Dark Woods - Darkwood (Promptober 2025 #4)

Moon tree in moonlight.

A narrow, rambling sinkhole snakes behind the stone hut in Medusa's Grove, home to a large colony of gargoyles (and no medusae at all). Gargoyles line the edge of the sinkhole to sleep, blocking the sun during the day and exposing the trees to moonlight when they wake up and leave at night. These trees have silvery-grey leaves and bark so black that it looks oil-stained. The elves call this precious resource Ithil nimloth (moon tree), and they grow the trees in specially-constructed moonhouses which let in the moonlight while blocking sunlight. Humans simply call it Darkwood.

The wood itself looks quite dark, more dark grey than brown, and it shimmers slightly under moonlight. The trees consume very little water as they grow, so the wood looks fine-grained and extremely dense but feels surprisingly light. Any wooden item made from darkwood weighs half as much as normal (and the encumbrance penalty goes down by 1 item to a minimum of 0 in Swords of Cepheus), including bows, staves, and weapon hafts. The dense grain makes it stronger than the hardiest oak, doubling durability and resistance to damage.

Some elves use larger scraps and trimmings to make armor suits entirely of darkwood scales, providing protection as +1 scale armor and costing 4x as much to purchase while weighing only as much as a suit of leather armor. Elves may look askance at a non-elf wearing darkwood scale, but it's common enough to not be perceived as a slight requiring an instant duel.

Darkwood arrows (and other missile weapons) fly 20% farther than regular arrows, and they are more likely to survive shooting (75% instead of 50% in combat situations). Other weapons made with darkwood only gain the weight and encumbrance benefit.

NOTE: Darkwood appears in the Swords of Cepheus rules, but I thought I'd flesh it out a little bit more than the brief mechanical treatment it receives. Darkwood scale armor popped out of my head, but it just sounds cool to me. Plus, you can use this writeup to port darkwood to other systems fairly easily.

Part of the Promptober project for 2025.