The Dark Eye

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Das Schwarze Auge
RPG published by Ulysses Games
Authors	Droemer Knaur Schmidt Spiele
First Publication	1984 (1st edition) 1988 (2nd ed) 1992 (3rd ed) 2001 (4th ed) 2015 (5th ed)

Das Schwarze Auge (The Dark Eye) is what Germany equipped on their character sheet where Americans wrote "Dungeons & Dragons". It's pretty much THE fantasy role-playing game in Germany, it's been around since the 1980s, and it's in 5th edition. And it exists because TSR said "we will not do business with the krauts."

There was one shit translation effort, but in the 2010s there was a kickstarter to raise funds to bribe fund DSA's publishers into making a decent English translation for 5th edition. Despite the lack of translations of the games themselves, the video game adaptions Realms of Arkania, Drakensang, Memoria and Blackguards were all translated and 3 out of 4 of those are considered solid entries into their genre. All of these games dropped the supertitle in translation as a result.

The default campaign setting is the world of "Dere" (an anagram of "Erde," or "Earth"), on the bog-standard fantasy feudal Europe continent of Aventurien. It's got the usual complement of fantasy races: orcs, Tolkien-like elves, lizardmen, goblins, kobolds, giants, etc. It's got spellcasters and the technology level is somewhere below muskets and blackpowder. Over the sea far to the west is the golden land of Myranor where it looks more like Final Fantasy games with a decadent and declining wealthy empire, airships, and catgirls. A third continent and setting is the Hollow World of Tharun which has an Edgar-Rice-Burroughs feel in island archipelagos.

Peoples of the world

In The Dark Eye, characters are built from the race (what you are), the culture (where you grew up) and the profession (what you learned). Races therefore are mostly about biology while history, religion, mentality and such are dictated by the culture.

