The BackHalls

X Worldbuilders:

GM James R

The BackHalls, as seen from above

This page is about the demiplane, for the campaign named after the Demiplane, see The BackHalls (Campaign)

The BackHalls (Real name unknown) were a mysterious and seemingly unending labyrinth of hallways and office spaces, where the only companions you'll find are the comfort of the damp carpet under your feet, and the buzz of the florescent lights above. Creatures from all manner of time and space found themselves in the BackHalls fighting for survival.

History

Prehistoric Article This article contains information said to be from Prehistoric Times. The validity of prehistoric content is dubious at best due to poor recordkeeping in the era, and should be considered unreliable, or at best: Legend.

It was rumored that the BackHalls were created in prehistoric times by a legendary warden known as Ymbtry (the same warden which the town Ymbtrymman is named for), who had created the demiplane as part of a lost magical ritual which he called "The Blackened Hallmark".

After its creation, very few, if any, creatures ever escaped back to Quelmar from the BackHalls. As a result, its long history is compressed into a compressed time in which it seems everything is happening everywhere at once.

It was confirmed that the BackHalls (much like other planar links) were destroyed as part of the Fracturing of the Weave, and the contents of the halls at that time were dumped out across Quelmar, including whatever power was left of its Vestiges, who added to the apocalyptic vibes of the fracture.

About

Creatures (or objects, magic, plants, really anything that can be targeted by a spell) enter the BackHalls when they are subjected to imprisonment magic, but the spell was not done in the correct way -- either on purpose or due to a lack of skill. As a result, the target of the spell is teleported and imprisoned not in a typical imprisonment bubble, but to this nullified demiplane that exists tangential to reality. Since it was inescapable, it would later become a secret among mages to cast Imprisonment incorrectly if you REALLY needed to get rid of something for good, such as a piece of blackmail, or a curse, or something else that threatens the realm.

Spawning

The BackHalls has specific rooms that are "spawn rooms" where creatures will appear to be summoned out of nowhere. Typically once a spawn room has summoned a party of creatures, it will have a cooldown period before it summons more creatures. Every time a creature spawns, they will be carrying whatever they had on their person when they were originally subjected to the imprisonment, including their clothes, weapons, and any satchels/inventory they had on their person.

When someone is killed in the BackHalls, they do not die, but rather respawn in the halls in a new spawn room. However, they will not retain any memories, items, or powers from their prior life cycle. As a result, every time someone spawns into the BackHalls, they will feel like it is the first time they've ever spawned in the BackHalls.

Life in the Halls

The souls banished to the BackHalls never needed to eat, sleep, or drink. They don't get physically sleepy, but may find themselves wearing thin on abilities and power (such as magic) as they exhaust their power, requiring them to still rest for a time to regain natural strength.

Escape

At least 4 methods of escaping the BackHalls have been recorded:

• Traveling to The City and gaining passage inside while net you access to The Tovag Baragu, a circle of planar portals that will take you somewhere else in the infinite expanse of the multiverse. Considered a last resort by most, because it's just as likely to take you back home as it is to take you to another universe where air is replaced with boiling lava.
• Using Wild Magic to temporarily break the hold, and then plane-jumping while the hold is broken.
• Finding a set of mysterious stairs that lead upstairs. It's never been confirmed if that takes you out of the BackHalls entirely, or just out of THIS rendition of the BackHalls. Considering none of the Vestiges, the creatures the halls were built to trap, ever took the stairs. It's possible they know something about the stairs that others don't.
• Traveling to The Royal Court, where you can be safe and wait out eternity. At the end of 1295 PR the BackHalls are dispelled, and all creatures still alive are dumped out back into Quelmar.

Chambers in the BackHalls were always rectangular, with somewhere between 1 and 8 hallways leading out into more chambers.

Architecture

The walls of the BackHalls were said to be covered in an offensive wallpaper of beige and yellow colors, featuring vertical columns of repeating fleur-de-lis. There were no doors in the hallways, only open passages, though whether or not there were historically any doors is an open question, considering that wooden debris could be found in various places.

Shops

Every 42nd Room in the BackHalls was home to a strange shop. Shops came in all shapes, sizes, forms, and sold any number of weird things.

The economy in the BackHalls was based off of Trinkets and not money. Trinkets took the form of literally anything small and deemed valuable to someone in the halls. That could include true valuables like jewelry, as well as lesser valuables like portraits, books, weapons, parchment, hair, and all manner of strange left-behinds.

The infamous "Shop" taken over by the Cult of the Dragon, who sold trinkets for Dragon goods and intel.

