Inquisition of Summer

Creating your character

Characters will be created before Session One begins. Players are encouraged to reach out before the campaign starts so we can connect your character's history to the world of Inquisition of Summer and ensure your personal stake in the Fellowship's reach feels lived-in from the first session. Characters begin at 1st level using the Modified Array: 16, 15, 14, 13, 12, 10 for ability scores, and gain maximum hit points at every level. For character options players may draw from the Standard 5th Edition Player's Handbook, Grim Hollow, and The Crooked Moon. No other supplements are required, though players are encouraged to think beyond combat archetypes — this is a campaign about survival, resistance, and uncovering the truth, and characters built with a personal history and a reason to distrust the Fellowship will find more purchase here than those built purely for the dungeon. Every character should arrive at the table with one thing already lost to the Inquisition. Everything else will follow.

Preparing for the session

Before your first session, players will need the following: Fantasy Grounds Unity installed and ready on their device. Fantasy Grounds is free to download and no license is required — players connect through the GM's host at no additional cost. A Discord account and membership in the Avner's Games Discord server, which serves as the primary hub for session announcements, campaign updates, character coordination, and between-session communication. An invite link will be provided upon booking. D&D Beyond access is recommended but not required. Grim Hollow and The Crooked Moon player options are available there for reference during character creation. Players are encouraged to reach out through Discord before the campaign begins. Inquisition of Summer is built around personal histories and connection to the world — a brief conversation before Session One ensures your character arrives with roots already in the ground.

What Avner brings to the table

Inquisition of Summer is a fully produced table experience. Every session comes with premium battlemaps from patron vendors built for the encounters you will face, ambient soundscapes running throughout via Kenku FM that shift with the tone of the scene, and a GM who gives distinct voices to every character you meet — from the hollow courtesy of a Witchfinder reading a Declaration to the fractured warmth of something fae that has been in hiding too long. Combat is tactical and grid-based. Positioning matters. The Inquisition fights like an institution — coordinated, procedural, and relentless — and the world's darker inhabitants fight like things that have nothing left to lose. Expect encounters that reward thinking as much as hitting. Outside of combat, Inquisition of Summer is a heavily roleplay-driven experience built on improv and player agency. The story responds to your choices. The world remembers what you do and what you fail to do. No encounter is purely mechanical and no conversation is purely flavor — everything here has weight. Rules serve the story. When the rules and the moment are in conflict, the moment wins. A Session Zero is conducted before the campaign begins. Inquisition of Summer deals with themes of persecution, institutional cruelty, and loss. Safety tools are in place and the table is built around trust. What happens here should be challenging. It should never be uncomfortable in ways that aren't welcome.

Homebrew rules

Contention dice as a consumable resource that moves between the DM and players. Grim Hollow introduces the Transformation system — a slow, story-driven progression that tracks what happens to characters who carry fae-blood or forbidden magic in a world that is actively trying to destroy them. Transformations are not power fantasies. They are consequences with teeth. The Inquisition Domain and Lapsed Inquisitor background are available for players who want their origin rooted directly in the Fellowship's machinery. The Crooked Moon brings folk horror to the ground level of the world — the old superstitions the Fellowship has declared heretical, the creatures bleeding through a Feywild without its King, and the Fateweaving system that binds your character's personal history directly into the campaign's narrative from session one. Ruins of Symbaroum's Corruption and Shadow mechanics are used to represent the cost of magic in a world where magic is hunted. Every use of unsanctioned power leaves a mark. Corruption is visible to those who know how to look — and the Inquisition trains its people to look. Kingdoms and Warfare governs the resistance. As the players build their network of allies, safe houses, and political pressure against the Fellowship, their efforts are tracked through faction mechanics that make the war against the Inquisition feel like a war rather than a series of disconnected encounters. All homebrew rulings will be communicated clearly before they become relevant at the table. Nothing will surprise you mid-session.

How Avner creates a safe table

Inquisition of Summer deals with themes of institutional persecution, religious coercion, public executions, loss of identity, and body horror. These themes are central to the story and will not be avoided — but they will always be handled with care and with your comfort as a priority. A full Session Zero is conducted before the campaign begins. We will establish Lines and Veils together as a table — Lines being content that will not appear in the game under any circumstances, Veils being content that may occur but will be handled off-screen. No Line or Veil is too small to name. Every player's boundaries shape the table equally. During play, safety tools are available at all times through Fantasy Grounds chat or the Avener's Games Discord. Typing X in chat stops the scene immediately and we step back from the content without question or explanation required. N signals that we need to steer away from where things are heading. O signals that you are comfortable and want to continue. Nothing typed in the safety channel will ever be questioned at the table. After sessions that go to heavy places — and in a campaign like this, some will — a brief check-in closes every session. The Avener's Games Discord remains open between sessions and a private message to me directly is always available if something needs to be addressed away from the group. No player should carry something uncomfortable home alone. This is a dark story. It should feel that way. It should never feel unsafe.