Step into the shadowed depths of the Underdark and claim your rightful place as the noble leaders of Drow Households in the illustrious Kingdom of Mithilnir. Unlike the typical Lloth Sworn Drow, these characters are imbued with a unique culture, offering a captivating 'blank slate' for you to mold and guide according to your desires.

Homebrew - Rules Lite invites you to partake in a mesmerizing blend of strategy and roleplaying, where dungeon crawling takes a backseat to the exhilarating challenges of diplomacy with foreign envoys, unraveling ancient mysteries of magic, and quelling rebellions as you forge the destiny of your domain.

With a rich tapestry of over 3,000 years of history already woven, the stage is set for you to etch your mark upon the annals of the Underdark, shaping its future on a grand scale that will resonate through the ages. Are you ready to seize the reins of power and embark on an epic journey of conquest and intrigue?

This initial post will explain the game and get you started creating a character. Feel free to read the other notices and posts as you have time.


How this game came to be:

 After many years of dungeon crawls and tactical table-top battles I have lost interest in both. I am no longer interested in bleeding for the guy in the tavern that gave me 200 GP to die in the dungeon.

 I decided to run a game that I would like to play in. That's really the best thing you can do when no game meets your needs. This is one of the scenarios that I think would be the most fun to play.

I was recently in a live session and all I did was roll to hit, roll initiative, roll damage, roll this, roll that - no real role playing, just roll playing. I was bored to tears and I realized that I needed more from the game. The players were awesome. The GM was awesome, but computer games like Baldur's Gate 3 already do that for me.

I wanted to create a game that combined strategy and roleplaying. When you own some land, and have some people, then you may feel the need to bleed for it. It is much more rewarding to plant the seeds in your domain and watch it grow.

There are a 1000 games where you play a 1st level adventurer who has no home or background really, and is just out on the road looking for ruins to explore.  This is not one of those games.

What kind of game is it?:

In this game, players take the role of the head of a noble house of Drow in the Kingdom of Mithilnir. The players share regency over the Kingdom - much like an adventuring party would decide what path to take in the dungeon - they work together to make decisions for their shared domain.

You will also have your own personal demense. This is not a game of six players all playing a solo game together. This is a collaborative and participative game. The personal demense represents your wealth and relative power and the resources you can use to solve mutual problems. It is not my intent to create solo games for six people and try to run them. It is my intent to provide a setting where you feel like you are powerful.

In a typical AD&D game, you might have a magic sword or armor - think of your demense much as you would the inventory on your character sheet for dungeon crawls.

How frequent do we post?:

I am going to try to post several times a week, and give everyone plenty of time to respond to events and post. I am going to use the concept of "Chapters" to pass time. You can think of a chapter as a discrete unit of time, but of no specific length.

A chapter may be a single adventure or day, or a several years to skip ahead to the "Good parts".

The best way to think of it is like chapters in a book. The author takes a beat to pause between events and give everyone a chance to skill up and do some administrative stuff. This is my intent with chapters. I'll keep an archive of chapters for future players to read.

Each chapter may have one or more "events" that happen simultaneously or concurrently within the chapter and I'll talk about that next.

What is the format of the game?:

I plan to use a hybrid of rules-lite home brew to manage statistics. I want you to feel like an noble lord or lady - not an accountant.

 I am a very analytic person who enjoys designing complex systems. I do not enjoy accounting and used to get bogged down with statistics. The biggest single point of failure for kingdom domain games is paper work. Eventually it becomes a chore.

I plan to make sure that you know what you would know about your kingdom - how well stocked is your food supplies and treasury? how well trained and equipped are your soldiers? I do not plan to tell you the names of every archer in your employ, or to track their arrows.

Turn Based Events:

I will post events in the game where I ask everyone to respond with what they want to do. I'll process this like a "Turn" in a dungeons and dragons game.

Except instead of moving 30 feet and swinging swords for tactical battles, it may be that you are dealing with the arrival of a Prince acting as an emissary from a faraway kingdom. There may be tactical battles -including full scale wars. We'll handle those the same way.

However, this is not a game where your character needs to get their hands dirty going out and spelunking, exploring and doing the grunt work yourself. You are the Lords of the land - you have minions and henchmen to do the dying for you.

In this events, you simply respond as you would as your character and tell me what you want to do - just like you would at an AD&D table. I'll use the minimal amount of dice and record keeping.

I am into ROLE PLAYING not ROLL PLAYING

When your character takes a definitive action or commits to it, I would like you to highlight it in red and bold. such as "I order the execution of the insolent Orc"


Due to the nature of people's posting schedules, I'll take a beat during the event to ensure that everyone has a chance to respond, so that someone else who may choose to intervene has the opportunity to do so.



Free Form Threads:

I'll also create free form threads for roleplay. Think of these threads as happening simultaneously to the events. It can be a slightly hard concept to transition to, but essentially these are places outside of the "action" of the turn events where the interaction must be happening at some point during the current chapter of the game/during the events.

