Wizard Dads Workshop: Layering games for a richer setting.

I love to play all kinds of games. I run the gamut from cozy mysteries through dark dystopian sci-fi. I also love setting building. Whether it is taking a the skeleton of simpler written prefab setting (Like the grey box set of Forgotten Realms circa 1987 or the orange original Numenera setting from 2013) and building on it, or coming up from scratch with my own original setting I love adding details, characters, plots and intrigues, interesting places to explore, and discovering the game world.

Back in my GMing days this was the bread and butter of my gaming life. Mind I loved running for my game group, and letting them add their own little details from character history, mentors, or just suggesting what would make a cool addition to the game. Sans game group now, as a solo player, I still reach out to gaming friends for suggestions and advice. In fact, me and three other friends have been tinkering around with an OSR setting, mostly written by me, but with a lot of input from them, for over 5 years. We rarely play it, we just love the act of setting building.

But, it is as an individual solo gamer I want to talk right now. 

In most solo games from scratch you start with a nearly blank slate. A cool idea seed and a character, and you let it take off from there. That is a great way to start, and I have done it dozens of times. In fact for the techniques I am going to discuss below that is exactly how I would suggest starting. The only drawback is the world comes to you through one set of eyes. Which isn't necessarily a problem, and for many players it is definitely feature not flaw, but for me that doesn't truly satisfy that world building itch.

In a prior article, "West Marches on one character a day, or a Crosshatch Campaign", game suggestions for running a stable of characters over the same geographic and chronological areas so that the events of one character would cause ripples that other characters would have to deal with. I still use that method with nearly every full campaign I run. It builds up a series of events an rumors that effect every character that comes after it.

Another method I use is borrowed, and slightly altered, from the Mythic Magazine article "Deconstructing Prepared Adventures For Solo Play" (found in MM vol. 50, pg. 3), but instead of applying it simply to adventures (which it does exceptionally well), I apply it to whole setting books, novels, and lately an entire 11 book novel series. (All you need to make this work is a random number generator that you can easily access from any search engine.) 

Using both of these together has given me an exceptionally rich game world, where I can start a character from rat catching newbie to visiting lord and have not trouble having piles of context to run my game from.

For the last month, I have been doing something a bit different. The background scenario I am using, and you could use any variation on this you like, is that I have a cozy mystery solving character (a librarian in fact) in a fantasy setting (though this would work for any setting that allows for action adventures), who has her own daily affairs and small, relatively safe adventures where she solves crimes and tends her library, but she is also surrounded by many unread and un catalogued books. Now, this is a private library with a taste towards the exotic, so it wasn't unusual that it acquired a set of diaries from a former treasure hunter, discussing his travels and the many strange and frequently unsolved mysteries he found along the way. This is a high fantasy setting, so the journals of a the treasure hunter are full of close calls with monsters, strange societies, and magic. 

Rather than simply roll a few random plot hooks from the themes of the journals (which would be a perfectly reasonable option), instead I am playing out the treasure hunters adventures using the techniques found in the article "Mythic As A Solo Journaling Game" (found in MM Vol. 30, pg. 10). To actually play out the treasure hunt in Journal style. When the treasure hunter finds his treasure he moves on, leaving in his wake several unsolved mysteries, and a lot of game details about the setting. 

Now, my cozy librarian, while she wields a little magic, doesn't have a single skill that lends itself towards life as an adventurer, so she takes all the little mystery strands and finds people who do, leading to the third level of layering: one shots. 

Acting now as the quest giver, she finds an adventurer whose skills and style would mesh with the needs of the mystery (" “Gather A Crew” Mythic Adventures", MM Vol. 32, pg. 3), and they go forth and untangle the mystery. The advantage to the one shot approach is that you get to play over the course of several mysteries, many character types, and even drift from your normal RPG to something you have been wanting to try out. It won't tangle with the rules from your primary game because it is encapsulated, and along the way you add yet another layer of word building to the setting (and probably create yet more adventure hooks for your primary game along the way). 

A solo game can be a fun one off, or a long campaign, but it also can be a creative opportunity to make a vibrant and uniquely personal world for your imagination to wander, and for me that is the biggest pay off of all. 

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A bundle scene starters sans context: Part 2

1-2

3-4

1-2  A transport carrying captives (slaves, prisoners of war, criminals, dissidents), one of high priority (former noble, bandit leader, enemy officer), is blown over releasing the captives. The locals turn on them in a frenzy, (whether they are guilty or not). There is no obvious reason for the crash. An armored transport (armored man on a war steed, reinforced jeep, VTOL drone) swoops in and takes one of the captives, but not the one of high priority. Your PC(s) is close enough to witness the event. What do you do?

