I just want to see what everyone likes and dislikes about some domains. I would also like to see some homebrew ones.

This is not the place to complain about the difference between 5e domains, Darklords and the demiplane in general and domains, Darklords and the demiplane in general from other editions.

This is more of a fun, parody type idea but my friends and I were throwing around the idea of a homebrew domain of dread called the Raveyard which is some sort of mix between a cemetery and a dance club. I am thinking pretty standard enemies here would be skeletons or zombies and there are environmental effects that might subject PCs to magical effects similar to Ottos Irresistible Dance. Not sure if there would be (or could be) any friendly NPCs beyond maybe other people who were caught by the mists. 

No idea what the darklord for such a domian might look like. Maybe some parody of Micheal Jackson (similar to the character from his Thriller music video). 

I'm curious to see what people will do to flesh out the Cyre 1313 setting.

Quote from Kaboom979 >>

This is more of a fun, parody type idea but my friends and I were throwing around the idea of a homebrew domain of dread called the Raveyard which is some sort of mix between a cemetery and a dance club. I am thinking pretty standard enemies here would be skeletons or zombies and there are environmental effects that might subject PCs to magical effects similar to Ottos Irresistible Dance. Not sure if there would be (or could be) any friendly NPCs beyond maybe other people who were caught by the mists. 

No idea what the darklord for such a domian might look like. Maybe some parody of Micheal Jackson (similar to the character from his Thriller music video). 

 This seems really cool!

Quote from Knowbody >>

I'm curious to see what people will do to flesh out the Cyre 1313 setting.

 I agree.

I have an idea for a domain of dread were the moon disappeared trapping the lacyntrophes in hybrid or animal forms making them all go insane tearing the domain apart and the one who made the moon disappear is their darklord. 

Quote from _merp >>

I have an idea for a domain of dread were the moon disappeared trapping the lacyntrophes in hybrid or animal forms making them all go insane tearing the domain apart and the one who made the moon disappear is their darklord. 

 Interesting...

Cyre 313, Mordent, Dementlieu, and Lamordia are far and away my favorites. I def want to see how people flesh out the former two in particular.

Quote from Kaboom979 >>

This is more of a fun, parody type idea but my friends and I were throwing around the idea of a homebrew domain of dread called the Raveyard which is some sort of mix between a cemetery and a dance club. I am thinking pretty standard enemies here would be skeletons or zombies and there are environmental effects that might subject PCs to magical effects similar to Ottos Irresistible Dance. Not sure if there would be (or could be) any friendly NPCs beyond maybe other people who were caught by the mists. 

No idea what the darklord for such a domian might look like. Maybe some parody of Micheal Jackson (similar to the character from his Thriller music video). 

 It's the eternal dance floor.The enemies move to beat taking the dash action action every other turn.Creatures that do not do so take damage.

Quote from stuffattackknightofrandom >>

Quote from Kaboom979 >>

This is more of a fun, parody type idea but my friends and I were throwing around the idea of a homebrew domain of dread called the Raveyard which is some sort of mix between a cemetery and a dance club. I am thinking pretty standard enemies here would be skeletons or zombies and there are environmental effects that might subject PCs to magical effects similar to Ottos Irresistible Dance. Not sure if there would be (or could be) any friendly NPCs beyond maybe other people who were caught by the mists. 

No idea what the darklord for such a domian might look like. Maybe some parody of Micheal Jackson (similar to the character from his Thriller music video). 

 It's the eternal dance floor.The enemies move to beat taking the dash action action every other turn.Creatures that do not do so take damage.

 Ooh. I love that idea. 

Quote from Kaboom979 >>

Quote from stuffattackknightofrandom >>

Quote from Kaboom979 >>

This is more of a fun, parody type idea but my friends and I were throwing around the idea of a homebrew domain of dread called the Raveyard which is some sort of mix between a cemetery and a dance club. I am thinking pretty standard enemies here would be skeletons or zombies and there are environmental effects that might subject PCs to magical effects similar to Ottos Irresistible Dance. Not sure if there would be (or could be) any friendly NPCs beyond maybe other people who were caught by the mists. 

No idea what the darklord for such a domian might look like. Maybe some parody of Micheal Jackson (similar to the character from his Thriller music video). 

 It's the eternal dance floor.The enemies move to beat taking the dash action action every other turn.Creatures that do not do so take damage.

 Ooh. I love that idea. 

In the time since my original comment, I wrote up some potential lore for this Domain. Here is the link to the google doc if anyone is interested. 

 

 Some?! Thats five pages! I'd say its about as much lore as the average ones in the book! (Its also rather good).

I would love to see anyone else's homebrew domains!

Quote from Dragonslayer9 >>

Quote from Kaboom979 >>

Quote from stuffattackknightofrandom >>

Quote from Kaboom979 >>

This is more of a fun, parody type idea but my friends and I were throwing around the idea of a homebrew domain of dread called the Raveyard which is some sort of mix between a cemetery and a dance club. I am thinking pretty standard enemies here would be skeletons or zombies and there are environmental effects that might subject PCs to magical effects similar to Ottos Irresistible Dance. Not sure if there would be (or could be) any friendly NPCs beyond maybe other people who were caught by the mists. 

No idea what the darklord for such a domian might look like. Maybe some parody of Micheal Jackson (similar to the character from his Thriller music video). 

 It's the eternal dance floor.The enemies move to beat taking the dash action action every other turn.Creatures that do not do so take damage.

 Ooh. I love that idea. 

In the time since my original comment, I wrote up some potential lore for this Domain. Here is the link to the google doc if anyone is interested. 

 

 Some?! Thats five pages! I'd say its about as much lore as the average ones in the book! (Its also rather good).

 Thank you very much. 

 
This is actually for a planned campaign about preventing a kingdom from becoming a Domain, but I wanted to theorize about what would happen if the player characters failed. There is a lot of text, so be ready.

Jubilate

Darklord: Danys Strahpha
Genre: Gothic horror and disaster horror. Maybe a little cosmic horror
Hallmarks: False utopia, good ideals corrupted by fanaticism, societal collapse, betrayal by heroes and leaders, and the personal costs in the face of all this
Mist Talismans: Shattered picture of a family, remnants of a devil which took the form of a beloved humanoid, medical records of a person killed by their physician or healer, dagger with the blood of one slain for another's crimes

The Story of Danys Strahpha

 Jubilate as a Domain

  Danys as a Darklord

 I’m still figuring out what to do about the Anchors.

Quote from Fifinger >>

Sorry, I don’t know how to get rid of this. 

Quote from Dragonslayer9 >>

I would love to see anyone else's homebrew domains!

 
This is actually for a planned campaign about preventing a kingdom from becoming a Domain, but I wanted to theorize about what would happen if the player characters failed. There is a lot of text, so be ready.

Jubilate

Darklord: Danys Strahpha
Genre: Gothic horror and disaster horror. Maybe a little cosmic horror
Hallmarks: False utopia, good ideals corrupted by fanaticism, societal collapse, betrayal by heroes and leaders, and the personal costs in the face of all this
Mist Talismans: Shattered picture of a family, remnants of a devil which took the form of a beloved humanoid, medical records of a person killed by their physician or healer, dagger with the blood of one slain for another's crimes

The Story of Danys Strahpha

Danys was an elf born in the Prime Material, though he never cared to find out what his world was called, as he moved to Sigil as soon as he was able. Joining the Society of Sensation, he was Hungry to see the multiverse though as many eyes as possible. Believing to have seen the highs and lows of life, Danys resolved to bring the former and prevent the later, and took the paladin oath. Allying with several other champions, they would travel the Outland and many worlds righting wrongs, protecting the innocent, and aiding the sick and wounded.