I am not going to preach or lecture you about god-moding. I am sure you know what that is and why it's against the spirit of the game. This is not a place to say "Hey guys, I was captured by the ogre magi, look for me in their wagon.." either.

I'll create a thread that I call FF: Banquet Hall. This is a location. Let's assume that the players are feasting in some common area and you can talk to whoever you want that would be in that area including NPCs. The type of interaction should be conversational. You can comment about observation of the food, wine, entertainment and lavish or decadent furnishings, and generally command the servants to your bidding as well.

I want you to feel free to talk to one another about whatever you feel is appropriate. I do not want to restrict you to any sort of initiative. The first person to post is the next person to talk. A good rule of thumb if anything escalates to needing to ROLL DICE because of skill checks or combat, then I'll create an event for that.  It doesn't matter if several days pass - this was all happening at a feast at some point.

As long as you don't get stuck on "Did this happen before or after this event" - and can roll with it, I think we'll be fine.

Out of Character threads:

I will create an out of character thread to jibber jabber about anything except what your character is doing or saying. Let's not meta game where we play things in the OOC threads. This is a place also to make game suggestions, advertise your own game, whatever as long as it is constructive. If you have negative feedback, private it.


As I get more questions, I'll update this initial post. Next I'll talk about the Campaign world.
This message was last edited by the GM at 05:27, Sun 03 Mar.

Many people associate Drow with the Llolth-Sworn Drow of Dungeons and Dragons. They do exist but that is not what you are playing here.

The Mithilnir are dark elves descended of the same Miresgalnor -- the first generation of Dark Elves who were originally banished by the Gods of Elven Kind.That was over 5,000 years ago. They once ruled vast underground kingdoms and built cities of wonder. They are sometimes called the "Hidden Jeweled Onest by the archivists and historians.

As your people lived below the surface, your features became darker and you developed the ability to see in the dark more keenly than the surface dwellers.

There are several versions of Drow.


Celebenhel -- "The silvery ones." This is what most people think of when they speak the word "drow" upon the surface. They are known as the silvery ones. These are the most populous and the Lloth-Sworn Drow are Celebenhel.

There are others as well, but far less numerous that the Celebenhel

Angoren -- Live on the surface in small enclaves, few in number.
Cevenhel -- "The earthy ones." Burnt like umber and ash, the Cevenhel work and worship their ancestors.
Selfanhel -- "The shining ones." Purplish in hue, these dark elves exist in eternal twilight.
Rustfanhel -- "The coppery ones." These people exist among mushroom forests and fly on skinwings.

Sereganhel - Monstorous and bestial, they trace their ancestry to Drow that mated with demons in pacts. They roam the underdark in barbarous hordes or small packs.

Mithrilanhel (or Mithilnir for short) claim descendency from Celestials, and all of the noble houses trace their ancestry back to divine beings of great power.

Men and women can inherit power equally in Mithilnir civilization, and while marriage is typically only monogomy, it is common for the wealthy to have harems of slaves.

Mithilnir keep slaves, but require them to be tended properly, and do not respond well to pointlessly sadistic uses for them, such as Llolth-sworn drow might do.  It is rare that a Mithilnir themselves will be enslaved, but for some crimes that and castration is the punishment.

They are an honorable people - you might think of them as Lawful Evil or Lawful Neutral in Dungeons and Dragons terms, with a few even being Lawful Good, however there is no "Alignment" system in this game. You are free to define yourself as you choose.

The society you were raised in taught you that Drow are meant to rule and that you should respect the divine. You owe no allegiance to Lloth, and her worship is currently forbidden heresy in your Kingdom. It is illegal to assassinate or murder another Drow, but few would stop you from killing lesser races as long as it were justified.

I've intentionally left the culture relatively vague so that player's can shape it - but wanted to draw the distinction that you are not Lloth Sworn Drow. Decadence and hedonism is encouraged, and taking many sexual partners is not seen as that scandalous of an activity.


(The game does have a fade to black on that - so I'd rather we not get graphic, and keep things PG-13.)


Just as with humans, there is a range of personalities from arrogance to patient and cautious. You'll be free to define your own and change it as you evolve in the game.

Physically, Drow are beautiful and incapable of natural scarring (magical scarring is possible), much like their elven counterparts on the surface, they are lithe, and ageless living for hundreds of years without showing signs of old age.

They range in height from 4 feet and ​7 inches​ to ​5 feet and ​5 inches (140​ to ​170 centimeters), averaging at 5 feet (150 centimeters). Males weighed between 87​ to ​157 pounds (39​ to ​71.2 kilograms), averaging 109.5 pounds (49.67 kilograms), while females were a bit lighter, weighing between 82​ to ​152 pounds (37​ to ​68.9 kilograms) and averaging 104.5 pounds (47.4 kilograms). I am not a metric person - so this is the best I can do.

Drow skin tones ranged from dark grey, jet-black, obsidian, various shades of blue, and the rare albino  (Szarkai) pale, bone-white, or even alabaster-white skin. At the start of the game, no player will be Szarkai.

