The world of Ghetto DnD

As said in the title, This is where I'm going to write out all my stuff on my world of Ghetto DnD. Although Its going to be a bit more like I'm talking to myself of this world that I live in. Maybe its always a good thing to remind yourself of stuff while you can. I don't know who's going to be reading this, but feel free to message me anywhere BUT here. I would rather keep this clean for anything relating to my experiences here.


Anyway first lesson: this world has no name.

Thats right, it was never named, so call it what you will. Naming things places a limit on it on the mind, so leaving the world nameless leaves its openness for all to see.


Second Lesson: The history of Character creation

Character creation in the beginning used to take place in the Nexus, where they were given a name, age, appearance, class, and backstory. Since then it has vastly simplified depending on the need. Now characters are randomly entered with little backstory, a class, and some basic detail. Mostly this is due to the fact that I play with my friends and we only ever have about 30-40min during lunch at school that we play. This has also influenced the complexity of the campaigns we can use, since having to wait until tomorrow to have the same scene of the mage nuking the tank on accident and screwing everything over because he isn't paying any attention really screws with any system of money that can be permanently inputted.


Lesson the Third: The History of this unnamed world

This world is the result of mankind's inevitable rediscovery of lost and forbidden knowledge. Over the years the works of those who manipulated energy has caused the resurfacing of many gods and religions, and has caused quite a stir of the world. Nations rose and fell, Land twisted and changed, the Ocean ebbed and flowed. Mankind forgot the name of this world, and it was unified under one cause: division. The world was split from its grand nations to smaller countries, and smaller still, until only ideas remain. These ideas formed themselves into what the world decided to base themselves off of. Mere ideas, bringing everyone into a divided whole.


Lesson Four: Classes

These Ideas molded into Classes, each depicting what each person was best at. Some became Rift Mages, masters of portal creation and transdimensional matters. Others became Samurai, determined to draw the blade the fastest. Still others went on to master the abilities of their god(s), Priests who evoke their gods abilities. Despite what people chose, they chose what they are good with.

Some of these people, those who are skilled enough, multiclass into whatever suits them. Some have become gunslingers who can call upon the souls of the lost to assist them. Others have become Righteous practitioners of carpentry, building holy monuments that even the greatest priests can say would ward off evil just as well as they could.


Lesson the Fifth: The City of Masters

Classes have divided the world, but have also brought it together. The City of Masters is one such example, as it houses the masters of all classes together as one undivided whole. Those of which would go and seek training from one of these masters, can expect results as soon as they have passed a small test of the master's choosing. Those who pass both the test and the training may progress to the next level in their classes abilities, and eventually progress to master level themselves.


Sixth Lesson: The Energy Square

Energy is divided among four different types, each depending on how it is manipulated and used. Each is weak against another, yet they all share similarities as they are all essentially the same thing.

Spirit Energy is energy of manipulated souls, including that of your own. It overpowers Psychic energy, but can be purified and exorcised by Holy energy

Psychic energy is the manipulation of energy that living things produce, including that of yourself. It allows Arcane energy to free itself, but is overpowered by the energy of the Spirit.

Arcane energy is the energy of otherworldly and divine creatures, bent to the casters willpower. It is freed of its shackles by Psychic energy, and chains Holy energy to its bidding.

Holy energy is the energy of a divine or otherworldly creature that is given with their consent. It can be used to purify and exorcise Spirit energy, but the communion is lost when it is shackled by Arcane energy.


Lesson the Seventh: Classes

Classes that become known have been documented in the main archive, please find your nearest "CM" (Class Master) for any inquiries into learning about classes available. If you are unsure of what any class does at any given level, or are unsure what class would have the ability to do "X", please consult your nearest "CM" . This message brought to you by, Lesson the Seventh: Classes.

Classes branch out into the four energy types, as well as melee, ranged, stealth, and support.


