Scavs (short for “scavengers”) is the slang name used in Dundrake for the freelance adventurers that go below into the Underdrake to find relics and riches. Some are enlisted by the Reliquarians of the Feretorium to recover holy relics, some are hired by the Order of the Obsidian Eye or the Arcane Concordat to seek powerful artifacts, and some just come for the chance to crawl through catacombs and raid forgotten tombs for glory and fortune.
Credit to the late and great Dave Trampier
The “City of Nebulous Delights” is the royal seat of Queen Margareth of House Morvern, sovereign of Dal Raeth and Protector of the North. Built upon the foundations of prehistoric settlements, the city conceals a vast subterranean network beneath its streets and sewers. Known as the Underdrake, this realm of ruins, catacombs, and tunnels is a perilous lure for scavenging adventurers (Scavs). They delve into its depths seeking fame and fortune, risking everything in this dark frontier that promises both reward and ruin.
Dundrake, capital of the kingdom of Dal Raeth, is famed far and wide as the City of Nebulous Delights, both for its night fogs and for its darker, ephemeral pleasures. Yet, despite its dark allures, many of its destitute citizens live short, brutish and often violent lives.
Dundrake stands as an ancient metropolis built upon limestone foundations of enigmatic prehistoric settlements. Through centuries, its inhabitants carved extensive mines into the bedrock, extracting stone that rose to form majestic walls and towers crowning the emerging capital. When the vast network of cavities beneath the burgeoning city began causing dangerous sinkholes and structural collapses, mining operations ceased. Throughout the years the city’s pestilent and overcrowded cemeteries were emptied and the countless remains relocated into the abandoned tunnels below. Today, these extensive labyrinths of quarries, catacombs, and ancient ruins beneath are known collectively as the “Underdrake”.
Above, the cruel city offers you only grinding poverty. Below, in the darkness of the Underdrake, lies opportunity. You are a Scav—tomb reaver, relic seeker, catacomb crawler—one of the desperate few chasing fortune and glory in the forgotten depths. Grip your torch, draw your steel, ready your spells. Forge your legend in the labyrinth below, or die trying!
A mini-campaign for Shadowdark starting soon.
Once, mankind lived amongst nature as an equal and worshipped the gods of wood, water and stone. In time men began to cut down the trees and harness the water ways to cultivate the land and build cities of stone and wood. From these cities a prophet arose who taught that the spirits of the land were wicked and that a celestial Creator was responsible for the world and all within it, and that mankind, his chosen creation, should bow down in unrivaled obeisance and worship. At great expense to themselves, they raised enormous churches to this Creator, and gave power to his priests, persecuting those who still followed the old gods of wood, water and stone.
The Alder-King – one of the old gods and a mighty spirit of the dark woods – turned against his apostate disciples, and in his vengeful wrath opened the gates to the Outer Dark, unleashing demonic entities from the void into the world. A hellish horde soon swept across the lands, possessing mortal bodies and corrupting their souls. Rising from the ranks of the damned came the dread Wytchlords, who ruled and made covenant with the wrathful forest spirits, subjugated the mortals, and reshaped the world to satisfy their endless desires.