Danys' experiences as a Sensate allowed him to form friendships faster than most elves, and as more of his shorter lived companions died, or were killed before their time, the now Lonely Danys started to think on his life and his own mortality, realizing that centuries had passed with him barely acknowledging it. Having little time for Corellon and the elven pantheon, he started aging like a human, though far slower, meaning he'd likely go to a different plane that Arvador. He began to wonder what legacy he would leave.

Looking back on his deeds, he was troubled. In the centuries of his questing, many places he and his companions had helped only remained better for a short time. One town may be saved from a fiendish invasion, only to fall to another decades later while they were dealing with threats elsewhere. A plague ended now would not prevent the next plague from being just as devastating. Sometimes even the people they helped would become the next group of people's problem. Danys saw more souls lost to the Lower Planes than freed from them. Now well into the later half of his life, Danys wanted to leave something that would last, something that would continue his work and accomplish more that his or his companions ever could.

Searching from plane to plane, world to world, Danys finally found the staging ground for his dream. The world he found was almost uninhabited of sapient mortals, its only occupants were some mostly empty celestial and fiendish outposts, a few fey that came here more as a vacation spot than a home, some long dormant Gultheas trees, and a group of different colored dragons that mostly kept to one small continent. he slowly gathered the brief history of this world:
* From a couatl keeping vigil over an otherwise unused outpost, Outsider armies fought here long before any mortal set foot on the world, Mount Celestia had semi-officially dubbed the world the "Lands Unspoken", but it's information was rarely used.
* From a wandering sprite, he learned that a group of mortals had arrived to the Lands from anther world, but they accidentally took a Gultheas sapling, which grew in power and intelligence, learned necromancy, took over this civilization, and eventually destroyed it. Those that lived in the Feywyld near the Lands fought against "Yulathe" and its spawn until they devised a spell that would keep the trees asleep so long as they were undisturbed.
* From the silver dragon he learned of a being calling itself "the Witness" knew the ancient history of the Lands, but couldn't gather any more information on the Witness.

For Danys, while he wished he could get an interview with the Witness, the Lands Unspoken was the perfect world to build his kingdom, with its past seemingly ended, it bore none of the scars that hindered most mortal nations. It could be, in the truest sense of the word, a new start. Danys returned to the Outland to start his recruiting citizens, not knowing that the Lands in fact had a history far older than even the Outsider visitors, and that he was watched and judged the whole time.

Danys had planned to build his nation on the principles of the celestials. By keeping close relations to the being of the Upper Planes, the citizens of the kingdom would have moral guides and role models superior to what mortals could produce. Rather than learn right and wrong from their own trial-and-error, which Danys believed was the source of many existing nations' problems, his would learn right from the embodiments of Good. To the Dark Powers, few notions were more noxious, especially on the land they once called their own. (This campaign would rely on a lot of headcanons I have for the D&D multiverse, as you can probably tell).

Danys spoke eloquently to mortal and celestial alike, selling "Jubilate" as the meeting point between these two realities, which would one day be a beacon to the rest of the Material Plane. Some celestials could re-inhabit their old outposts, and from their teach the people how best to live. Finding a door in Sigil connecting to the Lands, Danys lead his followers and their materials to the location he had chosen. Over the course of another century and a half Jubilate grew in size and population and built larger settlements, culminating in the city of Vitalia. Over the course of this time, other groups arrived at the Lands to make their own nations, divided in ideals but united in the desire for a new start. Systems of international law were established to ease tensions, though more came when fiends started claiming their outposts once more and the spawn of Yulathe stirred from the increased activity.

And the Dark Powers watched, waiting for the weaknesses of these new leaders to reveal themselves, and they finally found it in Danys. Danys was untroubled by the return of the fiends and the Gultheas trees, or by any other potential threat from the more brutal nations, the monstrosities quickly filling the mountains, or the githyanki dwelling in the Rift to the Astral Plane. Instead he outright dared them to test themselves against hi creation, confident that it would only make Jubilate stronger. Not only would it have the celestials as the models of what to do, but enemies as a model of what not to do, he declared that witnessing this would only purify the kingdom further. And thus the seed of Danys' downfall was revealed, the dream of what Jubilate would represent had become more important to him than the people meant to benefit from that dream.

When Danys had become old by elf standards, Jubilate was at its height. The poor and sick were cared for, the courts operated fairly with a mind for rehabilitation, and its people planned altruistic missions across the Lands and even other worlds. Knowing his fertility wouldn't last long, Danys finally took a similarly aged elf and one of his old companions, Yelena Omblake, as wife and sired Jikarda, their successor. He grew to adolescence and showed kindness and wisdom, though was also melancholy due to knowing his parents would die while he was young. It seemed the dream of Jubilate was on its way to fulfillment.

The Fusian Plague was not devised by the Dark Powers, but when it struck Jubilate they knew this was their chance. Whatever its origin, it was of supernatural strength, resisting all healing spells and leaving its victims immune to resurrection. As it raged through the land, bringing down villages and towns, even destroying one major city, Danys was Lost for a solution, it seemed everything he worked for was crumbling away. Again. He organized his officials to find some way of stopping the plague, working tirelessly himself with his celestial allies, who knew as little as him. he reached his lowest point when the plague took Jikarda, infected from one of his friends.

Danys grew Angry at the celestials inability to help, and the other nations and Sigil closing their borders to Jubilate rather than offering aid. He delved into any source of knowledge he could find to stop the Fusian Plague, even that of the dark forces he had once fought. Eventually his searching brought him to the Witness. Living in an amber city far below ground, the Witness was a being the likes of which Danys had never seen nor heard of, it introduced itself as an "obyrith". the Witness spoke of the "True Masters", and while its tone was hatful towards them, it gave the information that Danys needed to bring him to the True Masters.

The True Masters told Danys there was no hope of curing the Fusian Plague, but he could starve it. They gave him the ability to command and army of shadows and said that the only way to save his kingdom was to send the shadows against places hit hardest by the plague so that they wouldn't spread it elsewhere. The True Masters where the guise of the Dark Powers, and Danys starting to carry out their advice was the start of Jubilate's slide into the Mists. However, rather than committing this deed enthusiastically, Danys was reluctant the whole time, indeed he planned to order his own execution once the plague had passed, making Jubilate's descent gradual rather than instant. Knowing that it could still be stopped if someone intervened, the Dark Powers chose four others to serve as Anchors that would seal Jubilates fate, Danys could only be stopped if the Anchors were prevented from committing their own dark deeds.

Jubilate was taken by the Mists when the shadows had killed most of the remaining population of the city of Quararin.

 Jubilate as a Domain

Jubilate is a subtropical area that quickly shifts form bright sunlight to heavy rainfall. In cold months, snow is short lived. The land is marked by rainforests, plains of towering grass, and a handful of swamps. To the north- and southwest are the waters of what were once an ocean and inland sea, respectively. Jubilate is continually being built up and broken down in a cycle of Prosperity and Calamity, which ultimately leaves it depopulated and forces Danys to build it once more. Drawing people from all across the multiverse, Jubilate is home to an incredible variety of species, and it's culture can change drastically from cycle to cycle, but most of its citizens are united in a desire for a perfect nation.

Prosperity

In the prosperity stage, one could hardly be blamed for disbelieving it's a Domain at all; indeed, many who come here from other Domains believe that they have escaped until they find the Mist on the border. As its settlements are being built, people from several worlds and planes are told of Jubilate by disguised agents of the Dark Powers, and those who like the idea of a kingdom reflecting the Upper Planes take the chance to move there by portal. Once they are trapped in the Domain, these people are made ageless so that they may witness what's to come. During Prosperity, Jubilate comes close to living up to its goals, those in need receive aid, the law is evenhanded, and at its peak its armies may even enter other Domains to help those inhabitants trying to escape their Darklord. Even the undead, low-level fiends, blights, and chimeric monstrosities haunting the wilds seemed to play a role for the greater good, teaching its people what not to emulate and providing a reminder that there are more important matters than their current disagreements.

