Dungeonhearts, my brief mashup of Monsterhearts and Dungeon World was just released on DriveThru for the folks who…
Dungeonhearts, my brief mashup of Monsterhearts and Dungeon World was just released on DriveThru for the folks who didn’t get it though the Second Skins kickstarter. It focuses on homeless teenage monsters and features art by Nate Marcel.
As threatened, here’s a draft of the first 8 pages of the Parallel Worlds supplement from the WIP Kickstarter.
As threatened, here’s a draft of the first 8 pages of the Parallel Worlds supplement from the WIP Kickstarter. Feedback and suggestions are welcome, though there’s a lot that will be covered in later sections.
https://corvidsun.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/parallelworlds-p01-08-20150820.pdf
Hey Imperilers!
Hey Imperilers! After numerous life delays, I’m finally getting around to wrapping up my commitment to the WiP Kickstarter. Apologies to all the backers for falling behind. Here’s a draft of the new cover (and tweaked title). Kyle Simons suggested that I consider running some of the content of the supplement by the folks in this community, since you’re the prime audience for it, so I may try to do that over the next few weeks.
As a reminder, here’s what this project is about:
On an alien planet, in a magical land, in a zombie apocalypse, in an alternate reality, in a far-future dystopia, or if supervillains take over… the world’s heroes still rise. How are they different and what do they fight for, across a series of worlds gone mad?
PARALLEL WORLDS is a mini-supplement for Worlds in Peril that provides guidelines for playing superheroes in a variety of alternative settings beyond urban heroics. It also provides a streamlined ruleset for use in pick-up games and one-shot adventures.
These two portions can be used together, but the guide to alternate superhero settings is also meant to be used alongside the full, standard rules for Worlds in Peril, particularly in an ongoing campaign.
We just had our 6th (?) session of our Monsterhearts campaign set at the prestigious serpent-controlled boarding…
We just had our 6th (?) session of our Monsterhearts campaign set at the prestigious serpent-controlled boarding school of Malvern-Chamberlain (Go Crusaders!), in Western Massachusetts. I really need to post all the weekly love letters from this game at some point. Here’s one of my favorites from this past week:
—
Dear Ms. Zazsu Brightly-Ladon [the Serpentine],
Your family has decided — despite not being like the hippies you were raised by — that it is time to “imminentize the eschaton” so to speak. It is time for the other major players in the game to choose which side they will stand with in the coming time of trial. You and your four cousins (Alistair, Genevieve, George Winston, and T) have each been asked to seduce and/or destroy the following five targets: Tucker [werewolf PC], Mark [infernal PC], Annie [witch PC], Eli [nephalim NPC], and Pastor Helen [Eli’s dark angel mother NPC]. The adults have left it up to you to divide these amongst yourselves while they handle some other matters, but are clearly watching to see which of the younglings handles this business with the most skill. Let’s play out the scene where you pick your targets, yes?
Are you still in your Darkest Self? If so, tell me whose life you have totally destroyed with cold venomous fury. Did you swallow them whole? If so, mark XP.
Hugs & Kisses,
Your MC
—
And, of course, the person that the Serpentine chose to swallow whole, slowly digest, and spit their bones down an old well was the girlfriend of the Infernal. So… awesome?
We have a world-shaking battle looming on the horizon between the spawn of the Dragon (the serpent brood) vs. the maybe-fallen Angel and her halfbreed childe. That will be fun.
Here’s a thing I’ve been thinking about.
Here’s a thing I’ve been thinking about. Probably our group will decide to go in a completely different direction, but could be a fun thing to try.
Originally shared by J. Walton
The Cage: A Setting Hack for Monsterhearts and for Brand Robins
Inspirations: Hunger Games, X-Men: Days of Future Past, The Coalition from Rifts.
In the near future, everybody has been told that monsters exist. After all, they were directly responsible for the collapse of civilization in the middle of the 21st century. That was definitely the monsters and not, say, the political fallout of ecological collapse and rampant epidemics.
Now, humankind lives safely in glistening walled fortress cities that protect us from the post-apocalyptic wasteland beyond and the monsters that roam the new wilderness. Here young people are taught in the paramilitary academies to loyally serve their city-state and to maintain a vigorous but ultimately toothless rivalry with those from other city-states, with whom we cooperate in manufacturing, agriculture, and security. Exhibiting internal divisions just creates openings for the monsters.
Because the threat of the monsters has not ever truly vanished. No, some monsters have managed to sneak their way into the city-states, posing as normal humans. Some traitorous humans have even betrayed their species by consorting with them or not reporting to the State Police that one of their associates or family members has been turned. Consequently, we must always be vigilant for signs of monstrous abominations in our midst.
That is why, young citizen, that your teacher has suggested we run some bloodtests. She reports that your behavior has been erratic of late and that you have missed several class meetings. Is there anything that you want to tell us?
Hi Monsters!
Hi Monsters!
So… I’ve played in several Monsterhearts one-shots, including some of the early playtests, but haven’t actually played in a multisession game yet, though I have a lot of background in the AW Engine. However, apparently I’m MCing 3-6 sessions of the big MH, starting next week, so I wanted to ask a couple questions of veteran monster-mashers.
The guidelines in the text essentially say that the first thing you do is have the players pick playbooks and start making characters, but I was wondering when and how it’s best to have a conversation about setting, vision, tone, etc. For example, if we’re playing a group of monsters in an isolated town on one of the San Juan Islands only reachable by private ferry, that’s pretty different than if we’re playing a Gossip Girl-inspired game of affluent and “Hollywood poor” kids in a big city.
Should I pitch a general “premise” to the players over email before we even get together?
Should I wait and have that discussion in person when we’re looking over playbooks?
