Story Ideas and Whatnot

Weird stuff I'm doing in my D&D campaign

Fri, 01 Sep 2023 07:37:16 +0000

Basically, I'm playing with a bunch of noobs. My brother and I have played D&D for years now, but our friends are less experienced - and to be completely honest, I'm okay with that. There are a lot of flaws and holes in the D&D system that kinda just don't work. Also I suck at running planned campaigns. I've tried in the past and it's always gone horribly. The problem is that my ideas are always way too specific and hardwired into my Autism/ADHD 5000 Neural Network (brain), but trying to portray these ideas is a lot more difficult than coming up with them.

My solution? BS it. BS everything. Come up with a few ideas and just roll with it. Experienced DMs will tell you not to make stuff up as you go along, as experienced players will catch on quick and realize that they're not really playing for anything important - but we're not paying attention to our D&D games. Last session we got about half an hour of walking in before it devolved into Clash of Clans and watching Lord of the Rings. Our games are not organized, our games are not professional, and our games are not planned.

And honestly? I have way more fun just coming up with random stuff on the fly. They roll an 18 for Investigating the kitchen? They find the legendary Apron of Cooking. Search the back wall for secrets? There's a room with a dwarven vending machine in it. Whether they antagonize a nest of birds with their grappling hook or set an entire library on fire, as long as they're the ones coming up with the hijinks, then it's only up to me to just come up with a funny way of explaining the situation.

But I still have ideas that I want to implement - I just don't necessarily plan the how. There's pretty much just a little list of random thoughts I have, and if they do something weird then I'll just drop one in there for them to mess around with for awhile.

Basically, imma record some of these random mini-mechanics that I've added. Think of them what you will.

Random Stat Shenanigans:

Spoiler

More Boons and Buffs: There's nothing quite like getting a big +# on some roll you do, so I've elected to add tons of bonuses that the players can add in certain situations. The idea started by having a pantheon of gods that grant you temporary stat boosts for a day or so if you pray to them, but continued to having common statboost potions and whatnot. Magic items are also more common, though in most cases I don't use the ones right from the books.

New Damage Types: I don't know where the idea came from, but at some point I decided to screw over the regular damage types and throw in some new ones. They're a bit rarer in terms of regular combat, but come with some added perks...

Sapping: Damage that directly weakens the target. -1 Str.
Leeching: Damage that slows the target. -1 Dex.
Draining: Damage that reduces the target's vitality. -1 Con.
Psychic: BRAIN. -1 Int
Blocking: Anti-chakra. -1 Wis
E m o t i o n a l : -1 Cha

Dwarven Vending Machine: I already mentioned this up above, but I recently backed a kickstarter for a brand-new D&D campaign book inspired by Ghibli and Zelda, which is like... awesome. And there are rules in there for magical vending machines! Obviously I couldn't wait and just took it upon myself to make some for this campaign early...

Spoiler
Insert 1 Silver Coin (CP are the base currency now instead of GP, because I think the mini coins don't get enough love) to roll 1d12 on the table below:
- 1-8: Common. Roll 1d4
  - 1 - Antidote. Cures poisoning and other status effects
  - 2 - Potion of Speed I. +5 ft speed for 1 turn
  - 3 - Potion of Healing I. Heals 1d6 HP
  - 4 - Potion of Resistance (1 hour) - Roll 1d6
    
    1 - Sapping
    
    2 - Leeching
    
    3 - Draining
    
    4 - Psychic
    
    5 - Blocking
    
    6 - Emotional
- 9-11: Uncommon. Roll 1d6
  - 1 - Potion of Advantage (single-use)
  - 2 - Potion of Resistance (1 hour) - Roll 1d8
    
    Slashing
    
    Bludgeoning
    
    Piercing
    
    Fire/Acid
    
    Ice
    
    Shock
    
    Radiant
    
    Necrotic
  - 3 - Potion of Buff (+2) - Roll 1d6 (for Stat)
  - 4 - Potion of Healing II - Heals 2d6 HP
  - 5 - Potion of Magic I - Grants a single-use 1st-level spell slot
  - 6 - Potion of Speed I - +10 ft speed for 1 turn
- 12: Rare. Roll 1d4
  - Potion of Healing III - Heals 3d6 HP
  - Potion of Magic II - Grants a single-use 2nd-level spell slot
  - Potion of Speed III - +15 ft speed for 1 turn
  - Potion of Buff II (+3) - Roll 1d6 (for Stat)
(I'll come up with a table for inserting Gold, Electrum (I made them decent), and Platinum coins later - for now they're broke poor, and haven't even seen any coins of that variety)

Weird Lore Stuff that'll Probably Show Up Later:

