Roleplay Rev is AI Assistance for RPGs

So I was screwing around on my phone, as one does, and I came across this AI adventure generator called Roleplay Rev. While I'm not a huge AI fan, I have played around with it some and I liked the idea of a tool that could conceivably be used to help create an adventure quickly.

I know all too well that sometimes it takes a metric shit-ton of effort to create a good effort. Actually just creating an adventure can take a lot of time.....one that is good(?).....can take freaking forever. While I don't expect a ton of quality from an AI generator, I figure it could be good at getting some of the grunt-work done so I could edit the generated adventure. Editing/Tweaking can take a lot less time, at least in my experience.

So I created an account at Roleplay Rev and started out with three credits. My initial thought was, "Oh so it's kind of free...great" It costs a credit to generate an adventure and while it didn't state it upfront, you get a credit per day you log in. Pretty much up front is that if you want some of the cooler/finer tools it costs $5 a month (normally $10?). After the fact I can see $5 a month being worth it, but that's probably something that would be covered in a summary paragraph.

Anyway, I started with this prompt: "The world is dominated by Man and organized into distinct countries. A valuable mountain range has been taken over by the ruling country and the party consists of dwarves that have to organize a resistance to retake their ancestral homeland from the army of men." Now I'm not sure that was worded well for an AI prompt since I haven't used AI stuff very much but I was pleased to find that the generator re-worded my prompt, that I could then tweak if needed and it even gave the damn thing a title: 

The Battle for the Mountain

The dwarves must organize a resistance to retake their ancestral homeland, a valuable mountain range, from the army of men who have taken it over.

Nice, I can work with that.....I was led through a few options for potential plot hooks and I settled on my favorite:

The players start the adventure in the depths of the mountain range, where they witness the men's army setting up mining operations to extract valuable resources. The dwarves are outraged at the desecration of their ancestral home and feel compelled to take action to reclaim it.

Then the AI generated some lore/background and I got this:

The players receive a distress call from a group of dwarven miners who managed to escape the army's occupation. They describe the devastation brought upon their once-thriving community and plead for the players' help in organizing a resistance to retake their homeland.

The players witness a fierce battle between the dwarven resistance and the army of men, where the dwarves are outnumbered and struggling to defend their territory. Witnessing the bravery and determination of their kin, the players feel a deep sense of duty to join the resistance and fight for their people's freedom.

The central conflict stems from the ruling country's desire to exploit the valuable resources within the dwarven ancestral mountain range. The ruler of the country, King Thorian, seeks to strengthen his kingdom's economy and military power by gaining control of the rich mines and strategic location of the mountains. To achieve this, he has dispatched a formidable army led by General Rendak to forcibly occupy the dwarven territories, displacing the native inhabitants and suppressing any resistance.

King Thorian's ultimate plan is to establish permanent control over the mountain range, leveraging the resources to enrich his kingdom and solidify his rule. The dwarves, however, refuse to relinquish their ancestral lands and are determined to fight back. The villainous General Rendak is tasked with not only subduing the dwarven resistance but also ensuring that the mountain range remains under the control of the ruling country. His cruel methods and ruthless tactics have further fueled the dwarves' resolve to reclaim their homeland and drive out the oppressive army.

Honestly, for free, I'd have been good with what I got so far, but some actual encounters would help...and then it gave me three potential encounters. Thing was I didn't just get three potential encounters. No, I got three types of encounters to choose from and it defaulted to one skill encounter, one social encounter, and one combat encounter. If I wanted three combat encounters I could've done that. It's important to note that I got to establish the general "feel" for the campaign, the size of the party, and the level, which was all factored in. For the record, I went with "realistic", 6 party members, and 1st level.

So the thing spit out the three encounters, gave me some NPCs and saved everything. The $5 paid content would go so far as to let me generate battle maps (IIRC they don't actually generate battlemaps but they have a large stockpile of ready-made maps that the AI chooses from) and generate PCs. There is also, and I think this is free, a way to basically play a solo adventure through the adventure you just made as well. I started messing with that but didn't even start the adventure portion.

Pretty much everything is tweakable and while it looks like it's set up for maybe 5th Edition D&D, I don't know it's definitely not OSR, there's a LOT of meat on those bones. You can not only create adventures but also campaigns and worlds as well, all with AI assistance. I do not think it would be difficult to take a few minutes to create an adventure and basically tweak on the fly. Combined with your own map collection and your own bestiary......this could be a great help.

For $5 a month I think the organization factor (world, campaign, adventures) alone might be worth it, especially if I can get some AI assistance and prompts to help fill in gaps. For the price of free, definitely worth checking out Roleplay Rev.

Deal of the Day - The Forest of Gornate (OSRIC Point Crawl)

Gabor Lux is a well-known name to long-time OSR folk, but the name pops up less these days than it should. Simply put, if Gabor Lux is on the tin, you can safely assume the product will be far above average to great.

The Forest of Gornate by Gabor Lux is today's Deal of the Day at DTRPG. Normally 6.50 in PDF, until tomorrow morning The Forest of Gornate is on sale for 3.25.

