A tool for pacing

This is a half-baked idea for managing the pacing of RPGs. You have a restricted amount of time in a play session, and plenty of flexibility in how much in-game time that can represent. (Consider something like Microscope, for the extreme example of covering eons of in-game time in a single session.)

Groups form habits about when to zoom in for detailed scenes or zoom out for montages. Maybe they read cues, spoken or unspoken, to make those decisions. Maybe the specific game gives direction on it.

I'm aiming here to have a modular mechanic that can be thrown into any game to handle this.

On the table, place a sheet with three circles marked on it. One circle is marked "play the scene", another is marked "resolve the scene", the third is marked "cut away".

During play, when a clear idea of the next scenario/scene has formed, each person places a d6 in the circle of their choice.

Putting your die in "play the scene" is a quick non-verbal communication of "I like the sound of this, let's zoom in and play through it".

Choosing "Resolve the scene" is a way of saying "I'm interested in the outcome of this situation and I want to get straight to the consequences. Let's use some mechanics of the game to quickly resolve how this turns out."

"Cut away" says "This is not what I want to focus on right now, let's skip onwards."

A player may also not place their die, which I think communicates "I'm just going with the flow," which is fine too.

What I think this would achieve is a really quick declaration of how people want to manage the next chunk of session time.

The most gentle application of this idea, is that the GM glances at that, and uses the polling data to inform (but not dictate) their decisions. (Or if it is a more democratic style game, the group do the same thing.)

To be more directed - go with the majority. If there's a tie, roll the dice to see which comes out on top.

I think everything so far is kind of not very useful. It is all equivalent to just having a quick chat. It is *maybe* a little quicker.

Where this *might* become more useful is that, while playing through a scene, you could move your die. It is a silent (hopefully non-disruptive) way to say "I think we've actually just answered the important question here, and I'm ready to move on". (I'm conscious that silent forms of communication aren't accessible to all players, maybe their are other subtle cues that could be used.)

In practical appearance, it might look something like a safety tool, but with an entirely different purpose. It is purely for the pacing of the session.

Maybe, because it's a die with numbers, you could also rotate it to show emphasis. A 1 for "I'm happy to move on, but also happy to hang out in this scene," and higher numbers for "Come on, let's move on." (I imagine that 1,2,3 give enough granularity for those opinions, and if you ever use a 6 you are banned from the group for life.)

Could this be a way for people to be rude and basically give a thumbs down anytime they don't like someone roleplaying in depth? Yes, that sucks, and I can only suggest to be cool.

I probably don't read enough games to know whether there is already something like this in use. Do let me know if there is.

Woland hexflower 6: every book is a hexflower

William from Half a Worm and a Bitten Apple has designed a collaborative realm creation project for Mythic Bastionland and it's my turn to add some weirdness to Woland.

As an experiment, I've decided to explore the idea of "every book is a sourcebook". I first saw this phrase in the FKR (Free Kriegsspiel Revolution) Discord. (They made a zine about it here: The Neverending Drachenschwanz.) The idea is to draw ideas from any source and homebrew them into your game.

I recently read The City and its Uncertain Walls by Haruki Murakami and I'll be using that to build my part of the realm.

Big ideas

The novel begins with a man looking back on a teenage romance, and the imagined town which he and his girlfriend talked about when they were together. It has three ideas which I think could work well in Mythic Bastionland:

1. An imaginary place can become real, and can be visited by those who are enchanted by it.
2. An individual human can be split into multiple independent conscious beings.
3. Certain animals can thrive in summer but be vulnerable in winter.
   

I'll be looking for ways to apply those ideas across the region of my hexflower. For lower level detail, I'll be trying something else.

Random sentence sparks

This is inspired by regular spark tables and by Tana Pigeon's "Deconstruct the Known" method which I heard about here Playing Published Adventures with Tana Pigeon. I pick two sentences at random from the novel and combine the ideas (or just use them as vague inspiration) for any prompts I need. I initially planned to use dice to pick pages and locations within a page, but it was much easier just to flick through and put my finger on a sentence without looking. Once or twice I stepped on to the next sentence if it seemed helpful to do so.

The hexflower

I rolled a d20 and got hex 6. I was pleased to get one without a holding, as I wanted to try focusing on wilderness.

