I want to run a multi-session supernatural mystery adventure in my game. Evil forces are trying to learn the forbidden arts of witchcraft, in order to get the attention of a long-lost god who is considered by many to be "the devil." The PCs will have to learn and delve into witchcraft themselves in order to stop this from happening. A mysterious mentor will teach them how to use a Tarot deck (Raider-Waite-Smith, if anyone cares) to learn the lessons required to be able to use witchcraft. Seven cards of the Major Arcana (this is Tarot terminology) will provide the vital clues on how to do this.

I think I've got the mechanics of this down. I know about Justin Alexander's Three Clue Rule, and so on. What I'm struggling with is how to elicit the athmosphere I want. If you've seen the movie The Ninth Gate, read the DaVinci Code, or seen the Netflix show Archive 81, I think you know what I'm talking about; that sense of "What the f--- is going on here? I just have to know how this all connects together and get to the bottom of this!" The TV show Lost is probably another good example, but I haven't seen it myself.

Things that I think will help:

• Thematic music. Every time the topic of the Tarot deck comes up, some mysterious-sounding specific song should be played. This trick is used in Wagner's The Ring opera, as well as in the Lord of the Rings movies (for example, the ring has its own theme which is played when the ring is mentioned).
• Frequently giving the PCs new little bits of information which seem to lead them to the conclusions they're hopefully craving.
• I think personal stakes will probably help to keep the players engaged, which in turn will perhaps contribute to the "I just have to know more" feeling I want to elicit.

One trick I can't really use is what the DaVinci code did - it used a story that in some ways sounded so plausible that the reader could think "Wait, could what's proposed in this book actually be true?" That worked in that story, because it took place in the real world and was about Christianity which many in the western world take very seriously. I can't really do the same with my homebrew world which has very little in common with the real world.

So - does anyone have any ideas or suggestions on how to accomplish this? Again, it's the atmosphere of mystery that I'm primarily concerned with here, although mechanical discussion would be welcomed too.

I love stuff like this - hexcrawl combined with dungeon crawl. I continue to be surprised by how much Four Against Darkness stuff engages me, depite its simple mechanics.

My friends and I have been playing DnD 5e for a few years now, but now I’ve decided to start GMing PathFinder 2e. We’ve played through most of the Beginner Box, and now I want to continue with my own homebrew content. As part of my world, I want to introduce a fighter “subclass” (probably the wrong terminology for PathFinder). What I want is a tribe of warriors who fight without armor (starting at level 2 or 3), and to compensate for the lower AC they get magical tattoos which increase their AC. It will also be possible (when you advance in levels) to choose to add other tattoos with other magical effects.

So my question is: Is this what archetypes are for? Because I don’t think “subclasses” are a thing in PathFinder? Or how would I go about this?

My friends and I have been playing DnD 5e for a few years now, but now I've decided to start GMing PathFinder 2e. We've played through most of the Beginner Box, and now I want to continue with my own homebrew content. As part of my world, I want to introduce a fighter "subclass" (probably the wrong terminology for PathFinder). What I want is a tribe of warriors who fight without armor (starting at level 2 or 3), and to compensate for the lower AC they get magical tattoos which increase their AC. It will also be possible (when you advance in levels) to choose to add other tattoos with other magical effects).

So my question is: Is this what archetypes are for? Because I don't think "subclasses" are a thing in PathFinder? Or how would I go about this?

For those who aren't familiar, Four Against Darkness is a solo pen-and-paper dungeon crawler. You control four characters of various classes at a time. You roll dice, a table shows you which dungeon room or corridor to draw, then you roll again for its contents, etc. In the base game, all combat and all actions are resolved with a simple d6.

Normally, I would balk at this. A d6 simply doesn't permit sufficient resolution. It leaves little room for depth of mechanics. And to be fair, the base game isn't really all that interesting (to me) because of its lack of depth.