• Humans: Human races are the Middlelanders (Caucasians), Tulamids (Arabians), Thorwals (Vikings), Nivese (Mongols), Moha (Native Americans), Utulu (Africans) and a few more. Among the biggest cultures are the Middleland (central Europe, high middle ages), the Horas-Empire (Italy/France, full renaissance), Al’Alfa (Spain in colonial times with a good measure of ancient Rome), the Tulamid City States (ancient Egypt / 1001 nights / Persia), the Novadis (desert dwelling one-true-god worshipping zealots), the Bornland (Tsaristic Russia minus the Tsar), and a lot more smaller ones.
• Elves: Physically, elves are mostly as Tolkien wrote them: beautiful, ageless and magic. They live as hunter-gatherers, but help themselves a lot with their innate magic. Turning themselves invisible for the hunt, magically making plants produce ripe fruit or literally singing pure metal out of the ground and shaping it - for elves magic is part of their everyday life. This leaves them with lots of time for music, art or storytelling. Elves are divided into different peoples after the fall of their race (sound familiar?). A few thousand years ago, the high elves ruled the continent with advanced magic and science. After a series of bad decisions (allied with an over-ambitious dragon-god, pissing of their own gods, trying to become gods themselves, falling for the tricks of The Nameless One) they all went extinct. Now we are left with three branches of the tree:
  • Wood Elves: Direct descendants of the light elves who first arrived in our reality from The Light. While other elves went off, explored, advanced and later became the high elves, the wood elves already back then cut ties with their cousins. By living traditionally and staying in their old forests close to The Dream, they avoided the bad things that happened. Never rose, therefore never fell. Wood elves prefer to live their lives as they have always done, isolating themselves from the rest of the world. Even other elves are accepted, but rarely welcomed with open arms. Would-be intruders usually find themselves a few days later outside the forest again with no memory of how they got there or what happened. Except if they were aggressive, then they never return. Tree houses, talk to animals, control plants, collectively dream to alter reality.
  • Firn Elves: Survivors of high elves’ attempt to ascend to godhood. The heaven’s tower in the far north was their most advanced city, dedicated to the study of reality and divinity. Learning of their achievements, the corruptor Pardona charmed her way into the city and slowly took over. A few elves recognized her evil, but by then she already controlled most of the population. The resulting civil war wiped out the city save for a few survivors who managed to flee the destruction. The descendents of these survivors now live in the eternal ice of the far north. They returned to the old ways, but remember well the fate of their ancestors. This makes them wary of everything foreign, people and ideas alike. In the frozen wastes survival is a constant battle even for a tribe of elves with all their magic and this has made the firn elves a grim, hard people. Don’t expect them to rescue you if you freeze to death on their doorstep – life is hard and after you die they can use your stuff to improve the survival of their tribe. Igloos and Ice palaces, weaponized weather, very tough.
  • Shire Elves: The longest to hold on to their high elven might, but they too ultimately fell. The other elves say that they did not quite learn the lesson the first time: while the firn elves and wood elves live in tribes keeping mostly to themselves, the shire elves got right back up from their fall and founded another kingdom. Which also ended badly. Their expansion and exploration lead to wars with humans, dwarfs and orcs and although they could win most battles, over the centuries they were losing by attrition. Now the shire elves, like the others, live again in tribes and small villages which do each their own thing. Other than the rest of the elves, these guys trade freely with other races, some clans and families even living side by side with humans in villages and cities. They are the most friendly and open of all elves, teaching and learning from others and curious to travel and see the world. Also the most common source of half elves. The elves next door. Friendly, curious, but surprisingly fighty when necessary.
• Dwarves: Dwarves are small, sturdy, have a life span of about 600 years and mostly live below ground. Interestingly, only about one in four dwarves is female, leading to fierce competition among males to impress the ladies with skill, heroism or wealth. Dwarves hate magic and possess a high magic resistance. The very few who are born with the gift either get it burned out or are taken in by a Geode (dwarven druids, living respected but exiled in the wild). To compensate, they have developed technology further than any other people and are doing quite well for themselves (concrete, chemistry, complex mechanics but still no firearms). Of all the non-humans they have the best relationship with humans and often live together in shared cities. Before the rise of the younger races they spread out from their ancient home of Xorlosch and settled under many mountain ranges and slowly their culture evolved into four different peoples:
  • Anvil Dwarves: Standard-fantasy-dwarves. Love to fight, drink, sing (badly) and forge weapons and armour. Very war-like, often go to seek glory in battle or hire out as mercenaries.
  • Gem Dwarves: Fancy clothes instead of chainmails, fencing weapons instead of axes. Gem dwarves have style and are famous as traders, jewelers and tinkerers (also infamous as thieves). More equivalent of gnomes in other settings.
