#dark academia ask game

[dark-romantics]

I’m bored. Ask me a question :)

(in the inbox)

[theresattrpgforthat]

any ttrpgs for spooky dark boarding school stories? gotham academy, the boarding school: las cumbres, wednesday, that kinda thing?

THEME: Dark Boarding Schools

Hello there, at first I felt like this overlapped with all of my magic school recommendations, but once I did some digging, I realized that there's a lot of big differences! That also means that there was a good number of games I haven't recommended before, so I hope there's something here that fits what you're looking for.

Tangled Blessings, by Cassi Mothwin.

On the eve of your final exam at Brackroot Academy, what mysteries, secrets, dread, and drama will you recall from your last four years of schooling?

Tangled Blessings is a solo journaling or two-player RPG inspired by dark academia media, ghost stories, and graduate school. Featuring a wizarding college, wandering specters, assigned houses, curses, devils’ bargains and more supernatural flavor, Tangled Blessings blends horror and the fantastical to help players craft a story that spans their time at the academy — culminating in one final showdown against their rival.

If your favorite stories ever involved sneaking around an ancient building, uncovering dangerous secrets, studying in a dusty library, practicing spells on the lawn, or making perilous deals with creatures lurking in the darkness… This game is for you.

Tangled Blessings is a game about discovering the dark secrets hidden behind the allure of a secret magical world. You use a tarot deck to determine your character’s placement at the school, the nature of their rival, and the ghosts and creatures that will emerge throughout your years at the school. Each year is represented by a series of card draws, which will represent events that you have to decide how you respond to. If you play this game using the 2-player variant, each of you will play each-other’s rivals, comparing your results to see how the school year affects the both of you. The game culminates in a Final Exam that will determine whether you or or rival comes out on top.

St. Hornbeck, by belsaas.

Welcome to St. Hornbeck College/

Atop a small hill in the woods just outside the small town of Southfield, WI sits a College. Old, copper-rimmed limestone buildings huddle together against the harsh winters, while herds of students wander between them in search of wisdom, kinship and the occasional party. Soon, those herds of students will include you. There are two main reasons for enrolling at St. Hornbeck. Firstly, they have a leading program in the field you want to major in (yes, whatever you may choose). Secondly, there are only a handful of colleges that accept monster-teens in America…

This game relies on traditional teenage tropes to inform your character background, and leans fully into the allegory of monstrosity being a metaphor for young adulthood. Gameplay occurs over a series of scenes, marking various days in the calendar of the school year. In each scene, you can roll for or choose complications related to your monstrosity as a way to invite tension and obstacles for your characters to overcome. If you want to see something that’s a bit darker, you might want to check out this game’s inspiration, by snagging Midnight Oil from Jay Dragon’s Patreon.

Lost Years, by Summerwood Games.

The boarding school in this game is any boarding school, every boarding school. The walls are old stone or red brick, the dormitories are filled with young people going through the agonizing process of becoming themselves, classrooms retrofitted with ceiling tiles and modern lighting.

There are spaces of this school that belong only to us students, sacred rites performed in them that mean nothing to others and everything to us. We smoke cigarettes in the basement, make out in the tack room, make meaningful eye contact across the cricket pitch. I will tell you two truths and a lie: no one can take these years from us, none of us will be the same when we leave, no class will teach us more than we learn from one another. Can you see now which one is the lie? We couldn’t.

Lost Years is a Belonging Outside Belonging game set in a boarding school menaced by a mysterious force that threatens to empty the students of everything that makes them themselves. Meant for 3-5 players, it can be played as a one-shot but is most suited for multi-session play. 

Lost Years looks to be a game that focuses on the emotional highs and lows of being a teenager trying to survive in a strange environment away from the eyes of their parents - but still under the control of some form of authority. Your characters will fill the roles of various tropes from boarding school media, such as the Sporty One, or the Witchy One.

Because this game is BoB, the school itself will fill the foreground, with various locations such as the Attic and the Greenhouse being fleshed out by different players around the table. If you want a game that focuses on the themes of dark academia and how they affect the relationships of these students, you might want to check out Lost Years.

Never & More, by Small Stories.

NEVER & MORE is a quick-play roleplaying game and Edgar Allan Poe-inspired hack of John Harper's Lasers & Feelings.

You are the newest recruits of The Society of Ushers, an occult secret society. Your mission is to prove yourself to your superiors, master the rituals required to move up a rung, and learn how to talk to ravens. Your direct superior and teacher, the Belfry-Devil, has finally deemed you suitable to circulate by yourselves amongst greater society, trusting you to remain faithful to the Ushers in the face of attempted poaching, targeted seduction, and superior parties.