But - and here's the thing - there's so much extra content you can get for this game. Adventures, new classes, new mechanics (some of which involves other dice than the d6 although the base mechanic of the game is always based on the d6 as far as I'm aware), etc. For example, the excellent Treacheries of the Troublesome Towns supplement (which comes in two books) adds the ability to enter towns where you will meet all sorts of characters. There are even options for romance, having children, buying a house, and becoming the mayor of the town - there's so much that can happen. And that's just one of the (around 50, I think?) supplements that are out there.

So, in summary, I find myself fascinated by this game despite its lack of complex mechanics, simply because there is so much content for it. If you want, you could think of it as not very deep (read: simple mechanics), but very wide (read: lots of available content).

What are your thoughts on games like this?

The Monsters & Mazes blog has suggested #Hexplore24 to replace #Dungeon23. The idea is to solo play through a newly generated hex each day for a year.

I'm making a fantasy-based TTRPG, and I'm pondering whether or not I could make foraging interesting.

I have a hexcrawl system with rules for what happens when the players traverses a hexmap using random tables. One of the things that can happen (besides random encounters, finding locations, etc) is that they can come across "resources", which for now is only different types of food (mushrooms, edible roots, etc). But I wonder if I could extend this system in a meaningful way, to make foraging fun? As in, can I make a system where players think going out to forage for herbs or spell components in the wild is more attractive than simply buying them in a local magic shop?

The most simple and obvious solution is to extend what I already have in the same way that it already works. That is, one of the things that can happen as players traverse hexes on the map is that they can come across resources in the form of "herbs" or "spell components", etc. When that happens, there could simply be a random table (different for each type of hex terrain) that you roll on, to see what and how much you found. This system would work, but I'm not sure it would be very interesting.

I mean, sure, as you're walking around in the wilderness, the other things that can happen (possibly hostile random encounters, and finding random locations, etc) will probably help keep the process of wandering in the wilderness as a whole interesting, but I wonder if the "you found resources/herbs" event itself could somehow be turned into a mini-game or something, to make it more interesting.

Anyone have any suggestions about this?

In order to reduce the amount of times you have to update your number of torches (etc), and also to introduce some random uncertainty, some people suggested an alternative method. Instead of putting "10" in the number of torches you have left on your character sheet, you could put "1d8". This means that every time you need a new torch, you roll 1d8.

If the result is anything other than a 1, then you don't have to update your character sheet at all. But if you do roll a 1, you change it from 1d8 to 1d6. And if you roll a 1 on the d6 in the future, it goes to 1d4. And once you roll a 1 on the 1d4, you're out of torches.

Again, the point of this is to reduce the amount of times you have to change the number of torches you have on your character sheet. Also, it introduces tension - you're several levels into the dungeon, and you only have 1d4 torches left; will it be enough?

This is all fine. I like this system. But it does have a small problem, I think.

Let's say you have 1d4 torches left, and you buy 2 "units" of torches to go from 1d4 through 1d6 up to 1d8. Each "unit" (read: die) you buy costs the same. But, and here's the (slight) problem: going from 1d10 to 1d12 is more valuable than going from 1d4 to 1d6, because the 1d12 only has a 1 in 12 chance of depleting (which is good), but the 1d6 has a 1 in 6 chance of depleting (which is worse).

In other words, it always makes sense to buy as many torches as you can (if you ignore encumbrance, I guess), because the last "unit" you buy will be more valuable than the first (read: have a smaller chance of being depleted).

So, one way of changing this would be to flip it around: Having 1d4 torches is the MOST amount of torches, and when you roll a 1, you switch "upwards" to 1d6 instead. Then, when you finally get to 1d12 roll a 1 on that, then you're out of torches.

This doesn't solve the problem of each "unit" of torches you buy is valued differently, but at least then the least valuable ones you buy are the ones you buy last, instead of the ones you buy first. This introduces diminishing returns on buying loads and loads of torches, which has some positive effects. But the problem with this approach is that it's less intuitive ("What? Having 1d12 torches means I have LESS than 1d4? That makes no sense!").

