"The Master's Vault" is an introductory adventure built to teach the basics of D&D, with a fine balance of roleplay, combat, and exploration. Veterans of D&D and the Play-by-Post format are still welcome, but be aware that this adventure may not give you the level of strategy and intrigue that you desire.
Read through the rest of this post thoroughly, and if you are interested, follow the instructions to apply.
About The Adventure:
- This adventure is set in the frontier of the Merriam Vale.
- This is a short adventure, covered in one or two real life sessions. An adventure of this length typically lasts for a few months in this format.
- This is an excellent adventure for new and aspiring players. If you are fairly new to D&D, 5th edition, or the play-by-post format, this is a great opportunity for you to test the waters without needing to commit to a full-length campaign.
About The DM & House Rules:
- I currently run four long-running campaigns on this site, and have many years of experience DMing both in person and online.
- My fantasy writing influences are primarily R.A. Salvatore and George R.R. Martin.
- On most days I resolve actions and advance the adventure once each day at a minimum. When you apply, please send me a PM that includes the phrase “Marigold the Brave” to ensure the players are attentive to others' posts.
- I want PbP to be simple and flow easily. I do not use grids for PbP, and I use grouped initiative to reduce the need to wait on players to post in a specific order.
- I do not use any averages. All health and damage is rolled, for both players and monsters.
- Characters can die in my campaigns. Though it has not happened often, I do not fudge rolls and senseless actions often have consequences.
How To Apply:
- If you are at all uncertain that you can be committed to completing this adventure (a period of a few months), please do not apply. Don't be the person that ghosts an adventure and leaves their fellow players hanging.
- Rolling for stats is preferred, but Standard Array and Point Buy are also accepted for determining ability scores.
- If you are rolling for stats, those rolls must be made here or in a PM. Rerolls will only be allowed if there are no ability scores above 13. There are no other exceptions. If you are not comfortable with that risk, please use the Standard Array or Point Buy.
- Reply to this thread or send me a PM with your application. Please include your D&D experience. If you are not familiar with character creation and would prefer to use a pregenerated character, please let me know. Otherwise, include the 1) race/class you would like to play, 2) a short background summary, and 3) your method of determining ability scores (include rolls if rolling). No Unearthed Arcana or homebrew characters will be accepted.
- Your character's backstory can be as light or heavy as you would like, but the party begins this adventure as students of Elaria Feywing, also known as "The Master", who teaches her legendary skills in magic, combat, and survival. Your backstory should answer one question at a minimum: Why did you come to The Master’s mansion to begin your life of adventure?
- I do not prioritize players with PbP experience. I do try my best not to select players that have a history of leaving games unfinished, or consistently making short/rushed posts.
- As this is an introductory adventure, I will weight my selection toward those with less experience. That being said, I will be selecting 1-2 experience players at a minimum.
This post has potentially manipulated dice roll results.
Ability scores: 11101414169
Experience: Played for a short bit decades ago live, am in the starting stages of a couple PBP campaigns here now...
Race: Human
Class: Wizard
Background: Malfearance claims that he was once a noble who was unjustly jailed and left in a prison to rot. He claims his position and family were stolen from him while he was left in the dark, chained and forgotten. He claims that death has passed him by so that he can seek revenge upon those who wronged him and find his long last wife and the power to resurrect her to her former glory. He claims her spirit told him to come to The Master to learn the steps to power so that he can start this journey... He may or may not be insane. Malfearance wears a tattered robe which, if asked, he claims is a symbol of the rank he once held and refuses to give up. He also wears shackles and chains, these act as his spell book as he carves his spells into the links...
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
We're doing one small murder-y thing for a bigger, better reason. The ends justify the means.
Quenthel (Quent as his friends call him) hails from city of Neverwinter. Learning with a group of fellow bards who played more south side establishments, Quent had to learn to run as much as he played. Due to the challenges some people had with his drow heritage (and his scathing wit), he often had to duck out of engagements to prevent becoming someone’s else’s story.
His local mentor advised him that he should pursue the opportunity to study with Elaria Feywing, known more commonly as the Master. According to Darin Fellblade, his mentor, Elaria has been something of a launching pad for the most prestigious adventurers. Given his status as a bit of a troublemaker in his local scene, he elected to take the opportunity and set off to the Master’s Mansion.
Experience: Only been playing Dnd for a few weeks! Never played a PbP before but I really want to.