Calamity

eventually, the Dark Powers will introduce the agent of this iteration's destruction. Danys will combat this disaster and eventually take such extreme measures to protect his kingdom that he becomes just as much a danger to it as the original problem. The fog grows increasingly thick during the time of Calamity, emulating the slow descent into the Mist during the original fall of Jubilate.

The cause of the Calamity is different each time, as is Danys' response, the following table is just a handful of possibilities:

8d Calamity
1 the Domain is opened to another Darklord who invades with their armies.
2 a portal to the Abyss or Baator (or a facsimile) opens in the middle of Jubilate.
3 angry spirits of a previous cycle direct their vengeance toward the new citizens.
4 the seas rise up against the Domain, in the form of both floods and water elementals.
5 a spawn of Yulathe stuck in the domain receives a boon and grows to its progenitor's size and power.
6 several zombies around the Domain become epicenters for ever-growing zombie clots.
7 the Domain is revealed to some priests of Osybus, it's only a matter of time....
8 somehow, some way, the Dark Powers send a tarrasque to the Domain.

Regardless of the cause, several of the Domains of Dread's unique monsters will start appearing during Calamity, such as relentless slashers or dullahans. Eventually the people themselves are likely to turn on each other in desperation and paranoia, to ultimately be consumed by Danys' desperate "solution".

Significant Sites

Jubilate is a large kingdom that will have several settlements at its height. There are some places that will likely remain with each cycle.

Vitalia: The capital and site of Danys' palace, Vitalia is the most glorious place in the kingdom during Prosperity and most terrifying in Calamity. Some part of the city remains standing each cycle, even when Danys tries to raze it to the ground, so a piece of each cycle's civilization is preserved there to remind the Darklord of his failures. he suffers this willingly, believing it will drive him to find a better solution next cycle. Before becoming a Domain, Vitalia was one of the most visited trade hubs in the Lands Unspoken, and several preserved items from that time can be found there still. However, with most imports coming from Vistani caravans, Vitalia has switched to a militaristic center, all Jubilate's paladins end their training here, and it's where most combat constructs are built.

Whisper: The largest rainforest in the kingdom, the people in Whisper were specially focused on the more Chaotic of the Upper Planes, exploring the meeting place of the natures of celestial and fey. In the Lands Unspoken, it was where the good and evil spirits that influenced the world came in closest contact. Now with most of the former gone, Whisper has become a very dangerous place even in Prosperity. Towns are only made on the edges now rather than within, and in Calamity not even those are safe. Most of the spawn of Yulathe now in the Domain are in Whisper, and their creations will often march out to join the Calamity's cause.

Warp Marsh: Once a crossing over point to the Elemental Planes, Warp Marsh will send any who find the old portal straight to the Elemental Chaos. It is quite possibly the only way out of the Mists in Jubilate, but vanishingly few can survive the trip. In the later stages of a Calamity, some will take that risk.

Amber City: True to its namesake, the roads and buildings of this deep underground city a made of amber. This is where the Witness lives, an obyrith who knows of the Dark Powers and seems to some personal history with them. The Witness uses the stats of an unspeakable horror with Loathsome Limbs for Body Composition, Beguiling Hex for Hex Blast, and Grasping Tentacles for Limbs. His type is changed to fiend and his Int is raised to 16 (+3). The Witness arranged for his own transport to the Mists and believes the Dark Powers can't find him in the Amber City, whether this is true remains to be seen.

Spirits of Good

Most of the celestials that dwelled in Jubilate to advise its citizens have been imprisoned by the Dark Powers and replaced by their own creations in disguise. Those that escaped this fate have gone undercover, aiding newcomers as best they can and fighting against the Calamities, but they don't know how to fix things permanently.

  Danys as a Darklord

Powers and Dominion

Danys Strahpha is acknowledged as the legitimate ruler of Jubilate and has most of its citizens loyalty until in the later stages of the Calamity. His statistics are similar to a wood elf blackguard, but has a magical +2 halberd that deals 1d8 extra Necrotic damage that appears Radiant to onlookers, has 50 HP worth of Lay on Hands, and has the Polearm Master feat. Despite his physical age, he is still a fine warrior and has personally trained several paladins. If there is any magic that can detect the moral nature of a mortal, Danys will be made to seem good and benevolent while in his Domain.

The Shadow Army: Danys can still summon his army of shadows, though he is loathe to use that ability now, even during Calamity. If activates it again, 100 shadows will appear in Vitalia and increase their numbers as described in their entry. These shadows are smart enough to gang up on stronger opponents and take advantage of their resistances.

Dark Disciple: Danys is unaware of the Dark Powers' role in the Calamities and believes them to be righteous beings, attributing his failures to save Jubilate to flaws in how he carries out their advising. While he doesn't go so far as to worship them, he seeks messages from them through four statues in his inner sanctum. An eidolon shares this room and can use each as a sacred statue, and will follow Danys with one whenever he leaves his palace. If there's any hope of reaching through to Danys, it will only be after all the statues are destroyed and the Dark Powers can no longer speak to him.

Closing the Borders: During Prosperity, Danys can open or close the borders at will, blacketing the borders with rain so thick it feels like a wall. Observers can see that the rain falls through the ground and if they persist enough they can catch a brief reflection of the Upper Planes. During Calamity, the borders will open or close on their own depending on the form of the Calamity.

Danys' Torment

- He must watch his kingdom come so close to his vision, only to watch it crumble away once more, in part by his hands.
- Unable to close himself completely to his people, their deaths still weigh on him even as he tells himself it was necessary.
- He clings to the Dark Powers as a source of hope, to accept that he never should have listened to them in the first place would be far more devastating than his current belief that his failures are only due to his implementation of solutions.
- The knowledge that even among more obviously malicious rulers of the new nations, he was the one to doom his land to the Mists.
- While now un-aging, the fact that he's not as swift of enduring as he once was gives him a constant feeling of mortality.

Roleplaying Danys

Danys rarely goes out among his people anymore, but in conversation he is aloof but polite regardless of rank. During Prosperity he genuinely takes his people's concerns into account in his rulings, and will seek justice in any legal case that comes before his throne. During Calamity, however, he shows himself more an more willing to sacrifice larger groups to ensure the kingdom's survival, and will eventually prioritize Jubilate before any of its inhabitants.

Personality Trait: "Permanence is what gives an endeavor value. Our descendants will not appreciate leaving them to continue the battle that we could not finish."
Ideal: "Jubilate will be a beacon for the multiverse."
Bond: "The True Masters are good entities in a sea of evil, even if some call them 'Dark'."
Flaw: "Those who stand in the way of what I must do are ungrateful."

 I’m still figuring out what to do about the Anchors.

 This is awesome! I love the Domain, the world, all of it! I would enjoy looking at something more in-depth about the world itself, so if its possible for you to compile a document about it, or if you already have one, I would love to see it!.

Quote from Dragonslayer9 >>

Quote from Fifinger >>

Sorry, I don’t know how to get rid of this. 

Quote from Dragonslayer9 >>

I would love to see anyone else's homebrew domains!

 
This is actually for a planned campaign about preventing a kingdom from becoming a Domain, but I wanted to theorize about what would happen if the player characters failed. There is a lot of text, so be ready.

