The Director Welcomes You

The Jagged Insignia Conundrum

#ee3ae9

Location

Bright, Gloomy Bulgaria

Time of Day

4:24

Extraction Point

153 Miles SWW

Time to Complete

3 Hours

Operatives,
I have sent you to within earshot of a Deserted Carousal to look for a suspect by the name "King Bat". This mission is anti-surveillance. Their recent activity is concerning and we need you to assassinate the target. We don't know much about their goals but we've intercepted this cryptic message – "A thick fog rolls in at the Beast's Maze".

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

— The Burner Phone you were holding self destructs.

The Villain Dossier

Name

Juliana Burgess

Alias

"King Bat"

Features

6' 11"

Hazel eyes

Large deep scar / Neck

Organization

The Club of Uninterested Oven

Emotions

Insecure

Personality

Tremendously Filthy

Motive

Take over a government out of greed

Bodyguard

James the "Heavy Bear"

Physical Size

Petty

Story

Additional Locations

The Jagged Crypt

Underwater Carnival

Bliss Palace

Random Events

Spice Box Integrates silently into the group

VAT of Broth meets disaster

Turtle is loose

Bum Crashes slowly

World

Stores

Amy's Wingback chair Department store

Moss's Bell Collective

Duncan's Bonsai Emporium

Jimenez's Hanging Birdcage Industries

Traps

Phantasmal Killer

Compacting Room of Doom

Objects

Wingback chair that is glowing

Bonsai children's replica

Secret Bell

Hidden Sling

Blowgun of Doom

Wand of Wonder

Target’s legs are shaped like springs and twang when he walks

People

Name Codename Career Likes Dislikes
Xander Moss "Short Thumbs" Merchant Lions Dice
Adam Duncan "Violet Fingers" Mole Acorns Essential Oils
Alexa Sanders Physician Comic Books Christmas
Amy Chan Farmer Paper Soup
Eric Jimenez Blacksmith Harmonica Paperclips

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).