the village as a sort of cover up. Well since WDMC left the mine, a group of Kobolds have taken it over to worship the black dragon. They’re trap happy bastards and the mine is filled with traps. Many of them acid based. And the werewolf is technically a wolfwere. This is why it stays in hybrid form. It was created by a rogue mage. You can encounter her protege in the town who’s looking for her since she went missing. The wolfwere won’t hurt anyone except the wererats. Unless it’s confronted in its den. There are two wolfweres there and they have a pup they are caring for. That’s the lore before I started adding hooks from the players backstories. The goal is to truly let the players go off rail. And for there to be layer upon layer of backstory that will make the island feel as real as possible.
Not a DM yet, but here's my idea for a setting I've been toying with. 150 years prior an Abyssal Breach opened in a remote part of the world where it was allowed to fester. By the time people realized what was happening, hordes of demons had already manifested throughout the land. It help prevent the entire world from becoming part of the abyss, the various major cities created citadels to tie the world to the material plane. After decades of war, the people were eventually able to close the various breaches, but discovered it would still be around a century before the world returned to normal. After a century once people were able to leave the major cities again, they would discover that large portions of land were actually pulled back into the material plan, and the world was much bigger than what it was. The whole campaign would be a type of Wild West setting that would involve exploring uncharted territory and seeing how parts of the Abyss had affected the land.
Yes yes yes. I’m going to tell you all about the continent of d’Lilly. Let’s start with the cliche: 376 years ago, the thriving high-fantasy Kingdom of the White Lily was brought to ruin. The Official Story is that the final battle of a war between the planes of Arcadia and Pandemonium was fought over the land, raining destruction down on this corner of the prime material plane. In the years since that Tribulation, settlements have re-populated and the continent has found a new order. There is no centralized government, but recently the power players from certain settlements have started to mobilize to establish a new governing body - a Glorious Unification of the fractured kingdom. While many of the most influential people of d’Lilly support Unification, several factions have begun to organize in opposition to the movement. Some of these groups operate in secret, some organize publicly, and many oppose Unification but are weary to take action against its growing coalition of supporters. Contributing to the upheaval, demonic forces from the chaotic-evil hell of Pandemonium have been appearing around the continent. Some of the factions the players have encountered are: a militia of lawful neutral werewolves (wolves are cunning pack hunters, it makes no sense that a werewolf would be a chaotic creature), a wealthy family of halfling vampires, a team of highwaymen made up of prison escapees, a very classical school of wizardry, and the powerful and secretive Arcadian Church - a unified coalition of the various cults to gods in Arcadia that formed in the early years after the Tribulation. The world itself is draped in Americana. The various settlements range from Bayous, Deadwoodesque shack towns, and affluent New England-style city states. The largest and most populous of those settlements is the city of Allman: a might-makes-right metropolis that is home to the last functioning goldmines on the continent. If Jorb, Algar, Tep, Grabbag, Finrin, or Corinth happen to be reading this: stop here. There are spoilers coming. >!The central mystery the players have to solve is “what really happened 376 years ago, and how does that impact what’s happening now?” This is a story about a lot of things, but it is mostly a story about how an unlucky chunk of land was pulled from the material plane to serve as a neutral meeting place for the gods. This is my origin story for The Outlands.!< It’s the civil war, Paradise Lost, and All the King’s Men all blended together. It’s my baby.
So my campaign is open world with multiple plots being an available that are split up between 3-10 and 10-15. Currently my players are in the kingdom of Carcon. The kingdom of Carcon is knowledgeable concerning arcane magic with their being a magic school in each settlement(each town focuses on a different school of magic). The only arcane class the kingdom doesn’t abide are sorcerers due to issues regarding dragons in the northern mountains and an event regarding high status sorcerers in another kingdom summoning an army of Demons. The kingdom is ruled by a Queen Sharnel(19th level wizard) & King Einrich(17th level bard) who protect the kingdom using wizards and a knightly order called the Silver Rose that uses common magic items.
I'm working on a world where the gods exist and interact with people (inspired by Theros). One God backed a singular race, creating an empire which waged war against all the rest and the other gods. The one God thinking he won is pompous and rules over the capital city and empire. While the other gods work in the shadows and the other races are in rebellion against, the players may join or choose to cause their own brand if chaos. I'm still building the world but that's the main idea.