“South of the dark walls of Mur, an overgrown forest lies between two mountain ranges. Its namesake, the immortal beast Gornate, noted for his thirty-six eyes and a peculiar taste for collecting human spinal columns, has made no sign of his presence in many years. Even so, the woodlands hide numerous dangers. Robber bands, man-eating beasts, abandoned manor houses and mysterious ruins dot a land divided by rivers and mountain ridges. The people of the city rarely venture into the forest, but recently, three notabilities have expressed an interest in sponsoring a hazardous, but lucrative expedition. While serving three masters may be too much for a single adventure, a resourceful and lucky company could return rich from… The Forest of Gornate!”

A 32-page module for 3rd to 5th level characters, The Forest of Gornate offers a complex, open-ended wilderness pointcrawl set in the Forest of Gornate, a place of fallen civilisations, strange denizens, and natural wonders. Seek the treasures of a mysterious villa, the secrets of a reclusive bandit leader, win the patronage of the ancient and sinister Guild of Judges, or strike out on your own to seek fame and fortune in the forests, and the lands beyond. Inspired by the gamebook classic, Scorpion Swamp, this is a module offering 42+39 keyed areas, adventure hooks, rumours, and random encounters offering numerous possibilities for open-ended exploration and player-driven adventure. It is also a companion to In the Shadow of the City-God, but enjoyable on its own terms. The adventure features illustrations by Denis McCarthy (who also did the cover), Stefan Poag, Jerry Boucher, as well as the Dead Victorians.

The Tavern is supported by readers like you. The easiest way to support The Tavern is to shop via our affiliate links. The Tavern DOES NOT do "Paid For" Articles and discloses personal connections to products and creators written about when applicable.

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Kickstarter - The Lair of the Bog Lich (OSR/ZineQuest)

A boggy OSR micro-adventure Zine for 1st-level characters.

Tis the most abundant time of year for OSR - ZineQuest is here! For about 9 bucks shipped, you can snag a physical copy of The Lair of the Bog Lich Zine.

The Lair of the Bog Lich is a micro-adventure zine made for all manner of OSR and OSR-adjacent systems. It is set deep within a bubbling swamp in the hinterlands of the realm where an unseen menace is stealing villagers away in their sleep.

What's Inside?

• The Lair, an underground heap where the bog lich goes about its sinister machinations.
• Adventure hooks to allow for easy integration into any campaign.
• Random encounters to spice up the journey to the Lair.
• Hand-illustrated map of the Lair.
• 8+ random tables to provide some suitably swampy flavour.
• 3 mud-encrusted foes to fight, including the titular bog lich.
• Sinister Illustrations by Simone Tammetta.

 

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Deal of the Day - Holy Mountain Shaker (OSE pointcrawl adventure for 5th to 6th)

I really enjoy Old School Essentials and the adventures they release. Even if I don't run them directly under OSE, they convert easily enough to the OSR system of your choice.

Holy Mountain Shaker for OSE is today's Deal of the Day at DTRPG. Normally 7.50 in PDF, but until tomorrow morning Holy Mountain Shaker is on sale for $3.

Thunder and quake have come to the old town. Towers crumble, homes tumble, the quick become the dead. What omen could be more obvious? The Pharaoh Fish under the mountain is displeased. This God must be propitiated. Brave heroes must venture to buy the city's salvation. At the very least, the Town Council needs to appear in control and send some 'expert adventurers' into the depths.

• A fantasy pointcrawl adventure for characters of 5th to 6th level.
• Local town, 17 pointcrawl regions, dungeon inside the Pharaoh Fish.
• Pointcrawl mechanics for Old-School Essentials.
• Keyed in a quick-reference, bullet point format.
• Statted for Old-School Essentials (B/X), usable with any vintage adventure game.
• Unlabelled map included for VTT use.

The Tavern is supported by readers like you. The easiest way to support The Tavern is to shop via our affiliate links. The Tavern DOES NOT do "Paid For" Articles and discloses personal connections to products and creators written about when applicable.

DTRPG, Amazon, and Humble Bundle are affiliate programs that support The Tavern.  You can catch the daily Tavern Chat cast on Anchor, YouTube,  or wherever you listen to your podcast collection. - Tenkar    

The Unwritten Agreement that is a Convention Game

Last night I was in a small group helping our GM in prepping for an up-coming convention game. We're playtesting some rules and helping him tweak the adventure. After we were done with what bit of the game we had managed (it was largely a character creation and rule dissemination session) the GM asked what we felt about the adventure setup and  how the beginning/intro went.

Now I've got quite a bit of tournament/convention game experience under my belt, not only as a player, but as a writer and even organizer. I can honestly say I've seen some shit. Good shit, bad shit, and the HUGE gambit of the in-between....especially as it pertains to setting up the game/session for a convention.

Oooof....I've got stories upon stories here, but I'll spare you for the most part. The thing is, at it's core, the setup for a convention game isn't nearly as important as you might expect. When players sit down at a convention table to play, they've already signed off on a whole slew of gaming parameters. They've already agreed to a system and a specific time-frame within which they make themselves available. This isn't a home-game where they have the freedom to whatever the eff they want. "Hey, let's spend 6 hours roleplaying spending all our gold on hookers and booze whilst planning which tomb to plunder next."

