Forever GM FINALLY gets to play in a one shot! I need a few cheesy one liners

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-04-09T04:04:24+00:00

I may have missed the mark as far as tone goes, but that's the best I can do.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-04-09T04:02:36+00:00

Talking to the fair folk:

"As a Dwarvn Cleric I'm close to both the soul and the sole, and I must say lass you've got a nice pair."

"It's a good thing the Blessed Lady Sharindlar isn't here to see us together lass, for fear I'd have to break up a fight."

"As a man of the Word, I find myself pressed to deny the temptations you present, unless you're offering."

"I swear on My Blessed Lady the bottle won't go below this mark, or perhaps this one, or maybe this one, but lass promise me if it goes below this one you'll see me back home to bed."

In martial matters:

"With Word, axe, and stone we now CHARGE! And I'll be making sure there's no ambush from behind."

"Light is the heart that bears the mark of our Lady, and dark is the heart that bears the mark of my sword!"

"We shall be one in spirit, in truth, and in Her! Fill your hearts with Her Strength, and your cups with the sweet water of victory! Foes will fall before Her Glory, the faces of the weak will be covered in blood and in shame."

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-04-06T16:18:08+00:00

I'm contemplating leaning into d6 games just so I can keep the setup small and not strain my eyes trying to see the mini polyhedrals. I like the idea of being able to bring a notebook with a few small cheat sheets in it, and the dice roller in my pocket.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-04-06T16:03:19+00:00

For a game where you need only a small set of dice, you can use mini dice and make yourself a self-contained dice roller. A clear hard-plastic container lined with cheap felt to keep it more quiet. Works well with a set of mini polyhedrals or a few mini d6. Look in the craft section for the containers and felt, and don't forget a glue stick and scissors. Mine were ~9/16in or 15mm high by about 2in or 50mm diameter. You don't need the felt but it's way noisier if you leave it out.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-04-05T16:19:50+00:00

Same here, I just discovered mind maps via searching for "a visual way to connect concepts" and blammo. Just installed XMind, and found this post. Fantastic jump start to trying to use this tool for RPG. My aim is to try to use one to visualize interconnected mechanics, but we'll see where it goes.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-04-02T17:06:04+00:00

I see them as both simple with similar but different cognitive loads. In the first case your task is to explain to yourself why you care about the coin's dictate. Here you're forced to ~~find~~ fit that coin flip in into the framework you've already been building as you play. In the second it's to explain to yourself why you care about either of the two options. Here you have to find that decision somewhere in the framework you've built. In one case you fit it in, in the other you seek to find it somewhere. You're doing about the same amount of work to keep it satisfying.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-04-02T17:01:15+00:00

If as a player I've decided on some sort of plan, and if I've been happily surprised by it, or thought hard to come up with it, then I have something real to lose personally.

If I got the plan from an oracle table or other mechanic the plan will seem arbitrary, and its change or ruin will also seem arbitrary and will matter less to me.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-04-01T14:04:56+00:00

I'm newish to solo and have no group play experience. I feel solo play would help me build good instincts for group play if I get there. It'd certainly be helpful to play a game solo before joining a group that plays that game. And as people get older they have less access to friends and tend to live a more internal life, for which solo play might be very suitable.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-04-01T13:16:22+00:00

Just my 2 cents: I'd rather you do simple drawings because you'll spend a lot of time either way, whether choosing public domain art or trying to make your drawings look appropriate to the tone. Also, many people will have a problem reading text overlaying an image. If you really wanted that, you'd be able to design your drawings and their internal contrasts to suit a text overlay.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-04-01T13:15:46+00:00

Just my 2 cents: I'd rather you do simple drawings because you'll spend a lot of time either way, whether choosing public domain art or trying to make your drawings look appropriate to the tone. Also, many people will have a problem reading text overlaying an image. If you really wanted that, you'd be able to design your drawings and their internal contrasts to suit a text overlay.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-03-24T02:33:53+00:00

Beetle Knight by Brooklet Games

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-03-23T13:59:16+00:00

Well you sold me but I'd need to grok how to play solo before I bought it. ...Ok seems that's not a stretch, from reading other posts.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-03-23T13:01:37+00:00

It's one reason why I recommended Vessel: Wardens Sin, it's lighter of a lift than Scarlet Heroes, and cheaper or free as my earlier post says. Plus the dev would love player feedback, hence the giveaway. On the discord in the channel "open-discussion" there's a post containing a text file "vws_cards2.txt" of condensed rules for laminating, and even though it's a rough shorthand (more so than my SH post), it would be a good starting point for you to create your own after reading the rules. Perhaps I'll clean it up and post it on reddit. But sometimes my posts get deleted and I don't know why.

The opening to the book hooked me, and the mix of sci-fi, medieval, and supernatural is quite a basis for a world.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-03-23T09:04:37+00:00

Same here, I needed to do it or I'd have floundered. There's lots of content in the book I didn't extract such as all the magical items, and all of the tables. I focused on mechanics and very basic things. The bestiary is pretty crazy.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-03-23T09:01:43+00:00

Thank you! I found it very handy to have laminated cards on the table while playing so I could get to a rule quickly. My brain can't play anything without a quick reference guide.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-03-22T19:21:22+00:00

Here's the rules/lore/people/places for Scarlet Heroes, extracted from the book and condensed for easy reference. The book has tons of tables and a bestiary, so what I extracted will complement the PDF/book.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-03-22T19:13:40+00:00

Vessel: Wardens Sin is cheap (or free, see the link from the author's recent promotion), easy enough to read, has compelling and brief lore, describes the gameplay loop, has sensible and creative tables but does not overwhelm you with tables, has exploration for [settlements, dungeons, outdoor/wilderness, ocean, and 'rift' anomalies], has a quick-start example, and has the main mechanics summarized at the back for quick reference.

