This D&D 5E book wants to give your characters A Life Well Lived away from dungeons and dragons
Upcoming supplement lets you generate lifepaths, allies and activities in downtime between adventures - as well as eventually retiring your hero.
An upcoming supplement for Dungeons & Dragons 5E will let you see how your character lives before, between and after their epic adventures.
A Life Well Lived aims to fill in the gaps between the typical encounters seen in classic tabletop RPGs like D&D, working to flesh out your characters’ origins, backstories and even what happens after their questing days are over.
The book includes dedicated rules for generating lifepaths - similar to the character creation systems seen in tabletop RPGs such as Cyberpunk and Traveller - by outlining characters’ lives before they became adventurers, influencing their skills, motivations and personality by detailing their experiences, personal connections and complications before a group’s first session begins.
Between adventures themselves, characters can take part in dedicated campcraft activities while taking a long rest or pausing on the way to their next quest, with the rules designed to provide new ways for party members to bond and reveal more of their own backstories - not unlike the long rests taken by players in recent D&D video game Baldur’s Gate 3.
As well as resting around the campfire, characters can head home to explore their hobbies outside of looting treasure and defeating monsters in a set of downtime activities. The activities range from the personal - such as spending time with family and friends, or settling scores with foes - to the professional, with characters able to run a business, pursue work on the side of their career as an adventurer or working away on a masterpiece.
Joining them might be one of the book’s new patrons, representing allies that can provide boons to characters during their adventures - as well as being a possible motivation for quests in some cases. The allies may come with enemies of their own, though, opening up opportunities for characters to encounter new foes connected to them via their patron.
Finally, once a character’s questing days are at an end, A Life Well Lived embraces its title by providing a new way for characters to retire, simulating what happens once they hang up their sword - whether that’s focusing on family, business or just taking it easy after a life of adventure. That retirement may not always be permanent, however, with ways for retired characters to find themselves thrust back into the action.
A Life Well Lived comes from Cubicle 7, the RPG studio behind Warhammer RPGs Soulbound and Imperium Maledictum, as well as the Elden Ring-esque D&D setting Broken Weave and previous 5E-compatible supplement Uncharted Journeys, which can also be combined with A Life Well Lived’s rules.
A Life Well Lived will launch a Kickstarter in early October.