Jubilate

Darklord: Danys Strahpha
Genre: Gothic horror and disaster horror. Maybe a little cosmic horror
Hallmarks: False utopia, good ideals corrupted by fanaticism, societal collapse, betrayal by heroes and leaders, and the personal costs in the face of all this
Mist Talismans: Shattered picture of a family, remnants of a devil which took the form of a beloved humanoid, medical records of a person killed by their physician or healer, dagger with the blood of one slain for another's crimes

The Story of Danys Strahpha

Danys was an elf born in the Prime Material, though he never cared to find out what his world was called, as he moved to Sigil as soon as he was able. Joining the Society of Sensation, he was Hungry to see the multiverse though as many eyes as possible. Believing to have seen the highs and lows of life, Danys resolved to bring the former and prevent the later, and took the paladin oath. Allying with several other champions, they would travel the Outland and many worlds righting wrongs, protecting the innocent, and aiding the sick and wounded.

Danys' experiences as a Sensate allowed him to form friendships faster than most elves, and as more of his shorter lived companions died, or were killed before their time, the now Lonely Danys started to think on his life and his own mortality, realizing that centuries had passed with him barely acknowledging it. Having little time for Corellon and the elven pantheon, he started aging like a human, though far slower, meaning he'd likely go to a different plane that Arvador. He began to wonder what legacy he would leave.

Looking back on his deeds, he was troubled. In the centuries of his questing, many places he and his companions had helped only remained better for a short time. One town may be saved from a fiendish invasion, only to fall to another decades later while they were dealing with threats elsewhere. A plague ended now would not prevent the next plague from being just as devastating. Sometimes even the people they helped would become the next group of people's problem. Danys saw more souls lost to the Lower Planes than freed from them. Now well into the later half of his life, Danys wanted to leave something that would last, something that would continue his work and accomplish more that his or his companions ever could.

Searching from plane to plane, world to world, Danys finally found the staging ground for his dream. The world he found was almost uninhabited of sapient mortals, its only occupants were some mostly empty celestial and fiendish outposts, a few fey that came here more as a vacation spot than a home, some long dormant Gultheas trees, and a group of different colored dragons that mostly kept to one small continent. he slowly gathered the brief history of this world:
* From a couatl keeping vigil over an otherwise unused outpost, Outsider armies fought here long before any mortal set foot on the world, Mount Celestia had semi-officially dubbed the world the "Lands Unspoken", but it's information was rarely used.
* From a wandering sprite, he learned that a group of mortals had arrived to the Lands from anther world, but they accidentally took a Gultheas sapling, which grew in power and intelligence, learned necromancy, took over this civilization, and eventually destroyed it. Those that lived in the Feywyld near the Lands fought against "Yulathe" and its spawn until they devised a spell that would keep the trees asleep so long as they were undisturbed.
* From the silver dragon he learned of a being calling itself "the Witness" knew the ancient history of the Lands, but couldn't gather any more information on the Witness.

For Danys, while he wished he could get an interview with the Witness, the Lands Unspoken was the perfect world to build his kingdom, with its past seemingly ended, it bore none of the scars that hindered most mortal nations. It could be, in the truest sense of the word, a new start. Danys returned to the Outland to start his recruiting citizens, not knowing that the Lands in fact had a history far older than even the Outsider visitors, and that he was watched and judged the whole time.

Danys had planned to build his nation on the principles of the celestials. By keeping close relations to the being of the Upper Planes, the citizens of the kingdom would have moral guides and role models superior to what mortals could produce. Rather than learn right and wrong from their own trial-and-error, which Danys believed was the source of many existing nations' problems, his would learn right from the embodiments of Good. To the Dark Powers, few notions were more noxious, especially on the land they once called their own. (This campaign would rely on a lot of headcanons I have for the D&D multiverse, as you can probably tell).

Danys spoke eloquently to mortal and celestial alike, selling "Jubilate" as the meeting point between these two realities, which would one day be a beacon to the rest of the Material Plane. Some celestials could re-inhabit their old outposts, and from their teach the people how best to live. Finding a door in Sigil connecting to the Lands, Danys lead his followers and their materials to the location he had chosen. Over the course of another century and a half Jubilate grew in size and population and built larger settlements, culminating in the city of Vitalia. Over the course of this time, other groups arrived at the Lands to make their own nations, divided in ideals but united in the desire for a new start. Systems of international law were established to ease tensions, though more came when fiends started claiming their outposts once more and the spawn of Yulathe stirred from the increased activity.

And the Dark Powers watched, waiting for the weaknesses of these new leaders to reveal themselves, and they finally found it in Danys. Danys was untroubled by the return of the fiends and the Gultheas trees, or by any other potential threat from the more brutal nations, the monstrosities quickly filling the mountains, or the githyanki dwelling in the Rift to the Astral Plane. Instead he outright dared them to test themselves against hi creation, confident that it would only make Jubilate stronger. Not only would it have the celestials as the models of what to do, but enemies as a model of what not to do, he declared that witnessing this would only purify the kingdom further. And thus the seed of Danys' downfall was revealed, the dream of what Jubilate would represent had become more important to him than the people meant to benefit from that dream.

When Danys had become old by elf standards, Jubilate was at its height. The poor and sick were cared for, the courts operated fairly with a mind for rehabilitation, and its people planned altruistic missions across the Lands and even other worlds. Knowing his fertility wouldn't last long, Danys finally took a similarly aged elf and one of his old companions, Yelena Omblake, as wife and sired Jikarda, their successor. He grew to adolescence and showed kindness and wisdom, though was also melancholy due to knowing his parents would die while he was young. It seemed the dream of Jubilate was on its way to fulfillment.

The Fusian Plague was not devised by the Dark Powers, but when it struck Jubilate they knew this was their chance. Whatever its origin, it was of supernatural strength, resisting all healing spells and leaving its victims immune to resurrection. As it raged through the land, bringing down villages and towns, even destroying one major city, Danys was Lost for a solution, it seemed everything he worked for was crumbling away. Again. He organized his officials to find some way of stopping the plague, working tirelessly himself with his celestial allies, who knew as little as him. he reached his lowest point when the plague took Jikarda, infected from one of his friends.

Danys grew Angry at the celestials inability to help, and the other nations and Sigil closing their borders to Jubilate rather than offering aid. He delved into any source of knowledge he could find to stop the Fusian Plague, even that of the dark forces he had once fought. Eventually his searching brought him to the Witness. Living in an amber city far below ground, the Witness was a being the likes of which Danys had never seen nor heard of, it introduced itself as an "obyrith". the Witness spoke of the "True Masters", and while its tone was hatful towards them, it gave the information that Danys needed to bring him to the True Masters.

The True Masters told Danys there was no hope of curing the Fusian Plague, but he could starve it. They gave him the ability to command and army of shadows and said that the only way to save his kingdom was to send the shadows against places hit hardest by the plague so that they wouldn't spread it elsewhere. The True Masters where the guise of the Dark Powers, and Danys starting to carry out their advice was the start of Jubilate's slide into the Mists. However, rather than committing this deed enthusiastically, Danys was reluctant the whole time, indeed he planned to order his own execution once the plague had passed, making Jubilate's descent gradual rather than instant. Knowing that it could still be stopped if someone intervened, the Dark Powers chose four others to serve as Anchors that would seal Jubilates fate, Danys could only be stopped if the Anchors were prevented from committing their own dark deeds.

Jubilate was taken by the Mists when the shadows had killed most of the remaining population of the city of Quararin.

 Jubilate as a Domain

Jubilate is a subtropical area that quickly shifts form bright sunlight to heavy rainfall. In cold months, snow is short lived. The land is marked by rainforests, plains of towering grass, and a handful of swamps. To the north- and southwest are the waters of what were once an ocean and inland sea, respectively. Jubilate is continually being built up and broken down in a cycle of Prosperity and Calamity, which ultimately leaves it depopulated and forces Danys to build it once more. Drawing people from all across the multiverse, Jubilate is home to an incredible variety of species, and it's culture can change drastically from cycle to cycle, but most of its citizens are united in a desire for a perfect nation.

