The Director Welcomes You

Operation — Extensive Scoundrel

#6e4b17

Location

Hot, Bright Liechtenstein

Time of Day

10:40

Extraction Point

122 Miles W

Time to Complete

21 Hours

Detectives,
I have sent you to descend into Underwater Mansion to look for a suspect by the name "Mad Kangaroos". This mission is counterintelligence. Their recent activity is concerning and we need you to uncover their plans. We don't know much about their goals but we've intercepted this cryptic message – "A pool of blood at the Top of the carousel wheel".

We're low budget this mission – I've packed a Angry Hot Glue Gun in your kit to help.

— The CD player you were holding self destructs.

The Villain Dossier

Name

Scarlett Floyd

Alias

"Mad Kangaroos"

Features

6' 10"

Heterochromia eyes

Large moles / Right middle finger

Organization

The Agency of Dire Industry

Emotions

Disgusted

Personality

Enormously Mannered

Motive

Take over a government to become the best

Bodyguard

Mitch the "Clumsy Sprite"

Physical Size

Massive

Story

Additional Locations

The Extensive Port

Underwater Citadel

Euthanasia Jungle

Random Events

Tramp Balances on a ledge

Rustler emerges

Gallon of Trash Catches leprosy

Wedding Cake scurries by

World

Stores

Ashley's Mantle Solutions

Howard's Tea Pot Collective

Campbell's Musical instrument Little shop

Chapman's Desk Bureau

Traps

Lightning Bolt

Dropping Ceiling of Cheer

Objects

Mantle that has been hollowed out

Musical instrument made of heavy metal

Secret Tea Pot

Hidden Whip

Sticks of Cheer

Wand of Wonder

Everyone within 100 yards races toward the target at top speed

People

Name Codename Career Likes Dislikes
Mattie Howard "The Knuckles" Merchant Dinosaurs Flowers
Evan Campbell "Wild Falafels" Mole Flashlights Washing Machines
Joel Horton Demon Basketball Oranges
Ashley Warren Master Distiller Potatoes Jigsaw Puzzles
Zayden Chapman Secretary Plushies Snowglobes

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).