# The Warring Expanse — Environmental Hazards & Stack Tables
### The cavern where **Limbo** and **Pandemonium** collide · Session 8, *Descent into Madness*
**Party:** lvl ~11–12 · Francheska (AC 23) · Jonah (AC 20, **CON +0 — weak**) · Jocular (AC 17, Evasion) · Orbek (fighter-monk, best saves)

---

## 0. THE CORE IDEA

Two planes are grinding into one cavern, and they attack **different halves of a person**:

| | **LIMBO** | **PANDEMONIUM** |
|---|---|---|
| Attacks your… | **body & reality** | **mind & identity** |
| Track name | **FLUX** | **HOWL** |
| Save | **CON / STR / DEX** | **WIS / CHA / INT** |
| Feels like | *"I am not staying the shape I was."* | *"I am not sure that thought was mine."* |
| Gives you | chaotic power (double-edged) | knowledge you didn't want |

**Stacks are the whole system.** They **accumulate**, they **persist for the session**, and they come from *many* sources — hazards, bad choices, and the players' own curiosity. Nothing here should feel like a slot-machine punishment; each stack is a **story the character now carries.**

> **Design rule (matches the Eclipse doc):** *Warn, escalate, give the window.* No stack should ever kill someone outright. The dread does the work.

---

## 1. STANDING TRAITS OF THE CAVERN *(always on — no roll)*

These are true everywhere in the expanse. Narrate them constantly; they're the texture.

1. **Contested Gravity.** "Down" is a local opinion and it changes by region. Staircases arrive at ceilings. Dust falls *up* in places. Any long jump or fall may resolve in an unexpected direction.
2. **The Howl.** A wind that is always screaming somewhere. Normal conversation beyond 15 ft requires shouting. **Stealth by sound is trivial; stealth by sight is impossible** (the light is wrong and constant).
3. **Unfixed Matter.** Limbo re-forms terrain on a whim. *No map stays accurate for more than an hour.* Anything the party builds, marks, or leaves behind may not be there on the way back.
4. **The Answering Dark.** Sound comes back **changed**. Speak, and something repeats it slightly wrong, slightly later, in a voice you almost recognize.
5. **No True Rest.** A long rest here restores only **half** the normal Hit Dice and **no** exhaustion reduction — unless taken inside an **Anchor** (§5). Short rests work normally.
6. **The Two Weathers.** At any moment the party is in either a **Flux region** (rainbow chaos-light, drifting stone, silence) or a **Howl region** (red light, screaming wind, close walls). Announce which. It determines which hazard table you roll.

---

## 2. WHEN TO ROLL

Break travel into **legs** (~4–6 across the session). At each leg:

1. **Announce the weather** — Flux region or Howl region.
2. **Roll the hazard** (d8, §3 or §4). This is what *the environment does.*
3. **Everyone affected makes the save.** DC **15** (raise to **17** deeper in; **13** near an Anchor).
4. **On a failure:** gain **+1 stack** in that track, then that player **rolls on the Experience table** (§6/§7, d12) to find out *what it felt like.*
5. **On a success:** no stack. On a **natural 20** or beating the DC by 10+, **shed 1 stack** of that type (you found the rhythm of the place).

> **Also award stacks for choices, not just rolls:**
> - **+1 HOWL** — answering a voice **using your own voice** *(Ravon's Paper IV explicitly warns against this)*
> - **+1 HOWL** — speaking the King's title aloud, or reading Papers V–VI aloud in the open
> - **+1 FLUX** — deliberately **shaping Limbo** (see §8) — power has a price
> - **+1 HOWL** — lingering to listen to something that is calling you by name