I'd like to name the whole region. I find naming places hard, but I'm turning to Murakami again here. Before he was a novelist he owned a jazz bar which he named Peter Cat after his wife's cat (maybe he also finds naming things hard). Welcome to Peter's Lowlands. Who is/was Peter in this realm? I'll leave that unanswered.

The lore of Peter's Lowlands is inspired by the first Big Idea from the novel (an imaginary place can become real). In the past, the daughter of a wealthy family had poor health. She spent much of her youth bed-ridden, with a maid from Peter's Lowlands for company. Throughout the long hours of each day, the maid would tell stories of her homeland while doing her needlework. The young girl added fanciful elements and descriptions and the maid would simply say, "Indeed, that is also true."

Years later, the girl having grown into a healthy adult, she traveled to Peter's Lowlands for the first time. She was stunned to discover that every detail of their shared descriptions were true. The place was just as she had imagined it, perhaps because she had imagined it so.

Since I don't have a holding in my region, I won't say who that character is, but someone later in this project may like to add her to a council or something.

I'll step through each hex now, starting at the top and working downwards.

D4: The North

Spark sentences:

• 'As winter deepened, their golden fur turned a bleached white, making them one with the snow.'
• 'And the girl in the library used the apples to make a sweet dish for me.'
  

There are mountains in the northern part of the hex. In the Grey Season, herds of golden buffalo turn white and migrate to the mountains. When the grasslands are frozen over, the scrubby plants of the mountains sustain them. Some herds are joined by nomadic people who spend the Grey Season with the animals, protecting them from predators. The people brew a hearty cider for vitality during the winter nights. In the Green Season, the people shear the white fur from the buffalo and travel to holdings where it is a prized resource. The buffalo are not tame, but they allow this shearing after building trust through the season.

Threat: Poachers want to kill the buffalo in the Grey Season, to take their white furs. (The golden fur of other seasons is not valued.)

Valuables: A skinful of the cider, along with ritual heating and serving, is a Remedy for restoring Vigour. The nomads wear heavy white coats of buffalo fur. They are warm and offer excellent camouflage in a snowfield.

C5: The Northwest

Spark sentences:

• 'This is merely my imagination, of course, and I have no way of knowing what sadness is.'
• 'Your bare, slender shoulders under the strap of the green dress trembled under my arm.'

These are so focused on people that I think it has to be a Dwelling Landmark.

Dwelling: lovers' escape

A simple cabin, home to a couple whose love was forbidden by their families. The area is mostly grasslands with some lightly wooded areas. The couple gather flowers, mineral rocks, and even forest beetles to extract pigments for dyes and paints. They travel to the nearest holding to trade these, hoping never to be recognized by those from their former lives.

Threat: Repeatedly handling the forest beetles, from which an exotic purple dye can be made, slowly drains a person of their ability to feel emotion. The couple are in the early stages of this and they are unaware of it.

D5: The Centre

Spark sentences:

• 'As I entered the room some of the dark knotholes in the wooden walls looked at me, as if sending out a warning.'
• 'The hallway made a series of complex turns until we emerged in a dimly lit spot that I could hardly recall seeing before.'
  

A dry barren plane. The surface is fractured by countless cracks. There is little hope of traversing the plain without descending into these cracks and the network of labyrinthine canyons below. (If the Company choose to remain above, add a phase to the travel time for finding places to cross the cracks safely.) Very little vegetation grows but in the shadows of these canyons you may find patches of glarewood - stubby trees that produce eyeball-like knobs on their bark. The rock walls of the canyon are, here and there, marked with symbols by previous travelers.

 

Threat: The symbols scratched into the canyon walls do not always guide travelers to safety. (Consider using a Luck Roll to determine whether the marks are helpful or misleading.)

Area of interest: With a map, a guide, or pure luck, travelers may find their way to a nexus point among the canyons. The area is ringed with glarewood. Here, the wooden eyes turn and blink. An altar at the centre indicates this place has been used for Eldermass ceremonies.

E5: The Northeast

Spark sentences:

• 'Usually it was the job of someone else on staff, not Mrs. Soeda, to bring over tea for the boss, but I predicted that she'd bring over the tea and muffins herself.'
• 'This sense of freedom reminded me of something I'd experienced before, and I tried to remember.'

A pleasant forest, filled with birdsong. In the Gold Season, a tea-like aroma may lead travelers to a natural hot spring. Leaves of many plants, falling into the heated waters, fill the air with rich flavours. In the Grey Season, small primates relax in the waters, taking little notice of visitors.