We should do that before everybody picks Skins, yeah? The San Juan Islands premise might make someone really want to play the Selkie, right? Or to not play a different playbook.
I mean, the setting and tone obviously also vary depending on which playbooks are chosen, especially the Chosen! And I am totally anticipating some give and take, pushback from the players on some things, and adapting to their ideas and suggestions as well.
How has making these kinds of initial decisions worked best for you in practice?
The Behemoth walks!
The Behemoth walks!
Originally shared by J. Walton
For those of you who need a kaiju playbook for Apocalypse World, here’s the first full draft of mine. Excited to see it in play!
http://corvidsun.files.wordpress.com/2013/08/behemoth_081013.pdf
Here’s the alpha of Love Over Gold that I wrote last week, inspired by some “movies” of the Uncharted video game…
Here’s the alpha of Love Over Gold that I wrote last week, inspired by some “movies” of the Uncharted video game series that Christian Griffen posted links to. It’s a game of modern treasure hunting inspired by Uncharted, Tomb Raider, Three Kings, Indiana Jones, National Treasure, Into the Blue, etc.
We playtested it this weekend and it needs some tweaks, but there are few interesting things about it that I wanted to share with other AW-based designers.
1. Fixed characters, ala Lady Blackbird, but with open-ended Hx/Bonds things that create triangles.
2. Core moves are halfway between AW and WoDu. There’s one core move for rolling, but then it’s adapted for different purposes by the “stipulations” you make, which are very much like picking things off lists in AW or games with multiple core moves.
3. Question moves and action moves are unified. Two sides of the same coin. The exact questions and stipulations need some tweaking, but the concept works, I think.
4. A “module/adventure” is just a bunch of random documents that the players have to sort through and interpret to determine what to do next. Players pick where and what the next scene is about, then the GM describes it.
5. Mysteries are thus sandboxes, not pre-determined things you uncover, and the surprising stuff you find along the way is generated by drawing scraps of paper with interesting imagery written on them, ala Sign in Stranger and Roguish. Need to tighten this up a bit, but I mostly love it.
6. Harm is an interesting but pretty loose thing right now. The ideas will probably stick around, but the principles need tightening a bit.
In any event, hope it’s thought-provoking at least. Not sure when I’ll have a chance to revise and update it following the initial playtest but hopefully soon.
http://corvidsun.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/loveovergold_draft-062913.pdf
For your enjoyment and analysis.
For your enjoyment and analysis.
Originally shared by J. Walton
AW Hacking, Hardcore presents:
SUPER GRAPHITE FIGHTERS
a pencil fighting AW hack for 2 players
If at any time the other player isn’t doing what you want them to do, you can ridicule or cajole them until one of the following occurs:
– they comply
– they sort of comply, well enough to continue
– you give up in frustration and move on
– someone walks away (ending the game)
When another player makes it clear they want to pencil fight, you can do one or more of the following things:
– refuse
– make excuses
– agree with conditions
– agree
When both players have agreed to begin pencil fighting, decide who will begin as the attacking player and who will be the defending player.
When defending player holds their pencil horizontally with both hands, the attacking player can do some or all of the following:
– talk trash and ridicule the defending player
– tell stories about this other time they were pencil fighting
– complain about percieved or speculative noncompliance with the rules by the other player: past, present, or future
– hit the defender’s pencil with their pencil
While this is occurring, the defending player can do some or all of the following:
– retract their pencil from a vulnerable position
– make some noise about quitting the game
– ask for mercy
– make some unconvincing retorts
– complain about percieved or speculative noncompliance with the rules by the other player: past, present, or future
– recieve a blow on their pencil from the attacker’s pencil
When pencils clash, test the integrity of each one. Roll+total harm suffered so far; on a 12+, the pencil breaks; on a 10+, the pencil takes 2 harm; on a 7-9, the pencil takes 1 harm; on a 6-, the pencil is unharmed.
If a blow is agreed to be properly struck, the attacking player is now the defending player and vice versa. If the blow is found to be objectionable, the roles stay the same.
If one or both pencils break, determine if someone has clearly and fairly triumphed. If not, replace the broken pencil(s) and continue.
I got a super limited-edition AW hack in the mail that I wanted to share some photos of.
I got a super limited-edition AW hack in the mail that I wanted to share some photos of.
Originally shared by J. Walton
So I’m putting together a dark, twisted, vaguely Potter-esque academy of sorcery called School of the Arts for Jackson Tegu ‘s current Monsterhearts thing, and I came home from work yesterday to discover that Gray Pawn had send me a package containing his work on a Pottery AW hack. And I figured it’d be awesome but HOLY SNITCH BALLS, Hermione! I was not fully prepared.
Steel yourselves for this:
(1) Character Creation and Basic Moves booklet
(2) two copies of the Playbo– I mean Spellbooks
(3) A bunch of cool icons on cards
(4) A bunch of black cardstock pieces that are kinda weird but– WTF THEY HAVE MOONLETTERS ON THEM WHEN YOU TILT THEM IN THE LIGHT (see second photo)
(5) A handwritten, color-coded spiral notebook with 2/3 of a complete Potter-style AW hack (I attached two photos of this because it is pure awesome)
(6) And last but not least, an alphabetical lexicon of every spell cast in any of the Potter books, complete with description
Wow, just wow. So be advised that I am now fully armed for the task ahead and will be building on the badass foundations of those who have Pottered before me. Appropriately (because we’re talking Monsterhearts) I don’t think I’ve received a package quite this humbling since Joe Mcdaldno’s beautiful handmade game about the history of emo.
If you want to pitch in and make sure this happens, consider contributing to the Kickstarter, which is full of an intense assortment of goodies from some of the greatest minds currently at work in indie gaming. Also emo-tastic prep-school sorcerers from yours truly! http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1571708637/monsterhearts-second-skins