---

## 3. LIMBO HAZARDS — *The Flux* (d8)

Roll d8 when in a Flux region. **Save vs. FLUX.**

| d8 | Hazard | Save | Effect |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | **Shifting Ground** — the platform re-forms mid-step | DEX 15 | Fail: slide toward an edge; 2d6 falling or an ally's reaction to catch |
| 2 | **Gravity Votes** — for 1 min, "down" is 90° off | STR 15 | Fail: movement wasted, shoved 15 ft toward the new down; ranged attacks at disadv. |
| 3 | **The Long Second** — time dilates in a 60-ft bubble | CON 15 | Fail: you act **last** in the next round regardless of initiative |
| 4 | **Unmaking Rain** — motes of raw possibility drift down | CON 15 | Fail: one **non-magical** carried item is rewritten into something else (roll or choose — often useless, occasionally wonderful) |
| 5 | **The Fold** — two places briefly occupy each other | DEX 15 | Fail: you are **swapped** with another creature's position (ally or enemy), 60-ft range |
| 6 | **Proliferation** — the plane makes a copy of something | WIS 15 | Fail: a **duplicate of you** walks out of the stone. It is not hostile; it is *confused*, and it will follow. It lasts 1 min and unravels. Deeply unsettling. |
| 7 | **The Sea of Stairs** — the route dissolves into 100 staircases | INT 15 | Fail: the party is **separated** — split into two groups for 1d4 rounds. Great tension beat. |
| 8 | **Bloom** — chaos surges; everything is possible for 6 seconds | CON 16 | **Everyone** rolls. Fail: +1 FLUX. Success: gain **1 Chaos Die (d6)** — add to any one d20 roll before the session ends. *Use this to teach them the plane gives as well as takes.* |

---

## 4. PANDEMONIUM HAZARDS — *The Howl* (d8)

Roll d8 when in a Howl region. **Save vs. HOWL.**

| d8 | Hazard | Save | Effect |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | **Screaming Corridor** — a wind tunnel of pure noise | CON 15 | Fail: **deafened** + disadv. on next check until clear. *(Jonah's weak CON — this one finds him.)* |
| 2 | **The Wind's Whisper** — the gale speaks in *your* voice | WIS 16 | Fail: +1 HOWL and roll Experience (§7) |
| 3 | **Vertigo of the Inverted** — you look up too long at the upside-down plazas | WIS 14 | Fail: **poisoned** (dizzy) until end of next turn |
| 4 | **False Companion** — a party member's voice calls from the wrong direction | WIS 15 | Fail: you move toward it (half your speed) before realizing. If alone: you are now **alone somewhere else** |
| 5 | **The Grinding** — the two planes scrape; a sound below hearing | CON 15 | Fail: 3d6 psychic, and you cannot speak (not silenced — you simply have nothing to say) for 1 min |
| 6 | **The Question** — a voice asks you something true and personal | CHA 16 | Fail: you **answer it out loud** before you can stop yourself. **+1 HOWL automatically** (you answered with your own voice). *Ask the player what their character admitted.* |
| 7 | **Memory Draft** — the wind takes a memory and gives back a wrong one | INT 16 | Fail: you now sincerely misremember one fact. **DM writes it on a note and hands it to the player.** They must play it as true. |
| 8 | **The Listening** — everything goes **silent** for six full seconds | WIS 17 | The scariest one. Fail: +1 HOWL and the certainty that **something located you.** *(Foreshadows the King.)* |

---

## 5. THE STACK TRACKS

Stacks **persist for the whole session** unless shed. Track them openly on the table — let the players watch each other's numbers climb. Max **5**.

### FLUX — *"I am not staying the shape I was."*

| Stack | Name | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| **1** | **Loose** | Cosmetic warping — your shadow is the wrong length, your gear sits oddly. Speed varies ±5 ft each round. |
| **2** | **Rewritten** | Something about you **changes permanently and cosmetically** (eye color, handedness, a scar relocating, hair going white). Roll on §6 or choose. It does not change back. |
| **3** | **Unfixed** | Reality struggles to hold you. Once per round when you're hit, roll a d6 — on a 6 the attack **passes through** you (you were briefly not there). Also: disadv. on Concentration. |
| **4** | **Rendering** | Part of you is now Limbo-stuff. **Resistance to bludgeoning/piercing/slashing**, but you cannot benefit from healing magic (nothing to knit). Visibly, you are wrong. |
| **5** | **DISSOLUTION** | **Break event.** You begin to come apart into possibility. At the start of each of your turns, CON save DC 15 or lose 2 levels of nothing — instead: you take 4d6 force and your form flickers. **You must reach an Anchor (§8) or have an ally spend an action to *insist* on you (CHA check DC 15) within 3 rounds**, or you are reshaped: the plane returns you altered (DM and player negotiate a permanent change). *You do not die. You come back different.* |

