Here is my public slush
pile, organized by genre.
Heroic Fantasy
- A group of powerful heroes set out from the last shining city of
good to reconquer the evil, swampy lowlands for humanity.
- System: 4e/Icon
- kinda cliche though
- Mausritter: disgraced mouse knights. Mausritter + Mythic Bastionland
(???)
Science Fantasy
- The apocalypse is happening in every place, in every time. A post
apocalyptic landscape with both teleportation circles and shuttle launch
pads serve as strange, liminal dungeons.
- System: Mashup of Cairn and hacks.
- Character generation: choose or roll a time period: past, present,
far future, distant future. For past, roll a Cairn character; present,
Liminal Horror; far future, Plerion; distant future, Vaults of Vaarn.
Then proceed as normal.
- different players on different systems? but how fight monsters?
Weird Settings
- Wild west but dark fantasy creatures. Maybe some steampunk in there
as well. You go to hunt down a bandit, and end up in the den of a
monstrosity,
Ultralight
- Everyone wants a political/GoT/Dune style political game, yes? Then
make the game entirely that. Every player is leader of a faction, and
every game session is a meeting of the leaders. Very few rolls, all
negotiations and debates at the table. Players make deals, strike trade
agreements, and go to war. GM deals with consequences between
sessions.
- To run ultralight, you must have a strong sense of expectations in
genre. Not necessarily to meet the expectations, but also to subvert
them in clever ways.
Horror
- Exploration as Horror: The Anti–conquistador. Journeying through
strange places, seeing awful and horrible structures, fighting off
creatures double your size but of a wholly inhuman shape. Players show
up to the table with wonder and leave with dread as they think back on
how they would ever expect something pleasant.
- Rando scenarios:
- Human roadkill
- ghost possessing books in a library, driving people to do awful
things
- cat-like vampire. Hyperintelligent predator.
Aphoristic System Thoughts
- Include more items, not more mechanics.
Random Thoughts
- Dune-like settings need some player powers, especially if
you want to capture the politics. Players have to be someone worthwhile
to have as an ally. That doesn’t need to mean survivability is high, but
it does mean that you have to feel like you have some oomph behind
attacks.
- No mechanical changes necessary, just make strong-sounding monsters
with mediocre stats.
Short Adventure Prompts
Next time you’re planning a new campaign or one-shot, for DnD or for
any RPG, instead of having the DM decide for everyone what the adventure
is, have everyone come up with adventure hooks that everyone thinks is
cool. A good format for short adventure pitches is “What if we were
group doing mission in setting, but obstacle.” For example,
- What if we were forensic engineers investigating a mine collapse
deep underground, but the isolation may drive us crazy?
- What if we were survivors trying to make it to a safe haven in a
post-apocalyptic America, but zombies with parasitic fungus crowd the
cities?
- What if we were a space cleanup crew ransacking a derelict ship, but
we heard something huge move down near the reactor chamber?
- What if we were the heads of rival thieves’ guilds planning heists
in ancient Alexandria, but the city-state is enforcing a strict
curfew?
- What if we were cavemen trying to cross the Bering land bridge, but
winter is almost upon us?