The Director Welcomes You

Error, Sasquatch, Walk, Spy.

#ad606e

Location

Breezy, Stormy Georgia

Time of Day

7:8

Extraction Point

44 Miles W

Time to Complete

7 Hours

Investigators,
It seems "Plump Unicorn" has gone level 6. They have been broadcasting this message "Distant sounds of screaming at the Flooded Crystal". We need you to eliminate them, Suspiciously. Their last known location was recorded at 09:18. You have a Light Atlas as a last resort. Use carefully.

— The CD player you were holding self destructs.

The Villain Dossier

Name

Olivia Davis

Alias

"Plump Unicorn"

Features

7' 7"

Amber eyes

Large moles / Right thumb

Organization

The Association of Faithful Walk

Emotions

Cheerful

Personality

Suspiciously Tertiary

Motive

Make a lot of money in pursuit of knowledge

Bodyguard

Jimmy the "Rainy Elephant"

Physical Size

Baby

Story

Additional Locations

The Squeaking Fortress

Expensive City

Destruction Business

Random Events

Dozen Eggs Ignites violently

Horse Carriage Glistens gently

Herd of Chicken Protests

Goblet meets disaster

World

Stores

Samuel's Shelf of alcohol Little shop

McDonald's Trinket Hole

McCarthy's Hat Productions

McCormick's Kitchen table Discount

Traps

Bricks from Ceiling

Ceiling Pendulum of Calamity

Objects

Shelf of alcohol made of heavy metal

Hat that is glowing

Secret Trinket

Hidden Sticks

Guthook of Calamity

Wand of Wonder

Target is forever immune to lycanthropy

People

Name Codename Career Likes Dislikes
Melanie McDonald "Gross Waffles" Merchant Syrup Children's Stories
Ximena McCarthy "Plump Feet" Mole Sharks Soccer
Elias Stone Counselor Singing Balloons
Samuel Williamson Operator Chili Flowers
Elena McCormick Phantom Candles Deodorant

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).