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Heaven's Path
Month 1, Day 2, 2 RE
Scope
The motivation behind building Heaven's Path
I want this world to be my own, and I wouldn't want it any other way. Well actually, this world is our own. With my closest friends, my players, we built this world together. I want us to all thrive in it so that life is worth living and our struggles can melt away for at least one more session.
It doesn't have to make me money. I'm glad that it doesn't.
It just has to mean something to me. And I'm glad that it does.
The goal of the project
Heaven's Path is where I can have my messiest, half-formed ideas and let them run their course. Whatever works, I cherish and keep forever. Whatever doesn't, I reflect and learn from. No one outside of our group will ever experience the full depth of this world, and that's okay. This is what makes me happy.
Building Heaven's Path is my escapism. It is also a great excuse to hang out with friends. I love worldbuilding, and being a Dungeon Master means I get to explore and experiment with all that Dungeons and Dragons 5th edition has to offer.
I want my players to have fun above all else, but I also want to challenge them as character designers and roleplayers.
I love seeing my players interact with the world and each other. I love seeing them be excited to get something. I love seeing them motivated to uncover a truth. I love seeing them be completely stupid.
Heaven's Path's Unique Selling point
Heaven's Path as a D&D campaign is all about openness. It's about saying yes to nearly everything because I have faith in my players to put thought into their characters and their actions. And because of that openness, collaborative worldbuilding becomes the heart of the campaign.
I am constantly talking to my players about their character's backgrounds and letting that decide many details about the setting. Yes, there are plenty of secrets and mysteries on my end, but that is necessary as a Dungeon Master.
Furthermore, it means that I can weave other modes of storytelling into this campaign. Not only do my players participate in the session as per usual, they also do quite a bit of work away from the table. Our discord server really is where much of the magic happens. Here, I can share information and special documents or discuss theories and plans for characters' next moves.
Most notably, I can also take roleplaying up a notch. As children of the internet, we are all active RPers (RP meaning roleplay, but very much emphasizing its online aspect) and so there are dedicated channels for just that. With RPing, there is little to no rolling involved and the spotlight is on the characters themselves, as well as the writing styles of its participants.
Theme
Genre
From the get-go, Heaven's Path was meant to be a high fantasy campaign with sprinklings of magitech. The worldbuilding is flexible and collaborative, with a framework that allows for practically anything to be added on as my players and I see fit. Silly and stupid things happen, as a result, but even then, there is still a narrative core to the campaign.
Though it is not a complete sandbox type of campaign, I would say that its roots are heavily inspired by the West Marches style. Like a West Marches game, there is a central "hub" and a dangerous world outside that hub that is ripe with adventure and exploration. My players can pick and choose which characters they want to bring and even whether one of them would like to sit one adventure out. However, it is not nearly as open as the typical West Marches game, and there are far fewer players. So I call my campaign a bit of a West Marches lite.
Setting wise, I take inspiration from a variety of Asian cultures and blend them with your typical D&D Forgotten Realms races. You have your tieflings, elves, dwarves, humans, etc. Their statistics and bonuses are kept, as well as their general themes. Past that, they are completely adapted to fit my world. Their mythologies, histories, and even biology have been modified. All of this happens in cooperation with my players, so in this sense, Heaven's Path is very open.
Reader Experience
For my players, I want the world to feel big, dynamic, and fluid. As a post-apocalyptic setting, my goal is to get my players excited to explore the ruined world outside the last bastion of civilization. Secrets will be uncovered, histories will be learned, and much chaotic fun is to be had.
However, even with all the expansive worldbuilding I've done, I want my world to feel like it is for them. By that, I don't mean that everyone bends to their whims, but that I built this world to tell my player's character's stories. We want these characters to grow and learn and cry. I'm never too many steps ahead of my players when it comes to the details I add to the Heaven's Path lore because I always need to be ready to adapt to the actions their characters have taken.
Creating Heaven's Path is an exercise in restraint, patience, and communication. I never want my players to feel like I'm dumping a bunch of info on them to flex my writing muscles. I want them to be interested in what their characters would want to learn, and seek out that information themselves. I just need to make sure I have that information on hand.
