Horrors Beyond the Witchlight🥀 Dark Fae Fairytale 🥀lvl 3, 🌈

Creating your character

Player Characters will start at level 3 for this game and I highly encourage players to create their characters with roleplay in mind. I am planning to strongly adapt the set up of the campaign to incorporate player backstory so be prepared to work with your fellow players and me to create a backstory that you are excited about and gives me material to work with as I flesh out the plot hooks and obstacles to overcome. This game will have some intense combat and exploration but I want you to come to the game with a character that you will have the most fun playing out at the table, a character you would want to fully embody to explore a wacky horror fairytale with. Please have an idea of a class, race, general basic background information for a character that would fit in this setting ready before session 0 but be aware that things will potentially shift after we talk as a group, so be ready to be flexible if needed! If you have your heart set on a particular character detail, however, please let me know and I will do my best to work that in for you! I am a big fan of unofficial published DnD content for character creation and I usually have no restrictions and never any banned races/features etc., so please reach out to me if you have any interesting ideas for your character and we can workshop it to help it fit into the game. After Session 0 you will be expected to make a fully fleshed out character sheet prior to Session 1 and you are welcome to use a digital creator like D&D Beyond or a physical handwritten sheet. Please reach out to me if you need help filling out your sheet and I would be happy to work with you on it! I allow players to take one free feat, which will be discussed at Session 0 to make sure we try to have a balanced party that will be fun for all. We will be using milestones to level up throughout the campaign and I expect to get to mid-high level by the end of the campaign (around 11-13). Though this highly depends on the table and where the story takes us! It is important to me that your character fits into this world and into the tone of the story that we are building together so be prepared to work with your fellow players and myself to weave your character into the world before our campaign even begins.

Preparing for the session

Things you will need: - Discord account - Roll20 account - webcam (or similar video device) - microphone or headset (built in is totally fine as long as you have tested it) - basic character idea - internet with the capabilities that can accommodate several hour long sessions - a quiet, distraction free space to play in - If you are a new player to D&D, please reach out to me ASAP after booking so we can get you ready and settled to dive into this campaign - ability to commit to a long form campaign (and the flexibility to adjust when needed - your real lives are important to me as well!) - a sense of humor and compassion as well as a willingness to get down with the creepy wackiness of this spooky setting - additional materials may be required depending on our table and the progression of the campaign Optional: - cozy blanket - warm drink - spooky lighting - tasty snack - love of dark fairytales, gothic horror, The Fae, whimsy - dice! - costume

What GoPorridgeGaming brings to the table

I am a generally rules-light GM and am in favor of working with my players to make cool moments happen for them. I like rewarding my players for creative thinking and pushing themselves out of their comfort zone as a player (as long as it is in a safe and enjoyable way for them and does not chronically take the spotlight from other players). I run moderately dangerous combat that does not feel punishing and I enjoy letting my players run wild with what they can do. If you can come up with a creative idea, I want to help you make it happen. I am a huge fan of crafting and designing props and may be physically sending out certain important props in the mail to my players. In person I create full terrain and virtually will be using a combination of custom designed battle maps and tokens and premade ones. I also make visual aid compilations for my players in the form of “moodboards”, pinterest boards and albums as well as possible custom artwork both physical and digital, such as the campaign listing picture I drew. I will be setting up a discord specifically for this game with channels to help organize all the campaign information for the table. Audio is very important for me to create a fully immersive experience at the table, from ambient sounds to carefully chosen music to enhance each situation the party gets into. I want to take you on a dark, whimsical, and potentially intense adventure through this corner of the Faewild. This campaign draws inspiration from popular/classic fairytale and gothic horror media such as Pan’s Labyrinth, Brothers Grimm, Hans Christian Andersen, Peter Pan, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Frankenstien, Dracula, and Alice: Madness Returns, as well as folklore and legends from various cultures around the world. It is important to me to curate the feeling of surreal gothic horror with plays on character and player fear, a claustrophobic atmosphere and at times a discontinuous and convoluted narrative. In this campaign you will find tales within tales, changing narrators, dreamstates, the discovery of obscured family ties, unintelligible writings, nocturnal and changing landscapes, and physical reminders of the past, especially through ruined buildings that stand as proof of a previously thriving world that is now decaying. Humor is an essential way people cope through fear so it is expected to have levity at the table, however I also expect a certain level of seriousness from all players to ensure we can dive into the dark thrills of this game. I use a large amount of homebrew content from other wonderful creators as well as from published resources so if you as a player have found items or other elements of the game you might like to see come up at the table, you are encouraged to send it over to me and we can have a conversation about implementing it in our game. ✨ LBGTQIA+ friendly ✨ ✨ Long-term campaign (expected to run for 30+ sessions) ✨ ✨ Open to players of all experience levels ✨ ✨ 18+ required ✨

Homebrew rules

Homebrewed rules will be discussed as a table in our session 0 to establish collaboratively what written rulings we want to change and how we want to change them. Commonly I have ruled that taking a health potion is a bonus action, double dice is rolled for a critical hit, death saves are rolled privately from the group. I will also be using homebrewed magical items and monsters throughout the campaign.

How GoPorridgeGaming creates a safe table

Especially as this is a game with a particularly unsettling/dark/eerie setting, I want to make sure my players are getting the most from the experience without feeling uncomfortable by the things that might come up in this surreal horror setting. I put out a consent checklist which helps establish the expectations for the group prior to Session 0 and encourage players to reach out to me for a brief chat about any discomfort or hard limits they think they could have during this game. Their limits and discomforts can be anonymous to the rest of the group. During Session 0, I facilitate a group discussion about expectations, boundaries and safety tools, and explain how lines and veils works, my open door policy and what specific boundaries we want to set as a group both in and out of game. TTRPG safety and comfort are incredibly important to me as a DM and I know we might be stepping into quite uncomfortable places together in this game. There is the potential for sexual themes, extreme violence and violence towards children, as well as the charming of PCs to come up. I want to be extremely careful to navigate any hard subjects consensually as a table and have safe fun together. If you have any further questions please do not hesitate to reach out.