Verum Rules

This article is being reorganized to consolidate information. This process is WIP. Hover over the CODEX tab on the left to display the Table of Contents.

Before Playing

Perhaps the most important aspect of the Living World of Verum is the various rule systems that allow a sense of progression, structure, and direction. There are specific systems taken from other gaming systems, modified systems from basic D&D 5e, and completely homebrewed rules that must be learned and understood in order to progress meaningfully in this world. If you want to just sign-up as a player and not deal with any of the homebrew details right now, then you can skip to Joining Verum below and follow the directions there. However, for the purposes of just creating and playing a character in Verum, it is highly advised you tackle the information starting from the Playing the Game section before you play in your first game, as certain factors and mechanics are significantly different from traditional 5e.

Joining Verum

In order to play in the Living World of Verum, you must join the community as a player or as a dungeon master. If you wish to join as a player, you must:

Be subscribed to Arcadum's twitch channel
Have a World Anvil account (the platform you're reading this article on)

If you fulfill the above, then you can sign-up with a character submission during an open character wave. How many players Verum can support is proportionate to how many dungeon masters are available to run games, so sometimes character submissions are open, sometimes they are closed. If submissions are closed, you will have to wait until the next wave or sign-up as a dungeon master.

Joining as a Player

If you wish to submit a character during an open wave, you must fill out an application in the #character-submissions channel in the Verum Discord with the information below. Details regarding race, class, origin, factions, etc., you can read further in Character Creation.

Discord Name:
World Anvil Username:
Character Name:
Race:
Class:
Origin:
Sub-Origin:
1st Faction Choice:
2nd Faction Choice:
3rd Faction Choice:
Deity:

You may only play one character in Verum at a time.

Retiring a Character

If you wish to play a new character before your current one has died, you must retire them from adventuring. You do not control your character once they've retired. You may write roleplaying posts for narrative purposes on your character exiting from the adventurer's life, but as is with backstory, actions beyond their scope are not canon. You can read further about roleplaying in Roleplaying and about backstory in Backstory. When you're ready to play a new character, whatever the reason, you must fill out the above application and post it in #character-submissions again for the new character. If you wish to retire your character and make a new one right away, add "(retiring [character name])" below the information in your post. If you do retire, it is common courtesy to inform your faction's chapter master. If you're unable to decide on what character to play next but still want to as soon as you figure it out, you must still at least inform a Political DM that your latest character is retiring. If you do not plan to play a new character in Verum for a while, but still wish to be a player in Verum, you can inform a Political DM you are going on hiatus. You can read further about this in Hiatus. If you are planning on retiring and you want to trade your character's items, you must either deposit them into your faction bank if you are in a faction, or trade them to other players. You can read further about this in Trading. You can not trade items to others with the intent of getting them back for your next character. The only way for you to pass items directly to your next character when retiring is through Progeny, which you can read further about in Marriage.

Joining as a DM

If you become a dungeon master, you are automatically allowed to be a player. However, dungeon masters are vetted, so you will have to go through the process of learning how to run games for Verum by the Training department first. To sign-up to become a dungeon master, you must fill out an application in the #dungeon-master-applications channel in the Verum discord. Doing so will require you to fill out the following information:

Discord Name:
Years of DnD experience:
Years of 5e experience:
Availability to run games:
Experience with Maptools:
Experience with online DM'ing:
Your level of comfort being streamed:
Your Twitch name:
Are you one of the Seven?:
Why do you want to be a DM for Verum? What do you believe you bring to the table?:

Once your application has been looked over and approved, the Training DMs will contact you and explain how to proceed. Besides always have a character slot open to you, DMs may choose to enjoy a slight boost to character progression speed over other players, as compensation for running games or writing content for Verum. You can learn more about this as you become a DM.

Maptools

The Living World of Verum uses MapTools as its main platform for running sessions. You can download this program here.

Character Tokens

If you are new to D&D, you will need to create a token that represents your character for use in MapTools. An easy to use program for creating a character token is TokenTool. Below is a step-by-step guide to creating your token with TokenTool.

Install and open TokenTool
Click and drag the image you want to use onto the left, bigger side of the window
Choose a frame, zoom, pan, and utilize the other options to your liking
Use Save As to save the token image, or if MapTools is already open, you can click and drag the image in the right, smaller window to the Maptools playing area, which will automatically create the token for you
- You can also create a token in MapTools by clicking and dragging the token image file from its directory in your computer to the MapTools playing area
Once the token is in MapTools, you can edit the token's properties and macros as appropriate for your character
- The #maptool-help channel in the Verum discord explains further how to edit your token for Verum
Save the token by right-clicking it and selecting Save... This will save all edits associated with that token
When you join games from now on, you need only click and drag the saved token file (not the image like in step 4) to MapTools - it is the file with the .rptok extension.

Joining a Session in MapTools

With MapTools open, click File, then Connect to Server. How you will connect from this point is dependent on the DM running your game. If you're not sure how to proceed, make sure to ask them.

Scheduling

The scheduling process for Verum is mostly handled by Scheduling DMs. The two important links you need to keep are:

The Scheduling Master spreadsheet
The Player Submission for Games form

As Dungeon Masters submit games to run, they will appear in the Pending Games tab of the spreadsheet. Here, you can learn about the game in the tab:

Its name,

Recommended level,

Etc. Generally, around Thursday, the Scheduling DM will announce that the Player Submission for Games form has been updated. You then have until the following Sunday at 10 pm CST to use the form to sign-up for games. You are allowed to make only one submission for each game you wish to join. Sunday, the Scheduling DM will sort players into games, and announce who is playing when in the #pending-game-channel in the Verum discord. By default, every player is able to play in a session every two weeks, with a few exceptions described in Sessions and Missions. Signing up for games in back-to-back weeks puts you lower in priority to be chosen than another who has not played in the weeks prior to this. If you retire your character and create a new one while scheduled for a mission, you give up your slot in that mission — it does not carry over between characters (it's metagaming if it did). Make sure to check the pins in the #player-scheduling as well, as certain questions or nuances about scheduling are addressed in there. You can also ask questions regarding scheduling and signing-up for games in that channel. Every player has a 15-minute buffer for lateness. If you are late to a scheduled game for 15-minutes or longer the DM will replace you with another—appropriately—leveled character. You can read further about game sessions in Sessions and Missions.

Grace

If you're an adventurer and your subscription to Arcadum has run out, you will be placed in Grace. When in Grace, you have until the first Sunday of the next month to re-subscribe and maintain your character and slot in the Living World. This grace period can be extended by the Admins or Arcadum for any reason to give players more leniency (IE: Covid-19 or sub running out at the end of the month). Only Admins will contact you about your grace status. If someone other than an admin is contacting you about your grace status, please contact an administrator.

Hiatus

Some players may not have the time to spend to RP or play in Verum due to life commitments. If this comes to be you can inform a Political DM you are going on hiatus, or you are automatically given this status after a month of inactivity. Your character is removed from its faction and goes to a pool of characters that can rejoin at the beginning of the next phase without giving up your character slot or the rest of that character's details; level, inventory, faction loyalty, etc. Upon your return, you are re-added to your faction if there is room. Otherwise, you stay as factionless without taking the exit penalties. If you have not returned from hiatus by the next phase and after the one month grace period your character is retired, and your character slot revoked. You'll have to rejoin Verum as any new player would. Should you return from hiatus before the next phase, you can retire the character and make a new one to play right away.
Players in the military may rejoin at any time. You can read further about factions in the Factions section. Should a player go on hiatus whose character is involved in significant narrative roleplay, a DM will RP that character to the best of their ability to resolve the situation. Should you wish to go on hiatus for an amount of time on the grounds of preserving your mental health or other similar circumstances, you must appeal to the Discipline Admin (Crystal) in a private message. If you are in good standing in Verum, your hiatus will be allowed and you will be able to leave from the server without losing your character. Once you return, should there be a character slot available and if a long time skip has not occurred since going on hiatus, you will be able to return to your character.

Roleplaying

A large portion of the content that Verum provides takes place in the Verum community discord. This content consists of roleplaying and in order to achieve the fairest and most enjoyable roleplaying environment for our players, there are several rules to be aware of when participating. There are five environments in which roleplay occurs:

Faction Channels
Open RP Areas
Prestige Events
World Events
Campaign Events

Each one has unique properties that will be gone over in their respective sections, though they all share very important basic rules.

General Roleplay and Formatting

Change your discord nickname to [character name] ([discord alias]).
- These names can be abbreviated if you go over Discord's 32 character limit, but they must remain reasonably recognizable, no memes.

If you are Staff or a DM, NPCs you play as must have the name of the NPC either within your nickname or noted down at the top of your post as the NPC.

You can only have a maximum of 2 emojis in your nickname if you are an adventurer, staff, DM, or Admin. This can be temporarily voided with permission from the admins if you have a valid reason to use more than 2 emojis in your nickname.

Use quotation marks to speak in character.
Use normal text to describe scenes, appearances, and actions.
- The standard format for this is to italicize the text, which you do by placing a single asterisk around what is not spoken.
- Other formatting options in discord include:
  - Placing double asterisks [**] around the text bolds it.
  - Placing triple asterisks [***] around the text bolds and italicizes it.
  - Placing double underscores [ __ ] around the text underlines it.
  - Placing double tildes [ ~~ ] around the text ~~strikes through~~ it.
  - Placing a single greater-than sign [ > ] as the first character in a line of text gives it a simple quote-like format (you'll have to see for yourself).
- It is recommended to use discord's tagging function [@] to tag players or characters who are relevant to your roleplaying. This is to ensure that they see your post and do not lose the flow, especially when there are multiple players roleplaying in the same channel.
All roleplaying is in character. If you want to type something in a roleplaying channel that is out of character, use paratheses ( ) around it. However, excessive out of character (OoC) typing should be relegated elsewhere, such as the #living-world-oorc channel in the Verum discord.
Erotic roleplaying (ERP) and crimes of an exceedingly violent or sexual nature are forbidden from being performed. If you're not sure if something you're doing qualifies here, do not post it.
You can reflavor abilities or appearances, or give unique flairs to something for your character, but these are merely for dramatization - it does not mechanically benefit your character, ever.
You control only your character in roleplay. You cannot dictate the actions of another player's character, ever.
Most non-player characters (NPC) you cannot control either, but there are some exceptions:
- You can control familiars, animal companions, and pets your character possesses.
- If an NPC is significantly associated with your character, such as an NPC spouse of your character, you may roleplay that NPC only with the permission of the DM that created them. To reiterate, do not control them unless you have asked and received explicit permission from that NPC's creative DM.
  - If you do receive permission, be very reserved with what they are capable of doing. Using NPCs you control to propagate sensitive information is potentially metagaming. You can read further about this in the Metagaming section.
  - NPCs that have been created as a part of your character's background cannot be controlled either. You can read further about this in Backstory.
You can roleplay in only one channel at a time.
If your character travels from one location to another - moving to a different channel to roleplay - you must designate your character's exit of a channel with a post before arriving at the new one with an **Exit**. The post does not need to be descriptive (though it is encouraged), stating **Exit** and leaving the channel is fine.
Any roleplay that occurs outside of the Verum discord and that is not witnessed by an unimplicated DM is not canon.
- If you wish to have a private conversation with another player, such as addressing political agendas, you can tag Political in your relevant roleplay post to request one. An available Political DM will invite you and the involved players to a private server to carry the conversation.
If ever you are in doubt, ask a DM.

