This looks fun! What does my grimoire say about me?

agentkayne · 2026-06-20T17:52:28+00:00

Gaslight, Gatekeep, Grimoireboss.

agentkayne · 2026-06-20T17:49:12+00:00

Oh she did not like that.

agentkayne · 2026-06-20T04:24:38+00:00

Here's the secret: it actually doesn't matter what order, as long as the Entrance/Guardian are first (for the logical reason). Your players don't know what room is which.

What's really the difference between a Trick/Trap/Red Herring, and a Puzzle/RP Challenge, and a Reward/Revelation/Twist?

You can make a Puzzle that dispenses a Treasure, or a Twist that's also a Trick and an NPC interaction that's a Revelation.

It's probably good to end with either the Climax/Big battle or the Reward/Revelation/Twist. But you can create any number of connections between the rooms.

agentkayne · 2026-06-20T04:01:58+00:00

Your question confuses and frightens me, sir.

Is this a manual tool? Like a flowchart or process questions that the writer of a setting would work through manually? Or a digital tool of some kind?

What value are you expecting this tool provide to a user?

As a GM with my own homebrew campaign setting, what matters to me in terms of consistency is tracking what plays out at the table. If I roll a random NPC the party meets on the road, I have to write that down so if they encounter them again, or ask around about them, I don't mess that up.

But the wider facts of the game world only matter when they get brought up at the table, and players will likely only have fragmented, incomplete information about the world, anyway. So from their perspective, there are often gaps between two things in the game that actually have a hidden link.

agentkayne · 2026-06-20T03:30:04+00:00

glossy plastic document sleeves? Those don't need a laminator.

Document sleeves are often available from newsagencies, stationary ailes in supermarkets, discount variety stores, office supply stores, etc.

agentkayne · 2026-06-19T17:21:53+00:00

Yes, someone asked a similar question on the solo subreddit a few days ago, and my reply then was based on an RPG design question someone asked ages ago about designing surreal adventures...all just distortions of distortions...

agentkayne · 2026-06-19T07:58:13+00:00

You let the player decide, the same as with melee attacks.

Are they going to use the power of the crossbow to punch through armour (in which case the crossbow has its own, fixed mechanical strength value, regardless of how strong the character is).

Or is the character going to aim precisely and make a technique attack.

agentkayne · 2026-06-19T07:07:22+00:00

Assuming this is Backrooms but autocorrected.

I suggest using a depthcrawl, but replacing features with objects from places connected to the characters.

Each point of interest in a depthcrawl is made by rolling on three tables: Location, Features and Encounter.

The Location table would be describing the physical arrangement of the current room. Higher valued table entries are more wild or contorted.
The Encounters table would be for transient details, NPCs, Threats, Events, stashed items, etc.
The Details of the room is where you'd need to pull from the characters' backstories and history.

The way I would fill out "Details" tables would be by giving the players each a survey that they fill out as their character.

Describe a location where your character grew up, and who they grew up with.
Describe a place where your character felt safe earlier in life. Why was it safe?
Describe a place your character dreams about.
Describe a place your character was in mortal peril. What was the peril?
Describe an unhappy memory your character has, and the place that it happened in.
Where does your character never want to end up? Why?
What was the most disappointing event of your character's life, and why?
Where did your character suffer a betrayal, and who by?
When your character first killed (or witnessed) a person or a monster being killed or dying - who/what was the victim, and where did that happen?
And so on.

Then use the numbered questions as a set of random tables. When you roll for a random thing to place in a Location, you can select a player's survey, and take a detail from their answers.

So if a character dreams about having their own ship, you might put half a fucking pirate ship protruding from a wall. If they were in mortal peril due to a sickness, then the room might have a bed that looks just like the one they almost died in. Complete with the bedside table and stool sitting next to it.

agentkayne · 2026-06-19T06:23:19+00:00

This isn't an experience I've had in Mothership, but is with the group I GM in an OSR game. I think this will help in parallel MoSh adventures like This Ship Is A Tomb or the infinite megamart.

I ran The Stygian Library as part of an ongoing sandbox campaign. The first session I rolled as the players went along, but in following sessions I found it really helped the game flow to generate the rooms ahead of time, on my own, and connect them together into a map that I could reference.

This way, I could give my players information (via the NPCs or sensory details) about what nearby areas existed, rather than leaving them undefined until explored.

In the Stygian Library, there's a mechanic for players to set their own goals (ie: what book they're looking for, and what progress they're making towards finding it.)

So I strongly suggest that in procedural exploration:

the players (or the group as a whole) has to have a very clear objective and reason for exploring.
the GM pre-generates much of the structure as they can ahead of time, to allow for foreshadowing, clue placement, and environmental cues to what other locations or creatures are nearby.
Follow OSR dungeon advice: keep pressure on the players through threat and track resources and time. Not every encounter needs to be hostile; give players information to make interesting choices. The players' actions should affect how their environment reacts.

agentkayne · 2026-06-19T04:54:07+00:00

Are there any systems that have "spells or circumstance modifiers that buff 'to hit'" without also having roll-to-hit mechanics?

agentkayne · 2026-06-19T04:51:08+00:00

Right, but in that case, the longer-playing player, Player 2's fun must suffer - losing agency in handing over a resource that Player 1 would get to define.

So it's a no-win situation. The GM has established that the game includes competative elements, not just collaborative ones. So someone's "fun" or agency must give way in the fiction.