Array: I prefer point buy personally
I'd like to play a Ranger Tabaxi named Arifice.
Backstory: She grew up in the forests with a band of other Tabaxi. She's been able to learn as much as she could on her own but she has a deep desire to learn as much about combat and hunting as possible. After talking heavily with her family she decided to leave the forest to seek a better life and went to talk to the Master.
Experience: Currently in progress on my first online campaign [ToA] using Beyond20, DnDBeyond, and Discord. We have done eight 3-hour sessions so I am relatively new to D&D and have not done a PbP campaign.
Stats: I wouldn't be against rolling for stats. Could add some randomness and fun to the character. Ability scores: 13148111711
Class: High Elf Wizard named Staloki
Backstory: Growing increasingly frustrated with the focus on solely arcane magic, Staloki planned to sneak away from the town of Nylfehil on the next stormy night. He heard rumors of an instructor known as Master Elaria Feywing with a wide range of adventuring knowledge. Regardless whether The Master would allow him to join as a student, anything was better than continuing the mundane life in Nylfehil.
Background: In his home town, Agnarr was hailed as a Robin Hood-esque figure, helping the poor at the expense of the rich. However, he had no intention of helping the poor. He had to find a reason to leave town before his true motives were found out. He jumped at the first opportunity to present itself: training in the Mansion of the Master.
Background: For years Gunter was a traveling performer, taking his one-man-show from town to town. Although he was always on the brink of poverty, he reveled in the vagabond life. This all changed after the drought and poor harvest of last year. At his lowest point, outcast and starving, he made a pact that he believed would give him the edge he needed to improve his act and survive. He was granted power, but the cost was devastating. Desperate and scared, he heard of the guidance offered by “The Master”. He sought her out in the hope that she could help him control what he had unleashed.
Experience: I have played 3.5e and 5e on-and-off in person and on roll20 for the last decade. I have been playing 5e as a player regularly for the last year. I am totally new to PBP and excited for an introduction.
Experience: Been playing D&D for as long as I have been on this site. I wanted to get used to mechanics before going into tabletop.
Class: Warlock
Race: Changeling (May change race)
Background: Urchin
Backstory: Valiamor spent most of his life not knowing their parents. He wasn’t even sure what they really looked like. He survived the cruelty of city life by stealing and using his ability to turn into anyone. One day, he found out about a valuable shipment heading to a halfling woman called Merigold the Brave. Believing it to be a priceless artifact, or maybe even gold, Valiamor attempted to steal it and succeeded. He found a stick that appeared to be ancient and had some kind of symbol carved into it. That was the first and only time he heard the voice in his head. He never heard it again, but he believed it was because he was not strong enough. He eventually found out about an Elaria Feywing, known to many as “The Master,” and worked to learn about the magical ability he started showing.
About myself: A rather experienced role-player, first with D&D 2nd as a kid, then really getting into 3rd and Pathfinder later on, then into 5th. I've ran a campaign from 3rd to 20th in Pathfinder, and had many others, including a few with other systems both long and short. I've been a DM more than a player- having started as a rule lawyer and wargamer in 3rd- but long since improved on how to have fun with everyone, from chaotic neutral-only players to totally inexperienced and friendly folk... most notably converting my mother into a player, which nobody could have seen coming. I'd like to jump into something on the more simple side, as I'm regularly world-building and running other games (2 pbp right now), and am currently not a player for any game. Short of catastrophic societal collapse, I will be around these forums for a long while, daily.
Ability scores: 915911813
Race, probably Human, and class dependent on scores, see PM following up.
Backstory:
Ryona Westfellow of Margreve is the oldest and sole surviving descendant of a successful occult trader. Her mother, a former messenger for a well-to-do wizard, settled down with her father to raise several children. Together with her mother, she had traveled further than most children, more than even the nomads, to see her mother's family. However, neither parent could keep their curious children safe from the many things they've collected- after their 3rd child died from another accident, this time involving the son of one of the local priests, the mother was held accountable and locked in a cell for years. Both parents suffered in that time, and when her mother was finally released, Ryona was already coming close of age. She had done much to help the now-small family get by, earning admiration by the community. In doing so, however, many of her old friends had moved on- she had been too busy to play much, spending much of her free time in study and martial practice in fear of harassment that had occurred following her mother's persecution.
