GRIM HOLLOW: BLOOD KNIGHT | Diablo-like Miniseries | Lv. 3–4

The blood knight is an evil apparition assuming the form of a hulking knight dripping in…blood. And, it's recently been sighted. We need your help.

TYPE

Campaign

LEVELS

3–4

EXPERIENCE

Open to all

AGE

18+
About the adventure

Evil comes in all forms in Etharis, and you're about to meet one. Travel to the lands where the mysterious and dangerous Blood Knight has been spotted. Investigate murder mysteries and rumors of it's sighting. Discover the curse behind the monster, and possibly a cure. Finally, face down against the Blood Knight itself in the climactic battle. This short adventure is a great way to learn the revised rules, explore the Grim Hollow campaign setting, or enjoy a short grimdark fantasy story with an experienced GM. There is an option to continue a longer adventure after the miniseries. 🔵 STYLES Grimdark fantasy, curses, dangerous land, murder msytery, overpowered monster 🔵 MUSES Diablo (video games), Soulsborne (video games)

3 NEEDED TO START
$30.00

/ Session

Details

Weekly / Tuesday – 7:00 PM UTC

Campaign Length / 3–4 Sessions

3–3.5 Hour Duration

0 / 6 Seats Filled

GAME MASTER

John (Big Bad Evil Gamer)

he/him

5.0

(79)

This game will begin once 3 players have joined

Each player will be charged when a session starts.

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Meet the Game Master
Published Writer
Artist
Voice Actor
Game Designer

4 years on StartPlaying

504 games hosted

Highly rated for: Storytelling, Sets the Mood, World Builder

Average response time: 7 hours

Response rate: 100%

About me

Yo, I'm John (27/M/US-ET). I like long walks on the beach and total party kills. I offer high-value adventures, versatile gamemastery, and 100% human-made art. My games focus on player-driven stories, great characters, complex tactics, deep roleplay, and good VTT use. 🔵 STYLES • Varied content (big fight one session, hard puzzle the next, long talk the next…) • Voice-acted characters • Lots of maps and moving pieces • Ambient soundscapes • Custom worldbuilding, creatures, items, and more 🔵 COMMISSIONS • Many systems, any genre • Official or custom content • Large group, small group, or duet • Specialty offerings • See pricing below 🔵 EXPERIENCE • 4+ years public speaking • 7+ years acting (10 theater performances, 1 year formal improv training) • 14+ years gamemastering • 20+ years worldbuilding • 11+ years "Dungeons and Dragons 5e" • 3+ years "Pathfinder 2e" • 2+ years Old School Renaissance (primarily, "Without Number") • 2+ years "Forged in the Dark" • 1+ year "LANCER" • <1 year experience "City of Mist", "Cortex Prime", "The Contract", and others 🔵 PERKS All perks only provided at request. • After your first session, I will credit you up to $75 USD to purchase a character portrait by an artist who uses human methods (no gen-AI) of your choice. Credits are provided as a per-session discount of 10% of the purchase price (up to $7.50) for the next 10 sessions. • Prior to your first or second session, I will call you for a free 30–60 minute character creation consultation. • For any private commission of custom content, I will call you for a free 30–60 minute adventure design consultation. • At any time, I can help you source a human-generated image for your character portrait from my library of purchased assets or freely-licensed content libraries I have access to. • After one session, I will write ~1,000 words (~2 pages of text @ 12-point font, single-spaced) at your direction for your character to create narrative anchors to the adventure, explore your backstory, answer lore questions, or define a personal quest. One revision cycle allowed. 🔵 PRICING Listed fees for public games may differ, below prices reflect fees for private requests. • Official/published content: $35 per person per session • Ready-to-play homebrew content, yours or mine: $40 per person per session • Custom content I design for you: $50+ per person per session, complex or specialty requests may cost more. Labor-intensive designs may incur a nonrefundable retainer equal to the cost of 1–2 undiscounted session(s), credited to the first session(s). I may require 2-4 weeks to prepare content. • Private groups of 2–5 players: 6 × regular cost of 1 person, either distributed equally between all players or serviced by special arrangement. Arrangement is renegotiable upon gain or loss of group members. This price modifier reflects the opportunity cost of hosting a smaller private game when I could otherwise host a public game of 6+ players. • Single-player adventures (duets): 7 × regular cost of 1 person. This price modifier reflects the same sentiments as above, as well as the additional labor required to entertain and advance a solo player through an adventure without the social and creative reliefs provided by multi-player party. • New system beyond my current offerings: Upfront retainer equal to the cost of 1 undiscounted session, credited to the first session(s). I may require up to 2–4 weeks to become competent with the system. • Play-by-post (play slowly via text-messaging): -15$ to regular cost. You are guaranteed up to 6 hours of messaging availability per week, schedule to be determined by interview. 🔵 TRIVIA • I used to do heavy equipment mechanics. • I once drove a puppy-powered dog-sled atop an Alaskan glacier. • I once sang at Carnegie Hall (with my high-school chorus, I sung baritone). • My director typecast me as the designated "drunk" character-actor for 5 of our plays (Twelfth Night, The Tempest, The Plow and the Stars, Our Town, Threepenny Opera,). • I have lived in two US states and one EU country.

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Reviews (79)

Proficiencies

Players say this GM is great at:

Storytelling

Sets the Mood

World Builder

Roger  avatar

Roger

Played 103 sessions

The GM has a thorough understanding of Foundry VTT with which he helped me better understand and use the VTT. Also, to note is the great voices he is able to do. I would recommend them highly.