So, what do you think? Personally, I feel like I'm overthinking this and that I should just go with 1d4 being the lowest amount which is more intuitive, and the problem with that which I'm describing above is so small as to be insignificant.

Additionally, I want to abstract this further and say that instead of "torches" in your inventory, it should just say "supplies" which includes torches, arrows, and other similar resources. The point of this would be to reduce clutter on your character sheet.

This channel is shaping up to become a really interesting resource in the #TTRPG space. They've already got some good videos from which I've learned a thing or two. I encourage you to check them out.

This is an interesting blog post by @malin@dice.camp about how to weave multiple stories/plots together in an interesting way, which makes it possible to organically "catch" the players even if they wander off in an unexpected (read: unprepped) direction.

This can be used in any #TTRPG, but it can also be turned into a mechanic, built into an #TTRPG. It reminds me of Fronts (I think they're called) in #DungeonWorld.

Hello there, fellow RPG designer!

If you're anything like me, you too love to discuss roleplaying game mechanics, and how they affect gameplay. That is precisely the kind of thing we'll get to do in this community. Personally, I'm currently working on a roleplaying game that I'm so far calling Unified RPG which I sort of think of as a "rules-lite, GURPS-like" TTRPG. So don't be surprised if you see me creating posts about that here in the near future.

But what about you? What brought you to this community? What kind of game are you working on, or what do you want to make in the future? I'd love to hear all about it!

Zelda: Breath of the Wild

Part of what made the 2017 game Zelda: Breath of the Wild so popular was its travel and exploration element. This aspect of the game was exceptionally well designed.

Climbing

The game has a climbing mechanic, which means that you can basically go anywhere in the game world; there is nothing to stop you, not even mountains. Once you have reached the summit of a mountain, you are often rewarded with a beautiful view.

Spotting something interesting in the distance

Everywhere you go in Zelda: Breath of the Wild, you will see something interesting to do or explore. Once you have climbed a mountain, you typically see several other interesting places you could go. And once you go to them, you will spot other interesting things in the distance.

Flying

Once you have altitude, you can fly forwards and slowly downwards by using a glider. This means that it is often easy to get to interesting locations once you've spotted them from your mountaintop vantage point.

Towers and fast travel

Dotting the landscape of Zelda: Breath of the Wild are towers. Once you have reached and climbed a tower, you will be rewarded with a map of the area around the tower. Each tower, however, has some sort of challenge associated with climbing it. At any time, you can instantly teleport to any of the towers that you have conquered in this way, which is a reward in itself, and makes it easier to get from A to B without constantly having to traverse the same area. This makes long journeys less repetitive and tedious.

Shrines and Korok seeds

Scattered through the landscape are also Shrines (which, when completed, upgrades the player character in various ways). You can also come across Korok seeds which are hidden - either physically under a rock, or sometimes behind a small challenge like "hit ten targets with bow and arrow within this set time limit". The Korok seeds can be used to increase your inventory space, which is sorely needed in this game.

Analysis

This is the feedback loop of exploration in Zelda: Breath of the Wild which makes exploration a rewarding experience.

1. You see something in the distance that looks interesting, and thanks to the climbing and flying mechanic you can be pretty sure you can reach it.
2. While traveling to that destinations, you are likely to also stumble across things which are also interesting, such as Korok seeds.
3. When you do reach your destination, you can be certain that it is in fact interesting.
4. When you complete a tower, which is the central point in each area, you are rewarded with a map and the ability to fast-travel to the top of this tower (from which you can easily glide to other nearby locations), which reduces repetition of already consumed content.
5. Once you are done at the destination, you likely can see other interesting-looking locations in the distance, and the cycle repeats.

How to replicate in tabletop roleplaying games

The following aspects are important in order to be able to replicate this experience in roleplaying games.

