The Director Welcomes You

Election, Corset, Whistle, Spy.

#14da2d

Location

Rainy, Calm Samoa

Time of Day

2:53

Extraction Point

88 Miles E

Time to Complete

24 Hours

Informants,
This week should be easy. You are delivering a Bell children's replica. Get to Samoa at 23:04

Good Luck.

— The Messenger Pigeon you were holding self destructs.

The Villain Dossier

Name

Andrew Silva

Alias

"Four Orcs"

Features

6' 4"

Amber eyes

Large deep scar / Right middle finger

Organization

The Committee of Nutritious Whistle

Emotions

Spiteful

Personality

Quarrelsomely Narrow

Motive

Disrupt the military because of a betrayal

Bodyguard

Randy the "Chilly Giraffe"

Physical Size

Miniature

Story

Additional Locations

The Dusty Palace

Desolate House

Expiration Lake

Random Events

Bum Is accused by the law

Keg gathers near a point of interest

Dancer Calls menacingly

Pine Branch drops from the sky

World

Stores

Oliver's Bell Hole

Howell's Canopy Bed Consulting

Harper's Candelabra Chic Chåteau

Conner's Goblet Industries

Traps

Symbol of Hypnosis

Box of Brown Mold of Violence

Objects

Bell children's replica

Candelabra children's replica

Secret Canopy Bed

Hidden Necklace

Key of Violence

Wand of Wonder

Next weapon to wound target afflicts its wielder with narcolepsy

People

Name Codename Career Likes Dislikes
Molly Howell "Four Tongues" Merchant Honey Houses
Lillian Harper "The Boy" Mole Candles Rubber Bands
Maverick Robbins Graphic Designer Lions Tigers
Oliver Fernandez Operator Teeth Rabbits
Madelyn Conner Art Therapist Video Games Rubber Bands

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).