Check out the Arcverse's first novel
Faelvur, the dark elven god of fire
Check out the Arcverse's first novel
Role Play Games for Beginners
Discover Worlds. Tell Stories. Create Legends
Welcome to the Arcverse
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Your gateway to tabletop roleplaying games — whether you’re starting with Dungeons & Dragons or exploring new systems and genres.
We offer expert RPG advice for beginners, Game Master tools, and worldbuilding guides to help you create and run unforgettable adventures. Whether you play fantasy, sci-fi, cyberpunk, horror, superheroes, or post-apocalyptic settings, the Arcverse is your home for creativity, storytelling, and game-ready inspiration.
Start your next campaign. Build your world. Shape your legend.
The Deep Net is the ghost of the global network that existed before the DataKrash. Also known as the Old Net, it's a vast, unregulated, and terrifying digital wasteland haunted by the sins of the past. After the legendary netrunner Rache Bartmoss unleashed his RABIDS viruses, the old, interconnected global network was shattered and became an unnavigable hellscape. In response, the Netwatch corporation erected the Blackwall, a massive firewall of black ICE designed to quarantine the ruins of the Old Net and its rogue AIs from the newly-formed, isolated CityNets that society now uses. For most netrunners, the Deep Net is a death sentence, a place where rogue AIs, military-grade viruses, and the digital ghosts of soulkilled netrunners roam free. But for the bravest or most foolish, it represents an irresistible prize: a treasure trove of lost corporate secrets, pre-Collapse data, and powerful technologies that could be worth a fortune. To journey beyond the Blackwall is to risk your mind for the ultimate reward.
The Deep Net is the fractured, haunted cyberspace that remains from the pre-2020s world. Before the DataKrash, the Net was a global entity, a true information superhighway where a netrunner in Night City could seamlessly access a data fortress in Tokyo. This all changed when the dying netrunner Rache Bartmoss unleashed his ultimate masterpieces: the RABIDS (Roving Autonomous Bartmoss Interface Drones).These were self-replicating, malevolent programs and viruses designed to cause maximum chaos, corrupting data and frying the brains of anyone jacked in at the time. The ensuing digital apocalypse, known as the DataKrash, tore the global network apart.
In the aftermath, Netwatch, the de facto law enforcement of cyberspace, realized the Old Net was unsalvageable. Their solution was drastic: they created the Blackwall. This is an immense, impenetrable wall of Black ICE that cordons off the still-burning ruins of the Old Net from the newly established, fragmented CityNets used in the Time of the Red. Beyond this digital barricade lies a true nightmare. Rogue AIs, many of them former corporate and military weapons, have evolved for decades in this chaotic environment.They rule over vast, abandoned data fortresses like digital gods. The very architecture of the Deep Net is unstable, a landscape of corrupted data and ghost systems where the laws of digital physics no longer apply.
Despite the unimaginable danger, the lure of the Deep Net is powerful. The ruins contain priceless information from the pre-Collapse world—corporate secrets, lost technologies, and the soulkilled engrams of legendary netrunners like Alt Cunningham. Corporations, governments, and powerful groups like the Voodoo Boys are constantly seeking ways to breach the Blackwall for their own ends. Netrunners who dare to venture into this digital wasteland are a special breed, requiring not only immense skill but also specialized gear and often a death wish. They risk instant death by Black ICE or a fate far worse: having their minds shattered and absorbed by the sentient, predatory programs that call the Deep Net home.
Adventure Hook
A reclusive former Netwatch agent, known only as "Echo," contacts the crew through a secure channel. Decades ago, before the Blackwall was fully solidified, her partner went missing during a deep dive into the Old Net. Everyone presumed him dead, another victim of the DataKrash. Now, Echo has picked up a ghost signal—a repeating snippet of code that was her partner's unique digital signature. It's broadcasting from a long-lost corporate data haven deep behind the Blackwall.
Echo believes her partner may not be dead but soulkilled, his engram trapped within the crumbling fortress. She has found a temporary, high-risk backdoor through the Blackwall and needs a crew to escort her netrunner on a rescue mission. The job is twofold: the crew's netrunner must navigate the treacherous Deep Net with Echo's guidance, battling rogue AIs and ancient ICE to reach the data haven. Meanwhile, the rest of the crew must defend their physical location—a derelict radio tower in the Badlands—from a Netwatch task force that has detected the illegal breach. The crew must pull a ghost from a digital hell before they are either flatlined by ancient viruses or zeroed by modern corporate agents.