Lesson Eight: The Rumored Black Box

Everyone passes through the City of Masters at some point, usually to learn some basics as a Novice and officially gain a Class title. Some say whenever a group goes adventuring to help a town, or to solve some problem, they are watched by an invisible room in the sky. Rumor has it that this room sometimes materializes as a Black Box in the sky to show itself to these adventurers. It is foretold that whenever a group is about, a man is in the box directing everything. Many call him simply, "the DM", few can truly call him by his preferred title.


Lesson Nine: Religion

Since this worlds rebirth, many Gods and Goddesses have returned. Many are still under investigation, but it is confirmed by sources that the current religions are:

Christian: One God, the Holy one. Dislikes all other religion.

Nordic: Many Gods and Goddesses. Dislikes Christian and Greek, Neutral with other religions. Loves to fight, and values honor and courage above all.

Greek: Many Gods and Goddesses. Dislikes Nordic and anyone who uses the Roman variation of their names, Neutral with other religions. Usually has one of their gods as a preference, leaving many opportunities for other gods of their pantheon to be helpful or harmful depending on the actions those who follow this religion.

Egyptian: Many Gods and Goddesses. Older than most, seems to be quite behind the times. Tolerant, but new in their own respect.

Taoist: Dragons, and the Eight Immortals. Likes to keep to themselves, Prefers not to be to obvious about their dislike of others. Rather condescending if you can get them to be fully honest of their intentions.

Druidic: Worships Nature, belief in reincarnation to "The Otherworld" that is a direct polar opposite to this world. May be either a focus of Nature, or The Otherworld. Usually doesn't have an opinion of other religions, saying it doesn't exactly concern them.

Priests under any of these religions may invoke the powers of any God/Goddess/Divine creature they have consent from. Arcane energy workers usually prefer to chain the energies of the many "local deities" or "lesser deities" that have not been chained back to any of these religions due to complications with chaining the full wrath of a god to their bidding instead of merely foiling their actions.


Lesson the Tenth and Last: Common misconceptions that need to be addressed.

Monks are of affiliation with both the energies of Holy, and Psychic. However may not use either form outside of the body at level one unless multiclassed (Holy energy is available at higher levels).

If a living creature is drained of all its Psychic energy, they die.

If a living creature is drained of all their Spirit energy (their soul), they are cursed with undeath. Likewise if they find that they have become nothing but a collection of Spirit energy, they are cursed to live as a ghost of some form.

All people can become Cursed or Insane, giving them rather unique properties. These properties are highly exploitable by workers energy. Exploitations may become a hindrance or an asset depending on which type of energy manipulation is used to generate effects.

Cursed people may suffer excessive penalties when faced with any sort of Holy energy, including energy that is invoked by the one who is curse.

Insanity causes changed in any usage of Psychic energy, varying from amplification to inhibition. Insanity also may cause Insanity to anyone who attempts to cure or alter the inflicted person. Insanity grants the inflicted a higher resistance to all forms of energy, as well as most forms of damage, at the cost of involuntary actions that may be induced at random.

Guns are not as strong as they were in times of old, a living creature may survive multiple rounds before finally dieing.

Shield scrolls provide a means of protection to any form of assault. They must be activated by applying energy or blood to the scroll. Shield scrolls vary in what they block, so be sure you grab the correct scroll for the situation. Shield scrolls also have a rating at how well they defend you before they break, to deactivate shield scrolls, merely remove any applied blood or energy.

Notable Figures in the world of Ghetto DnD


The King:
My DM avatar, the Mimic master. Has DM abilities, derived from the creation of this world, rivaling the power of any god.

The King is immortal, but only appears in reality to make sure a group of adventurers don't end up intentionally leaving a comrade behind. Otherwise appears all over in strange places, doing strange things. Nobody is entirely sure what his motives are, or if he has any. It is said when one is ready to ascend to the level of a Master Mimic, he will give him the ultimate test.


