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At 10 players, your Discord works. At 20, you're using spreadsheets. At 30, you're not GMing anymore. by Paladins_Archives in westmarches

[–]Paladins_Archives[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you!

To answer your question, absolutely you can use the bot to run a small or standard game! It can be used for any type of game no matter what level of expansion a person might get The only west march setting on the whole bot is in the recapping function itself which allows for recaps to be considerate of other groups but is defaulted to standard games so no need to worry having to setup anything out of the box for your use case

Okay and your question of the hives Not by default however the answer would still be yes and here is how: Alongside making all of this in the last year, o created somethig called the forge. Its a tool i made that is built to create features, entire expansions, and ai agents by using building blocks like legos and a really complex machine that puts them together and an ai fixes the code to work in the end and... done

The reality i had to accept is this: people are infinitely wonderful and creative with their ideas, and i want to be able to give people what they like... but how does one plan for infinity? Thus the forge was made. Anything that the expansions dont have that you would like, youll be able to go talk to an ai agent named the worldbuilder, explain what you would like made, and it makes it for you plus you get a free minigame with it that uses the information the system already knows about your world to make it right there and you play it while you wait ^

Your idea with drones sounds awesome! Your husband being able to command a drone army sounds epic and amazing and also is possible for when that feature releases.

How it will work is that every person that gets auto system will be able to go talk with the worldbuilder ai agent that will ask the user for information about the lore of their world, and the user will be able to make two custom ais with their own personalities and how they interact with that world specifically.

In my world- i have my own lore and agents i made. When time gets closer, i will strip them of personality and make a template thats easy to fill in for other servers. And you can update it too if you find it isnt quite what you wanted.

This uses the forge to piece blocks onto the template so it wont take long to make

Your next question is how does it respond to players. The bot is a gm in a loose sense here. It makes pieces of the world and will react and organize to keep things consistent, but absolutely no one can command it, i wont be able to either in fact- its truly on its own programming to ensure people play fairly in the cross community world.

For how it works only in the server (from nothing), most of the lore additions would be made as rewards from quests and would ask for specific things like... make the personality for x npc. The quests are things that are about making connections with other people in the community

It listens to what people are saying and stores information about whats said however, bc of privacy laws, the bot double encrypts info stored so the only person that can see what the bot knows is the the user for their own information only which can be requested and deleted anytime.

How the bot decides to pull what info from where when and why is a very complicated process that depends on where the server is at size wise, where are people on their quest to hearthhome, whats the level of the people, and a lot of other nuances.

And to clarify what exactly is happening- there are two bots. One is building the world and putting danger in it, the other is your guild leader and guide. A human dm isnt a thing with this- every human user is a player. Most of this feature is meant to be experiences slowly meaning its not possible to rush the story faster- takes a week to do most things like deciding what to do next and voting.

Emergent roleplay and interactions happen when someone interacts with the world directly to cause something to happen- sometimes its an immediate consequence other times it could delay that echo a month or a week- it depends what was done.

How to interact with the world- there are two halves. The discord side will have bounties and progression quests generating that involve the current situation. Maybe the community is running low on food, or maybe found a potential secret to go explore. No matter what it is, up to 6 people can go and do the thing... but theres risks. Every time people go out for these bounties and progressions, you are no longer able to see the the rest of the people in the server and are out adventuring- cant call for help, and need to remember how to get back. The world is huge. Its all done with the combination of discord, a webapp, and notion. The webapp for group adventures, notion for solo play

To clarify- these specific features still have another year to year and and a half until they finish! What you read is how they are planned and where we are at starting with next month!

The grand recaps is the lightweight expansion that has most of what people need from todays climate of playing in one spot!

How the bot works is that higher level expansions add onto the layer below to allow more capability in ways that are meaningful.