No, players are generally focused and in the convention setting a little railroading goes a long, long way. The GM doesn't need to convince the players to do much of anything, so an hour or so of role-play can easily be condensed down into a paragraph or two of setup flavor text. Actually from my experience, the setup should be a paragraph or two of flavor text.

Story Time (Example) 1: As an organizer I once had a writer send me, I shit you not, 4+ pages of adventure setup. A page for the table GMs I get, but pages of backstory, NPC motivations, and role-playing the pre-adventure.....ugh. Now that was bad, but what was worse was that the writer was sending me adventure updates as late as the morning of the convention game.

Story Time (Example) 2: I was playing in an online convention tournament that had absolutely no setup whatsoever. It was a HackMaster (4th edition) game and the way tournaments ran your PCs would essentially be plucked from your home game/wurld (this misspelling was a thing) and plopped down into essentially a new wurld to do a thing (the adventure). Maybe it was the Gawds, maybe not...who cares? You hopefully survive, do the thing, get some loot, and get popped back where you were plucked from. In this one online convention game my PC just gets plucked from the home wurld and dropped into a void. No outside stimuli whatsoever. Now as a player I'm like, "W..T....F!" Nope, that's it....I'm out. If I was at a physical convention table I'd have sat for a few minutes (at best) then just noped the fuck out. The GM wasn't too thrilled when I immediately informed him(?) that I was done, but as far as I knew my PC was dead. Well, dead or dying.

There is an unwritten agreement when it comes to convention games......players have come to play and they really just need to be pointed to the start so they can work through the middle towards the end. They are much more likely to take extra, even suicidal, risks with their PCs that they would never do in a home game, BUT they need a reason to do so....not much of a reason...at least a paragraph or two of flavor text.....

Kickstater - Arcane Adventures - 10 Quests For £10 (OSR & 5e)

Arcane adventures and challenges for D&D (Dungeons and Dragons) 5th edition & OSR TTRPGs

I love the opportunity to grab adventures for my gaming collection, as you never know when you are going to be running an RPG session with minimal prep time. 

10 adventures for 13 bucks (give or take) is almost a no-brainer for me, so count me as a backer of Arcane Adventures.

Arcane Adventures is a collection of one-shot style missions designed for Fifth Edition rules plus OSR TTRPGs, and is tailored to emphasis the Arcane Arts. These adventures are easy to read, easy to include in any session, and can be completed in around 2 to 4 hours each.

Created with the DM in mind, these adventures are made for ease of use and can run alongside any campaign and fit any setting. The intended levels for these adventures will be mostly levels 1 to 4 with a few at level 5 to 8, and are perfect for those who love fantasy adventures and role-playing games.

Unleash the power of magic as you explore forgotten tomes, enchanted forests, and arcane laboratories. Face off against powerful sorcerers, navigate dangerous elemental planes, and delve into the dark arts to stop the forces of evil from overtaking the land.

The Tavern is supported by readers like you. The easiest way to support The Tavern is to shop via our affiliate links. 

DTRPG, Amazon, and Humble Bundle are affiliate programs that support The Tavern.  You can catch the daily Tavern Chat cast on Anchor, YouTube,  or wherever you listen to your podcast collection. - Tenkar 

Thoughts About Starting Off a New PC/Game

This last week I've been playing (probably too much) Tiny Tina Wonderlands, which is a D&D themed(ish) Borderlands game. It's different, and I think I preferred the D&D themed Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragonkeep (link to the standalone...it does occasionally come up for free on Steam) DLC for Borderlands 2. I know this is lot of...exposition, but whatever. This week I decided to try out the new Blightcaller class and trying to run through the whole game up to level 40 so I can get to the end-game and the 50 (?!) levels of the Chaos Chamber. Thankfully, much to my surprise, at least the first 17 levels have allowed my new PC to skip through two levels at a time. Not sure if there is some weird requirement in order to do so, but I'm taking it.

Since I'm playing in a D&D themed 1st person loot shooter I'm definitely thinking about table-top RPGs while I slog through the grind to Chaos 50. I'm kind of wishing I didn't have to start at level 1 and work my way up, but really only because playing through the game a second time is exactly like playing through the first time. Clearly the level skipping in the Chaos Chamber is more than fine by me.

Up until recently I've never started out a TTRPG PC at beyond 1st level, well at least not in a home game. In a tournament setting one-off, it's a normal thing. Outside of a convention setting I've never GM'd PCs starting out at higher level. Currently in my home game I have a secondary PC that I use when our entire group cannot get together: Gunnhilder (Goon-hill-dur), a kick-ass 4th Level Fighter....(well I am biased). Since we've had a few sessions now I'm starting to get a bit of a feel for the PC, but really on starting. That's the problem with starting off at a higher level, there's no history: personal or shared. No biggie for a one-off, but a mini-campaign....it can be a little...disconcerting at times. Hell, after three games I still can't get the GM to say my PC's name right.

