Sunday 16 September 2012

The Verbs Of Madness

(I wrote this in E.Prime for reasons even I do not understand.)

Isle of the Unknown presents some problems. 

I need to make a random generator so my players know what their Dark Lord wants them to do.

But the things presented by the Isle and the things that grew through play do not go together well. 

We find each monster alone and in the centre of a ten mile hex, and encounter each Zodiacal Mage in one particualr position. They do not move.

Some clerics have a place.

We find some clerics and lesser mages in a state of movement, but always in the same place for the first time, after that we can find them anywhere.

Lesser NPC's have a town where they live and once found they can move between towns. I don't think it likely the players will find them anywhere else.

High level NPC's lock into particular positions. The story will only find them elsewhere for important reasons

I made an elegant and simple chart. The elegant chart did not do what I need it to. I made this ugly chart instead. I tried to use only evil verbs. Below I talk about how it works.

I used a D7 because, in the words of James Raggi 'fuck you, that's why'.

IN A PLACE 1 HEX# PASSIRISK WANTS YOU TO 1 MINDFUCK IN ORDER TO 1 MINDFUCK 1 HEX#
2 KILL 2 KILL
3 TAKE 3 TAKE
2 TOWN# 4 STEAL 4 STEAL 2 TOWN#
5 CORRUPT 5 CORRUPT
6 TERRORIZE 6 TERRORIZE
3 OOG 7 DISCOVER 7 DISCOVER 3 OOG
8 HIDE 8 HIDE
9 IMPLICATE 9 IMPLICATE
THERE IS A PERSON 4 MAGE 10 SEDUCE/PERSUADE 10 SEDUCE/PERSUADE 4 MAGE
11 BURN 11 BURN
12 DESTROY 12 DESTROY
5 CLERIC 13 BURN 13 BURN 5 CLERIC
14 MUTILATE 14 MUTILATE
15 RETREIVE 15 RETREIVE
6 MONSTER 16 ASSASINATE 16 ASSASINATE 6 MONSTER
17 CONTROL 17 CONTROL
18 KIDNAP 18 KIDNAP
7 NPC 19 MOCK AND SNEER AT 19 MOCK AND SNEER AT 7 NPC
20 EXPOSE 20 EXPOSE

HEX# Use description, or roll bandits, or add dungeon.
TOWN# Roll district/then profession/then person
OOG# The Capital. Roll Strata/then Mystery/Profession/Person
MAGE# Roll Mage/assign name if neccessary
CLERIC# Random roll/assign name
MONSTER# Roll HD/Roll Monster/Assign name if cool or very big/possibly roll lair, dungeon, caves, ruin.
NPC# use big list of people met so far. 

Roll a d7 and a d20 to find someone/something and what Passirisk wants you to do to them. Choose whatever makes sense. The roll a d7 and d20 again to find out what he intends to achieve by this.

Things needed. Monster Name List. plan of Oog. Master NPC name list.

Questions - Will this get them into enough dungeons? Have I trigger-warining'd myself with too many bad verbs? Can I see some of this shit through? Should I?

2 comments:

  1. That looks like a good start for a campaign of evil!

    One thought: with rolling a d7, if you decide to roll it on a d8 with re-rolls (rather than on the odd d7 that I know you have), perhaps it would be worth keeping a tally of all of the 8s that come up. When you hit a special limit (known only to the DM) that could be when Passirisk tires of his minions, and from that point perhaps he is sending others to kill them...?

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    Replies
    1. I think I'll keep the d7. I have to use it for something after all. But I might give them xp bonuses for perverting Passirisks evil schemes.

      I know its forcing morality on the players but they are teens and thats essentially what society is meant to do with them anyway.

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