  • Ore Dwarves: The original dwarven culture, and they are very proud of it. A common saying is “Grandfather did it like this and his Grandfather before him, therefore it is good this way”. Not exactly innovators, but the most spiritual of the dwarves, very close to their god and obsessed with history, philosophy and numerology. Rather reclusive, but not unfriendly.
  • Hill Dwarves: Live under hills rather than mountains; Inventors of beer and many delicious recipes. Friendly, peaceful, equivalent more to Tolkien-Hobbits. But don’t think you can go and raid their nice little houses – they are still dwarves and if you get on their bad side you get a heavy crossbow bolt between the eyes.
• Achaz: Achaz are humanoid Lizardmen. They stand as tall as humans, have scales, webbed fingers and a tail and can grow up to 250 years old. Being cold-blooded, they only live in the (sub-)tropical regions of the continent (except that one tribe in the Orcland for some reason). Females can be identified by their red-colored dorsal ridges (no lizard boobs here). While they do feel love, sex involves no pleasure for them and “producing a clutch” is only a means of reproduction. When necessary Achaz can also change their gender. While in some regions tribal Achaz trade with humans and in rare instances also live together with them, their comparatively alien physiology and mentality always sets them apart from us mammals. Achaz are an ancient race, even pre-dating dwarves and elves. At the height of their power their empire spanned continents, but latest since the second dragon war those are all gone. Gone from this world, at least... When the ancient Achaz saw their race falling, they folded space and time around the core lands of their empire and shunted in into a globule (DnD-eqilvalent: demiplane). That really big desert in the middle of the continent, where now Novadis ride their camels and wage djihad? That is what they left when they went away and somewhere in the limbus (DnD-eqivalent: astral plane) these guys are still around. Several adventures deal with preventing the return of a country full of super-powerful lizard-wizards. In the here and now, there are two cultures of Achaz:
  • Archaic Achaz: The very few who retain their old culture (or at least as much as they could). Often protecting ancient hidden temples or outposts which somehow survived, these Achaz still pray to the old gods and practice the ancient art of cristallomancy (channeling magic through crystals). Although much knowledge has been lost since their glory days, they still hold great power, especially in temporal and transmutation magic.
  • Tribal Achaz: Most of the Achaz people have reverted to a primitive tribal lifestyle. Contrary to the elves, this was not a choice but a cultural regression due to most of their elite being wiped out or fleeing this world. They live mostly as hunter-gatherers, fishermen and occasionally from a bit of farming. They lost the art of working metal and practicing magic and instead of the mighty priests of old they are now led by shamans.
• Orcs: Orcs are smaller than humans, but taller than dwarves. They are humanoid but covered in dense, black fur, have proportionally longer arms and impressive teeth (think small Wookies). Orcs are strong and tough and have keen senses. They mature quickly (adult by age 10) and even under the best of conditions don’t live past 40. Orcs hail from the northern steppes only known to humans as the Orcland where they live in tribes of hunter-gatherers. These tribes constantly war with each other and with their neighbors, plundering resources, treasure and slaves. Orcs are physically superior to humans and for all their brutality by no means stupid. Would the tribes unite, they could form a fighting force that could threaten the very existence of the human realms. A few times this already happened; after the last Orcenstorm they actually kept a few conquered territories where they rule over enslaved populations of humans. Other Orcs think these occupants are lazy and un-orcy because they live too comfortable a life. Additionally, the chosen of their gods has been building a proper city deep in the Orclands where orcs play at civilisation – and are frighteningly good at it. Orcs are a patriarchal society, so much so that females are seen as possessions and are not even given names. They appear primitive, but are surprisingly good craftsmen and their steel weapons and composite bows can easily match human products.
• Goblins:Goblins are related to Orcs and share their general physique; they are however smaller (about the size of a dwarf and significantly lighter) and their fur is red. Where Orcs are seen as a threat, Goblins are usually seen as a nuisance. They live in primitive stone-age-like tribes, hunting, gathering, stealing and raiding. Their proverbial cowardice leads them to only attack when they greatly outnumber a target and even then they quickly turn and flee when encountering resistance. Almost nobody remembers that these little guys had a kingdom only a few hundred years ago that gave the knights of Rondra (Godess of Battle) a run for their money... Also different from orcs, goblins are led by their female-only shamans. Hilariously, they still have not understood the connection between sex and pregnancy, leading to a high fertility rate. Most goblins live as tribes in the wilderness, but some have settled in human cities, taking care of dirty work like catching vermin and cleaning gutters.
• Other Races: Other intelligent races exist, but are either too monstrous (Ogres, Krakonians) or too alien (Fae, Zilits) to be a playable race. You may encounter them on your adventures but except for highly specialized quests they are just not feasible as PCs.