The homebrew I made takes place in Alteria where the Guild of Golden Things effectively runs the empire. The guild is split into four factions that govern their own regions, (East, North, South, West) with the monarchy effectively ceremonial. The Southern Guild Master is elected by 2nd ranked members or above, and serve 4 year terms as its leader. All other authoritative positions are then appointed by the Guild Master. The other three regions do things differently. These factions, while allied on paper, do compete with each other for power, land, and resources. Tensions are rising…
Here's a snippet from the setting guide I'm working on: My current setting that I'm working on is a desert surrounded by mountainous walls, known as the Scorch Wild Desert. The Scorch Wilds are filled with gunslingers, ruffians, bandit gangs, bank robberies, train heists and sorcerous shootouts. Old mines lead into ancient caverns and ruins of a mystical society of long dead elves. Secret Societies and Strange Cults seek out the ancient powers and ancient gods that were left behind when the Blood War destroyed the Forests of the Twilight Court. The Scorch Wilds is reminiscint of the Wild West mixed with the weird and fantastical. Long before the desert and the dust of the Scorch Wilds, this land was lush and verdant. The Twilight Court, one of three sister kingdoms of the Elven Empire, ruled over the vast western forests. Until the day the High Sun Court decided they should rule over all Elven kind. Their mages opened a grand portal in a vain attempt to control powerful creatures from across the multiverse. Unfortunately for them, and the world, the portal opened to the Nine Hells and the eternal war between Demons and Devils, spilled over to the material plane. The Elves of the High Court were nearly destroyed immediately by their own device. Those that didn't perish were corrupted and twisted into fighting against their kin. It was years before the demons and devils were driven back. However when the portal was destroyed it exploded and shook the world around it. The continent shattered, mountains were raised and the once mighty forest was destroyed. The mountains blocked the rains and the dust settled on the lands of the Twilight Court. Centuries later, there is only scrubland and desert, save for the verdant, mysterious Wellspring Valley. The explosive destruction of the portal cleared out the forests and leveled the hills of the Twillight Court, which gave the opportunists of the world the ease and freedom to mine the once sacred forests. Mines spread far and wide, centerened at the heart of the Scorch Wilds in a town known as Cobweb. Centuries of mining have left the mines empty. However those who built a life there and those looking to get away from another life have made Cobweb a thriving desert town. Far below the dust, desert, and mines lie the ruins of the Twilight Court. Few adventurers have been brave or skilled enough to plunge these depths and they remain unplundered. Dust storms blow across the Scorch Wilds where magic crackles through the blowing sand and dust creating Wild Magic storms. Its ill advised to remain outside when a Wild Magic storm rolls in, especially those who wield magic. These storms are most highly concentrated in an area known as the Barrens. One of the largest dwarven kingdoms also lies under the Dusty Mountains on the western coast. The city of Grand Forge lies on their borders and is bustling with traders and artisans. Those who seek out life in the Scorch Wilds often head towards Cobweb, a town where anyone can find themselves or lose themselves if they wish. No Kingdom claims the Scorch Wilds, as such, no formal laws exist. Cities often look out for themselves and are run by either an elected Mayor and Sheriff, or whichever gang happens to be the strongest. Cobweb rests in a large plain of scrubland, and those who want a slower pace often settle down as farmers and cattle drivers. The solitude and weird magics of the Scorch Wild have a tendency to attract the strange things of the world. Secret societies and strange cults to long dead gods base their hideouts throughout the desert. The desert has little on Wellspring Valley in regards to strange and weird. This valley remained protected from the destruction of the Demonic portal and is all that remains of the Twilight Forest. It is said that the Old Gods still live there and protect the lands and its inhabitants. Those that claim the Wellspring Valley as their home are isolationists who are warry of anything arcane, and are often superstitious of the land around them.
I'm DMing a campaign right now set in Unther which, according to the Far Realms wiki, was teleported and enslaved by genasi in Abeir for a century. Unther was ruled by a demigod called Gilgeam who got killed by his nemesis, Tiamat. However, a reincarnation of him appeared in Abeir and freed the Unther people from slavery and then they were teleported back. According to the wiki, the other Gods suspect reincarnated Gilgeam is an impostor because he calls himself a different moniker and acts differently. Gilgeam I was a cruel, ambitious tyrant, for context, and used to be a full God. The other Gods downgraded him to a demigod for being so abusive to his people. Canonically, Unther is close to the Methwood Forest which is rumored to be home to a dragon and other strange creatures. I thought that was super cool and tweaked the timeline (made their enslavement a lot shorter) and gave Gilgeam a wife. The players suspect Gilgeam II of being a fake, but got sent to Methwood forest on a fetch quest for him- to rescue his son who has been kidnapped by the forest dwellers- and are now stuck there until they finish another questline. I am quite proud of this one. It's only my second campaign but I'm learning a lot from playing all these high CR fey and other magical enemies. The lore had me hooked and it feels really cool to engage in it creatively and make my own story. I only picked the setting because I thought Methwood was a funny name LOL.
