Rultmoork Player Start Summary
As Above, So Below
The adventurers investigate a solitary spire of stone in the barren mountain wastelands.
According to legend, water once sprung forth from this spire, blessing the land with life.
Now, the land is dry, the ancient site in ruins, and a wondrous waterclock is stagnant.
The stagnation infuses all beings, from the strange cultists on the surface to the former elemental guardians deep below.
It is up to the adventurers to defeat the ancient evils within Rultmoork, restore the waterclock, and bring life back to the land.
Explore wasteland ruins and uncover mysterious clues to the past in this adventure for 4-6 characters, starting at levels 5-7 and concluding at levels 8-11.
I know that not everyone could make it to the Session Zero and that’s fine
There are some things that will be important for you to keep in mind for this campaign
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This is going to be run in a “West Marches” style. That means that each gaming session is intended to work as a single “venturing forth” from a shared base camp. The intent is to keep these sessions open for players to be able to come and go from the table as they need without putting the adventure on hold for everyone.
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The “participation-fluid” approach means that my focus, as GM, for any given session is on presenting the environs, challenges, etc. of the scenario. I want everyone to feel free to express a beautiful and unique character but, for this campaign, it will be awkward, difficult, and distracting to deep-dive into extensive character backstories and quest lines. Your character came to this place, they’re looking for something here, and here is a nearly lifeless wasteland in the middle of nowhere.
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The author bills this as a difficult adventure that rewards player attention and careful logical examination. You’ll not find success by “throwing dice at” the barriers and problems presented here. The bulk of the play consists of puzzles of varying scale and complexity.
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Combat will be challenging. That means that enemies are much, much more than HP vaults that need to be beaten into submission. Combat will happen, it will typically be non-optional, and it may often be overpowering and “unbalanced” if you’re only accustomed to the stock DMG encounter-math. This is intentional, see point 3.
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Character death is highly likely. That will not eliminate a player from the campaign, but it may knock them out of participating directly in the action of the current session. If your character dies, they are dead and may not rejoin this campaign. It might be worthwhile to have a spare (or two) that have been hanging out back in camp.
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The single best advice I can provide regarding the difficulty is this: work together. As the GM, I am not your adversary (and any GM who claims otherwise is wrong, without exception). I am not going to (intentionally) mislead you, contrive to cut short your game, or engineer tedium. I’m bringing this campaign module to the table because it is interesting and I think it will be fun. Angling for a TPK isn’t fun, it’s obnoxious and pointless - when I choose the encounters, I could just as easily pit you against a Swarm of Terrasques as a gang of zombies. Killing everyone off and stopping the story is self-defeating and trivially easy; I have no interest in that.
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There was a series of Limited Run Adventures (nee one-shots) that preceded this. Those were intended as a practice ground for a character that you may want to consider bringing to this campaign. It’s not required that you do, but you may find deep familiarity with a character’s performance profile quite valuable.
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Your character is one in a party. Talk to each other. Figure out who in the party is best at what sorts of tasks. Employ the Help action, (PHB, p. 368). It is not possible to build one character that is good at everything you may face, so specialize and coordinate - work as a team. If this sounds like point 6, consider that a clue.
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Use this thread as you like. I recommend talking to each other, devising character connections, even talking through strategies or theories about the things your characters encounter in this strange corner of the world.