Player versus Player (PvP)

Players will inevitably be antagonistic against others, so PvP is an allowed action in Verum. Due to its seriousness, the following rules are in place addressing it:

PvP does not require consent from all involved parties to occur.
Unless the involved parties decide to make the PvP non-lethal, player characters can die through PvP.
A DM who is not implicated in the PvP is required to witness and resolve it. If one is not available when PvP would initiate, it and the involved parties are RP Locked until one is.
The DM will create a combat map in Maptools, start a server, and the involved parties are brought in to perform the PvP. The involved parties may request the DM to have the PvP be done with text in the discord channel, but the DM makes the final decision.
Be aware that the DM may have outsiders become involved with the encounter, such as random nearby creatures, town guards, NPC faction members coming to the defense of an involved party, etc.

Faction Roleplay

Each faction in Verum has its own allocated channel for roleplaying between its members and important NPCs. The faction has one of five states that determines its availability to players outside the faction, decided by the respective faction's chapter master.

Open: Any player may visit and roleplay at any time.
Neutral: Only those who are members of the faction, allies of the faction, and the factionless may RP here.
Defensive: Only those who are members of the faction and allies of the faction may RP here.
Restricted: Only those who are members of the faction or invited by the Chapter Master may RP here.
Closed: Only the faction's members may roleplay.

When the faction is Neutral or Defensive, the Chapter Master may grant permission to any person or persons (not exceeding 3 people), to enter the faction if they do not meet the regular requirements. When a faction has an in-character meeting, a Political DM is required to be present to take notes of the relevant information. Anything that occurs in a faction meeting without a Political DM is not canon. You can read further about factions in the Factions section.

Open RP

Open RP areas are locations scattered across the game world that have no faction affiliation. The purpose of these locations is to be free and open to interactions between all sorts for roleplaying, though they still adhere to the General Roleplay Rules. Since these Open RP locations can include a variety of opportunities for roleplaying, it is good etiquette to wait at least two hours since the last post has been made to change the roleplaying scene in the channel to one of your preference — as appropriate for the channel you're in. If any conflicts arise from scene changing, notify a DM to resolve it. While you ultimately have control over your character's action, carrying out illegal acts, such as theft or assault, will mark you as a criminal, bandit, blacklisted, or similar if the proper authorities become aware of it. There are several open RP areas in every region of the continent. Most have some kind of pre-determined association, such as with a certain class, deity of worship, or a purpose of society, and may limit entry based on these associations. The channel descriptions elaborate on these associations and describe the area. However, the two channels below are open to all by default:

The World Road | #the-world-road
- This channel is not tied to a particular region but is found in all regions as a series of roads that connect them. The World Road is managed by the World Wanderers (the organization beyond the player faction), and typical scenes are campsite meetings, road-side interactions, etc.
The Proving Ground | #the-proving-ground
- This channel is in the Daborak region and is an arena where any may come to participate in competitive combat. The Proving Ground is owned and managed by Iltanen Oronoscorenzie, a famous combatant, and typical scenes are duels in the arena, conversations in the surrounding stands, etc.

An RP Event DM may host a roleplaying event in any of these open RP areas with time-sensitive participation. Such events are usually announced in advance, but when transpiring, they are frequently RP Locked.

Marriage

A marriage is, in the mortal's view, a contract of love and binding of souls; this is true to a fuller extent than most realize. The deities of Verum care very much about marriage as it has a narrative weight. Whether it be the absolute profession of love or the power of the oath itself, many deities benefit from the fact that two souls bound together have more impact than two souls separated. As such, the following rules are in place to explain how things work in marriage:

Getting Married
- Regardless of culture, marriage is a combining of two souls. These souls do not need to be in love, but they both must agree to a ceremony. The reason for the ceremony does not matter, but they must agree to it. Although it is extremely rare, the indirect forcing of marriage has occurred before.
- Betrothals are not an exception, and they can cause some serious indirect pressure.
- A cleric of any deity may perform the ceremony in dedication to any deity on the request of those to be married. However, it should be noted that the cleric in charge of the ceremony has the final say. Some clerics may refuse to do a ceremony if they do not agree with the request.
- A marriage can only be between two souls. This does not mean the relationship must be monogamous, it simply means only two souls can be combined. There are cosmological reasons for this.
Mechanical Effects
- The bonus to AC effect of marriage from the Ceremony spell is permanent.
- Whenever two souls are conjoined in marriage, the highest prestige among them is used for both characters.
Divorce
- Marriage is considered to be an oath from a mechanical stance. Unlike other oaths, marriages can be annulled by one person rather than requiring both.
- To divorce a marriage, you are required to seek out a cleric of Viderick or Babylon (this does not have to be a player). The oath is then nullified, not broken.
- If you seek a marriage between two player characters to be annulled so that you can marry again, you must seek atonement and wait at least 1 year of time in-character. This wait period does not apply to characters married to pure NPCs, but does apply if they are married to an NPC who was once a player character.
  - This restriction on marriage after divorce can be lifted due to extraneous out-of-character reason, such as harassment or coercion using progeny, at the discretion of the Marriage department given ample and suitable evidence.
- You cannot force someone to stay in marriage by declining their desire for a divorce.

You can read further about oaths in Oaths.

Progeny

Children of player characters are to be tracked through the Marriage DMs. Player and non-player children can benefit, but only in limited fashions. There are no other progeny relations allowed at this time. The benefits that a child receives must be for a child that is documented and tracked by the Marriage DMs, and only one child from any pairing can receive these benefits. Below are the tiers of progeny. All requirements and benefits are cumulative.

Tier 1
- Requirement: The child is a documented child of the parents
- The child may receive 50 gp per level of the highest level character. The gold must be possessed by the character.
Tier 2
- Requirement: The child is the result of a player x player character marriage. Children of retired player characters are still considered in this tier.
- The child may inherit a magic item with limitations.
Tier 3
- Requirement: If a parent has at least 4 prestige, then the marriage bond will create a noble house.
- The child receives half of the prestige of the parents.
- A new origin representing the noble bloodline is created for the child.

A couple that is unable to, or does not wish to have progeny through normal means of pregnancy, has the following option:

Seek a Cleric of Viderick (does not have to be a player character) to have the ritual of birth be performed to have the essence of their souls be combined to birth a child.
This ritual of birth takes as long to come to fruition as the race’s typical gestation does. While the ritual is cast instantly, the baby will appear at the site of the ritual after the gestation period. It is recommended to perform this in a safe, comfortable place for the newborn child.

Mothers have a +2 bonus to AC while pregnant. It is assumed the mother will not put their unborn child at risk by continuing to adventure in life-threatening situations, but mothers in Verum have this defensive boon to protect the soul within. When the child is born, the parent holding the child also receives this bonus of +2 to their AC. This and the prior listed AC bonus do not stack with multiple children. The child is not an object, and exploiting this will dip into forbidden actions and punishment will be dealt if you are found to be using children in a distasteful manner. Bringing a child into a mission can, and likely will, also be treated in the same manner. Children cannot use magic until maturity. This is to prevent issues regarding hostile actions and being unable to be harmed due to forbidden actions. Couples that wish to do the dirty, so to speak, and not have children are capable of doing so, as protection exists. You can read further about forbidden actions in Forbidden Actions.

Prestige, Campaign, and World Events

These events are situations that generally take place before, or as a result of, a significant event in Verum. What the event is about, who can participate, and when it will be run is usually explained in advanced by a DM. These events are more likely than most to have important consequences, perhaps even dangerous ones. Due to the significant nature of these events, they will almost always have a dedicated channel for roleplaying in them.

DM Intervention

Should a DM intervene in roleplay, or simply in conversation, they will typically use a formatting technique referred to as “bars”. These bars are meant to organize and separate instances of roleplay that require a DMs input.

Double Bars: (===========)
Single bars: (----------)

Discord Moderators will also use these bars when necessary.

Forbidden Actions

Forbidden Actions are those you cannot take in-character, for any reason. If your proposed action has something to do with the actions described below and you start your sentence with, "what if?" or similar wording to produce the same effect, you are wrong. If you falsely accuse someone of such acts, or if you try to claim them in a manner seen to troll or manipulate a situation, you will be punished as if you had committed them yourself. You can read further about this in Player Behavior and Discipline. These subjects exist in the world just like in our own, but the point is that they are not described nor depicted for the sake of all of our player's and DM's peace of mind.

Sexual Assault
Torture
Child Death
Suicide
Phobias

Arachnophobia (spiders)
Aerophobia (flying)
Trypophobia (clusters of holes)
Ophidiophobia (snakes)
Cynophobia (dogs)
Thalassophobia (deep water)
Trypanophobia (needles)
Coulrophobia (clowns)

Metagaming

Metagaming is when a player uses their out-of-character knowledge to determine their character's actions, even though the character has no relevant knowledge or awareness of its details. There are different levels of severity to metagaming, some of it harmless, but it is inevitable to happen one way or another. The best we can do is mitigate it and the consequences. Due to the inherent nature of Verum, with many players in many factions, political intrigue plays a part; secret information is held and protected by many characters. Since it is possible a player is able to read and make conjectures on what is said in the various channels when their own character isn't present, then there's always a risk that information influences that player's decisions. Just like there's a risk that a player privately messages another player to further an agenda. As safe as players may try to be when being underhanded, there's nothing the DMs haven't seen before. So, do not have your character act in a way that is not consistent with the character's established persona or their knowledge. It's as simple as that.

Player Behavior and Discipline

This system is meant to punish any person (regardless of authority) for extensively breaking Verum rules, instigating adverse conflict, and/or breaking Discord Terms of Service. The list below serves as an insight into examples and definitions of some of the offenses with rough categorizations on their levels of severity. However, actions that require judgment will be interpreted based on the evidence at our disposal. When someone commits misconduct, relative disciplinary action will be taken against them. Though, as the server owner, Arcadum reserves the right to remove any user from the server at any time—for any reason. The main people in charge of discipline are the moderators, admins — particularly the Discipline admin — and Arcadum. When an offense is made aware, the moderators will question the involved parties and review evidence. If, after deliberation, discipline is found warranted it is brought before Arcadum who confirms the decision and the severity of the punishment. Offenses committed are tracked. If you're ever unsure that something you may do may warrant discipline, it's in your best interest to not commit to it without speaking with a moderator first. If you wish to report someone else breaking a rule, alert a moderator, do not purposefully instigate controversy over it in public. If you wish to report anonymously, you may do so, but be aware that it can limit the context of the report and evidence. You can either ask another player or the moderator to report the information anonymously, or you can follow the directions in the #report-box channel in the Verum discord. If you have any questions about this system, feel free to message a moderator.

Minor Offenses

Repetitive misuse of the suggestion box
Repetitive jumping of the chain of command
Unprofessional server application
Being timed out in Arcadum’s twitch chat

Moderate Offenses

Disrespect of authority in OoC
Repetitive disruptive behavior in OoC
Belligerent insulting or slurring in OoC
Blatant minor metagaming
Repetitive misuse of reports

Greater Offenses

Blatant disregard of written rules of the server
Blatant moderate metagaming
Repetitive uncomfortable behavior regarding adult topics
Revealing information from Political Server in OoC without consent of Political DMs and/or public in-character interaction
Being temporarily banned from Arcadum’s twitch chat

Major Offenses

Cheating
Sevenic metagaming
Lying to a DM
Metagaming DM-only knowledge
Metagaming Mod-only knowledge
Falsifying loot
Blatant major metagaming
Breaking a forbidden action
Knowingly falsely accusing someone of breaking a forbidden action when they didn't
Blatant bullying in OoC
Repetitively promoting an unhealthy atmosphere

Intolerable Offenses

Sexual harassment in OoC
Stalking in OoC/IRL
IRL threats
Blatant racist behavior in OoC
Blatant sexist behavior in OoC
Intentionally trying to contact a user when blocked / harassment
Being phase banned for an entire phase a second time
Blatant sexuality discrimination in OoC
Breaking discord terms of Service
Knowingly spreading lies about a user
Knowingly gaslighting in OoC
Blatant abuse of DM/Staff authority
Blatant abuse of Moderator authority
Being permanently banned from Arcadum’s twitch chat

Playing the Game

Approved 5e Books

The following are the books allowed in Verum:

Player's Handbook
Dungeon Master's Guide
Monster Manual
Sword Coast Adventure Guide
Elemental Evil Player's Companion
Volo's Guide to Monsters
Xanathar’s Guide to Everything
Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes
Unearthed Arcana
- ONLY Ranger (Revised)
Anything within the Verum World Anvil that is not Work In Progress (WIP).

