HE HE HO HO ZAREYL LORE

ok lets see where to start!! zareyl is drow who grew up in the underdark with a really abusive mother 😀 she raised all her childern to extremely strict standards with harsh punishments whenever they werent up to her standards (which was often). he was never allowed to leave the house so the only socialization he had were his tutors (which kept themselves distanced from the children), his older sister, and occasionally his dad (who was not allowed to dote on the children, but would sneak time with them against the mother's wishes). his dad actually teaches him how to play the pan flute and gives him his own flute as a gift <3

mom finds out about these stolen moments, and she is Not Happy!!! and to teach the kids a lesson - theyre around... i dont remember the exact ages, around 70 years old for Zareyl and 80 for his sister Inwyss? which in elf years is something closer to, idk, 15 human years roughly, to guesstimate. and she decides to just! murder her husband in front of the two of them.

thats the straw that broke the camels back for Inwyss - so she ran away. but Zareyl stayed, because they had two younger brothers - one of which was a literal newborn - and he was afraid of what would happen to them if he did. at least if he stayed he could make his mom focus her punishments on him instead.

so his life miserably goes on, making sure to be there for his brothers and show them the love and care their mom wouldnt. he doesnt speak a lot about their dad because hes scarred and it hurts, but he refuses to tell them it was their mom that killed him. and at one point, when he sees her focus start going towards his brothers as well, he decides enough is enough - he sneaks out of the house, bumbles his way to find some poison, and tries to kill her. spoiler alert, he is wildly ignorant about poisons, and barely had any money to himself anyways, so he just makes her seriously ill. terrified that she was going to kill him in front of his brothers like she did his father, he decides the best course of action for them is to do what his sister did and leave. he tells them he loves them and will be back one day, apologizes over and over, and leaves them the pan flute his dad left him, as a trinket and a promise.

so he runs away! and he goes to the surface, learns a lot about nature and some about people. eventually he gets recruited in this adventurer's guild, which was actually pretty defunct and him and the new people he meets are tasked, if they will, with bringing it back to old glory. hes like, fuck it, its something to do, itll help me actually have someplace to stay, and id like to help other people. (spoiler alert: we've been doing pretty damn good for ourselves!)

his group (the guild is divided in two groups usually, though the members of the group swap around from time to time - but theyve been with the same group for a few months at the start) has this particularly handsome tiefling, who isnt afraid to show his distaste for zareyl for the simple act of being a drow. and you know what, zareyl doesnt mind that! he finds his honesty disarming, in a good way. he has trust issues, and heres a guy that isnt afraid to let him know he doesnt like him, and whats more honest than that? eventually they get to know each other better and they become friends, and at this point in time zareyl has fallen HAAARD for him. there was a point in a mission where zareyl kind of fell unconscious, bitch almost drowned, and Quies (the tiefling) did CPR on him - except that Zareyl wasn't unconscious, just paralyzed, and so he thinks back to that fucking kiss every week of his life. they also slept together in the same bed once and Zareyl barely got a wink of rest.

they have also adopted a false god baby together. 🤭 everyone was like "its a FALSE GOD, the last one was burning people to a crisp, you should kill it before it grows up to be evil" and we were like "um actually, fuck you, this is a literal baby and we don't believe in the concept of 'youre destined to be this and it cannot be changed', touch this baby and youre dead". so his name is Sedd and hes being taken care of by someone they trust as we keep on adventuring and they dote on him when they are back at the guild

ANYWAYS his current mission? going back to his hometown, to get his brothers. he feels so much guilt over leaving them, and hes terrified of what has happened to them in the meantime - but with a good guild with a solid set of people he trusts as staff (and a few kobolds), he finally has a home for them to go to where they can be safe and grow up properly. so that's where he's headed, and he's terrified, but his friends are there with him to support him. (im lowkey hoping we get to fight and kill his mom, but that might be too traumatizing for the brothers, so we'll see)

hmmmmm who are your ocs?

hi lex!!

aghhhh okay now youve got me started :DD im gonna describe the world they live in a bit and then go into a brief description of each character

so the world they live in is very much inspired by classic dnd world. i do not know how else to describe it soooo. anyways the main kingdom is called the kingdom of the lost ones because it is known for not having a direct bloodline of succession. like the rulers children do not tend to take over the throne. so its often lower class people who take the throne, either scholars or soldiers or something like that, people who have the populations respect. also there is a group of necromancers who live in the forest and are a fun found family!

now for the characters!!

jeannemarie-47 she/her

she is one of the queens of the kingdom. she is married to reina. they have both been queens for about five years, since the precious ruler died and named reina his successor. jeannemarie is a magic user, and specializes with healing and light magic. she has a brother named beatrice

reina-49 she/her

reina is the other queen of the kingdom. she is a former general, and that is how she rose in ranks and grew to be respected enough to be named successor to the throne. she is a very calm and strong presence and the people love her.

