RPG

Hi y'all, I was interested in running a Buffy style Urban Fantasy game, I had a look through some of the more obvious and popular choices like the Buffy RPG and the World of Darkness and Curseborne options, as well as the Powered by the Apocalypse games like Monster of the Week.

My problem with those tho is that they're all rules lite, and I prefer a bit more structure to my games, can anyone offer any recommendations? cos otherwise I was thinking about homebrewing over the Dark Heresy rules.

Thanks in advance!

Hello! I have been running TTRPG games for lemmy folks for a few years now and we are moving into our next system, Mothership. I have previously run (Cyberpunk Red, Shadowrun 5e, Lancer, The Burning Wheel, Pathfinder 2e, Shadowdark, Ars Magica, Masks, Delta Green, Mothership 1shots) for folks from here.

I have previous experience with D&D 5e, Blades in the Dark, Monster of the Week, ICONS, and Vampire the Masquerade 5e. I tend to run according to the rules more than homebrew, am more merciful than antagonistic, rely on prep more than improv, faction over disparate NPCs, lower amounts of explicit violence/gore, complex encounters, slow burn terror over horror.

The campaign themes are expected to touch on Body Horror, Capitalistic Horror, and Monster Horror.

We play weekly for about 3 hours starting at around 20:00 CET/14:00 EST on Thursday.

There are two to three returning players and I'm looking for another player or two. We usually run if there are 3 players.

We use Discord for voice & session scheduling and Roll20 for the virtual table top, it is a dedicated hexbear ttrpg discord server and I'm happy to help folks with roll20.

Mothership is a retro-future lightweight system that leans heavily on survival horror. The image moodboard in the post is one I made to reflect the campaign which I expect to run for about 10-15 sessions but am always happy to extend if the players want to.

The media touchstones I had in mind are: Altered Carbon, The Expanse, Alien, Matrix Reloaded. The players are the crew of a recently decommissioned cargo vessel docking at an outlaw space station on the edge of known space. The station known as Prospero's Dream is home to a handful of factions and has strict Oxygen rationing. The crew will need to find a way to scrape together credits to repair/upgrade their ship so they can get back to Inner Space or save the space station.

I will provide all the rules needed and we will have a session 0.5 where we go over some of the safety tools I like to use (X-Card & Lines and Veils), make the crew and whatever remaining time we will jump into the game on the ship as it approaches Prospero's Dream.

There is a hard line with Romance/Sexual content, and Young Children. There are veils for Extreme Violence, Torture, Adolescent Children and Player vs Player.

Feel free to respond here or DM me, I am looking to start the second week of April.

Thanks for reading!

I finally published a polished, pay-what-you-want version of the Employee Handbook that I print for players at the start of a new Orpheus campaign.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/60915972

Hey folks,

just in the last few days I've really become very interested (probably one of those ADHD micro-obsessions) with trying to play a MUD or MUSH. I'm a long-time tabletop RPG GM, and I've been diving into retro games lately. It feels like it should be right up my alley!

That said, I haven't had a great experience with my first little foray. I've had some software issues accessing some of them, and others are simply dead. It sounds like Gemstone IV is super popular, but I don't want to jump into a neutered experience (and I certainly don't want to pay to play from the outset!).

I'm hoping to try a few more, but it would be great if anyone has: (a) specific ones that they think are still great, so that I can feel more sure that it's worth the trouble of getting set up on and used to a specific MUD. (b) advice about getting started!

Thanks for any input! =)

So I’m playing Slugblaster with my friends and they’re invited to a party by an arcade designing company/sponsor. I’d love some stupid idea for arcade they could sell.

So far I’ve come up with:

• your Life : an arcade that scan you and let you play your life in a less boring way

Hi All,

Our playgroup is finally switching over from d&d to pathfinder. We just finished the beginner module and are looking for what to do next and looking for recommendations.

We are experienced RPG players but no pathfinder experience so want to avoid something too lethal. Additionally, it seems many modules skew heavily into dungeon crawls but we are looking for maybe a bit more of a healthy mix of combat and roleplay.

I've heard of the adventure paths, is that the main thing to be looking at? Or are there also more conventional, less episodic modules out there? I only have a rough understanding of what the adventure paths even are so insight there could be helpful too.

Thanks!

Great little game, at this price buy it two times

Damage by weapon rating instead of making a separate damage roll. Yes or no?

