Tag Archives: Fluff/Inspiration

RPGs

SKILL LEVEL OF THE CITY WATCH/TOWN GUARD

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Here are some ideas for how to determine the skill and effectiveness of the city watch.

Skill Level:  d6
1.) Incompetent – Due to being corrupt, apathy, ignorance, stupidity, asshole, drunkard, or combination.
2.) Raw Recruit – Means well but doesn’t know all the tricks. Makes mistakes out of ignorance and inexperience.
3.) Experienced – Doing this a while and had seen a few things. – Depending on level of motivation knows how to avoid reprimands and extra duty.
4.) Veteran/Seasoned – Doing this a while and had seen a few things.
5.) Skilled – Shows leadership potential, energy, drive, thoroughness.
6.) Leadership Quality – Waiting for an opening, or just good at the job and doesn’t want the added responsibility.

NOTE: A bribed in the pocket guard may not be incompetent. They may be very skilled and do their job correctly, accurately, and conscientiously, except for the one/group who owns them. They could be owned by threat of force rather than being bribed or a willing member of the network. Being under a charm or suggestion is also a possibility.

Training:
Similar to skill level is training. Are there regular drills? Are the guards familiar with the laws and do they apply them correctly?

Performance:
The way the guard goes about performing their duties will have a big effect. Are they too lenient or brutal in their enforcement? Guards that are too lenient, too strict, or too brutal will all have a negative impact on how the citizens view them.

Condition of the guard: d8
-Individually, at a particular post or roving squad, or the entire town. A post might be a specific gate, tower, neighborhood, etc. Festivals, celebrations, and quality of leadership can also affect this.
1.) -Alert – paying attention
2.) -Unobservant
3.) -High Alert – Monster incursions, assassination attempt, etc.
4.) -Nervous
5.) -Apathetic
6.) -Drunk
7.) -Drugged
8.) -Incapacitated

Motivation: d10
1. ) -Eh, it’s a job
2.) -I love my job and want to be the best!
3.) -Bribed – Will only go along as long as they don’t get caught.
4. ) -On the Take – Irregular payments from an individual or an organization.
5.) -Blackmailed – Item or loved one at risk. Remove the risk and the motivation changes.
6.) -Charmed – May have been charmed by an adventure party or the local wizard. Perhaps a town with a powerful wizard in charge has charmed all the town guard to make sure he isn’t interrupted, root out the thieve’s guild, etc. What happens when they make their save? Is their charm a potion in their food or drink?
7.) -I live here and so does my family. My job keeps them safe.
8.) -Conscript – I don’t want to be here, but I have too.
9.) -Bully – Likes telling others what to do.
10.) -Plant/Fake – Group of NPC’s have impersonated/replaced/joined the guard for some unknown reason. Monsters seeking to take the city, rob a tomb or temple, take out rivals, doppelganger, demon, etc. Will fit in so as not to be noticed. May not be able to withstand magical scrutiny, a la known alignment, detect magic, true seeing, etc.

Morale:
As usual, the level of pay, training, and rewards from management will affect morale. A detail on the gate to the rich part of town would most likely have a better morale and be more likely to do a good job. A small town in the midst of a drought, famine, monster incursion, military invasion, or other economic downturn might have guards that feel helpless and who won’t stand and fight. In addition to the backstory developed by the DM, the events unleashed on the campaign by the players could have far reaching and unintended consequences.

Strictness – The Law/Chaos scale is helpful to a degree. This can vary from a simple, stay out of trouble and don’t get the town leadership’s attention. The extreme would be any law broken must be attended to and the appropriate judgement and penalties distributed. Would a bar fight get you run out of town or locked up for a period of time? What if you got in a fight with a rival? Would it result in a price on your head? Are the town guard law enforcement officers looking for sources of revenue through fines for infractions of a huge legal code, or keepers of the peace looking to keep thing quiet?