Prosperity

In the prosperity stage, one could hardly be blamed for disbelieving it's a Domain at all; indeed, many who come here from other Domains believe that they have escaped until they find the Mist on the border. As its settlements are being built, people from several worlds and planes are told of Jubilate by disguised agents of the Dark Powers, and those who like the idea of a kingdom reflecting the Upper Planes take the chance to move there by portal. Once they are trapped in the Domain, these people are made ageless so that they may witness what's to come. During Prosperity, Jubilate comes close to living up to its goals, those in need receive aid, the law is evenhanded, and at its peak its armies may even enter other Domains to help those inhabitants trying to escape their Darklord. Even the undead, low-level fiends, blights, and chimeric monstrosities haunting the wilds seemed to play a role for the greater good, teaching its people what not to emulate and providing a reminder that there are more important matters than their current disagreements.

Calamity

eventually, the Dark Powers will introduce the agent of this iteration's destruction. Danys will combat this disaster and eventually take such extreme measures to protect his kingdom that he becomes just as much a danger to it as the original problem. The fog grows increasingly thick during the time of Calamity, emulating the slow descent into the Mist during the original fall of Jubilate.

The cause of the Calamity is different each time, as is Danys' response, the following table is just a handful of possibilities:

8d Calamity
1 the Domain is opened to another Darklord who invades with their armies.
2 a portal to the Abyss or Baator (or a facsimile) opens in the middle of Jubilate.
3 angry spirits of a previous cycle direct their vengeance toward the new citizens.
4 the seas rise up against the Domain, in the form of both floods and water elementals.
5 a spawn of Yulathe stuck in the domain receives a boon and grows to its progenitor's size and power.
6 several zombies around the Domain become epicenters for ever-growing zombie clots.
7 the Domain is revealed to some priests of Osybus, it's only a matter of time....
8 somehow, some way, the Dark Powers send a tarrasque to the Domain.

Regardless of the cause, several of the Domains of Dread's unique monsters will start appearing during Calamity, such as relentless slashers or dullahans. Eventually the people themselves are likely to turn on each other in desperation and paranoia, to ultimately be consumed by Danys' desperate "solution".

Significant Sites

Jubilate is a large kingdom that will have several settlements at its height. There are some places that will likely remain with each cycle.

Vitalia: The capital and site of Danys' palace, Vitalia is the most glorious place in the kingdom during Prosperity and most terrifying in Calamity. Some part of the city remains standing each cycle, even when Danys tries to raze it to the ground, so a piece of each cycle's civilization is preserved there to remind the Darklord of his failures. he suffers this willingly, believing it will drive him to find a better solution next cycle. Before becoming a Domain, Vitalia was one of the most visited trade hubs in the Lands Unspoken, and several preserved items from that time can be found there still. However, with most imports coming from Vistani caravans, Vitalia has switched to a militaristic center, all Jubilate's paladins end their training here, and it's where most combat constructs are built.

Whisper: The largest rainforest in the kingdom, the people in Whisper were specially focused on the more Chaotic of the Upper Planes, exploring the meeting place of the natures of celestial and fey. In the Lands Unspoken, it was where the good and evil spirits that influenced the world came in closest contact. Now with most of the former gone, Whisper has become a very dangerous place even in Prosperity. Towns are only made on the edges now rather than within, and in Calamity not even those are safe. Most of the spawn of Yulathe now in the Domain are in Whisper, and their creations will often march out to join the Calamity's cause.

Warp Marsh: Once a crossing over point to the Elemental Planes, Warp Marsh will send any who find the old portal straight to the Elemental Chaos. It is quite possibly the only way out of the Mists in Jubilate, but vanishingly few can survive the trip. In the later stages of a Calamity, some will take that risk.

Amber City: True to its namesake, the roads and buildings of this deep underground city a made of amber. This is where the Witness lives, an obyrith who knows of the Dark Powers and seems to some personal history with them. The Witness uses the stats of an unspeakable horror with Loathsome Limbs for Body Composition, Beguiling Hex for Hex Blast, and Grasping Tentacles for Limbs. His type is changed to fiend and his Int is raised to 16 (+3). The Witness arranged for his own transport to the Mists and believes the Dark Powers can't find him in the Amber City, whether this is true remains to be seen.

Spirits of Good

Most of the celestials that dwelled in Jubilate to advise its citizens have been imprisoned by the Dark Powers and replaced by their own creations in disguise. Those that escaped this fate have gone undercover, aiding newcomers as best they can and fighting against the Calamities, but they don't know how to fix things permanently.

  Danys as a Darklord

Powers and Dominion

Danys Strahpha is acknowledged as the legitimate ruler of Jubilate and has most of its citizens loyalty until in the later stages of the Calamity. His statistics are similar to a wood elf blackguard, but has a magical +2 halberd that deals 1d8 extra Necrotic damage that appears Radiant to onlookers, has 50 HP worth of Lay on Hands, and has the Polearm Master feat. Despite his physical age, he is still a fine warrior and has personally trained several paladins. If there is any magic that can detect the moral nature of a mortal, Danys will be made to seem good and benevolent while in his Domain.

The Shadow Army: Danys can still summon his army of shadows, though he is loathe to use that ability now, even during Calamity. If activates it again, 100 shadows will appear in Vitalia and increase their numbers as described in their entry. These shadows are smart enough to gang up on stronger opponents and take advantage of their resistances.

Dark Disciple: Danys is unaware of the Dark Powers' role in the Calamities and believes them to be righteous beings, attributing his failures to save Jubilate to flaws in how he carries out their advising. While he doesn't go so far as to worship them, he seeks messages from them through four statues in his inner sanctum. An eidolon shares this room and can use each as a sacred statue, and will follow Danys with one whenever he leaves his palace. If there's any hope of reaching through to Danys, it will only be after all the statues are destroyed and the Dark Powers can no longer speak to him.

Closing the Borders: During Prosperity, Danys can open or close the borders at will, blacketing the borders with rain so thick it feels like a wall. Observers can see that the rain falls through the ground and if they persist enough they can catch a brief reflection of the Upper Planes. During Calamity, the borders will open or close on their own depending on the form of the Calamity.

Danys' Torment

- He must watch his kingdom come so close to his vision, only to watch it crumble away once more, in part by his hands.
- Unable to close himself completely to his people, their deaths still weigh on him even as he tells himself it was necessary.
- He clings to the Dark Powers as a source of hope, to accept that he never should have listened to them in the first place would be far more devastating than his current belief that his failures are only due to his implementation of solutions.
- The knowledge that even among more obviously malicious rulers of the new nations, he was the one to doom his land to the Mists.
- While now un-aging, the fact that he's not as swift of enduring as he once was gives him a constant feeling of mortality.

Roleplaying Danys

Danys rarely goes out among his people anymore, but in conversation he is aloof but polite regardless of rank. During Prosperity he genuinely takes his people's concerns into account in his rulings, and will seek justice in any legal case that comes before his throne. During Calamity, however, he shows himself more an more willing to sacrifice larger groups to ensure the kingdom's survival, and will eventually prioritize Jubilate before any of its inhabitants.

Personality Trait: "Permanence is what gives an endeavor value. Our descendants will not appreciate leaving them to continue the battle that we could not finish."
Ideal: "Jubilate will be a beacon for the multiverse."
Bond: "The True Masters are good entities in a sea of evil, even if some call them 'Dark'."
Flaw: "Those who stand in the way of what I must do are ungrateful."

