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Message: <blockquote data-quote="_Michael_" data-source="post: 9667232" data-attributes="member: 7045276">I definitely get the horror fatigue. That's why I want this to be very subtle, and the monsters within few and deadly. Much of the danger will come from natural hazards like crumbling bridges and unstable walkways. I want it to be weird, too, on a Stephen King-esque level. However, it's going to be work to set up because I want to give the players plenty of reasons to question what they think they heard in my descriptions, and what they think they're seeing and hearing in-character.Putting it in spoiler tags so you're not hit with an entire page of text at once. lol[Spoiler]The history of Volgas Dol (for those who are not familiar with Erdeyn and my low-magic campaign setting I've discussed in other threads) involves the Protea, which were magical clockwork constructs powered by crystalline formations called Lithosynes that are themselves semi-sentient (their sentience increases the more of them are gathered together). The machines even assisted people to travel to the sister planet, Aeos, where a cult of priests sought to build a giant clockwork simulacrum to house the spirit of a god. They used a diamond they pulled from the depths of Atlán (the void of space), but it shattered, obliterating the god and scattering its essence across the prime material plane. That essence infected the clockwork machines (through the psychic "network" formed by the lithosynes) and instantly made them self-aware and malevolently bent on the destruction of all organic life. They then turned to Erdeyn, and sent seed ships through Atlán and the Veil (a meteor belt the planet passes through twice a year) to crash land and establish a beach head. From there, humanity was pushed to the brink of extinction, and the other elder races had to step in and help turn the tide and rid the planet of the Protea. Once it was over, however, the good races shut themselves away from humans, and humanity entered a Dark Ages. Three thousand years later, and humanity is finally emerging from it, but the old fears and prejudices in the elder races remain--halflings were the first to reopen themselves to human trade and have since capitalized on it. Gnomes and dwarves are tolerant of humans, but they're only allowed so far into their territories and banned from certain areas altogether. Elves, however, are the most suspicious of all, and very few are found in human lands.In the aftermath of the Schism, the High Council of Wizardry formed, using a mountain citadel called Uthengard on the island Arkenheim as their headquarters. These remaining wizards and magi established an order to preserve the world, archive the past and keep it from disappearing, and prevent incursions by the Protea. Uthengard itself is a marvel of the Old World--an entire mountain hollowed out into a vast citadel with hundreds of levels and miles of corridor and open air markets in elaborately carved arcades lined with columns and balconies. From there, Magi go out with Red Legion knights to collect dangerous artifacts, put down monsters, and curate artifacts of the past. Because it's a low-magic world, magic itself is high-damage, but rare. Every magical item has a story, and magic users are looked at with awe or suspicion (depending on where they go). There exist no "magic shops," and you won't find a handy hedge wizard in every town and village. Most place characters will go will not see a wizard or hedge mage for hundreds of miles. At the same time, the wild places are littered with ruins and relics of the past, so there's plenty of opportunity for players to explore and interact. I even revised the skill list (and added dozens of refinements to Craft, Knowledge and Profession from several OGL sources) specifically to give players more mundane options for combat and social situations so that magic doesn't become a deus ex machina. Volgas Dol is a castle that was built immediately after the Schism by the few remaining archmagi and wizards who knew the magics of the Age of Dreams. Designed to be a magical version of Area 51, it was meant to contain hundreds of laboratories, store rooms, dungeons, libraries, and repositories of artifacts--a colossal spell construct, woven from stone and will, meant to maintain the sanity of the world. Each tower, each wall, a binding ward. Each chamber, a containment cell. However, it is also a bit of a pocket dimension, I think. So there's likely way more rooms than could be physically contained by the castle itself, some of which contain libraries and laboratories that haven't been disturbed for nearly three millennia. While the few surviving human wizards scrambled to preserve as much of the past as possible, foreseeing the coming darkness of civilization, wanting to guard the knowledge for a day iin the future when mankind would have need again of advanced sciences and magics. No one alive (not even in the High Council) in the present day has any real knowledge of what lay inside because it shifts. The castle itself, while not sentient, could be considered a grand magical construct akin to a Mordenkainen's Magnificent Mansion, only with a malevolent chaotic evil twist thanks to what snuck in.Part of the reason why is because when that elder god was obliterated, it wasn't annihilated. Instead, parts of itself went into the Protea. Other parts...congealed. They found dark places in the world where they could hide and regroup. One shard of that deity became the malevolent shadow goddess Che'loth, who rules the Evergloom (my version of the Underdark) with an iron fist through her elves, the Ebynai. Yes, based on drow, but I've done quite a bit of tweaking to make them my own. Che'loth knows she's missing parts of herself, and works to recover them while also engaging on a campaign of empire building in the Evergloom.Another piece of that forgotten god found Volgas Dol, and as the millennia slowly swept past, and the magical wards and seals began to fail from sheer age and the loss of knowledge of how to maintain them, the dark dangerous things in Volgas Dol began to seep out. However, something also found its way in and began to twist the magics to suit itself, shaping them around its being to protect and conceal it as it slowly digested those foolish enough to wander into the ruin in search of fortune and glory. It's basically a version of Machin Shin, where it's not a physical being, but a shadow, like in the Dr. Who episode The Library where the shadows moved and didn't fall where the light said they should. When it approaches adventurers to learn about them, people hear indistinct whispering voices, which grow louder and more intense when the being attacks. It can kill, physically, but I'm sort of envisioning a siphoning similar to Mass Effect 2 where people were being turned into husks. I could use an undead template to stand in, perhaps this congealed essence of a former god turns them into revenants to use as puppets. Any undead within would likely be under its direct control and could be "taken over" by the former god to act like an avatar. Even passing by the crossroads that lead to Volgas Dol (which can be seen from them, and the way there is blocked by warning signs), some report hearing whispers calling to them, murmurring in their dreams to lure them into the black keep. Others say they feel persistent dread when it comes into view, only departs when they leave the castle behind them. Still others report an eerie feeling of being watched when they get close to the area.So...that's sort of how I envision this place. I apologize for the wall o' words, but I had to give some background on Volgas Dol so you can understand where I'm going with it. I'm hoping some of the other features will offset the horror-fatigue, and this place is not meant for the light of heart and weak of will, anyway. lol This will likely be one of the end-game locations as a prelude to epic level campaigns--I mean, when you're fighting the ghosts of elder gods who demand sacrifice and blood, you're pretty much at Elminster stage. Bonus: Lithosyne 3.5e write-up! Woo![ATTACH=full]406316[/ATTACH][ATTACH=full]406317[/ATTACH][/Spoiler]Tl;dr: Volgas Dol has a seriously elaborate and complex history with plenty of campaign hooks and--ooh, is that a free monster write up??? #winning<img class="smilie smilie--emoji" alt="🤣" src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f923.png" title="Rolling on the floor laughing    :rofl:" data-shortname=":rofl:" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" /></blockquote>

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