Mixed Races only exist in the half-elf and half-orc, other species do not produce viable offspring.

The World

Cosmology

In TDE, space-time is seven-dimensional. The seven Axes are: 3 Axes Spatiales (make up our three-dimensional space), Vector Temporalis (along that line be time travel), Axis Transglobulis (that way lie globules / demiplanes and pocket dimensions), Axis Nodicocausalum (this way to alternate realities / mirror universes) and Axis Orthosphaericus (along this line through the spheres).
All of existence is made up from seven spheres, one inside the other. Thinking of it as an onion or a russian doll is wrong, but helpful for visualizing.

• The first sphere, also known as the mysterium of Kha, is infinetly small. Basically it has no space, so don’t try to travel there. It is the foundation of all existence and the source of all order and rules. Without the first sphere, there would be no other spheres, no causality, no time, nothing but ever-fluctuating pure chaos.
  
• The second sphere is the sphere of the elements. Here we have a proper flow of time and the source of all matter, divided into the six elements (Fire - Water, Rock - Air, Humus - Ice). The power of Elementals and Djinni originates from this sphere.
  
• The third sphere is where we exist. We have space and time and gravity. The elements are coming together and form air to breathe, ground to stand on, plants, animals and us. Nice place here.
  
• The fourth sphere is the realm of the dead. When something dies in the third, its soul goes here. Almost all of the sphere is controlled by the god Boron, who judges the dead. Worthy souls move on, not-so-worthy ones stay here until sufficiently purified - or for all eternity. A few tiny corners belong to death-gods of other races, but the vast majority are the Halls of Boron.
  
• The fifth sphere is the citadel of Alveran, the seat of the gods. Here the Twelve Gods and their allies have their paradises where they live and welcome worthy souls.
  
• The sixth sphere is called “Stars and Power” and is the source of all magic. Here dwell remnants of forgotten or defeated gods and a few things we don’t quite understand yet. The outer edge of the sixth sphere is the wall of stars, the bulwark against chaos. Maintained by gods and others, it keeps all those nasties from the seventh from pouring in.
  
• The seventh sphere, as a counterpoint to the first, is infinite. These are the hells, the broiling chaos. They can be divided into the “lower hells” and the “upper hells”. The lower hells surround creation and the tiny bit of order that leaks out is enough to give the chaos some form. Here be arch-demons, hellscapes and generally bad things. The upper hells are too chaotic even for that, nothing can exist here and anything venturing that far out would dissolve into pure chaos.

It has been speculated that somewhere out in the infinity of the seventh there might be other worlds existing, with their own foundation and cosmology, but whether or not they exist, travel there would be impossible so it’s a moot point.

Separating and connecting all these spheres, globules and mirror worlds is the Limbus. Basically an infinite, formless place of grey fog. Nothing to see here, nothing existing here. Also no way of moving since no ground. Teleportation magic warps the user through the limbus for a short hop, but in order to travel between planes one first needs to find a way to orient themselves and then move through the Limbus... Leave that to Gods, Demons and NPC-archmages.

Derography

TDE takes place mostly in the third sphere on the planet of Dere. Other planets or solar systems may exist, but are never mentioned. No aliens here. On Dere we have several continents each with their own flavour: The most explored and fleshed out is Aventuria, with the races and cultures mentioned above. Mostly medieval fantasy setting, generally pretty nice, despite the occasional war or evil dark plot. Until the invasion of the damned. Afterwards considerably grimmer and darker.

To the west of Aventuria lies Myranor or the Golden Land. The ancestors of the middlelanders emigrated from here, fleeing from an oppressive demon-worshipping empire. Nowadays here be magitech and occasional steampunk (still demons). Flying cities, titans (like from the other imperium), lots of magically “enhanced” hybrid species (catgirls, anyone?).

To the east of Aventuria lies Rakshazar or the Giant’s Land. Here be Conan. A divine curse of discord lies over the entire continent, preventing the rise of any nation or alliance. The biggest you can get is city-states, but even those are unstable. Additionally, spells do not work here. Try it and blow yourself up. With the proper knowledge and caution, ritual magic is possible but still dangerous. On top of that, most peoples do not have the knowledge or the resources to make steel, leading to mostly stone-age or bronze-age cultures.

To the south of Aventuria lies Uthuria, “the miraculous southern continent, about which almost nothing is known”. Aventurians have just discovered it and started to explore its northern shores.

Besides Dere, there are a number of other settings, mostly large Globules connected to the third sphere by stable gateways. Some examples are the fairy worlds, the islands in the mist (refuge of ancient elves), Zze Tha (suviving part of the Achaz-empire) and the hollow world of Tharun (the world is on the inside of a hollow sphere). Dere itself varies greatly depending on when you are setting your campaign. Aventuria has about 2000 years of really detailed history (and ancient history going back as far as 36000 years plus a few ages). Most common settings are the “current times”, before or after the invasion of the damned or the “dark ages”, the last centuries of the old empire and the diamond sultanate(about 1500-1000 years before “present”).

The Gods

In principle, gods are very real in TDE. That still does not mean that everything that is being worshiped is a god though. While great number of religions exist on Dere, a real god is a being that can wield karmic energy. Other than astral energy, which is the source of all magic, karmic energy is pure divine order. Gods can bestow a fraction of their energy onto mortal beings, making them clerics. Clerics can use this karmic energy to perform liturgies and miracles to shape the world around them according to the will of their god.

