/dgc/ Darksiders Godbound Campaign

Previous thread Free version of Godbound: drivethrurpg.com/product/185959/Godbound-A-Game-of-Divine-Heroes-Free-Edition

>Set after The End War
>Other Humans survived The End War like The Hunter, others could have made deals with different Demons (including Vulgrim, Samiel or the Chosen), Angels (like Uriel), or one of the many Old Ones (like Ostegoth or Ulthane), allowing Heroic Human characters.
>All the Horsemen appeared during the end war and were accused of starting it early. Stay have since gone on the run to prove their innocence and may have even split up to cover more leads / make harder to track.

The Charred Council are recruiting capable and power warriors from across the realms, Angel, Demon, Old One, Undead.
>Hunt down the traitorous Horsemen.
>Find this mysterious Destroyer, determine how it was able to turn the Horsemen against the balance and lead the hordes of the Abyss to crush the armies of the White City.
>Patrol Earth, stop the depredations of the Demons and unceasing fury of the Angels, find any surviving Humans and protect what's left of the Third kingdom.

List of known realms:
The First Kingdom: Heaven, including the outpost of Lostlight.
The Second Kingdom: Hell, including the outpost Shadow's Edge.
The Third Kingdom: Earth.
The Veil, realm of the Crowfather.
The Abyss, primordial darkness from before creation, home to countless monsters.
The Far Fields, realm of the Horsemaster and Phantom Horses.
The Forge Lands, realm of the Makers and their Constructs.
The Kingdom of the Dead, realm of the Dead Lords who shepherd the deceased to be cleansed of their past lives so that they may return to the Well of Souls, also home to a variety of Undead. (may include Argul's Tomb, but it greatly resembles Crowfather's Veil)
The River Styx, A place existing between the Three Kingdoms, the Styx is a river filled with wrathful souls that became lost rather than making it to the Well of Souls and thus to the Kingdom of the Dead.
The Charred Council's Realm, from this unknown place the Charred Council uphold the balance and send their enforcers to carry out their will.
Dead worlds: Eden, Kothysos, Ravaiim

Know methods of traversing the worlds:
The Tree of Life/Death (exists in every realm except for earth)
Serpent Holes, can potentially connect to every realm, requires powerful entity to manifest them (Vulgrim, Azrael, Samael, Crowfather, Archon Lucien, The Charred Council)

Possible characters concepts:
Angel
Demon
Maker
Maker-Construct
Undead
Abyssal Creatures
Human that has somehow survived the Apocalypse
One of the many types of unnamed Old Ones (Crowfather, Ostegoth, Kargon)

I decided to take another crack at the same Angel concept I made earlier but this time as a Heavy.

NAME: Barachiel, Eden’s Guardian
GOAL: Find Azrael and return to Heaven with him.
There was once a garden, more beautiful than anything in Creation. It is gone now, and with it The Tree of Life, but there are those who still remember its wonders...
Barachiel, a warrior of Heaven, was among the Hellguard who fought against the Nephilim at Eden. For his bravery in that battle he was among those charged with protecting the holy garden from anyone else who would seek to claim it. He was also there when the First Ones were cast out of Eden and the garden began to fall into ruins. Barachiel could not abide this; neither could the Archangel Azrael. At the Archangel’s behest, Barachiel agreed to continue defending the small piece of Eden which Azrael managed to save.
Following the Archangel’s disappearance in the aftermath of the Apocalypse, Barachiel petitioned to be allowed to go in search of his co-conspirator. His request was granted, but at a heavy price: the gates of the White City will remain forever closed to him unless he can return with the Archangel... and the location of Eden.

ATTRIBUTES Score Mod check (21-attrib.)
Strength 14 +1 7
Dexterity 16 +2 5
Constitution 14 +1 7
Wisdom 13 +1 8
Intelligence 8 -1 13
Charisma 10 0 11

SAVING THROWS
Base Mod Armour Penalty Final Save
Hardiness 14 1 -4 17
Evasion 13 2 -4
Spirit 14 1 0

FACTS:
#1 – Angel.
#2 – A member of the Hellguard who once defended Eden.
#3 – Theoretically subordinate of Abbadon/Uriel, loyalty to Azrael.

WORDS & GIFTS:

ARMOUR: Angelic Heavy Armour (Heavy) and Shield AC: 0
WEAPONS: Holy Sword (1d10+1 thanks to gift, use any ATR mod
HIT POINTS: 9
EFFORT: 2
INFLUENCE: 2

BOW: Omnipresent Reach (1)
SWORD Contempt of Distance (1), Steel Without End (1), Nine Iron Walls (1)
SKY: Rain of Lightning (1), Sapphire Wings (1)

I thought it was interesting that Barachiel ended up being quite a bit weaker than the other characters in terms of raw attributes because of the Word choices, especially compared to one like the demon Zephris. The thing is that the moment he gets access to more powerful weapons and gear he'll suddenly come into his own because he'll be able to use them better than anyone else and be able summon exactly the right tool for a particular job.

