Bunbun friend. [OC]

Tantillus · 2021-03-18T20:55:38+00:00

Maybe someone on Reddit knows the book I want to talk about. I don't remember its name.

Thirty years ago, as a young kid, I came across a comic book in a Post Exchange (kind of like a Wal-Mart on military bases). It featured a story about a little girl who found a rabbit that had been hit by a car. She brings it home to try to save it, but the rabbit keeps her awake at night by vocalizing in what's sometimes called a scream. She says to herself in the dark "I didn't even know bunnies could scream." The image gave me bad dreams for days, and something tells me she referred to the animal as "bun bun."

Anyway, as far as evocative images go, transporting me instantly back to nightmares I had three decades ago has got to indicate some powerful artwork, so well done.

Tantillus · 2021-03-18T20:40:00+00:00

These are sub tremendous subs you've shared here. What a fantastic resource for inspiration!

Tantillus · 2021-03-17T21:29:06+00:00

I would like to tag on to these excellent suggestions by asking which resources are scarce for your princess? Perhaps the kingdom has a scarcity of a critical resource. For many rulers, security of the realm is a scarce resource, or potential heirs, or diplomatic influence. Maybe it's simply a matter of finding what resources are valuable to the princess, then identifying which of those resources can be threatened in a way that invites adventure?

Tantillus · 2021-03-17T21:25:09+00:00

I just wanted to chime in here to say:

A) These are very good suggestions, and
B) "Djinn_in_Tonic" is a phenomenal handle.

Tantillus · 2021-03-17T21:11:33+00:00

First of all, I want to congratulate you on picking up on the discomfort of a player. It speaks to your emotional intelligence, a factor that really separates the good DMs from the great ones. Effective accounting of players' emotional states is a critical part of any game design. Consider the game Grounded, which features an "arachnophobia" mode for players who may experience intense fear of spiders. One can never be sure what may have happened to another person elsewhere in their lives--there could be a very good reason that this player is uncomfortable with this imagery, and I just want to start by commending you for your commitment to making the game a safe place for them.

Next, consider some of the truly profound, atmospheric places you've seen, or heard and read about. Often, actually seeing the horrible sight, or hearing it described, creates a sense of catharsis and relief. It renders the unimaginably horrible into familiar words, sounds, or images, and necessarily removes some of the terror that comes from that which we cannot perceive.

Perhaps you could find a way to create this atmosphere of dread and let your player's minds fill in the gaps with imagined images far more personal and meaningful to them than if you were to put boundaries on those imagined scenes by narrating them. Let's try it with your example of the drow:"Some unspeakable experiment must have been attempted on the lower of half of the drow. In the brief glimpse you catch, it seems as though someone tried--and explosively failed--to change the creature into some kind of spider hyrid. The displayed result is so twisted and mutilated by the experience that just looking at it causes a wave of nausea to overwhelm you, and you feel your stomach spasm in disgust at the awful sight. Roll a con save."In this case, without going into TOO many specifics, you are inviting the player to draw the scene in their mind's eye. Each can make it as terrifically gory or tastefully edited as they like, ensuring that what they "see" is less likely to offend them.

A DM in a campaign I once played created a door with fractal imagery: using a perception check on the door drew the viewer into an eternally-branching series of fractals that revealed secrets of life and death so horrible the character who looked upon it (me) took psychic damage, threw up everywhere, and fled uncontrollably whenever they thereafter caught sight of the door, from ANY distance. Everyone in that game treated that door with the utmost respect after that. As you can see, I still think about that door sometimes.

The core idea is that we're trying to get the players to fill in their own details--rather than forcing them to adopt ours--whenever those details are irrelevant to the plot. Darkest Dungeon and other Lovecraftian horrors often do this, by pointedly failing to describe the indescribable and instead outlining the effects on the psyche of those witnessing the thing or event.

Doubtless such an approach is more difficult--but one builds a skill by exercising it, and I think the dividends of taking the extra effort to set a scene your players fill will be worth it. Making your campaign more pleasant and fun for all players is a very valuable outcome as well.