One shop wound up being a Stuckey's

• This specific shop was run by a recneck attendant named Zeke. He gave out temporary tattoos which granted powers such as Spell Slots, Action Surges, etc.
• The Stuckey's had mounted mirrors in the corners of the room like a gas station, but unlike normal mirrors, these also seemed to show spooky demons lurking around the room

It seems to be possible to "hijack" a shop and take over the room, but in the few times it's been witnessed, the room still inevitably turns into a new type of shop. For example, it was known that the Cult of the Dragon killed and took over a shop, but in its stead, they set up tables where they began a trinket swap program, looking to trade away high value trinkets if anyone who comes by has anything remotely draconic to trade them.

Chalk could be rarely found in special shops dedicated entirely to them...for a high price.

It was also rumored that one shop sold actual digestible food. There's no point to it other than to feel alive again.

Additional Shops

• 

  A shop which sold "Films" and "Concessions"

• 

  A shop that sold "gas" and took the form of a Stuckey's

• 

  A shop which sold intel and books

The BackDoors

It was possible to enter the space between the walls using a crafted door. Attempting to magically or mechanically attach a door to any of the natural decaying mustard-yellow walls of the BackHalls will reveal an opening. Stepping inside the opening places you exactly on the other side of the wall, in an inky black abyss impossible to navigate, but literally on the other side of the walls. It's possible to quietly use this space between the walls to navigate the halls while avoiding detection, but like all good ideas, that means encountering similarly clever creatures who lurk in the darkness, either innocently sneaking by, or purposefully ready to ambush in the dark.

BackDoor Runic Chalk

Besides opening doors in the wall, another "Backdoor" way of travel was invented at some point in time. Using a special, limited availability, chalk -- one can draw a sigil on the ground that they believe only they understand. The chalk will then connect to any other identical sigils in the halls, opening a gateway. This could be used in a single "run" to create safe points or teleporation points, but it could also be used ACROSS runs to see where your past life has been. The primary users of the Runic Chalk were wizards and other spellcasters, who often times would decipher the mysteries of the halls quick enough to "re-discover" the chalk and find themselves in a cozy room they partitioned off, already full of the records and items and friends of their past lives.

Quirks & Tidbits

Many groups preferred to travel in groups of 10, called Contuberniums, due to it giving that group a sort of invincibility or invulnerability from The Allip.

Puzzles

Several Rooms have written puzzles placed on either the floor, or the ceiling, or even on a wall. The source of the puzzles is unknown, but it's been said that anyone who can solve the mysterious, anomalous puzzles will be instantly rewarded with treasure of some kind. Sometimes it's an instant refresher, sometimes it's a weapon or item, or sometimes it's exactly the answers you were looking for.

Doors

There was almost nothing as valuable as a free-standing Door in the BackHalls. Having a large door on wheels (a specialty of the Dwarven guild that lived in the halls) would allow groups to travel and close off passages behind them, or find a safe dead-end somewhere where they could close off the only passage in, providing a 100% guaranteed sanctuary.

Soundtracks

The BackHalls was full of an eerie buzz and a haunting silence, which was sometimes broken by distance screams, crunches, or other ghastly sounds of people dying. However, to remedy this, a number of shops in the BackHalls sold "Soundtracks", which could be purchased and activated to relieve the haunting silence, filling the air with all manner of music and noise. It was almost necessarily for long-time survival, as the haunting silence and constant reminders of death tended to drive others to insanity.

Some known soundtracks include:

• Attention K-Mart Shoppers
• Synthwave

Poetry

It was common for lost souls to eventually scribble out poems and thoughts onto the walls using whatever material they had on them, sometimes including their own blood. A sample of poems scrapped from the Backhall walls include:

"1000 Rooms 4000 Walls 2000 doors 10,000 Halls Did I get them all?"	"Franny Cranks served Us our last meal. I'll never understand How to get back To room 420 And have another"	"Is it counting up till dawn? Or counting down till we're all gone? The strength to proceed, I don't got it Won't reach the dominant or tonic"
"I saw the most peculiar clock It counted ways I'd never thought It didn't just count seconds up But minutes left and hours rough And thus when I would count the time I would rely on chalking line Imposing from the floor below Just tell me clock now where to go"	"Glassbreaker Glassbreaker break me some glass Bond me for life To your eternal mass. Let me seek justice and punish the foes Who crawl in the halls alone."	"Since I don't know the way, I'm beginning to think I've been lead astray. I could spend all the rest of my days Escaping from a Maze."

Encounters

This is an incomplete list of things encountered in The Backhalls (so far). This table is broken up into a 6x10 table so if you wanted to roll randomly you can roll a d6 and a d10 to generate a square.

