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Death unto Darkness

Death Unto Darkness is a LARP system set in a dark, character-driven interpretation of Games Workshop’s Warhammer 40,000 universe. It focuses on stories of survival, resistance, and moral complexity within an overwhelmingly hostile galaxy.

We explore this setting as horror rather than celebration. The Imperium is a brutal and oppressive regime, and our stories centre on characters navigating, enduring, and resisting its many forms of violence, alongside Chaos, Xenos, Heresy, and the darker edges of Imperial authority. Real-world fascism, hate movements, extremist iconography, or apologism for them have no place in our community.

In our current campaign, players take on the roles of agents of the Inquisition operating in a distant sector of space, uncovering threats and confronting dangers both external and internal to humanity’s fractured empire. We are a not-for-profit fan group. No individual involved in the game receives any financial benefit. Event fees are used solely to cover venue hire, props, and the costs of running events.

This website contains the core rules and setting information for the system. For further community discussion, you can join our our Facebook group or contact the Game Team at deathuntodarkness@gmail.com to request access to our Discord server.

Quick Start

If you're new to Death Unto Darkness, here are some good places to start:

• Campaign Events includes information on Death Unto Darkness events, including details of the next event.
• Building a Character guides you through the process of creating a character to play Death Unto Darkness.
• An Age of Ignorance helps explain our approach to the 40k setting and lore, and the knowledge an ordinary character can expect to have.
• System Policies and Ethos explains important game policies including our approach to Equality & Diversity, self-care, behaviour at games and the social contract.
• Look and Feel explains the visual aesthetic of costume and kit that we ask players to aim for at our games.
• Reading the Wiki provides some recommendations on where to go next.

Who is Death Unto Darkness About?

Death Unto Darkness is a story about the Servants of the Inquisition. It is a story about those who carry out the grim work of the Inquisition - not the powerful Inquisitors themselves, but their Acolytes and Servants who sweat blood and tears in the neverending struggles hidden in the shadows of the Imperium. These people are not heroes, though they may be heroic, because heroes get recognition and glory. These people do not. They might lead double lives where their aliases’ deeds are recognised, but only so far as they are permitted by their true masters, the secretive figures that guide the Imperium. If they try and leave then, by velvet glove or iron gauntlet, they are always dragged back despite their wishes. Ultimately, they know - and the Inquisition knows - that they have stared the truths of the universe in the face; and innocence, once lost, cannot be recovered.

To report problems with this wiki, please email wiki.deathuntodarkness@gmail.com.