The Veiled Face of Chaos: Campaign Framework for Players

Player edition. Everything in this document may be read before play. Eversia contains disputed histories, incomplete records, and institutions that present their own versions of the truth. This guide describes what characters might reasonably know; it does not provide final answers to the world's mysteries.

Pitch

Beyond the Gods' Teeth lies Genosia, once the most wondrous realm in Eversia. Three hundred and eleven years ago it shattered. Some say an enemy destroyed it; others say its own marvelous machines failed. Still others speak of a dead god. No one can prove what happened.

Mana is life unbound in Genosia. Forests, beasts, and people have changed across generations, while immense creatures roam among the ruins of engines and cities. Descendants of those who survived have built lives there through three centuries of hardship. They are formidable, and the fallen land is theirs to navigate.

The University of Arcana sends you across the Gods' Teeth to recover a lost marvel. That first journey is only the beginning. What you find will draw you into mysteries and rivalries across Eversia, from buried machines to the halls of governments and libraries. An engine might power a city; a recovered record might bring down its ruler. Who gets the object, who learns the truth, and what will either of them do next? Your choices will help decide what Eversia becomes.

Player overview

Eversia is rebuilding after a world war and the destruction of its most technologically advanced realm. Its surviving regions have distinct histories, faiths, institutions, and claims upon the discoveries buried across Genosia and elsewhere. People disagree about whether gods once shaped the world at all. They agree that ancient Aetheric engines and other Genosian works still exist—and that recovering one can change lives far beyond an expedition's crew.

The campaign begins in Philly, a city of the Kinlands, where the University of Arcana is recruiting people for an expedition into Genosia. The first assignment involves a sea crossing, altered wilderness, and ancient underground works. Later missions may lead to tombs, ruins, distant regions, government halls, neighborhood streets, or mysteries that never approach Genosia.

Each mission stands on its own while changing a shared world. The crew may differ from one session to another. What one crew discovers, conceals, releases, damages, or leaves behind becomes part of Eversia's continuing history.

Any published class, ancestry, or Community can contribute. A crew may need people who can fight, investigate, navigate, bargain, mend, understand old devices, notice what others miss, and decide what to do when an assignment no longer tells the whole story.

Tone and feel

• Jules Verne meets The Walking Dead meets Howl's Moving Castle It can only be experienced, not explained, really.
• Wonder and danger: Missions uncover marvelous technology and strange life, often at personal cost.
• Expedition survival: In dangerous territory, preparation, supplies, trust, and the route home matter.
• Investigation and intrigue: Clues in cities, archives, workshops, and government offices can be as dangerous as a ruin.
• Dungeon exploration: Expeditions into Genosia often combine an overland crossing with ancient sewers, tombs, or broken facilities.
• Hard-won survival: Genosian communities have endured three centuries of transformation and scarcity through choices outsiders may find brutal.
• Layered technology: Black powder, pepperboxes, and steam machinery coexist with mana-powered artifacts that no living institution can reliably reproduce.

Themes

• Who controls discovery? Finders, scholars, sponsors, governments, communities, and others may assert competing claims upon an object or piece of information.
• What can be believed? Lost archives, inherited stories, contradictory evidence, and institutional interests complicate every account of the past.
• What should be restored? A recovered marvel might relieve suffering, concentrate power, or do both at once.
• What reaches the world? Choosing who receives an artifact or learns a secret can matter as much as recovering it.
• How do people survive change? Individuals, communities, and nations must adapt when a discovery changes what is possible.

Touchstones

What the people of Eversia know

A world of disputed gods

Eversia's principal continent, Dikaioma, curves around the water-separated land of Genosia. Ancient religion describes nine divine powers: Quadorma at the center of four opposed pairs—Order and Chaos, War and Peace, Good and Evil, Love and Hate. Eight regions retain traditional associations with those powers.

Whether the gods ever existed is an open question. Religious teachings, inherited memories, surviving records, and national traditions disagree. Many people believe the gods are a shared fiction preserved by governments and temples. Others regard the ruins, magic, and shape of history as evidence that something divine once walked the world. Neither side can prove its account.

Faith and magic remain real parts of daily life. Answered prayers and miraculous acts demonstrate that magic exists (magic exists outside the any gods as well), but they do not settle who or what answers—or whether the ancient stories are history.

The War of Four Generations

The old world was broken by a conflict lasting approximately 120 years and four human generations. Armies crossed Dikaioma, borders moved, settlements vanished, and roads ended at abandoned fortifications. Communication routes, schools, and archives were deliberately destroyed. So much evidence was lost that even the causes of the war are now disputed.