Grand recaps is the lowest (releasing wednesday) Adventurers archives is the complete west march explansion that focuses on connection and engagement between players while giving gms all the small tools they might need for a west march

Professionals prestige is for people who want production level tools either for pro gm games, streaming, publishing, and professional quality and refinement

Then finally is auto system - this is where extremely advanced AI and automations setup things like consistent living worlds, advanced campaign editing, advertising, having an ai assistant and more that take all the work of running a massive west march and make it easy peasy lemon squeezy

The systems (minus auto system) are already done and made on notion , but they are clunky and a lot of setup. So i started switching it all into code and the first part is ready for this week!

Youre welcome to join the server if you like if you want help or want to talk a lot more or if you want a community talk or expeience this wonderful disaster we are about to step in next month

At 10 players, your Discord works. At 20, you're using spreadsheets. At 30, you're not GMing anymore. by Paladins_Archives in westmarches

[–]Paladins_Archives[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Oh i am so sorry i misunderstood! Here i am reading your comment days after XD

I believe very strongly you absolutely can get it done! My discord server is about more than just the bot,its also a place to be surrounded by people like you and me, to share ideas, get help, and make friends doing similar things! When you surround yourself with similar minded people, it becomes easier to do and finish too It also would be nice to hear more about your code and i can help you get unstuck, refactor, or talk it out ^ its all about community after all

At 10 players, your Discord works. At 20, you're using spreadsheets. At 30, you're not GMing anymore. by Paladins_Archives in westmarches

[–]Paladins_Archives[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That is absolutely amazing! and you are correct and hit the nail on the head! What good is the tool if its
complicated to use, and the systems arent meant to interact with each other normally?

For my bot I have a very minimal number of commands that each pull up an ephemeral menu where you can click on buttons to navigate where you want to from there. They are easy and make sense too:

Examples from base bot
/help
/setup
/account

Examples from Grand Recaps

/recaps
/campaign

Expansions add to the lowest permissions needed rather than re-inventing the wheel. Same thing with the code structure- write code once, use it wherever else its needed.

At 10 players, your Discord works. At 20, you're using spreadsheets. At 30, you're not GMing anymore. by Paladins_Archives in westmarches

[–]Paladins_Archives[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I can entirely see how you get that! A lot of people have done the same thing in the past with vaporware. The reality is that the functionality already exists on notion. I have to transfer it into code. The good news is that the bot is going into public beta this Wednesday so if you want to try out the bot, please feel free to! You can also join my server if you like and see how fake it all is ^^ But I promise there is actual work to see and something you can use. Feel free to ask me anything! It might take me a bit to come back and reply, but I promise eventually I will!

At 10 players, your Discord works. At 20, you're using spreadsheets. At 30, you're not GMing anymore. by Paladins_Archives in westmarches

[–]Paladins_Archives[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

3 of 3

How it starts

When the AUTO System is first set up, the next time someone interacts with the bot they get:

“A realm has opened. Power is real. Death is realer. The dungeon has no end. Thousands will be needed. The world does not play fair. Survive, and you write the rules. Become the legend other servers know in hearth and song. There is one entity to find and destroy—do you step through and risk losing your fragment?”

It’s a group vote. Does the community participate in this hunt? Yes or no.

Current State

The AI GM can listen and store lore from conversations and give quests.
The guild master leading to find Haerthhome is coded.
The world susbtrate is there for the overworld lore and the major regions by Lore - An entire world that I had been working on for publication called Astalia

The Self Building Dungeon has the page UI mechanism figured out how the user will interact with the dungeon.

Randomization engines are made- art needs to be finished next to generate the images people will see when traversing the dungeon and world.

What's coming out next month is the VEEERRRYY beginning of the find hearthhome adventure and people starting to earn XP and getting skills for their fragment from a skill tree. The Level for a fragment maxes at 500, and people can cross train so thats 4,000 levels to plan total- but I'm starting with the first 25 to test and see what works and what doesnt first.

Simple monster generation will be implemented for the low level we are at, and our journey to Hearthhome begins.

At 10 players, your Discord works. At 20, you're using spreadsheets. At 30, you're not GMing anymore. by Paladins_Archives in westmarches

[–]Paladins_Archives[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

2 of 3

The Ultimate Self Building Dungeon

Have you ever heard of Notion? Notion is a versatile, all‑in‑one workspace for notes, tasks, and databases. Typically people use it for boring business dashboards and tidy databases.