corinne-17 they/them

corinne is the prince of the kingdom and their moms are the queens. they are very creative and energetic and charismatic, but kind of resent being royalty, since theyre not used to it at all. they spend most of their time out of castle. they use a cane. they were found on a battlefield as a baby by reina and adopted by reina and jeannemarie.

beatrice-39-she/he

beatrice is jeannemaries younger brother. she is the leader of a group of necromancers that live in the forest near the kingdom. he was the primary caretaker of jaymie as jaymie was growing up. she loves her sister a lot and they have a very close relationship. he is also a magic user, but unlike her sister, she is a necromancer. he has a prosthetic arm made out of a reanimated skeleton arm.

jaymie-16 he/him

jaymie was found in the middle of the forest as an infant by the group of necromancers. they all kind of adopted him, but his primary parent would be beatrice. he loves plants and nature a lot. his family all thought he didnt have magic for the longest time (magic takes a bit to manifest in this world and he was a late bloomer even by those standards) and they were all chill with that. but then one day he started doing nature and healing magic. so beatrice was like ‘hey do you want to go live with my sister for a bit because she knows a lot more about this stuff then any of us do’

anyways thats the basic premise of the characters and setting! sorry it got so long lol, and thank you for the ask!

edit: oh also if you want to see art or see more about the characters, the tag on my blog is “the kingdom of the lost ones”

well that's it lads. we will never see jack or jenna ever again

Do you know a good place to learn how to play D &D. A group of friends have invited me to join in a game, but I have no idea how it works lol.

Hmmm.. thats a good question. I think there isnt just one good answer either. For myself being still a relatively "new" DnD player I watch ALOT of DnD related videos to try and learn rules and how to better play classes etc Theres a couple of youtube channels I can recommend that Ive watched a few vids and liked. Heres a short list:* DnD Beyond(official and has good advice)* Zee Bashew (amazing tips all done in comedic animation)* XP to Level 3 (good tips and some funny elements that make for a fun watch)* Talking 20(Good tips)* Matthew Colville( some people dont like him but he does have some good tips, specifically for beginners)* Tablerop Weekly (only a few tip vids)(( I think thats all I have for now on youtube recommendations))I also think, if you can, give the players handbook a quick read. Or go online and look up all the classes, read up on them, and then pick the one you think sounds the coolest or most fun. I suggest then going and specifically learning about that one. Dont overload on knowledge, try to zero in on just what youre going to be playing. Thats sort of what I do and it helps.As for rules specifically for playing. I struggled with those when I first started and still sort of do, but watching Critical Role has helped. So my other recommendation is that it you have time, watch a little of someone else playing. Doesnt have to be Critrole. Anyone will do for this purpose. Just to see how the flow works.Good flow is RP moments, rolling to investigate or gain knowledge (through: Persception, Investigation, Survival, Nature, etc rolls), then combat.Combat is hands down the most difficult part of DnD because its where all the mechanics start coming into play.This is were some people would advice to play a Class that has no magic to make combat easier. My first roll was Barbarian and my second now is Rogue. Spells are fun but can be hard to manage. I know this was a lot of.. not the most helpful advice. Hopefully the videos help more. And I hope your upcoming game is really fun!You'll have to message me and let me know what you rolled (character wise) and how your first game is going. As ya'll have seen lately Ive been OBSESSED with DnD. So anyone anytime can come to me and talk about DnD. I love that shit. Also I made a sideblog specifically for DnD related stuff so my main doesnt get bogged down and make none DnD fans mad. The new blog is Storms-dnd-archive if anyone is intereted. Its mostly Critical Role right now, but Im in the process of moving a lot of stuff from here to there. Its going to be DnD stuff in general. Hopefully DnD tips too. Also I actually tag over there so its easier to find things. Anyways. Ramble over, hoped this helped!

8, 14, 17 for the dnd asks!

thank you!!!!

8: what does your dream dice set look like?

hmmm i’m not sure…. definitely blue. probably that etheral yeti one miho sent yesterday that i fell in love with haha they’re so pretty!!!!!

14: what inspired you to make your character?

i guess i’ll go through each of them.

norixius kava, dragonborn paladin (out of the abyss). this was my first one and i had no idea how dnd worked haha at all. in the car on the way to my cousins place, i was driving, and my dad and brother were reading through the books and talking about the races and classes and stuff and explaining to me bc obvi i couldnt read them bc i was driving haha. anyway we got to my cousins place and each of them paired up w the three of us to help make our first characters and we rolled for stats and they asked if i had anything i wanted to play and i was like “idk dragonborn sounds really cool” and they were like thats as good a reason as any, and then they suggested paladin would work well w my stats so i was like sure why not and did it haha. she survived the campaign, to level 11

matilda, human monk (curse of strahd). this was point buy system. i had mentioned seeing a homebrew avatar thing, so one of my cousins mentioned how way of the four elements monk is like the avatar, so i read through it and thought it sounded cool. i took the mobile feat, and went way of open hand instead. in this campaign we had a fight where four characters died outright (three deaths due to natural 1s in the death saves) and only two survived, including matilda. the dm mentioned taking the dead people to another room to discuss what to do and i was like “nah brian and i will just move since we’re the only alive one and theres more of you”. they ended up becoming revernants (idk spelling) but i suggested adding a caveat in place where every time you died as a revernant, you lost 1hp from your max, which we did. we then abandoned this campaign after 4 levels bc my uncle who was dm-ing was having trouble finding the time to read the campaign