Drow are notably intelligent, as having an analytical mindset and being observant at all times was needed to survive in their society.


The Pantheon of Mithilnir is made up of three gods called "The Divinity". The priests of the Divinity worship the pantheon equally but sometimes select the order, the church or the temple as a distinction of service. The Masked Lord


Eilistraee
The church of Eilistraee, drow goddess of beauty, song, and freedom. The church produces priestesses of great beauty and artisans

Aeldar
The order of Aeldar, warriors and war, honor, judgement. - the Order produces holy champions.

Seldarine
The temple of Seldarine - The goddess of secrets, magic, wisdom, and intelligence

In addition, many recognize

Vhaeraun - The Masked Lord
The god of rogues, archers, hunters, and stealth
Whose temples and shrines are not found in open places and only available to those who can find them/are invited.

Creating a character-

I will create some other pinned threads to provide details about the game (History of the Kingdom, Bestiary of races, Notable NPCs etc)

However, for now I want to ask you to create a character using the following system:

1. First Name - if you need help with an appropriate name let me know. It should sound "elvish"


2. A Noble House: Pick your first and second choice. All of the powerful families in the game will have relatively similar power, but each has reputation. This is largely for flavor and you'll be free to pursue your own goals.

The house names are:
House Xynd'rath: One of the oldest houses tracing back to the founding of the Kingdom, House Xynd'rath holds considerable influence in the underworld of the Mithilnir society.

House Vel'sharen: Renowned for their expertise in arcane arts and their vast network of spies, House Vel'sharen is one of the oldest and most prestigious noble families among the Mithilnir

House Zha'nyl: With a history of skilled warriors and ruthless strategists, House Zha'nyl commands respect on the battlefield and in political maneuvering alike.

House Drathir: Scholars and researchers of ancient knowledge, House Drathir delves into the darkest secrets of magic and history, seeking power and understanding.

House T'saran: Known for their favor of Ellistrae, they are exceptionally beautiful even by Drow standards, and often accomplished musicians and artisans.

House Kael'zorl: Masters of trade and commerce in the Drow cities, House Kael'zorl is known for their shrewd business acumen.

3. Gender, and physical description (height, weight)

Write one or two paragraphs at most of how you would describe your persona to another player the first time they see them.


4. We will use very minimal statistics and dice roles in this game.


Dueling (DUE): Represents combat prowess and tactical skill in one-on-one combat.
The player must pick one style of combat that is your speciality. Combat is not a primary focus of this game for PC's.

• Bautha z'hin: A style based on evasion, and on flanking and surrounding a single enemy (usually a monster) with superior numbers and agility,
• Draa velve: Involving the use of two swords, this style is reserved for nobility or rare champions, difficult to master.
• Jivvin golhyrr: A style used to force enemies into humiliating positions, sadistic and brutal, often using improvised weapons or daggers.
• Orb alur: This style focused on striking many opponents with one strike - it requires a single drow blade and allows for no shield or buckler. It is a very acrobatic style.
• Luth alur: A bowmaster- while you are proficient in melee, it is focused on expert archery.
• Ust sreen: Style for striking quickly, often with poison.

There are other styles of combat, but typically not taught to the nobility - including ones that are simply savage brutality.

Marshall (MAR): The ability to train, command and lead troops in military situations. It can at times be used for other things such as games of strategy, but it's primary use is to go beyond theory to the practical application of leading small to large armies.

Intrigue (INT): Reflects cunning, manipulation, and the ability to navigate political machinations or to spy and cull information

Diplomacy (DIP): The player must select one style  You can still attempt other forms of diplomacy but this represents your primary style.

• Intimidation: You negotiate from strength and may have an arrogance about you, but your charisma is the kind that can strike terror or fear.
• Silver Tongue: Courtly words of the lover and diplomat - you seek fellowship and agreement in negotiation
• Mercantile: You are an expert trader and know how to strike bargains by reading people and the situation.

Stewardship/Rulership (STE): Governs the management of resources, administration, and leadership capabilities. This is going to be

Worship (WOR): Measures devotion to Drow deities, knowledge of religious practices, and influence within religious circles. High Worship is required by Priests. As Nobles, you will not normally cast divine spells.

Arcane: (ARC): Measures the ability and capacity to practice magic. It takes years to master these spells, typically the nobility do not cast spells, but employ wizards. it can still help you to understand and use relics or magical items.


Ancient Knowledge/Sage (KNW): Represents understanding of ancient lore, magic, and history, providing insight into mystical matters. It can be valuable to understand lost languages, solve ancient puzzles, etc.

PICK ONE COMBAT STYLE, PICK ONE DIPLOMACY STYLE
Select TWO TRAITS to specialize in.


5. Describe your personality, and perhaps your history. Then write one or two paragraphs that would be a quick summary of what other players know about you from your reputation.


6. (This is still a WIP - I am going to work out the creation of your demense)
This message was last edited by the GM at 04:42, Sun 03 Mar.