>Bow: Heroes with the Bow Word never run out of normal ammunition. They may instantly call ranged or throwing weapons they've used to their hands over any distance, and their ranged weapon attacks never harm any target they did not intend to hurt. Their ranged attacks always count as magical for purposes of overcoming defenses.

>Sky: Heroes with the Sky Word are never harmed by falling, need not breathe, and have an invincible defense against electricity, cold and injurious sounds.

>Sword: Heroes with the Sword Word treat all their weapon or unarmed attacks as magical, cannot be disarmed, and can summon any melee weapon they’ve ever used immediately to hand as an Instant action

This dovetails really nicely with the high-tech nature of Darksiders angels compared to the more primitive but strong demons.

In case anyone was interested, Barachiel is a guardian angel in some Orthodox and folk Catholic beliefs. He tends to be associated with lightning and abundance.

Keep it up. I like where it's going so far.

In the OSR general there is a link to bunch of OSR PDFs. I grabbed a bunch of different bestiaries to mine for appropriate monsters.

I forgot to ask last time, are you gonna run this IRL or over the internet?

I've never ran an online rpg before. For this type of rules lite game what would be the best way to do it?

Make an IRC channel (actually, get two, one for out of character chat and dice rolls, and one for strictly in-character interaction) and a bot with a dice rolling function.

I've used Roll20 before and it seems to work OK. It does come with a lot of dice roller built in and lets you upload maps and what have you pretty easily. I've never recruited from its "community", mind you. IRC can work as well.

I haven't really had any time today to do any more for this besides the 2nd angel, but I'm hoping I can spare a bit tomorrow. Would it be worth putting together some thoughts and descriptions for locations? Alternatively, should I try to help mine for creatures?

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...

Bump

As discussed in the last thread, I whipped up a very quick adaptation of Fire to Ice Word/Gifts. Its more about immediate damage dealing than a more subtle application.


ICE
Born of biting cold, the Word of Ice grants powers of freezing, chilling, and engulfing those things displeasing to the hero. It may also be used to shield allies from the bite of frost, or undo the damage that ice has done to a person or object. Its miracles may also bring forth slabs of frozen material seemingly from thin air, or to conceal with sudden storms of icy hail. More subtle miracles may invoke Ice’s ties to grip of anxiety and despair, clawing at the hearts of others or causing the emotions to spread to others like the spread of hoarfrost.

Heroes with the Ice Word have an invincible defence against cold and frost. They may wield ice as a magical weapon with a range of up to 50 feet and a 1d10 damage die.


LESSER GIFTS
Engulfing Glacier / Action
An object in sight up to 20 x 20 x 20 feet in size is encased in a solid tomb of ice
and cannot escape. Larger objects may take a few rounds to become completely trapped. Objects carried by a person cannot be affected. If the ice containing an object is violently shattered, the object inside is also irreparably broken. See page 27 for rules on creating walls of ice or other zones of hazardous terrain.

Blizzard / (Smite) Action
Commit Effort for the scene. Choose a point within sight; every chosen target within 100 feet of it is struck by a blast of snow and sharp ice for a 1d6 die of damage per level of the Godbound, with an Evasion save allowed to halve the damage taken, rounded up.

Walking in the Air / On Turn
Commit Effort for the scene. Instantly know the location of all ice and snow within a mile. As an action, teleport and emerge from any larger than a hailstone with any willing companions in physical contact with you. You cannot move more than one mile total in any one hour.

The Snow Retreats / Action
Unfreeze objects or creatures in a 20 x 20 x 20 foot cube each round, repairing damage and restoring the condition of frozen objects. Ice damage is healed at no Effort cost, but the dead are not raised.

Master of the Glacier/ On Turn
Commit Effort. Shape and mould all ice within sight, growing or collapsing it as you wish. As an action, trap an unattended, inanimate object within sight on in solid ice. Objects larger than a wagon can be trapped only in part

Nimbus of Frost / On Turn
Commit Effort. You’re surrounded by a halo of biting cold. Anyone who attacks you in melee combat takes 1 point of ice damage before the attack is resolved. Assailants can suffer only one such injury per round, even if they launch multiple attacks.

GREATER GIFTS
Frozen Scorn / On Turn
Commit Effort. Every foe that attacks you while afraid or reluctant suffers your Fray die in frost damage before each attack is resolved, even if they have more hit dice than you or make multiple attacks. Normally, only mindless creatures or remarkably disciplined foes can remain calm enough to avoid the damage. Mobs suffer this damage straight.

