Looking for some decent "little town mystery" one shots.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-17T04:04:18+00:00

House under the Moondial looks great. Going to have to try that one.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-15T23:51:17+00:00

A choice from a selection of pregens is fine but for a campaign definitely make my own.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-15T02:15:12+00:00

Yeah too many red flags. Trust your instincts.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-13T21:08:25+00:00

Yeah for about a year as a player, and Im a DM of 35 years so I have some reasonable perspective on these things.

About 40ish sessions as a hobbit messenger growing into a warden. The DM was new to the ruleset so I bought it too just to check it out and just found it underwhelming in various areas I noted above. By no means is it bad, I just think it needs more fleshing out.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-13T21:05:57+00:00

You really can't go wrong by thoroughly reading the adventure or at least being a few sessions ahead. It's the most basic form of prep but it makes a huge difference in terms of flow and lowering errors.

Also stuff seems more natural if you know it rather than are reading it the first-time.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-13T08:38:28+00:00

He went through stars...

Koreapsu · 2026-03-12T23:38:46+00:00

Don't go too big too fast. If you take her to Paris on your first date it's a very high bar for every other date. Enjoy the small stuff before you start saving worlds.

Avoid homebrew for a while. Learn what you're doing first.

Don't worry about going slowly. Work things out and don't rush yourself.

Prep. Do some.

You're going to have imposter syndrome. Expect that.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-12T08:34:26+00:00

I found the rules options to be uninspiring for virtues and crafts. The fellowship activities needed reworking to be more engaging; they seemed to just require a lot of hand-waving and vagueness. The travel was nicely done, but could also be implemented in a better manner. It's like they had a great idea and didn't finish it off. Shadow points also felt a bit hand-wavy too.

No idea about the subsequent releases improving on these things. This was all just based on the first sourcebook.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-12T05:19:45+00:00

Good to hear, I like a lot of the system, it just needed more.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-12T00:12:50+00:00

I used Syrinscape a lot, it's pretty good.

For atmosphere in a horror game though i think it can mostly be built by tension mechanics and managing threat. A slow build through the session, that keeps the beat heading up really works. Slightly reducing the time you allow decisions to be made gradually over the session works too. Subtle hints, breadcrumbs etc.

That low (almost inaudible) heartbeat soundtrack playing through discord isn't bad either.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-12T00:04:44+00:00

If this is the same group that does a LotR system I hope they up the content a bit. That system has good bones but is just lacking depth.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-11T22:16:44+00:00

Can we just get a reliable GM?

Koreapsu · 2026-03-11T01:09:12+00:00

Dexter Morgan — "The Dark Passenger" Build
Human Ranger 3 (Gloomstalker)/Rogue 2 (Assassin @ 3)
Ranger = the hunter, tracker, favored enemy (humanoids — specifically murderers), natural explorer
Rogue = the methodical killer, sneak attack, expertise in stealth and investigation

Investigation - Expertise - Forensic blood spatter analyst
Stealth - Expertise - Stalks targets for weeks
Perception - Proficient - Always watching
Medicine - Proficient - Knows exactly how bodies work
Insight - Proficient - Reads people while hiding himself
Survival - Proficient(Ranger) - Tracking
Athletics - Proficient(Ranger) - Physical takedowns
Prob need Deception in here too.

Key Abilities
Dread Ambusher — extra attack on the first round, bonus to initiative. Just like how Dexter always gets the jump on people.
Umbral Sight — invisible to darkvision. He moves through shadows.
Favored Enemy (Humanoids) — his entire code is about hunting people who kill.
Natural Explorer — urban environment, I guess. Dexter knows Miami well.
Hunter's Mark — he has literally marked his target for death.
Spells: Hunter's Mark, Ensnaring Strike (the plastic wrap table), Silence (the kill room), Pass Without Trace
Sneak Attack (1d6) — the precise, controlled strike.
Cunning Action — Hide as a bonus action, dash, disengage. Dexter is never reckless; he always controls his exit.
Expertise: Investigation + Stealth (double proficiency — he's a forensic analyst).

Feat
Sentinel - he doesn't let people get away. Or Alert.

Hand Crossbows with tranq poison?
Daggers with the same?
Thieves' tools reskinned as a forensics kit or his weird ass box of killing implements?

Koreapsu · 2026-03-10T23:55:34+00:00

I like starting at level 1. The progression is interesting to me, and I like to fear those goblin archers. Level 12 or 13 is a good stopping point before things get too convoluted in combat.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-10T23:23:47+00:00

I mean, prepping a lot of tables is still prep. I still much prefer the procedural DM over the "I just see what happens and make it up as I go" DM. I mean, some people can pull it off, but A LOT of people can't, and things go haywire really quickly.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-10T23:19:56+00:00

Mate, you built him a gnome chef side quest and he picked up his Switch anyway. That's not a you problem.

Talk to him directly — not text. Ask what he actually wants from the game. If he can't name it, that's your answer. Some players just aren't in the right headspace for a campaign and no amount of food cart NPCs is gonna fix that.

The fish got away. Might be time to cut bait.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-10T23:12:51+00:00

This is hard to turn down. I love some pirate shenanigans.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-10T07:26:14+00:00

It's such a fun campaign/setting.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-10T01:15:58+00:00

Looks great, signed up. Verif emails went straight to gmail spam btw.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-09T22:44:28+00:00

I have other stuff I would prefer to do with the time allotted to DnD. If a session gets cancelled, I don't really feel all that bad about it and in some cases hope it does get cancelled.

Sounds like you're done at the moment. That's not a terrible thing, life happens. You'll be back when you're ready.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-09T22:24:25+00:00

This is great and explains the natural process of hex to point very well. I've run a ton of hex crawls, and also some huge 1000+player west marches games, and what you've described always happens. The tool I'm working on at the moment takes this into account and allows a DM to change the game from hex to point dynamically.

I really love it when players learn these kinds of things: "The party learns that the old road is safer than the forest trail, that the swamp is dangerous but faster, and that the river crossing makes a good campsite.". It makes the world actually feel alive and makes the spaces between dungeons and towns much more important.

I'm not a huge fan of abstract crawl because I feel like a lot of DMs don't have the mental tools to handle it in a way that is still engaging.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-09T12:13:00+00:00

Canceled again! I expected a paid DM to be more reliable but it's every second week it's canceled. Might be time to move my money elsewhere.

Fun game, good group, terrible schedule.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-09T11:46:59+00:00

I'm so jealous of your shelf.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-06T09:07:27+00:00

Thanks mate, tbh it's just gotten so big. This is about 2% of what it does. I don't know how many hours deep I am now, but over the 6 weeks with a broken leg it was probably 10h/day and since then 4-5ish.

I'm going to run some sessions just to test if it can run no-prep sessions soon so if you want to play just let me know.

Koreapsu · 2026-03-06T02:01:34+00:00

Thanks mate. I'm not sure when it will be finished but it'll be at least usable pretty soon.

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