Clearly I'm a fan of starting out at 1st level and I'm also a fan of creating PCs as a group, even though there is something to be said for the chaos of randomness in parties. Want four 1st level Magic-Users and one 1st level Thief? Good luck with that.

So along with thinking about starting off new PCs I naturally (let's be honest, it takes a long time to level up a Borderlands character) segue from new PCs to new players...and not just new new players (like never rolled dice before), but new to a specific game players. Learning the ins-and-outs of a new game can be a bit much sometimes. If there was only some sort of training dungeon you could configure to learn some tips, tactics, and whatnot. 

Now my wandering thoughts were...well way too similar to the Chaos Chamber mentioned above, but...well that idea kind of sucks. Yeah, basically I'm beatings *someone* here to it! Thing is, I've done a training adventure before for the newest edition of HackMaster. Just something I put together to help out with newbs at conventions when the 5th Edition HackMaster came out. Danger in Drakesville (free on DTRPG) wasn't terribly difficult to play, or run, and really served to get a bit of experience (in and out of game), and I had fun with it for a couple of years, well maybe after the first convention season. That first convention was a PITA. Too many people basically said "fuck it" and just went off the rails in the most spectacularly-stupid fashion and I had to tweak the adventure to accommodate the two biggest fuck-offs I experienced: 1) Players thinking it would be "cool" to have their PCs down a pint of what was described as 190 proof Everclear (a pint and half would have a 50% chance of being fatal for 180# person, give or take). 2) At the clear end of the adventure, let's go into this obvious death-trap 'cause why the fuck not?

Thing is, I totally forgot I literally (in this case) wrote an adventure that the back-story is that it was a configurable dungeon, but your group was just a bunch of 1st level newbs going through it last and there were a bunch of spectators watching the group and betting. It was for 4th Edition HackMaster, which is OSR and I figure at least one person here might want a copy. Normally it's a $2 item for me on DTRPG, but I went ahead and made a special freebie discount code for "The Test" (link to the freebie). It's my hope that *somebody* could get some use from this and use it as a starter dungeon to help someone new learn to play.

Kickstarter - Palace of the Golden Princess #1 (5e Adventure & Comic Book)

5e module and comic based on the first RPG adventure written by a woman.

In 1980, Jean Wells, the only woman in TSR's design department, was assigned to write an adventure for the "B" (Basic) series that would teach new players how to play D&D using rules for the D&D Basic Set. This module would be unique as it was the first TSR adventure authored by a female designer. Wikipedia - Palace of the Silver Princess

It's not often, if ever, that I start a blog post with a quote from Wikipedia, but I thought it was appropriate this time ;)

Now, on to the "connections". The project creator, author of the comic, and co-author of the adventure is Preston Poulter. Preston is a frequent participant in The Tavern's weekly hangouts on Thursday Nights on our Discord Server and loves creating comic books. Courtney Campbell is a prolific and highly skilled writer of RPG material. Courtney has a blog - Hack & Slash - and can often be found lurching in the Common Room of The Tavern's Discord Server. Heck, he was there earlier today.

So yes, I know the main folks behind the Palace of the Golden Princess #1 Kickstarter project. Quite simply, if Courtney is writing RPG material, I want it. If Preston is publishing a comic book, it will literally look amazing (parental supervision may be required on some comic book titles, as the artwork can be risque ;)

So, what can you get and for how much?

The comic book, the adventure, and character sheets in digital format will be 10 bucks. Print of the comic book adventure will be 20 bucks. Then it goes a bit crazy but in a good way. There's a Deck of Many Things, limited covers for the comics, resin minis, replica swords, wall tapestries, and more. Phew! Have at it. Damn, but the sword tempts me ;)

Subsequent to the success of the Palace comic, I sought to build a campaign to offer a module set in the world of Palace. Ultimately, I partnered with prolific module writer Courtney Campbell to bring you an adventure that, while published under the current 5e ruleset for the world's most popular roleplaying game, has been customized by Courtney and myself to embrace the play style of the 1980s. I invite you to download our introductory release, available on drivethrurpg as a "Pay what you want" PDF. 

Rejecting the modern notion of roleplaying which seems to have evolved into what can best be described as "fantasy superheroes," Courtney and I dispatch the modern notion of character "builds" straight away by declaring that character stats should be generated by rolling 3d6 for each stat in the order the appear on the sheet, just like you would have done back in 1981 to play Jean Wells original work.

Of course, you are free to ignore our rules recommendations, but we feel you will be cheating yourself and your group out of a different kind of roleplaying experience that delivers a lot more fun. 

The module offered with this campaign incorporates all the material of the introductory release, and expands upon it to offer a multi-session adventure designed for 4-8 characters of levels 1-3. 

 

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Bundle of Holding - 50 Dungeons - Goodman Games 3x Era Adventures

Now, before anyone says "Pffft! who wants 3x D&D?" I need to state the following - I've used a number of the adventures offered below with OSRIC and Swords & Wizardry and converted on the fly. I never played, let alone ran, 3x era D&D and it was easy as pie. The adventures are written in an "old school" manner.

I have many of these in print and others in PDF. The worst ones are good and the best ones are simply amazing.