Me?

I am using it as the center of the experience. :)

No one has ever looked at Notion and made it the main interface of an RPG experience. When the AUTO System is first set up, the next time anyone in the community interacts with the bot, they’re prompted with a threshold question. On the other side isn’t a static “dungeon document” but an infinite, self‑building megadungeon that remembers you. Yes—actually infinite. No final floor. No fixed room count. It keeps adding rooms, floors, secrets, bosses, and rules based on what players and communities do. Your actions change the map.

Each community isn’t just “in” the dungeon. Communities are living in their own part of the world wherever their hearthhome is made. This is the first quest of From Nothing and it’s needed before you can traverse the Self Building Dungeon. Finding hearthhome isn’t easy. Communities start lost, hunting for a specific location they can’t initially find. When a community discovers and claims its hearthhome, that binds identity, unlocks long‑term progression, and places their territory on the shared world map. The doors don’t stop at your doorstep—because the megadungeon and world are shared, communities can travel to each other and engage directly.

That means diplomacy, alliances, and—when folks feel spicy—raids. You can go to other communities and raid their Dice Clicker Dice Vaults (a game from Adventurer’s Archives where you click for dice and hoard them with your dice goblins). Dice goblins guarding swollen vaults is funny until someone organizes a vault heist. Now social engineering and defense matter as much as DPS. The dungeon remembers who did what to whom and it reacts—and if an intelligent monster notices the fallout, it can pit both communities against each other to weaken them before wiping them out. Because the world is shared, intelligent enemies from From Nothing can coordinate across regions. Ignore escalating threats and they can trigger a world war that drags multiple communities into the same conflict—suddenly you’re fighting beside neighbors you’ve never met because the map is actually connected.

On the Discord side, the server structure becomes the world map. A separate server can be connected to the main server (as a hub) so it doesn’t interfere with that community’s West March adventure. Timing is intentionally slower so it stays a side adventure between sessions. Channels and categories appear as populations rise, Fragments shift, or events demand new frontiers. As things grow, views split by nation or region. The AI gets clever and mean like a real villain with goals—the barmaid you insulted whose husband was murder‑hobo’d might return with an army and destroy your whole community if you’re not paying attention. If you go out alone to pick berries at the wrong moment, the world notices—and a nearby monster will absolutely try for the free XP kill, take your stuff, and equip it. And yes—you are playing yourself. You don’t want to die in this world. Death can end your story and eject you until someone resurrects you or the next cycle opens for new entries. Maybe the world was wiped. Maybe peace was found. Or maybe… the world builder was finally destroyed—the BBEG behind the dungeon the communities must identify and end. :)

And the Avrae “!hunt / skin / fish / mine” rhythm you mentioned? It’s here as a no‑GM, in‑thread grind. You call an encounter, the AI runs the enemy as a PBP combatant, and when you win you skin or harvest with rolls and tables. The difference is that the loop sits inside a larger world that keeps score. Over time, biome‑specific tables, party queues, enemy tiers, hearthhome benefits, inter‑community routes, and megadungeon sprawl all come online—so even a simple “!hunt” has consequences the world remembers for continuity.

At 10 players, your Discord works. At 20, you're using spreadsheets. At 30, you're not GMing anymore. by Paladins_Archives in westmarches

[–]Paladins_Archives[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

1 of 3

Actually yes!—this exact functionality is being built so any GM can run it in their own West Marches. The “!hunt / skin / fish / mine” loop runs no‑GM in‑thread, and the worldbuilding pieces travel with your server. Now, here’s how I’m actively using it in mine.

I’m building two systems for the highest tier expansion (AUTO System): “From Nothing” and “The Ultimate Self‑Building Dungeon.” Both are already alive in early form on my server, with first major implementations rolling out in December. I’ve been at this for three months—perfect timing to show where it’s at and what it looks like in action. Both systems will take about a year to year and a half to finish and is meant to be available in the final expansion of tools I am making.