Chilling Words On Turn
Commit Effort. Your voice freezes your enemies. Every lesser foe within earshot takes your Fray damage each round. You can freeze unattended objects with a word as a free action once a round.

Fimbulwinter / On Turn
Commit Effort. You wield ice as a weapon, either encasing a blade in it or using projections of it as a magical weapon with a 200 foot range and 1d10 damage die. Individual victims killed by this are instantly trapped in a large crystal which radiates cold, doing a 1d3 damage die to all desired targets within 20 feet and halving their movement rate.
This gift's damage is always rolled straight against Mobs of lesser foes.

These would be particularly helpful for some Demons and undead associated with Argul, the Deposed King.

Finished the Sycorax blurb.

Broodling Sycorax: Web-spinning spy
Goal: Escape Silitha and set up a nest lair of its own.

Silitha, Broodmother and Chosen of the Destroyer, carved out a demesne on the outskirts of the Black Throne amid the toppled spires of Humanity’s greatest city. She has spawned a vast army of horrid children to be her eyes, ears, and gibbering mouths, collecting information and stories from across the ruins of the Third Kingdom. Sycorax is just one such broodling, trusted to venture further from the nest than most.

Sycorax caught the Broodmother’s attention when it managed to lure a member of the Hellguard into a trap deep in the Iron Canopy. From the unfortunate angel Sycorax learned a terrible secret which it has, thus far, managed to keep from the Broodmother. Whatever the secret was has made Sycorax intensely interested in finding a way to escape Silitha’s clutches and find a deep, dark bolthole of its own to hide in.

...

I like it.

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Thanks! There's definitely room for improvement to make it its own thing rather than a blatant find&replace but it should work fine as is. One thing I did think could work is expanding on effecting movement rates and cutting enemy actions instead of direct action, to represent the cold slowing and stopping people, but I don't know how well that would work.

Meanwhile, I've been looking at the Faction rules on p.134. Writing up the Destroyer's Chosen, Lostlight and Shadow's Edge, some of the Dead Kingdoms and the Maker realms should be very doable, to say nothing of just making stuff up.

I can look into roll20 as well.
As far as locations go, go for it. I'll archive them too. I'm wondering if we should bash together our own bestiary instead of just using whatever 2e/OSR monsters exist?

Damn dood. I have to say I haven't had this much fun working on an RPG in long ass time.

Darsiders Godbound Factions (p. 134+)

>A faction is any group or community which is intended to be an important actor in your campaign. Factions can be nations, religions, communities, secret cabals, rebel movements, or any other substantial organization of NPCs. These faction rules are best used only with theactive, important groups in your campaign; not every nation should be statted up as a faction, nor every sinister conspiracy. Only the ones that seem most interesting or relevant to the campaign deserve the extra effort of writing them up.

Power / Size / Action Die
1 / Village neighborhood, guild, cabal / 1d6
2 / City, regional faith, major institute / 1d8
3 / Province, region, widespread faith / 1d10
4 / Nation, realm-wide faith / 1d12
5 / Empire ruling an entire realm / 1d20

Factions have:
POWER representing size and scope. Determines ability of the Faction to take actions with action die above.
COHESION measures the resilience, unity, and durability of the faction's identity. Starts equal to Power.
FEATURES are useful or resilient facts about the membership or their available assets. Usually one sentence.
PROBLEMS are opposite of Features. Problem sentences have a point value assigned to them
TROUBLE score is sum of Problem points. If Trouble equals maximum action die roll the faction collapses.
INTEREST in other factions. Measures ability to interfere with or aid another faction. A faction can have no more points of Interest in any single rival than twice its own maximum action die roll.
DOMINION points, just like PCs. Can only make Plausible and Improbable changes with their Dominion.

Rolled 1 + 3 (1d3 + 3)

So, using that,

NAME: The Destroyer’s Kingdom (draft #1)
POWER: 4 (1d12)
COHESION: 4
FEATURES: Hell’s almost undisputed demesne in the ruins of Earth. Legions of Demons, Abyssal entities and Undead are at the Destroyer’s command. His capital, The Black Throne, is both an almost impenetrable fortress and a magical siphon used to empower the forces of Hell.
PROBLEMS: Constant guerrilla attacks by the surviving forces of heaven (4). Low-level internecine warfare both between demon factions and within demon factions (2). Increasing hostility with Kingdom of the Dead (1)
TROUBLE: 7
INTEREST: The Hellguard on Earth (6)
DOMINION: 4


Going to do some random rolls to try to quickstart an NPC town to see how that works now.

dice+1d3 (size) + 3d20 (facts) + 3d20 (problems) + 1d10 (goal)

Rolled 1 + 3 (1d3 + 3)

Well I ballsed that up. Lets see if I can do it right this time.