3-4 While travelling in a new area the PC(s) inadvertently enter a secret war zone (trade war, labor dispute, gang territory dispute, freedom fighters using gorilla tactics) between an established power and a local resistance. A group of "terrorist" have been captured by the dominant side after an attack on a civilian establishment, with many injuries and possibly deaths. The underdog call it a false flag. Does the PC(s) get involved?

5-6 While attending a regular social gathering (open mic night, weekly market square, local band performance) an important community leader (well loved religious heterodoxical leader, district councilor, well regarded political activist), is spirited away from the crowd as if he disappeared. A local radical group opposed to their ideals takes credit, and makes outrageous and unfulfillable demands for the release. 

7-8 While on the lamb (running from some authority or powerful figure) for reasons that are either good or due to a mistake, the PC(s) take refuge in a out of the way small rural setting (a farm town in the Midwest, a forest hamlet, a semi permanent oasis village). While they arrive coming down from the north (or south, or east, or from off planet) another unknown person cloaked (perhaps literally) in mystery arrives as well. This hamlet in the wilderness is the secret home of a powerful but respected recluse, loved by the community, until the stranger begins his whispering accusations, that the villagers listen to far to readily. Why is this stranger so influential, and what are there feelings about the recluse?

9-0 The PC(s) is called to a the site of a crash (air plane, space ship, minivan, caravan wagon) by an old but important acquaintance (mentor, parent, friend, old enemy), the crash ends, or at least pauses, an old feud (family argument, boarder war, personal grudge), but soon after the PCs arrive old secrets are revealed that call both sides of the dispute into disreputable light. Every one expects the PC(s) to sort it out. What do they do?

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Wizard Dad's Work Shop: A bundle scene starters sans context: Part 1.

First, let me give credit where credit is due. The inspiration and primary tool I will be using for this project come from various Word Mill Games products, with perhaps a few other randomizing tools thrown in. I am only going to be giving outputs so I don't believe the I will be doing the authors any injustice using there tools. With that said, though I don't this caveat will be necessary, please don't reproduce this article in whole or in part for commercial use.   

The primary tool I will be using is The Adventure Crafter Deck, which I have found be extremely useful in coming with with starting scenes or pushing a game forward when it seems to be running out of steam. 

I will probably get some minor use out of The Game Master's Apprentice: Base Deck. It is especially useful when you need a little more inspiration to tease out detail about a scene.

What I am going to do is make generic, context-less, game hooks, that can be used as rumors, catalyst, or mid game jump starters. I will provide a little who and what, but the context of your own game will determine what that finally looks like.

If this is popular I will do the same with NPCs and Locations, but there is no point in either of those without some reason to go there. 

In the first few hooks I will provide a fantasy, fantastic modern, sci-fi, and pulp adventure  interpretation just to show how it works."

This is a bit of an experiment, in sharing with others, but having random hooks, NPC, items, and locations with no context laying around has save a huge amount of time in my own games. 

The 5 hooks provided alone do not have to be used alone, you can randomly roll several and combine them for a more dynamic scene. I may string several of these pages together into a mega table, if there grow to be enough of them. 

(roll a d4 on a 1-2 use the hooks from this page. On a 3-4 try the hooks from here instead. Feel free to add several together, and make a unique start or continuation of your game.)

1-2 

1-2 Some exotic [monster, alien, a person in a Halloween costume] character springs forth unexpectedly from an unpredictable direction [shadows, a parallel dimension, from behind a cloaking device]  and from and threatens, perhaps even attacks, your PC(s), but with no intention to kill, but very loudly, while from behind a concealed [shrouded in darkness, protected by a blur module, simply very stealth] and skilled co-assailant seeks to steal the most valuable thing to be seen [a wallet, briefcase, weapon, jewelry], after which both fade back into the back ground [magically vanish, mundanely run into the dark]

3-4 Social: At a popular celebration [Christmas Parade, Harvest Festival, Coronation], , in which your PC(s) have a front row viewing, in a major urban metropolis [New York, Fanatsy New York, Sc-fi New York, Metropolis (which is New York)], the local leader's [Mayor, King, Archbishop, Celebrity] body guards vanish from the scene, while he/she/they are giving a speech.