Howdy. So I’ve been running a 5e D&D game live at a table and another one on foundry. Both groups kind of collapsed over the holidays and that’s fine. I want to try a super hero RPG. I’ve been looking at Masks but it seems kind of teen focused which I’m not into. Does anyone know if this system is more adaptable than I’m giving it credit or if there is a better system they could recommend?

I wanted to share my in-progress TTRPG enhancement project, The Gold Box

Video: The Gold Box demonstrates its functionality by absolutely smoking the player in a skeleton ambush.

My eventual goal is to enable fully single player play of any adventure for any TTRPG in Foundry VTT - and along the way, the many capabilities of the program will make it a powerful "oracle"-style GM for your roleplaying group, an assistant for your GM, or the brains for a "DMPC" in a group that could use an extra player.

Right now, The Gold Box can interact in chat, roll dice (ACTUALLY roll them and react to the results, not simulate the roll itself), read character sheets/stats and modify them, create and delete combat encounters, and advance the turn order in an ongoing encounter, enough to make it capable of running a simple combat or roleplaying an NPC outside of it.

The Gold Box requires no special account setup and sends your data to nobody that you don't tell it to, and has been built from the ground up with privacy and security in mind. It is also totally free to use.

You can configure it for both remote and local LLMs, although to get the most functionality you will need a function-capable model with at least 12k tokens of context. I recommend GLM-4.7 via z.ai as the cheapest way to get the necessary performance, although there is also a "legacy mode" that can enable it to work with basic chat functionality on small local models. I've run chats with NPCs and generated descriptions with llama3.2:3b

I'd love it if any interested people here gave it a try and gave me feedback on it. Right now I'm working on the problem of spatial awareness on the game board and enabling token movement by the LLM, but I'm always interested in improving features that aren't up to snuff or add features that people seem to want.

D6x6 Dungeon Gardens (Archons March On)

http://archonsmarchon.blogspot.com/2025/12/d6x6-dungeon-gardens.html

@rpg
#ttrpg #blogospherefind

I started my first ever TTRPG experience (one-shot DnD) back in August. It’s been a blast, I wish I had got started earlier in life with it.

But beyond the fun I have in-game, what’s been the best part for me is, I have three kids ages 3-7. When I put them to bed after a session earlier in the evening, I tell them the story of what happened in our game. They love this. The day of, they will constantly ask me when I’m playing and if I’ll tell them about what happened. Last night, when they weren’t listening to their mom I told them if they don’t listen I won’t tell them the story. The look of terror on their faces…. they were good the rest of the night.

So I really want to use this as an opportunity to get them into kids’ RPGs. My problem is, I’m new to this whole world myself and I’m having trouble narrowing down the possibilities for their first adventure. They really like a fantasy world so I’m trying to stick to that. FirstFable and Hero Kids looks interesting, but I wanted to make a post to solicit ideas from the community: what are some RPGs you would recommend for little kids for their first experience with it?

Welcome back to Advent's Amazing Advice! The series where I take popular One-Shots, Adventures, Campaigns, etc., and fully prep them for both New and Busy DMs. This prep includes music, ambiance, encounter sheets, handouts, battle maps, tweaks, and more, so you can run the best sessions possible with the least stress possible!

Inspired by Stranger Things and written by Mike Wheeler himself, this adventure drops your players into a monster hunt like no other. Summoned by Sir Tristan, ruler of a remote mountain realm, your party is tasked with tracking down a fearsome creature known as the Thessalhydra, which has attacked his castle and terrorized the land.

In Part 1, your players will explore a mysterious forest, encounter travelers, priests, and farmers, until they uncover the entrance to the troglodyte caverns. There, they can fight or negotiate their way deeper until they reach the ever-shifting Cursed Labyrinth. Should they solve the riddles of the mysterious Lost Knight, they will be greeted with a portal...to the Upside Down.

Without further ado:

• Google Docs Notes for Stranger Things (Part 1): DM Notes
• Link to: Stranger Things Adventure
• Link to: Stranger Things The Hunt for the Thessalhydra Playlist
• Link to: The AAA Collection

Included in The AAA Collection is:

• Downloadable copy of DM Notes, including links to music tracks for ambiance and fights
• Special PDF for all encounters. This includes the enemy stat blocks organized neatly, along with an initiative tracker and spots to mark HP
• Custom Maps of Troglodyte Cavern

Over 7 dozen other Fully Prepped One-Shots, Adventures, and Campaigns: Click Here

As always, if you see something you think I can improve, add, change, etc., please let me know. I want this to be an amazing resource for all DMs and plan to keep it constantly updated! If you'd like to support me, shape future releases, and get content early, feel free to check out my Patreon!