Spoiler

The Void: There are three players, each currently Level 1. In the past I've always overestimated how powerful certain monsters can be, so I put them up against a decent group of slightly overleveled baddies at the end of the current dungeon - surprise surprise, they get TPK'd! Right the heck away! So of course I scrounge through my brain for ideas as fast as humanly possible, then inform them of the following:

"You appear in the Between, through an infinite black void. A voice speaks to you..."
[Super Smash Bros. Brawl announcer voice]: CONTINUE???
(They say "yes" ofc, because they're nerds like me)
"A Reaper appears before you, a pad and pen in hand. 'Do you have any Souls to bargain with?'"
(They're like "...?")
"'Hm. Thought so. We'll put you back in on Easy mode, with a debt of 1 Soul each. Your warranty is 1 month, and we're taking a fragment of your essence as a down payment."

And then they reappear to defeat the (nerfed) boss - though each of them has to roll a 1d6, and reduces the corresponding Ability Score by 1.

Souls: So of course they immediately begin asking around about Souls this and Souls that to pay off their debt - after all, if they can't after a month, they will be claimed by the Reapers and put into Hell Internship. I spent a few hours between sessions designing a Soul and Debt system, which was introduced to them on accident when they accidentally murdered a talking sparrow's deadbeat husband, who - the sparrow, not the husband - taught them the following:

Using a Crystal Bottle (yes, I pretty much just stole this from Zelda), you can entrap a single Soul from a slain creature. However, not all Souls are created equal - in fact, most are quite squalid. Few Souls have the capability to stick around in a stable form after death, and when captured are generally in some state of fractured. How Whole they are determines their Quality, which comes in five tiers:

Tier 1 - Broken Soul (1)
Tier 2 - Weakened Soul (2)
Tier 3 - Regular Soul (4)
Tier 4 - Prime Soul (8)
Tier 5 - Pure Soul (16)

Their debt is currently (16), which is equal to 1 Pure Soul or some combination of various others. The Sparrow Husband soul they captured was Tier 1, which wasn't partiularly helpful - and in fact they wound up dumping it out later in the hopes of getting a better one, even though they screwed up and didn't.

When a PC dies, they can choose to be revived (because lore reasons). Without a Soul to spend they get a Tier 0 revival, which reduces a random stat by 1 and sets their Warranty to 1 month. I do have a system for revivals of higher tiers providing stat boosts, but I might have that only be the case for if PCs have already paid their debt in full - otherwise, the Souls only work to prolong the Warranty.

Weird Lore Stuff that will Also Probably Show Up Later but in a Less Important Manner:

Spoiler

The Walls: I should probably explain the lore of where they're at... it's a place called The Palace of One Million Doors, which is misleading. It's a megagigantic supercastle that spans over several continents, rising high into the sky and down far beneath the surface - between realms and time and space. Obviously it is The Place for adventurers to go, and works a treat for the shortform sessions we tend to run (I just throw them in some mini-setting, they do some hijinks, and after awhile we call it a day). Because of the mysterious nature of this place, I can feel free to throw whatever lore I want into it. In this case, I added a fellow called The Architect who controls the Walls of the the Palace through godlike spacebending powers - however, for some reason, he uses these powers to rent out little wall-based pocket realms to traveling merchants. You can pay tribute to The Architect to receive a personal Wallspace, but they also provide two services that reduce costs to stimulate the economy: they both provide several connected Wallspaces for a reduced price, granted to merchants and farmers. They are - respectively - the Wall Mart service and the Wall Greens service.

Insurance?: I had a character sheet prepared for a rival character since the beginning - a wizard lady called LiLi. She's a total cremhole and sucks to no end - but by the time they bumped into her, they were already remarkably well-equipped and beat the schnozz out of her pretty much right away. This was all part of the plan, of course, as a few minutes later some eldritch horror took control of her body and soul; basically, she went Super Saiyan. She TPK'd the party immediately, but because this one was scripted I added some :mystery: by having the Reapers inform the players that (for some reason) their Debt had been paid in full... how strange.

Anyway, they woke up on the last remnant a completely destroyed bridge hanging over the abyss, completely incapable of escaping by any regular means. I honestly didn't have a plan for them at this point - you know. BS and all. One of the players decided to grovel and pray to their patron god, which I of course responded to in character - that is, by a Customer Service helpline (and the Wii Shop theme for hold music!). By now it was just a back-and-forth of various character stuff, so I just did whatever felt right - which, in this case, meant bringing up Divine Insurance. The PCs obviously didn't have any of this, so they were placed in the god's debt instead.