It was her parents that encouraged her to go to Elaria Feywing, praising her for her near-independent upbringing and talent. They said it was time for them to move on, to close the shop, that she would be a natural adventurer. When the shop was finally empty and they celebrated with a feast she had only dreamed of, she left the next day to finally become a student of a master, eager and bright to the possibility of her new future.
This post has potentially manipulated dice roll results.
Race/Class: Half-elf Ranger
Short background: A young half-elf came to The Master to study and learn the art of survival. He aims to be a wilderness scout and guide, and hopes to use his skills as a hunter to aid others and make a place for himself in the world.
About Me: I have been playing D&D for ten years, beginning with 3.5e and Pathfinder before jumping on board with the D&D Next playtest. As soon as it went live as 5e, I pulled my IRL groups along with the conversion and have been playing it ever since. I've also been DMing 5e for about a year and a half, trading off to give my usual DM a break. As far as PbP goes, I've got some experience with other sites, but am new to using the D&DBeyond forum and have yet to play a game here. I'm hoping to get my feet wet playing in a game to get comfortable with the site so that I can begin DMing here as well.
This table has been filled, thank you everyone for your interest. If you have not heard from me, it is likely that your application just came in too late. This generated a ton of interest, and so many of the characters were excellent.
Hi everyone. I know the game has been filled, but I am so curious... How do you roll for stats so that it shows in your post? Thanks for any help you can give!
Seeking a party of 1st level adventurers!
"The Master's Vault" is an introductory adventure built to teach the basics of D&D, with a fine balance of roleplay, combat, and exploration. Veterans of D&D and the Play-by-Post format are still welcome, but be aware that this adventure may not give you the level of strategy and intrigue that you desire.
Read through the rest of this post thoroughly, and if you are interested, follow the instructions to apply.
About The Adventure:
- This adventure is set in the frontier of the Merriam Vale.
- This is a short adventure, covered in one or two real life sessions. An adventure of this length typically lasts for a few months in this format.
- This is an excellent adventure for new and aspiring players. If you are fairly new to D&D, 5th edition, or the play-by-post format, this is a great opportunity for you to test the waters without needing to commit to a full-length campaign.
About The DM & House Rules:
- I currently run four long-running campaigns on this site, and have many years of experience DMing both in person and online.
- My fantasy writing influences are primarily R.A. Salvatore and George R.R. Martin.
- On most days I resolve actions and advance the adventure once each day at a minimum. When you apply, please send me a PM that includes the phrase “Marigold the Brave” to ensure the players are attentive to others' posts.
- I want PbP to be simple and flow easily. I do not use grids for PbP, and I use grouped initiative to reduce the need to wait on players to post in a specific order.
- I do not use any averages. All health and damage is rolled, for both players and monsters.
- Characters can die in my campaigns. Though it has not happened often, I do not fudge rolls and senseless actions often have consequences.
How To Apply:
- If you are at all uncertain that you can be committed to completing this adventure (a period of a few months), please do not apply. Don't be the person that ghosts an adventure and leaves their fellow players hanging.
- Rolling for stats is preferred, but Standard Array and Point Buy are also accepted for determining ability scores.
- If you are rolling for stats, those rolls must be made here or in a PM. Rerolls will only be allowed if there are no ability scores above 13. There are no other exceptions. If you are not comfortable with that risk, please use the Standard Array or Point Buy.
- Reply to this thread or send me a PM with your application. Please include your D&D experience. If you are not familiar with character creation and would prefer to use a pregenerated character, please let me know. Otherwise, include the 1) race/class you would like to play, 2) a short background summary, and 3) your method of determining ability scores (include rolls if rolling). No Unearthed Arcana or homebrew characters will be accepted.
- Your character's backstory can be as light or heavy as you would like, but the party begins this adventure as students of Elaria Feywing, also known as "The Master", who teaches her legendary skills in magic, combat, and survival. Your backstory should answer one question at a minimum: Why did you come to The Master’s mansion to begin your life of adventure?
- I do not prioritize players with PbP experience. I do try my best not to select players that have a history of leaving games unfinished, or consistently making short/rushed posts.
- As this is an introductory adventure, I will weight my selection toward those with less experience. That being said, I will be selecting 1-2 experience players at a minimum.
See my profile for all my PbP threads!
Ability scores: 11 10 14 14 16 9
Experience: Played for a short bit decades ago live, am in the starting stages of a couple PBP campaigns here now...