Reader Tone
I would venture to say that my world leans towards bright and whimsical but it also delves into some heavier themes from time to time. My absolute biggest inspiration comes from Steven Universe (which I'll elaborate more on in the appropriate section) and other modern children's cartoons that tackle more adult themes while keeping the overall tone light and pleasant and silly.
Life is hard, but realistic (according to the rules of my world). Bad things happen. Good things happen. Most of the time, however, those "things" are character growth moments for both NPCs and PCs. I rarely deploy death or graphic suffering to get a reaction out of my players. I try to mostly rely on crafting compelling NPCs that my players will want to care about.
Recurring Themes
My first major theme is unabashed queerness. I would say that at least half the NPCs I've made are somewhere on the LGBTQ+ spectrum. As a gay Asian femme man, this was incredibly important to me personally. And my players are completely onboard as well, since most of them also happen to be queer. And even though I could just say that everyone is gay because they can, I wanted to craft an actual narrative reason for why gender and sexuality are so universally fluid. That's why I made the Destiny of the Twelve to be as influential as it is; when the biggest legend in the world features a flexible cast of queer characters, it is no wonder why most people have no qualms embracing difference.
The second major theme is diversity. Like I mentioned previously, this campaign draws loosely off of various Asian cultures. I distinctly did not want to craft a western fantasy campaign (and those are fine! I am a player in one myself) when I began drafting Heaven's Path. Was it to be unique, defy the mainstream, and incorporate more marginalized representation? Absolutely. But those comprise only a small piece of why I love making Heaven's Path. I simply just love variety and complexity and nuance, and though there is room for that in your medieval Europe inspired campaigns, I also wanted novelty. I love learning, especially about cultures far removed from the American eye.
The third major theme is redemption. I love a juicy redemption arc, or at least, the potential for them to occur. You can probably imagine I'd say that considering I mentioned Steven Universe as my biggest inspiration. In any case, this theme is fundamentally about seeing the inherent goodness in people. This is what keeps the tone of my campaign bright and hopeful. Very few of the major antagonists are villains just for the sake of it. Each carries a heart colored in undulating shades of gray, and maybe, just maybe, my players can help them do better. And perhaps, they can even do that for themselves.
Character Agency
My players and their characters can be as influential as they would like to be. They can all do whatever they'd like, and I am almost always inclined to say yes, within reason. And that also includes helping me add details to the world that my players want to see. My players have helped me create all kinds of lore from races to religions.
Heaven's Path is our campaign, and I am always thinking of them whenever I make any worldbuilding decisions behind the screen. After all, what kind of D&D campaign would I be running if there weren't any secrets to uncover? I just need to make sure that they'll enjoy the journey.
Focus
Drama
The Chaos
100 years ago, an apocalyptic force known as the Chaos swept through Tian Wu Yan, marking the beginning of the Chaos Era. The first decade of this era was plagued with immeasurable loss and suffering of all people, regardless of race. Entire civilizations were toppled, leaving behind ruins and thousands of refugees. From all across the continent, people left their homelands to make their journey towards the last bastion of safety - the human city state of Fengqi. The agents of destruction could only be described as monsters. Resembling the creatures of legend, but corrupted in such a way where that resemblance is faint, these Chaos monsters ravaged the world. Geography dictated what kind of form a Chaos monster might embody, which has definitely left some scholars puzzled as to the exact reason why. In fact, 'why' is pretty much the question posed by the survivors of this catastrophe. Why did the Chaos happen? Why was it monsters, and not a plague, a storm, or an eruption? Why did the Chaos occur when it did? It wasn't until just this year, the first year of the Reclamation Era, did the answers finally begin to reveal themselves.Reclamation
