Water drips in some distant, godforsaken tunnel, a constant heartbeat in the oppressive darkness. A damp breeze brushes across your face, carrying with it the earthy scent of minerals leached from stone and the sickly sweetness of decay. Your bare and bloodied feet pitter patter across the slick stone of the tunnel you find yourself in, one of many in this accursed, neverending labyrinth of despair. You learned long ago that the soles of your shoes made too much sound when stepping on stone, and too much sound was deadly down here. Better to have scrapes and cuts rather than the alternative of missing your head.
The tunnel widens into a cavern, patches of bioluminescent algae and fungus clinging to stalactites and stalagmites jutting from the ceiling and rough floor like the fangs of some ancient, subterranean beast. The feeble illumination barely keeps the oppressive darkness at bay, though it’s nearly blinding to your senses. Memories of sunlight seemed like distant, long forgotten fantasies of days past, and at this point, any light in this infernal pit of darkness was like a shaft of heavenly illumination piercing through the depths of the Hells themselves.
Body and mind weary, you stagger to one of the nearby stalagmites and collapse to the ground, curling up to the dank pillar of stone like a baby cuddling up to its mother. Maybe this time the dreams wouldn’t come. Dreams of decay eating away at the foundations of the earth, clawing towards the sunlit surface. Of men ripping into one another, reveling in bloodshed. Of madness and chaos ruling eternal. Of voices whispering vile things in the back of your mind. Yes, maybe they wouldn’t come. But if they did, maybe you’d listen this time. At least then, you’d no longer be alone.
Hey y’all! Looking to start up an Out of the Abyss PbP campaign on Discord! We’ll be using Avrae and Tupper, and beginners are welcome! This is going to be heavily modified to include character backstories as an integral part of the overall plot, and as such, I’m looking for players who are interested in storytelling, role playing, writing, and sticking around for a long term campaign! I originally posted this recruitment on Reddit, but there's some kind of error where it deletes my post after I make it, so I figured I'd post it here as well.
Think of this PbP as a group of people gathering together to write a story. As such, if you only like hacking and slashing through dungeons filled with monsters, this might not be the campaign for you. Out of the Abyss is notorious for being grueling and hard to survive, but I plan to streamline things to allow more room for storytelling and interactions.
Without giving too much away, the premise of Out of the Abyss is this: you, an Overlander, are trapped deep underground in the endless subterranean depths known simply as the Underdark. Imprisoned by an evil race of elves known as drow, you struggle to escape, and once you do, it's a long trek back to the surface, every step filled with nightmarish beasts and the uneasiness of not knowing what lies ahead. As you travel through the winding tunnels, you begin to learn that not all is well in the Underdark. Whispers of demons running amok circulate amongst the subterranean dwellers, and tendrils of madness itch at the back of your mind. Something is very, very wrong with the world, but will you risk your life (and possibly your sanity) to learn what it is, or will you simply race to the surface and leave the Underdark to its own nefarious devices?
To dive into the nitty-gritty details, here’s some important info:
-System: 5e, 2014 rules
-Levels: Start at 3 and potentially reaching as high as 15
-We will be playing on Discord exclusively.
-Undark races (drow, druegar, svirfneblin) are banned UNLESS your character has a reason for never being in the Underdark before. Similarly, features such as Favored Terrain from the Ranger class and the Outlander’s Natural Explorer won’t work in the Underdark. This is to help portray some of the survival horror themes of the campaign.
-OotA is a darker, more grim campaign than most others, though there are lighter moments. Some themes that could be portrayed include but are not limited to the following: insanity, imprisonment, starvation, disease, body horror, slavery, racism/oppresion, effects of war, genocide, and betrayal.
-There’s a LOT of exploration/traveling in OotA, and since exploration is hard to do in PbP, I’ve thought of a cool way to portray it. When traveling for the inevitable 30+ days between locations, everyone (both me as the DM and you as a player) will be responsible for describing a stretch of the journey. There are many strange things in the Underdark: caverns filled with forests of towering mushrooms, tunnels filled with glowing geodes, chasms and ravines filled with magma, underground oceans filled with unspeakable horrors. As such, it’s the perfect setting to flex your creative writing skills! There will probably be creature encounters along the way, but we’ll sort details out later. Remember, I’m looking for a group of writers and storytellers, so if you don’t like either of those things, this might not be the campaign for you.
-This will be asynchronous, but there will be a strict at least 1 post per weekday policy. On the weekends, I’d love for everyone to still post, but since those days seem to be a bit busier than most, we’ll be a bit more lenient. If you know you’ll be busy and unable to post for any reason, just let us know! If you fall behind and don’t post for a long time without a reason, you’ll probably be kicked. This is to help keep things going since the biggest killer of PbP seems to be slow posting.
