Dungeon of the Mad Mage šŸ’€ Levels 5-20 MEGA DUNGEON

Dungeon of the Mad Mage šŸ’€ Levels 5-20 MEGA DUNGEON

Halaster built a murder-theatre under Waterdeep. You are tonight’s cast, crew, and casualty.

TYPE

Campaign

LEVELS

5–20

LANGUAGE

English

EXPERIENCE

Open to all

AGE

18+
1 SEAT LEFT
$25.00

/ Session

Details

1 player following this game

Weekly / Monday - 3:00 AM UTC

Jul 20 / Session 22

Session Duration / 3–3.5 hours

5 / 6 Seats Filled

Top Game Master

One of StartPlaying's top-rated GMs, a player favorite and highly recommended.

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Schedule

Mon, Jul 20 | 3:00 AM – Session 22

Mon, Jul 27 | 3:00 AM – Session 23

Mon, Aug 03 | 3:00 AM – Session 24

Mon, Aug 10 | 3:00 AM – Session 25

Mon, Aug 17 | 3:00 AM – Session 26

Mon, Aug 24 | 3:00 AM – Session 27

Mon, Aug 31 | 3:00 AM – Session 28

Mon, Sep 07 | 3:00 AM – Session 29

Meet your party members

5/6

About the adventure

Beneath the Yawning Portal, Undermountain is waking up, and every level is at war with the one below it. Ancient gates are stirring, old safeguards are failing, and Halaster’s dungeon has begun turning on itself. Xanathar’s Guild claws at the upper halls. Drow houses scheme in ruined cities. Goblinoid warlords fortify their kingdoms. Arcane apprentices play at godhood in abandoned laboratories. Mind flayers, duergar, undead, aberrations, cults, monsters, and worse all carve out their little pieces of the Mad Mage’s private hell. Up above, Waterdeep drinks, watches, and wagers while Durnan pays good coin for trophies dragged back from the dark. Bring your own torches, rope, and plausible deniability. You have the dungeon’s attention. This is a seat in an ongoing story, not a drop-in ticket - once you're in, the party (and the plot) counts on you being there.

Game style

Roleplay Heavy

Combat Heavy

Sandbox / Open World

Dungeon Crawl

Meet the Game Master

5.0

(26)

TOP GM
Streamer
Neurodivergent
Voice Actor

4 years on StartPlaying

258 games hosted

Highly rated for: Voices, Storytelling, Creativity

Average response time: 4 hours

Response rate: 100%

About me

Watch the short video pitch for the TL;DR version of my origin story: https://youtu.be/htEhWDgKbsU I run character-driven D&D with strong story and real consequences. Your choices steer the game, the dice complicate it, and the best moments are the ones nobody planned. It gets tense when it needs to, and we’ll laugh when everything goes sideways. My love of this stuff goes back a long way. I grew up obsessed with mythology and fairy tales, and in the mid-80s I fell into D&D through Dragonlance and the old Gold Box computer games. While other kids were outside doing whatever normal kids do, I was busy arguing with myself about hit points and monster design. That same obsession eventually spilled into theatre and film. I directed Troll Bridge (a Pratchett-approved Discworld comedy that got a surprising amount of attention) and made Blood on the Game Dice, which is my love letter to tabletop play. These days I’m behind the screen, stitching together myth, motives, and dangerous possibilities, letting your characters decide which fire to walk into.

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Character creation

Creating your character

You’ll be creating your character on D&D Beyond with the complete official library and any available partnered content to scheme with. We use 5.5e where available, with 5e (2014 rules) filling in the gaps. Homebrew is not on the table. New characters start at level 7 and use point buy with fixed hit points. For gear, take your normal starting equipment - you may sell back anything you don’t want - then add 1,800 GP, plus 2 common and 2 uncommon magic items. You may buy additional equipment and magic items before the game at 5.5e prices. Please finish your sheet with details like height and weight; some traps pay attention to that. Completed characters must be submitted before the game so I can approve and import them into Foundry. You’ll have access to the game ~30 minutes before the session if you want to test dice rolls or poke at macros.