But of course I had to write out the Divine Insurance Firms to have information on them in the future. Here they be:

Big Brain Services: Provides hints and clues where necessary. Providers:
- Dite, Goddess of Arcana
- Anlein, God of Knowledge
- Phyte, God of Forge
Live, Long, & Prosper: Provides emergency healing and whatnot. Providers:
- Etex, Goddess of Life (Live)
- Lalix, God of Death (Long)
- Methos, Goddess of Grave (Prosper)
Nature Inc.: Provides various traveling assistances and whatnot. Providers:
- Mutein, Goddess of Light
- Ozan, God of Twilight
- Tilan, God of Nature
- Aher, Goddess of Order
- Dynos, God of Peace
Screw it; We ball: COMBAT. STUFF. Providers:
- Kiand, Goddess of Tempest
- Mynar, Goddess of War
- Cottis, God of Trickery

that's it for now

bye

D&D - Movie

Fri, 18 Aug 2023 08:49:42 +0000

Again: I really liked Honor Among Thieves. Baller movie. 9/10, would recommend.

But what would make a 10/10 D&D movie?

E d g a r W r i g h t

and by that I mean his writing style, which is god-tier in every respect. He's the mastermind behind Scott Pilgrim (the movie), Shaun of the Dead, and those are the only ones of his I've seen but THEY'RE REALLY GOOD. Basically he's the best comedy director on the market, because his style is so damn good.

For a D&D movie, you need to go the Scott Pilgrim route. Mix in whacky graphics for stuff like stats, action effects, etc. - instead of just going for "adventure in the D&D world," go for "a D&D game, abridged."

It would open thusly:

Quote

[All the studios and whatnot get their obligatory intros]

[Cold open to a dimly-lit tavern, camera facing down at a table where several men are gambling over dice. One of them rolls snake-eyes, much to the delight of his not-so-companions]

[Pan up to look over at a far table, where an unlikely crew has assembled]

[Cut to the table and its characters: Rogue, Fighter, Wizard, Cleric, and Gunslinger. They're all very visually distinct. The camera centers from the corner to catch all their faces: a comic-panel-esque text box appears overhead, written with an aggressively medieval font]

Text Box: They meet at a tavern.

And then they would have their intros.

I don't know what their intros would be, but the following would be clear:

Rogue is clearly in charge, has the most experience, etc. They're really aggressively edgy and no one knows why.
Fighter seems new to this whole thing, but quite eager to learn.
Wizard has experience, playing it cool for the time being. They make a big fuss over their spellbook for some reason.
Cleric is the token girl, dressed in gaudy blue robes and sporting a massive staff of healing. Everyone else is dirty and ragged - she's clean, pristine, and colorful. Might be Rogue's girlfriend.
Gunslinger does not fit the vibe at all. He had to fight hard to convince everyone that he belonged here.

The movie would happen. I don't know about much of it, but...

Rolls, actions, spells, etc; would all appear in the same text box format, perhaps with different fonts and colors depending on the character. If you've ever seen Scott Pilgrim then you know what I'm getting at - if you haven't then you need to get on that. Long battle sequences would have dice rolls, modifiers, damage counts, status effects, class abilities, and whatnot all firing off alongside the action.
At some point one of the characters would die unexpectedly (probably Cleric). A few scenes later a completely new character is introduced, played by the same actor (no one acknowledges this).
There would be a long, drawn-out scene between Rogue and Wizard arguing as to whether they need to count out all their individual gold pieces or not. It evolves into the debate of whose backpack has the most efficient adventuring gear in it, which attracts Gunslinger to introduce them to a funny magical effect that can technically allow them to carry infinite weight without the use of a Bag of Holding. Have them bring up their own weights several times, which are multiplied via text box to their Strength Scores to determine their Carrying Capacity.
Cleric would find a spell scroll, but use it before the party has a chance to Long Rest. Wizard experiences the five stages of grief.
Fighter continuously searches for items like Flame Tongues and whatnot, despite the fact that Rogue keeps insisting that they're really quite rare and hard to come by. Fighter finds one at the end of the first dungeon.
Unimportant side characters would all be named Bob, but spread thinly enough throughout the movie that it would take a rewatch to notice.
The end would be a final battle against the BBEG (obviously)
- The lot of them getting beat about and played with, up until they have a big climactic scene of accepting each others' differences and learning the true meaning of friendship. They charge the Dark Wizard all at once as he charges a spell, and as he casts it...
- Big explosion. The whole place is evaporated in instants. As the dust settles over the course of almost half a minute, a single text box appears posthumously: 20
- Cut to an office shot of the actors around a table, the director sitting at the end with a DM screen. They're all silent, contemplating the sudden turn of events.
- Director: "Well sh-"