A widespread explanation blames peoples historically associated with War, especially orcs and giants, and treats their supposed aggression as the cause. This is prejudice, not established history. An ancestry does not determine a person's nature, loyalty, or appetite for violence.

The war's injuries remain visible. The Grainfall bears scars from magic and black powder. Much of the dwarven Mid-dark stands empty. Families separated during the war now live on opposite sides of hostile borders.

The Fall of Genosia

Before its destruction, Genosia was famous for Aetherics: mana-powered engines, portals, vehicles, tools, and civic systems. Some surviving devices continue functioning after three centuries without understood maintenance.

Genosia fell 311 years ago, shortly after the war ended. Some historians argue that foreign powers attacked it before peace had truly taken hold. Others believe an experiment, industrial failure, or attempted upgrade escaped all control. Religious traditions speak of a god's death, although they disagree about what died and whether the Fall was punishment, sacrifice, murder, or consequence.

Whatever happened, the land broke. The Gods' Teeth rose from the surrounding waters, fragments and artifacts were scattered across Eversia, and chaotic mana transformed Genosia.

Life unbound

Mana does more than fuel spells. It participates in life itself. In Genosia it has altered plants, animals, people, and sometimes the terrain at extraordinary speed. Immense creatures cross its wilderness, while stranger forms survive in ruins, rivers, caverns, and abandoned machines.

Genosia is not an empty ruin awaiting discovery. Its peoples descend from those who survived the Fall and built lives during the three centuries since. Some communities trade or negotiate with outsiders. Others raid, defend their territories fiercely, or survive by rules visitors may find harsh. No single settlement speaks for all Genosians.

Death and the Soul

There's no mystery about the soul. When someone dies, everyone can see a soft, blurry, undetailed ectoplasmic image of the soul leaving somebody's body. It quickly forms into an ectoplasmic sphere about the size of a softball. There's a real physical object. A person could touch it, herd it into a bag, but in all cases, it doesn't take long for it to seep through any matter or any barrier and move in a direction that it's drawn to. Whether that be deep in the ground or flying off into the sky

There is no argument that these souls go somewhere and then return to the world of mortals as newly conceived life. Reincarnation. There's no particular hard evidence, and yet there's also not much argument that that's what happens. A priori.

It's also known that in the world, mostly in what's called the Divine Kingdom, there are Soulsmiths. These incredible artificers know how to interact with souls in such a way as to trap them inside the votary, which DaggerHeart Core rules would call "clanks." Using souls or soul fragments, because often souls can be recaptured even if they were literally blown to smithereens. Soulsmiths use these to animate these soft brass and bronze automatons.

Aetherics today

Working Aetheric technology is scarce, valuable, and unevenly distributed. The following terms are widely used, although scholars continue to argue about their construction and origins:

The Kinlands and Divine Kingdom continue trying to restore Aetheric systems. Regions farther from Genosia rely more heavily upon black powder, steam machinery, and other technologies. A single recovered device can therefore affect trade, public works, warfare, medicine, or political power.

The Reflectorium

During the War of Four Generations, libraries and schools began cooperating across borders to save books and records from destruction. After the Fall, these efforts became the Reflectorium, an independent network of libraries found in cities throughout Eversia.

Its public houses lend books, teach, preserve local histories, assist researchers, and serve readers from many walks of life. A village visitor might regard one with awe; a city resident might treat it as an ordinary public convenience. Travelers and political figures often value the Reflectorium's reach while wondering how much information such a widespread institution possesses.

The best-known traveling members are the Cobalt Blues, librarian-monks trained for approximately a decade in scholarship, diplomacy, survival, etiquette, and unarmed martial arts. They retrieve endangered texts and artifacts, investigate uncertain reports, and work in places where magic or specialized equipment may fail. They command respect, although age, temperament, and experience differ from one Cobalt Blue to another.

The Reflectorium's guiding principle is: To change the world for the better, be informed and Reflect. What changing the world “for the better” requires is not always obvious—and not everyone trusts the same institution to decide.

The regions of Eversia

These are historic associations and broad introductions, not descriptions of every inhabitant.

Quadorma has no corresponding territory. Regional associations are histories, stereotypes, and institutions—not judgments upon every person born there.

Scattershot campaign structure

Scattershot combines open-world choice with self-contained one-shot missions. Each scheduled session begins with an assignment and whichever players and characters are available. They are the people hired or otherwise drawn together for that job, so the crew can change naturally from session to session.