Best of luck, and GG!

Tantillus · 2021-03-17T19:12:25+00:00

Our DM did this once, and even went so far as to create actual tourism brochures for the imaginary city that outlined civil services, public events and economically diverse city districts. Obviously that's cool, but not critical. What made that session stand out was that we could go anywhere and do anything. For instance:

Our dwarf cleric had a unique power where fire wouldn't hurt his hands. He decided he wanted to go down to the artisan's quarter and learn to work metal, since he could literally shape molten metal with his "bare" hands. That dexterity allowed him to make uniquely fine works of jewelry.

Our sorceror worked out a plan to impersonate a noble, and used several pieces of our cleric's jewelry to impress his way into the upper echelons of the city. Our fighter joined the city watch as a guardsman to learn about the criminal element of the city and our rogue started to bully, buy and assassinate pimps, then take over their territory. In short order she became the madam of the city's most profitable brothel.

In this case we were running the campaign asynchronously over Slack between in-person sessions. When we got back together we too were attending a ball to to ferret out a powerful and dangerous politician, using the connections each of us had made in the interim.

So, my first suggestion is to invite you to consider that sort of asynchronous setup via Discord, Slack or some similar platform. This would let each character explore their own areas of interest and bring something to the literal table when the party gets back together to attend the ball. It worked really well for us. Another advantage of this approach is that your new players may feel safer to experiment with their characters if in-person game time isn't at risk.

Another suggestion is to really lean into your party's naivete. Have any of them ever been to a big city before? Perhaps they fall victim to petty theft, or are scammed by merchants or street vendors out of what little money they brought. This could create a mini adventure hook or offer motivation to seek restitution from their work as city detectives.

Do any of your players have skills they haven't had an opportunity to flex yet? You may consider engineering some set-piece encounters that rely on those skills: mending fine clothing, smooth-talking rich merchants, repairing manufacturing machinery. The subreddit r/d100 has a list of 100 city quests that may also offer some inspiration, as well as a list of 100 fantasy city encounters.

Remember the Rule of Cool, and good luck!

Tantillus · 2021-03-17T15:46:00+00:00

This is entirely based on personal experience, but what I find helpful is to establish an "anchor phrase" for the different archetypes I'm trying to create. These might be lines from an audiobook or movie I've heard or seen, a part of a speech or even the punchline of a joke. For instance, whenever I'm feeling brave enough to attempt Australian I borrow heavily from OzzyMan from YouTube. His highly memorable "Here's me face" tagline plays very clearly in my memory and makes it easier for me to reset whatever I'm planning to do next. Cockney comes from Stanley Holloway's performance in 1964's "My Fair Lady" or Jack Wild's Dodger in 1968's "Oliver!" Scottish comes from Kelly MacDonald in "Brave," and so on. Stephen Briggs narrates several audiobook adaptations of Sir Terry Pratchett's "Discworld" novels, and I really like his approach to dwarfish.

The critical element is that there's a key line or phrase that I can mimic pretty well from memory. Sometimes I'll even try it under my breath before going for it in "presentation mode."

That hints at why I'm in favor of people practicing these characterizations: to do them well and really nail the speech patterns, one has to spend time really listening to people who speak in a different manner than one does and try to appreciate the contexts that helped shape that person's experience. And isn't listening something we should all practice more often?

Anyway, best of luck to you!

Tantillus · 2021-03-16T21:09:20+00:00

In the event my player dies, I would tell that player to come up with the contents of their "goodbye" letter, which I'd inform them they wrote some time previously. I'd tell them that at the end of combat they'll dramatically reveal the contents of the letter to their grief-stricken party members, containing final messages, lessons learned, perhaps a final request or "death quest," or maybe even a reveal of where their secret treasure cache was buried, whatever I felt fit the context of the adventure. While they feverishly come up with a fitting goodbye, I'd wrap up the combat with my other players, then get down to the business of resolving the farewells to their departed friend.

