The Dark Veil Setting
One year ago, the time dimension collapsed in what is now called the “time event.” In the time event’s wake, a cloud of mystery known as the Dark Veil emerged. It unraveled the fabric of time into living splinters coexisting side by side in a single, new timeline.
The Dark Veil separates each sector by a thin, massive storm-like dome that encompasses sectors on all sides. The Veil acts as a prison, protector, and, when entered, a highway of travel across the realms: infinite sectors of magic, mystery, and darkness.
The survivors of the time event formed factions, most clinging to their original timelines. The strongest of factions, The Order of the Veil, merged technology from future eras with Magi spell work of the past. The Order built gateways of travel between the living sectors to bypass the Veil. But as survivors continue to link their sectors together, new struggles begin between factions, eras, and the unexplored Veil.
Factions & Eras of Time
Order of the Veil
A massive conglomerate of organizations, nations, and armies, the Order of the Veil is responsible for nearly all gate constructions between Veil sectors. The expanded reach by Veil gates and the policing of sectors by the Orders, the Knight Agent Inquisitors, has left the faction in control of most civilized regions of the planet and its surrounding space. The Order occupies most of the space, future era sectors, but does have alliances with other times.
Retian Steam Republic
The Victorian era, named after Earth nobility, is one of steam technology. The sectors of this era are filled with sprawling cities of noir culture and the battlefields of the great metal war. Many poets, philosophers, and inventors are found within this era despite the ever-impending doom of giant steam and metal robots that lurk at sector borders. The Retian Steam Republic is the most prominent faction of this era, ruled by Queen Victoria X.
Alliance of Kingdoms
The Kingdoms era represents a medieval setting of castles, kingdoms, pirates, and nobles all fighting for power across multiple sectors. Most of the nations of this era formed an alliance, The Alliance of Kingdoms, broadening their reach across the face of the planet through trade and military allegiance.
Prime Initiate
Coming Soon
Ferrian Clans
Coming Soon
The Game System
Dark Veil is a TTRPG focused on simple, effective success-based d6 skill rolls. Players roll their skill dice over a series of actions attempting successes. Successes are rolled on a 5and 6; on rolling a 6the dice is then re-rolled for a chance at an additional success. Players get 3 skill actions every turn and can roll the same or a different skill with each action. As players roll their skill actions, dice are removed for every roll of 1. This mechanic is called “burning” a dice. Burnt dice are also withheld from consecutive actions on a player's turn. If a player ends their turn with all their remaining dice burned, they critically fail the skill. Players set their own target success difficulty based on their character’s goal, presenting a moment of potential glory with every die success or a moment of impending doom with every die burnt. Every dice roll in Dark Veil has the potential to become an epic moment for the players, good or bad.
With 16 common skills, 4 combat skills, and 4 Magi skills (magical skills), players create characters with a set number of d6 dice to roll for every skill. Skills range from 1to 8dice, where all skills from 5to 8are considered mastery and require story points—Dark Veil’s form of experience—to unlock. Skills have bonuses added to the end of a turn once all skill actions are used. All characters begin the game with a minimum of at least one dice in every skill, allowing any character the potential to accomplish tasks they aren’t trained in with a lucky roll. Some skills, like linguistics, allow players to learn signed and spoken language as they adventure, adding temporary or permanent languages to their character sheet in real time. Players will also track defense, heroic action points, and life.
Players’ origin backgrounds make up their starting character. A character then branches out into their own unique direction through customized gear and organization affiliations. Gear focuses a character into specialized magic- or tech-based benefits. All gear items have ratings that players can increase through organization affiliations to improve their magic or tech value. Players can fully customize gear with engineering (tech gear) or artificing (Magi gear) skills, and mix and match up to five different types of gear including armor and weapons. In addition to armor, the dodge skill can be utilized to boost a player’s defense even higher during conflicts.
Traits provide role-play and combat benefits. Both are trained with organization affiliation but can also be mastered during role-play with the spell thief or tactics skills. This unique mechanic allows players to mirror combat techniques of their enemy or master new spells in real time. The benefits of stealing (temporary) or memorizing (permanent) traits depends on the skill success of the roll. Players can learn traits from other players by sharing their knowledge during adventures, but time and dice rolls are required. Some traits are unique and cannot be learned unless a character joins a certain organization through their origin background or by unlocking them with story points. Hundreds of traits are available within the Dark Veil core book with more available to discover with every unique monster and enemy released. Players should be warned, however: critical failure when attempting to learn a new spell will lead to dangerous and unexpected results from the Veil.