Dungeons & Dragons: How To Run Vecna In Your Eve Of Ruin Campaign

Vecna: Eve of Ruin is the module which pays off years of foreshadowing and buildup across the Dungeons & Dragons multiverse. The Lich god is one of the most famous antagonists in the franchise, and it's important to get him right for the players to buy into the multiversal shenanigans of the adventure.

Dungeons & Dragons: Complete Guide To Vecna Eve Of Ruin

We answer your questions to help run this high-level D&D adventure.

The Lord of the Hand and Eye has been around since the second edition, but you don't have to read back to 1989 to understand his character. Knowing where to focus your efforts and tie them into the broader narrative of the module will save you a lot of preparation time.

Use The Link To Vecna

The player characters are metaphysically linked to Vecna following the opening act of the adventure. Metaphysics doesn't pop up often in Dungeons & Dragons, but you can use it for interesting things that the book leaves largely to your discretion.

One way to to characterise Vecna despite him not being directly present is to have the link impose on the players. The characters aren't just psionically or magically linked to the Archlich. The metaphysical concept of Vecna overlaps with them.

A few things are consistent and laid out for you:

• Vecna is not aware of the link and does not attempt to sever it.
• The characters gain some of the Lich God's power over secrets, collecting them as trophies or spending them as currency.
• The players can choose how strongly they want the link to be emphasized by the Dungeon Master.

Here are a few things you can do with the link to make Vecna's presence felt long before the level 20 confrontation.

Method

How To Run It

Considerations

Mistaken Identity

You can have NPCs momentarily recognise a PC to be Vecna before correcting themselves and not knowing why they made that mistake.

Depending on whether the NPC is a cultist of Vecna, a sworn enemy, or an innocent bystander will all build facets of his character without him making a direct appearance.

Worship

Prayers from Vecna cultists are audible to the players.

Hearing what accolades and requests his worshippers make will give the players an understanding of Vecna's cruelty and wrath.

Having a Sending spell to Vecna be received by the players will help set up the reveal that Mordenkainen is Kas in disguise.

Name And Identity

A character's crest or signature might be corrupted by the link, spelling an anagram of Vecna and showing a hand or eye motif that distatic.aayyy.com/topic/dn/'t exist before, but others now remember to always have been there.

This is easier to do in the theatre of the mind. If your party uses props or unique character art, consider another method.

Insanity Mechanics

Characters can gain new personality traits derived from Vecna's history and character.

You can borrow or modify traits from the major mastatic.aayyy.com/topic/dn/ess table such as "there's only one person I trust", "I am the smartest person in the world", and "I'm certain I'm being watched at all times."

Only do this if your group agrees to use the mastatic.aayyy.com/topic/dn/ess rules in session zero.

Encourage Secrecy

Emphasizing the importance of the secrets of power out of character can lead to the players engaging in more secrecy in character, imitating the lich's behaviour.

Most players won't require too much nudging to experiment with a new mechanic. Using tokens or another physical prop to represent accumulated secrets will help them remember it.

Personalised Secrets

You can turn secrets the PCs hold from their backstory into secrets of power.

The secrets may not have the world-shattering implications of the plot-relevant deceptions but are given power by the characters' links.

This needs to be done on a player-by-player basis, so it consumes a lot of preparation time.

Vecna's Spells

When a player casts Counterspell, apply the expanded effect of Vecna's Dread Counterspell.

Non-spellcasters don't have to be left out. Have critical hits imbued with the entropic energy of Vecna's dagger, Afterthought.

Ham Up Vecna's Pride

Vecna's plan with the ritual of remaking is to rewrite history not just to put himself on top of reality but to make it so "he has never known defeat and all who oppose him live in torment".

To put it short, he's incredibly petty, and you should exaggeratethis to make him more interesting as a character. It is not enough for Vecna to win, he wants to wipe it in the face of everyone who has ever wronged him, forever.

You can do this by having exaggerated displays of grudge-bearing against the characters who share history with him. The players spend more time interacting with Kas and other foes of Vecna than with the lich himself.

The final chapter includes several areas of unreality showing how Vecna intends to remake the world. When the players are exploring other parts of the multiverse, you can have smaller symbols of Vecna's intended rewriting appear.

Being too overt can spoil the tension of the unrealities in chapter 11. Don't open chapter one with Neverwinter already ruled by Death Knight Neverember.

Describe the city guard as wearing new spikier armour that you can call back to later when they are instead worn by wights.

Archlich Vecna Is Not His Strongest Form

By the time the players confront Vecna in combat, he's severely weakened himself via the ritual. The players fight him as a mortal(ish) lich and not as a deity. This doesn't mean he'll stay this weak or that he'll stay defeated.

Even if the players are successful in their quest, Vecna cannot be prevented from regenerating. The cast has made an enemy of a deity with cults and allies across several worlds. The Whispered One's presence can still be felt through the persistent threat he poses.

The players may have started the game beneath his notice, but now they're worthy of being put on his list of people who will be tormented forever when he becomes supreme ruler of the multiverse.

If you want to reuse him as a villain more quickly, you can adjust the waiting period on his undying trait.

1d100 years isn't a long time on the divine timescale, but it's a long time for players to wait, especially if some of them are playing as humans.

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