Dumbass the Tinkerer

Master Tinkerer/Mechanic. What he considers to be the ultimate support class.

Dumbass is self named, as he prefers everyone to think him a crazy idiot, when in reality he is possibly the smartest man alive. It is well known amongst certain circles of his feats, including the creation of a flame spewing tank using nothing but local vegetation, dirt, and gravel found within the dirt. He tends to be rather introverted and moody, preferring to have fun instead of work on the next invention that will change the world. His favorite accomplishment was his mechanical spider that he had programmed to cocoon people within plastic wrap, until it was destroyed in his quest to study the many lands of this world.


Spiderlegs Ragebeard

One of a race of dwarves that have revealed themselves with the rediscovery of Lost and Forbidden knowledge. At a young age he set out to slay Medusa, but was caught by her. Fortunately for him, he had been able to save himself from full petrification, instead only becoming stone from the waist down, and his hands to the forearm. His hands have been frozen in very strange positions, his right with a deathgrip on his favorite war axe, his left as if he were holding something, or clawing at it.

Alone in front of Medusa's new home he stood, unable to do anything, until one day a group went in to slay Medusa. The mage of the group was rather funny, accidentally breaking Ragebeard's legs off. Crawling after his new adversary, Ragebeard eventually was found by Dumbass the Tinkerer, who agreed to make him a new pair of legs. Receiving four new legs of stone that carried him as if he were a spider, Ragebeard officially changed his name to Spiderlegs Ragebeard, and parted ways with Dumbass after swearing to repay him for his kindness.


Chuckles, the Fucking Lich

Not much is known about this monstrosity, only that he is a Lich of what used to be the master clown with the strongest improbability drive. Many fear his name, but much more fear the thought that he may come looking for them to entertain himself.

DM's Log: 4/10/12-4/12/12.
Leprechaun campaign side quest: "Bounty: Organist"

Group:
Greek Priest Lv1 (Hades)
Battlemage Lv1 (Raw Arcane preference)
Greek Priest Lv1 (Ares, Aka "The Spartan") (shall be referred to as the spartan)

Target:
Organist: Level 2 Bard. Instrument: Church Organ
Level 2 Psychic. Power: Dissipate-Sound (can turn himself into sound)


Story:

The group wandered into the church, not quite expecting what to find. Having just earned twenty golden drachmas from their last side quest, the priests were pretty happy. The battlemage was hoping to earn something for himself on this trip, eager to prove his worth. To much of the parties expectations, they walked in to see a dark skinned christian priest with large orblike hair sitting at a bench where they had left him earlier.

Showing this priest the bounty poster, he mumbled something of his dislike toward the other religion and walked off to a corridor beckoning them to follow. Beneath where his holy shotgun was mounted to the wall, lay a trapdoor to a hidden section of the church, as well as traces of faint organ music. Knowing that this is where their target would be, the party boldly set off down the trapdoor into the cavern below.

Making sure to take a quick sweep of the area beforehand, the party concluded nothing man made in the cavern save for the ladder that they climbed down on, and what looked like a door set into a wall on the other side. From inside the cavern they could all hear the church music, as well as knew for sure that it was beyond the door. So setting off for it, they all went inside and closed the door behind them. Inside they spotted a man in a tuxedo, with wild and greasy hair, playing an organ as if he had not left it in weeks.

Thinking it would be best to pull the first move, the Spartan charged forth and impaled the simple organist upon his sword. This however only released sound, as if he was singing, so the Spartan decided to slash upward to free his sword and slay his enemy as his team looked on. Slashing through the sound as if it was nothing, the party looked shocked at the Organist floating above his organ, singing along to the music flowing from the pipes. Putting his hands together the Spartan prayed to Hephaestus and challenged him to make a soundproof blanket.