Location – A border town whether it is between kingdoms, or the last bastion of civilization in the area will tend to have guards that are more alert. If not, the town is easy pickings for invasion/infestation. However, border towns can still have a poor quality of guard overall. Cities on the interior of a kingdom might have lax guards who have grown soft and are not up to an invasion or monster incursion.

Equipment – The type of weapons and armor and it’s quality will have an effect on the effectiveness and morale of the guard. If all they have is a badge and a nightstick, they won’t be of much use against a fully equipped party. If they all have plate mail, they won’t be up to a foot chase against unarmored miscreants.

If the gates, portcullis, battlements and walls are in disrepair, it will have some effect on morale. If there was an illusionist in power, a permanent illusion to hide the true condition of the walls could make a big difference to morale. As long as guards weren’t falling through holes, or walls were collapsing, it would work, Mysteriously injured and missing guards would have the opposite effect.

Quality of Officers – This will be similar to the skill level. A new lieutenant due to a political appointment, might want to do a good job but be incompetent from inexperience. Or they might just view it as an opportunity to order people around, and not really get the nature of the duties and responsibilities of the guard. Internal politics of a town or city could influence this also.

If officers are bullies and unresponsive to the needs of their men, this will impact morale. If there is cause for fighting on the walls, officers could have the equivalent of being fragged. For example, the men could fall back in fighting and let them fall, or push them over the wall.

Group Dynamic – Is the guard as an organization honorable and do their best to keep order and keep the town safe? If there is corruption, is it limited to a single gate or neighborhood, or is the whole guard corrupt? Does the corruption go all the way to the top? For example, if the thieve’s guild owns the town guard, do they also control the leadership? Is the leader of the town secretly the guild master of the thieve’s guild?

Popular Sentiment – How does the town view the guard? Are they corrupt, but keep the peace and keep the town safe? Or are they corrupt and a burden to the town? Is the leader/government of the town in on the corruption? Do any problems that get out of hand draw the attention of the nearest feudal overlord, or the king?

Other Groups – In addition the religious institutions, merchants,  guilds, farmers, and others with a stake in how the guards perform their duties. Will the leader of the main temple get involved? Will the mages guild decide to step in for the good of the town, or their own motivations?

How do all the motivations and goals of all the various groups that make up the town or city mesh? If all the groups in a town are more concerned with their own group’s agenda rather than the safety of the place, the guard may not be the best. If most of the groups understand that if the town is not safe that it doesn’t matter what their group’s goal is, then the guard is likely to be better funded and trained.

If town is only a placeholder of civilization to rest and resupply between forays into the local dungeon, then you may not need much detail on the guard. However, if you plan on a lot of city/town adventures, you will want to think about how all of these things inform what kind of guards the PC’s will encounter.

 

RPGs

Other Side Effects/Consequences of Heat and Cold Based Spells

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The idea came to me the other day, when someone is hit with a Cone of Cold spell, there is a sudden temperature drop, and they take damage if they are in the area of affect. Even if they save they take half damage.

The thing is such a sudden temperature drop that causes such drastic cold would cause some degree of frost bite and at the very least hypothermia. With hypothermia, the blood pulls away from the extremities, thus people with severe frostbite having black fingers and losing them. Hypothermia causes those affected to become tired. On the long march back from Moscow of  Napoleon’s army, many soldiers just laid down and died because they didn’t have the energy to keep marching. Thus the efforts of others in the same situation to keep everyone awake, and for rescuers to do the same.

Perhaps a severe temperature drop might be a welcome thing in a hot and humid jungle, but on a cold day, a mountain top, or the depths of winter, not so much.

Similarly with heat and fire based spells, in addition to some degree and portion of the body affected with burns, there could also be heat stroke or heat exhaustion. Heat might be welcome on the frozen tundra, but the steamy jungles or arid scorching desert would be most unhelpful.

Electrical attacks would have effects similar to those hit with high voltage. Lightning bolts should cause injuries on par with being struck by lightning. People hit by lightning often have toes blown off.