Sessions and Missions

Verum is structured around a system of D&D game sessions that take place on a weekly basis. Between these sessions, players are welcome to partake in the vast range of roleplaying that goes on in the Verum discord. The true consequences of one's actions take place in this roleplaying environment, though it could not function without the core content that is the D&D games. This core content follows a leveling system that rewards milestones known as Mission Value, which you can read further about in Character Experience. In contrast from a session, which is the typical 4-hour play session between a party and the DM, a Mission is a more focused representation of the party's objective. A mission can span one or multiple sessions, but all in the effort of completing that overarching mission. There are default estimations of rewards for completing a mission, depending on its number of sessions and the rate of difficulty. Thus, higher difficulties and higher numbers of sessions generally equate to better rewards upon completing the mission. For scheduling, missions are broadly categorized into Standard and Special types. You can be scheduled for only one standard and one special mission at the same time if you are not RP Locked, explained further in RP Lock. Thus, as an example you can be in both a prestige mission and a standard mission, but not in two standard missions or both a prestige and company mission. In the case where a DM needs a replacement for a game and doesn't have the luxury of time, they may seek a player substitute even if they've already played that week.

Tiers of Play

The tiers of play are categories that separate mission types and difficulty based upon character level. Due to the nature of the game, there is some overlap between the different types, or occasionally a DM may break the standard level range for a particular reason. The tiers of play are as follows:

Standard Missions
- Tier 1 | Levels 1 - 4
  - Minor Missions
- Tier 2 | Levels 5 - 8
  - Lesser Missions
  - Major Missions
- Tier 3 | Levels 9 - 12
- Greater Missions
Tier 4 | Levels 13 - 15
- TBD
Tier 5 | Levels 16 - 17
- TBD
Tier 6 | Levels 18 - 19
- TBD
Tier 7 | Level 20
- TBD

Special Missions

Prestige Mission
- These missions include all tiers of play but at increased difficulties. Prestige missions have focused objectives, and even greater rewards - chief among them Prestige, diamond dust, more powerful items, and divine boons. They have no set session limit, though they are more likely to be one session than multiple.
- Unlike standard scheduling, players are intended to meet, discuss, and arrange their parties with some agency. Each prestige mission has a unique objective and may have priorities that differ in their broadness (some are specific, others less so). The players are welcome to select their prestige missions based on the objectives and priorities. Typically, a channel in the discord is created and used to serve as the hub to track the narrative set-up, any disclosed information, and RP between players looking to join.
Company Mission
- These missions are those that are reserved specifically for Companies, a sort of small-scale group formed between players. These missions provide rewards unique to companies, will have higher difficulties compared to standard missions and are likely to break tier of play due to companies having players in different level ranges.
Campaigns
- These missions start at tier 2 of play but can be played in all tiers beyond. Campaigns are multiple session missions that occur as a result of the grand, culminating narrative across the Verum world. As such, they usually focus on the higher leveled characters and are ran by Arcadum himself or designated out to a trusted DM. Campaigns can award one flat prestige gain upon completion, but are are considered normal missions for the purposes of being scheduled into a prestige or company mission.

RP Lock

RP Lock also applies missions, as a condition where you are limited in your contact with the world outside of your mission and your current party. While in a mission that is RP Locked, you:

Can not spend Downtime or Crafting Days, but they accrue with each weekly reset and do not expire like normal. When you return from your RP lock mission, these backlogged days become available for you to spend and do not expire until a number of weeks pass equal to how many weeks you spent in the RP lock. This accrual of days also applies to Inventory Lock, which is functionally similar with the exception that it only prevents your inventory from changing, still allowing you to RP freely.
May use time-sensitive downtime activities, such as purchasing crafting materials or special crafters from the Great Bazaar, and purchasing items from the Prestige Shop can still be done when RP locked. Things you purchase in these ways are not available to your character until the RP locked mission is complete.
Can not add in or take out things in your character's inventory from outside the mission, with the exception of gold or crafting tokens for time-sensitive activities mentioned above.
May send messages to the outside world via spells like Sending and Animal Messenger, or through a courier if your DM allows it. Messages can not be sent or received if you are engaged in combat between sessions.
May level up between sessions of a mission if you take a long rest at the end of the session in which you would level up.

Character Experience

If you are familiar with D&D, or even RPGs at all, then you're most likely aware of the concept of using "experience" to represent a character's growth. In order to smooth the leveling process for players, experience is not earned based on creature kills like in traditional D&D instead it's rewarded for completing missions. The term used in Verum is Mission Value, or MV for short. The amount of MV awarded for each session is 1 by default at the end of each session. More is awarded for completing a mission based on its difficulty and tier of play, as seen in Tiers of Play. This mission completion reward is only received at the end of the mission, and only to those characters that participated in more than half of the sessions. For example, in a 4 session Major Mission, you must participate in at least three of the sessions - more than half - to be rewarded with the extra 4 MV for mission completion. A 2 session mission would thus require you participating in both.
You do not need to be in the last session to get completion rewards. If the mission is failed, there is no completion reward, and any remaining MV for unplayed sessions are forfeit. A character levels up when they've earned their current level in MV, starting from level 1. For example, a level 2 character must earn 2 MV to level up to 3, and then earn 3 MV to level up to 4, and so on. Below is a list showing a character’s total MV to level ratio.

1st Level = 0 MV
2nd Level = 1 MV
3rd Level = 3 MV
4th Level = 6 MV
5th Level = 10 MV
6th Level = 15 MV
7th Level = 21 MV
8th Level = 28 MV
9th Level = 36 MV
10th Level = 45 MV
11th Level = 55 MV
12th Level = 66 MV
13th Level = 78 MV
14th Level = 91 MV
15th Level = 105 MV
16th Level = 120 MV
17th Level = 136 MV
18th Level = 153 MV
19th Level = 171 MV
20th Level = 190 MV

Prestige

Prestige is a mechanic similar to reputation, but there is more nuance to it. It is a numerical representation of your character's fame and influence, as well as other narrative factors. The amount of Prestige corresponds to the difficulty of a mission. Players also need specific amounts of Prestige to embark on personal quests, unlock exclusive privileges (like Exotic pets) and to measure their characters’ impact on Verum. Prestige can be earned in different ways outside of missions, which generally amount to performing heroic actions, going above and beyond expectations. Such situations can be matters of life and death, requiring you to take a gamble.
Still, the standard method is to complete prestige missions. Each prestige mission will have a prestige number associated with it, such as a Prestige 3 Mission. You earn prestige from completing the mission if this number is higher than your character's current prestige. Thus, your character would need 2 or less prestige to earn one more from a Prestige 3 Mission. Companies gain prestige as a singular entity. Your character's prestige does not apply to their company, but a company's prestige can carry over to its members. You can read further about this in Companies. Here are a few ways that prestige can help or be utilized:

Access to crafting materials or special crafters from the Great Bazaar
Access to the Prestige Shop
Access to certain Academy courses
Access to Exotic Pets
Access to Prestige Classes
Your personal quest

Downtime

Downtime is the system through which the player economy and trading of Verum is based upon. Players have the means to make gold, purchase goods, and prepare for future adventures. Each system allows players to do specific actions while waiting for their next missions. Usually every Sunday at approximately 3 pm CST, an update stream is hosted by Arcadum, also referred to as the weekly reset. During it, many things happen that pertain to the world at large, though what pertains here are the weekly resources awarded - Downtime Days and Crafting Days, which will be stated in the #announcements and #patch-notes channels in the Verum discord. All active players are given these resources regardless of mission participation. By default, any unspent downtime days and crafting days automatically expire at the next weekly reset. The exception to this is when you're in an RP Locked mission, as detailed in the RP Lock section. The number of days awarded can vary, so it is important to keep track of what given for each week.

Downtime Days

Below is a list of options you can spend your downtime days on, but to do so, you must fill out the Google Form—following the directions stated.

Agendas
- You spend your downtime days to advance your faction's current agenda.
Carousing | Requires being scheduled for a mission
- You spend a downtime day and gold equal to [Your character level] x [50 gp] to grant 1 Inspiration to your party for each planned session of the mission.
Cooking | Requires being scheduled for a mission
- You spend a downtime day or crafting day and some gold to cook food that can apply buffs when eaten.
Day Job
- You spend a downtime day to earn an amount of gold equal to [Your character level] x [25 gp] + [Your faction loyalty (up to 5)] x [5 gp].
Foraging
- You spend a downtime day in an attempt to find alchemical reagents for potions and poisons.
Personal Quest | Requires 4 Prestige
- A personal goal of your character can be defined and advanced. This goal is open ended and can result in many world changing events. It can be something small and simple or large and complex. Once you have yours decided and meet the prerequisite, you may contact Arcadum to organize the specifics of your quest.
Pet or Mount Training
- You spend a downtime day and an amount of gold to train a pet or mount of yours.
Research
- You spend a downtime day to progress a research project.
Scroll Modifiers
- You spend a downtime day and some gold to attempt to tweak a spell scroll you're crafting.
Shopping
- You spend a downtime day to buy and sell non-magical items. Anything you sell is at half value.

Crafting Days

Crafting days are used for:

Magical Item Crafting Rules
Mundane Item Crafting Rules
Consumable Crafting
Academies

You must read the individual system articles to learn how their individual rules, applications, and nuances.

Trading

The systems of trading allow players to trade items and gold between themselves, as well as offer ways to purchase unique magic items and crafting materials. It is important to note that the use of these trading systems are within the context of downtime and cannot be employed during a session.

Player-to-Player Trading

The methods of trading between players occur either directly, or through a middleman, which can be the Great Bazaar World Market or a faction's bank. Direct trading is the traditional method—when you wish to trade something with another player face-to-face. This kind of trade requires you and any other involved players to meet in character and roleplay the exchange. The benefit to this kind of trade is that it is completely within the player's control of how the trade is settled; bargaining, bartering, deception, favors, and so on. However the trade is conducted, it must be approved and logged by a Trading DM. One of the trading players—you must decide amongst yourselves who - must initiate the trade process by making a post in the #trading-log channel in the Verum discord, using the following format:

@Economy @[yourself] is buying/selling/giving/trading [List of items/gold] to @[other players] for [list all terms of the trade]. #[the discord channel you and the other players roleplayed the trade]
Starting Gold: [amount]
Leftover Gold: [amount]

After this initial player makes their post, all other respective players will confirm the terms by making a quick post with the following format:

@[the initial player] confirmed

This indicates that terms are acceptable by all players in the trade, so read the fine print before you post your "confirmed". When this has been done, a Trading DM will react to the "confirmed" posts with a thumbs-up. All players in the trade must wait for this thumbs-up reaction before you can edit your character sheet inventories. The discord channel in which the trade took place must be linked in order for the Trading DM to verify that the trade is legitimate—metagaming will not be tolerated. Here are example posts when trading:

Player Average Guy, initiating the trade:
- @Economy @Average Guy is selling +1 Best Longsword to @Average Girl for 500 gp. #the-party-barge
  Starting gold: 800 gp
  Leftover gold: 300 gp
Then player Average Girl, confirming the trade:
- @Average Guy confirmed

Faction Bank

This type of item exchange is rather straight-forward. Since depositing and withdrawing items from a faction bank are generally instantaneous, one player can deposit an item into their bank for another to withdraw immediately after without having to be in the same location. Obviously, this only works between players in the same faction but is a benefit of the convenience of fluid time. You can read further on factions and faction banks at Factions.