This isn’t necessarily a game about academia, but I think it carries similar elements of learning, dark secrets, and hierarchy. Lasers and Feelings games balance your characters between two qualities; in this case, you are torn between your desire for safety and your hunger for knowledge. You can play this as a one-shot or draw it out if you like, just keep in mind that these types of games usually don’t have resources for character advancement, so your characters won’t gain any new abilities - although whether or not they learn from their mistakes is up to you.

Precarious Prep, by Seaworks.

Welcome to Precarious Prep.

Something dark is going on at Precarious Preparatory School, and one detective - your GM - needs somebody on the inside. In the daytime you'll take classes, get to know the students and faculty, figure out who you can trust. The better you do in class, the faster you'll level up. At night you'll investigate the campus, search for clues, and unlock puzzles. Report your discoveries to the detective to gain points.

Instead of having 6 universal stats, Precarious Prep uses a curriculum - the stats your character takes on are determined by the course load you pick up each trimester. The better you do in classes, the more firepower you’ll have in your investigations. Classes can be fully relevant, partially relevant, or irrelevant to the checks you need to make throughout the game, so coordinate with your team and round out your education with a variety of skills.

Precarious Prep uses something called Discovery Points to indicate how close your students are to revealing what exactly is going on at this preparatory school. Your characters use the things they are learning in class to investigate the mystery, while trying to avoid generating enough suspicion to get them kicked out. Many of the rules strive to generate a number of different gambles that the players can take while trying to gather information - will you do something that increases your chances of success while also increasing your chances of getting expelled? Can you get enough information before the school year ends - or before one of you gets killed?

This game is still in open beta, which means it’s free, but also that it might still have some kinks that need to be worked out. The designer is very eager for feedback, so if you take a look at this game, you might be able to contribute to the final product!

I’d Also Recommend….

The Gardening Club, by Wizard of Ox.

[kacievvbbbb]

I don't know especially with the lastest chapter (ch 265) this just feels so much like Yuuji.

Like especially in the first season people kept asking why he is doing all this, why he wants to save people, why he's beating himself up so much over people he barely knows. People kept wanting to know Yuuji's why and he couldn't explain it he was holding unto the promise he made to his granfther as an explanation but that wasnt really is.

And then you have Mahito who tried to force his own defintion of who yuuji was unto him and beat him down until Yuuji believed it too. He's just a machine killing curses because thats his nature vs Mahito killing humans cause thats his nature. They are beings of instinct slaves to their nature, cogs in the machine. And Yuuji internalizes that so much it weighs so heavily on him the idea that his job isnt to save people but kill curses doesn't sit right with him.

but then at what should be his lowest point he stares his biggest tormentor in the face and said you know what I don't particulalry care what you or anyone else thinks about my reasons. I don't think you have to have grand or innate reasons to do something. Sometimes you just do! and what yuuji wants, more than anything; more than killing curses more than keeping the "weak" safe, is to save his friends. And it's too late for a lot of them, Yuuji was too late but goddam it he won't be late for this. So fuck Sukuna he's bringing Megumi home.

[sajra-savera]

Forget ask games, drop your favourite quote from book or movie in my inbox and i give you song rec(s) based on it!

[nightmareevara]

Uh so your wildest fantasies?

Being vulnerable in front of someone without feeling embarrassed

[protagonist-art]

"Uh- I'm Arnold. Bennett. It's profoundly difficult to get your lifes works and studies accepted if your name isn't... yes, oh! Are you a fan of moths, sir?"

NEW RDR2 OC!! a reclusive, clumsy entomologist and bug collector; cooped up in his study of uniformed clutter

[mishhty]

you've been on medications for depression and you never told me, why? i thought you will never hide your pain from me. what did i do for you to be fighting this all alone?

some battles are meant to be fought alone, including others may scar them as well despite their best intentions. what you think, won’t heal my pain, hiding it from you was my choice. you said you were willing to give me my space, that’s why i let you in and our sweet story begin.

i am well aware that i’m not alone. i know i have you and that is more than enough but this is my problem and i have to find a solution myself, i have to get better by myself. your help may interfere with all the efforts i worked so hard towards to build my ability, resilience and will. i may always need help thereafter and that is what i am working against. i need you, that’s true but i don’t want to depend on you for my life and that’s why i never told you. i understand your cause but it’s killing the reason.

i just want to be free and once i am free, the first thing i’ll ever do is to come running back to you, happily. i promise.

[stephen-stilwell]

baby I love you so much

I have wife who I love v much.

[manincaffeine]

You got nice hands but they would look better around my neck 😏

You're right babygirl. My hand looks better around your neck while I kiss the hell out of you and choke you.