One who eats a meal at this spring may experience a vivid memory of another meal:

1. The first meal with a current companion.
2. The last meal with a distant (or lost) loved one.
3. A great banquet.
4. A much appreciated meal, after a long hunger.
5. A reluctant meal, shared with a rival or enemy.
6. A foreign memory, from the mind of a previous visitor to this place.
    

C6: The Southwest

Spark sentences:

• 'There were lots of things about the town where my memory was fuzzy.'
• 'The moon was beautiful that night, and I was still a bit tipsy from the whisky and beer.'

(I've gone a little wild with this one.)

This hex has the appearance of the surface of the moon. Lifeless rock, craters, stark areas of light and shadow. At night, one can see an earth-like planet moving across the sky. There is no wind, nor weather of any other kind. The air is chill and motionless. Footprints and other tracks remain in place unless they are disturbed by other travelers.

Threat: It is peaceful here. Impossibly peaceful. Knights who tire of the demands of their oaths may wish to remain here and pass from all tales of the realm.

Valuables: Roll for a Knight, and choose a single item of their property to place here. It rests on a grave with an inscription on the headstone: 'I gave all I could, and they asked for more.'

D6: The South

Spark sentences:

• 'One rainy afternoon, when I was finally starting to regain full awareness, the old man sat down on a chair by the window, and as he sipped an ersatz coffee made from dandelions, he told me some stories of his past.'
• 'For various reasons, we couldn't see each other more than once or twice a month.'

(The aspects I'm focusing on here are dandelions/history and visibility/seasons.)

Vast meadows of grass and wildflowers. In the height of the Green Season, the ground is vivid with colour. As Gold Season approaches, the air is so thick with dandelion seeds, that travelers can lose sight of their companions. In the Grey Season it rains here constantly (weather rolls determine the strength of the rainfall). Mud slides down the gentle slopes of the low hills, sometimes revealing old ruins and bones.

Threats: In the Green Season, poisonous caterpillars (1d4 VIG loss if sleeping on the ground). In the Grey Season, sinking mud (impossible to Gallop and attacks made while mounted are Impaired).

Seasonal barriers: The barriers surrounding this hex appear in the Grey Season. Shifting muds reveal old unholy sites that cannot be crossed. They are hidden again when the season turns, unless someone disturbs them.

E6: The Southeast

I don't have sparks for this final hex - I'll make it an area of small mountains with sparse tree cover - but I do have a second landmark I want to use, inspired by one of the Big Ideas from The City and its Uncertain Walls (a person can be split into multiple independent conscious beings).

Hazard: The Soul Splitter

A piercing wind, recognized by its high-pitched whistle and the accompanying dizziness and headache. Most travelers flee from the Soul Splitter, or take any shelter they can find. Those that choose to push through risk being changed completely. For many ages, philosophers have speculated that the human soul is composed of three Virtues: Vigour, Clarity, and Spirit. This dread wind seems to confirm this, as one person facing it may leave as three people.

Mechanics: A character with VIG 11 CLA 8 SPI 13 GD 4 is exposed to the Soul Splitter wind. There is a 2-in-6 chance that they will be transformed into three characters, identical in appearance and knowledge. Their Virtues are:

• The self of Vigour: VIG 11 CLA 1 SPI 1 GD 4
• The self of Clarity: VIG 1 CLA 8 SPI 1 GD 4
• The self of Spirit: VIG 1 CLA 1 SPI 13 GD 4

Common clothes and items are duplicated. Special items are not duplicated, and remain in possession of the character whose Virtue seems most fitting or is allocated randomly. Each character's personality is similar to the original, though with their particular Virtue being more dominant. An affected player and the Referee should decide together who takes on the role of each of the three characters.

Art

I tried drawing something digitally but I didn't like how it was turning out, so I broke out the pen and pencils. There is a mix of aerial views and scenes from the locations. I haven't tried that approach before, but I think it's an interesting result.

Player-facing map

Referee-facing map (barriers in red)

For the other drawing, I tried to do something in a medieval style, to associate with the Soul Splitter hazard. The figure is bearing his soul to reveal his three Virtues. (I recommend trying to draw in this style for anyone who usually worries about proportions and realism! It is quite liberating.)

Wrap up

That's all for this part of the realm! Thanks again to William for running this project. I'm excited to see what comes next.

Feel free to let me know in the comments if any of these ideas make it to your table.