Race: Human
Class: Wizard
Background: Malfearance claims that he was once a noble who was unjustly jailed and left in a prison to rot. He claims his position and family were stolen from him while he was left in the dark, chained and forgotten. He claims that death has passed him by so that he can seek revenge upon those who wronged him and find his long last wife and the power to resurrect her to her former glory. He claims her spirit told him to come to The Master to learn the steps to power so that he can start this journey... He may or may not be insane. Malfearance wears a tattered robe which, if asked, he claims is a symbol of the rank he once held and refuses to give up. He also wears shackles and chains, these act as his spell book as he carves his spells into the links...
We're doing one small murder-y thing for a bigger, better reason. The ends justify the means.
-- Eleanor Shellstrop
This goes out to Marigold the Brave. It’s a ditty hailing from Neverwinter.
https://ddb.ac/characters/26726776/DL6Voq
Quenthel (Quent as his friends call him) hails from city of Neverwinter. Learning with a group of fellow bards who played more south side establishments, Quent had to learn to run as much as he played. Due to the challenges some people had with his drow heritage (and his scathing wit), he often had to duck out of engagements to prevent becoming someone’s else’s story.
Halsen - Human Monk - Winter Splendor
Aradurk - Half-Orc Fighter - Barty's Blade Bizarre
Aradurk - Half-Orc Fighter - Betrayal at Devilsfall
Aradurk - Half-Orc Fighter - Barty's "The Hidden War" (Doom Portals Part 4A)
Aradurk - Half-Orc Fighter - Barty's "The Whispered Word (Doom Portals Part 5)
Garu - Tabaxi Paladin - Barty's "Beyond Twilight" (Rikirta Part 3)
Experience: Only been playing Dnd for a few weeks! Never played a PbP before but I really want to.
Array: I prefer point buy personally
I'd like to play a Ranger Tabaxi named Arifice.
Backstory: She grew up in the forests with a band of other Tabaxi. She's been able to learn as much as she could on her own but she has a deep desire to learn as much about combat and hunting as possible. After talking heavily with her family she decided to leave the forest to seek a better life and went to talk to the Master.
To Marigold the Brave:
Experience: Currently in progress on my first online campaign [ToA] using Beyond20, DnDBeyond, and Discord. We have done eight 3-hour sessions so I am relatively new to D&D and have not done a PbP campaign.
Stats: I wouldn't be against rolling for stats. Could add some randomness and fun to the character. Ability scores: 13 14 8 11 17 11
Class: High Elf Wizard named Staloki
Backstory: Growing increasingly frustrated with the focus on solely arcane magic, Staloki planned to sneak away from the town of Nylfehil on the next stormy night. He heard rumors of an instructor known as Master Elaria Feywing with a wide range of adventuring knowledge. Regardless whether The Master would allow him to join as a student, anything was better than continuing the mundane life in Nylfehil.
Ability scores: 8 16 13 13 12 14
Experience: Pretty much none
Race: Human
Class: Rogue
Background: In his home town, Agnarr was hailed as a Robin Hood-esque figure, helping the poor at the expense of the rich. However, he had no intention of helping the poor. He had to find a reason to leave town before his true motives were found out. He jumped at the first opportunity to present itself: training in the Mansion of the Master.
Ability Scores: 8, 12, 10, 13, 15, 8, 18
Race: Half-elf
Class: Warlock
Background: For years Gunter was a traveling performer, taking his one-man-show from town to town. Although he was always on the brink of poverty, he reveled in the vagabond life. This all changed after the drought and poor harvest of last year. At his lowest point, outcast and starving, he made a pact that he believed would give him the edge he needed to improve his act and survive. He was granted power, but the cost was devastating. Desperate and scared, he heard of the guidance offered by “The Master”. He sought her out in the hope that she could help him control what he had unleashed.
Experience: I have played 3.5e and 5e on-and-off in person and on roll20 for the last decade. I have been playing 5e as a player regularly for the last year. I am totally new to PBP and excited for an introduction.
Ability scores: 10 11 15 15 13 13
Experience: Been playing D&D for as long as I have been on this site. I wanted to get used to mechanics before going into tabletop.