Cheers,
Advent

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/post/34730867

Summary of my plot so far:

Started as the party meeting up in a hospital, which suddenly got attacked by a CULT. The hospital had a enchantment on it powered by a big fucking crystal that made everyone unable to do violence unless holding a specific charm (which all staff had.) The Hospital Director allowed this cult in and also gave them the charm, with the goal of Inverting the Enchantment - causing everyone to go into a bloodthirsty rage and want to murder each other. Party stopped them. Also they killed the Director.

The party went to the Cult headquarters, based in a ancient underground disused Royal catacombs murdered the fuck out of the leadership, but in the process, accidentally woke up a Lich. The lich didn't notice them and they noped the fuck out of there.

Found out about the lich, a hack of PointyHat's Hierarch Lich - instead of a physical phylactery they use a bloodline, only way to permakill it's to kill the bloodline or a difficult and risky ritual to cleanse the bloodline. They would have probably been fine with option A, but then find out that one of the bloodline is the adoptive father of a party member, so don't want to kill him.

They cleanse the bloodline, turning the Lich into a ghost bound to an object, then they kill the ghost.

Whilst investigating the Lich they find out he'd been gifted his powers by a Patron, once only found mention of in a few texts and never by name, only by a Title - The Deceiver.

Find out that the Deceiver was giving undead powers to basically the entirety of the Lords and Ladies of the Kingdom they live in, but the party know they can't go around killing Lords and Ladies indiscriminately, some of them are genuinely good people.

To throw another spanner in the works, an entity known only as Fox, a demigod that can hijack the bodies of all foxes on the planet and can shapeshift into a human form (man with a fox pelt scarf) contacts them. He's pretty pissed, because he was assigned a job by the gods to keep things in a stalemate, to make sure no major wars break out, and the party broke that stalemate by killing the Hierarch, and so he just goes "FUCKING YOUR PROBLEM NOW MATE"

D I'm trying to plot as the BIGGER BAD, the endgame problem (like, who they'll fight at level 15-20). And he's a Fae that tried and failed to reach Godhood and was punished for it, and now he's trapped by Archons of Order, Fate and Truth in a Antimagic Bubble in the Astral Plane

D He's been making these deals with a clause that when the people who make them die, all their accrued power goes back to him, with the goal of weakening his prison. And he's been manipulating the party intentionally, to make them kill people for him.

Which the party now knows. And they're stuck in that if they don't kill these bastards, they cause untold misery to innocents. But if they do kill them all, D will escape (and continue to try and achieve Godhood, probably killing millions doing it.)

They're currently looking for loopholes. And deciding that it's still best to kill the bastards, but having a plan brewing in the background for stopping D from escaping.

They have leads on some of the undead Lords, and they know one person managed to break their contract with D, by overwriting it with a contract with an Archfey (autumn court), only issue is that Archfey is unwilling to exit the Fae realms, they'd have to come to her

Welcome back to Advent's Amazing Advice! The series where I take popular One-Shots, Adventures, Campaigns, etc., and fully prep them for both New and Busy DMs. This prep includes fully fleshed-out notes, music, ambiance, encounter sheets, handouts, battle maps, tweaks, and more, so you can run the best sessions possible with the least stress possible!

*New: For 2025, I'm updating all my old work to be more accessible for the Visually Impaired! Check out the links below, which contain improved notes with larger font, better contrast, color-blind features, and more!

Dragons of Stormwreck Isle is a level 1-3 Adventure, the most recent Starter Set, and successor to The Lost Mine of Phandelver, released by WoTC. In it, your players will sail to the titular Stormwreck Isle, an island shaped by an age of conflict between Chromatic and Metallic Dragons. They'll be able to befriend kobolds, explore fungal grottos, fight those twisted by Orcus, and perhaps save the very island itself!

Have your players create their own characters or jump right in using the Pre-Gens that are built with backstories integrated into the plot!

