The Awakened (DnD 4th Edition - Interest Check)

Started by ShadeOfGray, June 26, 2011, 11:50:09 PM

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ShadeOfGray

(Since this languished for an entire week in the non-forum RP section without a single reply..  modifying it to a forum game to see if anyone's interested,  I'd like to still do combat sessions over maptool..  but if I need to do it by forum, then forum it is)

Forward:

I am dreaming. 
I have dreamt my birth.
I have dreamt my childhood.
I have dreamt the years I have walked upon this path. 
In my dream, I am powerful.
I am loved.
I am respected.
Nobody dares to bring weapons against me.
Nobody challenges my views and ideas.
Nobody questions,  Nobody defies
They dance according to my will, and should I wish it
they will wave their fists in anger toward their tyrant.
Even this is a sickening display of loyalty. 
How long have I been dreaming?
I don’t remember.  I don’t recall.
Not a single moment of reality,
Not a single day that has gone against my desires.
I have to be dreaming.
Hours, days, years, decades
Why am I still dreaming? 
This most wretched prison
Where everything is served to me upon silver platters
I will wave, and they all will bow their heads.
This dream is unbearable
I must wake up
Do I exist outside of this dream?
What lies beyond the boundaries?
I must wake up
If only to a field of black oblivion,
I will awake.



As my eyes opened, the dream turned black.  Everything was black.  Where was I?  My pained breaths struggling to escape from my chest reminded me that I was not dead. 

Not yet.

I reach my hands forward, every movement is painful.  My muscles feel like they have not been used in years.  I am hungry, so hungry, my throat and tongue cracked with dryness and desperation. 

My hands felt something in front of me, I was imprisoned.  A prison of stone rather than one of mind.  Stone could be broken, it could be escaped.  Am I still dreaming? 

No, I've never felt this pain.  The desire that ached through my entire body wrought of years of neglect.  There was no neglect within the dream.  I have to get out of here.

I pushed, I pushed with whatever strength was left in me.  The blackness did not move.  I grew angry.  I did not shake off the everlasting dream to die in this stone coffin.  I pushed, I shook, I punched, I kicked.  I threw everything that was left of me against that cold stone. 

There was a creak.  A crack.  A brilliant sliver of light began to erupt into my darkness.  Though it was only a narrow beam it was blinding to my seclusion.  I covered my eyes in pain as it slowly grew bigger. 

The door of my coffin drew open, in front of it fell my emancipated body.  There were hundreds of coffins in this corridor, each was the same with the exception of being closed.  I tried to stand up in this strange hallway of red stone, but I had no more strength.  I lay there wheezing, waiting for death to take me.

I had escaped.  The dream was ended.  I had seen a small fragment of light and would be happy to return to the darkness that I no longer would see.  Those footsteps walking toward me were the final vision I had before everything blurred to nothingness. 

The Setting:

The Awakened is a story of a collection of souls that have woken from a spell of eternal imprisonment.  Locked within a dream where every desire is granted as their bodies slowly decay.  It would have been a slow but happy death, but for some reason, that was not good enough.   For whatever reason, your character has shrugged off the shackles of the dream. 

The long prison within the dreamland erased almost all memories of the life they had led before.  Only fleeting and painful images resided in the backs of their minds, though their wills, skills and their personalities remained, albeit warped by the experiences of the dream.  Of the thousands and thousands that resided in the red stone coffins, less than one percent of them ever woke up.  Such was the allure of a dream of never ending bliss. 

When they awoke, they found themselves in a red stone palace.  Attended to by a squad of attendants who nursed their aching and neglected bodies back to health.  Once they were health, they would meet their captor, one of the six remaining Arch-devils. 

She would explain that hey had long since been dead, their souls captured to this ruined realm of darkness and dust.  The futile struggles of their dream only serving to fuel the Devils' own needs, as their souls had been deemed too worthless to serve in material form.  The devil explained this all with a candid indifference, as if she had related the tale thousands of times before. 

Still, since they were so rare, the awakened always interested her, and as she was feeling particularly devilish, she offered to them a choice.  To return to their dream, to gain the embrace of death, or to serve her and in doing so earn eventual freedom and a return to the world they had forgotten.  Service to the devil took on many forms.  Those charismatic and attractive often found their way into the Devil's harem, Those strong and brave would serve in her armies,  the more cunning and the wise she would use as her messengers, hands and eyes in this underworld and beyond.  Of course, there was plenty of overlap. 

The world they had found themselves in was grim and bleak.  Crimson thunder echoed through smoggy red skies, a dark and dusty island floating over an infinite sea of red.  Only the few gnarled and petrified trees gave any indication that the ground had once supported life.  The air was filled with ash and dust.  Armies of the archdevils march across the realm everyday, either in struggle with each other or battles with the outside.   In the center of the island lie lord Hald's black tower, an outsider god who had overthrown one of the archdevils and now held the rest in an unwilling servitude. 

As the awakened journey, the absence of the dream will allow the memories of their life to slowly return, and the excursions back to their world that the devil allows will only increase the pace of recall.   However, while their souls are leashed to the Devil, their material presence in their old world is only temporary and able to be revoked at a whim.   The tasks for the devil were myriad and diverse, but freedom was just around the corner... or so they would hope. 

The Technical:
Characters:
Character attributes will be built with a standard array: 16,14,13,12,11,10.  Level 1.  Your souls weren't worth too much when your character died, after all, but maybe they can change that with your second chance.

As per a frequent houserule of mine, you can select ANY skills to be trained in at first level (up to your allotted limit), not just off your class skill list.

Though technically dead, within the devil's world the characters will function exactly as their material counterparts, within the material they will be able to materialize as normal with the archdevil's assistance.  There are a few exceptions, in that they will not need to eat or sleep (though still will suffer fatigue from physical exertion) and will enjoy greatly enhanced natural healing abilities. 

Clerics and other Divine power source characters will not remember their deity at first, though the archdevil will offer to fuel their powers herself.   Divine powers must have a definite source in this setting.  That is to say, you cannot be a cleric of "Goodness" or "Freedom".

Greenskins and Halflings do not exist in this setting.  All other PHB races are fine, Eladrin are High Elves, Elves are Sylvan Elves.  Races from other books by individual approval.  (I rarely deny one unless there's really no place for it in the setting, and if needed can offer an alternative with the same stats)

The vast majority of classes are A-OK.  Some power sources get refluffed on a class to class basis, but no mechanical changes. 

Devils in this setting are the twisted physical forms of mortals.  Many are evil due to the prevalent culture, but they are not necessarily so.  Many are enslaved to the will of an archdevil or otherwise stuck inside the realm for various reasons.  Good devils do exist.  There are no restrictions on party alignment but preferably there is no outright conflict between party members.  Please no "double agents" or characters who are joining the party for the sole purpose of undermining or backstabbing it. 

Content:
This will largely depend on the nature of the assembled party.  Sex wise, plot will always take precedence over pleasure, if pleasure starts to interfere then players will be asked to refocus and continue privately if necessary.  For the rest, This will obviously be touch and feel as we go.  There are plenty of tasks an archdevil needs done, after all.  Entertaining allies, confounding enemies, forging alliances, and pulling strings.   

If Interested:
Post here or PM me.  I would like a core group of at least 4 players, and ideally 6.  Preferably with an even gender mix.   This is still in interest check stage technically, so feel free to ask for any clarifications/requests/etc. 
Between young and old, Between was and be
Between dark and light, Between you and me
This pleasant shade of gray.. (O/O)
(Idea Thread)

Revelation

Hey! I'm pretty interested in this, being 4e and all... So you have at least one interested player.