I don’t think there needs to be a special table or other additional mechanic or rule for this. this is just something to keep in mind to add some flavor when describing the scene.

If a character takes the full brunt of a cone of cold and fails their save, and still live, they should be shivering with cold, fingers, toes, earlobes, and face stinging from the cold. Fingers slow to grasp things. Metal chilled to freezing temperatures is most unpleasant to hold in already cold and bare hands. For example, a thief trying to pick a lock soon after receiving an icy blast might not be up to the task at peak performance right away. I speak of this from personal experience.

Similarly with a fire base spell or attack,and just how sever the burns are, i.e. first, second or third degree; and how much of the person is affected. One can use the Rule of 9’s to explain the percentage of the body affected.

One can add a bit more realism to the game with just some descriptions and throwing a wrench into the plans. Every game I have ever played where a player is hit by a fireball, cone of cold, or lightning bolt, the player runs their character like nothing happened and keeps going. Other than the change in hit points getting their attention and making them more desperate or more cautious, most don’t play it showing that they have a boo boo.

I know how much I jump when I touch an electric fence by mistake, how cranky I get when I get super cold, and how angry I feel when I get bacon grease on the back of my hand. Add in all the appropriate expletives to let the world how miserable those things have made me. Imagine that magnified a hundred or a thousand times.

Perhaps it is something players should keep more in mind when playing characters affected by these things. I’m not saying that one should aim for an Oscar winning performance. If your style of role playing is just descriptive of what your character is doing, you can still add this bit of flair to it. I know that I am still able to see the action a players describes in my head. That is, I see the scene, be it a room in a dungeon, bar at a tavern, or along a trail, I have an image in my head of what the GM describes and place the characters in the scene. Just like with reading a book, I can make my own “movie” out of it.

Some memorable event in the later re-telling, we all see it and laugh or console each other with each re-telling of our favorite actions from a particularly memorable session. We can bore to tears anyone who wasn’t there. But when even a mere mention with the right group can take everyone back to that moment.

If your thief is suddenly frosted by a cone of cold and says something that fits the situation perfectly, whether serious or humorous, the rest of the party, and the DM will remember it.

RPGs

General Tables

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Why do we get the ideas that we do? The other day, it came to me. I wondered, why don’t we have a collection of generic tables for the most common attributes of persons, places, and things? With the addition of adjectives and verbs, one can use simple tables to build up hints for ideas that are easy to flesh out.

For example:

COLOR (add sub-tables for variations on Red, Blue, and Yellow.)

  • White
  • Black
  • Brown
  • Red
  • Blue
  • Yellow

RAINBOW

  • RED
  • ORANGE
  • YELLOW
  • GREEN
  • BLUE
  • INDIGO
  • VIOLET

SIZE

  • Sub-atomic
  • Atomic
  • Microscopic
  • Miniscule
  • Tiny
  • Small
  • Little
  • Medium/Mid-Sized
  • Big
  • Large
  • Giant
  • Huge
  • Brobdignagian
  • Planatary
  • Galaxy-Wide
  • Universal
  • Infinite

DISTANCE

  • Close
  • Near
  • Here
  • Far
  • Distant

MEASUREMENT

  • Imperial
  • Metic
  • Other
  • Miles
  • Inches
  • Light-years
  • Parsecs

SHAPE

  • Specific
    • Square
    • Circle
    • Triangle
    • Rectangle
    • Rhomboid
    • Pentagon
    • Star
  • General
    • Roundish
    • Ill-defined
    • Non-specific
    • Lump
    • Pile
    • Heap

For a very general noun generator, pick a letter of the alphabet and a noun that starts with that letter. Perhaps categories of nouns, like the biggies, person, place, and thing.

Pick a letter and come up with something that describes a person, place, and thing, adding in a verb (action) and perhaps a description (adjective). For example, ‘S’. Sailor, Sea, Ship. This makes it easy to come up with a simple idea: A sailor sailed his ship upon the sea. So the action is sailing. Easily one can think of pirates, maritime trade, whaling, naval battles of any era, or even space battles.

