Dungeon Master reference

This page collects the optional rules for running travel through the Starlight Roads. The lore and in-world description live on the main Plane-The Starlight Roads page; this companion holds only the dice tables and procedures.

Running the Roads

While a party travels the Roads, the warped flow of time and the instability of magic are resolved with two tables:

  • Every six hours, roll on the Time Effects table and apply the result. Describe the sensations to the players - sudden fatigue or its absence, gnawing hunger or none at all, and so on.
  • Every six hours, whenever the characters are casting, roll on the Magic Zones table and apply the result. On each casting, confirm the spell’s school and exactly what it does before resolving any zone effect, and layer in any effect that specifically targets metamagic.

Table 1 - Time Effects

Roll once every six hours.

Roll (d100)ResultTime flowEffects
1–20No change×1Time behaves as it did before; nothing changes.
21–40Minor acceleration×2Time runs twice as fast. Spells and potions last half as long; long rests are needed twice as often and last half as long; characters eat double rations, being genuinely hungry.
41–60Major acceleration×4Time runs four times as fast. Spells and potions last a quarter as long; long rests are needed four times as often (the party is exhausted almost constantly) and last a quarter as long; characters eat four times the rations.
61–80Minor deceleration×½Time runs half as fast. Spells and potions last twice as long; long rests are needed half as often and last twice as long; characters eat half rations, not being very hungry.
81–100Major deceleration×¼Time runs a quarter as fast. Spells and potions last four times as long; long rests are needed a quarter as often (the party is never tired) and last four times as long; characters eat a quarter rations, scarcely hungry at all.

Table 2 - Magic Zones

Roll once every six hours while the characters are casting spells.

Roll (d100)ZoneSpell effectMetamagic effect
1–5NormalNoneNone
6–20InertSpells cannot be cast at all (the area works like an antimagic field)Cannot be used
21–30SuperfluousEvery spell is cast as though one level higher - its range, duration and number of targets are doubled, as is any damage or healing it dealsAlways works at double effectiveness
31–50Wild MagicEvery spell cast triggers a wild magic surgeNone
51–70UnravelingEvery spell cast, or magic item activated, forces an additional roll (as the Unraveling Magic variant)-
71–100UnpredictableCasting a spell instead produces a different spell of the same levelYou gain a different metamagic effect

Appendix

Sources & Attribution

Translated from the campaign’s original Hebrew notes on the Starlight Roads (the field research attributed in-world to Kimyo) and archived privately. See the main Plane-The Starlight Roads page for the in-world description.