Clearly not. Using something else I got

Size: 1
Features: 4,12,8
Problems: 8,13,9
Goal: 3
(you don't need this many facts and problems, but whatever)

So assuming that this is a small human village, and choosing which roll to use on which table, we could have

Facts: The people have faith in their leaders' wisdom (Cultural), Artisan guilds exist and are all obedient to the rulers (Economic), A mighty refuge they have is reputed to be untakeable (Military)

Problems: Idealistic reformers are tearing down vital institutions (Cultural), Technical expertise is jealously guarded by its keepers (Economic), The army is so disorganized that it's near-useless (Military)

Goal: Solve one point worth of Problems, prioritizing those that have to do with external entanglements (Self-Absorbed Survivors, 3-4)

So we have a very small, isolated enclave of crafts-men and -women that has managed to survive for quite a long time by moving into somewhere very well hidden and very well protected - perhaps a former Angelic staging ground, or an area so infested with sandworms that only small, nimble humans can get in. They don't get many visitors, and its not like they have any weapons capable of scratching the things out there, so there's no real reason for a military. The leaders know the Craft which keeps them all safe, and they only share it with a few key people in the tribe so that the defences don't get compromised. That's perfectly fine for most people, but there's always youngsters and trouble makers (otherwise known as PCs) trying to stir up trouble.

If it were me, I'd go with a fremen-esque village deep in the Ashlands that's somehow hit on a way to make use of Chronospheres. Nobody knows they're there because its so worm infested even the demons avoid it, but the instant word gets out that there are squishy slaves with Old One secrets (perhaps from a PC from there who uses the Time Word) they're all doomed.

Forgot I'd formatted it properly.

NAME: Wormfood Village (“I wanted to call it Arrakis, but Bill over there wouldn’t be having with any of that nerd shit!”)
POWER: 1 (1d6)
COHESION: 1
FEATURES: The people have faith in their leaders' wisdom, There is a Chronomancer guild which is obedient to the elders, Their home is reputed to be untakeable.
PROBLEMS: Idealistic reformers are tearing down vital institutions (1), Technical expertise is jealously guarded by its keepers (2), The army is so disorganized that it's near-useless (2)
TROUBLE: 5
INTEREST: Ash Worms (3), Stygian Camp demons (2)
DOMINION: 0
GOAL: Train a more effective army

I'll try to do a couple more factions later.

...

NAME: Shadow’s Edge (post-apocalypse)
POWER: 1 (1d6)
COHESION: 1
FEATURES: The Mad Queen Lilith holds court here in Samael’s absence. She knows many secrets and has the ear of many influential entities across creation. Even in a decayed state the Black Stone remains a formidable fortress with defences across time and space. If one can manipulate time it is still possible to seek an audience with Samael.
PROBLEMS: Lilith is powerful, capricious and insane (2). Without Samael’s strong will to hold it in place, Shadow’s Edge will continue to crumble and will eventually be destroyed as it is dragged into the Abyss (2).
TROUBLE: 4
INTEREST: Samael (1), The Destroyer (1), The Nephilim (1)
DOMINION: 0

NAME: Shadow’s Edge (pre-apocalypse)
POWER: 2 (1d8)
COHESION: 2
FEATURES: The infamous demon Samael’s seat of power and one of the foremost outposts of Hell. Home to a legion of Samael’s elite guard and terrifyingly powerful relics, the Black Stone is an exceptional fortress.
PROBLEMS: Samael has many powerful rivals who constantly seek his downfall (including, possibly, The Dark Prince himself) (3). Shadow’s Edge is held in place entirely by Samael’s will – should any calamity befall him it will immediately begin to crumble away (1)
TROUBLE: 4
INTEREST: Lost Light (1), Other Demon factions (2)
DOMINION: 3

NAME: Heaven’s Outpost, Lostlight
POWER: 2 (1d8)
COHESION: 2
FEATURES: The Scriptorium is home to Angels with knowledge of all creation, past, present and future. Lostlight’s leader, Archon Lucien, was entrusted with powerful relics including scrying pools, portals to other realms and one of the keys to the Well of Souls.
PROBLEMS: Lostlight’s defenders are brave, but surprisingly few in number (1). Since the apocalypse Archon Lucien has become increasingly withdrawn and secretive (1). It is extremely difficult to reach the Ivory Citadel and its librarian citizens are uncooperative and ill-tempered (2)
TROUBLE: 4
INTEREST: The Destroyer and His Armies (4), The White City (3)
DOMINION: 1