Fluid Time

Verum currently uses fluid time, meaning chronologically tracking events is done softly rather than hard. Case in point, if you aren't RP locked, you can travel from one side of the continent to the other instantly. If you wanted to add logical steps to your travels, such as taking a carriage halfway and walking the other half, fluid time ignores tese steps. It doesn't matter if, narratively, it should actually take a month to achieve—in fluid time, you arrive at your destination as soon as you want, and the world just accepts it. The main reason fluid time is used is that the alternative—having to strictly adhere to time like it's a resource to be spent—is much too frustrating and obnoxious for both players and DMs to track. The only instances fluid time and its implications are not used is during RP Lock. Most times (pun not intended), if you're on an RP locked mission, the time you spend on the mission is what prevents you from leaving it. The DM will explain how events like travel or narrative time-lapses act as a buffer between the mission and what happens outside of it. If coming to terms between fluid time and logic is difficult to grasp, unless it's so bad that you're actually gaining time (losing time isn't as egregious), then it's best to ignore it. Or, you can blame the deity of time, Raquel, and then ignore it.

Lore

The lore of Verum is very extensive. Arcadum writes out lore on various topics when he has the time. Presently, you can read about the various regions of the continent of Kalkatesh—and details of each. Below are quick summaries of each location, and links to their respective articles.

Bloodwave Bay
- Bloodwave Bay is a place where freedom is paramount and the difference between a pirate and a privateer is what day of the week it may be.
Badlands
- The wastes of the Badlands are unforgiving. Death, famine, and disease await any creature that dare to walk its poisoned earth.
Dolten
- Dolten is a country hidden in the great expanse of the Abhorrent Arboreal. Her citizens survive amongst some of the most iconic evils darkness has to offer.
Daborak
- Daborak is a land of rolling plains, high grass, and the greatest calvary of any realm. All hail the horselords!
Khao
- A country with a dual existence - one, a city that floats above the clouds, and the other, the tribes in the misty jungles below.
Krazax
- Krazax is the mountain home of the dwarves. The lowlands hold host to many other races who live in the shadow of protection the great mountains provide.
Majital
- Majital is a land comprised of desert and scattered oases. Once a vibrant paradise, the land was stricken dry in the war of the Skarab Lords.
Orde
- Orde is a country of lush fields and sparkling white towers, where the light is upheld above all else.

Verum Character Creation

In Verum, there are several things different from standard 5e character creation options, as well as new concepts. If you're new to Verum and want to read about creating a character before submitting one, you can skip to Character Alignments. Once you have a character submitted and approved for Verum, then you can come back here to read the Character Sheets section below.

Character Sheets

How to connect your character to The Living World of Verum on World Anvil:

Login to your World Anvil account.
Close to the top left corner of your screen, click Switch to... and click your character’s name in the menu that appears.
Click on the invite link that will be sent to you by a staff member.

Don't add a character unless it's been approved by a DM in the Discord, as errant characters are removed. You can read Joining as a Player for more about this.

Filling Out a Character Sheet

Below is an in depth guide to writing the details of your character into your sheet. The character sheet will handle the vast majority of things that pertain to your character mechanically and numerically. Aside from the basic information that has a field on the sheet, this guide covers things that are more thematic or flavor such as:

A description of your character's appearance

Their relationship

Their backstory Additionally, when editing your sheet, you may notice a handful of tabs at the top, named Arms & Equipment, Creatures & Mounts, Retinue, Spellbook, Possessions & Property; ignore these. In the first area of the sheet at the top, the fields are fairly straightforward, simply write in the appropriate details. Examples provided are utilizing this writer's own character.

Character Name
- Your character's name
Class
- Your individual classes
- For a single class character, the suggested format is just the class name
- If you are multiclassing, it is suggested to separate the individual classes with a + sign, noting the individual class levels for each, and then ending the line with an = sign
  - Example
Level
- Your total character level
Origin
- Your character's origin and sub-origin.
- It is suggested to put your sub-origin in parentheses after the origin.
  - Example
Race
- Your character's race.
Alignment
- Your character's alignment.
Deity
- The deity that your character worships.
- While your character is free to worship multiple deities as a matter of flavor, you can only gain the Lip Service and Church Boons from one deity, which is the deity you'd name here.
  - You can read further about deities in Religion.
Stat Array
- This is the stat array you chose for your character.
Faction
- Your character's faction.
- You would note Factionless here if not in a faction
Rank/Position
- Your character's rank or position within their faction. If your character is the Chapter Master, Ambassador, or Quartermaster of your Faction, you'd note that here.
- Most factions also have individual rank names for their members, which can be viewed in each faction's respective article.
  - You can read further on this in Factions.
- You can ignore this field if you are factionless.
Company
- If your character is in a company, you would name it here. Otherwise, you can leave this field blank.
  - You can read further on this in Companies.
Loyalty
- Your character's loyalty to their faction. Loyalty is gained by completing agendas for your faction, gaining 1 loyalty each time. The accumuluation of this loyalty is noted here.
  - You can read further about this in the Loyalty section of Verumese Factions & Factionless Rules.
- Loyalty and Loyalty Benefits are granted when you complete a Long Rest.
You can ignore this field if you're factionless.

Character Alignments

Alignments are the traditional nine alignments, from Lawful Good to Chaotic Evil. However, because of the allowance of PvP in Verum, there is a risk for players who play only to kill other characters and have no care for emotional investment or the consequences of their griefing. While we don't want to disallow evil characters outright since they have their place, they will be controlled. If you wish to play an evil-aligned character, you must begin in one of the four factions below—you cannot start factionless or any other faction. Note that you are not required to be evil in these factions, only that these are the ones that allow evil characters.

The Linnorm Lords
The Ever Eye
The Crowsworn
The Forked Tongue

Any evil characters that willingly find themselves not in any of these factions are automatically retired. If a narrative reason forces you out of the faction, you might have options to proceed depending on the circumstances, but these options will be explained to you at that time. You can read further about factions in the Factions section. Unlike standard 5e, character alignments in Verum may have subtle and potentially impactful weight to them; therefore, you should consider your choice carefully before choosing.

Prime Actions

Prime actions are those that are invariably aligned with a particular force. By performing one of these actions you are furthering that force's influence in the universe, regardless of your reasons.

Law
- Fulfilling an Oath
- Accepting the providence of Fate
Chaos
- Breaking an Oath
- Rejecting the providence of Fate
Good
- Sacrificing your life or existence in exchange to prevent the death or destruction of another
- Defending the Lifestream.
Evil
- Destroying a soul or preventing its return to the Lifestream
- Severing a soul's silver chord
All Alignments | This action is considered lawful, chaotic, good, and evil simultaneously, which cancel each other out
- Upholding the Balance of a Greater Force
Pure Destruction
- Undoing the Reckoning

Oaths

Oaths are a divinely powerful and protected interaction characters can partake in and make with other characters, players or NPCs. As such, they come with a certain number of rules by which they work.

An oath needs to be specifically said, be it in or out-of-character, that it is an oath. Otherwise, it is just a promise.
All oaths are promises, but not all promises are oaths.
The difference between an oath and a promise is that an Oath has mechanical and narrative power.
Oaths do not consider intentions, circumstances, or fairness when they're broken.
When making an oath, Divinity must be tagged in the Verum discord within the post declaring the oath.
Oaths can be formally ended as long as both parties are present in a formal setting, and agree to relinquish said oath.

Ability Scores

Ability scores will be determined using stat arrays, in which you will pick one of three arrays available and allocate the scores as you see fit. These stat arrays were created for the purpose of making it easier to balance Verum across all of its games and players. Additional arrays for character creation may become available as the state of Verum calls for it. All other ability score rules from 5e apply as normal.

The Specialist: 17 / 12 / 12 / 11 / 10 / 10
The Mad Man: 15 / 15 / 14 / 11 / 11 / 10
The Razzle Dazzle: 13 / 13 / 13 / 13 / 13 / 13

Martial Skill

A new skill has been added to the standard skill list, called Martial. This check focuses on combat knowledge, relative enemy strength, and similar concepts. This skill is represented by the Wisdom score. All classes may choose Martial with their starting class skill proficiencies. You can read further about using the Martial skill in Combat.

Races

All races from the books available listed in Approved 5e Books, except those specifically listed (Shadar-kai and Gith), can be played. These races use lore and themes particular to Verum, so lore associated with a race such as elves in D&D 5e does not carry over here. You can read further about the lore of these races in Verum Races. Some races also have slight changes to their traits, which you can read about in Race Changes.

Verum Races

In addition to the standard 5e races, there are several custom races available just for Verum. Some of these races have prerequisites to play such as being in a certain faction, or fulfilling certain narrative conditions. Some of the other races, such as minotaur and changeling, were created for Verum before they were released in D&D 5e books. Because of this their ability score bonuses and other racial traits will be different. For example the changeling in Verum was released mid-2018, while Eberron (the book with 5e's changeling) was released in November 2019.

The following races cannot be chosen at character creation, but instead your character can become these races upon fulfilling certain conditions.

Revenant
Echo

Languages

A language is comprised of its root and Dialect. If you know the root language then you can understand, speak and write all of the dialects of that language to a passable degree, unless stated otherwise. Some dialects are locked for narrative reasons and cannot be chosen. Verum tweaks a few of the base languages listed in 5e, in addition to introducing a few new ones. You can read through the list of languages and their individual dialects and details in Languages. As of right now there are no mechanical differences between dialects, but there will be in the future. Your dialect will matter even more as actually knowing it can make a subtle but impactful difference. If a race or class grants you a language, you are considered to know the root of that language. If a dialect is not designated this way, you may choose one.

Age

In Verum, you cannot play a character that is underage for the race, you may only play adults. For example, Elves reach adulthood at the age of 100, so you cannot play elves that are younger than 100 years.

Classes

All classes and their subclasses from Approved 5e Books are allowed. The Ranger (Revised) from Unearthed Arcana is used instead of from the Player's Handbook. Furthermore, the Beast Conclave subclass has been significantly rebalanced for Verum (this is listed below in Verum Classes under Ranger. Other classes have slight changes, which you can read about in Class Changes.

Hit Points

Your starting hit points at level 1 is calculated based on the maximum amount of your class’ hit die plus your constitution modifier and any modifiers from feats, origins, or items as applicable. For example, a level 1 wizard that uses a D6 hit die would have 6 hit points before adding any relevant modifiers. Every time you level up after level 1, you gain an additional number of hit points equal to the class’ hit die average, (rounded up) adding your constitution modifier then any other modifiers such as from feats, origins, or items as appropriate.

D6 = 4
D8 = 5
D10 = 6
D12 = 7

Starting Equipment

You begin play with your respective class' Starting Equipment, and you cannot choose the alternative GP option. Instead, any wealth you'd start with comes from your chosen faction, or from a few specific origins. Thus, the factionless by default does not start with any wealth. However, you do always start with a set of Common Clothes. You can further read about factions in Factions and origins in Origins.

