"Dig hard, dig deep, go for shelter, and never look back." That has become a creed for all of mankind. Where once thriving civilizations stood of men and elves, and even of orcs and gnolls -- now the skies and the land belong to the dragons. Over the past year, the population of dragons has risen a hundredfold, and they have swept over all the nations of the world.

Of the survivors, only a few remain. While dragons sweep the most inhabited portions, adventurous folk seek out the most remote and inhospitable underground structures -- taking with them the few other survivors whom they were able to rescue. Together, they seek to carve out a new life for themselves in the ruins and dungeons of the old world.

This is an epic campaign for the Dungeons & Dragons game which turns the game on its head. A plague of dragons has devastated the entire surface world. Rather than raiding dungeons to find the treasure of dragons, now humanity is fleeing to remote underground locations to survive in the face of a dragon plague. This draws on the post-apocalyptic genre, in films like Reign of Fire and Dawn of the Dead or the Walking Dead series. The concept is that there will still be exploring dungeons and fighting monsters, but rather than raiding for treasure and killing, the adventurers are looking for a place to live.

Features

• Money: With the fall of civilization, money is now worthless. Gold and platinum coins will be tossed aside in favor of fresh water, food, and equipment.
• Society and NPCs: The PCs will be the leaders and champions of a small group of survivors -- perhaps a few dozen. As far as they know, they are the only ones in the region who have survived. The PCs will be leaders of this group, but will also be responsible for them.
• Good and Evil: All dragons have taken over the surface, respecting only other dragons in their sweep of the globe. Under the circumstances, the historic differences between humans and orcs (for example) pale by comparison. There are a minority good metallic dragons, but they can't change the balance of power and are not at war with the chromatics. I expect there will be some alliances between good and evil creatures for the purpose of mutual survival. Good and evil still exist, but it is less important to the game.
• Equipment: For many campaigns, the equipment rules of D&D are simply tedious. Characters regularly go back to the store to load up on arrows and such, checking off marks. In this game, however, there are no stores or cities to go back to. Thus, equipment will be valuable and justify the carefully tracking.

Resources

• Design Notes