50 Dungeons from Bundle of Holding features some of the very best adventures from Goodman Games. The Adventure Begins & The Adventure Continues are practically worth the price of admission alone. Add in 23 more adventure modules and you get over 60 low-level adventures for 20 bucks. For about 45 bucks, you add in Castle Whiterock (a mega-dungeon), Gazeteer of the Known Realms (an excellent setting), and another 19 modules. You have a lifetime of adventure for less than 50 bucks.

The Tavern is supported by readers like you. The easiest way to support The Tavern is to shop via our affiliate links. DTRPG, Amazon, and Humble Bundle are affiliate programs that support The Tavern. 

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Getting my Gaming Fix In by Any Means Possible

It's week four, or is it five(?), that I've been going sans dice as I'm overseas and my group is not playing during the lead-up to NTRPG. To say I've been jonesing for a game is a bit of an understatement. Luckily I did download Baldur's Gate off of steam and I'm on day 66 of my adventures along the Sword Coast. This go around....I've started the game maybe a half-dozen times but have only made it to Baldur's Gate once and never had finished the game.....this go around I just started off with an entirely custom party:

• Elven Ranger (Archer)
• Dwarven Defender
• Halfling Swashbuckler
• Human Mage
• Human Priest of Talos
• Half-Elf Skald (Bard)

I am totally cheesing this playthrough though in making sure every level-up has the PC's getting maximum HP. I'm doing my best to hoard every GP I can, even if that means selling off all of the potions, which I assume might bite me in the butt later...we'll see.

Even though it's a fun enough time-waster, it doesn't quite scratch that itch....

....so I'm starting to write/design a new adventure.

After getting to explore a bit of the local area I've come up with a mish-mash of ideas that I think could work well together for a written adventure. Right now I just have the shell of an idea....but it is written down, and I need to figure out the framework with which I'd like to work in.

Right off the bat I'm thinking I'd like this adventure to be a bit of a multi-purpose kind of thing, so I'm thinking I'll use something that already exists as a rough template. A1 Slave Pits of the Undercity works for me as said template because what I'm thinking of is a larger adventure that can be used, at least in part, as a tournament adventure. 

Since most of my more formal adventure writing is for tournaments, I've got that experience I can draw from. Of course, the adventure portion will literally just be part of the overall adventure.

Now my initial planning is to write this for Old School Essentials (OSE) as I think that'll be easy enough for GMs to flip over to any other flavor of OSR. Also I'm thinking levels 3-5, but I want to keep that a bit loose until I figure out the tournament portion of the adventure.

Since my initial inspiration came from a couple of local (well, currently local) places, I need/want to do what I can to import some historical maps from the area. Luckily I was able to find a German map website that had access to some old maps of the area. It's enough to start off with, but it's really misleading on just how the location itself looks. I'm hoping that with more time looking I can find a topographical map I can overlay on a homemade version of this old 1800-something map to strike a nice balance that shows just how much this one feature can be seen from even the far side of this rather large valley.

So the first phase of this project will be working on the larger overland map, tightening up the background story, and then writing the tournament portion of the adventure, along with any specific tournament requirements (special rules, pregens, etc.) Then I can work on "interior" maps, any special monsters, and overall tweaks. 

Then the real PITA work comes in: editing and playtesting.......luckily I have a few folks I can probably reach out to for assistance on that one.

Deal of the Day - Bottomless Pit of Zorth (OSR Adventure)

I have to admit, I'm a bit of an adventure junkie. No, not in real life, but I enjoy reading adventures, especially adventures written for the OSR. Its few and far between where I run them as written, but I mine the shit out of them for the sessions I run. 

Bottomless Pit of Zorth is today's Deal of the Day, written for OSRIC/OSR for a party of levels 3 to 5. I wish they mentioned the level range on the sales page, but I'll forgive that sin. Sure, it's on the cover, but you'll only be able to read that bit if you click on the thumbnail. Bottomless Pit of Zorth is normally 7.50 in PDF, but until tomorrow morning, it's on sale for 4.50.

This OSRIC/OSR adventure can be run as a stand-alone or as part of the Gunderholfen and Darkness at Nekemte setting. It includes approximatlely 65 keyed locations + random site/event and encounter tables. It's heavy on curious oddities; viscous oozes; and squishy, mutated monstrosities, with a healthy dose of push-the-red-button and see-what-happens interaction thrown in for good measure. 

The Bottomless Pit of Zorth has stood as a place of inscrutable mystery and dread since time immemorial, yet not few of the brave and reckless have tried their luck within its deep and reportedly never ending depths. Those lucky enough to survive can attest to its apparent bottomless nature, but spoke more of the alienness and oddness of the place: the unfathomable purpose of the giant rotating pin that pierces down into the depths; the otherworldly machinery; and the crazed and demented denizens that for reasons unknown defended the hellish hole. These survivors often left with a sense that there was a deliberate design and purpose to the Pit and that a terrible but inhuman intellect ruled and guided all, though none have yet seen or met this assuredly dreadful master.

 

The Tavern is supported by readers like you. The easiest way to support The Tavern is to shop via our affiliate links. DTRPG, Amazon, and Humble Bundle are affiliate programs that support The Tavern. 