 I’m still figuring out what to do about the Anchors.

 This is awesome! I love the Domain, the world, all of it! I would enjoy looking at something more in-depth about the world itself, so if its possible for you to compile a document about it, or if you already have one, I would love to see it!.

Thank you kindly! I do have a document in the works, and can give a preview of sorts:

 Some of these I want to rethink, but they're the basic ideas at the moment.

Quote from Fifinger >>

Quote from Dragonslayer9 >>

Quote from Fifinger >>

Sorry, I don’t know how to get rid of this. 

Quote from Dragonslayer9 >>

I would love to see anyone else's homebrew domains!

 
This is actually for a planned campaign about preventing a kingdom from becoming a Domain, but I wanted to theorize about what would happen if the player characters failed. There is a lot of text, so be ready.

Jubilate

Darklord: Danys Strahpha
Genre: Gothic horror and disaster horror. Maybe a little cosmic horror
Hallmarks: False utopia, good ideals corrupted by fanaticism, societal collapse, betrayal by heroes and leaders, and the personal costs in the face of all this
Mist Talismans: Shattered picture of a family, remnants of a devil which took the form of a beloved humanoid, medical records of a person killed by their physician or healer, dagger with the blood of one slain for another's crimes

The Story of Danys Strahpha

Danys was an elf born in the Prime Material, though he never cared to find out what his world was called, as he moved to Sigil as soon as he was able. Joining the Society of Sensation, he was Hungry to see the multiverse though as many eyes as possible. Believing to have seen the highs and lows of life, Danys resolved to bring the former and prevent the later, and took the paladin oath. Allying with several other champions, they would travel the Outland and many worlds righting wrongs, protecting the innocent, and aiding the sick and wounded.

Danys' experiences as a Sensate allowed him to form friendships faster than most elves, and as more of his shorter lived companions died, or were killed before their time, the now Lonely Danys started to think on his life and his own mortality, realizing that centuries had passed with him barely acknowledging it. Having little time for Corellon and the elven pantheon, he started aging like a human, though far slower, meaning he'd likely go to a different plane that Arvador. He began to wonder what legacy he would leave.

Looking back on his deeds, he was troubled. In the centuries of his questing, many places he and his companions had helped only remained better for a short time. One town may be saved from a fiendish invasion, only to fall to another decades later while they were dealing with threats elsewhere. A plague ended now would not prevent the next plague from being just as devastating. Sometimes even the people they helped would become the next group of people's problem. Danys saw more souls lost to the Lower Planes than freed from them. Now well into the later half of his life, Danys wanted to leave something that would last, something that would continue his work and accomplish more that his or his companions ever could.

Searching from plane to plane, world to world, Danys finally found the staging ground for his dream. The world he found was almost uninhabited of sapient mortals, its only occupants were some mostly empty celestial and fiendish outposts, a few fey that came here more as a vacation spot than a home, some long dormant Gultheas trees, and a group of different colored dragons that mostly kept to one small continent. he slowly gathered the brief history of this world:
* From a couatl keeping vigil over an otherwise unused outpost, Outsider armies fought here long before any mortal set foot on the world, Mount Celestia had semi-officially dubbed the world the "Lands Unspoken", but it's information was rarely used.
* From a wandering sprite, he learned that a group of mortals had arrived to the Lands from anther world, but they accidentally took a Gultheas sapling, which grew in power and intelligence, learned necromancy, took over this civilization, and eventually destroyed it. Those that lived in the Feywyld near the Lands fought against "Yulathe" and its spawn until they devised a spell that would keep the trees asleep so long as they were undisturbed.
* From the silver dragon he learned of a being calling itself "the Witness" knew the ancient history of the Lands, but couldn't gather any more information on the Witness.

For Danys, while he wished he could get an interview with the Witness, the Lands Unspoken was the perfect world to build his kingdom, with its past seemingly ended, it bore none of the scars that hindered most mortal nations. It could be, in the truest sense of the word, a new start. Danys returned to the Outland to start his recruiting citizens, not knowing that the Lands in fact had a history far older than even the Outsider visitors, and that he was watched and judged the whole time.

Danys had planned to build his nation on the principles of the celestials. By keeping close relations to the being of the Upper Planes, the citizens of the kingdom would have moral guides and role models superior to what mortals could produce. Rather than learn right and wrong from their own trial-and-error, which Danys believed was the source of many existing nations' problems, his would learn right from the embodiments of Good. To the Dark Powers, few notions were more noxious, especially on the land they once called their own. (This campaign would rely on a lot of headcanons I have for the D&D multiverse, as you can probably tell).

Danys spoke eloquently to mortal and celestial alike, selling "Jubilate" as the meeting point between these two realities, which would one day be a beacon to the rest of the Material Plane. Some celestials could re-inhabit their old outposts, and from their teach the people how best to live. Finding a door in Sigil connecting to the Lands, Danys lead his followers and their materials to the location he had chosen. Over the course of another century and a half Jubilate grew in size and population and built larger settlements, culminating in the city of Vitalia. Over the course of this time, other groups arrived at the Lands to make their own nations, divided in ideals but united in the desire for a new start. Systems of international law were established to ease tensions, though more came when fiends started claiming their outposts once more and the spawn of Yulathe stirred from the increased activity.

And the Dark Powers watched, waiting for the weaknesses of these new leaders to reveal themselves, and they finally found it in Danys. Danys was untroubled by the return of the fiends and the Gultheas trees, or by any other potential threat from the more brutal nations, the monstrosities quickly filling the mountains, or the githyanki dwelling in the Rift to the Astral Plane. Instead he outright dared them to test themselves against hi creation, confident that it would only make Jubilate stronger. Not only would it have the celestials as the models of what to do, but enemies as a model of what not to do, he declared that witnessing this would only purify the kingdom further. And thus the seed of Danys' downfall was revealed, the dream of what Jubilate would represent had become more important to him than the people meant to benefit from that dream.

When Danys had become old by elf standards, Jubilate was at its height. The poor and sick were cared for, the courts operated fairly with a mind for rehabilitation, and its people planned altruistic missions across the Lands and even other worlds. Knowing his fertility wouldn't last long, Danys finally took a similarly aged elf and one of his old companions, Yelena Omblake, as wife and sired Jikarda, their successor. He grew to adolescence and showed kindness and wisdom, though was also melancholy due to knowing his parents would die while he was young. It seemed the dream of Jubilate was on its way to fulfillment.

The Fusian Plague was not devised by the Dark Powers, but when it struck Jubilate they knew this was their chance. Whatever its origin, it was of supernatural strength, resisting all healing spells and leaving its victims immune to resurrection. As it raged through the land, bringing down villages and towns, even destroying one major city, Danys was Lost for a solution, it seemed everything he worked for was crumbling away. Again. He organized his officials to find some way of stopping the plague, working tirelessly himself with his celestial allies, who knew as little as him. he reached his lowest point when the plague took Jikarda, infected from one of his friends.

Danys grew Angry at the celestials inability to help, and the other nations and Sigil closing their borders to Jubilate rather than offering aid. He delved into any source of knowledge he could find to stop the Fusian Plague, even that of the dark forces he had once fought. Eventually his searching brought him to the Witness. Living in an amber city far below ground, the Witness was a being the likes of which Danys had never seen nor heard of, it introduced itself as an "obyrith". the Witness spoke of the "True Masters", and while its tone was hatful towards them, it gave the information that Danys needed to bring him to the True Masters.