5-6 The PC(s) are approached, a well informed quest [ giver (but not one familiar to them) to assist them with the investigation of a strange and violent crime, that seems to have no rational motive, that is within the realm of expertise of your character(s). They bring all the case information and hold nothing back.

7-8  The PCs are drawn to a back water district after hearing of a friend/allies death (or wounding). The PC (or one PC if there are multiple) is the target of a failed assassination attempt by the lieutenant of a new local warlord/crime boss, to remove he/her/they as a potential complication before they can settle in. 

9-0 Something that has upset a formerly known NPC has come back from the PC(s)'s past to haunt them. The NPC now is powerful enough to exert threat over a distance. The PC's must avoid bounty hunters and/or law enforcement until they can either clear up/make amends/disappear.

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Mythic Worksheet Index, Mythic RPG

ToC

I love this game. It is one of the finest toolkit games every written in my opinion. All of the blank worksheets are in the backmatter of the book, so I will also list the first appearance of the the worksheet as well as what page they are in the back matter.

• Resolution Tables Worksheet
• First found on pg. 37
• Back matter location, pg. 129
• Adventure Summary Sheet
• First found on pg. 69
• Back matter location, pg. 131
• Scaling Box
• First found on pg. 79
• Back matter location, pg. 130
• NPC Worksheet
• First found on pg. 83
• Back matter location, pg. 132
• Character Sheet
• Back matter location, pg. 133
• Wounds worksheet
• Back matter location, pg. 134

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Wizard Dad: Blog Update

As I am sure you have noticed, the blog has been on something of a hiatus, as I have a final coming up in my online courses, and like it or not the I have to focus away from the gaming table and blog.

But there are a few things that are, very slowly, in the works.

I am scaling back the Worksheet and Charts index to just worksheets. That is what I have the most trouble finding so that is what I am going to focus on. I think it will be a useful tool for everyone, so I will slap it up here. 

After that, still on the Index front, I am going to do a reverse publication order list off all articles including brief descriptions, that way if you want to peruse what is in a magazine or compellation before purchasing you will have a better idea what you are getting into. I have tragically fallen behind on (due to school) on being able to do anything but do a speed read of articles to add them to the primary Index. (this is probably going to be the slowest project I am working on).

There is a new category of articles I have in mind (with a couple of nearly finished) called "But what if we use it like this" to show alternative uses of ideas from Word Mill products, especially the Magazines.

Lastly, I am working (at a snails pace) on transferring the byzantine rules for early Shadowrun (I am going with 3e) into a Mythic and Fudge friendly format. Both are excellent toolkit games. Mythic tends to be more swingy for those wild action scenes, but if you want to play in the Shadowrun lore as more of a slice of life game (maybe between Runs), the Fudge tendency to pull towards the mean mathematically could be to your liking. I will post both, but expect a bit of overlap.

Well that is all that is fit for print. Be patient with me folks, Wizard Dad can not stand to be out of the lab for too long, so articles will be heading down the line soon.

Wizard Dad's Workshop: The Villain's Turn: Power, Resources, Influence, Knowledge, and Personal Life

Good villains make good stories. Well perhaps it takes more than that, but a good villain can really help a story along. Just as your characters are not static so too your villains have lives in motion. I am in the camp of nothing is real till it happens in game, but that doesn't have to mean that nothing is going on behind the scenes. So, I suggest that you consider giving the bad guy a turn every now and again. I am not saying focus the lens on the antagonist like you would a PC, that would take the fun out of the discovery later on. Instead I suggest a broad view procedure that gives a sense of the type of action your nemesis is taking over a certain period of time. 

Let's say, your PC is a sword swinging, good natured, friend to the common man. Now, early in his career he encounters a manipulative lord who uses his aristocratic powers to oppress and exploit the very people your PC focuses on caring for. Sounds like you have a good foil to your actions, and a nice focus for your campaign. If your villain is doing so much for you, perhaps you, the Solo Player, should do him a nice turn as well. 

In this system (partially inspired by Mr. Kevin Crawford's very well detailed faction system in Stars Without Number) you can break the action of a powerful person into five categories: Power, Resources, Influence, Knowledge, and Personal. Each Villain Turn you will roll for the category, and roll if the action is focused on acquisition or exercise, then a second roll on for success or failure. Lastly make a check on your Oracle of choice on whether the action as an outward facing effect. In other words does it generate a rumor or news event. Even if it does, that outward facing effect probably won't exactly reflect what happened, it is just what was seen and talked about. It is important that the action only loosely be defined, because it remains an unknown to the PC, until either the PC investigates and uncovers the truth behind the rumor or the villain takes an action which reveals what is behind the scenes.

