The Director Welcomes You

The Devotedly Hallowed Agent

#5ff948

Location

Humid, Calm Malawi

Time of Day

11:40

Extraction Point

98 Miles NW

Time to Complete

47 Hours

Eyeballs,
I have sent you to fly above a Archaic Motel to look for a suspect by the name "No Kraken". This mission is anti-surveillance. Their recent activity is concerning and we need you to disable the bomb. We don't know much about their goals but we've intercepted this cryptic message – "A traveling merchant appears at the Garden of Bears".

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

— The Vinyl record player you were holding self destructs.

The Villain Dossier

Name

Julianna Owen

Alias

"No Kraken"

Features

4' 8"

Hazel eyes

Stretch Marks / Right leg

Organization

The Division of Raw Flame

Emotions

Interested

Personality

Devotedly Shrilling

Motive

Disrupt the military because of grief and loss

Bodyguard

Juan the "Clever Whale"

Physical Size

Microscopic

Story

Additional Locations

The Hallowed Citadel

Ancient Lodge

Reservation Festival

Random Events

Renaissance Faire arrives in the mail

Pack of Wild Dogs Is throwing a protest

Jug of Peanut Butter is heard screaming

Diary Glistens gently

World

Stores

Aubrey's Bench Logistics

Manning's Coat Group

Stone's Oil Lamp Productions

McGee's Easel Little shop

Traps

Ray of Sickness

Phantasmal Killer of Prosperity

Objects

Bench made of heavy metal

Oil Lamp made of heavy metal

Secret Coat

Hidden Sling

Shield of Prosperity

Wand of Wonder

Target is suddenly standing atop a tall ladder

People

Name Codename Career Likes Dislikes
Oliver Manning "No Lox" Merchant Hammers Chocolate
Jordan Stone "Red Knuckles" Mole Music Honey
Hudson Riley Stressed Washing Machines Clocks
Aubrey Jennings Paramedic Bears Socks
Jackson McGee Operator Balloons Hamsters

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).