Location interconnectedness

Each location should be connected to at least one other location. This can be done in many different ways:

1. A road sign at a crossroads which point to three different towns in different locations.
2. At one location, you could find a treasure map which leads to another location.
3. Letters, notes, or journals found in one location could contain references or even directions to other locations.
4. Location B could simply be visible from point A, such as a town being visible from a mountaintop or from the top of a tall tree.
5. Let's not forget simply having an NPC at location A talking about something enticing at location B.

Random discoverability during travel

While travelling, it should be possible to randomly stumble across interesting locations or events. This can be accomplished either by having hexes pre-populated, or by using random tables to generate content on the fly - this is harder to do and slower, but it requires less preparation on the part of the game master.

A middle ground between pre-populated hexes and content generation on the fly at the table is to just pre-generate a small number of locations without pre-placing them in a hex. Instead, once the dice determine that players have discovered something interesting, pull (or select randomly) from your pool of pre-generated but hitherto unused locations, and place them wherever the players are. You might also want to make sure this type of location fits here - optionally, you could have separate pools for "forest locations", "mountain locations", etc. Just make sure to make a note of where you placed the location afterwards for consistency's sake, so that you can keep your world consistent in future sessions. This can also make the sessions more rewarding for the game master, as they are in a sense "discovering" what lies where along with their players during play.

Locations should be interesting

As a designer you can do everything else right, but if the locations you reach are uninteresting, then it was all for naught. There are different kinds of rewards that you can provide players with for finding a location:

1. Combat. Lots of players enjoy finding a bandit camp that they can clear of bandits.
2. Information. By finding a location, players can learn of the existance of other interesting locations through maps or other means as discussed above, or they can learn of the plots of their enemies.
3. Lore. Some players straight up enjoy reading lore about your world.
4. Allies. Coming across a hidden camp of outcasts in the forest gives players a chance to forge new alliances, and can also provide new plot hooks.
5. Loot. Players always enjoy finding a hidden cache of loot in the form of a chest, or perhaps as the belongings of a dead adventurer.
6. Experience. You could also simply award players with experience points for finding a new location, to encourage exploration.

Consider allowing fast travel through already explored locations

To avoid the tedium of repeatedly travelling through the same areas over and over, consider allowing fast travel through and to areas that have already been explored.

1. A horse-and-carriage network can allow travel between towns that have already been explored.
2. Fast travel via gryphons as in World of Warcraft is also a possibility.
3. Good old teleportation also works. Perhaps you need to have seen the destination first in order to be able to properly visualize it, and that's why you can't teleport to locations you haven't seen before. Perhaps teleportation is only available between specific designated teleportation circles, which prevents players from bypassing problems by teleporting past them.

It's the obvious question, isn't it? Everybody knows that roleplaying games are a group exercise. The fun comes from the interaction with other participants as well as untangling the plots of the Game Master. That's not something you can do alone - you can't have interpersonal interactions alone, and you can't have both players and a Game Master if it's just you. So why on earth would you even try to engage in an inherently group-oriented activity on your own?

I'm glad you asked; let me explain.

What are the most common problems of group roleplaying games?

• Scheduling issues is THE number one killer of roleplaying campaigns. It's hard to find a regular time slot that everyone can commit to. This is not a problem when you play alone. When you play alone, you don't need a regular time slot - you just play whenever you want.

• Interpersonal drama in group games is a common complaint. It is not uncommon for people to disagree and become upset around the game table. This is not a problem when you play alone. It's just you - no drama.

• The other players in the group don't want to play the same game as I. There are so many games to choose from, and not everybody prefers to play the same game. This is not a problem when you play alone. When you're alone, you get to play whatever game you want without compromise or judgement.

• Even if all players in the group agree on what kind of game they want to play, they still probably won't all want to play the exact same type of campaign. Even if you all agree that, say, Pathfinder is the game you want to play, you still have to agree on what kind of Pathfinder campaign you want. Hack'n'slash? Mystery? Horror? Heist? This is not a problem when you play alone. Just pick whatever strikes your fancy and go.