I think the key is not to limit oneself. You can just as easily use a different letter for each thing. Just go with what works. If you happen to get a rush of ideas, don’t wait, jot them down, and you can have a large collection of ideas ready to flesh out for play.

For a plot, pick a book in your personal library that has a word that starts with that letter, in this case, ‘S’ in the title. I looked quickly and only see one book on my shelves that has an ‘S’ word in the title, and it is actually a periodical, “Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine”, April, 1980. It’s the only one I have. I liked some of the stories in that one, so I kept it. Perhaps I should read them again to get some ideas.

Another book jumped out because I mentioned he possibility of pirates, “Under the Black Flag: The Romance and the Reality of Life Among the Pirates [Aff link].” This is nonfiction, but that doesn’t matter. Truth is stranger than fiction. There are some pirates that are little known today that inspired old movies and before that adventure stories. As I recall, there are some good ideas here. I haven’t read it in a decade.

Instead of reading either of these in their entirety, get the page count. For example, “Under the Black Flag”  has 244 pages before the Appendix with various tables and charts. To keep it simple, just do a d200 roll. That’s a d100 with a control die. Any die will do that has an even number of sides. For example, a d6. 1-3 is low, so add 0, and 4-6 is high, add 100.

A roll of 127 for page 127 gives us: The third page of chapter 7, Torture, Violence, and Marooning. Page 127 picks up mid-story about a leader of a mutiny that was captured, tortured, tried, and executed and his body hung in chains until the bones were picked clean.

I’m not a lawyer, so an adventure involving courtroom drama does not sound exciting to me. However, hiring the PC’s to go capture a mutinous crew and bring them and their ship back for justice sounds interesting.

Every story needs a complication, so an obvious one is a rival band going after the mutineers. Further complicated that the mutineers were justified in their mutiny and are actually freedom fighters out to overthrow the evil overlord.

If you want an original idea, try something like this. With an outline for a story like that, you can easily flesh out the band of mutineers, the other adventurers, perhaps loyal flunkies of the evil overlord who are also out to get the party. Throw in some random encounters, maybe roll on the ocean random encounter table to get a unique crew member, like a sahuagin sailor, or some large sea creature who pulls a ship.

Place the action in your world, and figure our how different ocean going peoples, nations, and real pirates figure into the mix.

Use the general/generic tables for colors, shapes, sizes, descriptions, etc. the AD&D Dungeon Master’s Guide has great tables for ambiance of dungeons and other ideas. Many other OSR rules have similar tables, like OSRIC, ACKS, Swords & Wizardry, plus many sites online.

Another option might be to pick an RPG blog at random from your blogroll, then go to that blog and look at its blogroll and pick one table at random from each of those blogs that has a collection of tables. Take the results of all these tables and see what you get.

I’m sure I have heard the inspiration for using a random page in a book in other places, but most recently, it was from +Adam Muszkiewicz at Dispatches from Kickassistan, with this article. Actually, he mentioned that during the sessions of DCC he ran at Marmalade Dog 20, back in January. He just recently wrote it up.

I like input and suggestions. Are there other general/generic tables that can be added to the mix? Other creative ways to take random elements to get an idea for an adventure? The main idea is not to require too much time to get a solid idea that you can have ready to play with minimal prep time.

RPGs

Cell Phones – Handheld Communicator And Computer

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I was struggling with a topic for an article, and was about to give up and end my streak of a post a day back to the end of January. Then I had a message indicator on my cellphone, and it hit me.

We have such small devices that handle all forms of communication: two way (calls, texting, email), and one way (received: emailed receipts, bill reminders, entertainment & sent: payments, notes/lists/reminders). Some phones have gone for bigger screens with higher resolutions for better experience, two cameras, motion sensors, GPS, etc.