You can catch the daily Tavern Chat podcast on Anchor, YouTube, or wherever you listen to your podcast collection. - Tenkar 

Do You Play a Seasonal Halloween Game/Session?

One thing I've always wondered, and maybe I should have been thinking about this last weekend, is if other gaming groups gather to play a holiday-themed session, whether it's a one-off or a regular integration. Maybe you play a different game altogether for the holiday.

Now my group had kind of a one-off this weekend, but it wasn't a holiday-themed game. Now I'm not saying I wanted a Halloween game....actually I didn't even consider it or I'd have made the suggestion. Now I know from my (unfortunate) time in retail that Halloween has pretty much become the #2 holiday after Christmas as far as consumer spending goes. I think it's still #3 after Thanksgiving as far as popularity, and for some it's easily #1.

Some folks just LOOOOOVE Halloween. Me....I'm a bit "meh". Probably doesn't help that my house is in a bad location and I just haven't had a single Trick-or-Treater since I moved here in 2018. I'm already so NOT a seasonal decorator to begin with, so why bother.

It also doesn't help that I swear my part of Oklahoma gets like one week of Fall. Granted it's been this last week, but it'll pretty much be winter by like Tuesday. Hard to get excited about fall activities when you jump from Summer to Winter. I've got stuff to do during the fall and screwing around with Halloween isn't one of them.

So right about now I'm sure that I'm coming across all "bah humbug".....I know, I know, wrong holiday, but you know what I'm saying.....

A couple years ago I wrote a small Tweak & Toss that was kind of inspired by the movie "Motel Hell". If you're not familiar with the movie.....well there's a link for you.

Now I don't really think if this Tweak & Toss as a straight-up Halloween "adventure", but if you are the type of GM that likes to slip a potential something-something into your regular campaign, it might work. It's not a scary setup by any means, but occasionally I do some meta-crap and the one thing I did was oversell the cover for those players that take too much notice of the "adventure's" cover (Something I think a lot of us have done as players....).

So while I was thinking of Halloween and this one Tweak & Toss I went ahead and took a second look at the thing. Ugh.....it had a link to a high-resolution map that was essentially lost when I close my Patreon campaign. So I fixed that and I made sure to change the "price" down to a buck and make it Pay What You Want. If you don't have that huge map, which you really didn't need anyway, not something I'd want a couple bucks for. 

Anyway, I know it's a bit of self-promotion, but Erik lets me do what I want on Sundays as it is, and since it's PWYW....feel free to grab it for $0. You can click on through to The Horrors of Halfling Hollow by clicking on the link or the graphic above. Do me a favor though, if you incorporate into your ongoing campaign, drop me a note to say how it went. Always good to hear from GMs.

Deal of the Day - Edge of the Wilds - 100+ scenarios for rural adventures! (System Neutral)

Stepping away - briefly - from ZineQuest 3 coverage - I'm taking a peek at today's Deal of the Day. Sometimes, all you need is the seed for an adventure, the spark that sets of your own imagination, and it looks like Edge of the Wilds - 100+ scenarios for rural adventures! may just be that. I love adding tools to my DM's toolkit, and this looks to be a nice fit.

Normally 4.73 in PDF, until tomorrow morning, Edge of the Wilds is on sale for a mere 2.31.

This book contains dozens and dozens of scenarios and scenario ideas for adventures in rural settings, suited for nearly all imaginable kinds of fantasy RPGs. If your game has villages and towns surrounded by wilderness, you will be able to run these scenarios!

Our plothooks and storyseeds (around half a page in length each) are ideas: a collection of lawless gangs, rampaging beasts, rivaling settlements, incarnate powers of nature and much much more. A few adventures are straightforward, but many come with a twist, designed to lead to more trouble and more action for your average adventuring party!

Each adventure introduces the basic story: a villain's plan, the most important NPCs and how things might develop once our heroes become involved.

Use these scenarios as they are written, or let them inspire you and grow your own, custom adventure from the sprouting seed of our story!

Most of the scenarios are written with a medieval-ish fantasy setting in mind, but are easily adaptable to ancient, victorian or even more modern rural settings.

Each adventure seed is focused on one or more of the four large categories of RPG scenarios: exploration, diplomacy, investigation and combat.

Many adventures are designed for low to mid level characters, but you can also find quite a few for veteran adventurers and even some for legendary champions in this collection.

Rural adventures are extremely well suited as starting points for RPG campaigns. They have their own distinct strengths and traits to capture the “flair” of this frontier environment. In this collection you will find a short guide with the most important tips on running plots in the rural setting.

Last but not least: we have included a list of 20 short encounters that can be used in any rural area and are especially well suited to be thrown into your campaign as a bit of a distraction, a small tidbit of interest that gives your player characters a little room to breathe...but at the same time holds the potential for much more!

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Halloween is Over! (Too early to prep for next year?)

 

For some reason two things I like to do here at the Tavern is confess shit and tell stories, which seems appropriate since that's something I'd normally do at a tavern, but then I'd be dressed in more than my underwear and probably have less sugar and more alcohol in me.....