Lets meander through the list and discuss what each label constitutes, and show some examples that could come up in play.

Power is any action taken to enhance the personal power of the villain or its organization. This could be getting a new magic item it covets, increasing its magic or weapon prowess, or any other action that makes the villain itself greater in magnitude.

Resources is similar to power excepting it is outside of the villain's personal being. This could mean making an ally of a powerful creature, strengthening a lieutenant, gaining control of business, or laying hands on a large pile of money. 

Influence is social or political in nature. This could involve seducing a local lord to their side, gaining  a political appointment, insinuating a spy in an organization, or gaining blackmail material over an important individual. 

Knowledge is information that is useful to the goals of the villain. This maybe gained through books, sages, reports from spies, or personal investigation. The knowledge is rarely abstract, save for more esoteric villains, and will probably be used as an asset in the future to gain more of the advantages listed above.

Lastly, whether your villain be an ambitious business man or a demigod, all of them are people (with rare exceptions). Things of a private nature will effect the Personal Life of the villain as they do with the protagonist. Maybe they fall in love, find a long lost child, have a religious revelation, or fall off a horse and break there leg. This may sound like a skipped round, but personal experiences can change a villain (though rarely into a hero) in such a way that there goals may change, or there approach needs to be altered. Or maybe they just need to be personally benched while that leg heals. In any account a Personal Life experience will impact a villain as much as it does a PC and should be taken into account as goals grown and bloom.

Ok, that is enough philosophy.

Lets talk mechanics.

After encountering a Villain, a trusted lieutenant, or a demonstration of his power base, note them down on their own card (or word doc, etc.). Here you will add all the details that you think you know about them. These details will only solidify if they come up in game, but details you think you know will inform your decisions. (If you use a character list, such is found in Mythic GMU make sure note them down there as well, if there is a noteworthy outward display).

Next, continue playing your normal solo campaign and at the conclusion of an adventure (or after one game month has passed, which every is shorter), whether or not it involved the villain, roll for the type of action that the villain engages in during that time period. Just use a 10 sided die with 1-2 being Power, 3-4 being Resources, 5-6 being Influence, 7-8 being Power, and 9-0 being Personal Life. Note the result.  After that roll on your random word generator of choice roll the  first word (preferably from some Action table) and put it with the result. This is meta knowledge, but it will work in the back of your mind until such a time when a revelation in reasonable. 

The next step is to find out if the action had any public facing consequences. This is as simple as asking your Oracle "Did the Villain turn have public facing fall out?" Judge the likelihood based on what you know of the Villain's public persona, what type of action it was, and what the first of your word pair turned out to be.  If the answer is no, you just go on with your next phase of your adventure. If the answer is yes, take the first word and add a second or more words until you have an idea what shape that fall out took. From there build a rumor or plot hook from it, and then pick move on to your next adventure. (Though this is written for protagonist it could also be done for any non static element of your game, but I don't want to make this article 17 pages long)

Revelation 
Remember all Revelations should work within the context of the game. Merge both the context and the results to give the picture presented to the characters.

Rumor: Revelation can come in the way of an outward expression of the the action of the villain turn, in which case you build a rumor from the first word, adding as many as you need to solidify it. After you have the rumor throw away all the words save for the first rolled, as that clings to he character to be used in the second phase.

Investigation: Assuming the PC wants to take the time to dig deeper, and has the resources to do so, investigating what a rival is doing, could reveal some of the secret information, if they have the skills to do so and aren't to clumsy implementing them. If they are successful, they learn one aspect of the rival's endeavors. In that case take the cumulated words from one category and develop them into a plot device. Which very well may lead to ...

Confrontation: There will come a time when you will clash with a antagonist or some aspect of there organization. At that time take a moment and figure out which category or categories (Power, Resources, Influence, Knowledge, or Personal Life) will be on display. It will probably be obvious from the context of the confrontation, but if now just roll to see what aspect is displayed. 

At this point use the cumulated words in each category used to produce a picture of what comes to bear in the encounter. Lets toss out a few examples using the oppressive lord mentioned in the introduction.

Power: Truce: While the lord was always a smooth talker now his voice produces a calming lassitude that seeps the will to fight from you and your allies. You notice he wears a strange platinum pendent that, is that the source of his new ability?

