The Director Welcomes You

Convenience store Royale

#cc0464

Location

Frigid, Calm China

Time of Day

17:16

Extraction Point

51 Miles S

Time to Complete

34 Hours

Investigators,
I have sent you to circle a Underground Palace to look for a suspect by the name "Three Platypuses". This mission is counterintelligence. Their recent activity is concerning and we need you to find where their funding is coming from. We don't know much about their goals but we've intercepted this cryptic message – "A vagrant asks for food at the Boneyard".

We're low budget this mission – I've packed a Clean Blanket in your kit to help.

— The Vinyl record player you were holding self destructs.

The Villain Dossier

Name

Calvin Gregory

Alias

"Three Platypuses"

Features

7' 9"

Gray eyes

A second belly button / Crotch

Organization

The Sorority of Polite Hole

Emotions

Disliked

Personality

Unabashedly Helpless

Motive

Make a lot of money for a love interest

Bodyguard

Frankie the "Fluffy Basilisk"

Physical Size

Slight

Story

Additional Locations

The Many Jungle

Desolate Forge

Enjoyment Peninsula

Random Events

Bard Salutes the adventurers

Chauvinist scurries by

Buccaneer Glistens gently

Fairy stop the party and asks questions

World

Stores

Bentley's Bible Convenience store

Carrillo's Suit of armor Group

Burgess's Chaise Cosmetics

Hayes's Cutting board Specialities

Traps

Scything Blade

Earthquake of Prosperity

Objects

Bible that is glowing

Chaise with a False bottom

Secret Suit of armor

Hidden Crossbow

Watch of Prosperity

Wand of Wonder

Caster’s spellbook is weightless while it’s open

People

Name Codename Career Likes Dislikes
Andrea Carrillo "Violet Scars" Merchant Harmonica Rabbits
Isaiah Burgess "Two Thumbs" Mole Trees Gym Memberships
Eliana Cannon Optimistic Sponges Contracts
Bentley Silva Midwife Hammers Football
Dominic Hayes Flirty Pillows Photography

Cipher



                

                
 
                

                

                

                

                

                

The Fuck Is This?

After years of playing Dungeons & Dragons, I decided to make a variation where everything is improv. The DM knows as much as the players and you tell a story together - sitcom style. We use this site as a quest starter, think of some characters, and see how much we can make each other laugh.

It's designed to be simple, portable, and dependent on being creative & inventive. I wanted a framework to guide the plot forward but let us find the story. This page is just a guide to help the stories become too redundant - take as much as you want, ignore as much as you need. If you want to follow along with our adventures or read some examples, check out my personal story notes.

This concept and site was crafted by Andrew Maruska with linguistic help from Evan Stark

But how?

The Most Important Rule

Be Silly. The goal is to laugh not to have a normal adventure. Someone wants to go to the moon? Fuck yeah they do and we're going to do it with medieval technology.

Set Up

Give the players a home base, a year they want to play in, and some general ownership of the setup. It's more successful when everyone has helped create the world because when a player makes suggestions it's easier to integrate them without feeling too precious. It helps to have a figurehead that assigns the quest to authoritatively start.

Characters

90% of creating a character here is a funny voice you're forced to talk in for 3 hours. I typically have people pick one trait they want to be good at and give them a slight advantage when using that - and the same for a negative trait. Don't overcomplicate it. They wanna be a skateboarder who can't feel love? perfect. +2 to cool & -2 to social acceptance.

Rolling

This can be whatever you want but as a general rule I use d20's as a graded scale. Sometimes, I craft the roll to mimic the action i.e. if they are walking a tight rope then might need to roll a 10 because 20 & 1 make them fall to one side or the other. Rolling in D&D got boring so make it fun again.

Dungeon Master

Your goal is to say 'Yes and...' but realistically it's 'Yes and roll to see if you can actually do that triple backflip down the cliff to mount the attacking phoenix...' - It's okay to make them fail, just don't tell them no. This guide is to help you be 1 step ahead of the players but it can't know the vibe of the room, have some empathy and play to the crowd.

Ending

No one can tell you this. The guide is to help you get 1/3 of the adventure set up and the rest will be created by the adventuring party. Have fun with it and try to tie up some loose ends at the end (or don't and bring them back for another adventure).