If one does no have a cell phone in today’s world, good luck finding a pay phone. The only place I see pay phones now are in airports, and they take credit cards.

For a science fiction setting, one can imagine a computer as powerful or more so than today’s desktops, in the palm of your hand. The display will be holographic, so the size of the screen is variable. As dense as memory is getting, what limits will one have on a hand held computer/communicator?

Encyclopedic knowledge will be available, for topics that are in the system. Landing on a backwater or uncharted planet will present a world of unknown factors. Other than being able to check the atmosphere, and scan air, water, and potential food for pathogens/compatibility, how would this device help you?

Is it able to communicate to orbit? Can it make interplanetary calls, or signal ships passing through the system? How does GPS help when there are no GPS sattellites? Is there a star-faring version of GPS and do the general civilian devices have access, or does it require a separate device?

Would a general purpose device be capable of basic first aid, or contain the ability to guide the user in basic first aid, or perhaps something more advanced?

How tough/resilient would such a device be? I dropped a cellphone out of my pocket onto a cast iron floor vent in my house (It was built in 1920.) and it cracked diagonally across the screen. Touch screens don’t work so good, or at all when that happens. How far of a drop would it take to damage it? What water depth can it reach and for how long before it is compromised? What about the vacuum of space? There are also radiation, concussions from explosions, shrapnel from explosions, or projectiles from weapons.

Like today, there would be various levels of such devices, from cheap burners with an older interface. Now, burners tend to have actual buttons, but some small touch screens have appeared. In the future, an old interface might be a touch screen that require physical contact, and not have a holographic screen. They are severely limited in how much you can put on them. These are not as well made and would survive only so many hardships of daily use. How often do you have a player roll to see if their communicator survives a crash or fall, or fight?

Next would be the standard comm-puters that can handle more drops, but have a limit. My youngest son can still manage to crack a cellphone screen in less than a day. I’m glad I’m not responsible for his phone anymore.

Premium devices would be made of sturdier and more expensive stuff. Advertising how long they can stay in vacuum, and how long they can last at 100 meters, or some such.

At the pinnacle would be government/military grade devices that are resistant to a variety of abuses and resistant to cracking, i.e. “black hat hacking”.

How long does the battery last? A day, a week, a month, longer?

Instead of earbuds on a wire, there would be a vibration pad or pads you stick to your head behind your ears. Voice activation and voice recognition would be the norm. Minimal contact with the device would be needed. Placing it in your pocket or a shoulder bag and placing it for use of the holographic display could be the only times one touches such a device.

The device could be so small that the device(s) behind your ear(s) IS the comm-puter. Some societies might advocate implanting the device, especially so the government can keep an eye on you, “to keep you safe”. What if some nefarious organization or person cracks the system and uses it for mind control of the populace?

Take what we know of the current direction of technology and extrapolate it for a futuristic RPG. It gets smaller, more powerful, and more ubiquitous. It could end in nanobots that reside along the optic and auditory nerves and send signals straight to the brain. A display would be limited to the person, but could be shared with others within a certain range.

A fun thought experiment that have given me several more ideas, if I ever get things together for a science fiction campaign, either White Star or Metamorphosis Alpha.

RPGs

Sages And Their Arguments

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Earlier this week, some researchers claim to have identified Phillip of Macedon’s bones, that is, the father of Alexander the Great.

There is some pretty impressive results, but there seems to be a war of opinion between those who say these bones, and another who say those bones.

This gives me two ideas. First, what wounds would adventurers find on the body of a warrior? Would they be the broken skull of the final fight that killed him, or some major wound from which he recovered? In the presence of magic or advanced technology, such massive injuries might not be seen. Where magic is not so plentiful, or technology not so advanced, this gives us a good idea.

Second, if the ruins nearby are of interest to more than one sage or groups of sages, mighty they resort to means other than logic and reason to make their point? I can see one sage hiring players to “take back” something another sage “stole” from him, in order to destroy it, or modify it to strengthen his argument. Perhaps, it might go beyond mere theft to outright murder and destruction.