Verum Classes

Special Verumese subclasses and prestige classes are available for players. Some have certain requirements to be able to be chosen. Verum also reintroduces the concept of Prestige Classes, as seen in classic D&D editions, which are stand-alone class expansions that focus your character's style further than even subclasses. Rather than taking levels in these prestige classes, they instead replace your ASIs as you would gain them with new class features. You can read further regarding this in Prestige Classes.

Classes
- None at this time.
Subclasses
- Bard
  - Jester
- Barbarian
  - Scar Seeker
- Cleric
  - Go to Cleric for a complete list of new cleric domains.
- Druid
  - Circle of Spires
  - Circle of Storms
- Fighter
- Paladin
  - Oath of the Linnorms
- Ranger
  - Beast Conclave (Verumese)
  - Scalecaller Conclave
- Sorcerer
  - Linnorm Sorcerer
- Warlock
  - The Evil Eye
  - Lunar
Prestige Classes
- Steel Saint

Origins

Origins are an important choice for your character, since they entail what has shaped them to be who they are just before the start of their adventuring life. They depict what skills and abilities were gained as your character grew into adulthood. Origins replace backgrounds as a character feature, but backstories can still potentially play a role later in your character's life. You can further read about this in Backstory. Origins are categorized by regions of Verum, which further detail suborigins from each region. While you are not necessarily born in these regions, they are what you would call home. Some races may be restricted to certain origins. You can find a complete list of origins and suborigins in Origins.

Factions

Factions are organizations in Verum run by players and important NPCs. They are run through a democratic player-based hierarchy and provide a structure through which players can interact with the world. Each is a unique entity which provides, benefits for joining at player creation including tool proficiencies, additional starting equipment, and potentially greater options. When you create your character you can choose to either start in a faction or be factionless. You can further read about faction rules in Verumese Factions & Factionless Rules. You can also find a complete list of available factions and their individual articles in Faction Category. As mentioned in Character Alignments, evil characters are restricted to beginning play in one of four determined factions: the Linnorm Lords, the Ever Eye, the Crowsworn, and the Forked Tongue.

Companies

Companies are like semi-factions. They are formed by those who wish to adventure together under a common cause. ns. They are formed by those who wish to adventure together under a common cause. There are missions specifically tailored for companies that a company's members are automatically slotted to attend. Such missions contrast with the often random scheduling of players for normal missions. Companies are one of the very few ways for players to create their own factions if the company is properly developed and supported. Companies are initially created by players with some investments and stipulations. You can read further about companies and how to make one in Company Rules, and find a list of companies created by players in Companies Category.

Religion

Verum is host to completely customized deities and pantheons, each with their own ideals and ambitions. You can find a complete list of available deities to worship in Divinity. Whenever you choose a deity to follow you receive the Lip Service benefit of that deity, which is generally a free skill proficiency. If you have the option to choose, your choice is locked-in once made and cannot be changed as long as you worship that deity. If your character has at least 1 level in cleric or paladin, you also gain the respective ability score bonus noted under Church Boon. You can change which god you worship, and thus the respective lip service and church boon benefits, at any time. This may result in in-character consequences. If you do wish to worship a different deity, you must make a roleplaying post in the discord tagging Divinity, notifying them who you are switching your worship to. The post can be as simple or complex as you want, though it is encouraged to elaborate on why you are switching deities.

Domains

When playing as a cleric, you can only choose from the domains associated with the deity your character worships. You may be a cleric that does not worship a deity and choose any domain you want, but you do not benefit from any lip service or church boon. In addition to the domains from available 5e books, there are 21 new domains available for you to choose from—which you can find in Cleric.

Backstory

There is no doubt that backstory is one of the most fun aspects of creating a character. You are encouraged to create a backstory to pair with your character, but keep in mind very important points:

Your backstory by default is not canon in the world.
- This means any story you imagine leading up to your character gaining their first level in a class and starting as an adventurer, has not actually happened within Verum. While you are free to reference your backstory in-character for narrative reasons, you cannot gain any mechanical benefits nor influence Verum's culture with it—directly or indirectly. This is to say that nothing your character has done, who they are related to, or any other aspect of their lives can have an impact on the game.
- The only facet of your background that has any actual weight is your origin.
Your backstory may become canonical, but only through personal quests. This is available to players who have achieved 4 Prestige, as described in Downtime.

Specific Verum Homebrew

Adventuring

Death

The archetypical adversary for D&D players, death occurs most ordinarily in a game session where the players are unfortunate or brash enough to be caught in a deadly situation. In standard D&D the presence of magic, especially at higher levels of play, can make character death trivial. In order to ensure there is weight behind your character's actions and the resulting consequences, it is much more difficult to resurrect the dead in Verum. Below are a few more points to keep in mind when your character dies:

Regardless of how or where they die, the first step is to make sure the DMs are aware. Though, in a situation where death is occurring, one is likely involved already.
Their inventory may be salvaged by others who are aware and present at the moment of death.
- Wills are not mechanically supported in Verum, as it leaves temptation for people to metagame and takes advantage of it. Anything in your character's possession that is retrieved and returned belongs to their faction, not their spouse or children.
- If the body and items are unable to be retrieved after death then they are considered gone and may only be found as loot on other missions.
Only other player characters or in-world events can resurrect a dead character. Any attempts to recover your old characters from death with any of your new characters will be considered metagaming.

Instant Death

The Instant Death rule found on page 197 of the D&D 5e Player's Handbook is ignored; your character can no longer be killed instantly through massive damage. Your character can still instantly die by other means of Certain Death - a phrase used to categorize scenarios in which there are no, or trivially low, chances of survival—such as falling from extremely high elevations or being plane-shifted to an inhospitable dimension with no recourse. Keep in mind that certain death scenarios are not limited to game sessions; you can just as easily die roleplaying in Verum if you're in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Ruthless

Ruthless is one of a collection of custom Verum creature traits. These traits describe certain aspects of the creature, but the important one here is Ruthless—due to its direct relation to death. By default, enemies will not attack a character that has been reduced to 0 hit points and is making death saving throws—commonly referred to as "downed". However, creatures that are Ruthless ignore this and will attack a downed character for the purpose of finishing them off. A typical example of a Ruthless enemy would be an assassin, but it can apply to whoever or whatever a DM deems fit.
Another reference to Ruthless, called Indirect Ruthless, may be used. This means enemies that have area-of-effect damaging abilities will cause automatic death saving throw failures without directly attacking a downed character. However, due to the intrinsic nature and commonality of area-of-effect abilities on enemies—like auras or spells—expect Indirect Ruthless even if it's not explicitly mentioned. You will always be warned out-of-character if there are Ruthless enemies in your mission, but not who. It may be possible to figure out who has Ruthless with successful information gathering and/or skill checks.

Scent

Scent refers to a trait or effect that allows a creature to detect approaching enemies, sniff out hidden foes, and track by sense of smell. Creatures with Scent can identify familiar smells just as humans do familiar sights. Creatures with Scent can detect opponents within a certain range by the sense of smell. Strong odors, such as smoke or rotting garbage, can be detected at twice the creature's scent range. Overpowering odors, such as skunk musk or Troglodyte Stench, can be detected at triple the creature's scent range. When a creature with Scent detects an odor the exact location of the source is not revealed, only that its presence is somewhere within the range. The creature can use an action to note the direction of the odor. When the creature is within 5 feet of the source of the odor, it pinpoints the source's location. A creature with Scent can follow tracks by smell, making a Wisdom (Survival) check to find or follow a track. The typical DC for a fresh trail is 10, regardless of the surface holding the odor. This DC increases or decreases depending on how strong the quarry's odor is the number of creatures, and how fresh the trail is. For each hour that the trail is cold, the DC increases by 2. The ability otherwise follows the rules for the Survival skill. Creatures tracking by scent ignore the effects of surface conditions and poor visibility. Scent can bypass the Pass Without Trace spell and reveal a creature's presence if they are within the Scent range.

Lifesense

Lifesense refers to a magical trait or effect that allows a creature to detect and locate living creatures within a specific radius as though they possessed the Blindsight sense.

Teleportation

Momentum does not carry through teleportation, except in circumstances of certain death.

Burrowing

Burrowing Rules are explained in depth here: Verumese Burrowing Rules

Combat

Using the Martial Skill

Using Martial is similar in the application of using Investigation on your surroundings, except Martial is focused specifically on a creature. While you are able to use your action to make Wisdom (Martial) checks like any other skill, all players can choose to make one free Martial skill check at the start of each of their turns when in combat. The results will vary, but things you might deduce about a creature include:

Their power relative to you
Traits they possess
Tactics they employ

Damage Reduction

Though damage reduction already exists in a small capacity in 5e, the mechanic is much more prevalent in Verum. Damage reduction is similar in function to resistance, in that it reduces damage received by a static amount based on a number associated with the damage reduction effect. Damage reduction is always applied before resistances unless stated otherwise. Damage reduction may be referred to by its shorthand of "DR".

Damage Taken Effects

Effects that are dependent on the amount of damage taken, is always counted after damage reduction and resistances. For example, a creature's damage reduction and resistance apply before the effects of the Warding Bond spell when counting damage taken between creatures.

Untyped Damage

Some abilities that add extra damage do not specify the type of damage; i.e., Hunter's Mark, Sneak Attack, Great Weapon Master, etc. which can be ambiguous when there are multiple types of damage being used for the attack (for example, a weapon that does piercing and cold damage). In these cases, untyped damage that is rolled for (Hunter's Mark, Sneak Attack) has a type of the player's choice from among the damage types used. All untyped damage that has a static value (Great Weapon Master, Sharpshooter, Imperial Dance) uses the weapon's base damage type. For example, a rogue with 1d6 sneak attack attacks with a magical shortbow that deals an extra 1d6 cold damage. If the rogue rolls sneak attack damage, they can choose for that 1d6 sneak attack to be either piercing (the shortbow's base damage type) or cold (the magical effect damage type)
If that same rogue then had the Sharpshooter feat and used its extra +10 damage ability, then that +10 damage must be piercing. You cannot change untyped damage into homebrew damage types made for Verum—bleed damage, primal damage, and astral damage at this time.

Physical Damage

Physical Damage is a category that specifically includes the bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage types. If an effect refers to physical damage in some way, then it means all three of these damage types.

Simultaneous Damage Types

Simultaneous damage types is a mechanic reintroduced for 5e in Verum with the implementation of the Improved Armory. Only homebrew weapons (such as the improved armory) and abilities use simultaneous damage types at this time. If an attack or effect deals multiple damage types simultaneously, such as, "Piercing and Slashing", it is considered to deal damage of the more beneficial type when it's relevant. For example, a weapon with "Piercing and Slashing" being used to attack a creature with resistance to slashing damage the damage wouldn't be halved since the piercing damage type would bypass it. A creature would need resistance to both piercing and slashing to halve the damage from such a weapon. If an attack or effect can deal one damage type between a choice od multiple types, such as, "Bludgeoning or Piercing", you choose which damage type is dealt for each instance—such as each attack of a weapon.

Bleed Damage

Bleed Damage is a continuous damage type in Verum reintroduced for 5e, along with the Bleeding condition. Below are the rules covering the two:

Bleed Damage

Bleed damage is its own damage type. It's generally extra damage applied to a weapon attack by another effect or ability, but it can be inflicted in other ways.
Bleed damage taken that is not from the bleeding condition stacks with itself.
A creature that takes bleed damage to their hit points receives the Bleeding condition. Bleeding does not occur if the initial attack or effect deals no damage to the target's hit points (blocked by temporary hit points, negated by an ability, or similar effects) unless stated otherwise.
A creature that does not have blood or that does not need blood to function, is immune to bleed damage.
If you have resistance and/or damage reduction to all three types of Physical Damage (Bludgeoning, Slashing, Piercing), non-magical or otherwise, that reduction then also applies to bleed damage.