A mission reaches a resolution within its session, whether the crew succeeds, fails, withdraws, or changes its goal. Its consequences become part of Eversia's ongoing history. A completed mission is not reset or replayed for another group sharing this campaign's continuity.

1. Choose a mission. The first assignment launches the campaign. Once players know more about Eversia, the GM may offer leads in different regions. The players choose which one to pursue.
2. Assemble the crew. Available players bring returning characters or new hires who have reasons to accept that assignment. A character can miss a mission without requiring an explanation for why everyone else continued without them.
3. Resolve the mission. Each adventure has its own opening, objective, complications, and outcome. An NPC guide may help orient the crew, but the characters make the consequential choices.
4. Update the Reflectorium record. Afterward, record where the crew went, what it witnessed, what it chose, how the mission ended, and what remains uncertain. This shared record distinguishes firsthand observations from reports and theories. Later crews can investigate, challenge, or act upon what earlier crews recorded.
5. Advance characters. Each character gains one level for every two missions they complete. A mission counts when its story resolves, including failure, withdrawal, or an outcome different from the original objective. Completed missions are tracked separately for each character.

Joining an experienced crew

For a new character, calculate the average level of the crew before adding that character. Round a fractional average down, then begin the new character one level below that average, with a minimum of level 1. Adjust the starting level if necessary so the newcomer is no more than one level below the highest-level character on the mission.

An established character may be raised by at most one level to join a mission. If that still leaves too large a gap, the player is encouraged to create a new character suited to this crew and save the established character for a future mission. An existing character does not have to skip several levels of their own story to participate.

Example: If the crew is around level 5 and a player wants to return with a level 1 character, they are encouraged to make a new level 4 character for this mission. Their level 1 character remains available for a lower-level mission.

Creating an Eversian character

Communities

All published Community cards are available. Community describes the culture and circumstances that raised a character. It is distinct from nationality, ancestry, profession, and current residence. A character raised in one region may now live in another, and neighbors within the same city may come from different Communities.

These are examples, not regional menus. Choose any available Community and explain how that upbringing arose.

Character question: What people and place raised you, and what did they teach you about the rest of Eversia?

Ancestries

All published ancestries and Mixed Ancestry are available. The following associations describe historical roots and large populations. They never restrict character creation. Migration, war, trade, enslavement, adoption, refuge, and ordinary travel have carried families throughout Eversia.

Cross-regional histories: Dwarven settlements in the Mid-dark cross modern borders beneath several mountain ranges. Firbolg peoples have long traveled the temperate grasslands without a single national homeland. Fungril peoples trace their roots to southern swamps. Humans have lived throughout Eversia for as long as surviving histories can tell. An ancestry introduced outside the Core Set does not need an invented ancient homeland before it can be played.

Published Ancestry Features function normally. Player characters express exceptional capabilities, so the existence of a feature does not mean every member of that ancestry possesses it to the same degree.

DARK ELF ANCESTRY

Once indistinguishable from all other elves a colony of wise and knowledgeable elves, with many great wizards, wishing to free themselves from the machinations of the Fea Courts. crossed from Uuden into the Unnamed Forest south of the Deep and north of the Longing Wastes.

There they lived peacefully and continued, in their isolation, with great studies of the magical world and built themselves a tower just inside the wastes as a training ground.

During the War of Four Generations, this tribe, simply calling themselves the Fey people, found themselves surrounded on four sides by enemies and frenemies. They declared themselves neutral. Helping any that could pay for it and none that could not . Finally, they were betrayed and conquered by the forces of Cruce and of course made to suffer .

Emperor Ghiltar, cursed all of Fey blood in that land with a change of features and an albino look. Then declared they were no longer people and could be used for any purpose.

When the war ended, they were free people once more, but even with their lighter complexion, they were called the Dark Elves. And at best, dark elves could not be relied upon, and at worst, they were inherently untrustworthy, with no morals to speak of . There is no truth to this, but the labeling and reputation stuck.

However, they did perfectly achieve the isolation that they sought.

A player character playing as a dark elf should take on board as much of this lore and history as they're comfortable with.

Votary characters

Votaries are Clanks most strongly associated with the Divine Kingdom and its Soul Smiths. Many were created for service, but free Votaries, escaped Votaries, independently constructed Clanks, and other origins are possible. Work with the GM to decide what your character understands about their own construction and what remains uncertain.

Votaries do not breathe, eat, digest, use a bathroom, or suffer the ordinary effects of poison. They can function across a wide range of temperatures while their joints remain operable. Unless properly sealed, they function poorly underwater. Their brass-sheet bodies can be tough at the surface while remaining hollow within. They periodically enter a dreamless restore mode rather than biological sleep.