If you've used my previous notes, you'll know that I take Adventures such as these and do all the difficult and time-consuming book-to-session conversions so you don't have to! I do my best to include Ambiance for every scene, custom battle maps, handouts when needed, spell sheets, encounter sheets, and more!

This may all sound familiar, but seeing as this is a Starter Set, I think it's important to reiterate:

• Read the Adventure: I know surprising, but it can be extremely confusing when you don't know where everything leads to.
• Consider the needs of your group: As you've heard or are about to hear a million times, every table is different. If you plan on combining this with a campaign, you'll have to make tweaks here and there.
• These notes aren't meant to be the end-all-be-all: Tweak to your heart's content, and don't consider any of what's written to be set in stone. For me, having notes like this helps give me the confidence to go off the rails and follow along with what my players want. It helps me understand where things are meant to go and why. Having that understanding allows me to guide the players and create other new and interesting stories. These are all things that will come with experience, though, so don't freak out and enjoy the journey!

Without further ado:

Dragons of Stormwreck Isle:

• Part 1 - Dragon's Rest
• Part 2 - Seagrow Cave
• Part 3 - Cursed Shipwreck
• Part 4 - Clifftop Observatory

*Important Errata for Pre-Gens

• The Rogue’s Investigation bonus should be +3, not zero.
• The Wizard should have a +2 DEX save, not +3.
• The High Elf should have longbow proficiency

Over 7 dozen other Fully Prepped One-Shots, Adventures, and Campaigns: Click Here

As always, if you see something you think I can improve, add, change, etc., please let me know. I want this to be an amazing resource for all DMs and plan to keep it constantly updated! If you'd like to support me, shape future releases, and get content early, feel free to check out my Patreon!

Cheers,
Advent

Let us write in detail about those minor characters (tertiary characters) from one of your favourite RPG that stuck with you and why.

For me, from Fallout New Vegas:

Aurelius of Phoenix: I am Italian and I love studying ancient Rome and Greece culture, so I am partial: he is stern but fair and awards competence and sacrifice, perfectly encapsulates what a true experienced Roman Centurion would be if he lived in a post-apocalyptic setting with the mentality gained from it, he is very tall (2.05 meters tall and his in-game model is customized to reflect that too, only other 2 human characters are custom-sized), badass in-game body language, iconic setting, and charismatic to the point it make you like the Legion in a twisted way if you verge toward ambigous evil.

**Calamity: **Very interesting 200 years old irradiated, virtually immortal woman that has lived hundreds of different roles, extremely erudite, behind her unfortunate look lies a gem of a woman, wish real-life girls and women were as open-minded and versatile as her.

Old Lady Gibson: Friendly granny with an extremely powerful customized sawed-off shotgun and cute but deadly wolves-dogs as her retainers.

**Driver Nephi, Cook Cook and Violet: **Restored cut-content via mod, they have HILARIOUS dialogue that shows how twisted and unhinged each one of them is, Nephi's "GET FUCKED" said in a hilariously monotone voice turned meme some years ago

**Dale Barton: **A merchant that tells you the truth, which is "Legion is made of mostly assholes, but if you follow their rules, merchants and traders are treated properly and their craft respected, instead of being overtaxed and overrulled by peers with much more money to invest"

Diane: A woman that studied chemistry and science and started an illicit drug traffic by herself with the help of her brother, strong and independent the way I like it, not evil per se, more like in need of money to survive

**Easy Pete: **Best tutorial town character ever, no contest, very relatable and subtly humorous.

Elder McNamara: A character that is indeed sort of a zealot BUT accepts the truth if given proof and WILL act accordingly, "character growth" done properly, a true hero after all.

Major Knight: Best repairer in the base game and found very early, shows that among incompetent people there are those that are true worthy the own grain of salt, even if at an intermediate rank.

**Miss Fortune: **Never seen again, the female counterpart to the Mysterious Stranger, memorable because of her only in-game appearance.

