Minimum Viable Setting

A working definition: the least amount of prep I would need before running the first session of a campaign. Not just a single session, mind you — a whole campaign. For a campaign, one needs a setting with a sufficient amount of hooks and things going on to keep the PCs embedded for at least a few months of in-game time. It's really easy to get bogged down in endless prep with a scope this big — so what's the absolute minimum? 

It could come in a variety of packages — I could imagine maybe a paragraph or page of prose that describes the part of the world where the PCs begin. That might work for some people. Me, I like tables. I also really like the hazard die (aka overloaded encounter die), and a while back over on the NSR Cauldron there was a discussion about the possibilities in expanding the die into a d66 table — each of the six results would drill down to a further six sub-results for some more detail. Could this be the key to a Minimum Viable Setting? I'm willing to give it a try.

 

First, let's recap the hazard die. It's a d6 with the following results — usually meant to be rolled every dungeon turn:

1. Encounter/setback

2. Exhaustion/fatigue

3. Expiration (clear condition)

4. Local/environmental change

5. Percept/foreshadowing/omen

6. Advantage/boon

Right away, I can easily see how I'd expand most of these results into a d66 table. "Encounter" is an obvious one — we'll get d6 encounters from this.  "Omen" would be d6 results keyed to those encounters. A blanket "Exhaustion" category doesn't quite give me enough to build a setting off of — so let's call it "Weather," with d6 results, each of which could cause some sort of fatigue or negative impact. "Environmental change" — this'll be an environmental obstacle or "Hazard," something to be negotiated/avoided. "Boon" is cool — we'll create a category where something positive happens. I've never been a huge fan of "Expiration" (e.g. torches go out, rations spoil) so let's make this an interesting "Discovery" — something with the potential to be either positive or negative that warrants further investigation.

A basic rubric could look something like this (season to taste):

1 Encounter

1-2 faction A — 3 faction B — 4 faction C — 5 unintelligent beasts — 6 powerful monster

2 Omen

1-6 keyed as above

3 Weather

1-3 mundane 4-6 magical/divine

4 Hazard

1-6 increasingly deadly or unavoidable

5 discovery

1-6 increasingly weird or mystical

6 boon

1-6 increasingly powerful or game-breaking

Of course, this is all very loose and flexible. Once we get some ideas brewing, we'll include call-backs to previous entries, to give the setting some cohesion. Here's an example thing I've been working on — it draws liberally from some favourite science-fantasy materials (Vaults of Vaarn, Anomalous Subsurface Environment, Acid Death Fantasy).

 

Zirah, the Reach of Regret

1 Encounter

1. Nairk, the Sorcerer of Brass

2. d4 brass synthetes (clockwork androids created by Nairk)

3. 2d6 pine-ghouls (broken sickrock spirits)

4. d6 cultist jossers (attempting to raise the divine)

5. d6+3 turbo reptiles (bioluminescent)

6. hellspawn tarrasque (formed from godparts and ichor)

2 Omens

1. ozonic scent of recent sorcery

2. stockpile of rusted cogs and springs

3. half-buried sickrock emits pale glow

4. a small shrine burning pungent incense

5. chittering mating howls echo in the distance

6. terrible earth-shattering footsteps draw near

3 Weather

1. acid rain

2. howling winds

3. oppressive humidity

4. ear-shattering god scream

5. grotesque disruption of physics 

6. corona of light

4 Hazard

1. fractured craters

2. narrow maze-like canyons

3. poisoned river

4. mounds of toxic slag

5. fuming acid geyser

6. sudden earthquake

5 Discovery

1. a long-neglected village

2. gilt domes

3. field of glass

4. the pylons of confusion

5. riddling sphinx

6. ichorous body of a dead god 

6 Boon

1. abandoned research outpost

2. decontaminated sickrock

3. unholy black blade

4. pool of potent ichor

5. visionary prescient dreams

6. fountain of youth

Instructions for use

Once you've got the master d66 table set up, roll a few times to figure out some hooks. Combine rolls for hookier hooks. Local foragers have gone missing — glowing reptiles spotted on the outskirts of town — the magistrate is offering a bounty. Earth-shaking rumblings have unleashed toxic gases — the church wants samples to develop an antidote. A dead-eyed messenger arrives from a forgotten village — their elders have discovered a source of awesome power and must be stopped.

Once the party picks a hook, determine how many "legs" of the journey must be completed to reach the destination — a "leg" being an abstract amount of time in which one event occurs* — and then roll the requisite number of events. Drop in a favourite dungeon at the destination if you like. Adventure happens.

Other considerations: Take lots of notes as the sessions go on to allow the emergent narrative to further influence the setting. Swap out, alter, or elaborate upon entries after they're rolled. Build new tables for other regions in the setting.

This post owes its existence to the April RPG Blog Carnival.

*the concept of "legs" was taken from Freebooters on the Frontier 2e.