The Director Welcomes You

The Annually Empty Agent

#87299a

Location

Chilly, Bright Chad

Time of Day

0:11

Extraction Point

24 Miles SE

Time to Complete

42 Hours

Informants,
It seems "Small Elephant" has gone level 2. They have been broadcasting this message "A lone flower growing at the Tempest". We need you to eliminate them, Annually. Their last known location was recorded at 04:13. You have a Vicious Flute as a last resort. Use carefully.

— The Tinder Date you were holding self destructs.

The Villain Dossier

Name

Kinsley Cooper

Alias

"Small Elephant"

Features

6' 6"

Blue eyes

Faint curved scar / Right leg

Organization

The Task Force of Garrulous Waste

Emotions

Tenderness

Personality

Annually Repulsive

Motive

Disrupt the military to corrupt everyone

Bodyguard

Peter the "Unsightly Demon"

Physical Size

Insignificant

Story

Additional Locations

The Empty Lodge

Bustling Castle

Peace Villa

Random Events

Nomad Is being detained

Wedding Cake Salutes the adventurers

Crying Child screams at the top of their lungs

Odor Is getting confiscated

World

Stores

Julian's Coat Atelier

Smith's Fruit Bowl Logistics

Gallagher's Toolbox Little shop

Acosta's Candlesticks Wardrobe

Traps

Water-Filled Room

Large Net of Freshness

Objects

Coat that has been hollowed out

Toolbox with a False bottom

Secret Fruit Bowl

Hidden Bracelet

Axe of Freshness

Wand of Wonder

Target permanently loses half his current hit points

People

Name Codename Career Likes Dislikes
Jameson Smith "Green Churros" Merchant Tea Hammers
Lucy Gallagher "Obese Knuckles" Mole Cellphones Rubber Bands
Harmony French Elder Easter Chickens
Julian Wade Firefighter Bracelets Balloons
Peyton Acosta Stressed Batteries Water

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).