The Director Welcomes You

The Lumber Skill Protocol

#6aa172

Location

Mild, Icy Georgia

Time of Day

4:59

Extraction Point

10 Miles E

Time to Complete

16 Hours

Ambassadors,
I have sent you to climb a Polluted Masquerade to look for a suspect by the name "Chunky Spirit". This mission is black bag. Their recent activity is concerning and we need you to uncover their plans. We don't know much about their goals but we've intercepted this cryptic message – "A pool of blood at the Sacrificial Hole".

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

— The Portable Radio you were holding self destructs.

The Villain Dossier

Name

Everly Washington

Alias

"Chunky Spirit"

Features

5' 2"

Gray eyes

A second belly button / Left eye

Organization

The Club of Jocular Handle

Emotions

Content

Personality

Famously Dilligent

Motive

Take over a government justice for a wrong-doing

Bodyguard

Frankie the "Comical Mummy"

Physical Size

Petty

Story

Additional Locations

The Small Chateau

Underwater Jungle

Competency Chateau

Random Events

Nearby Gas Tank Ignites violently

Bank Is being detained

Toilet strikes the ground

Wedding Cake Becomes wounded

World

Stores

Adalynn's Tea Set Properties

Jensen's Vanity Closet

Bush's Urn Productions

Mann's Urn Labs

Traps

Built-to-Collapse Wall

Fusillade of Darts of Skill

Objects

Tea Set with a False bottom

Urn with a False bottom

Secret Vanity

Hidden Fork

Longsword of Skill

Wand of Wonder

Tomorrow, caster wakes reeking of garlic and raw meat

People

Name Codename Career Likes Dislikes
Lyla Jensen "Four Thumbs" Merchant Dice Rubber Stamps
Ashley Bush "Tough Ribs" Mole Easter Dolphins
Melody Figueroa Hotel Manager Clocks Contracts
Adalynn Vargas Blacksmith Cousins Clocks
Juliana Mann Lawyer Coffee Oranges

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).