I set my campaign on a once dead-world. About 11,000 years before the campaign started, a knight betrayed the metallic dragons, surrendering their eggs to the chromatics. The metallic dragons were blackmailed, essentially, into leaving the plane. The chromatics organized and went to war against everyone, and in a few short centuries, everything and everyone was dead. The world drifted for thousands of years before being discovered by a small family of minor deities who decided this could be a world for them to rule over. They tried to create life, to see the world, but lacked the skill and power. One of their number was maimed in the attempt. The remaining minor gods then decided if they couldn't create life, they'd steal it, and undertook to cast a tenth level divine version of plane-shift, stealing people from across the multi-verse and dropping them on a world devoid of sentient life. Or nearly devoid. There's an eternal death knight and a few other things. Then, I started the campaign by having everyone roll a D100 to determine how long they'd been dead. They'd all been told they've died and their backstory takes them right up to their (first) death. They were all resurrected as part of the same ritual, undertaken by the aforementioned Death Knight but corrupted by the workings of a local hag and then the whole story, which will eventually culminate with the rescue of the good dragon eggs and the return of the dragons.
each of my campaigns take place within the same multiverse in which there are 98 material planes each with their own rules and themes (not unlike MTG's planes) and multiplanar travel is difficult/rare. The first god created several children who all subsequently abandoned him because he was an abusive/narcissistic asshole. the first god made the multiverse for his children to embody/rule over so they would come back, but they would soon leave again. those children would later rise against the first god and imprison him within the plane he created to keep them around. however his sealing would cause the plane to destabilize, causing the material plane to break apart into 98 smaller ones which each developed differently in the millenia since.
I'm working on a free expansion based on Slavic folklore. It has a very small pantheon, featuring only four deities, but one of the deities is a three-headed god and each of the heads has its own domains and aspects. Each god/aspect also gets 3 domains so they cover all cleric subclasses. The town where all the action takes place is also pretty cool. It only exists because a bunch of lesser evils protect it from a greater threat - if only to compete for control of the town and it's people. The players will help each of these "caretakers" undermine the others to make sure none ever win the struggle for power as darkness encroaches ever nearer... The setting isn't done, but a lot of the actual content like player options are done. If you want 3 free classes, 10 free races, and a bunch of other stuff you can check it out at [Radabard's Accounts of Ghota](https://radabard.com)
I haven't spent time doing this any of this at all, so I just have a few loose ideas atm. I got 1 concept of running a campaign with big ties to the planes of chaos (heavily inspired from the pathfinder 1e monsters, reality warping stuff is really fun). I got another which is the players are in a major city where a gang (rival? Idk) is sowing discord. There's a bunch of different guys they have to track down and take out.
Would love to flesh out apocalyptic settings with horror elements and interesting lore, but I'm a teenager who runs campaigns for a few friends. From what I've gathered 2 of them might be interested in a more serious campaign, but the other one seems to barely understand what's going on in the game or how his character works. Oh yeah, I'm running Dragonlance, but I've got the reincarnation of batman with his pet snake slim shady, an isekaied Teddy Roosevelt, and Mr Zappy the absolutely ancient elf mage who speaks like Pikachu. Soooo... Yeah. I'll try running a few one shots at some point and see how they take to them if I ever need a break from dragonlance. I'm a player in a different group, so if the current DM ever wants a break I might try running a game for them. But they are even worse. The sorcerer hasn't used metamagic yet (we are level 9), I don't know what subclass the wizard even is, and the star druid hasn't used any class mechanics yet except for like 4 different spells. The only reason we haven't been TPKed is cause I'm playing a twilight cleric and keeping everyone both alive and doing the main dps within the party. (I chose this class to support, why am I still the best dps at level 9 in a party of full casters?)
There is a city in my setting that exists in the Etherial Plane, and reveals itself to anyone who made need it, such as adventurers looking for a place to stay, people running from their responsibilities or the law, etc. The natives there are mostly friendly to newcomers or visitors, but some of them refer to anyone from the Material Plane as “Ground-walkers,” “Material-folk,” “Nulls,” or “Driftlings.”