War of the Sages makes for an interesting historical event, or perhaps and adventure, or even a series of adventures in a campaign. Interesting what might happen when the agents of the sages interfere with the agents of the big bad. Or one of the sages IS the big bad!

I have an interesting and quirky sage in my campaign, but so far, he does not have a “nemesis”. I can see how it might be very interesting for players in my campaign if he had one. At least I would be entertained by their reactions to what might occur.

 

RPGs

READ AN RPG BOOK IN PUBLIC WEEK – 2015 – July 26th – August 1st, 2015

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Just a little reminder that next week starting this Sunday, July 26th through August 1st, is the second of the three annual weeks for Read an RPG Book in Public Week.

This year, I have not managed to read an RPG book in public during an official week, but I have read part of the 5th Edition Player’s Handbook while in my hammock, between two big trees in my front yard. If the weather cooperates, I should be able to manage to actually meet this challenge.

 

RPGs

Adventure Idea/Locale – Isle of Wights

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The way my mind works, I see or read something and it triggers an idea.

A year or two ago, I came up with an idea for an adventure setting/locale/module, The Isle of Wights. Quite obviously appropriated from the Isle of Wight. I haven’t done more than think about this, but it’s on my list of future projects.  If you think about it, use the name of any monster and pair it with Isle, Tower, Pit, or other noun and you have a module name.

Plenty of barrows, tombs, and catacombs would be needed, and shipwreck survivors, or the unwitting making landfall for provisions, would add to the supply of wights.

In addition, who says that the only undead on the island are wights? All many of undead and creeping and slimy things that are at home in a tomb or cemetery would be found there.

As per the AD&D Monster Manual, liches look like wights or mummies, and wraiths resemble wights.

Any adventurers who end up on this island without silver or magic weapons, holy water, and at least one cleric (of sufficiently high level), would not last long. Of course a few powerful wizards would come in handy.

RPGs

New Monster – Felt Golem

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I was trying to come up with an idea for a new monster. I looked next to where the dogs sleep, and saw how much they shed. I made a comment that there was enough hair to knit a couple of new dogs and cats. One dog is “mine” – actually my youngest son’s. The other dog and the cats belong to my oldest son and his girlfriend.

Instead of knitting, I thought of making felt and then filling a felt body with loose hair.

I know that the Mongolian nomads make felt from horse hair for their tents and clothes. Felt can be made of any kind of hair.

Such a golem would be susceptible to fire, but would otherwise have the characteristics of the animal from which it is made. If made from the hair of multiple animals/sources, it would have multiple characteristics.

For example, plant fiber fabric, such as cotton, or linen, also can be felted. Bits of fabric separate when washing. How about a dryer lint golem? It would be made of cotton, and artificial fibers.

If the hair of a dog, a felt golem of larger than normal size could be constructed. Add hit dice and damage capabilities based on your rule set of choice.

Gather the hides from slain animals with fur to make any manner of felt golem.

They would move silently, being made of a soft fabric.

If combined with amber for the eyes, they could have an additional attack similar to shocking grasp, say once per turn.

Can you imagine a woolly mammoth golem with a trampling and goring attack, plus a shock attack?

If attacked with electrical attacks, it would allow them to be re-charged and make an extra shock attack.

That cute life size grizzly teddy bear will rip your arms off!

How about a room full of the things?

Lions, tigers, and bears! Oh yeah!!

How about a hell hound felt golem! The possibilities are endless!

RPGs

The Journey Home

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I traveled home yesterday by car, about 8 hours of driving from south central Illinois to south of Kalamazoo. It was interstate and highway all the way. I took a couple US and state highways for a bit to go around/avoid construction. I got to thinking about a journey of that distance in D&D.

I think it was like 350 miles or so, maybe closer to 400. At ten miles a day, walking would take 40 days! If you have ever walked 10 plus miles in a day you know how sore your feet are, if you are not used to it. If you carry a pack or any gear, you know how tired you are. Imaging doing that all the time.