The most powerful of the gods are The Twelve and their religion is, with a few variations, spread through the entire world. The twelve gods are:

• Praios - lord of the gods, god of lords. God of light, truth, justice, law and order. Hates magic.
• Rondra - the lioness. Goddess of battle, strength, honor and glory. Also lightning and thunder.
• Efferd - lord of the tides. God of air and water. A thunderstorm is him dancing with Rondra.
• Travia - the kind mother. Goddess of home, hearth and family, also compassion. Blesses weddings.
• Boron - the silent one. God of death, also of sleep, dreams and prophecies.
• Hesinde - mother of wisdom. Goddess of knowledge, wisdom, magic and arts (partly).
• Firun - the grim one. God of ice, of winter and of the hunt.
• Tsa - the young Goddess. Life, birth, change and peace. Chaos, in a good, renewing, growing way.
• Phex - lord of chance. God of opportunities and luck, traders, gamblers and thieves.
• Peraine - the giving one. Goddess of the living earth, of farming and of healing.
• Ingerimm - Alveran’s Hammer. God of fire and stone, craftsmen and builders. Patron of Dwarves.
• Rahja - the beautiful one. Godess of love, beauty, passion and arts (partly).

In this order, the months of the year are named after the gods with Praios equaling July. Each month has 30 days - the remaining 5 belong to The Nameless One.

Below The Twelve are numerous lesser gods, usually seen as sons/daughters of the gods or their high servants or allies. Examples are Kor, the coldhearted god of war and mercenaries (bastard son of Rondra), Nandus, god of intelligence, spys and riddles (son of Hesinde) or Marbo, godess of mercy and hope (daughter of Boron). Although having considerably less power than The Twelve, these are still proper gods, have a place in Alveran and can grant karmic energy to their devotees (although less than the big 12).

One tier below them are beings like Kamaluq, the black Jaguar, god of the Moha or Brazoragh and Tairach, Gods of the Orcs. These beings definitely exist but compared to the others have very little power. At most, they send dreams and visions, not much in the way of miracles here. They usually have only enough karma to empower one high priest. So... mini-gods, probably hanging out at the border of fifth and sixth sphere.

There are many other religions, sometimes deifying beings such as powerful Elementals, Dragons or even arch-demons, sometimes also praying to a purely fictional entity. Every religion has their own creation myth; Faithful of The Twelve believe in creation through Los and Sumu, the Maraskani believe in the world-discus and the Novadi believe that Rashtullah the one and only made the world in 9 days. Although the world has undergone many changes during previous ages it is confirmed that its existence is far older than all current religions so it is unclear if there was a creation at the beginning or just a big bang.

Opposing the gods are the legions of the lower hells, led by the twelve arch-demons. Each arch-demon is a perverted mirror image of a twelve-god. When Praios is the god of justice, law and order, so is Blakharaz the arch-demon of vengeance, oppression and tyranny.

Another player in the cosmic sandbox is The Nameless One, also called the thirteenth god. While one could make the argument that the demons are pure chaos given temporary form who naturally are the enemy of all order, such an excuse can not be made for The Thirteenth. He is a proper god, but pure evil. Tried to rule the world and when he could not, said “fuck it” and smashed a hole in the wall of stars to let all of the lower hells pour into creation. The other gods banded together to take him down and chained him forever in front of the breach, plugging the hole with his body. There he hangs for all eternity, facing inside to see the world which he can never reach while from the other side all of the hells claw at his immortal body. Finally, the gods took his name and destroyed it so nobody could ever pray to him again. Still, after all this he still retains dominion over 5 days of every year and the insane and evil cultists who give themselves to him are deadly dangerous during these times.

Playing the Game

Chargen used to be dierolls and classes, but in 4th edition they changed a lot of mechanics and went to skills based. Then they had a D&D 3.0 moment and had to re-release a fixed version of 4th edition, which fans call "4.1 edition". Version 5.0 was recently released after a public Beta. Very few changes to the rules happened, the basic is how talent checks at a disadvantage work now, basically the minimum disadvantage is tripled, but the way the math plays out now allows for a more accurate representation. In short, Germans tweaked the math on how well you can build a table without the proper tools. Also, there is now a magic resistance against divine/demonic damage, so demon pacteerers and priests of the thirteenth god are no longer absolute nightmare fuel for even the most experienced heroes.