But you don't have the guts to recreate this.

[girlw-amermaidtattoo]

Why submission get me hard and why I am excited when a superior tells me what to do?

It sounds like you’re tapping into the psychological and physiological sides of submission—something many people experience 😉💕✨ Here’s a straightforward breakdown:

1. Power Dynamics: Submitting to someone else, especially a “superior” who sets boundaries or gives orders, can trigger an arousal response because of the power dynamics. This exchange of control can create excitement, often because it allows you to release responsibility and focus on feeling and experiencing, rather than being in charge.

2. Psychological Triggers: Many find submission exciting because it’s tied to feelings of trust and vulnerability. When you’re in a submissive role, you’re letting go and allowing someone else to guide the experience. This dynamic can heighten emotional and physical sensations, making you more responsive and aroused.

3. Physical Response: Arousal from submission often stems from the way our brains respond to dopamine and adrenaline. The excitement and slight edge of “risk” (even in a safe context) can boost these chemicals, intensifying your reaction and heightening your physical arousal.

4. Fantasy and Identity: For some, the concept of being “taken care of” or “guided” fulfills a deeper need or fantasy. Submission might tap into specific desires or interests that align with who you are or how you want to explore your own sexuality.

Feeling aroused by submission is a common experience—it’s simply one way of connecting with another person through power and trust dynamics. Enjoy exploring this side of yourself

[kermit-the-hag]

favourites tag game

- favourite time of day: midnight

- favourite aesthetic: dark academia

- a colour that describes you: burgundy

- favourite quote: jenna marbles

- current obsession (show, movie, etc): parks and rec

- favourite texture: satin/silk

- favourite outfit (or an outfit you wish you had in your closet): this specific outfit that elaine wears

- world/universe/place you see yourself living: south of france

- favorite flower: daffodils

as you can see, there is absolutely no rhyme or reason to what i like. lifestyle/aesthetic? who’s she?

tagging moots i’d love to know more about

no pressure tags: @machtaholic @thisapplepielife @iwouldn-tdothatifiwereyou @impmunson @highkingpenny @justsheerfilth1 @spineless-lobster @taylorscarbonfootprint @fuzzypedal @cursedghosts @theheadlessphilosopher @hellion-child @ununpredictableme @deadtothebones @bettiebloodshed @munsinner @sunflowerharrington

do it coward: @rhaenyyras

[academic-vampire]

(Check out the two posts below to see which swan you prefer)

[caliburn-not-calculator]

My primary assumption about You is your house is filled nigh exclusively with dark wood furniture.

If I were able to a) afford and b) choose the furniture of where I live

Yes

Yes this would be 100% correct

I have the interior design sense of medieval fantasy nobility, a 1920s professor, and a vampire all combined into one lol

But I live with my parents and will be in a college dorm next year, so alas, no dark wood furniture for me.

Yet

[nightmareevara]

Tell me about your problems and I'll give unhelpful solutions like google

[jo-icarus]

pressed flowers, peeling wallpaper

pressed flowers - Have you ever fallen in love?

That's a tough question.

In retrospect, what does falling in love feel like anyway? Is it like serenity of the Sun's warm glow on my face? Or resounding image of the Moon in my lonely mind? Is it an explosion of color in the midst of quiet? Is falling in love silent? Is it like a kind of heartbreak?

I've had moments where my face would heat up at the sight of a boy. I felt the bite of unrequited love for a split moment. But all these instances were too short, too feeble, too quiet to resemble my idea of love.

I think that love is too deep, I think it shakes you to your core. Like the ocean and the crashing waves on the shore, like the blooming of stars above, their resounding yawp.

So no, I don't think so. I think I might one day, who knows. Perhaps in the warm air of a bakery, or in the candle lit libraries. I think that one day I will feel the burst of color and warmth and brilliance, all for one person.

For now, I'll write crooked poetry about love and it's reflection on the world.

peeling wallpaper - Write about a memory.

My mind is oblivion. It takes and eats at memories like a no-face, drowns in its greed for safety.

I remember the time I tried to pull from it a thread of innocence. Sitting with my younger self as I watched the blurry image of peeled oranges on a tabletop.

I remember the sweet juice dripping from my chin, the stickiness of my hands afterwards. I remember the resounding laughs and the quiet before as my dad peeled one for me. My tiny nose scrunched as I tried to do it myself. The sweetness of success in my mouth. The blur that follows. The oblivion that eats at my mind like oranges in the hands of a child, who worked so hard to peel it and waited for approval.

The record stops, however, in that particular moment. It never comes.

I lick my lips from time to time in search of that sour sweetness.