For those of you who don't know me personally, I worked a fair number of years in retail and Halloween marked the official beginning of what I could only call "the suck". When I worked at Fred Meyer I didn't get to "do" Halloween, instead I got to come in late and when the store closed at 11 PM we got cracking and swapped out the Seasonal Department from Halloween to Christmas. In later, and arguably better, retail (State-Run Liquor Store) Halloween is a big party holiday and the start of the busier selling-season. Halloween on a Saturday.....you know that was a busy day at the liquor store!

One thing I've never done, and I've heard it's something folks visiting this page would be wont to do, is run a special Halloween game. I've played in zombie-heavy campaigns, and I have only a couple sessions of Call of Cthulhu under my belt, but no special themed game just for Halloween.

Of course it being November 1st, I'm shit out of luck doing it this year......

Honestly though, I'm on the fence about a themed game to begin with. Probably because I'm a bit of a wuss and haven't been into scary movies since I was in High School. Sure, I have no problem watching an old Friday the 13th flick, but Cabin in the Woods? Actually I might like that one, but I cannot name any of the current crop of horror movies out there. What I do like is the comedy/horror blend. Figure out a way to run Tucker & Dale vs. Evil and I'll go grab my dice. Just don't expect me to write the damned thing.

I'm used to a small amount of comedy in my RPGs, but mostly because the players are gathered to have a good time and like to screw with each other.....ok it's me.....I enjoy screwing with the other players, or my players if I'm the GM. Nothing serious & lasting in-game mind you, but just as friends around the table.

I've written one adventure that was comedic in nature, for a GM-only game at Origins, but I have never written an actual "scary" adventure. The closest I've come is an adventure seed, something I call a Tweak & Toss....because I assume no matter how well-written I think I can make something (and I've seen adventures far too over-written!) any GM worth their salt is going to heavily tweak what I've done and toss it into their home game. Instead of a lot of pages of highly-focused content, I've been going with a few pages of more generic information that the GM could use as the base for them to spice it up to their specifications......

.....anyway, that's a long segue to my Tweak & Toss that had to be inspired on some level by Motel Hell. If you aren't familiar with this B Movie horror gem.......believe me you're better off. The Horrors of Halfling Hollow was something I had put up on my blog as a freebie download on DriveThruRPG. I think I'll keep it free for another week and let anyone here grab a copy so you can have a entire year to tweak it for a right proper scary Halloween game next year (the implication is you'd have to tweak it in order for it to be scary).

I'd love to hear from GMs/players who took part in an actual Halloween-themed game that was fun and NOT Call of Cthulhu. Don't get me wrong, I like CoC, but I'd rather hear about the normal game/table having an in-game one-off and not a "let's play this other system tonight" type of thing.  

New PWYW - The Trials of a Young Wizard (OSRIC)

Its been a while since I highlighted a PWYW release here at The Tavern. It being Christmas Eve (and only a few minutes until Christmas here on the East Coast) I figured I'd highlight a PWYW OSR release, sort of as an early Christmas gift.

The Trials of a Young Wizard is an exciting entry-level set of three scenarios:  

Fresh-faced and more than a little hung-over our newly graduated mage of the great Dunromin College of Magic and his friends step into the tea-room next to the Porter’s Lodge and ask for something for a headache. Within minutes they find themselves accosted by the smiling figure of Malcolm Darkstar, Bursar of the College and owner of the tea-rooms, keen to ask them a favour… 

This is a first level set of scenarios designed to take a starting-level party on their first exciting adventures in the Land of the Young; The Lost Son; The Return of the Cauldron of Millent and the Murder at the Red Barn. 

You can run this set of scenarios in your own game-world or use it as a gateway and taster for the wider gameworld setting of Barnaynia - the banana-shaped world, starting in Dunromin, the most amazing city in the Land of the Young, probably the world.  This highly detailed and quality set of game resources is both thought provoking andf enjoyable.  It is detailed yet flexible, complex yet easy to use.  The ideal gameworld for any sort of player and Game Master. 

SM12 The Trials of a Young Wizard was designed with AD&D in mind but set in the OSRIC ruleset.  This is the latest dungeon designed as excellent value for money and an easy fit to any fantasy role-playing campaign.  However,  The Trials of a Young Wizard is primarily aimed at the game setting the Free City of Dunromin and the Land of the Young on the astonishing World of Barnaynia.

Enjoy the adventures or strip out the maps and make them your own. Tip the publisher of you like the adventures included.

Yep, that's an affiliate link above. Affiliate links keep the lights on and the taps flowing here at The Tavern

Deal of the Day - Fever-Dreaming Marlinko (OSR Setting / Adventure)

Today's RPGNow Deal of the Day is Fever-Dreaming Marlinko from the Hydra Collective.

Visit Marlinko, a borderlands city where life takes a strange fever-dream cast, in this 72-page urban adventure fantasy supplement. Part city-setting, part full-blown adventure, Fever-Dreaming Marlinko is a stand-alone companion to the Slavic acid fantasy weirdness of the Slumbering Ursine Dunes. 