A Votary repairs physical damage during downtime with brass sheets, small hammers, tinning shears, alcohol torches, and solder. A traveling Votary can comfortably carry enough material to repair their total HP once, and greater experience makes that material more efficient. A specialist shop or capable tinsmith can later replace visible field repairs with careful finish work.

Under this campaign rule, magical healing does not restore a Votary's HP or Stress. Restore mode, appropriate repair, and ordinary nonmagical downtime recovery remain available. Wild or toxic mana may interfere with a Votary, but any mechanical danger will be announced through the environment rather than imposed without warning.

Classes and magic

All thirteen current classes and their published subclasses are available: Assassin, Bard, Brawler, Druid, Guardian, Ranger, Rogue, Seraph, Sorcerer, Warlock, Warrior, Witch, and Wizard. Class features, subclasses, domains, and spells work as printed unless a stated campaign rule changes them. A class describes capabilities; it does not automatically grant membership in a temple, university, military, or other organization.

Bards, Brawlers, Druids, Guardians, Rangers, Rogues, Warriors, and Assassins require no setting-specific change. A Cobalt Blue is an institutional role, not a required class.

Player principles

Bring a reason to take the job. Decide what your character hopes to gain, learn, protect, prove, repair, or leave behind by accepting a mission. That reason can change as the character does.

Rely on the whole crew. A mission may cross wilderness, ruins, and city streets. Make room for another character to solve a problem your own character could not, and let their choices change your plans.

Follow the trail beyond the assignment. Employers do not always possess the complete story—and do not always tell everything they know. Ask questions when the evidence contradicts the assignment.

Choose what reaches the world. An artifact, recovered record, or disclosed secret might change how people live. When a discovery creates competing claims, decide who receives it, who learns about it, and what responsibility follows from that choice. You may change your mind as you learn more.

Session Zero and character connections

Patience and respect

Patience and respect are mandatory at this table. Daggerheart and this campaign are new to us, including the GM. Give one another time to learn, think, ask questions, and correct course. Listen when someone else is speaking, avoid talking over them, and make room for everyone to contribute without pressuring anyone to speak.

People will sometimes misunderstand one another or say something badly. When that happens, speak sincerely, listen to the answer, apologize when appropriate, and work out what needs to change. Anyone can raise a concern with the GM during a session or afterward. No one has to explain a personal history to ask that a scene be handled differently.

The world's background

Eversia contains exploitation, prejudice, vice, and cruelty alongside kindness, pleasure, and ordinary daily life. The setting draws upon patterns that recur throughout real history and continue in the present. Slavery, brothels, pubs and taverns, drunkenness, tobacco use where available, misuse of medicines or other drugs, swearing, and cruelty may exist in the background without becoming the subject of a mission. Characters may encounter prejudice against women, poor people, fat people, or people whose appearance others consider unusual.

Their presence does not ask players to approve of them, and no single culture or adventure must contain every element. If a particular portrayal lands badly, tell the GM; the concern will be heard, and the scene can be handled differently.

Life in Philly before the posting

At the beginning of the campaign, the characters are not already adventuring in Philly or around the University of Arcana. Each has a job or regular role before answering the University's posting. Choose from the GM's list or propose something appropriate to the city. More than one character may choose the same role.

The GM asks two or three questions based upon the chosen roles: Who works together? Whose paths cross during an ordinary day? What does one character already know about another? A barista might serve a street cleaner coffee every morning; two unarmed security workers might share a shift at the wharf. Players decide how much those encounters mean to their characters and may reflect that history in their Daggerheart Experiences.

When the University posting appears, every character has a reason to answer it. The crew may have met before, but this is the first adventure they undertake together.

For later Scattershot missions, the GM asks two or three questions tailored to that session's crew. The answers establish why these characters came together, what they know about one another, and which Experiences may matter. New connections can form even when the roster changes for the next mission.

Before your first mission

Come prepared with:

• A character using any published ancestry, Community, class, and subclass approved for the table.
• A reason that character would answer an unusual University of Arcana posting.
• A job or ordinary role in Philly before the campaign begins.
• An idea about what the character hopes to gain, learn, protect, prove, repair, or escape.
• A willingness to discover connections with the other characters through the GM's questions.

The posting is an invitation. What follows from answering it belongs to the crew.

Player homebrew references

• Granny Nettles’ Book of Small Spites
• Sour the Draught
• DAG Flintlock
• Ancestries