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Showing posts from September, 2019

Spiking the Brew with Lessons Learned

For an upcoming public library game, I was handed a first-level adventure of the familiar rats-in-the-cellar stripe,  "A Most Potent Brew,"  from Winghorn Press . In prepping the adventure and looking for ways to juice it up, I found myself relying on advice gleaned from the OSR and OSR-adjacent community. 1. Slugs are Fun I thought is was strange, when I picked up David McGrogan's Yoon-Suin , that slug-folk were one of his core playable races—until I used one. Slugs make great NPCs. A slug innkeep serving you a pot of goat stew and sloshing out adventure hooks is much more distinct than, oh, say, a gnome in the same position. Rumpleslumph the slug-man runs the Fallen Tower Brewery and Inn. He keeps a clean inn, is a good boss to the humans and halflings that work in the brewery, and has let the PCs hang around a little too long while they look for work. Now, he's getting nervous, wondering if they'll ever pay their bill. When workers break open an anc...

5e: Quick Characters

I'm going to run some 5e games at the local library. I don't want to use pre-gens, but there isn't time for a full chargen session. So I'm going to try this very quick piece of life-path generation. A few assumptions: The PCs are all from the same village, are about the same age, and grew up together. Character creation options have been limited to make the process more fleet and new-player ready. First, we all agree on the name of the village. Then, as a group, we go through the following steps, one at a time. 1. Background Who raised you? What did trade they teach you? Did you like or hate this trade? Roll 1d30 1-10 Acolyte 28-29 Mason (Guild Artisan) 61-65 Hermit 11-12 Brewer (Guild Artisan) 30-31 Painter (Guild Artisan) 66-70 Merchant 13-14 Calligrapher (Guild Artisan) 32-33 Potter (Guild Artisan) ...

NPC Name list

Every referee should have a page of names in their binder, shouldn't they? Abbo Ablerus Acot Alexander Almanzor Althalos Ancelot Asher Aster Balan Balthazar Barat Bartholomew Bashir Basil Benedict Berinon Bertram Beves Bilmer Blanko Bodo Borin Bryce Carac Caspar Cassius Cedric Cephalos Chadwick Charillos Charles Chermon Clement Clifton Clovis Cyon Dain Dalmas Danor Dawud Destrian Domeka Doran Dumphey Eadmund Eckardus Edward Adelaide Agatha Aleida Alexia Alianor Aline Alma Alys Amabel Amice Anastas Angmar Annabel Arabella Ariana Ayleth Barberry Barsaba Basilia Beatrix Benevolence Bess Brangian Brigida Brunhild Camilla Canace Cecily Cedany Christina Claramunda Clarice Clover Collette Constance Daima Damaris Daphne Demona Dimia Dione Dorothea Douce Duraina Dyota...