Success checks are rolled on 3d20, and each die has to roll under one of the three appropriate attributes for the situation. Character attributes are: Courage, Wisdom, Intuition, Charisma, Dexterity, Agility, Constitution, Strength, and Speed. Failing on one or more of these dice tell you exactly how you fail (i.e.: you were agile enough to climb, but got too tired on the way up. or you had enough constitution to last, but couldn't find handholds that lead all the way to the top).

Characters

Because of the GURPS-like point-buy system, characters can grow to be pretty wild.

Basically, characters buy skills, attributes, special abilities, spells, perks and all the other stuff with adventure points, which are awarded similar to experience points, but can be directly spent rather than waiting for a level-up.

Character development is pretty open after the creation. There are no classes, only professions, which are sets of starting skills and abilities which almost all can be learned later in the game as well. The amount of available professions is mind boggling and (in true kraut fashion) are categorized into Combat, Wilderness, Social, Magic, Priestly, Scholars and Crafting, and go through all social strata, from whores (gender equality applies) and beggars to knights and royal guards.

This of course opens the possibilities to adventuring as anything. Wanna play a baker who wants to see the world? CHECK! A former boy prostitute trying to steal and sweet talk his way through the criminal underworld? YEPP! A good-for-nothing (a literal profession in the rule book) who just wants to blow his inheritance on becoming a hero? CAN DO!

Skills are wild and all over the place. Especially knowledge and crafting skills can be anything you can dream of. Characters that specialize in these fields sometimes need additional sheets just to list all their skills because the default sheet could not fit them all.

The point is: if you find a teacher, you can learn it. With the exception of magic potential. Only people born and raised to be spell casters will ever be. Some special people like half elves can learn some basic spells throughout their lives but it will be hard. And learning the skills that a certain profession starts with by default costs a mighty amount of adventure points, so you better think twice whether you want to dualspec your knight into a shipwright. For some characters, it's necessary to branch into other stuff. Mostly for all mages and most scholars, since they are fresh out of college and need to learn to not suck at everything else. If you chose one of the few gods that will let you keep your astral body, you can even be a priest and a mage, giving you access to two different kinds of magic with two seperate mana pools.

This diversity of professions and skills, combined with the german spirit, of course means that YES, there IS an official adventure that allows you to win by accounting.

Magic

Magic in Dere is pretty straightforward and takes its notes from the "useful things to have" book of magic, where spells are more like a 120-piece toolbox and less like a glowing rocket launcher. From deciding to cast a spell to actually casting it, the caster can make quite some decisions on how to define the outcome. Spells can have most components (duration, cast time, components) modified spontaneously (called "spontaneous Modifications"). Some spells also have alternative versions that a more experienced caster can utilize to, for example, turn a spell from a single gust of wind into a continuous wind as long as the caster can breathe out, or a simple telekinesis spell into a movement constricting inhibition field.

Also, spells arent organized into classes, only in difficulty to learn (increasing the adventure points necessary to achieve a certain skill level) and "Representation", indicating whether a spell is known in the different forms spell casting can take, from standard boring Guild mages' way, to witches and druids, dwarven, Kobold, high elven, Achatz etc. with some spells being only accessible to some specific professions or races. Every representation brings its own components. For example, druids need to have bare feet contact to the ground, Achatz' crystalcasters needs a special kind of crystal for each type of spell, Kobolds can only cast if it's funny (but they are very mischievous, so they might not have taken a situation seriously in the first place) etc. Also, some neat tricks can be applied, like Guild Mages being able to modify spells for half the disadvantage on the check, witches being able to amplify spells with emotions, giving even more flavour and customization to spells.

All this together boils down to spells being crafted by the player themselves and well thought-out. In combat, most spells are useless because of their casting time and direct damage spells are actually very rare. There are a few basic spells like speed or armor buffs that always help in a fight, but unless the group has a master of multi-target combat or the GM is so generous as to NOT throw enemies at the casters, they better start learning how to fight.