The Director Welcomes You

Hockey Arena, Fish, Prosperity, Spy.

#5c0e5a

Location

Windy, Rainy Saudi Arabia

Time of Day

5:52

Extraction Point

156 Miles NE

Time to Complete

14 Hours

Shadows,
I have sent you to the inside of a Compact Barn Dance to look for a suspect by the name "Casual Nymph". This mission is clandestine. Their recent activity is concerning and we need you to retrieve their missile codes. We don't know much about their goals but we've intercepted this cryptic message – "The group finds a dollar on the ground at the Great Shadow".

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

— The Origami Swan you were holding self destructs.

The Villain Dossier

Name

Raelynn Padilla

Alias

"Casual Nymph"

Features

6' 7"

Amber eyes

Faint curved scar / Right leg

Organization

The Task Force of Red Prosperity

Emotions

Lonely

Personality

Suddenly Calamitous

Motive

Take over a country out of jealousy

Bodyguard

David the "Vacant Bear"

Physical Size

Microscopic

Story

Additional Locations

The Victorious Pond

Underwater Citadel

Influence Mansion

Random Events

Goblet gathers near a point of interest

Panhandler Is accused by the law

Renaissance Faire Protests

Crying Child chase a suspect

World

Stores

Khloe's Shoe Horn Market

Byrd's Candelabra Technologies

McBride's Spare brick Discount

Blair's Armoir Mall

Traps

Poison Needle

Poison Needle of Euphoria

Objects

Shoe Horn children's replica

Spare brick children's replica

Secret Candelabra

Hidden Falchion

Hatchet of Euphoria

Wand of Wonder

Next weapon nearby to draw blood knocks its wielder unconscious

People

Name Codename Career Likes Dislikes
Payton Byrd "Cramped Parmigianas" Merchant Basketball Technology
Nova McBride "Cramped Ankles" Mole Rocks Flashlights
Lorenzo Carrillo Acupuncturist Paper Rubber Bands
Khloe Lopez Tailor Squirrels Death
Braxton Blair Old Timer Whipped Cream Soda

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).