Effectively pissing off the God of the Forge by saying he couldn't do something, he set right away to working golden fleece into a blanket. Making sure it would be perfect, his creation would arrive far too late. For the organist put his hands together to focus and gather sound as he launched his first blow. Singing "Breve!" as he launched his ball of sound, the organ seemed to shout with him as his blast sent the Spartan flying into the wall, rendering him unconscious. Seeing their teammate being knocked down so easily the others did what seemed most reasonable at the time; Distract him and search for a weakness.

Arguing that something in the song sounded off, the Greek priest managed to buy enough time for the Battlemage to figure out exactly what was going on with this man. Learning that the properties were of Psychic nature when it came to the organist himself, but of a Holy nature concerning the instrument, the Battlemage began devising a plan. Finally fed up with the constant disagreements from the Greek priest, the Organist launched the pipe that was being constantly mentioned at him as if it were a simple spear. Instead of impaling him, the pipe imbedded itself into the ground as the Greek priest jumped to the side.

Seeing the opportunity arising, the Battlemage fired a blast of energy, damaging a pipe beyond repair so that it produced a constant high pitched whistle. Using this to his advantage, the organist began wrapping the sound around his hand like in the form of a spike. Seeing this, the Battlemage began protecting himself with a shield of energy, just as the Spartan woke up and fell down with his shield above him. Positioning himself around the room, the Organist launched the spike to intentionally miss any living targets. Instead aiming at the pipe in the ground the spike of high pitched sound reacted with the Holy energy within the pipe, as well as reverberated within the pipe to release a strong explosion of Psychic and Holy sound into the entire room. The Battlemage lost the majority of his hearing from the blow and the Spartan became the equivalent of a human bell due to hiding underneath his bronze shield.

The Greek priest however, was not so lucky. Being thrown across the room from the raw energy that was thrown at him, he broke more than a few bones on collision with the church organ. Seeing a victim slam to an area nearby, the Organist floated down onto his bench and began playing. Knowing that this was his chance despite being broken, the Greek priest began messing with the Organist. Giving enough time for the Battlemage to charge and fire two energy bombs at the organ, One to blow some keys off the system, the second to explode the inside.

On the second explosion, the organ sucked in the organist to share its demise. Effectively causing an explosion using all four energy types, the fourth being supplied by the soul of the organist himself. The party was barely spared by the blast by Hephaestus's "Fleece of Muffling", which almost suffocated the party before the Spartan decided to pull it off like the overly large and shiny blanket that it was. In the aftermath of the battle the Spartan called upon the gods to heal the Greek priest who was only clinging to life due to a deal with Hades, while the Battlemage went to collect the spoils of war from the tattered tuxedo laying on the ground. Salvaging not only a bunch of rags that he decided to keep, he also found what appeared to be a pink thong in what used to be the pocket.

Thinking his spoils of the thong worthless, he threw it at the Greek priest jokingly, causing a chain reaction that would change their lives forever. The first things the Greek priest heard upon his full revival were his gods arguing amongst each other while Hermes continued healing him, as well as the giggled words "Hi, I'm Chuckles"

And so, after such an epic victory. and a whopping highscore of TWO minor victories. Our "Heros" have once again, as usual, made generally bad decisions that caused the entire campaign to fall apart

As usual the end result has gone somewhere along the lines of:

Disagreement among team, leading to the murder of a fellow teammate.

Multiple disagreements leading to a situation that ends up putting team in situation that makes everything so much more difficult than it has to be.

Missing or outright ignoring DM cues of pity that are suppose to lead the team to an easy victory, usually ending up doing the opposite and making the situation much more difficult than it has to be.



The things that must be dealt with when you play with a group of a Retarded Tank, a Nuke that can't aim, and a Professional that loves playing the Clown class unofficially all the time (pulls off some epic moves, but never helps if he can help it).

Restarting a campaign, our group ends up with finally a DECENT setup due to a 30min rant by me.