-Your character’s backstory will be included in the overall story arc. To make things easier on my side, feel free to drop as many story hooks as you’d like, but you must include at least 1 significant “plot hook” in your backstory. Some examples include themes like “I sacrificed my family to learn the secrets of necromancy” or “I’m so used to lying to others about myself that I’m starting to forget who I truly am.” I just need something juicy to work off of!
-This is a long term campaign, taking y’all to around level 15, maybe even higher. I’m looking for people who’ll stick around for the whole thing. If you know you’re going to have to drop out in a month or so, please don’t apply.
-Please, please, please don’t look up anything about the campaign. Spoilers ruin the fun for everyone.
-I’m hoping for us to all become friends, not just anonymous writers. As such, try to be active in the OOC thread as well. Share about yourself!
-This will be a clean game. There will be no explicit/sexual themes, and I’d like for there to not be too much profanity.
-Finally, remember to have fun!
!I’ll leave applications open for probably a couple of days, but if I get flooded with responses, I’ll probably close it down earlier. Looking forward to seeing your responses!
P.S. If y’all have any questions, just let me know!
I'm super interested. I have a spores druid I'd love to play, but I can be flexible based on party. I submitted in the application form, but can be reached on here with dms!
Alrighty, I’m going to close applications and sort through responses. I should have players chosen by tonight sometime, and I’ll be reaching out to these selected through Discord. Thank you all for applying!
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
DM- Azalin's Doom
DM- Surviving the Unsurvivable
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Application: https://forms.gle/XPYtCFesxRDUxFgt8
https://youtu.be/ONzBqZ4OYy4?si=wRSIZouaiU6QxYqs
Water drips in some distant, godforsaken tunnel, a constant heartbeat in the oppressive darkness. A damp breeze brushes across your face, carrying with it the earthy scent of minerals leached from stone and the sickly sweetness of decay. Your bare and bloodied feet pitter patter across the slick stone of the tunnel you find yourself in, one of many in this accursed, neverending labyrinth of despair. You learned long ago that the soles of your shoes made too much sound when stepping on stone, and too much sound was deadly down here. Better to have scrapes and cuts rather than the alternative of missing your head.
The tunnel widens into a cavern, patches of bioluminescent algae and fungus clinging to stalactites and stalagmites jutting from the ceiling and rough floor like the fangs of some ancient, subterranean beast. The feeble illumination barely keeps the oppressive darkness at bay, though it’s nearly blinding to your senses. Memories of sunlight seemed like distant, long forgotten fantasies of days past, and at this point, any light in this infernal pit of darkness was like a shaft of heavenly illumination piercing through the depths of the Hells themselves.
Body and mind weary, you stagger to one of the nearby stalagmites and collapse to the ground, curling up to the dank pillar of stone like a baby cuddling up to its mother. Maybe this time the dreams wouldn’t come. Dreams of decay eating away at the foundations of the earth, clawing towards the sunlit surface. Of men ripping into one another, reveling in bloodshed. Of madness and chaos ruling eternal. Of voices whispering vile things in the back of your mind. Yes, maybe they wouldn’t come. But if they did, maybe you’d listen this time. At least then, you’d no longer be alone.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hey y’all! Looking to start up an Out of the Abyss PbP campaign on Discord! We’ll be using Avrae and Tupper, and beginners are welcome! This is going to be heavily modified to include character backstories as an integral part of the overall plot, and as such, I’m looking for players who are interested in storytelling, role playing, writing, and sticking around for a long term campaign! I originally posted this recruitment on Reddit, but there's some kind of error where it deletes my post after I make it, so I figured I'd post it here as well.
Think of this PbP as a group of people gathering together to write a story. As such, if you only like hacking and slashing through dungeons filled with monsters, this might not be the campaign for you. Out of the Abyss is notorious for being grueling and hard to survive, but I plan to streamline things to allow more room for storytelling and interactions.
Without giving too much away, the premise of Out of the Abyss is this: you, an Overlander, are trapped deep underground in the endless subterranean depths known simply as the Underdark. Imprisoned by an evil race of elves known as drow, you struggle to escape, and once you do, it's a long trek back to the surface, every step filled with nightmarish beasts and the uneasiness of not knowing what lies ahead. As you travel through the winding tunnels, you begin to learn that not all is well in the Underdark. Whispers of demons running amok circulate amongst the subterranean dwellers, and tendrils of madness itch at the back of your mind. Something is very, very wrong with the world, but will you risk your life (and possibly your sanity) to learn what it is, or will you simply race to the surface and leave the Underdark to its own nefarious devices?
