Starting a Ghostwalk Campaing
There are many new and unique aspects that set the Ghostwalk setting apart from other D&D worlds. Consequently, running a campaign using this material can be challenging. Yet at the same time, for the same reasons, running a Ghostwalk campaign can be extremely rewarding for both you and your players.
'œWhen you die, you don't have to stop playing''€"that's the core idea behind Ghostwalk. When characters die during an adventure in or near (or under) Manifest, the PCs immediately become ghosts that the players can keep playing. This is a new facet to playing the game that creates all sorts of interesting situations.
Dungeon Masters should always keep the core idea in mind when running a Ghostwalk campaign. Don't let this unique aspect of the setting become commonplace and unspectacular to your players.
Rules - The Ghostwalk Campaign
- Eanwulf
- Level 18 Elite
- Posts: 7226
- Location: FL
- Title: The Grey
- User Class: Berserker
Rules - The Ghostwalk Campaign
When Life Hands You Razorblades. You Make A Baseball Bat Covered In Razorblades!
- Eanwulf
- Level 18 Elite
- Posts: 7226
- Location: FL
- Title: The Grey
- User Class: Berserker
Re: Rules - The Ghostwalk Campaign
Beyond the Veil
All things must eventually come to an end, and all living things eventually die. Ghosts give up their will to carry on and cross the Veil of Souls, a god can be slain by a rival, and even the animate force of an undead goes somewhere when it is destroyed. However, for a city on the edge of death itself and inhabited by a thousand ghosts, the people of Manifest are still ignorant of what exists beyond the Veil of Souls. People brought back from the dead have no memory of what happened during that time, spells to commune with the dead fail to give any information on the deceased spirit's surroundings, and even the deities cannot or will not divine what lies beyond. Some say the Deathwarden dwarves know, but they remain silent on the matter.
At some point, the heroes in a Ghostwalk campaign may feel they have explored all of the mysteries of the living world and seek adventures in other places'€"and an obvious new frontier is the True Afterlife, for no living creature has gone there and returned. A group of adventurers may need information from a long-dead person whose body is absent or too deteriorated to use speak with dead or from someone who refuses to be raised from the dead. They could even be looking for a powerful magic item pushed through the Veil with the body of its owner (perhaps the missing one of the Seven Crowns). No matter their reasons for going, anyone so brave or reckless as to undertake this journey is going to encounter a lot of opposition.
Be aware that if heroes make it beyond the Veil and back and tell about what awaits people there, it will change the face of the Ghostwalk campaign. Much of human (and humanoid) nature is driven by the fear of the unknown, particularly the fear and uncertainty of what happens after death, and without that ignorance people will act differently. Those who refrain from evil out of fear of punishment in the Afterlife may revel in their secret nature if they find that eternal torture does not await them after death. Those suffering in life may choose to kill themselves and their loved ones if they find that in death their suffering ends. Religious dogma may twist and shatter when the myths and lore about the Afterlife are proven to be supposition or even falsehoods. Unless the Dungeon Master is willing to deal with the repercussions of this knowledge becoming public, strange things may happen and the campaign can lose its flavor. Because of this, adventures beyond the Veil should be considered a heroic end to a Ghostwalk campaign, and the source material included here is designed for highlevel characters so that when the adventure is completed, the heroes can retire and the DM can take time to adjust the campaign or change to a different campaign.
All things must eventually come to an end, and all living things eventually die. Ghosts give up their will to carry on and cross the Veil of Souls, a god can be slain by a rival, and even the animate force of an undead goes somewhere when it is destroyed. However, for a city on the edge of death itself and inhabited by a thousand ghosts, the people of Manifest are still ignorant of what exists beyond the Veil of Souls. People brought back from the dead have no memory of what happened during that time, spells to commune with the dead fail to give any information on the deceased spirit's surroundings, and even the deities cannot or will not divine what lies beyond. Some say the Deathwarden dwarves know, but they remain silent on the matter.