Cole W avatar

Cole W

Played 82 sessions

This was my second campaign ever and finchy was always there to help with character creation to background creation to in game and the party i was with was amazing as well as the atmosphere finchy creates is easygoing while maintaining order and following the rules of the game i’ve had a great time so far as a novice and recommend finchy to all

Josh Walker avatar

Josh Walker

Played 81 sessions

I'm in two campaigns and can't decide which is my favorite because something great happens after each session! He encourages roleplaying, makes the world come alive with sounds and visuals, and works with you to make your characters shine, combat flows well, and he is willing to run with the players' ideas, even if that means hijinks.

Aedan A avatar

Aedan A

Played 56 sessions

Finchy, or whatever variation on the theme he’s going by on discord today, is simply one of the most incredible DMs. Where to begin? First, I guess, it’s worth mentioning almost all of his games are set in his own highly developed homebrew world, mainly in the region of the Western Reaches. It’s a really cool place, kind of more Renaissance than mediaeval, analogous to our own Age of Discovery as Finchy likes to explain it. The world itself is incredible - a vast range of complex, intriguing NPCs, from the mundane to the international and I fully expect cosmological level (although none of my campaigns with him have progressed that far yet). Finchy has wonderful ideas for campaigns that go well beyond any standard module, which creates a beautiful, living and breathing world that the characters can influence, indeed sometimes with a little overlap even between his different games. And in terms of the experience of playing with Finchy? I fell in love with the style of his games the moment I began - narratively, he has the perfect soporific, almost hypnotic, yet still fascinatingly engaging voice. He also achieves a range of different voices for his NPCs, all of which are engaging, appropriate, and interesting (although some overlap between different games, ha ha). I loved it so much I immediately signed up to any other open games, and now play in 7 different campaigns with him. He’s just that good - and each of them uses the most beautifully unique premises to keep you engaged. In terms of character creation, Finchy is a master at working with the player to create complex, fully rounded characters that are both a pleasure to play and to engage with other PCs. He also has developed his own randomised character creation system, which if you choose to use it (you don’t have to) gives you bonus in game rewards. It’s pretty damn cool. Finchy is also a master of Foundry, introducing a lot of useful automation and fun mods for a smooth flow - when the server isn’t lagging, of course, virtual tabletops being what they are. One of my favourite things about his approach as well, however, is rather than just using battle maps, he also introduces a series of beautiful animated vignettes for the screen between scenes. If you want complex characters, a clever DM with a beautifully worked out campaign, genuine attention and care given to your characters and their back stories, Finchy is pretty much perfect, definitely the DM for you. Thinking outside the box is often rewarded, as are clever solutions, shenanigans and fun, but he will also be true to his world and the rules, telling you when something, you know, just isn’t feasible. It’s a good balance that adds to immersion and realism. As does his inclusion of several alternative rules, like lingering injuries, which happen often enough to keep things interesting for your characters but not debilitate the game. Combat is always challenging, but the potential for death is real every single time. First and foremost, however, to my mind, Finchy is a storyteller: committed to the world, his campaigns and his players. A simply sublime DM. Couldn’t recommend him more.

Tristan avatar

Tristan

Played 44 sessions

The only reason not to play with Finchy is that it will make other DMs seem lackluster. This guy does it all. The voices, worldbuilding, narrative depth, art, music, mechanical understanding, balanced homebrews, and community all stand out. He also uses Foundry VTT, so the arithmetic is basically automatic, resources are tracked in easy to follow ways, and you can fully customize each one of your dice with special effects on a crit. If you're looking for more than that, you're gonna be looking for a long time.

Jordan Smith  avatar

Jordan Smith

Played 35 sessions

"The Finchmeister", This right here is an amazing DM. Terrific story telling and descriptions that brought the world alive. The interactions, visual aids and soundscape was 10/10. Role-playing NPC's, Combat behavior, wounding system and failures made for crazy randomness that I enjoy. Every Dice roll had weight, meaning and impact from the DM. Character design was also great additive with additional rules and balancing changes from 3rd party. Even though I had never used foundryvtt.com/ it was easy to pick up. Finch, his mods and his website were extremely helpful... The amount of craftmanship and hard work shows.... "The Finchmeister" is a Pro!

Character creation
Creating your character

Detailed character creation instructions are found in the system and adventure primers given after joining.

What to expect
Preparing for the session

1️⃣ Read this entire listing. 2️⃣ Review the preparation materials revealed after joining. They include the gamemaster’s contact information and links to the player documentation. 3️⃣ Follow the instructions included in the player documentation. 4️⃣ Contact the gamemaster for any queries. 5️⃣ Prepare a calm and comfortable play space.

What John (Big Bad Evil Gamer) brings to the table

🔵 VIBES • Casual atmopshere, professional performance • Smooth radio voice • Cute dog (cameos by request) 🔵 CONVENIENCE • No purchase of books or tools required • Easy automation (no math!) 🔵 COMMUNITY • Friendly players • Group events • Free play offers for members 🔵 AESTHETICS • Thousands of maps and tokens • Curated soundscapes • Custom worldbuilding

Equipment needed to play

Computer

Internet

Microphone

Platforms used
Safety
How John (Big Bad Evil Gamer) creates a safe table

By joining this game, you agree to our social contract. See the link below. This adventure is Rated-R. Certain content is limited or excluded for safety. Excluded content is not included in the adventure. Limited content is not featured frequently or with great intensity, typically occurring “off-scene” Limited content: • Extremely graphic violence, gore, torture, et cetera. • Violence against children, pets, and other innocents. • Consensual sexual activity. Excluded content: • Discrimination based on (non-fictional) race, color, religion, sex, sexuality, gender, or national origin. • Non-consensual romantic or sexual activity. • Fetish content. Big Bad Evil Games Roleplay Social Contract: https://rentry.co/bbeg_social_contract

Content warnings
Drugs (addiction, use, withdrawal)
Language/Cursing
Sexual Content
Extreme Violence
Blood
Safety tools used

Frequently asked questions

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