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To dive into the nitty-gritty details, here’s some important info:
-System: 5e, 2014 rules
-Levels: Start at 3 and potentially reaching as high as 15
-We will be playing on Discord exclusively.
-Undark races (drow, druegar, svirfneblin) are banned UNLESS your character has a reason for never being in the Underdark before. Similarly, features such as Favored Terrain from the Ranger class and the Outlander’s Natural Explorer won’t work in the Underdark. This is to help portray some of the survival horror themes of the campaign.
-OotA is a darker, more grim campaign than most others, though there are lighter moments. Some themes that could be portrayed include but are not limited to the following: insanity, imprisonment, starvation, disease, body horror, slavery, racism/oppresion, effects of war, genocide, and betrayal.
-There’s a LOT of exploration/traveling in OotA, and since exploration is hard to do in PbP, I’ve thought of a cool way to portray it. When traveling for the inevitable 30+ days between locations, everyone (both me as the DM and you as a player) will be responsible for describing a stretch of the journey. There are many strange things in the Underdark: caverns filled with forests of towering mushrooms, tunnels filled with glowing geodes, chasms and ravines filled with magma, underground oceans filled with unspeakable horrors. As such, it’s the perfect setting to flex your creative writing skills! There will probably be creature encounters along the way, but we’ll sort details out later. Remember, I’m looking for a group of writers and storytellers, so if you don’t like either of those things, this might not be the campaign for you.
-This will be asynchronous, but there will be a strict at least 1 post per weekday policy. On the weekends, I’d love for everyone to still post, but since those days seem to be a bit busier than most, we’ll be a bit more lenient. If you know you’ll be busy and unable to post for any reason, just let us know! If you fall behind and don’t post for a long time without a reason, you’ll probably be kicked. This is to help keep things going since the biggest killer of PbP seems to be slow posting.
-Your character’s backstory will be included in the overall story arc. To make things easier on my side, feel free to drop as many story hooks as you’d like, but you must include at least 1 significant “plot hook” in your backstory. Some examples include themes like “I sacrificed my family to learn the secrets of necromancy” or “I’m so used to lying to others about myself that I’m starting to forget who I truly am.” I just need something juicy to work off of!
-This is a long term campaign, taking y’all to around level 15, maybe even higher. I’m looking for people who’ll stick around for the whole thing. If you know you’re going to have to drop out in a month or so, please don’t apply.
-Please, please, please don’t look up anything about the campaign. Spoilers ruin the fun for everyone.
-I’m hoping for us to all become friends, not just anonymous writers. As such, try to be active in the OOC thread as well. Share about yourself!
-This will be a clean game. There will be no explicit/sexual themes, and I’d like for there to not be too much profanity.
-Finally, remember to have fun!
!I’ll leave applications open for probably a couple of days, but if I get flooded with responses, I’ll probably close it down earlier. Looking forward to seeing your responses!
P.S. If y’all have any questions, just let me know!
DM- Azalin's Doom
DM- Surviving the Unsurvivable
Sounds awesome! How will we be determining stats?
Stats will be rolled in the Discord server. Thanks for asking!
DM- Azalin's Doom
DM- Surviving the Unsurvivable
I'm super interested. I have a spores druid I'd love to play, but I can be flexible based on party. I submitted in the application form, but can be reached on here with dms!
I don't have a signature.
Thief rogue submitted! Here's his sheet with placeholder stats: https://www.dndbeyond.com/characters/136906462/SmHugb
Since it's Discord would using Dicecloud instead of DNDBeyond to build characters be alright?
There’s a dicebot called Avrae that will be handling all the rolls, so DnDBeyond character sheets are just fine!
DM- Azalin's Doom
DM- Surviving the Unsurvivable
I meant because I don't own books on here.
Oh, sorry! Go ahead!
DM- Azalin's Doom
DM- Surviving the Unsurvivable
What's your stance on homebrew?
Would stuff from WOTC-approved stuff like Drakkenheim, Grim Hollow, etc., be okay if you approve it?
It should be, but I’d have to check it first
DM- Azalin's Doom
DM- Surviving the Unsurvivable
Great, because I was interested in the Oath of Pestilence Paladin which seemed like it would fit in this campaign.
I applied to the form and hope I get in.
Sounds great, filled the application! Might play a Sorcerer, but still thinking about it a bit.
Application withdrawn
Application submitted!
Applied, sounds like a fun campaign
Alrighty, I’m going to close applications and sort through responses. I should have players chosen by tonight sometime, and I’ll be reaching out to these selected through Discord. Thank you all for applying!
DM- Azalin's Doom
DM- Surviving the Unsurvivable