Chase Rumors. Pull Threads. Save the City of Masks. | Shadowdark

Creating your character

We'll build characters together at Session 0. I'll send a short campaign document beforehand if you want to come in with some ideas, we sort out the rest at the table. Never played before? Don't worry. This stuff is easy and fun. I'll walk you through it. MECHANICS Level 1. Stats: roll 3d6, place them where you want. Classes: Fighter, Thief, Priest, Wizard, Bard, or Duelist. Once booked I'll send a Shadowdarklings.net link with the campaign options already set up. WHO ARE YOU IN MERIDIA? A canal rower who knows every waterway and back alley? A Bardic College student or graduate? A veteran who fought for this city and would do it again? A priest, a scholar, a duelist with a reputation? A thief with a code? A wizard with a complicated history? Or something else entirely? THE FACTIONS You might belong to one, work for one, or just know people in one. - The Duke — Loren di Montmar leads with discipline and dignity. Commands the City Guard, knights, and a network of spies. The city trusts him. - The Bardic College — A grand academy of music, truth, and enlightenment. Has the Duke's ear. - Gedgarrin College — Walled towers of arcane study along the river. Powerful mages who keep to themselves. - The Rowers — Canal workers who carry goods and passengers across the city, reciting ballads as they go. Not to be crossed. - The Beggars — Everywhere. See everything. Ignored by everyone. Know more than the Duke's own spies. - House of Seren — The Thieves Guild. Run by an assassin named Seren, all charm and secrecy. - Bywater Barons — Upstart thugs out of Rilken Row, pushing into the city's criminal territory. - Charnel-Men — Grave diggers, cremators, keepers of the dead. Silent, cloaked, feared. They carry the final secrets of the dying. HOW DO YOU ALL KNOW EACH OTHER? Same district, same tavern, same college, same canal. Maybe you've never met before session one. We'll work it out together — nothing locked in until then. The one thing that matters going in: you live here, and you're not letting this city go quietly.

Preparing for the session

Discord is a free voice and chat app. Make an account at discord.com if you don't have one. The app is better than the browser but both work. I'll send an invite link when you book. Foundry VTT is where the game actually happens. Maps, tokens, dice. It runs in your browser with no account or download needed. I host it on my end and send you a link. You need a working mic. Built-in laptop mic is fine. Camera is optional. We do voice on Discord. Shadowdarklings.net is a free character builder for Shadowdark. I'll send a settings link when you book with the campaign options already loaded. Good to poke around before Session 0. Before we meet I'll send a short one-pager about the city and factions. Worth reading before we all get together. Questions about any of this? Just message me.

What Matt brings to the table

When you book I'll send a Discord invite, a link to Owlbear Rodeo (our virtual tabletop. It runs in your browser. There's no account or download needed), and a short one-pager on Meridia and its factions. I'll also send a Shadowdarklings.net link with all the character class options already loaded. It's a free character builder worth a look before Session 0, but we'll go over everything together at the table. You don't need to own any books. I'll be providing maps for most combat and exploration locations, music and atmosphere throughout, voiced NPCs. This is a story-first game, but Shadowdark is lethal by design — you may play more than one character over the course of a campaign. The rules are simple enough that we rarely stop to look things up, and when we do, we make a call and sort it out between sessions.

How Matt creates a safe table

Before your first session I'll send a short Google Form asking for your Lines and Veils. Lines are things we won't even allude to at the table. Veils are things that can exist in the world but that we won't focus the story on. For example: does slavery exist in Meridia? If so, does it ever come up in our adventures? The form stays open the whole campaign. At the end of every session I encourage everyone to update it, and I read everything out at the top of the next one. We close every session with Stars and Wishes. Stars are things you liked; Wishes are things you'd love to see more of. "I loved getting some downtime to just shoot the breeze with the NPCs" or "Exploring this mystery has been fun, but I and my character are itching for a fight sometime soon." It's how we keep the game pointed at what the table actually wants.