Bleeding
- A creature that is bleeding automatically takes their total bleed damage stack as bleed damage at the start of each of its turns.
- Bleeding can be removed with a successful Medicine skill check, a use of a Healer's Kit, or any amount of magical healing.
- A creature that does not have blood or that does not need blood to function, is immune to the Bleeding condition.

Fortification

Fortification is an advantageous condition that can be applied mundanely or magically. Whenever an attack would score a critical hit against a creature with Fortification, the attack must be rolled again against the target’s AC—using the same modifiers and effects that affect the attack roll. If the rerolled attack would hit, this confirms the critical hit, and it deals extra damage as normal. If the rerolled attack would not hit, the critical hit becomes a normal hit.

Grappling

A few additional rules have been added for grappling. As a refresher for the grappling rules on page 195 of the Player's Handbook:

When you want to grab a creature or wrestle with it, you can use the Attack action to make a special melee attack, a grapple. If you’re able to make multiple attacks with the Attack action, this attack replaces one of them. The target of your grapple must be no more than one size larger than you, and it must be within your reach.

Using at least one free hand, you try to seize the target by making a grapple check, a Strength (Athletics) check contested by the target’s Strength (Athletics) or Dexterity (Acrobatics) check (the target chooses the ability to use). You succeed automatically if the target is incapacitated. If you succeed, you subject the target to the grappled condition (see Conditions). The condition specifies the things that end it, and you can release the target whenever you like (no action required).

Escaping a Grapple: A Grappled creature can use its action to escape. To do so, it must succeed on a Strength (Athletics) or Dexterity (Acrobatics) check contested by your Strength (Athletics) check.

Moving a Grappled Creature: When you move, you can drag or carry the grappled creature with you, but your speed is halved, unless the creature is two or more sizes smaller than you.

The new rule added for Verum:

Moving a Grappled Creature: When attempting to move a creature out of another creature’s grapple, the two grapplers must contest one another using a Strength (Athletics) check.

Spellcasting

Diamonds

Diamonds and diamond dust are an incredibly rare resource to adventurers in Verum, and as a result, many spells become incredibly difficult to cast. This is intentional for spells that provide resurrection, or some other form of life preservation. However, some spells have been altered to allow them to be easier to cast, so as not to encounter this diamond scarcity. In these following spells, the diamond material component has simply been replaced with any gem of equal value:

Chromatic Orb
Gate
Mighty Fortress
Glyph of Warding
Nondetection
Stoneskin
Symbol

Furthermore, the Reincarnate spell now requires an equivalent amount of diamond dust instead of its usual rare oils as a material component.

Hard Casting

There are multiple ways to cast spells. You can use spell slots, racial traits, scrolls and items to cast spells with each having their own effects when casting with them. Within Verum, Hard Casting is in reference to whenever you cast the spell using a spell slot. Hard cast effects do not interact with racial trait spells, items or other sources, only those cast using a spell slot from relevant class features (Spellcasting, Pact Magic). Cantrips can be hard cast only when the source is the caster itself (class feature, racial trait, origin, etc.) and not a magic item or consumable (e.g., the Mage’s Guild starting equipment).

Scrolls

Scroll functionality has changed in Verum. Failure to make any of the appropriate ability checks will cause the casting to fail and the scroll to be destroyed.

Casting a spell scroll that contains a spell that you cannot hard cast and isn't on your class' spell list requires an Intelligence (Arcana) check at DC 10 + the spell level
Casting a spell scroll of a higher spell level than you could normally hard cast requires an Intelligence check at DC 10 + the spell level.

You must pass both of the checks above to cast a spell scroll if both conditions apply.

If you do not possess the ability to hard cast a spell, you can cast spell scrolls of 1st and 2nd level spells only, and they require an Intelligence (Arcana) check at DC 10 + double the spell level. Your spell ability modifier—in this instance—is always Intelligence.
Only the original crafter can cast spell scrolls that summon or bind creatures to the caster if the scroll was crafted using Consumable Crafting.

There are no spell scrolls of cantrips in Verum.

Arcane and Divine

Arcane and divine magic is a concept reintroduced to 5e with Verum. There is no immediate effect due to this separation, but there are custom effects that are dependent upon whether casted magic is from an arcane or divine source. Note that this applies to magic in general, not just spellcasting, so magical class features also fall into these categories.

Arcane
- Bard
- Eldritch Fighter
- Arcane Trickster Rogue
- Sorcerer
- Warlock
- Wizard
Divine
- Cleric
- Druid
- Paladin
- Ranger

Magical items fall into the arcane category unless it is directly blessed by a deity, which you can read further about in Magical Item Crafting Rules. Spell scrolls are dependent on who crafted the scroll, whether they used a spell from an arcane or divine spell list.

Goodberries

The Goodberry spell now requires concentration for its duration.

Familiars

Familiars summoned with the Find Familiar spell cannot be equipped with items and any items they possess disappear after they’re gone. This includes Pact of the Chain Warlock familiars. Familiars can not be fed cooked Food Tokens created with Consumable Crafting, and thus cannot benefit from them.

Conjure Woodland Creatures

Pixies are considered CR 2 when summoned through the Conjure Woodland Creatures spell.

Expanded Summons

In addition to the creatures from approved books, the following creatures can also be summoned with the following changes found here.

Awaken

You can only have one awakened creature or plant at a time with the Awaken spell, and it must be tracked on your character sheet.

Healing Spirit

The healing from the Healing Spirit spell has been standardized when used out of combat; 10d6 healing per character.

Magic Missile

When rolling damage for Magic Missile, the dice is rolled for each dart separately, not once and applied to each dart.

Race Changes

The details below are homebrew changes or additions to official 5e races. These changes are implemented for either narrative reasons, game balancing purposes, or an attempt to increase the incentive to play these races.

Elves

All full elf races, except for the Shar'kai, gain the following trait:

Emperor's Gift. You gain a +2 to your initiative rolls.

Hobgoblins

The Martial Training trait is changed to the following:

Martial Training. You are proficient with one exotic weapon of your choice and one exotic light armor of your choice.

You can read further about exotic weapons and armor in Improved Armory.

Genasi (Air)

Air genasi gain the following trait:

Seal of Air. You gain a fly speed of 30 feet. When you deal lightning damage, the damage is increased by 2. This applies only once per source.

Furthermore, air genasi do not learn Primordial. They learn Auran (Lesser) instead.

Genasi (Earth)

Earth genasi gain the following trait:

Seal of Earth. You gain a burrow speed of 30 feet. When you deal acid damage, the damage is increased by 2. This applies only once per source.

Furthermore, earth genasi do not learn Primordial. They learn Terran (Lesser) instead.

Genasi (Fire)

Fire genasi gain the following trait:

Seal of Fire. Your walking speed is increased by 30 feet. When you deal fire damage, the damage is increased by 2. This applies only once per source.

Furthermore, fire genasi do not learn Primordial. They learn Ignan (Lesser) instead.

Genasi (Water)

Water genasi gain the following trait:

Seal of Water. Your swim speed is increased by 30 feet. When you deal cold damage, the damage is increased by 2. This applies only once per source.

Furthermore, water genasi do not learn Primordial. They learn Aquan (Lesser) instead.

Triton

Tritons do not learn Primordial. They learn Aquan (Lesser) instead.

Class Changes

Barbarian

Zealot
- Warrior of the Gods
  - Due to the harsher restrictions on resurrection abilities and diamonds Verum, as explained in Diamonds, this class feature has been altered to reflect this.
  - The phrase, “the caster doesn't need material components to cast the spell on you,” has been changed to, "the caster spends only half of the needed material components to cast the spell on you."

Cleric

Base Class
- Many new domains are available to choose, which you can read further about in Domains.
Knowledge
- Blessings of Knowledge
  - If you already have proficiency in one of the listed skills from an origin, lip service, or racial trait, you can choose to have that skill benefit from the double proficiency bonus instead of one of the two you've chosen—but no more than two skills can benefit from this feature.

Druid

Base Class
- As a reminder, the rule “Equipment that merges with the form has no effect until you leave the form,” applies to magical items.
- Druids may wear metal armor. Doing this does not break any tenets of druidism in Verum.
- You can wild shape into any beast from the allowed books that your druid level allows you to change into, regardless of whether you have seen them or not. In all cases, unless stated otherwise, homebrew beasts and official beasts with custom variant stats are not available to change into.
Circle of the Shepherd
- Mighty Summoner
  - This class feature has been slightly enhanced.
  - The phrase, "The damage from its natural weapons," has been changed to, "The damage from both its natural weapons and weapon attacks."

Fighter

Arcane Archer
- Arcane Shot
  - This class feature can be used with any weapon in the Bow weapon group.
- Magic Arrow
  - This class feature can be used with any weapon in the Bow weapon group.

You can read further about weapon groups in Improved Armory.

Monk

Base Class
- Martial Arts
  - The following weapons are monk weapons:
    - Throwing Knife
    - Katana
    - Kusarigama
    - Tonfa
    - Katar
    - Cestus
    - Kerambit
    - Sityrian Glider Wings
Kensei
- Path of the Kensei
  - The following weapons can be chosen for Kensei Weapons
    - Steton Greatbow
    - Bladed Longbow
    - Majitalian Flail
    - Ordesian Foil
    - Chain Whip
    - Scorpion Whip
    - Twinblade
    - Estoc
    - Flamberge

You can read further about these weapons in Improved Armory.

Ranger (Revised)

Base Class
- In addition to its normal effects, Favored Enemy gives advantage on Wisdom (Martial) checks against your chosen favored enemy.
Beast Conclave
- The entire subclass has been rebalanced for Verum. You can read further about it in Beast Conclave

Sorcerer

Base Class
- In Verum, the bonus action casting time of spells restriction has been removed for the sorcerer when the Quickened Spell metamagic is used.
  - As a refresher of this rule on page 202 of the Player's Handbook:
    - Bonus Action - A spell cast with a bonus action is especially swift. You must use a bonus action on your turn to cast the spell, provided that you haven’t already taken a bonus action this turn. You can’t cast another spell during the same turn, except for a cantrip with a casting time of 1 action.
  - And the Quickened Spell on page 102 of the Player's Handbook:
    - When you cast a spell that has a casting time of 1 action, you can spend 2 sorcery points to change the casting time to 1 bonus action for this casting.
- So when a sorcerer uses Quickened Spell, they may hard cast any spell in the same turn with their action.
Storm
- Windspeaker
  - You do not learn Primordial nor choose one of its dialects. Instead, you learn Auran and both its Noble and Lesser dialects.

Warlock

Base Class
- Pact of the Blade
  - You gain an exotic proficiency with only the first type of exotic weapon you create with this class feature, not any other exotic weapons created afterward.

Wizard

Base Class
- Wizards may copy spells into their spellbooks from another spellbook or a scroll containing that spell. When copying spells out-of-session, the time factor doesn't matter as much, but in order to track the gold cost of the process, you must:
- Dictate which spells, how much gold is spent, and who, if anyone, gave you the spells through the format outlined in Trading.
Bladesinging
- You can choose an exotic weapon for the Training in War and Song (Bladesinging) class feature.

Equipment

Attunement

In Verum, each character starts with 1 attunement slot by default, but it is possible to earn more than the traditional 3 attunement slots in basic 5e. Attunement slots can be awarded for completing prestige missions, campaigns, special RP events, or by reaching certain character levels; you gain a 2nd attunement slot at level 9 if you do not already have two, and a third at level 12 if you do not already have three. Furthermore, there are about a dozen new attunement types on magical items, each with their own unique mechanics. These are integrated in the crafting system, which you can read more about in Magical Item Crafting Rules.