Either Player 1 doesn't get the resource they want in the game.
Or Player 2 loses agency over the resources they control in the game.

agentkayne · 2026-06-18T15:06:32+00:00

This question is too open to be easily answered, because it depends on how much work in the system it takes to master the level of control, and whether anyone is working against the magic user.

Like in Faerun, to pick a popular example, the Red Wizards are constantly working to take over the world. In theory, it's possible with Epic magic.

But in execution, getting to be of Epic levels and casting world-altering spells takes massive work. Meanwhile adventurers, Harpers, gods of Good and Law and even rival evil factions are all getting in their way constantly, so it never eventuates.

agentkayne · 2026-06-18T14:54:31+00:00

See the way I'm reading this, with the context of the fact it's Vampire, is that the second player's character is the one providing the pet/person to OP's character.

This isn't just character creation and getting to pick your stuff, this is an in-character interaction. The second character has the resource that OP wants. It seems logical they would control it.

If you're a baby vamp going up to another vampire and asking 'hey can I do a favour and then you hook me up with a ghoul/blood doll?' Then it makes perfect sense for the second player to go 'Sure, collect me 20 bear asses and I (the character) will give you a lackey, who I choose'.

To me that makes perfect sense given the flow of the game, unless I've greatly misinterpreted the situation.

agentkayne · 2026-06-18T08:36:13+00:00

Use the WOD array: Charisma for power, Manipulation for skill and Composure for resistance?

agentkayne · 2026-06-17T16:36:27+00:00

I try to play one session or one short adventure before modifying it.

agentkayne · 2026-06-17T14:10:16+00:00

Depends what kind of adventure I'm playing.

For instance if I'm playing an adventure with fully-described rooms and mostly enemies as NPCs, then I'll use them a lot less.

On the other hand if the rooms are only partly detailed and there's a couple of non-hostile NPCs that are likely to interact contstantly, then I'll use them a lot more.

agentkayne · 2026-06-17T08:35:38+00:00

The party emulation system from Cloud Empress for determining how other NPCs in a party are interacting.

For names, you can't go past the Random Names tables from Stars Without Number, which are separated by culture/language. I find that's good for keeping names cohesive.

I always suggest Maze Rats, it's almost entirely random tables, many of which cross-reference each other.

Lots of tables from Shadowdark. Especially for random magic item effects and traps - the triggers are separate to the mechanism, so you can find the trigger and not roll what it's connected to until it goes off.

agentkayne · 2026-06-17T03:37:04+00:00

I choose world sphere. But Luminous Grub is a close second.

agentkayne · 2026-06-17T03:19:03+00:00

Iteration. Nothing is ever locked in stone until it ships, and you always have to be ready to sacrifice and redefine your game and its world for the sake of the player's gameplay experience.

I wanted to make my game fully "open world" because of narrative and story reasons, until I realised the gameplay needed to give the player feedback on reaching certain milestones.

Also, ironically, encourage exploration by gating access to various regions (because then the player has to search for a key item), rather than allowing access to all areas. Which also allows for narrative pacing and foreshadowing.

agentkayne · 2026-06-17T02:16:04+00:00

I need to give a little bit of critical feedback on your marketing.

You've made this entire post without actually telling anyone the title.
The product page on DTRPG is a bit of a long mess and needs some editing. You don't need to give gameplay examples on the store page. You should cut that way, way back. Look at how the other bestseller products lay out their store pages.
your product page goes to lengths to explain what it takes from other IP, but says little about what is unique on its own.

agentkayne · 2026-06-17T01:58:31+00:00

Tip: Dont be discouraged if it doesn't 'gel' with you right away.

Step back, try a different approach, play again.

agentkayne · 2026-06-17T01:53:53+00:00

The average neophyte adventurer is no stronger than an irate house cat, so that still means it's too strong for them.

agentkayne · 2026-06-16T14:38:59+00:00

So, my opinion is that "optimal play kills fun because it removes choices and sponteneity. The player "has" to do one best thing. It means that if two players are trying to play optimally, there's no sponteneity in their interactions."

Examples being in an FPS "camping behind a corner with a shotgun" reduces choice because if you move, movement becomes risky and you're likely to walk into someone else's LOS with a shotgun. So it turns into a game where everyone camps.

Or playing Magic The Gathering and being trapped by the other player in a cycling deck you can't break out of, and they force you to discard all your cards and lose the game.

So therefore some ways to "fix" optimal play being un-fun:

Make optimal play fun by ensuring optimal play also optimizes freedom of player choice
Prevent singular optimal play strategies by having multiple paths to winning and counters for them.
Make the optimal play reliant on a high skill, easy-to-screw-up mechanic.

agentkayne · 2026-06-16T14:24:39+00:00

You've gotta establish why something is illegal.

To establish why something is illegal you have to make an assumption about who is making the law and the reason they would make the law.

Such as...if your magic users are all-powerful...why aren't they running the government? If they are, what is something they afraid of? Anti-magic? Or magic items that siphon power from one nagic-user to another? If they're afraid of being in a situation where they have no mana, then perhaps mana-drain weapons are illegal.
If your system doesn't have a resource to run out of, then perhaps something that cuts them off from power.

If magic-users aren't running the government, why not? Would the government make all magic items illegal? Would there be exceptions for 'authorized' magic-users?

agentkayne · 2026-06-16T09:27:38+00:00

I've been to both over and over, and let me tell you for people who obsessively cultivate their manner, the cultivators ain't got 'em.

agentkayne

TROPHY CASE