jamnugget, gnome fighter (arcane archer) (storm kings thunder). this was rolling stats. one cousin rolled between 13 and 18 for every stat, and after race ability improvements got all 14-18…. so he multiclassed all of them and got to level 12 as one of each class it was a beautiful amalgamation (omg i spelt that correctly first try haha). then someone else rolled three single digit stats but was told he wasnt allowed to reroll so he became a druid for wildshape. he had -2 con, so only adding 3hp per level, starting at 6hp. 3rd level before he got double digits. if you averaged the rolls of these two you got normal stats haha. anyway onto my character. my cousin suggested the arcane archer thing on unearthed arcana so i was like “sure ok”. turns out you only got two magic arrows per rest thing and they werent very good so i hardly used them. the sharpshooter feat was way better. the best part tho was bc we were fighting so many giants, at one point someone cast fly on me, someone else cast greater invisibility on me, someone else gave me bless, so then i went in a chased a giant just shooting him on my own while everyone else was doing something else it was great. i also accidentally succeeded on an intimidation check bc an npc was saying “im sure we could handle a giant” when we asked about that and i was like “ive killed 15 myself” (bc we were keeping tallies on our sheets) and the guy panicked bc was technically in an alliance w them whoops. jamnugget survived the campaign. six of the seven original characters survived to the end, my brother went through four characters

maegrakka, half elf barbarian. we were told to make characters for a quick one shot dungeon thing for when storm kings thunder dm wasnt able to make it. so i made a barbarian bc i decided that was something i hadnt done yet and would be easy to just make (no spells. i have a strong aversion to spell casters). i think shes level 3 now???? every time we play this everyones like “wait whats my character again” bc its so long in between haha

nissa, human rogue 1 monk 2. one shot a friend wanted to dm before he moved to canberra. it was very fun. i made a monk bc i was desperate to play again bc matilda had been abandoned. i added a rogue level for sneak attack damage, w mobile feat, it was great

clover, human fighter 11 or 12, monk 3 or 4. level 15 fight to the death situation. i knew how powerful the arcane archer stuff was so i did it here. monk levels were to give me back up in case i got engaged in melee. i shouldve had some sort of healing that was my downfall. my first character to die bc three of them were ganging up on me!!

meredith, elf wizard (tomb of annihilation). we started off playing as commoners, as servants to this lord guy. so i was a librarian and realised id have to be a wizard dammit. i hated the spell casting part haha. she died. its funny bc my dads character died at first level, then we levelled up. brians character died at second level, then we levelled up. they were also sitting next to each other. i was sitting in the next seat along so was worried i was also gonna die… then my brother took that seat and died instead. so i was like there is definitely a curse. i was in the next seat along, and then one of my cousins. then came a fight where my cousin next to me turned to stone and then i died. turns out he could come back to life so the death seat thing continued. we levelled up to level 4 after my brother and i died in separate sessions in the same location. also my dad and brian died in the same location in separate session. so now theres multiple patterns - theres the “someone needs to die to level up” thing, and the death seat thing, and the two characters dying in the same location in separate sessions thing. w my cousin who got turned to stone, i keep on insisting he stays in the death seat bc either he dies (death seat) or he doesnt (he tricked death w the stone thing so is now immune), and if he doesnt die either it skips him and my uncle dies, or no one else dies ever. its very exciting haha. also w this campaign theres a map thing only the og characters can see and we’re joking how now only three characters left can see it and you can see how my cousin the dm is getting worried that we’ll all die haha. also the campaign is about how the og characters lord got sick and we need to find a cure, but once the og characters die then who cares about the random lord? itll be very funny haha

elenoa, tabaxi monk (tomb of annihilation). since i started at level 4 here, and matildas campaign got abandoned at level 4, it felt fitting to play a monk again. no mobile feat yet, but im playing the sun soul monk from xanathars which gives a radiant punch w a range of 30 ft so i dont need to get close to punch and then use mobile to run away. 

i havent even talked about where the names for each one came from….. maybe another time if asked……..

17: what is your favourite race?

idk actually. the only races ive ever played multiple times are humans, but altogether ive played longer as a dragonborn or gnome than human so like. theres not super much difference in the races in phb, like its just flavour. the new races and stuff have heaps extra stuff, but tabaxi is the only one of them ive ever played and only two sessions so far. i think humans are cool bc you get a feat at level 1 haha but other than that theres not really much difference in them yknow? races w darkvision make things easier too haha but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

thank you for these asks!!! it took so long to respond haha im gonna be late to uni now (bc still in pjs havent made lunch or brushed teeth or anything and if i wanna be on time i gotta leave in the next 15 minutes so maybe ill just…… skip this lecture lol idk haha