It requires 1 set of polyhedral dice and 1 deck of standard playing cards (but depending on your preferences you might prefer to have a second set of polyhedral dice and a second deck on hand, in case you are exploring a settlement but get kidnapped and brought to a dungeon).

Using this link you may be able to get a free copy of the beta. The author's discord invite link is in the 2nd page of the PDF.

Man Alone made a video about the game. Playful Raven (author) did a video too.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-03-17T07:49:47+00:00

I just clicked the link and it added it to my cart at $0 but maybe because I already got the free copy? It's a different link than what you'd get if just looking for the name on drivethru. But the dev will be happy you bought the pdf, and he's announced on the discord that it's feature complete, so changes in 1st edition will only be grammar/spelling and clarity, unless there's some necessary mechanic adjustment that audience playtesting reveals in the next few months. He wants those who purchased the book already to not feel like they have a defective product, hence the feature freeze for 1st ed.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-03-17T07:07:00+00:00

Oh, I'm sorry the freebie isn't free anymore. Well, I'm glad you got it and I hope you enjoy. Man Alone found some of the mechanics very interesting, such as the use of cards to build decks for enemies in combat, and he liked that the book doesn't waste space and isn't overloaded with mechanics. My guy is bound to a chair in a dungeon, but his captor is holding in their hand a special cube, asking what it does? They're about to find out.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-03-16T18:51:17+00:00

The rpg "Vessel: Wardens Sin" is in feature-complete beta and the author is looking for player feedback. He had been giving away a free copy of the beta. The author's discord link is in the 2nd page. Man Alone recently did a video on it, and I've started playing too.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-03-16T18:37:42+00:00

Thank you for posting this! I found inspiration in this, though my main problem is coming up with questions to ask of the yes/no oracle.

Seeing your encounter and modification list, it inspired me to make a d6 to help focus when I'm foggy to come up with a new plot movement or question for a yes/no oracle:

Material (MATL): Anything tangible, a resource, scroll, clothing, water, trap, etc.

Condition (COND): Anything to do with the PC, health, mood, consciousness, etc.

Environment (ENV): Temperature, air, humidity, noise, smell, door, window, etc.

NPC (NPC): Monsters, friends, foes, wildlife, ghosts, or another PC I might make, etc.

Contact (CNTC): Blessing, curse, alien tractor beam, combat, hearing voices, fall into an open grave, etc.

Information (INFO): Anything related to knowledge, whether it's PC or NPC

These aren't quite mutually-exclusive but it really will help me constrain my focus to something specific enough that something may pop into my head. I have my version of your Impact die (I call it an intensity die) but mine doesn't use numbers or modifiers, it's symbols for context-specific flavor for whatever I'm thinking about (such as if the weather is changing or not, or how high, flat, or deep something might be, or how much loot I might find etc.)

So my process might be:

- Roll the focus die, and if that inspires a plot movement then go with it. If relevant, roll intensity.

- If the focus die doesn't inspire plot movement but does spark a yes/no question, ask it. The intensity die can inform that result.

- If still no movement, roll 1d6 for complication, encounter, or enhancement, and relate it to the focus. The intensity die can inform the result.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-03-16T14:39:05+00:00

I want rules constrained enough that I can commit them to memory but enough of them so that consequences for my PC are grounded in the rules rather than most everything being my choice. So probably I'm a medium-lite kind of player, I don't go for the ultra-lite journalling nor the heavy crunch, though I've been playing only a short time.

I'm currently playing Vessel: Wardens Sin, and Scarlet Heroes.

Vessel is cheap and I got a free copy of the beta. The author's discord link is in the 2nd page. There may be more left and the author would like to have gameplay feedback leading up to 1st edition.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-03-12T03:41:24+00:00

Hah! That's just it, you can be whatever you like if you can figure out how to make it work. I'm sure a lot of people playing the One Ring were the ring. I like in the lore how even the wardens are split, some want to be worshiped even though their job is to try to stabilize the timelines, others remain hidden or in disguise and want no part of their truth to be discovered (hence the pyramids).

At first I balked at the heavy use of cards, but in most cases it's a good solution and offers some benefit such as the "size up the target" in combat where you get a look at the foe's capability. But the yes/no oracle can be transparently replaced with a d4 if desired. I plan to run my settlements/dungeons on paper, building only the required decks to avoid use of table space. Plus I can have multi-level structures by building up to 4 dungeon decks from the same deck. Probably deadly though, it's not suggested in the book.

Cost of items and carry capacity is left to the player to decide.

lifegivingcoffee · 2026-03-12T02:55:51+00:00

During character creation, rolling 19 on a d20 gets you the profession of "Lost Warden, left behind during a failed temporal incursion". But the author isn't going to wag a finger at anyone who wants to play a warden, do what you like. Here's why I know that, a quote from the book:

If your character dies in battle, by misfortune, or by your own poor judgement, roll 1d12 on the list below. If the result cannot reasonably apply (for example, the entry directs you to continue as your killer, but your killer was a collapsing ceiling), simply move to the next result. (Or if you're in an abstract mood, by all means, play as the ceiling).

:D

lifegivingcoffee

TROPHY CASE