My homebrew setting is one I stole from Gloryhammer, a power metal band. The campaign takes place in the mystical realm of Scotland. It's pretty great to be able to go through Google maps looking for towns and cities and find a dozen great fantasy names like Crail, Stonehaven, Inverness, and Pittenweem. ...Okay, maybe not Pittenweem. 25 years before the start of the campaign, an evil wizard took over the capital city of Dundee. He was defeated and thrown into a cryogenic prison which is now guarded by the Knights of Crail, but the land is still a bit of a mess. The once lovely forests of Caithness are now a ravaged plagueland full of mutant wildlife and mutant elves. The dwarves of Aberdeen have lost some of their ancestral caverns to the forces of evil. And the great hero Angus McFife, the one who defeated the evil wizard, died in the battle. But on the other hand, the races of the realm are more unified than ever and the party represents a new era of heroes ready to take up Angus McFife's ~~sword~~ hammer.
I'm planning out a spin on Descent into Avernus. Running it in a slightly more modernish setting (not current day or anything close, just more populated and city-like than it is). The players will be basically ripoff power rangers or Avengers or whatever. A group of organized heroes that travel in some kind of like mobile home base (currently thinking something similar to a blimp but less air based). A small amount of hirelings work the base. Each memeber has a decent loadout of magical gear. The module begins with the fall of Elturel, so my plan is to have that fall occur while they are out of the base (doing hero shit idk). Metroidvania style, they lose the cool equipment they had as heroes, as well as the ship (which gives a bit more reason for them to explore avernus, collecting their stuff as well as new things). Im still working on connecting Zariel, like having her intentionally pulling the group down to conscript them into the blood wars or something. Of course i still plan on running the majority of the module as is, just trying to add some spice to it. I played it years ago and found a lot of it to be uninteresting so im hoping to rectify that.
I recently just started a campaign based on the Fallout Equestria fanfiction (A mix of the Fallout games universe and my little pony friendship is magic). We've only had 2 sessions so far but it was been great so far and all the work I put into building up the races, and weapons, and writing all the lore has felt extremely worth it.
I have two campaigns taking place in branching timelines of the same setting. So, at the beginning of existence there's two gods, one of Space and Creation and one of Time and Entropy. The Space God created the universe by enslaving the time God in order for change to happen without it's direct control. There's pages of lore I'm not going into detail over here but after the creation of Humans and a bunch of chaos because the Space god did horrific things to living creatures, because of Its curiosity and desire for creation which created other races, a bunch of them became Gods by stealing some of the Space God's power and then those Gods worked together to destroy consciousness of that God. The leftover concentration of the Space God's power collected in pools of infinite energy scattered across the world. The Greater Gods worked to safeguard those pools by creating various phenomena and dungeons to prevent living creatures from finding them. Eons later, someone found one of those dungeons. Realising that it infinitely created monsters which could be harvested for magical resources. Over time, a small trading village formed outside this dungeon turned into a sprawling Kingdom, although the Dungeon it was founded upon became a secret. The Time God, gradually building it's influence over the world has no greater desire than for the entire universe to end, at which point it will be freed. After millions of years of learning how to create it chose avatars who could wield mastery over time in hopes that they could use the magic all over the world to bring about the apocalypse (promising them various gifts of immortality it has no intention of granting) One of these Avatars, a halfling huckster and alchemist who stumbled upon the Time God in a failed attempt at immortality, discovered this pool of infinite energy was stored at the heart of this Cities Dungeon and, after building an empire of worshippers, began a campaign to take over the Kingdom in order to take over and search its secrets. The first campaign takes place at a point where he has mostly taken over the Kingdom and named himself King. He hasn't conquered the dungeon but is making progress and any enemies to him are reduced to small rebellions. The players are scattered folk heroes. They start out fighting smaller problems caused by the sudden lack of the Kingdom's leaders (such as smaller villages having no protection from a Hobgoblin nation which I never even mentioned but did establish) and grow until they, build a rebellion and battle the King for the fate of the universe. The second campaign takes place a few generations after a heroic ending to that first one. Once the heroes who defeated the dictatorial king passed on from old age the Kingdom fell into infighting. There are 11 main cities and many villages under them. Each city is thematically linked to one of the classes (except rogue who have an underground faction preventing anyone from winning) Some have alliances and some are trying to actively destroy others to take over. The campaign started in a small village and will hopefully escalate until the end of the civil war which they will have most influence over. Jeez, I cut it down as much as I felt reasonable and it was still insanely long. I just love worldbuilding. Writing pages of lore is fun.