The True Masters told Danys there was no hope of curing the Fusian Plague, but he could starve it. They gave him the ability to command and army of shadows and said that the only way to save his kingdom was to send the shadows against places hit hardest by the plague so that they wouldn't spread it elsewhere. The True Masters where the guise of the Dark Powers, and Danys starting to carry out their advice was the start of Jubilate's slide into the Mists. However, rather than committing this deed enthusiastically, Danys was reluctant the whole time, indeed he planned to order his own execution once the plague had passed, making Jubilate's descent gradual rather than instant. Knowing that it could still be stopped if someone intervened, the Dark Powers chose four others to serve as Anchors that would seal Jubilates fate, Danys could only be stopped if the Anchors were prevented from committing their own dark deeds.

Jubilate was taken by the Mists when the shadows had killed most of the remaining population of the city of Quararin.

 Jubilate as a Domain

Jubilate is a subtropical area that quickly shifts form bright sunlight to heavy rainfall. In cold months, snow is short lived. The land is marked by rainforests, plains of towering grass, and a handful of swamps. To the north- and southwest are the waters of what were once an ocean and inland sea, respectively. Jubilate is continually being built up and broken down in a cycle of Prosperity and Calamity, which ultimately leaves it depopulated and forces Danys to build it once more. Drawing people from all across the multiverse, Jubilate is home to an incredible variety of species, and it's culture can change drastically from cycle to cycle, but most of its citizens are united in a desire for a perfect nation.

Prosperity

In the prosperity stage, one could hardly be blamed for disbelieving it's a Domain at all; indeed, many who come here from other Domains believe that they have escaped until they find the Mist on the border. As its settlements are being built, people from several worlds and planes are told of Jubilate by disguised agents of the Dark Powers, and those who like the idea of a kingdom reflecting the Upper Planes take the chance to move there by portal. Once they are trapped in the Domain, these people are made ageless so that they may witness what's to come. During Prosperity, Jubilate comes close to living up to its goals, those in need receive aid, the law is evenhanded, and at its peak its armies may even enter other Domains to help those inhabitants trying to escape their Darklord. Even the undead, low-level fiends, blights, and chimeric monstrosities haunting the wilds seemed to play a role for the greater good, teaching its people what not to emulate and providing a reminder that there are more important matters than their current disagreements.

Calamity

eventually, the Dark Powers will introduce the agent of this iteration's destruction. Danys will combat this disaster and eventually take such extreme measures to protect his kingdom that he becomes just as much a danger to it as the original problem. The fog grows increasingly thick during the time of Calamity, emulating the slow descent into the Mist during the original fall of Jubilate.

The cause of the Calamity is different each time, as is Danys' response, the following table is just a handful of possibilities:

8d Calamity
1 the Domain is opened to another Darklord who invades with their armies.
2 a portal to the Abyss or Baator (or a facsimile) opens in the middle of Jubilate.
3 angry spirits of a previous cycle direct their vengeance toward the new citizens.
4 the seas rise up against the Domain, in the form of both floods and water elementals.
5 a spawn of Yulathe stuck in the domain receives a boon and grows to its progenitor's size and power.
6 several zombies around the Domain become epicenters for ever-growing zombie clots.
7 the Domain is revealed to some priests of Osybus, it's only a matter of time....
8 somehow, some way, the Dark Powers send a tarrasque to the Domain.

Regardless of the cause, several of the Domains of Dread's unique monsters will start appearing during Calamity, such as relentless slashers or dullahans. Eventually the people themselves are likely to turn on each other in desperation and paranoia, to ultimately be consumed by Danys' desperate "solution".

Significant Sites

Jubilate is a large kingdom that will have several settlements at its height. There are some places that will likely remain with each cycle.

Vitalia: The capital and site of Danys' palace, Vitalia is the most glorious place in the kingdom during Prosperity and most terrifying in Calamity. Some part of the city remains standing each cycle, even when Danys tries to raze it to the ground, so a piece of each cycle's civilization is preserved there to remind the Darklord of his failures. he suffers this willingly, believing it will drive him to find a better solution next cycle. Before becoming a Domain, Vitalia was one of the most visited trade hubs in the Lands Unspoken, and several preserved items from that time can be found there still. However, with most imports coming from Vistani caravans, Vitalia has switched to a militaristic center, all Jubilate's paladins end their training here, and it's where most combat constructs are built.

Whisper: The largest rainforest in the kingdom, the people in Whisper were specially focused on the more Chaotic of the Upper Planes, exploring the meeting place of the natures of celestial and fey. In the Lands Unspoken, it was where the good and evil spirits that influenced the world came in closest contact. Now with most of the former gone, Whisper has become a very dangerous place even in Prosperity. Towns are only made on the edges now rather than within, and in Calamity not even those are safe. Most of the spawn of Yulathe now in the Domain are in Whisper, and their creations will often march out to join the Calamity's cause.

Warp Marsh: Once a crossing over point to the Elemental Planes, Warp Marsh will send any who find the old portal straight to the Elemental Chaos. It is quite possibly the only way out of the Mists in Jubilate, but vanishingly few can survive the trip. In the later stages of a Calamity, some will take that risk.

Amber City: True to its namesake, the roads and buildings of this deep underground city a made of amber. This is where the Witness lives, an obyrith who knows of the Dark Powers and seems to some personal history with them. The Witness uses the stats of an unspeakable horror with Loathsome Limbs for Body Composition, Beguiling Hex for Hex Blast, and Grasping Tentacles for Limbs. His type is changed to fiend and his Int is raised to 16 (+3). The Witness arranged for his own transport to the Mists and believes the Dark Powers can't find him in the Amber City, whether this is true remains to be seen.

Spirits of Good

Most of the celestials that dwelled in Jubilate to advise its citizens have been imprisoned by the Dark Powers and replaced by their own creations in disguise. Those that escaped this fate have gone undercover, aiding newcomers as best they can and fighting against the Calamities, but they don't know how to fix things permanently.

  Danys as a Darklord

Powers and Dominion

Danys Strahpha is acknowledged as the legitimate ruler of Jubilate and has most of its citizens loyalty until in the later stages of the Calamity. His statistics are similar to a wood elf blackguard, but has a magical +2 halberd that deals 1d8 extra Necrotic damage that appears Radiant to onlookers, has 50 HP worth of Lay on Hands, and has the Polearm Master feat. Despite his physical age, he is still a fine warrior and has personally trained several paladins. If there is any magic that can detect the moral nature of a mortal, Danys will be made to seem good and benevolent while in his Domain.

The Shadow Army: Danys can still summon his army of shadows, though he is loathe to use that ability now, even during Calamity. If activates it again, 100 shadows will appear in Vitalia and increase their numbers as described in their entry. These shadows are smart enough to gang up on stronger opponents and take advantage of their resistances.

Dark Disciple: Danys is unaware of the Dark Powers' role in the Calamities and believes them to be righteous beings, attributing his failures to save Jubilate to flaws in how he carries out their advising. While he doesn't go so far as to worship them, he seeks messages from them through four statues in his inner sanctum. An eidolon shares this room and can use each as a sacred statue, and will follow Danys with one whenever he leaves his palace. If there's any hope of reaching through to Danys, it will only be after all the statues are destroyed and the Dark Powers can no longer speak to him.

Closing the Borders: During Prosperity, Danys can open or close the borders at will, blacketing the borders with rain so thick it feels like a wall. Observers can see that the rain falls through the ground and if they persist enough they can catch a brief reflection of the Upper Planes. During Calamity, the borders will open or close on their own depending on the form of the Calamity.

Danys' Torment

- He must watch his kingdom come so close to his vision, only to watch it crumble away once more, in part by his hands.
- Unable to close himself completely to his people, their deaths still weigh on him even as he tells himself it was necessary.
- He clings to the Dark Powers as a source of hope, to accept that he never should have listened to them in the first place would be far more devastating than his current belief that his failures are only due to his implementation of solutions.
- The knowledge that even among more obviously malicious rulers of the new nations, he was the one to doom his land to the Mists.
- While now un-aging, the fact that he's not as swift of enduring as he once was gives him a constant feeling of mortality.