### HOWL — *"I am not sure that thought was mine."*

| Stack | Name | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| **1** | **Ringing** | The noise is inside now. Disadv. on Perception (hearing). You keep half-hearing your name. |
| **2** | **Company** | Something walks with you that no one else sees. It is **not hostile** and it uses a voice you love. Disadv. on checks requiring solitude/focus. |
| **3** | **Doubt** | You cannot be certain of one memory. Whenever you state a fact about the past, the DM may say *"…are you sure?"* — once per scene, at the worst moment. |
| **4** | **Answering** | **The wind has your voice.** Allies hear you say things you did not say. Once per scene the DM speaks a line *as your character* to the party. You may not correct it in the moment. |
| **5** | **THE LISTENING** | **Break event.** You are no longer being howled at — you are being **attended to.** The noise stops for you specifically; you exist in a pocket of terrible quiet. You gain: advantage on saves vs. fear (nothing here frightens you anymore), and **disadvantage on all social checks with your own party** (something is off about you). ⚠️ **DM: enter this character in the ledger.** They now carry one of the four signs from Ravon's Paper VI. |

> **Cross-track rule:** a character at **3+ in both tracks** is coming apart from both ends. Give them one **automatic** Experience roll at the start of each new leg, free of charge. They've become interesting to the cavern.

---

## 6. FLUX — What You Experience (d12) *(roll on each failed Flux save)*

*Stackable. Keep them all. They accumulate into a description of a person the plane is editing.*

| d12 | You experience… |
|---|---|
| 1 | Your **hand is briefly someone else's hand.** It does what you wanted anyway. That's worse. |
| 2 | You take a step and cover **thirty feet.** The next step covers three inches. |
| 3 | Your **equipment rearranges** — everything is still there, in the wrong places, tied in knots you didn't tie. |
| 4 | For one full round you can **see your own back.** |
| 5 | Something you were carrying is now **subtly the wrong object** — same weight, same pocket, different thing. |
| 6 | You **age** — visibly, five or ten years — for 1 minute, then snap back. Something about the eyes doesn't. |
| 7 | You **bleed light** instead of blood from an old scar. It doesn't hurt. It doesn't stop for an hour. |
| 8 | A **second heartbeat** starts, out of sync with yours. It stops when you concentrate on it. |
| 9 | Your **reflection lags** in every surface for the rest of the session. |
| 10 | You **fall upward** for a count of three and are set gently back down. Nobody else saw it. |
| 11 | A **duplicate of your voice** finishes your sentence a half-second ahead of you. |
| 12 | **The plane offers.** For one round you can reshape a 10-ft cube of matter by will alone. Then it takes the offer back — and **+1 FLUX** for having accepted. |

---

## 7. HOWL — What You Experience (d12) *(roll on each failed Howl save)*

| d12 | You experience… |
|---|---|
| 1 | You hear **your own voice from across the cavern**, saying something you have not said yet. Later, you say it. |
| 2 | A **name** you do not know surfaces in your mind and will not leave. *(DM: seed a plot thread — the same trick as the Eclipse Whisper table.)* |
| 3 | You are briefly **certain** that one member of the party is an impostor. The certainty fades. The suspicion doesn't. |
| 4 | You smell something from your **childhood home**. There is no reason for it to be here. |
| 5 | The wind sounds **exactly like someone you failed.** It is not saying anything cruel. It is just talking. |
| 6 | You realize you have been **walking for some time** and cannot account for the last few minutes. |
| 7 | Every stranger's face in your memory is now **the same face.** You can't undo it. |
| 8 | You catch yourself **answering a question no one asked** — out loud, mid-sentence. **+1 HOWL.** |
| 9 | You understand, briefly and completely, **something true about the Void** — and then it's gone, leaving only the shape of it and a headache. |
| 10 | You **stop dreaming**, starting tonight. You will not notice. *(DM: quietly note the date. This is one of the four signs.)* |
| 11 | Somebody **taps your shoulder.** There is no one within thirty feet. |
| 12 | The screaming **resolves into words** for exactly one sentence — and it is addressed to you **by title, not by name.** *(DM: this is the King acknowledging them. Do not explain.)* |

---

## 8. SHEDDING STACKS — ANCHORS & MERCY

The players **must** have a way to fight back, or the system is just weather.