Pretty Sarah: A survivor or violent rape, real women should learn from her on what really is a devastating event and how to cope with it as a strong woman, sadly underdeveloped

Gloria Van Graff: What a cunt, through restored cut content, you see how much more wicked she is than base-game, plus always via restored cut content, I side with the Legion to have her exterminated during the botched weapons deal

**Meyers: **Ex-convict for a bullshit reason that can be redeemed as the local town sceriff, and best option too

Ranger Andy: A broken man that can be reheartened with wise kind words and will pay you back with useful knowledge

R**anger Stella: **Only woman to ever turn combatant into the Legion arena which only accepts males and animals, she killed experienced legionaries by herself, truely exceptional

Rotface: Cut-content for him, he has a quest where related to how much he is paid and how you answer to specific questions, he will turn either good but gullible, good but aware, evil but honorable, evil but asshole

**Ruby Nash: **Granny with a revolver and great knowledge on how to produce Radscoprion Venom Casserole, tasty but lethal if you have canker sores in your throat

**Santiago: **Lovable lying rogue

Trudy: First bar-tender you meet, very talkative and friendly, treats you well

Vagrant: New Vegas residential idiot that has hidden sophisticated dialogue if you are temporarily or permanently at intelligence 3\10 or less.

Swank: What if Benny was truely lovable and friendly and not just a ploy, would play card games with him all day along

............

What about you?

It's been a long time since I last used #FoundryVTT How's it holding lately? @rpg

cross-posted from: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/9446561

I miss WEG Star Wars...

cross-posted from: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/9446561

I miss WEG Star Wars...

Welcome back to Advent's Amazing Advice! The series where I take popular One-Shots, Adventures, Campaigns, etc., and fully prep them for both New and Busy DMs. This prep includes fully fleshed-out notes, music, ambiance, encounter sheets, handouts, battle maps, tweaks, and more, so you can run the best sessions possible with the least stress possible!

*New: For 2025, I'm updating all my old work to be more accessible for the Visually Impaired! Check out the link below, which contains improved notes with larger font, better contrast, color-blind features, and more!

We're back at it again with one of my favorite creators, Winghorn Press, from the much-loved A Wild Sheep Chase! This Level 3 One-Shot will have your players solving a mystery that might just shake them to their very core!

A fearsome hound has been seen prowling the mist-soaked moors surrounding Cabell Manor, but what is the foul beast searching for? Is there any truth to the rumors tying the family to an ancient devilish evil, or is it just a local superstition?

If they want to solve the mystery, your players will need to keep their wits just as sharp as their swords…

Without further ado:

• Google Docs Notes for The Hound of Cabell Manor: DM Notes (Preview)
• (New) Link to: DM Notes for the Visually Impaired
• Link to: The Hound of Cabell Manor Playlist 
• Link to: The Hound of Cabell Manor PDF
• Link to: The AAA Collection

Included in The AAA Collection is:

• Downloadable copy of DM Notes, including links to music tracks for ambiance and fights
• (New) DM Notes for the Visually Impaired
• Special PDF for all encounters. This includes the enemy stat blocks organized neatly, along with an initiative tracker and a spot to mark HP
• Spell Sheet for Final Boss
• Custom Maps

Over 7 dozen other Fully Prepped One-Shots, Adventures, and Campaigns: Click Here

As always, if you see something you think I can improve, add, change, etc., please let me know. I want this to be an amazing resource for all DMs and plan to keep it constantly updated! If you'd like to support me, shape future releases, and get content early, feel free to check out my Patreon!

Cheers,
Advent

My players have been working on a racing plot for a while now. I’ve generated a node based map that will be the course they’ll navigate with some interesting things along the way. We’ve built them a Mad Max style vehicle and I’ll be using a modified set of rules when engaging with the other racers. And they’ve even made a arch rival of another racing team.

The only part I haven’t figured out is how to run the other racers behind the scenes. I don’t really want to do a full simulation of 20 contending race teams, but I want to be to give my players updates as the race progresses so they can feel the pressure of competition.

I’m not opposed to cheating like Mario Kart and doing a little rubberbanding. But I want something quick to resolve at the table. I’ve also thought about pre-generating the race and then the players would run through it like a scripted event. I’m just worried about how to dynamically adjust if they take out some of the other racers.

Has anyone run a race at their table before?

I made a Conspyramid Template for Obsidian.Md Canvas. Here's a link to download it (from wormhole app)

I started with Cypher System (medium-low crunch, cinematic, genre-agnostic TTRPG) a few years ago because someone on Reddit recommended it for people with GM fatigue. I’ve been really into it ever since. The system makes it easy to homebrew monsters and adventures, and there are tons of different setting and genre books. The new version addresses some long-standing complaints about the old one—for example, taking damage gives you “wounds” instead of directly reducing your stat pools.

The crowdfunding campaign is doing great, I’m really excited about it.