I’ve been pretty into Dungeons & Dragons (a tabletop role playing game, for the uninitiated) for a while, and all along, I’ve played characters who can attack from afar. So, I’ve only played clerics, druids, sorcerers, rangers and rogues, and used only bow and arrows, or spells and cantrips in combat. I’ve also always played characters who were chaotic good, neutral good, or lawful good. My favourite, by far, is being chaotic good, where I follow my own code and morals, societal norms and laws be damned, in pursuit of the greater good. It always makes for a fun campaign, in my opinion.
Half a year ago, one of my Dungeon Masters (DM) pointed out that I tended to not challenge myself and explore new roles. I couldn’t argue, because I knew that was true. So, after that campaign ended, and I had to make a new character for a new campaign, I decided to push myself. I made myself a Tiefling Barbarian, on the Path of the Zealot, min/maxed my stats to make me a toughass tank character, and chose close combat weapons. I also decided that my character, Evabad S (like evil badass, get it? Get it?) would be of a lawful evil alignment. Lawful, not as in following the societal laws, but in following his own code of conduct. In turn, his code of conduct would be wholly based on the rules and whims of his deity, one whose name I now hesitate to mention. Instead of following the typical evil-aligned deities offered in the D&D 5e world, I requested a real world deity that I knew of. I’m just gonna call it RWD (real world deity) for now. My DM approved this, and I was pleased. This RWD was close to pure evil. It was almost like a cross between Bhaal, the Lord of Murder, and Bane, the Black Lord, in the D&D 5e (fifth edition - the newest edition thus far) world.
I started the new campaign nervous. I was experienced mostly as a spellcaster, and sometimes rogues, rangers, but I was entirely new to the mechanics of a barbarian. Sure, I’ve had barbarians in my previous parties, but I never had to figure the mechanics and stats out. I read up plenty on it, but it was wayyy complicated and I decided to just wing it.
Much to my own surprise, I very quickly began to love it. Every aspect of it. It was extremely cathartic, for one. I acted out my darkest impulses. I broke the rules and laws of society (in-game). I beat the shit out of any asshole NPC (non-player character, in case you didn’t know), and even intimidated my own party members. I felt powerful. I felt strong. And above all, I felt that delicious thrill of giving in to my darkest impulses.
My party was annoyed and amused by this new character. I had always been prosocial in my gameplay, helpful healer, medicine-maker, conscientious. I was now creating a whole tonne of wreckage and trouble for them. But at the same time, they seemed pleased that I was expressing this side of myself. They’re patient people, truly.
It all went well, and I got really into the role. I began crafting out an elaborate backstory for Evabad S, making props, figurines, painting them, and had a whole excel sheet on his traits, inventory, and so on. I began learning to deepen my voice to sound manly when I played him, I learnt accents from various movies with evil demon characters, and started dressing to suit the part when I went for sessions.
It was only when I began to outline and detail the rules, laws, history, visions and missions of the RWD, that things started going wrong.
I took what I knew of the deity in real life, and incorporated my own ideas into creating its background and history. Its preferences, dislikes, allegiances, enemies. All sorts of details that I could think of.
I made it truly evil. And I played my character as the zealot who wished only to serve its dark needs. Long story short, I spent a couple months just devouring the hearts of every creature I killed, putting heads on pikes and wearing the skins of the conquered. My party got used to this and generally were fine with it. After all, it was a safe space to be anything you wanted to be.
And let me just reiterate this - D&D is awesome. It does not encourage evil. In fact, it usually results in more prosocial behaviours. Research has backed that up. But I digress.
The point is, the mistake I made was, including a deity from the real world.
I began noticing that something was amiss, when the nightmares began.
In-game, my character would often communicate with his RWD in his dreams. Receive instructions, give updates, and whatnot.
I began dreaming of it in real life. And not as the figurine I painted, which was loosely based on the RWD. I saw the actual image of the RWD as it was depicted in many artworks, in the real world. Worst of all, it had a realism that my mind could never have conjured or embellished from the more abstract artworks I’d seen.
The first time I dreamt of it, I thought I was lying in bed in the dark. But it very quickly struck me that I could not move, not at all. Ever had a terrifying sleep paralysis episode? It was like that, but worse. I didn’t just panic. I felt this dread of death, which yes, I do feel in normal sleep paralysis episodes, but this was serious stuff. I was very certain I would not wake up. I didn’t even struggle anymore, so certain was I of my death.
