The Director Welcomes You

The Substance Amnesia Incident

#808023

Location

Cool, Sunny China

Time of Day

14:21

Extraction Point

120 Miles SE

Time to Complete

20 Hours

Examiners,
It seems "Five Mermaid" has gone level 2. They have been broadcasting this message "The group finds a dead fish at the Garden of Bears". We need you to eliminate them, Frequently. Their last known location was recorded at 00:05. You have a Robotic Socks as a last resort. Use carefully.

— The Origami Swan you were holding self destructs.

The Villain Dossier

Name

Waylon Dixon

Alias

"Five Mermaid"

Features

4' 11"

Brown eyes

Stretch Marks / Right arm

Organization

The Agency of Jagged Bat

Emotions

Suspicious

Personality

Frequently Portly

Motive

Take over a government because they straight up craycray

Bodyguard

Donald the "Faithful The Grim Reaper"

Physical Size

Adult

Story

Additional Locations

The Tertiary Mansion

Ancient Reef

Good Spirits Circus

Random Events

Fairy Protests

Tramp overflows

Reindeer Pulls on the coat tails of one of the adventurers

Tramp Adopts a nearby child

World

Stores

Declan's Fire poker set Beauty Stop

Becker's Figurine Supermarket

Cohen's Hanging Birdcage Mall

Stewart's Hose Industries

Traps

Poison Wall Spikes

Falling Block of Amnesia

Objects

Fire poker set that is glowing

Hanging Birdcage with a False bottom

Secret Figurine

Hidden Book

Bow of Amnesia

Wand of Wonder

Target obsessively pursues some crazy get-rich-quick scheme

People

Name Codename Career Likes Dislikes
Catherine Becker "Slow Brains" Merchant Batteries Football
Valentina Cohen "Italian Tongues" Mole Children's Stories Technology
Zayden Holt Elder Chickens Harmonica
Declan Frank Animator Paper Sponges
Oliver Stewart Chief Executive Officer Lamps Squirrels

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).