Using Items

In Verum a few rules regarding equipped items have been changed, added or clarified further. As a refresher of the relevant rules on page 140 of the Dungeon Master's Guide:

Wearing and Wielding Items
Using a magic item's properties might mean wearing or wielding it. A magic item meant to be worn must be donned in the intended fashion: boots go on the feet, gloves on the hands, hats and helmets on the head, and rings on the finger. Magic armor must be donned, a shield strapped to the arm, a cloak fastened about the shoulders. A weapon must be held in hand.

In most cases, a magic item that's meant to be worn can fit a creature regardless of size or build. Many magic garments are made to be easily adjustable, or they magically adjust themselves to the wearer.

Rare exceptions exist. If the story suggests a good reason for an item to fit only creatures of a certain size or shape, you can rule that it doesn't adjust. For example, armor made by the drow might fit elves only. Dwarves might make items usable only by dwarf-sized and dwarf-shaped characters.

When a non-humanoid tries to wear an item, use your discretion as to whether the item functions as intended. A ring placed on a tentacle might work, but a yuan-ti with a snakelike tail instead of legs has no way to wear magic boots.

Multiple Items of the Same Kind
Use common sense to determine whether more than one of a given kind of magic item can be worn. A character can't normally wear more than one pair of footwear, one pair of gloves or gauntlets, one pair of bracers, one suit of armor, one item of headwear, and one cloak. You can make exceptions; a character might be able to wear a circlet under a helmet, for example, or be able to layer two cloaks.

Paired Items
Items that come in pairs-such as boots, bracers, gauntlets, and gloves-impart their benefits only if both items of the pair are worn. For example, a character wearing a boot of striding and springing on one foot and a boot of elven kind on the other foot gains no benefit from either item.

Activating an Item
Activating some magic items requires a user to do something in particular, such as holding the item and uttering a command word, reading the item if it is a scroll, or drinking it if it is a potion. The description of each item category or individual item details how an item is activated. Certain items use one or more of the following rules related to their activation.

If an item requires an action to activate, that action isn't a function of the Use an Object action, so a feature such as the rogue's Fast Hands can't be used to activate the item.

Below are the Verum addendums:

Wearing and Wielding Items - Exceptions
- It is possible for an item to impart an effect to an attuned player without being wielded or worn properly if the item explicitly states as much. If you craft an item that has such an effect, the effect is considered to be more powerful than if it didn't; however, the item must still be within your possession.
Wearing and Wielding Items - Versatile Effects
- The effects provided by magical weapons, armor, and shields only apply to themselves. For example, if a weapon gives you an extra 1d4 fire damage on attacks it only applies to attacks made with that weapon—not all weapon attacks.
- This restriction cannot be circumvented until Minor Legendary or better rarities; at which point, wording that allows such effects to apply beyond the item itself can be used, but they are considered to be more powerful than if they didn't.
- This rule is lax for wondrous items; they will dictate whether their effect applies to a generalized type of action or other situations.
Wearing and Wielding Items - Distance
- For wondrous items, it is possible for an item to impart an effect to an attuned player even if the item is not in the character's possession if the item explicitly states as much. If you craft an item that has such an effect, it is considered to be more powerful than if it didn't.
- If the item is not able to be worn or reasonably held by the character, such as a vehicle, this stipulation is implied.
- In either of the cases above, such items must still be within 100 feet of the character by default, or fulfill any requisite conditions particular to the item—such as from special attunements.
Activating an Item - Consumables
- Using a consumable item (potion, poison) is always an action taking the Use an Object action. Administering a potion or poison to another character is also counted as taking the Use an Object action. It will only be a bonus action or item interaction if another effect or ability explicitly states as much.
- Typically when scrolls are used, they are spell scrolls and are used to cast a spell. Casting a spell from a spell scroll takes a Cast a Spell action and not a Use an Object action. However scrolls that are not spell scrolls may also be encountered. These scrolls often state what is required to use them. Unless otherwise stated, these scrolls take a Use an Object action.
- You can no longer withdraw a potion, poison, or scroll from any container you're carrying—such as a backpack—during a combat encounter. Instead, a new mechanical item called Bandoliers has been introduced to allow these consumables in a limited fashion.
- Stored potions, poisons, or scrolls in a container, such as a backpack, are secured for the safety of the contents. Dumping the contents of a container thus does not dump these consumables if they're stored within. Assuming you're not in a combat encounter, removing an individually secured consumable from a container requires the Use an Object action.
Bandolier
- A potion, poison, or scroll can only be withdrawn in active combat if it is stored in a bandolier. Withdrawing these from a bandolier is a standard object interaction, which can be achieved with your free object interaction during your turn.
- It's possible to wear multiple bandoliers, but only two can be active on your person at the same time. Withdrawing a consumable from a bandolier that is not active, removing a worn bandolier, or equipping a new bandolier, requires the Use an Object action. Restocking a bandolier with potions, poisons, or scrolls takes 1 minute.
- The Powerful Build racial trait allows you to have one extra bandolier active.
- Only humanoid creature can wear bandoliers.

Specific Item Weights

50 coins, regardless of type, weigh 1 lb, so the total weight of carried coinage is [Your total coin amount] divided by 50.
Potions and poisons weigh 2 lbs each.
Scrolls weigh 1 lb each.

Bottled Breath

The DC for the Strength saving throw is equal to 13.

Oil of Slipperiness

The duration of Oil of Slipperiness has been reduced to 1 hour and its rarity has been increased to Major Uncommon.

Potion of Longevity

A Potion of Longevity does not take effect without a DM knowing, tracking, and rolling for the player. Thus, contact a DM if you wish to use one.

Oil of Sharpness

The Oil of Sharpness has been split up into three varieties of potency, with the effect enhanced for more options.Before:

This clear, gelatinous oil sparkles with tiny, ultrathin silver shards. The oil can coat one slashing or piercing weapon or up to 5 pieces of slashing or piercing ammunition. Applying the oil takes 1 minute. For 1 hour, the coated item is magical and has a +3 bonus to attack and damage rolls.

In Verum:

This clear, gelatinous oil sparkles with tiny, ultrathin silver shards. The oil can coat one weapon or part of the body for natural weapons and unarmed strikes. Applying the oil takes 1 minute. For 1 hour, the coated item or body-part is magical and has a [+1, +2, +3] bonus to attack and damage rolls.

The potencies are separated as such:

Weak Oil of Sharpness | Rare | +1
Oil of Sharpness | Very Rare | +2
Potent Oil of Sharpness | Legendary | +3

Potion of Mind Control (Humanoid)

This potion has been removed from play.

Philter of Love

Philter of Love has been modified as shown below to be in accordance with Forbidden Actions.

The next time you see a creature within 10 minutes after drinking this philter, you must make a DC 13 Wisdom saving throw or become charmed by that creature for 1 hour. If the creature is of a species and gender you are normally attracted to, you regard it as your true love while you are charmed. This potion's rose-hued, effervescent liquid contains one easy-to-miss bubble shaped like a heart.

Score Increasing Potions

Potions that increase your ability scores, such as a Potion of Giant Strength, are removed from play. Only full magic items can magically increase your scores.

Covenant

Covenant is a new property for magic items in Verum. Covenant items grow in regards to the growth in level of the character wielding it. What exactly this power growth entails, is up to you to find out...

Seeker

Seeker is a new property for magic items in Verum. When you first attune to a Seeker item, you can choose to seek out a person, place, or other objectives that are determined by the item; that once completed, will upgrade the item to a new form.

Glorybound

Glorybound is a new property for magic items in Verum. These rewarded items do not have slots and can only be upgraded through special circumstances.They also have the following level restrictions which can be bypassed if they also have the Worthy property.

Common - Major Uncommon: N/A

Minor Rare - Major Rare: Level 4+

Minor Very Rare - Major Very Rare: Level 8+

Minor Legendary - Major Legendary: Level 12+

Masterwork Items

Masterwork is a property for items reintroduced for Verum. The effects of the masterwork property are mundane in nature, and are different depending on the type of item.

Masterwork Weapons
- The weapon has a +1 bonus to damage. This damage does not stack with the +bonus of magic weapons. When scoring a critical hit, the damage counts as magical for bypassing resistances—though the weapon itself is not considered magical. Adding the bonus for masterwork ammo functions similarly to magical +bonus ammo.
Masterwork Light Armor
- The time it takes to don and doff is reduced to 3 rounds. Walking, swimming and climbing speeds are increased by 5 feet. This gives you a swim and climb speed of 5 feet if you did not already possess them.
Masterwork Medium Armor
- The time it takes to don is reduced to 1 minute. The maximum dexterity modifier is increased by 1.
Masterwork Heavy Armor
- The time it takes to don is reduced to 5 minutes. Strength requirements are reduced by 1. "+ Dex modifier (max 1)" is added to the armor's AC.
Masterwork Shields
- You can use a bonus action to don or doff the shield.
Masterwork Tools

You have advantage on checks that utilize the tool. Some other benefits can manifest under the right circumstances.

Other Masterwork Objects
- The effects of masterwork objects beyond the above will vary and will be defined when needed. Universally, masterwork items that don't have defined mechanics are simply more resilient to damage. When calculating the hit points of a masterwork item, they're increased by 20%.

You can read further about crafting your own masterwork items in Mundane Item Crafting Rules.

Improved Armory

The Improved Armory is a set of new mechanics and items introduced for the game with Verum. You can read further about each mechanic and item in Improved Armory, but below is a brief summary.

Mechanics
- Exotic Proficiency
  - A new type of proficiency—called Exotic—categorizes a group of weapons, armor, shields, and potentially other items, that require greater investment and training to gain proficiency with them. All new items made with the Improved Armory are exotic.
- New Weapon Properties
  - Five new weapon properties have been created that several of the new exotic weapons possess. These properties are Brutal, Twinned, Cleaving, Braced, and Catching.
Weapon Groups
- Weapon groups are categorizations of the available weapons in Verum, standard 5e and exotic. These groups do not have a large mechanical impact at the moment, with the only thing to take advantage of it is the Arcane Archer Fighter. Weapon groups will become relevant later with the introduction of new fighting styles. Below is the current weapon groups:
  - Axes
    Handaxe
    Battle Axe
    Great Axe
    Butcher’s Axe
    Krazaxian Waraxe
  - Light Blades
    Dagger
    Sickle
    Short Sword
    Scimitar
    Rapier
    Throwing Knife
    Ordesian Foil
    Kusarigama
    Katar
    Kerambit
    Claw Blade
  - Blades
    Longsword
    Greatsword
    Bladed Longbow
    Katana
    Twinblade
    Daborakian Claymore
    Estoc
    Flamberge
  - Bows
    Shortbow
    Longbow
    Steton Greatbow
    Bladed Longbow
  - Crossbows
    Light Crossbow
    Heavy Crossbow
    Hand Crossbows
    Blowgun
    Repeating Crossbow
  - Flails
    Flail
    Whip
    Heavy Star-and-Chain
    Kusarigama
    Chain Whip
    Scorpion Whip
  - Hammers
    Light Hammer
    Mace
    Warhammer
    Club
    Greatclub
    Morningstar
    Maul
    Krazaxian Waraxe
    Tonfa
  - Polearms
    Glaive
    Halberd
    Quarterstaff
    Scythe
  - Spears
    Spear
    Lance
    Pike
    Trident
    Long Spear
    Krazaxian Waraxe

Feats

5e Feat Changes

Lightly / Moderately / Heavily Armored
- Additional effects:
  - You gain proficiency with one exotic light / medium / heavy armor of your choice.
Heavy Armor Master
- The damage reduction provided from the feat reduces Bleed damage taken from nonmagical weapons as well.
Orcish Fury
- Exotic weapons can be used with this feat.
Polearm Master
- The Long Spear and the Scythe can be used with this feat.
Prodigy
- Verum's Dhampir and Changeling races are half-humans, and qualify for this feat.
Shield Master
- Additional effect:
  - You gain proficiency with one exotic shield of your choice.
Weapon Master
- Additional effects:
  - You gain proficiency with one exotic weapon of your choice.
  - Choose one type of weapon you gained proficiency with from this feat. Add your proficiency bonus to your AC against attacks made by that type of weapon.