What you will find inside: 

• Background and hooks for the city's “four contradas,” city quarters with their own peculiar traditions, sites and even gods.
• Gorgeous isometric city maps by Luka Rejec. Download them for free at full-sized, high resolution here. 
• Two complete dungeon adventure sites.
• Two new players classes (the Mountebank and Robodwarf).
• Chaos Index with escalating events/triggers scattered throughout the city.
• News generator with full news briefs and hooks.
• Tiger-wrestling mini-game.
• Weird nickname generator.
• Section on running scams, hoaxes and grifting activity in a fantasy campaign.
• Carousing system tied into the contrada system.
• A“fair play/pay” guild system for hirelings.

Normally $6.75 in PDF, you can grab a copy of Fever Dreaming Marlinko until tomorrow morning for $2.70.

That's an affiliate link above. Its one of the ways you can "tip your bartender" doing what you were going to do anyway ;)

RPGNow Deal of the Day - The Wreckers of Windward Isle From Roan Studio

Today's RPGNow Deal of the Day is The Wreckers of Windward Isle. So, what actually is The Wreckers of Windward Isle, as the boilerplate doesn't say much:

Sitting at the entrance to the Bay of Spirits is an imposing rocky island that has been a hazard to ships and seafarers since the early years of exploration in the region. The weather, rough seas, pirates and the damnable Wreckers make ocean voyage in the area perilous at best. The land itself can be just as dangerous with adventure and intrigue around every corner. 

Yeah, doesn't really tell squat. Good news is that I ponied up my $1.79 (as it is 40% off of the usual $2.99) so I can tell you what it is. It is an OSR setting with adventure hooks and such. Maybe it is more accurately a micro-setting as it covers all of about 1.75 square miles.

I'm actually less interested in that than the locations and personalities within the setting, as they are generally the easiest to port to your own campaign, and stuff looks highly portable. Well laid out with pleasing art, this is well worth your 3 bucks, let alone a buck seventy nine. If I have a complaint, and its a fairly common one, the NPCs have too much magic. But that's my perspective and it may not be yours.

OSR non denominational, it should fit the ruleset of your choice with relative ease.

Normally $2.99, The Wreckers of Windward Isle is on sale until tomorrow morning for $1.79.

Remember, The Tavern gets paid a small amount from every purchase that uses affiliate links like the ones above. Please remember to tip your barman.

Kickstarter - RPG Mini Mods - Role Playing Games Mini Modules

What can I tell you about +Lloyd Metcalf ? Well, he was the main artist doing work on Whisper & Venom (a NTRPG Three Castles Award Finalist and ENnie Award Finalist for 2014). I actually own one of his original pieces of work. I truly do like his art. I have no idea about his adventure writing, but I'm willing to make a bet (with my own money) that Lloyd writes a decent adventure. I guess I'll find out with his RPG Mini Mods.

$24 for print copies of all three mini mods, $32 if you want a set of three 5"x7" prints of the covers. Can you guess what level I'll be ponying up for?

Let's face it, not every GM has time to sit down and prepare adventures on short notice every time the players decide to pop in for some RPG fun. 

A Mini Mod quest is simply a side quest in short format, designed to serve many purposes. 

A Mini Mod can be a quick one-off adventure or a side quest in a longer campaign. You can use a Mini Mod to unobtrusively make sure that players come across objects or tavern-rumors with connections to larger story lines. You can also use one to enrich the campaign setting in a longer story arc. 

Mini Mods will keep your players entertained and give them things to do while other events are cooking. You can use them as a springboard to further adventures or just to add depth to your world, and all with minimal pre-planning time. 

This Kickstarter will raise the funds necessary to produce 3 complete Mini mods in their entirety. The Bogey  has previously been done, but will receive a re-write and some added details from our newly added writer Christopher Scott Thompson along with Ian Graham and myself (Lloyd Metcalf). 

Christopher is already hard at work fixing up The Bogey of Swindle and ironing out the bugs in "The Children of Blackweb Bog". Two great mini mods to get the ball rolling. 

We will pay our professional writer to help us along in creating "Midnight Oliviah" with successful funding. A mini mod inspired by a lady known to a number of Texans, but loaded with character ready for any world. 

All Mini mods will be illustrated by myself (Lloyd Metcalf)

Laminated Micro Adventure by Tim Shorts

I received the above from +Tim Shorts (Gothridge Manor blog) in the mail yesterday (I also received a mystery envelope from Tim today - a mystery as it was ripped open and delivered w/o contents by the wonderful US Mail system). You can grab it free in PDF at Tim's blog.

This is awesome. As +Christian Walker says over at the Destination Unknown blog, a DM armed with a handful of these will never be found wanting. Good stuff. Now I feel the need to buy a grease pencil and write on the map ;)

Big or Small?

When it comes to adventures, is less more?

I ask because I've seen adventures range from 4 pages to 104 pages more or less (I'm not counting mega dungeons, settings or adventure paths).

For me, the sweet spot is usually around 16-24 pages. Long enough for maybe 2 nites of adventure but not so long I can't familiarize myself in less then an hour or so.

I know at times more IS more, but for the me, less is usually more for adventures.