The Director Welcomes You

Industries Royale

#c92ac3

Location

Bright, Dry United Arab Emirates

Time of Day

24:2

Extraction Point

20 Miles NNE

Time to Complete

34 Hours

Investigators,
We need your help. Agent Joseph Thompson has gone missing and we believe "Black Bat" is responsible. They were last seen in United Arab Emirates at 05:02. The agent sent one final message – "A white horse dashes past at the Stone Circle". Take this Soft Belt - it was their favorite tool and might help you.

— The Burner Phone you were holding self destructs.

The Villain Dossier

Name

Avery Howell

Alias

"Black Bat"

Features

5' 10"

Green eyes

Faint curved scar / Neck

Organization

The Committee of Brutish Regret

Emotions

Interested

Personality

Verbally Annoying

Motive

Disrupt the military to save humanity

Bodyguard

Jackie the "Putrid mammoth"

Physical Size

Microscopic

Story

Additional Locations

The Echoing Arcade

Desolate Forge

Destruction Arcade

Random Events

Rustler Is accused by the law

Toilet Evades the law

Gunshot explodes

Pine Branch grabs a lady's purse

World

Stores

Sydney's Window Industries

Cobb's Coat Emporium

Perkins's Cutting board Department store

Thompson's Globe Warehouse

Traps

Fireball

Beehive of Extermination

Objects

Window that is glowing

Cutting board that is glowing

Secret Coat

Hidden Sword

File of Extermination

Wand of Wonder

Each day, caster wakes with several new and disturbing scars

People

Name Codename Career Likes Dislikes
Lucy Cobb "Quiet Waffles" Merchant Water Money
Ava Perkins "Quiet Noses" Mole Chickens Robots
Zion Sparks Veterinarian Flashlights Balloons
Sydney Norris Art Therapist Rock n' Roll Gym Memberships
Joseph Thompson Drunken Flowers Coffee

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).