• Not everybody can find a group to play with in the first place. As with all hobbies, it can be hard to find others with which to share it. This is not a problem when you play alone. The only person you need is yourself.

Okay, so it might be a good idea to play alone, but how?

When you play alone, or solo as it's often called, you will be both the sole player as well as the Game Master. But the role of the Game Master is to prepare an adventure for the players in advance, so if you're both a player and the Game Master, isn't that a bit like reading a book you've written yourself? Where's the suspense, the sense of discovery, and plot twists if you know everything in advance?

The beauty of it is, you don't need to prepare the campaign in advance. You create the campaign on the fly as you play. There are three types of tools you can use to make this possible:

1. First, there are solo Game Master tools which provide systems and inspiration for creating sessions and entire campaigns on the fly. The most well-known of these is the Mythic Game Master Emulator which is an entire book on the subject, but there are also simpler (and free) alternatives such as the One Page Solo Engine.

2. Second, as always in roleplaying games, you need dice to provide the element of randomness.

3. Third, you need your imagination. Your imagination is the glue which you apply to the prompts you get from using your dice with the solo Game Master tools to construct an interesting adventure.

I'm having a hard time understanding how this works, can you give me an example?

Certainly. This won't explain the process in detail, but at least it'll give you some idea - your solo Game Master tool of choice will provide more detail and clear instructions.

Let's say you've picked your game, your genre, and you've rolled up your character. Now you need something for this character to do - you need a quest to undertake. So you turn to your solo Game Master tool of choice for help. Such tools often provide random tables with "Action" and "Subject" or similar headings. Rolling on the Action table, you get the result "Investigate" and the Subject table gives you "Enemies".

Okay, "Investigate Enemies". This is where your imagination comes in. As the Game Master, you now have to come up with who these enemies are. If you need further inspiration, lots of solo Game Master tools provide tables for this too. Using such tables to get more information on who these enemies might be, let's say you get the words "Clandestine" and "Alliance". Oh! In other words, your enemies is a clandestine alliance - a secret society, perhaps? A cult? You decide!

Then you start playing. You make your way towards the first plot point, and you realize this is where you as a player would need to ask the Game Master something. For example, "do I manage to make my way through the dark alley without getting ambushed?" Then you can turn to what's known as a "Yes/No Oracle" in your solo Game Master tool. A simple d6-based one works as follow:

1. Yes, and it's even better than you think
2. Yes
3. Yes, but it's not as good as you think
4. No, but it's not as bad as you think
5. No
6. No, and it's worse than you think

This is a simple way of rolling a six-sided die and getting a somewhat nuanced yes or no answer - again, use your imagination to interpret the results.

Other useful tools

Apart from the solo Game Master tools, there are other tools that are not necessarily only for solo play but are especially useful for solo players.

• NPC generators can be used to generate interesting NPCs to interact with.

• Random dungeon generators are also popular.

• Random settlements generators can be used to generate anything from a hamlet to a full city.

• Random point of interest generators can generate non-settlement locations.

• Random wilderness generators are great if you want to make travel interesting or if you're simply playing a hexcrawl.

Additionally, let me tell you an open secret - making your own generators is fun, and not really that hard.

Downsides to playing solo

• When a group works well, it can be incredibly rewarding. That's not something you can really replicate when playing alone.
• Playing on your own is slower-paced. Since you're not preparing sessions in advance, if your question happens to take you to a dungeon, you'll probably have to generate it on the fly which will slow your game down.
• Sometimes you just want to be a player and sit down and play without having to generate any content on your own. In that case, a group game is probably best.

Conclusion

• Sometimes, playing alone is the best - or the only - choice available.
• Rolling on random tables in solo Game Master tools can give you inspiration which you use your imagination to interpret on the fly at the table. This makes it possible to be surprised at what comes up at the table without having to involve anyone else.
• There are lots of tools available to enhance your game, and it's not that complicated to make your own if you want.

Obviously, both group and solo play have their place. We all have to find the style that best suit our needs.