Riftmage (lv2) Card Reader (lv1)
Gunslinger (lv1, pistol) Psychic (lv1, Electricity manipulation)
Swordsman (lv1) Conjurer (lv1)

Within the first 10 minutes of the campaign, the Riftmage is sent to prison for the murder of a little girl and her pet cat (which he threw from the top of the church instead of bring down). Bail is 300 gold, party has 0. Locked up in energy canceling cells hidden away from the party.

Meanwhile in order to pay the bail, the remainder of the party has decided to actually continue on the main story, they currently have almost died by electrocuting themselves in the sewer and are about to fight a fully reanimated decomposed gorilla that's wielding two clubs. Personally . . . I don't think they're going to survive and end up doing something stupid like fighting it instead of running like hell down an, already pointed out, escape tunnel.

Due to continual failure, we have two new additions to the world of Ghetto DnD: one being the Co-DMing ability of live campaigns where a CM plays all NPCs and enemies while a DM plays the world, plot, storyline, and interactions. Its a process that was too slow in the making due to the fact that we never thought it would work until we tried it out.

The other newest addition is Races into Ghetto DnD, making it just that much less Ghetto. This does however add a few elements such as the various racial feats, and the concept of half-breeds.

Humans: are good at everything, better at psychics than other races.
-Their Politics are similar to modern day politics

Elves are divided into three categories:
-The High elves with their magic and god complexes.
--Politics include a lot of proving who's the best among the hierarchy.
-The Wood elves with their superior bowmanship and natural druidic tendencies
--Politics include competitions and a hierarchy.
-The Dark elves and their superior stealth skills and affiliation for most things roguelike.
--Politics include tests of skill and strategy

Dwarves are categorized into various clans which all follow the same politics, notable clan variations include:
-Stone Dwarves, which are more absolute sentient golems with the ability to grow and change. They eat stones and die when their energy core runs dry.
-Mountain Dwarves, the eight foot tall troll half-breeds take after dwarves in all respects save for stature and spirit.
--All Dwarf politics consist of either Drinking contests, "Dwarven Olympics", or a Deathmatch. These can occur in any order.

Trolls are the twelve foot tall shamans of the world, each is born with a spirit guide that assists them throughout life.
-Politics are all meditative whilst the spirits of the clan decide.

Orcs are straightforward and aggressive. Usually quick to anger, an Orc must always take the most direct route to anything. Usually thinking after acting, Orcs have been blessed with natural resistance to most physical and energetic damage that can be caused to them due to their nature. Orcs also have a natural berserker tendency that can sometimes be unleashed to allow them to fight unconscious.
-Orc Politics usually involve taking turns punching one another as hard as they can in the face, the winner is the last one conscious or alive. If the loser is slain, the winner claims all of his possessions, as well as his title and his spouse.

Gnomes are the most creative and inventive race amongst those in this world, with Goblins as their closest rival. Gnomes prefer to live in secretive locations so that their creations can remain secret until they're ready to unveil it to the world. Their inventions are world renowned for their ingenuity and craftsmanship, as well as their reputation for success.
-Politics include underground robot battle pits, as well as casual gambling on such exhibitions.

Goblins are the cousins of Gnomes and the only race to embrace the field of engineering and invention. Their cities can be considered similar to giant scrapyards riddled with twisting roads, and explosions. Many avoid Goblin technology due to their reputation to randomly explode, even when working correctly. Goblins have turned these explosions into a excuse to party, and have worked to the point where even simple items have the chance to explode in their faces. Due to the highly volatile nature of their inventions, Goblins have developed a natural high resistance to explosions, especially those that happen nearby.
-Goblin politics usually consist of a high speed race in vehicles of their choice, the winner is the first to cross the finish line with their vehicle causing at least one explosion on any vehicle. This sometimes leads to a debate about who caused an explosion and more racing.

Non-Humanoid races come from the Otherworld, and are usually not talked about. Few know of their Politics, and those who do know choose to keep them secret.