Racial Feats

In order to counter-balance the power of Human (Variant), several dozen new feats have been created for the various non-human races in Verum. Due to how many there are, you can read further about each particular race's feats by following the links below.

And below are feats that don't belong in any particular racial group, but are dependent on race nonetheless.

Miscellaneous Feats

Faction Feats

These feats are available only to members of the appropriate factions.

The Great Coven
- Blessing of the Shadowhound
  Blessing of the Shadowhound
  Prerequisite: 1 Loyalty to the Great Coven
  The Shadowhound is a great canine, it's contorted shade-like form causing its features to be confusing at times, but its purpose is not. It is a witch-guard of the highest caliber, as it guards the Witch Queen herself. The Shadowhound gives its blessing to those that would be the wall that stands before the many threats.
  - During a short rest you can choose one ally that possesses the Spellcasting or Pact Magic class feature. While you are within 5 feet of the chosen ally, they gain a +1 bonus to their Constitution saving throws to maintain concentration.
  - While you are within 5 feet of the chosen ally when they would take damage, you can choose to divert half of it to yourself three times before finishing a short or long rest.
  - You gain resistance to force damage.
- Lady of Eyes
  Lady of Eyes
  Prerequisite: 1 Loyalty to the Great Coven
  The Lady of Eyes is the spymaster for the Witch Queen and quite adept at subterfuge and divination. She bestows those with her blessing, the gifts of being unseen.
  - You gain advantage on Insight, Investigation, and Perception skill checks against a creature if they are unaware of your presence.
  - If you possess the One with Shadows invocation, you can move without breaking the invisibility bestowed from it.
  - You gain a +1 bonus to all Stealth skill checks.
- The Laughing Serpent
  The Laughing Serpent
  Prerequisite: 1 Loyalty to the Great Coven
  The Laughing Serpent is the court jester for the Witch Queen, using wry wit and careful timing to achieve his goals. Those that ask for his blessing receive insight into other people and how best to manipulate them.
  - You gain expertise in the Deception skill.
  - You gain advantage on Insight skill checks against a creature you have succeeded in deceiving with the Deception skill within the same encounter.
  - Whenever you deal poison damage, you do 2 extra poison damage. This effect can only occur once for each source of poison damage.
- The Wordless Wyrm
  The Wordless Wyrm
  Prerequisite: 1 Loyalty to the Great Coven
  The Wordless Wyrm is a silent opposition to the throne of the Witch Queen, although he serves with loyalty, he disagrees with the manner in which Baba Yaga is governed.
  - If you possess the Armor of Shadows warlock invocation, the base AC is increased to 15 + your dexterity modifier when you use it.
  - Your Eldritch Sight invocation is now permanent and doesn't need to be activated. You can see magic at all times as natural as sunlight. You can turn this effect off and on as a free action during your turn.
  - You gain a +1 bonus to Charisma saving throws.
The Mage's Guild
- Sigil of the Dane
  Sigil of the Dane
  Prerequisite: The ability to cast an arcane spell; Proficiency with one martial weapon; 1 Loyalty to the Mage's Guild
  You are trained in the efficiency of battle magic.
  - You are surrounded by a sigil that protects you from physical harm, granting you a permanent Mage Armor effect that gives a base AC of 15 + your dexterity modifier.
  - Whenever you critically hit with a spell, you can reroll any number of extra dice rolled each once and take the higher result.
  - You gain a bonus to your initiative equal to your Intelligence modifier.
- Primal Pulse
  Primal Pulse
  Prerequisite: Spellcasting class feature from the Wizard spell list; 1 Loyalty to the Mage's Guild
  The power of primal magic pulses within your spell casting.
  - Whenever you cast an evocation spell, all enemies within 5 feet of you must make a Dexterity saving throw against your spell save DC, taking 1d6 primal damage plus another d6 per level of the spell cast. This happens simultaneously with the spell.
  - Whenever you cast a spell with an area of effect, you must add an additional 5 to 20 feet of extra space after you have chosen the area. This is determined randomly by a d4 roll (1 is 5 feet, 2 is 10 feet, ect.).
  - Whenever you cast a damaging cantrip you can increase its damage by your proficiency bonus. If you do, you take damage equal to your proficiency bonus. This damage cannot be mitigated or avoided in any way, and still occurs even if you miss.
- Lesser Alchemize
  Lesser Alchemize
  Prerequisite: Spellcasting class feature from the Wizard spell list; 1 Loyalty to the Mages Guild.
  You have learned the power of gold as a malleable metal.
  - Whenever you cast a spell, you can raise its spell save DC by 1 by consuming 100 gp as a material component. You can pay this material cost up to 3 times for each spell, but the price doubles for each increase. This effect lasts until the end of your turn.
  - You can use any type of Potion of Healing as a material component when you cast a spell. If you do, the potion is consumed and you heal yourself for its healing amount as part of casting the spell.
- The Twin Pillars
  The Twin Pillars
  Prerequisite: The ability to cast an arcane spell; The ability to cast a divine spell; 1 Loyalty to the Mages Guild.
  The divine might of the pantheons and the knowledge of sages, make powerful bedfellows.
  - Whenever you hard cast a non-ritual, non-cantrip, divine spell, your next arcane spell has its DC increased by 2. This effect fades after 1 hour.
  - Whenever you hard cast a non-ritual, non-cantrip, arcane spell, your next divine spell has its DC increased by 2. This effect fades after 1 hour.
  - If an enemy fails a saving throw of or be damaged by both an arcane and a divine spell hard cast by you, that enemy has disadvantage on the next saving throw it makes against a spell you cast. Your next spell that deals damage against that creature deals extra damage equal to your Intelligence if it's not already applied, and equal to your Wisdom modifier if it's not already applied.
- Translocation
  Translocation
  Prerequisite: Spellcasting class feature from the Wizard spell list; 1 Loyalty to the Mages Guild.
  To walk between the world is no easy feat. but to you it is as simple as can be.
  - Whenever you teleport in any fashion, you can increase its distance up to 50%, rounded down.
  - Whenever an enemy misses you with a melee attack, you can freely teleport 5 feet but must remain within a creature's reach.
  - Whenever you take the dash action, the distance moved is through teleportation and you can teleport anywhere within the range that you can see and is within distance. This distance is augmented by this feat.
- Fate-bound
  Fate-bound
  Prerequisite: Spellcasting class feature from the Wizard spell list; 1 Loyalty to the Mages Guild.
  Bound in fate, you know how to follow its rhythm to focus your spells.
  - On the third round of combat, enemies have disadvantage on saving throws against your spells. This effect lasts 1 round, and only if you have at least 3 levels in Wizard.
  - On the sixth round of combat, all damage you deal with spells is doubled for 1 round. This effect occurs only if you have at least 6 levels in Wizard.
  - On the ninth round of combat, you are healed for half of your maximum hit points if you are conscious. This effect occurs only if you have at least 9 levels in Wizard.
- Starcall
  Starcall
  Prerequisite: Spellcasting class feature from the Wizard spell list; 1 Loyalty to the Mages Guild.
  The Astral Sea flows through your magic and alights your spells.
  - You can freely change any damage you deal with spells to the Astral damage type.
  - If you hard cast the Magic Missile spell, they take on the appearance of comets and one extra dart is created.
  - If you can see the stars of the night sky (such as if its night), then all your spells have their DCs increased by 2 and you critically hit with spells that deal astral damage on a 19 or 20.
The Bard's College
- Duet of Duality
  Duet of Duality
  Prerequisite: 1 Loyalty to the Bards College
  The Bard mimics their own voice while speaking at the same time, allowing them to sing a duet on their own, harmonizing with themselves. This dual aspect of thinking lends itself to martial inclinations as well.
  - You gain a +1 bonus to AC while you are wielding a separate melee weapon in each hand. This bonus does not stack with a shield.
  - You can freely make attacks for two-weapon fighting with your bonus action. You can also cast cantrips as though your hands are free while wielding weapons.
  - Whenever an enemy affected by the Vicious Mockery spell would attack you and miss, you gain advantage on your next attack roll against that creature.
- The Harsh March
  The Harsh March
  Prerequisite: 1 Loyalty to the Bards College
  The bard plays an uplifting melody, inciting all their allies to the rigors of marching and imbues them with increased stamina to sustain themselves for the Harsh March.
  - You can use your bonus action to spend a Bardic Inspiration die to restore 1 level of exhaustion on an ally within 30 feet.
  - Whenever you or an ally uses your Combat Inspiration class feature to deal extra damage, you are healed for the result of the Bardic Inspiration die.
  - You gain +5 movement speed.
- Revelry of Kings
  Revelry of Kings
  Prerequisite: 1 Loyalty to the Bards College
  The bard performs a celebratory tune, reciting ancient poems and promoting the heroism of kings through their allies, speaking of their courage, their fortitude and strength.
  - Whenever you heal an ally, that ally can gain temporary hit points equal to your Charisma modifier. An ally can only benefit from this ability once before finishing a long rest.
  - Whenever you would remove a harmful condition from an ally that was inflicted by an enemy, they are healed a number of hit points equal to your Charisma modifier.
  - You have advantage on saving throws against effects that would inflict the Frightened condition.
- Jam of Slams
  Jam of Slams
  Prerequisite: 1 Loyalty to the Bards College.
  By using large percussion instruments, hammers, headbutts or rocks, the bard creates a powerful thundering barrage of notes. These pump up their allies, but more importantly, slam their enemies.
  - You can reroll the damage die of any thunder damage you deal once. You must take the better result.
  - Whenever you deal thunder damage, you do 4 extra thunder damage. This effect can only occur once for each source of thunder damage.
  - You have advantage on saving throws against being deafened.

Rules As In Verum (RAIV)

In base Fifth Edition D&D, there is an incredibly helpful source of rulings made by the creators known as Sage Advice. This source depicts questions made by players and answers by the creators. The Dungeon Masters of Verum have gone through these rulings and made some specific tweaks, so that they more accurately fit with Verum’s balance. The document these changes have been allocated to can be located HERE.

Before Playing

Joining Verum
Maptools
- Character Tokens
- Joining a Session in Maptools

Scheduling
Hiatus
Roleplaying
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Metagaming
Player Behavior and Discipline

Playing the Game

Approved 5e Books
Sessions and Missions
- Tiers of Play
- RP Lock
Character Experience (Mission Value)
Prestige
Downtime
- Downtime Days
- Crafting Days
Trading
- Player-to-Player Trading
- Faction Bank
Fluid Time
Lore

Verum Character Creation

Character Sheets

Filling Out a Character Sheet

Character Alignments
- Prime Actions
- Oaths
Ability Scores
- Martial Skill
Races
Classes
Origins
Factions
Companies
Religion
- Domains
Backstory

Specific Verum Homebrew

Adventuring
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- Death
- Instant Death
- Ruthless
- Scent
- Lifesense
- Teleportation
Combat
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Spellcasting
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Race Changes
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Class Changes
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- Barbarian
- Cleric
- Druid
- Fighter
- Monk
- Ranger (Revised)
- Sorcerer
- Warlock
- Wizard
Equipment
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Feats