“You misrepresented me,” were its first words to me. It didn’t speak, not aloud, but its voice boomed in my mind. The voice was made of chills and terror. It pierced my spine in a way that took my breath away, and it crawled down, stayed in the pit of my existence and just kept tugging away at my nerves. Playing my fear like a chord.
I couldn’t respond. I was far too paralysed with fear. And well, sleep paralysis.
“I am not like you portrayed me. Did you think you had to add to my powers, add to my cruelty? Was I not evil enough for you, you pathetic human?”
I tried to speak, but croaked instead. A choked, guttural sound. It moved closer, staring into my eyes with its piercing eyes. Not on fire with flames within, the way I had depicted it in my games. But with a cold, soulless gaze. It seemed to suck all the warmth and life from my body.
“You will represent me well. You will show them what I’m really like.”
It wrapped a clawed, muscular hand around my throat, and squeezed. I thought my brain would burst, with the pounding that escalated as it continued to press hard. My eyes felt enlarged and swollen. Then it let go.
I sucked in a rasping breath of air, and struggled desperately to move something, anything. Then it was gone.
I woke up soaked in perspiration. Without any care of his well-being, I shook my partner awake, and told him what happened, voice raspy, throat in pain, and tears streaming. He reassured me that it was just a nightmare, and that perhaps we’d been going at D&D too hard.
He told me that a cup of tea would soothe my nerves, and went out to make one. When he was back, he switched on the room lights.
He gasped, and nearly dropped the cup of tea.
Still tearing, his reaction triggered a wave of adrenaline.
“What’s wrong? What’s happening?” I jumped up and started to his side, looking back in shock and fear.
“Your…your neck…” he said, pointing.
I turned to look at the mirror by the door, and gasped.
My throat was ringed with fresh red marks. I felt my knees weaken as I lost balance and fell to the ground, my partner trying to catch me with one hand, while balancing the tea in the other.
We didn’t go back to sleep that night. By daylight, we had concluded that I had choked myself in my nightmare. I had probably been too wrapped up in it, it had been too realistic, and I had choked myself out. That was not unheard of, we told ourselves.
We talked about backing out of the campaign. But I’d put so much into it, and after a couple of days had passed with no incident, I was more and more convinced that it was a fluke, that I’d had a nightmare/sleepwalking incident and hurt myself. Besides, I had always leant towards logic.
We didn’t give it up. We went for the next session, with me in a turtleneck to cover the now blue and purple bruises on my neck. I didn’t want anyone thinking there was domestic violence going on in our home.
But I changed things. I stopped using the figurine where I’d altered the RWD’s appearance, and simply used a D6 (one of the dice I had) to represent it. I also altered the backstory of the RWD to suit reality. I wasn’t taking any chances. No offending it anymore, if I could help it.
Things seemed to go fine for a session or two. Then, in a particularly exciting session, when we’d just defeated a bunch of night hags and I got to deal the killing blow, I decided to proclaim the line that my zealot barbarian occasionally used when he had accomplished something particularly badass. A disclaimer here: It’s not really that cool. I just liked to yell it in my faked guttural, manly (as much as I could get) voice.
“YOUR BLOOD SHALL NOURISH HIS DARKNESS!!” I boomed, then froze.
The voice which came from my throat was not mine. It was deep, jarring, a growl pulsating with darkness. It sent cold stabs from my neck to my gut. I looked around the table and saw that it had the same effect on the other players. They were staring, wide-eyed, in shock and with some trepidation.
Then the DM began to clap. “WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT! That was amazing!”
Wtfs went around the room. “How the heck did you get there? Hell, I didn’t even know it was physically possible for women’s voices to get that low! Your voice-acting is out of control!” The party cleric yelled, then hooted loudly. I sat silent amidst the ruckus and cheers. My partner stared at me quietly too. We both knew that the voice did not come from training. Or talent. Or any of my efforts.
We brushed off their confusion at our lack of enthusiasm about my guttural roar, and tried to redirect them back to the game, to avoid further questions.
It was only when we were on our way home that my partner asked, “That wasn’t you, was it?”
I shook my head. He was quiet. We stayed that way the whole trip home.
I’m now sitting here, typing this out, as my partner is silently tapping away furiously at his laptop. I suspect he’s trying to Google the shit out of this situation.
I’m here, telling you guys about this, because, well, when in doubt, I turn to Reddit. Is it always the best idea? I’m not sure. But hey, couldn’t hurt. (Or could it? lol)
So what are your thoughts? Should I quit the campaign? Continue? Change my character, get this original one killed off asap? Any ideas?