Roleplaying Danys

Danys rarely goes out among his people anymore, but in conversation he is aloof but polite regardless of rank. During Prosperity he genuinely takes his people's concerns into account in his rulings, and will seek justice in any legal case that comes before his throne. During Calamity, however, he shows himself more an more willing to sacrifice larger groups to ensure the kingdom's survival, and will eventually prioritize Jubilate before any of its inhabitants.

Personality Trait: "Permanence is what gives an endeavor value. Our descendants will not appreciate leaving them to continue the battle that we could not finish."
Ideal: "Jubilate will be a beacon for the multiverse."
Bond: "The True Masters are good entities in a sea of evil, even if some call them 'Dark'."
Flaw: "Those who stand in the way of what I must do are ungrateful."

 I’m still figuring out what to do about the Anchors.

 This is awesome! I love the Domain, the world, all of it! I would enjoy looking at something more in-depth about the world itself, so if its possible for you to compile a document about it, or if you already have one, I would love to see it!.

 

Thank you kindly! I do have a document in the works, and can give a preview of sorts:

Regions at a Glance

               Ain-sha

               A people who weaved spells to make themselves forget their previous life and build complex communal dreamworlds, where they spend their time between tending to their jobs and preparing for battles against Cessation.

               Archipelago of Apprehension

               Islands populated by loosely confederated cities. Contains the currently sole spelljammer port.

Astral Rift

A liminal space between the Lands and the Astral plane. Spelljammers enter and exit here. Contains some githyanki companies.

The Barrier

A mountain cutting through Respite, interrupted by Terrorbloom. Normally an environment for hippogriffs, griffons, and wyverns, it has increasingly been populated by perytons and harpies. Some aarakorca have risked settling here.

Bulbritch

The local Feywild was not so empty as the Material Plane, fey would make short visits to the Lands. Some, concerned with what the influx of mortals could mean, and/or seeing opportunities to benefit, built a Material Plane outpost to observe and interact with the newcomers. Seelie keep to the east, unseelie to the west, and some mortals have also moved here.

               Cage

               The outpost of the devils.

               Calteneas

               The eight dragons have responded to the settling of Respite by calling in kobold and dragonborn servants from the planes. They will trade with the new nations, but will respond to any attempts to settle the Wyrms’ Territory with war.

               Cessation

               A nation ruled by the Knights of Annihilation, a group dedicated to giving the multiverse a glorious death rather than the pitiful one they think it’s headed for. They have found ways to harness, if not exactly tame, oozes.

               Contested Region

               A resource rich area of forests, plains, small mountains, and swamps in the north. Claimed by many groups in the initial settling, and is now beset by minor wars and quickly shifting borders. Its current state is considered a threat to the goals of the more idealistic settlers, who often try to send diplomates to ease tensions.

               Deias

               Orcs and goblinoids that fled to the Lands to escape the influence of Gruumsh and Maglubiyet. Origin of several mercenary bands hired in the Contested Territory. Hopes to grow large enough in influence to challenge these gods for the minds of their people.

               Edge of the Known

               A gigantic mountain range that marks the extent any known settlers have explored. An environment for rocs.

               Kalzeen’s Hold

               Inhabited by underground-preferring peoples. Built on the ethos of everyone being personally loyal to each other. Citizens have a government assigned role, and those who chaff against these restrictions often become explorers of Respite underground (no Underdark discovered yet).

               Jubilate

               A kingdom based off the idea of keeping in close contact with celestials and using them as a model for behavior and governance. Viewed with suspicion among other nations, who see its quick diplomatic annexation of struggling border regions such as Whisper as signs of intend to establish an empire across Respite.

               Meeting of Eight

               A gathering of metallic and chromatic dragons maintaining an uneasy peace to preserve the Lands, though for different motives.

               Ooze Pits

               Oozes. A “holy” site for Cessation.

               Somali

               Desert containing celestial outposts. Usually stays out of the affairs of mortal nations, except to teach celestial-pact warlocks, oppose powerful fiends, and allow safe passage through the desert. Some mortal ports dot the coast for trade.

               Tenarii’s Landing

               An area mutated by demonic influence. The demons’ outpost for their return to the Lands.

               Terrorbloom

               Resting site of an old and massive Gulthias tree. Its blights are more colorful than standard and appear covered in blooming flowers, but their behavior is the same. Contains the ruins of a civilization that once served the tree. Many who’ve seen signs of previous civilization assume it’s the same as the one of these ruins, but this is incorrect.

               Ullahd

               Not everyone came to the Lands intentionally. Some walked through the wrong portal, or stowed away on a spelljammer without knowing its destination. While many of these settled in with their new neighbors, others were troubled with the unfettered romanticism of the nations. Others saw frightening portents that others overlooked in their elation. These people gathered here, mostly with the goal of leaving when they find the funds.

               Unquiet Sea

               Body of water contested between Jubilate and the demons.

               Yurnvyn

               Home of several groups of giants come from Ysgard. Situated on the massive Unnamed Continent, their territory seems strangely pre-prepared. They have shared reports of a tarrasque far to the south. Hopes to be the firsts step of restoring the giants’ empires of the Material Plane.

 Some of these I want to rethink, but they're the basic ideas at the moment.

 This is awesome! I would love it if you could make a finished document, but it’s all right if you don’t.

Am starting a new campaign soon for my players.  Have a few domains in mind to flesh out (One Note is fantastic for this).  Going to have them level up and at certain points, they will find themselves shifting to a different domain.  Was stuck for how I was going to do the transition, and then struck gold with an idea that just leapt up and screamed "Use me, I'm fantastic".

Quote from Hannman >>

Am starting a new campaign soon for my players.  Have a few domains in mind to flesh out (One Note is fantastic for this).  Going to have them level up and at certain points, they will find themselves shifting to a different domain.  Was stuck for how I was going to do the transition, and then struck gold with an idea that just leapt up and screamed "Use me, I'm fantastic".

They are starting in a Mansion at a dinner party.  After the opening set up (Weeping Angel 5e style) the house will become enshrouded in mist.  They will wake in whatever domain I start them in.  Thing is, they're still "in" the House.  Each room is a different domain, the House itself being some Dark Power gateway.  I'll figure that bit out when I need to.  Levelling up and shifting realms moves them through the house, eventually they'll find the bbeg at the centre of it and have to figure out how to escape the domains and the house.  Thankfully that's a long way off so I have time to figure it out as I go :D.

 

 I like this! And maybe the hallways are filled with Mist, so they can't leave their room until they get transported from some other force.

Quote from Hannman >>

Am starting a new campaign soon for my players.  Have a few domains in mind to flesh out (One Note is fantastic for this).  Going to have them level up and at certain points, they will find themselves shifting to a different domain.  Was stuck for how I was going to do the transition, and then struck gold with an idea that just leapt up and screamed "Use me, I'm fantastic".

They are starting in a Mansion at a dinner party.  After the opening set up (Weeping Angel 5e style) the house will become enshrouded in mist.  They will wake in whatever domain I start them in.  Thing is, they're still "in" the House.  Each room is a different domain, the House itself being some Dark Power gateway.  I'll figure that bit out when I need to.  Levelling up and shifting realms moves them through the house, eventually they'll find the bbeg at the centre of it and have to figure out how to escape the domains and the house.  Thankfully that's a long way off so I have time to figure it out as I go :D.

 

Oh that's cool! And I like Dragonslayer9's Mist hallways idea too.

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Has anyone else here played End Roll? The premise of that game could easily be made into a Domain.