When characters are walking for miles on end, we need to keep in mind the need for them to stop and rest, to avoid exhaustion. We should also keep in mind that a character with a lower constitution might have trouble staying awake for a watch. Lack of enough food and water can make one weak and more prone to dozing off as the body conserves energy.

I’m not arguing for complicated rules and tables to track this, just keep in mind if there is an encounter while traveling and it happens before they can take their next rest during their daily travel, they might be exhausted sooner. Of course, if they have enough food and water and are not injured, sick, or exhausted for some reason, such as running, they will have a natural resistance to being worn out. However, any characters with a low constitution would be hard pressed to maintain a normal/standard pace.

Age also has an effect. When I was a teenager I used to mow lawns in the high heat and humidity of Missouri summers. I would mow on days it wasn’t really safe to do so, and as long as I drank enough water, I was fine. Now, 30+ years later, I mow my yard and on hot days, I am spent if I don’t take it slow and stop to get plenty of water and a snack to keep me going.

Again I think these don’t need complicated mechanics. Just keep these in mind, for those times it makes sense. If the party has no random encounters and plenty of food and water, and gets enough rest, it won’t be an issue. Just apply the effects if they are short or out of supplies, injured, running for their lives, or short on rest.

RPGs

An Example of Yes

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A couple days ago, I wrote about The Fun Is In Yes! Today, I’ll give an example that shows how invisible this can be to players.

In my face to face campaign with my sons and the girlfriend of my oldest son, they kill creatures and skin them, decapitate them, etc. and then have things made.

For example, due to really bad rolls when they encountered a minotaur returning to its lair, it could not hit them and they killed it. Being a large and impressive monster, they took its head and brought it back to town. They wanted to take it to a taxidermist and have it mounted.

When I created the town, I had generated the different businesses and skills available in town. A taxidermist was not one of them. However, since the town is on the marches between the kingdom and the ancient abandoned city, and serving adventurers is one of its industries, it made sense to have a taxidermist. So I picked a name and decided what part of town the shop was in. They haggled with the owner over a price, and arrange for a time to pick it up.

They go back a few days later, just to check on progress, only to find a crowd gathered around the taxidermist’s shop. It turns out that the taxidermist was charging  to give people a chance to look at this head in progress. All the normal benches and things in the shop were cleared out to focus on this one head and allow as many paying onlookers as possible. This little twist greatly enhanced their enjoyment.

The agreement was to mount the head on something to make it easy to mount on their wagon behind the seat and above the heads of the driver and passenger. This sight alone makes an impression on less powerful foes they encounter. They later added an ogre head to their wagon display, prepared by the same taxidermist.

They fought two giant weasels, who again couldn’t roll to hit, and how their heads and hides are hooded cloaks.

I am sure, if we ever resume play, that they will skin and decapitate more creatures to add to their collection.

The twist of adding an unplanned NPC expert hireling increased the fun for both the players, and me.

There was no good reason not to bring the taxidermist into existence. Had I said, “No”, the mental image of two preserved monstrous heads mounted on a wagon, with a driver and passenger wearing giant weasel cloaks would not exist. That’s part of the fun of the collaborative storytelling that is RPG’s.

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[EDIT: Google is deleting all G+ comments to non-blogger blogs. Below is one of two G+ comments on my blog I want to save. 02/06/2019]

Finding ways to say “yes” is such a great framework for driving not just consequence, but byproduct to either polarize; but strengthen the hilarity! The ability of giving a yes in your example, would give a total acceptance “yes” from the players to segue that taxidermist to become so desperate to continue his fame, that his only recourse is to have the heads of the adventurers who depopulated the region and have moved on…. or at minimum dog the party from a far, exposing their surprise assault on the next monster that can’t hit them. 🙂

Roy Snyder
plus.google.com/u/0/+AlphaGamersRPGMI/about

06/30/2015 at 8:35 pm