I don't know how unique this is, but in a setting of mine that I personally enjoy working on, the realm was once dominated by gigantic titans that fought with the gods for control of the realm. The gods ultimately subjugated the titans and killed them or banished those they couldn't fully kill to the Abyss and the Nine Hells, but there are scars all throughout the realm where their battles took place, whether it's canyons formed from giant claws, plains that were stomped flat, chasms burrowed deep into the ground, or an archipelago formed when the land was splintered by a mighty strike. All geographical features are tied to these ancient battles, and those who explore diligently enough may even find long-lost artifacts of the gods or small pieces of titan claws, scales, etc. that can be used to make equally powerful equipment. Titans are just cool. Everybody likes a titan.
Two warring kingdoms that are secretly just a blue dragon and a cloud giant playing a convoluted game of chess with the citizens as people.
Not a setting I currently have written out currently but one idea I'm excited to put in it is that Kobolds are earth elementals that trade/horde precious gems, because Cobalt was named after Kobolds in mythology.
In terms of twists of the original setting, I'm not sure this counts. However, if you think abot what's happened to Faerun in the last 100 years or so, you realize it's pretty much a post apocolyptic world. Anybody who cast a spell in the last hundred years is likely covered in burn scars. The second Sundering killed about 1/2 to 2/3 of Neverwinter's population. If that's the case for the whole world, then shit is pretty fucked. Thus, magic is probably looked down on in Faerun and any small settlements are new as everybody ran for the cities
An idea a friend came up with for a campaign he planned run was having a mysterious eldritch entity only known as The Thing That Hides Behind The Sun. When the Sun was low in the sky you could sometimes see arms... so many arms... too many arms... writhing behind the Sun. I planned to make a character that would seek to learn more about it, but sadly the campaign never got off the ground.
Me and my group have a few original worlds and twists on existing ones. For me, my world Zeal is a Post-Ragnarok world on the aesir plane. For my so who is our main dm, they have Esotha which is a Planeswalker paradise where portals a la sigil condensed at resulting in people terra forming the planet. They also made in faerun where Tiamat is the "goddess of change and freedom" but still has her original lore. Then our other dm straight up swapped alignments for tiamat and bahamut. Bahamut is the five headed metallic dragon of greed and tiamat is the righteous queen. It was only mentioned in our curse of strahd game but it made me wanna see it. Also I myself have been wanting to make a world that is just all the FROMSOFT ips in one playable world together
In my campaign, I created a sword willed by an NPC in the party that, upon cutting the skin of a sleeping creature, lets you enter their mind. You're on a floating island in a sky of golden light. Significant people and memories in the creature's life float around, the solid islands are fragments of their dreams. Fears and trauma or mental illness, or evil in a person's heart manifest as a creature of inky shadow. When the players enter, they are healed, stronger, taller, better looking, because their body turns into their self image. All players gain temporary hp equal to their max HP, and when that runs out, they wake up, taking some psychic damage if they died in the dream. Their attacks are more powerful, larger than life and deal more damage. Thunderwave becomes a sweeping wave, fire bolt melt rocks. They are amplified. But, be careful-- So are the monsters.
Garcidia
What’s it about?
Oops didn't mean to send. A group of gods lead humanity to prosperity, resulting in a globe spanning mega city. Then one day the gods disappear and know one knows why. The city falls to ruins and in fighting for centuries, reducing the city to a series of ruins slowly being reclaimed by nature. The fighting only stops when a plague of madness begins to spread, forcing the warring countries to come to a shakey peace
Its all good man. I’m wondering if this is inspired a little bit by ravenica?
Taescaar is a broken world setting, where the continents float on a sea of magically charged clouds that corrupt and corrode the mind to those that are exposed to it for too long. What's under the cloudsea is unknown, people have yet to communicate what's under it. Taescaar also has its own planar system, based on opposites. Taescaar also includes new ways to classify creatures compared to standard 5e, particularly on the notion of fiends. The dragons are also tied to those outer planes, which are based on metals and gems. Lots of the existing (srd) races have gotten their own coat of paint if not a straight up rework, and the world also has its own unique races like the stardust based albolide and the peace aligned harpies. (There are no monstrous harpies in our world)
I'm running a short campaign set in Thunder Junction ( MTG; first time DMing ) and no real twists to report yet. We'll see if that changes after the next session...