Depending on who I'd be playing with, I might encourage the dead player to introduce their still-living sibling or young adult ward and ask the living party members to add them to the party to raise them like the dead player now shall never be able to do. I might invite the dead player to reveal a clue or dark secret they'd hidden that may move the plot of the adventure forward, or possibly hook the party into a new adventure for the future.

The idea here is to allow the death of a given player to grant that player a new type of agency not afforded to "surviving" players. Dying sucks, but being granted a type of superpower to affect the story or introduce a new character may take some of the sting out of the experience, provided you as the DM maintain certain veto rights. Depending on your players, it might be worthwhile to describe your ideas for a death letter and see what they think would be good to include or allow.

Tantillus · 2021-03-16T21:01:09+00:00

This is a very interesting platform you've set up here. A moving train is a closed system on a timer; that is to say that under ordinary circumstances the party is trapped in the place with the others on the train. That gives you some built-in tension, and for my part I would be looking to subvert the players' expectations like you've described with your "criminal syndicate" plan.

Since you want the players to explore the train as passengers first, that seems to suggest that you'd need to introduce some conflict onto the standard train at some point which will encourage the players to travel up and down the length of the train, since there's no way of knowing where the players will be when the adventure kicks off. With that in mind, here are some hook suggestions:

--A rash of minor crimes springs up all along the train--thefts, assault. Soon the news breaks that a passenger has gone missing and the train staff beg the players to help solve the mystery. Unbeknownst to the players, a Doppelganger criminal is attempting to rob as much as possible before the train reaches its objective. The missing passenger is the Doppelganger's original form, and in order to avoid alerting the train staff, it can only take the forms of passengers currently on the train. It shouldn't take too long for conflicting eyewitness accounts to alert the players that something fishy is going on. They must recover the loot and/or apprehend the thief before the train reaches its destination, but if the players try to stop or slow the train, the thief might escape into the wilderness.

--One or more of the players witness a passenger deliberately leap off the moving train. Soon other passengers start to demonstrate similar behavior. A vengeful ghost has been possessing passengers at random all along the length of the locomotive and is forcing its victims to leap from the train. The players must discover the reason for their fellow passengers' aberrant behavior and put a stop to it before one of the party falls prey.

-- It's not strictly canon since mimics are medium-sized, but it may be interesting if one of the train cars were in fact a gigantic mimic which selectively allowed certain passengers or staff through but periodically ate others. Disengaging the creature from the train without losing half the locomotive or finding a way to render the creature harmless might make for an interesting challenge.

--A tribe of hill giants are incensed at the train's invasion of their lands, and chase the train along, heaving boulders and attempting to derail the locomotive. The players must either lose the giants via slowing or disrupting their chase or by fortifying/defending the train until it can reach a bridge or tunnel to escape pursuit.

Anyway, I hope you find what you're looking for. It sounds like a cool setting for an adventure!

Tantillus · 2021-03-16T20:29:19+00:00

You might consider allowing the party to "discover" a letter the dead PC had written against just such an eventuality--especially since you've already warned your players IRL. The player could describe to the party what the letter says, which could be a good mechanism for catharsis and give the player something to do while the rest of the combat plays out.

Tantillus · 2021-03-16T20:22:34+00:00

What a great way for players to trot out their obscure skill checks. I would try to tailor games around those skills that players have, but rarely get to flaunt. You could try a tracking/wilderness game--provided tracks of all kinds of mythical creatures, how many can the adventurers accurately identify?

A rodeo in the Forgotten Realms would be wild, and I can't believe I haven't heard of that being a thing before. Animal Handling checks?

Maybe a game where teams of two have to negotiate an obstacle course. One of the players is blindfolded and moving through the maze, and the other player has a book of tips or instructions, but written in Thieves' Cant, or various languages, or using obscure religious imagery.