SWAT Marines	Dire Wolves	A Blind balhannoth	Recent writing on the walls says in wet ink: "3...2...1"	An altar, written in gnomish: "The Altar of the GlassBreakers"	Oil Barrels filled with assorted items.
A tree grows out of the wall, merging with the wallpaer, the tree becomes more impossible to touch the closer you get to it.	A run down Intervention Buster with a dead skeleton inside. Particularly crafty or modern victims could maybe recover explosives from it.	A room with a shadow demon.	A group of hobos crowding around a flaming barrel	Locked Chests of Good Loot	Wall mounted Conversational Security Cameras with mic and speaker.
A reeking puddle of ooze	A small circle of stones, a labcoat sits on one of the rocks.	Untouched office with furniture from a schoolhouse	A wall mounted font which liquified (soupified?) anything placed into it.	Goblins	Blackouts
The Kreaker	Portals that let you enter the walls.	Death Dogs	Half Giants	Hill Giants	Trapped chambers which shut and fill with sand if triggered.
Spells that appear out of nowhere	Puzzles written into the floor	Random bursts of fire	Teleporting bugs	Trapped chambers which lock you in.	A sleepy Yagnoloth
Sundry demons	Vampires and vampire kobolds	Portals to other parts of the halls	Myconids fighting a Giant	Various altars	Chambers that make you lose all you senses.
A tribe of Git , green skinned warriors who attack with psionic magic.h	A group of gorilla-looking Demons	A man named "Vernon"	Bullywugs who will happily host you for a friendly lunch.	A merchant who sells "Backdoor" Chalk	A lair of 8 lizardfolk who turned one of the rooms into a swamp
3 Major Items of Loot	A group of dwarves from the mid 600s running from a group of Mind-Flayers	A Leucrotta	A shop which sells mechanical enhancements	"The Backhall", a long massive stretch of hallway claimed by unknown powers	A group of hostile drunkards who will fight to the death
A man named Earn'st Grimes and his harem of mermaids looking to rob whoever they come across.	A teleportation circle drawn in chalk on the floor that leads somewhere else.	A group of traveling catfolk	A Korred with a serious case of Deja Vu	An ancient looking man who claims that he built the halls to lock away the Masters	"IPOS WAS HERE" written next to a silly little smile.
A secret corner belonging to banished members of the Cult of the Dragon	A gelatinous Cube good god run RUN. RUUUUUUUNNNNN.	Wild vines from the Feywild crawling over every surface turning the room into a little forest.	A store selling stone statues of the dead.	A gnome riding a minotaur that claims to have memorized the entire halls	A hole in the wall that takes anything you put into it and generates a "soup" version of that thing.

The Vestiges

Sometimes called the Bosses or the Masters, there were a set of 10 vestiges (and one god) who were trapped in the halls. Some say that the halls were originally created to trap these unstoppable forces in the first place.

• The Allip
• The Eviscerator
• The Ogre Warlord
• The Dire Troll
• The Crab
  • As part of his supernatural abilities, he could burrow and dig through the halls as if they were dirt, creating massive holes and tunnels and trails that criss-crossed both through the walls, and under the floors. If a large hole was ever encountered in the BackHalls, you could be sure you've nearly crossed paths with the Crabhell.
• The Wyvern

• The Frog

• The Minotaur

• The Dragon

• The Goristro

• Ipos

Factions

• GlassBreakers
  • Cursed invidividuals (primarily gnomes, but also many others)

• Asmodeus' Rejects
  • Devils who had been cursed to the halls, who were disappointed to find out that killing themselves did NOT send them back to hell.
  • Many of them banished by Asmodeus himself.

• MapGabbers
  • A poetic group of bards writing songs to help them memorize all the rooms and encounters they've had
• The Bank, also known as The Mint and The Vault
  • The Dwarven guild, who have locked off several highly secure rooms and started operations to attempt to mine/hoard infinite gold off of the infinitely respawning creatures.
• Glumpfens
  • Desperate little goblinses who want nothing but to find purpose in life by serving the needs of anyone they find. They live off of praise and head pats.
• Camera Barbarians / Polaroid Ragers
  • A group of half giants who managed to get ahold of a Polaroid Camera, which they would utilize as a flashbomb, blinding anyone they came across and granting them the opportunity to pummel them.
  • They would keep the camera photos taken as a record of everything they've come across.
• The Royal Court / The Kingdom
  • Said to have once run the entire BackHalls, seemingly managed to "escape" the halls by breaking out of the outermost walls and building an independent kingdom at a spatial distance from the rooms of the labyrinth.
• Sisters of the Mystic Eye
  • A small clan of druids that populated the halls.
• Pelorians
  • Claiming to be the only "real" church in the whole halls. Set up somewhere in the low-numbered rooms.
• The City (including the Pistol Arrows/Pistoleros)
  • Full of children and Guidance Counselors
  • Also home to one of the few escape methods, the The Tovag Baragu
• The Watchers
• Circus of the Lost

Maps

• 

  Map taken from the MapGabbers

• 

  Snippet of Room intel taken from a Short Film

• 

  A map of the halls taken from the headquarters of the GlassBreakers