Queen Pao of Fengqi, an ambitious human woman with a passion for innovation, declared the beginning of the Reclamation Era exactly 100 years after the Chaos first began. On the first day of the year, she implemented her plan to facilitate the creation of several adventurer's guilds that would pave the way forward for the reclamation of territories lost to the Chaos. These guilds, open to everyone and subsidized by the Queen's treasury, would bring together the most talented, bold, and impassioned adventurers in order to set out and explore the world beyond Fengqi. Engaged in friendly rivalry, each guild would be incentivized to act quickly, other wise others might snatch up lucrative opportunities. Scholars, Knights, and Rogues Ushering in New Growth Under Sovereignty, or S.K.R.U.N.G.U.S. is currently Tian Wu Yan's most prestigious guild, having aided in the liberation of various historical territories. They worked with the dwarves, the halflings, the western dragonborn, and even the yetifolk to eliminate the lingering Chaos within each respective homeland. And along the way, it seems that they have made some rather intriguing revelations about the true nature of the Chaos. Other notable guilds include the plucky members of the Courageous and Lovely Adventurers Making Strides, or C.L.A.M.S, and the shady rivals of the Venerable Order of Royal Explorers, or V.O.R.E.The Court of Heaven
As the inhabitants of the mortal realm gear up to reclaim the lands that were once theirs, the Court of Heaven is acting as well. Considering their dependence on mortals for their continued existence, the celestials of the celestial plane are obligated to help out the cause as well. That is why the Court of Heaven also jumpstarted its out program to aid with the reclamation effort. For the first time in forever, the Court is permitting the descension of celestials from the celestial to the mortal plane. Descension is the process by which a celestial becomes mortal so that they may exist in the mortal world, as well, a mortal. The barrier between mortal and celestial is quite fluid, and individuals from both planes could move between them under certain circumstances. However, this time, if a celestial descends, that transition is permanent. Why do this? Well, the Court has incessantly reminded prospective individuals that the fate of the world rests upon their shoulders. Additionally, as an added incentive, if a descended were to achieve sizeable fame and notoriety, when they inevitably die and return to Heaven, they could attain much more power than they could ever dream of. And even though Heaven is the realm of immortals, power is still a valuable currency. From high gods to lesser demons, each vies for more followers, more believers, in order to survive and/or thrive.Advent of the Propagator
Something wicked this way comes...Every 50 years, on the beginning of the first year after the start of an era, some major event rocks the world to its core. 100 years ago, it was the Chaos. 200 years ago, a massive avalanche on the biggest mountain range - Janokk. 250 years ago, the sea dragon Duo Zhuwei's rampage. 300 years ago, the death of the old Elven gods. 350 years ago, the assault of the infamous 'Clockwork Empress'. 400 years ago, a massive superstorm. 450 years ago, the death of the All-King. With a few exceptions (note that I said nothing about 50 years ago, or 150 years ago) these tragedies have been happening with terrifying consistency. 'Unnatural' would be a massive understatement in describing this trend. So, what's on the horizon for the next 50 year mark? Well, as some of your characters would be aware of, perhaps it would be related to the Propagator. As mysterious and terrifying as a Lovecraftian eldritch abomination, the threat of the Propagator devouring the world whole looms over all. Who knows how much time is left? It is then up to our intrepid characters to unlock the Propagator's secrets and save the world from complete and utter annihilation. This is the primary conflict constantly lingering in the background. Always keep this in the back of your mind, my dear players.Surfacing of Dark Feng
The newest development in the campaign, Haliah of SKRUNGUS recently liberated the area known as 'the Yellows' from the Claw of Sharaka, a fanatical cult worshipping the evil naga goddess Sharaka. All this took place in the region just underground of Fengqi known as Dark Feng. Dark Feng is home to those who could not easily find a place in the surface, not necessarily due to racism or xenophobia, but more simply due to a lack of space in general following the Chaos. Dark Feng is home to the triton (amphibious fish people), the myconids (peaceful mushroom people), the thri-kreen (highly territorial ant people), the tieflings (satan-looking ass people), the drow (dark elves), and the sileni (think satyrs, but equine and with three horns). Each have their own stories, which will be further explored in the "People" section if the meta. A single tunnel connected Dark Feng to Fengqi, and that tunnel was tightly regulated by the Claw. If you didn't pay their exorbitant fee, there would be no passage coming to nor from Fengqi. Thus, the two worlds remained basically separate, until Haliah and company declawed the Claw. Now, Fengqi must deal with all the consequences of that action.The Black Opera
A mysterious cult of masked individuals that has been kidnapping bards, actors, and other performers for some unknown and dastardly purpose. With a penchant for drama, theatrics, and in-general extraness, the Black Opera love to put on a show whenever they appear. With atmospheric music playing in the background, the Black Opera would simultaneously slice you up whilst dancing a merry jig. Illuminating their true identities and intentions is key to stopping them.Find your way!
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