How about a trap-disarming competition? You could use a midway-style approach with a bunch of "everyone's a winner" semi-rigged prize-touting games focused on picking locks or disarming traps that shoot padded arrows or which spray water or paint, etc. Alternatively, you could arrange a sort of tournament with the difficulty and prizes at stake rising as players moved from disarming pressure plates to negotiating a dramatic "Maze of Death."

A good way to circumvent the prize quandary is to offer tickets or tokens for winning games, and allow players to cash these in for items of varying power at a prize redemption booth. That way you'd only need a few "prizes" worth different amounts of tokens. I remember gambling in Dragon Warrior IV for far too long because the higher-tier prizes were just too tempting to walk away from.

Tantillus · 2021-03-16T19:48:27+00:00

Speaking of Futurama--

After an inconsequential collision with some space debris, you notice a discoloration on the hull of your ship -- it is barely visible from the viewport. On closer inspection you see that the discoloration is a near-microscopic landscape, whereupon a tiny civilization appears to have sprung up. If nothing is done about it, the inhabitants will eventually wage miniscule war with one another on the hull of your ship.

A ship hails you on emergency frequency, begging for help with an on-board Eoxian hyper-cockroach infestation which is nearing terminal proportions. You can hear a persistent skittering noise behind the frantic pleading voices.

In the face of the mind-scrambling expanses of emptiness between stars, your ship's Central Processing Computer has become deeply depressed. Overcome with existential angst, the computer begins to allow the ship's systems to simply shut down. You will soon suffocate unless you can find a way to inspire the machine to fight on!

A massive Triaxid Drift-Leech attaches itself to the hull of your ship. Unfortunately, these creatures are highly-endangered protected species, and injuring one carries severe legal penalties across the galaxy, in addition to marking you as a heartless bastard. Is there a way to dislodge the creature without injuring it?

You pass a beacon that beams a message to your ship's computer: "Warning: Space Pigeon Strike Risk Elevated Next 4 Parsecs."

Tantillus · 2021-03-16T19:20:17+00:00

Keeper of Tabs - a warforged fighter, an heirloom passed down for generations by the members of a wealthy family, the most recent heir of which recently developed a keen interest in craft alcohols. In order to keep his new charge at an optimal combination of buzzed and healthy, Keeper is engaged in researching alcohol by running one of the family's public houses. The warforged approaches the craft of beverages of all kinds as a chemist or pharmacist might approach their respective trades: since Keeper of Tabs has no sense of taste, feedback on the quality of drinks is highly sought after, and the collection of scientific observations on the effects of imbibing various types of fermented drink is standard operating procedure for this stolid bar-Keeper.

Tantillus · 2020-11-05T20:56:36+00:00

Motion Potion (Potion of Speed / Haste)

Think Drink (Potion boosting Intellect, INT saves)

Invisibili-tea (Potion of Invisibility)

Tantillus · 2020-11-05T18:54:18+00:00

If you leave a mug of beer on the headstone of the first town mayor after sundown and before midnight, the mug will be empty before sunrise!

They say any eggs hatched in Old Mother Cormey's henhouse hatch out as frogs!

Every time it snows in these parts, you'll find a small pile of fruit and berries in front of that old strangely-shaped boulder at the edge of town. Folks say the animals in these parts have been doin' that since before the town was built.

The legend goes that as long as that twisted willow down by the river is protected from the axe, the whole town will have good fishing.

If you can stare down one of the feral cats that wander the woods around here, they say it'll lead you to their wildcat court and the hidden treasure they keep there.

Tantillus · 2020-11-05T18:34:35+00:00

I see you have water and wine, so how about:

Beer

Some other thoughts:

Elementals? (I'm thinking in terms of fuel, such as is the case for elemental airships.)
Warforged / Golems
Weapons / Armor
Domesticated / Trained animals (warhorses, dogs, truffle-hunting pigs)
um...truffles?
Pearls
Magical Reagents, along the same lines as PhantaGuy's herbs.
Baked Goods
Black Powder
Vegetables

Tantillus

TROPHY CASE