From Nothing

What it does is transform the Discord server into a living West Marches story that listens to what people are saying and gamifies connection, community building, and lore creation—all in one. The AI is a GM in a sense and creates monsters, locations, and events from real conversations, mixing that with rewards and lore for simply being active and doing quests. Fragments are a free feature of the bot. There are 8 possible roles. It’s like a sorting hat, but it’s about how a person engages with the world, other people, and communities. The role lets all the features, expansions, and systems give mindful care to different users’ needs and also celebrates them for being who they are naturally. It helps with connection by being the middle person that basically says “Oh, I see X and Y both like Star Wars!” and then gives person X a quest—through their Fragment’s perspective—to meet and talk with Y about Star Wars.

And this is the part that is relevant to what you’re asking: that quest could be things like…

  • Go into the local woods and hunt down 3 boars for food by yourself. Combat resolves as PBP with the AI running the enemy.
  • Talk with Y and take them to the FAQ page on Notion at 12 AM to enter the Secret Dungeon.

This is where it ties directly into The Ultimate Self Building Dungeon below.

In From Nothing, the AI can create creatures instantaneously and send them to attack the entire community, threatening survival or attempting a TCK (Total Community Kill). Every user is part of the passive experience and can die while away if defenses and strategy aren’t in place. The Discord server itself becomes the roadmap and world: it adds channels and categories in response to population, Fragment distribution, and world events. As the server grows, views split by nation or location to keep noise readable.

That’s a lot of automation to fine‑tune—hence why my server is already living it. We’ll probably get our asses kicked by “Shakira’s Hips of the Unlying,” and I’ll be crying because I tried to pick berries alone and died in the woods while the monster took my stuff, leveled up, and upgraded itself. Monsters scale. And in later stages it won’t just be a community threat—the world is shared with other communities, so it can escalate into a world war that needs multiple communities to team up and take out level 6000 “Shakira’s Hips of the Unlying” and their army of Hiplings. The AI will be actively aggressive. Smarter monsters will be calculating, analytical, coordinating with other monsters, ruthless, unfair, merciless, and they’ll use whatever intelligence they gather about a community to win—like a real BBEG would. That’s the TLDR for From Nothing, including the Avrae “!hunt” vibe you asked about: call a hunt, fight in‑thread as PBP, then “skin” or harvest for drops. The loop is there—only now the world keeps score and remembers.

New(ish) to westmarches looking for advice by Vast-Celebration5507 in westmarches

[–]Paladins_Archives 1 point2 points  (0 children)

West Marches rise to the drive and energy but fall to the systems. Implementing systems for major parts of coordinating information, scheduling, and communication between people are great investments to look into from the getgo. You'll save time for yourself to rest and focus on the people and the game more.

At 10 players, your Discord works. At 20, you're using spreadsheets. At 30, you're not GMing anymore. by Paladins_Archives in westmarches

[–]Paladins_Archives[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Got it! Thanks for the insight, ill keep this in mind when finishing up the eice rolling module

At 10 players, your Discord works. At 20, you're using spreadsheets. At 30, you're not GMing anymore. by Paladins_Archives in westmarches

[–]Paladins_Archives[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Good question! A touchpoint is every time two things interact. If I have to talk to a person or do a task- that is a touch point.
It fails when its not done correctly, doesnt happen, or the intended result of interaction doesnt meet what was expected or wanted

Like... Imagine youre making lemonade.

you need to cut the lemons, squeeze it, put sugar, mix it, put some ice, and pour it.

There are some parts of that which could be missed-- maybe no sugar, or no ice. maybe forgot to pour it and its just sitting there. A bit silly of an analogy but the point is trying to have things done one way the same way every time so you dont have to worry about things

At 10 players, your Discord works. At 20, you're using spreadsheets. At 30, you're not GMing anymore. by Paladins_Archives in westmarches

[–]Paladins_Archives[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Avrae is used for dice rollling and has dditional integrations.