Resources: Distrust: A well know champion of right and law is on the side of the lord. This cast doubt in the minds of your henchmen on whether they are on the right side of the fight.

Influence: A couple of the kings own knights are flanking the Duke acting as his body guards. To strike at them is the break Royal decree, is it worth it?

Knowledge: Free: Before the fight can commence the he calls for a parlay. He offers the location of your characters missing family member if you just stand aside this one time and let him have his way. He promises that if you don't that information will be lost to you forever.

Personal Life: Trust: The lord's own son, carefully kept away from fights in the past is armed and armored and standing next to his father. They look like a formidable team.

In actual play there will be several words to weave together to give you an idea of what is manifesting, but the point is to show, in a very gameable way, that your rival is in motion as much as your characters.

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Blank Page to First Scene 4: Out of the Frying Pan; Into the Fire

Return to ToC

The last step to wrap up this little project is to jump into the first scene. Now, I could ask a series of Mythic questions narrowing it down to a final step, or I could use the method from MM38 Solo Setting & World Creation System, to sketch out a place with a little history. Instead I am going to pull another tool from my toolbox and use  The Adventure Crafter, which is a wonderful tool for inciting events. 

As a brief overview (I seriously suggest you pick this up and its deck version as well), TAC gives you a series of story elements that contrive to make up a scene. I wish to start in media res so the TAC results will be the thing that leads up to the moment I start, and set the conditions of my Fate Chart questions to determine what action is going on. 

A couple months ago I made a deck of adventure starters, and boost, for when things got slow. These are full Adventure Crafter result sets on standard index cards. They are agnostic with no context. Because a little context is needed to interpret them I am going to grab a multi genre bestiary I own and just randomly pick a monster from it to give some simple context I need. The result is futuristic and horror. Now, I am going to draw from the deck until a starting scene takes shape. To be more precise these are the events that will lead up to the starting scene, the immediate background of the adventure.

Meta: (I am holding meta results to just one, two many of these muddles a scene)

• Character Upgrade 

Mystery: 

• Something lost has been found.
• This isn't working
• The observer
• Beat you to it
• The Plot Thickens
• Hidden Agenda

Action

• Destroy the thing
• Confrontation
• Protector

Personal

• Untouchable
• Character Assistance
• Willing to talk

Social

• Injustice
• A rare or unique social gathering

I may not be able to fit all of these hooks into a coherent back scene, but lets see what we can do.

Social gives us a strong location in "A rare or unique social gathering". We know the setting is both horrific and futuristic. Social also tells us that someone or some group faces an injustice. In Personal we have untouchable, which suggest my own character is considered either to exalted to touch or to loathsome to interact with. Lets go with the later, and we are going to expand that to the others at the meeting as well. We, collectively, represent a group of lone-wolf pariah gathered for a purpose.

There are two factors that would make my character unique that I can think of off the top of my head. The first is that I am dimension hopper, but we know those are very rare. The second is that I am a wizard, but I mask it in the trappings of the local system, and sense this is sci-fi we will go with Psionics. This a world where both hyper science and psionic power are present, and those who practice the later are seen as unclean. 

I am just going to interject that psychics in this setting are lone-wolf types, with no over arching organization, which shows that meeting to discuss a problem (willing to talk) and banding together (Character Assistance) to face it is almost unheard of. As a persecutor minority they probably stay as far away from each other as possible, as not to draw attention.

If, the setting has hyper tech and the typical run of peace keepers and soldier, then this must be a scenario that only psionic power can handle, and it must be important enough to gather people from all parts of this space sector. 

Looking to the Mystery section we know that something, maybe an ancient psionic artifact, has been found, but we know that the group that has gathered think it is too dangerous and should be destroyed (Acton: Destroy the thing), which will lead to a confrontation with its guardian (Protector). 

Whatever it is even most psychic powers are bouncing off it (This isn't working). From seeming nowhere a character thought lost earlier in the adventure emerges from concealment, perhaps invisibility (The Observer) rushes past the combat and guardian, to seize the artifact for themselves (Beat you to it, Plot Thickens, Hidden Agenda). Upon seizing the object the power within it, that the guardian was trying to keep safe floods into our traitor, filling him with power (Meta: Character Upgraded). Which leads us to the opening scene...

A small group of psychic loners, along with Saul, are banded together, with the Protector joining them to face a seeming now much empowered psychic, who is a danger to this entire galactic sector.

Roll for initiative.