Class: Warlock
Race: Changeling (May change race)
Background: Urchin
Backstory: Valiamor spent most of his life not knowing their parents. He wasn’t even sure what they really looked like. He survived the cruelty of city life by stealing and using his ability to turn into anyone. One day, he found out about a valuable shipment heading to a halfling woman called Merigold the Brave. Believing it to be a priceless artifact, or maybe even gold, Valiamor attempted to steal it and succeeded. He found a stick that appeared to be ancient and had some kind of symbol carved into it. That was the first and only time he heard the voice in his head. He never heard it again, but he believed it was because he was not strong enough. He eventually found out about an Elaria Feywing, known to many as “The Master,” and worked to learn about the magical ability he started showing.
About myself: A rather experienced role-player, first with D&D 2nd as a kid, then really getting into 3rd and Pathfinder later on, then into 5th. I've ran a campaign from 3rd to 20th in Pathfinder, and had many others, including a few with other systems both long and short. I've been a DM more than a player- having started as a rule lawyer and wargamer in 3rd- but long since improved on how to have fun with everyone, from chaotic neutral-only players to totally inexperienced and friendly folk... most notably converting my mother into a player, which nobody could have seen coming. I'd like to jump into something on the more simple side, as I'm regularly world-building and running other games (2 pbp right now), and am currently not a player for any game. Short of catastrophic societal collapse, I will be around these forums for a long while, daily.
Ability scores: 9 15 9 11 8 13
Race, probably Human, and class dependent on scores, see PM following up.
Backstory:
Ryona Westfellow of Margreve is the oldest and sole surviving descendant of a successful occult trader. Her mother, a former messenger for a well-to-do wizard, settled down with her father to raise several children. Together with her mother, she had traveled further than most children, more than even the nomads, to see her mother's family. However, neither parent could keep their curious children safe from the many things they've collected- after their 3rd child died from another accident, this time involving the son of one of the local priests, the mother was held accountable and locked in a cell for years. Both parents suffered in that time, and when her mother was finally released, Ryona was already coming close of age. She had done much to help the now-small family get by, earning admiration by the community. In doing so, however, many of her old friends had moved on- she had been too busy to play much, spending much of her free time in study and martial practice in fear of harassment that had occurred following her mother's persecution.
It was her parents that encouraged her to go to Elaria Feywing, praising her for her near-independent upbringing and talent. They said it was time for them to move on, to close the shop, that she would be a natural adventurer. When the shop was finally empty and they celebrated with a feast she had only dreamed of, she left the next day to finally become a student of a master, eager and bright to the possibility of her new future.
Experience - played live in the 80s, played a few sessions of 5e over Discord, no PlaybyPost experience.
Ability Roll (first time using dice roller, let's see how it goes):
Ability scores: 9 8 13 6 13 17
Race / Class: Half Orc Barbarian preferred, named Gotes
Come to see the Master to learn survivability, want to get strong and earn gold, live as mercenary and fight until middle age.
Hi. I'm a beginner and this sounds perfect to help me get started.
I used the D&D beyond create a character but can't figure out how to share it 👎🏻
When you make a character, it is automatically “public” so anyone with the link can see it. Just copy-paste your url into the post
Race/Class: Half-elf Ranger
Short background: A young half-elf came to The Master to study and learn the art of survival. He aims to be a wilderness scout and guide, and hopes to use his skills as a hunter to aid others and make a place for himself in the world.
Ability Scores: Rolled. Ability scores: 12 16 9 8 10 12
About Me: I have been playing D&D for ten years, beginning with 3.5e and Pathfinder before jumping on board with the D&D Next playtest. As soon as it went live as 5e, I pulled my IRL groups along with the conversion and have been playing it ever since. I've also been DMing 5e for about a year and a half, trading off to give my usual DM a break. As far as PbP goes, I've got some experience with other sites, but am new to using the D&DBeyond forum and have yet to play a game here. I'm hoping to get my feet wet playing in a game to get comfortable with the site so that I can begin DMing here as well.
This table has been filled, thank you everyone for your interest. If you have not heard from me, it is likely that your application just came in too late. This generated a ton of interest, and so many of the characters were excellent.
Best of luck to you all and happy gaming!
See my profile for all my PbP threads!
Hi everyone. I know the game has been filled, but I am so curious... How do you roll for stats so that it shows in your post? Thanks for any help you can give!
Hello!
If you’re on a computer, the little “menu” has a dice button with 3 tabs, one of which is “Ability Scores”
If you’re on a mobile device, hold your phone horizontally