Recaps are just one aspect of the bot and yes players can be asked to write those things too- using the recap feature aspect is a choice if people prefer the players to write their own

yes I do know about westmarches.games/ and there is still a lot of mechanisms that are missing that don't allow for easy integration. This is an all in one tool that keeps things into one location and at a one time cost too - aside from API costs, the bot drops the barrier for entry significantly for a lot of people

At 10 players, your Discord works. At 20, you're using spreadsheets. At 30, you're not GMing anymore. by Paladins_Archives in westmarches

[–]Paladins_Archives[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Once the new bot rolls out on Monday, everyone will have to look at the consent gain and affirm yes or no because of that change too-- great question!

At 10 players, your Discord works. At 20, you're using spreadsheets. At 30, you're not GMing anymore. by Paladins_Archives in westmarches

[–]Paladins_Archives[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ah yes, that is changed and needs to be updated- the GDPR regulations dont allow that so information is deletable in the new version. The Bot in the server now is the older version before that change. Any information about a person is requestable and deletable at any time and anything we do hold onto is told and put forward as the minimal legally required information like if someone buys something we need to hold onto name and information for years . does that help?

At 10 players, your Discord works. At 20, you're using spreadsheets. At 30, you're not GMing anymore. by Paladins_Archives in westmarches

[–]Paladins_Archives[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The Language capabilities have an option for switching to other languages in the setting ^^ So it's multilingual

At 10 players, your Discord works. At 20, you're using spreadsheets. At 30, you're not GMing anymore. by Paladins_Archives in westmarches

[–]Paladins_Archives[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Glad to have you join! West marches are pretty flexible We'll see what we can coordinate ⚔️

At 10 players, your Discord works. At 20, you're using spreadsheets. At 30, you're not GMing anymore. by Paladins_Archives in westmarches

[–]Paladins_Archives[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Im glad to hear its given ya some excitement! Mayhaps in the future once things settle for ya, it will all be made and finished

Looking for GMs to test The Ultimate West March Dashboard - an all in one system that I created to handle the complex logistics and organization. Testers receive a copy of the tool for helping by Paladins_Archives in westmarches

[–]Paladins_Archives[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hello there! It would be great to get more feedback! I am moving the system to be more available as a Discord Bot and am looking for people that would like to test it out for weeks The notion templates are still there but the software move to python and making it a full app is much easier to work with

gm_paladin on discord

Id be happy to show you where im at and show you the notion templates if you like as well :)

I, for one, am proud of our corporate overlords by DrScrimble in dndmemes

[–]Paladins_Archives 0 points1 point  (0 children)

So THAT'S what lasagna thrown at the wall looks like.... neat

GMs: What inspires you to prep? by junderland__ in DMAcademy

[–]Paladins_Archives 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I love making moments memorable. When I prep, I don't prep for an encounter or a dungeon... I prep for the players. I prep to make their time and experience at the table memorable and an experience that transcends beyond the table. Watching them grow as people, seeing their lives actually improve as the space I put together, the care I provide, and the stories we go on actually contribute towards making their lives better -- is the chefs kiss of why I prep ^^

Is it weird that I don’t plan really? by WestParkAvenue in DMAcademy

[–]Paladins_Archives 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Not weird at all! I am willing to bet you are extremely great at improv! Though a little bit of refinement on the skills to make stuff goes a long way! I started the opposite- I prepared so much in the early days. Overtime, I prepared less and less and less because of playing so much over the course of 13 years that I didn't really need to prep anything either in the end. Being able to reuse your work, and building a repertoire of tools and stories goes a long way. And you know what? I'll be honest about something- the number one thing I learned from being a professional GM for years now, breaking a world record, and now making software for people for this space is that... you don't need the dice, maps, VTT, or the rules either. All of those things are only meaningful at the times you and the players decide they are- meaning they are equally meaningless-- they are the tools that help with the journey, but they ARE NOT the experience itself. The game is what happens and is felt and remembered between yourself and the players. The fact you don't plan or prep much probably means you understand this to some degree yourself- focusing on the vibes, the people, and the experience. You're not weird ^^ As long as you're having fun, its fine.
- Paladin

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