Heart of Gold | Intrigue in the City Beneath (Beginner-friendly)
Plunge headfirst into a visceral rift in reality where body horror abounds as you unravel the secrets of a cult that worships the goddess of debt.
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SYSTEM
LANGUAGE
EXPERIENCE
AGE
$25.00
/ Session
Details
2 players following this game
Weekly / Monday - 9:00 PM UTC
Session Duration / 3–4 hours
Campaign Length / 10–15 Sessions
1 / 5 Seats Filled
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Meet your party members
1/5
About the adventure
“There are two types of Incarnadines: those who owe debts, and those who collect them. And the oldest debts of all are paid in blood.” -Lady Atherolis Unbidden-The-Serpent, priestess of Incarne Two hundred years ago, a hole in reality called the Heart was torn open beneath your home city. It is a sapient locale that thinks it knows what its denizens want, and as such, it shapes itself to try and grant their greatest desires. However, the Heart has a poor grasp of human understanding, and its attempts are often grotesque and misguided. Surviving there is a dangerous ordeal, but some people believe they can bring civilization to the Heart—including the Camborne-Roseglass-Unbidden Trading Company, a collective of merchants who worship Incarne, the goddess of debt. They’ve employed you as part of their newest crew of Delvers, explorers who plumb the depths of the City Beneath in search of untapped occult resources to profit from. But five of the collective’s six senior partners are scattered across the Heart with a web of secrets entangling them, and the sixth has disappeared without a trace. As you venture deeper into the red and twisted landscape before you, you’ll discover that your employers aren’t what they seem, and while some of them may become invaluable allies, others are just as likely to be your mortal enemies. • Heart of Gold is a campaign that combines the standard exploration-heavy format of Heart with an increased emphasis on social intrigue. Mechanically, Heart: The City Beneath is a D10 pool system, and characters gain new class advances when they accomplish certain narrative or mechanical goals that the players have chosen in advance. Thematically, the setting and characters are reminiscent of Annihilation, Darkest Dungeon, Ready or Not, and Resident Evil: Village. Heart of Gold is partially adapted from “Black Diamond Billions” by xexnoncores, mxsinister, and co. Licensing: "Black Diamond Billions Hub" and related articles by xexnoncores and Dorian Sloan by mxsinister, from the SCP Wiki. Source: https://scpwiki.com/black-diamond-billions-hub. Licensed under CC BY-SA.
Game style
Puzzle / Mystery Focused
Hexcrawl / Exploration
Roleplay Heavy
Game themes
Meet the Game Master
5.0
(7)
3 years on StartPlaying
63 games hosted
Highly rated for: Creativity, Storytelling, Sets the Mood
Average response time: 4 hours
Response rate: 100%
About me
About Me I have previously worked for Rowan, Rook, and Decard (the publisher of Spire: The City Must Fall, Heart: The City Beneath, and Honey Heist) as a pro GM running Spire at GenCon, and now I want to bring Spire and Heart to the rest of the world as well. I run my online games on Discord and Roll20, and if you live in Minneapolis/St. Paul or their surrounding suburbs, I’m also available to book for in-person games. As stated above, I specialize in running Spire: The City Must Fall and Heart: The City Beneath. Both are roleplay-heavy D10 pool systems, the former featuring revolution and political intrigue a la Arcane and the latter featuring exploration and body horror in the vein of Annihilation and Darkest Dungeon. If you’ve never played them before, don’t let that stop you: I love helping players learn new systems and am happy to be your guide!
View Profile →Character creation
Creating your character
I prefer to discuss the beginnings of character creation with players before Session Zero, but this isn’t strictly necessary. If you do begin making your character beforehand, you can choose your Class, Calling, Ancestry, Beats, and Equipment, but it’s best to wait to answer the questions that come with your Ancestry and Calling until Session Zero as some of those are meant to create connections between your character and the other PCs. We’ll also work to come up with a plot hook connecting your character to one of the six main NPCs; Heart of Gold is a nonlinear campaign and the order of events is instead influenced by how your characters interact with these NPCs.
What to expect
Preparing for the session
The game is hosted on Discord and Roll20, and you can join the Discord server where campaigns are hosted here: https://discord.gg/sgd3gdwkg Once you’ve joined, I’ll share the campaign’s Roll20 link and the Heart rulebook with you.
What LaurenTheCorgi brings to the table
I have previously worked for Rowan, Rook and Decard (the publisher of Heart: The City Beneath) running their games at GenCon, and now I want to bring Heart to you. I have five years of experience with Sparked by the Resistance (Heart’s base mechanics) and enjoy helping new players learn the game. In this campaign, you can expect unique character voices, a map to track your progress as you delve through the Heart, a letter written to each player character in the opening session, and ambient music. In terms of what aspects of gameplay get the most focus in the campaign, Heart of Gold is 50% roleplay, 30% exploration, and 20% combat.
Equipment needed to play
Computer
Microphone
Internet
Platforms used
Safety
How LaurenTheCorgi creates a safe table
Upon joining the campaign, I will discuss Lines and Veils one-on-one with each player via Discord. During Session Zero, we will create a Palette Grid, a safety tool used to outline our threshold of comfort when playing with themes that would be considered veils or are otherwise particularly heavy. In lieu of X, N, and O cards, I use the traffic light system (green for “Everything is fine,” yellow for “Proceed with caution,” red for “Pause the session; something’s wrong,” and beige for “Make things even more intense.”) These can either be stated verbally or privately messaged to me, and I do check-ins during particularly intense scenes to make sure everyone’s comfortable with how things are going. Stars and Wishes will be discussed at the end of each session.
Content warnings
Safety tools used