The current party

Aminita: Goblin | Druid / Circle of Spores Gerbo Kackle: Gnome | Wizard / Diviner Ilya Thunderroot: Half-Orc | Cleric / Grave Domain Qualia Elanderan: Elf | Barbarian / Path of the World Tree Zoraster: Dragonborn | Sorcerer / Draconic Sorcery

What to expect

Preparing for the session

šŸ’¬ Discord: Install the app (not the browser version), make an account, and join the server link I send after you book. šŸ’» VTT: Foundry runs in your browser, you don’t need to buy anything. Use Edge for best performance (Chrome’s fine). Turn on hardware acceleration. šŸ“œ D&D Beyond: Make your character there and send me their link before your first run so I can bring them into Foundry. It's free to sign up. šŸŽ§ Audio gear: Headphones required. If we hear pets, fans, traffic, or typing, please enable push-to-talk. šŸ–±ļø Mouse: Foundry’s right-click, drag, hover, pan, target, and token controls are built for a mouse. šŸŽ¬ Tech check: Join Discord 10 minutes early for a quick audio check and chatter with the other players. Then we kick the doors off their hinges. šŸ›°ļø Connection: Stable internet. If your Wi-Fi is powered by sadness, plug in. Turn off your VPN and downloads.

What DM Dan Knight brings to the table

🐲 Master subscription on D&D Beyond for sharing the entire official 5e library āš’ļø Foundry VTT on Molten Hosting for accelerated network speeds šŸŽ¼ Syrinscape for licensed atmosphere and music šŸ—ŗļø Only the best third-party maps, tokens, and animation assets available šŸŽ™ļø Discord Nitro for exceptional speech clarity 🌈 A welcoming and inclusive game for everyone of all walks of life I run games from my studio with production-quality camera, lighting and audio. I have a background in film, theatre, AV, and graphic design, so I bring a production mindset to the table. The space is built for your character to take centre stage with a focus on presentation, flow, and narrative punch - so every session plays like a live show built around your party’s story. I run this from a dedicated studio with pro-grade camera, lighting, and audio. My background is in film, theatre, AV, and graphic design, and I bring that production sense to the VTT: clear audio, smooth pacing, and minimal technical friction. This is a professional setup built for immersive storytelling - so every session plays like a live show with your characters taking centre stage. You can see my setup here: https://youtu.be/htEhWDgKbsU

Homebrew rules

āž¤ Backgrounds are decoupled from ability score modifiers and origin feats, and you can select and adjust those appropriate to your character. āž¤ Drinking a potion as a full action provides maximum results on all rolls. Drinking as a bonus action rolls dice as normal. Administering a potion to another is a full action with dice rolls. āž¤ From 5th level critical hits provide maximum damage, followed by an additional roll of all dice. āž¤ No reactions when surprised. āž¤ Gain advantage on attacking targets out of their line of sight. Reactions can be used to face a melee attackers before the attack is resolved. In Mad Mage we use: āž¤ Healing Surges to buff mid-combat. āž¤ Rest with Epic Heroism to get up and keep moving.

Equipment needed to play

Internet

Computer

Microphone

Headphones

Safety

How DM Dan Knight creates a safe table

This is high-energy, heroic survival horror in FaerĆ»n’s deadliest death trap: the content warnings below are a feature, not a bug. That said, I do not decide what’s uncomfortable for you. If the fiction gets too close to home, that’s completely valid. The table runs on an open-door policy: you can step away, call a break, or tap out at any time with zero judgement. Intimacy fades to black and stays offscreen. There’s no racism, sexism, homophobia, or transphobia at the table. Any bias toward fantasy peoples (orc hate, drow misandry, etc) is roleplay only and earns in-world consequences. PvP only happens with prior explicit consent from everyone involved. Villains may perpetuate ugly things, but we don’t linger on it, we keep it offscreen, and player characters never perpetrate it. We always close with a quick debrief so nobody leaves carrying anything heavy. For everyone’s safety, sessions have their audio recorded.

Content warnings

Alcohol Use
Body Horror
Cults
Death
Deep or Large Bodies of Water
Devils / Demons / Fiends
Emotional Abuse
Extreme Violence
Gore
Insects
Language/Cursing
Mind alteration
Murder
Mutilation
Nightmares about Traumatic Events
Paralyzation
Prejudice
Small Spaces (Claustrophobia)
Snakes
Spiders
Suffocation
Torture
Fire
Mental Illness
Abuse
Animal Death
Blood
Character Death
Drowning
Hostages
Kidnapping
Illness
Mind Control
Mutilation of Corpses
Slavery
Human Trafficking (adult only)
Violence
Panic Attacks
Cannibalism
Freezing
Mass Death
Trauma
Uncanny Valley

Safety tools used

Frequently asked questions