At some point, the heroes in a Ghostwalk campaign may feel they have explored all of the mysteries of the living world and seek adventures in other places'€"and an obvious new frontier is the True Afterlife, for no living creature has gone there and returned. A group of adventurers may need information from a long-dead person whose body is absent or too deteriorated to use speak with dead or from someone who refuses to be raised from the dead. They could even be looking for a powerful magic item pushed through the Veil with the body of its owner (perhaps the missing one of the Seven Crowns). No matter their reasons for going, anyone so brave or reckless as to undertake this journey is going to encounter a lot of opposition.
Be aware that if heroes make it beyond the Veil and back and tell about what awaits people there, it will change the face of the Ghostwalk campaign. Much of human (and humanoid) nature is driven by the fear of the unknown, particularly the fear and uncertainty of what happens after death, and without that ignorance people will act differently. Those who refrain from evil out of fear of punishment in the Afterlife may revel in their secret nature if they find that eternal torture does not await them after death. Those suffering in life may choose to kill themselves and their loved ones if they find that in death their suffering ends. Religious dogma may twist and shatter when the myths and lore about the Afterlife are proven to be supposition or even falsehoods. Unless the Dungeon Master is willing to deal with the repercussions of this knowledge becoming public, strange things may happen and the campaign can lose its flavor. Because of this, adventures beyond the Veil should be considered a heroic end to a Ghostwalk campaign, and the source material included here is designed for highlevel characters so that when the adventure is completed, the heroes can retire and the DM can take time to adjust the campaign or change to a different campaign.
When Life Hands You Razorblades. You Make A Baseball Bat Covered In Razorblades!
- Eanwulf
- Level 18 Elite
- Posts: 7226
- Location: FL
- Title: The Grey
- User Class: Berserker
Re: Rules - The Ghostwalk Campaign
The True Afterlife
There are many contradicting legends and stories about the nature of the True Afterlife in the Ghostwalk campaign, but at its simplest it can be described in this way: death is much like life. The truly dead feel real to each other and can interact in much the same fashion as they did when they were alive or ghosts. There are some changes that take some getting used to, but overall it works similar to the world of the living. Some sages among the dead theorize that this is because a humanoid mind is configured a certain way, and because of this the mind interprets the metaphysical environment in a way that it can understand. These sages estimate that animals experience the afterlife in a manner more accustomed to their own senses, undead perceive it according to their unnatural senses, and so on. While this theory cannot be proven with any certainty (for one would have to experience life as a humanoid, then die, then live again as an animal or undead, then die again and retain memories of the previous visits to the True Afterlife to make comparisons), it gives the dead sages something to do in the infinite time they have remaining.
Suffice it to say that if a person dies and passes on to the True Afterlife, under the best circumstances they still look like their living selves, can communicate with others using what is apparently normal speech, interact with objects and creatures as if they were solid, and even draw upon magic as they did when alive. Of course, not all people arrive under the best circumstances, and the effects of this are described below.
There are many contradicting legends and stories about the nature of the True Afterlife in the Ghostwalk campaign, but at its simplest it can be described in this way: death is much like life. The truly dead feel real to each other and can interact in much the same fashion as they did when they were alive or ghosts. There are some changes that take some getting used to, but overall it works similar to the world of the living. Some sages among the dead theorize that this is because a humanoid mind is configured a certain way, and because of this the mind interprets the metaphysical environment in a way that it can understand. These sages estimate that animals experience the afterlife in a manner more accustomed to their own senses, undead perceive it according to their unnatural senses, and so on. While this theory cannot be proven with any certainty (for one would have to experience life as a humanoid, then die, then live again as an animal or undead, then die again and retain memories of the previous visits to the True Afterlife to make comparisons), it gives the dead sages something to do in the infinite time they have remaining.
Suffice it to say that if a person dies and passes on to the True Afterlife, under the best circumstances they still look like their living selves, can communicate with others using what is apparently normal speech, interact with objects and creatures as if they were solid, and even draw upon magic as they did when alive. Of course, not all people arrive under the best circumstances, and the effects of this are described below.
When Life Hands You Razorblades. You Make A Baseball Bat Covered In Razorblades!