**Anchors** — places or acts where reality holds. Inside one, stacks can be shed.

| Anchor | How it works |
|---|---|
| **Ravon's House** | The floating stone is a **hard Anchor.** A short rest here sheds **2 stacks** (of the player's choice, any track). This is *why the house matters* and why Ravon survived here. |
| **Naming a True Thing** | A PC describes, out loud, something concretely real from home (a person, a meal, a room — *specific*). CHA or WIS check DC 13. Success: shed **1 HOWL**. Each PC can only use their own true thing once per session — the second telling rings false. |
| **Physical Discipline** | Orbek's specialty. A full action spent in absolute stillness; CON or WIS save DC 14. Success: shed **1 FLUX**. |
| **Being Held** | An ally spends an action physically anchoring you and states who you are. Shed **1 stack** of either track. **Once per pair per session.** The best one — make it cost a turn in combat and it means something. |
| **Ravon's Rule** | *Never answer a voice using your own voice.* A PC who goes an entire leg without speaking aloud at all sheds **1 HOWL.** (Watch a player try this. It's great.) |
| **Leaving** | All stacks fade over a **long rest outside the bleed-zone** — except a **Stack-5 Break**, which leaves a permanent mark (a scar, a changed feature, or an entry in the ledger). |

---

## 9. WHO IN THIS PARTY IS VULNERABLE *(tune the spotlight)*

- **Jonah** — **CON +0.** The Screaming Corridor and The Grinding will land on him repeatedly. He'll pile up **HOWL** fast. ⚠️ **This is deliberate and dangerous:** Howl-5 (*The Listening*) hands him one of the four signs from Paper VI, and he's already Eclipse-marked. **Do not let him hit Howl 5 by accident** — foreshadow it at 3 and 4 so the table sees it coming.
- **Francheska** — void-attuned, so the Howl finds her *interesting.* Consider: she rolls at **advantage** vs. the noise (she's used to it) but on a failure gains **2 stacks** instead of 1. High floor, low ceiling.
- **Jocular** — ~90 years old, Abyssal-born, has already survived a plane that wanted him dead. Give him **advantage on HOWL saves** — flavored as *"you have heard worse, and from family."* But his cracked halo means **FLUX** hits him hardest: the halo is a fixed thing in an unfixed place.
- **Orbek** — monk discipline. **Advantage on FLUX saves.** He is the party's anchor; lean into "Being Held" and "Physical Discipline" being *his* moves.
- **The celestials (Aisha & Shareen)** — **immune, visibly.** They are not rolling. Let the players notice that. It's the power gap made mechanical, and it's why the party needs them.

---

## 10. QUICK-RUN CHEAT SHEET

```
EACH LEG:
  1. Weather?        → Flux region or Howl region
  2. Hazard          → d8 on the matching table (§3/§4)
  3. Saves           → DC 15 (17 deep / 13 near Anchor)
  4. Fail            → +1 stack + roll d12 Experience (§6/§7)
  5. Beat DC by 10+  → shed 1 stack

BONUS STACKS:
  +1 HOWL  answering a voice with your own voice
  +1 HOWL  saying the King's title aloud
  +1 FLUX  shaping Limbo on purpose

BREAKS AT 5:
  FLUX 5 → DISSOLUTION  (3 rounds to Anchor, or come back changed)
  HOWL 5 → THE LISTENING (silence, and you are in the ledger)

SHED:
  Ravon's House short rest (2) · Name a True Thing (1 Howl)
  Stillness (1 Flux) · Being Held (1, once/pair) · Silence for a leg (1 Howl)
```

---

## 11. PACING GUIDANCE

- **Aim for 2–3 stacks on most PCs by Scene 5.** That's enough to hurt and not enough to break.
- **Let exactly one character get close to 5.** Ideally by their own choices. That's the story of the session.
- Stacks are the **fuel for Scene 5A**: a PC at HOWL 3+ takes the sealed bag's WIS save at **disadvantage** — which is precisely how the four-armed thing gets touched *without* you railroading anyone.
- If the table is enjoying it, keep rolling. **If it becomes bookkeeping, drop to narrating stacks and stop rolling.** The system serves the dread; it isn't the point.