Woundwish: The Voice Under the Stairs
Woundwish: A shifting arena where survival is brutal, legends are born in blood, and the rules of reality change with every scream.
$22.50
/ Session
Details
1 player following this game
Bi-weekly / Thursday - 3:00 AM UTC
Oct 29 / Session 7
Session Duration / 2.5–4 hours
3 / 5 Seats Filled
Top Game Master
One of StartPlaying's top-rated GMs, a player favorite and highly recommended.
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Schedule
Meet your party members
3/5
About the adventure
**Woundwish is a high-level D&D 5e campaign about legendary gladiators who have already survived the meat grinder.** You are not fresh prisoners thrown into an arena for someone else’s amusement. You are champions: famous, dangerous, scarred, sponsored, feared, loved, and bound by blood, soul, contract, or something worse to the brutal holy spectacle known as Woundwish. The campaign begins in the uneasy comfort behind the arena walls. You have a home, allies, rivals, healers, handlers, fans, enemies, and maybe even a family trying very hard not to think about what you do for a living. The gods approve of Woundwish. The sponsors profit from it. The crowds adore it. And somewhere beneath all the roaring applause, something ancient is listening from the dark. This is not a straight PvP campaign, though the arena still matters. The party will investigate disappearances, navigate sponsors and factions, uncover what Woundwish is really feeding, and sometimes fight brutal exhibition matches where friendship, pride, survival, and public image collide. Player-versus-player scenes may happen, but they are part of the story, not the whole game. This game is best for players who enjoy high-level characters, dark fantasy, moral rot, dangerous politics, character drama, gallows humor, and cinematic combat. Expect a mix of roleplay, mystery, exploration, faction intrigue, horrifying revelations, and the occasional crowd-pleasing act of ultraviolence.
Game style
Combat Heavy
Rule of Cool (RoC)
Roleplay Heavy
Meet the Game Master
4.9
(44)
2 years on StartPlaying
472 games hosted
Highly rated for: Creativity, Rule of Cool, Storytelling
Average response time: 5 hours
Response rate: 100%
About me
I've been running homebrew Dungeons & Dragons campaigns since 2016, and what started as a hobby has grown into something I never imagined: a full-time career bringing people together to tell incredible stories, roll dice, and occasionally make some truly terrible decisions. My journey as a DM actually began with a pretty awful experience as a player. Shortly after learning D&D, I joined a game I found online. The DM treated the game like a competition against his players, and it showed. Nobody seemed to be having fun except him. I never went back. Instead, I started my own campaign with one simple goal: **make sure everyone at the table has a great time.** Nearly a decade later, that philosophy hasn't changed. I've had the pleasure of introducing kids and teenagers to D&D, running homebrew campaigns at The Kobold Lounge, and sharing hundreds of adventures with players from all walks of life. Since joining StartPlaying, I've turned my passion into my profession, running hundreds of sessions and earning recognition as a Top GM in 2026. My style is heavily focused on player freedom, creativity, and collaborative storytelling. I'm a sandbox DM at heart. I build living worlds filled with complicated characters, political intrigue, dangerous enemies, and plenty of opportunities for things to go spectacularly wrong. My campaigns can be dark, ridiculous, emotional, or downright chaotic, sometimes all in the same session. I love creative players. Got a bizarre character concept? An unusual subclass? Some ridiculous scheme that probably shouldn't work? Bring it to my table. I'm much more interested in finding a way to make your ideas work than telling you why they can't. I put an enormous amount of work into building my world, Arcanemia, and the adventures that take place within it. But the most important part of any campaign will always be the people playing it. Your characters' choices matter, your actions have consequences, and your stories help shape the world around you. $$ A quick note about pricing $$ If money is an obstacle, please reach out. This is how I make my living, and I've worked hard to get here, but I never want finances to be the only reason someone can't enjoy a game. I can't promise I'll always be able to accommodate everyone, but I'm happy to have that conversation. At the end of the day, I'm still doing this for the same reason I started in the first place: I love D&D, I love the people I've met playing it, and there's nothing quite like getting a group of people together for three hours of absolute nonsense and unforgettable storytelling. I hope to see you at one of my tables soon, and may all your 20s be natural!
View Profile →Character creation
Creating your character
We'll go over specifics in detail during session 0, but due to the nature of this campaign we'll be using point buy or standard array for stats. Almost any content is fine, but character sheets will be reviewed thoroughly to avoid any gamebreaking/bending
What to expect
Preparing for the session
A discord and dndbeyond account are necessary, so is a microphone. A webcam isn't necessary but is encouraged.
What DM Nug Gnome brings to the table
I run cinematic, character-driven D&D with a strong mix of roleplay, tactical combat, dark humor, and big dramatic consequences. My games tend to feel like a fantasy war story crashed into a haunted carnival: dangerous, strange, funny at the worst possible moments, and full of characters who make terrible choices for understandable reasons. For Woundwish, I’ll provide a living high-level campaign setting built around gladiator culture, divine spectacle, faction politics, mystery, and brutal arena combat. Players can expect custom NPCs, rival champions, sponsors, strange gods, recurring enemies, moral complications, and a world that reacts to what the party does. Your character’s backstory, relationships, reputation, and public image will matter. At the table, I use character voices, visual references, maps when combat benefits from them, and theater of the mind when the scene is better served by momentum and imagination. Combat will often be tactical and dangerous, especially at this level, but I’m not here to “beat” the players. I want fights to feel memorable, cinematic, and earned, whether that means a desperate survival match, a political duel, or a monster crawling out of something that absolutely should not have been alive. Rules-wise, I respect 5.5e’s structure, but I am not allergic to the Rule of Cool. I try to be fair, consistent, and generous when players come up with smart, flavorful, or hilariously reckless ideas. If something bends the rules, I’ll usually look for a reasonable ruling that keeps the game moving without letting the whole system fall apart. Expect a collaborative table where character choices matter, consequences are real, and the best moments often come from leaning into the chaos together.
Homebrew rules
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1YpIO-GTrZSYB2FskTh4V2ANngNFcziey-E2t-AzllpY/edit?usp=sharing
Equipment needed to play
Microphone
Internet
Platforms used
Safety
How DM Nug Gnome creates a safe table
X cards are messaged, safety tools and triggers will be discussed in session 0
Content warnings
Safety tools used