D&D campaign - in Elyden!

I'm very excited to post this update as it brings together two things that have been very important to me – the world of Elyden, which readers will know is the subject of my somewhat sporadic world-building attempts, and D&D (and roleplaying & wargaming in general) which I have been doing since my ahem... younger days.

This marks the first time that I will be setting a game in my world which is quite interesting for many reasons, not least of which is the fact that the world was not made with gaming in mind (though I have certainly entertained the thought) and so many things that are common to roleplaying games like classes, races etc. which are made with balance in mind were the last thing I was thinking of so it presented some challenges, particularly with balancing out some of the stranger races.

Though as always what might seem like a hindrance at first ends up being a godsend and I actually ended up adding and refining quite a few things in the world as a result of this.

We haven’t started playing and as is the norm for my motley group of gamers, its to be a small game of evil characters J My games are pretty open world (especially evil-themed ones, where characters tend to have a lot of evil agendas that would otherwise interfere with the traditional roaming party), and I tend to develop an entire region, sprinkling it with interesting background, sites and NPCs that the characters can explore at will. This usually means a lot of stuff doesn’t get used, though it helps the players feel in control – I hate railroading in games (forcing the players to do a particular thing even if they don’t want to, only for the sake of moving the adventure along).

I’m quite fond of DMing but as you might expect from someone whose hobby is crating worlds, I tend to over-prepare most of my games coming up with hooks, regions, NPC’s histories and maps and gods-know what else that probably won’t ever get used. Though the waste of one campaign is the history of another. In fact, those of you who have read the blog before might remember that Elyden was made out of recycled material from previous campaign settings I had devised for D&D and I would not be surprised to see unused things from the campaign being used elsewhere in the world.

The game is to be set in a relatively new region of the world called the Surrach, which means their actions can help shape its flavour.

For anyone interested I’ve included the regional map below, as well as a link to the campaign bible that I’ve sent out to my players. So they can create their characters. Though I’m sure I left out a lot of details. We’re to use D*D 3.5 rules (still my fave so-far, though I am looking forward to trying out 5^th edition)

Campaign Bible - please let me know what you think!

campaign map: