RIP OFF YOUR SKIN AND KILL YOUR GOD.

Out of game. Kind of. 

I don't care about Fun. I'm not competing in the Funlympics because it's a participation trophy and if your table isn't having Fun (whatthefuckareyoudoing): stop. Fun is bottom-of-the-barrel; assumed unless you're an idiot actively spending time with people you hate or a game you hate.

Among all of the tips, tricks, gimmicks, whatever you want to call the smoke & mirrors bullshit that the bulk of GM "advice" is vomited forth as, a hell-of-a-lot of it is painfully allergic to Roleplay. Forgive me for giving you a "just trust me bro," but if you've looked at the TTRPG space for any amount of time you'll come across GM-centered advice that tries to convince you-the-GM of some chore to impose upon or sneak into a game for a particular outcome, likely some kind of vibe or feel. This is not an attack on any one particular style of game, group, scene, none of that tribalism crap, Roleplaying as an element of a Roleplaying Game is disturbingly lacking and has never quite gotten the attention it deserves until recently.

And the main culprit, the thief of the beauty of Roleplaying, that demiurgic-shithead-clockwork-god at the head of the table; They Of Many Hats: The Rules Arbiter, The Bean-Counter, The Terrain-Architect, The Worldbuilder, The Handholder, The Ignorant Puppeteer, The Jabberer-Who-Must-Speak-Speak-Speak-Speak-Speak-Speak-Speak-Speak-Speak-Speak-Speak-Speak. 

Fuck that guy. Kill-him-dead. At least for a while. 

(GoW3)

Internet DM Brennan Lee Mulligan's Polygon Quote from 2024 provoked this ramble from me. The quote:

"[Calling D&D a combat-oriented game] would sort of be like looking at a stove and being like, This has nothing to do with food. You can’t eat metal. Clearly this contraption is for moving gas around and having a clock on it. If it was about food, there would be some food here. [...] What you should get is a machine that is either made of food, or has food in it. [...]*

*I’m going to bring the food. The food is my favorite part. [People say that] because D&D has so many combat mechanics, you are destined to tell combat stories. I fundamentally disagree. Combat is the part I’m the least interested in simulating through improvisational storytelling. So I need a game to do that for me, while I take care of emotions, relationships, character progression, because that shit is intuitive and I understand it well. I don’t intuitively understand how an arrow moves through a fictional airspace."

"...I take care of emotions, relationships, character progression because that shit is intuitive and I understand it well."

And the players don't? They players couldn't possibly be expected to control or be mindful of such elements and are expected to be the interactive audience in your machinations? Is the role of the DM/GM/Host truly defined by their ability to wrangle cats and orchestrate a grand vision? Why? Why aren't the other players not given a greater responsibility than "be cool and show up - answer my choose-your-own-adventure prompts and roll dice when I tell you to." Gamers like Brennan will claim that's not what's going on at their table, but their streamed games speak volumes louder than their memories. 

(Congtrats on the Garden, I guess)

By Roleplaying, I do not mean play-acting or voice acting. Anyone who has ever genuinely Roleplayed  and been immersed in a character knows those are not the same thing. 

The fundamental element of Roleplaying that I believe has been squelched is Character Evocation. The Players should be expected to Evoke their Character. They must be capable of conjuring their discussed Idea-Form in their mind's eye and express it well enough that it infects the other people at the table and spawns an approximate version of that idea-form in another's mind's eye - enough for it to be interacted with with others. The GM's ultimate and solitary goal should be to Evoke the Idea-Form that is the Otherworld and its inhabitants. The participants must give themselves to the Idea-Forms and let themselves be "possessed" by them. 

That's a lot of flowery pseudo-occult bullshit just to say, "fucking Roleplay consistently and play pretend and speak clearly, dummy." I don't believe in anything supernatural/stitious is involved here, don't get me wrong. An excellent part about wearing someone else's skin (in a group or solo) is that by giving yourself to these Idea-Forms, you can find out more about who you are as a person, however insignificant or fleeting a given revelation may be. Its the immersion in a character and their perception that I've found myself addicted to - not the systems and protocols of the game but their outcomes and not all systems and protocols leave room for this immersion or contribute to it. 

(Crowley's Thoth Moon)

Many will opt to ignore Character Evocation all-together, choosing to instead adopt a role provided or imposed upon them by the game and seeking to "beat" or explore a given scenario instead of exploring the possible decisions, thoughts, or actions of one's character. Alternatively the ignorant flowery spotlight "roleplayer" who seemingly exists in their own world and ruins what immersion those around them may have, is also a detriment to the group-based activity if the purpose of the group is to adopt adventuring roles.

Most GMs that I have played with or seen in cesspool Actual-Plays on YouTube simply need to learn when to stop speaking, especially those of allegedly veteran groups, and trust their players. For the love of Christ, trust your players. This isn't a matter of being a "BRUTAL GM WHO DOESN'T HELP THE PLAYERS AND LETS THEM STARVE AND DIE." No shit, do that. Do they want you to burp and wipe them too? 

If you all agreed to game rules, why wouldn't the players... who agreed to those rules... need a reminder of those rules? New rules that people need reminders on? Worry about them later. Why would one remind them in the middle of the game instead of them letting a given affliction afflict them and for the player to express that in-character? And if your player has some issues with remembering those rules, play your game. If the player accidently god-modes or otherwise ignores the rules, talk about it after the session. Keep Roleplaying. Trust Each Other. Vet Your Players. The GM should describe the world being interacted with and how its reacts. That's it. Evoke the World and its inhabitants. That is your job. If you want to have cool tools to help you in your job, great! But Keep Roleplaying. 

I first discovered this focus or "revival" of interest in Roleplaying on YouTube and it has a couple different names. "Hard Roleplaying" and "4D Roleplaying." The former being popularized by the late Shawn Driscoll aka Shonner and the closely-related 4D Roleplaying still being discussed by a few different RPG-Tubers. 

4D Roleplaying in-name started off as a joke and it's provoked pretty idiotic and irrelevant disputes  based on perceived "pretentiousness" of "ROLEPLAYING IN THE FOURTH DIMENSION." I've personally redubbed the "D" as degree°, for me, the various 1-2-3-4Ds aren't distinguished layers of "imagined reality" but more levels of engagement with the game world. Defined (based on my understanding), they are:

1D: Audience. The player showed up, jokes around but does not engage with the activity in any meaningful way and is likely there just to spend time with others. This is fine.

2D: Gamer. They're engaging with the rules of the game being played akin to a board game, they are not interested in Character Evocation. They speak to the Host directly out-of-character and only engage with the game world as-necessary to play the game. 

3D: Roleplayer. Engaging solely through the game world from the character's perspective, questions for the Host are channeled through in-character dialogue or narrated interaction with the world. Character is likely broken minimally  in order to prompt rolls or declare a statistic if it is mandatory to be shared. The necessity and frequency of this character breaking is heavily dependent on the agreed-upon system. 

4D: Roleplayer+. As 3D but the player does not leave their narration open-ended for the Host to clarify in the game world. The player adds to the world in their dialogue/narration and the rest of the participants adapt as-necessary. The extent of a single player's worldbuilding ability is agreed upon prior in the group's Social Contract. 

Social Contracts are crucial for this style of Roleplaying and customized for every game and table and are often extensions of the "Session 0" wherein you would also discuss the desired game and Characters. The Social Contract outlines the agreed-upon expectations and limits of the Narration. It's likely that you've played a game where the different "Degrees" of roleplaying have shown their face casually or played in systems that sound like or very well may be 4D-adjascent. The key difference is that a 3/4D table strives to stay locked into character. Roleplay in your favorite game that you like the resolution system in, ideally one with few to no questions or discussions necessary to simply check success or failure for. 

I dig d100 or other set-but-malleable target number systems for this, always knowing what you need to roll to succeed is cool and cuts down on out-of-character talk. That being said, Demon City (the Tarot-Card based system that recently came out in physical print and annihilates all of its contemporaries) isn't half bad for Hard Roleplaying either. Sure, you may need to break character to inquire or provide an intensity or contested stat but beyond that everything else is easily intuited and relies on players to pay attention to what's going on (a shared feature of DC & Hard Roleplay groups). Depending on the style of game, I would discuss who grants bonus throws. Base-line, keep it as is and have the Host declare Throws gained and lost. If you disagree, shut up and roleplay and discuss it after the game. If your group is high-trust, have players take their own throws. Make them in charge of their own deck. If a player seems cheaty and is swimming in senseless throws, talk to them after the game. You did vet them, right?

(Demon City. You did buy it, right?)

Roleplaying does not prevent you from playing the game you want to play with the tools you play with. It may prevent you from playing with certain people opposed to a continual stream of roleplay and that's cool. I'd personally much rather play with a consistent group instead of one that bounces between styles within a single session. 

Roleplaying should not prevent you from engaging with the game world or solving a problem using player skill, admittedly, the shifted priority does reduce its importance/frequency and instead relies more on a player's Roleplaying. Either is fine. A group that that exalts 2D play and player skill is great. Their agreed-upon goal is just not to Roleplay. They're gaming and that distinction is important when setting group expectations. My issue, up until recently, was the lack of vocabulary or understanding of what was going on at the bulk of tables when the medley of players claim to be agreeable but end up visibly detaching from the game and giving the vapid "I had fun" when feedback is given because that's the same shit advice spewed out; we had fun so it's all good. Fuck that. Fun is not enough. 

The OSR was a breath of fresh air because it celebrated the GM and the player-targeted challenges in a hobby (at the time) full of player-build centric nightmare games of lonely fun and number-crunching better served in a videogame. The GMs of OSR games are encouraged to engage in some of their own lonely fun with more thoughtful dungeon/adventure creation in addition to improv through the abundance of random tables that came/come out of that scene, (ideally) enhancing the GMs ability to evoke a convincing game world ("""verisimilitude""" as they say). A negative for me is the common dismissal of Character Evocation. Characters feel like a means to an end, a direct Avatar of the player or GM serving a function, not an emulated separate mind in the Otherworld to be explored alongside it.

(Peak OSR right here, I tell you what)

 A common Social Contract Rule is for the players to narrate certain test results while the GM/Host narrates the opposite type of result. Most commonly, the player narrates their successes whereas the GM narrates their failures. In High-Trust Horror games, this is sometimes swapped. This is in direct opposition to the the "mother may I" style of play where the players continually asking their GM a list of questions, hoping it leads to their success. Good. If the player is god-moding and narrating themselves as significantly more powerful than what was discussed during session 0, effectively playing a different game, then that will warrant discussion after the game. 

Roleplaying in this context is NOT the same thing as the narrative-centered play of PBTA or story games, it's much more natural and still grounded in the agreed-upon game world. It's assumed that the Narration is the natural result of relevant success/fail test or simply the intuition/imagination of the participants; the tests exist, as usual, to provide clarity or suggest answers to an unclear outcome as they always have. Primary difference is that now the player/character can narrate/speak and dictate the outcomes of their own efforts after confirming they have succeeded.

All that extra stuff expected to be done by the GM is secondary fluff; worldbuilding, game design, voice acting, etc, do not have a direct bearing on the game if the goal is Roleplay. These additions MAY enhance Roleplay but they are not required and may be detrimental if too distracting. If your GOAL is more "2D" and you expect strategic combat encounters or interesting procedures and are uninterested in Roleplay; make that known. Do not suffer the fool who wants to roleplay at the wrong table - few things are more pitiful than the lone Roleplayer in a table of Gamers. 

If you're still here, read Shonner's book. It'll give you more of an idea of what I'm about rambling here. With examples. The actual text explanations of the style are strange but it serves as a good litmus test of if the Hard/4D Roleplay is for you if I haven't already scared you away. It's free and short. He's gone now but he left quite the impression on the folks that stumbled upon his rants. 

Rest in Peace, Mr. Driscoll. 

Alone Against the City

A Solo Demon City hack.

Generally solo Demon City can fully function with the Mythic GM Emulator using dice or drawing twice as a "d100" but that doesn't translate the ~~VIBES~~ that come from using just the Tarot. I propose defining two "Phases" to your Solo Demon City game: Investigation and Horror; your typical solo play protocol of  asking the GM Emulator/Oracle; and the addition of a "threat level" called the Demon Factor, a tweaked/redubbed Chaos Factor from Mythic. 

You begin play with the Investigation Phase and a single "Solo Player" deck. It has the full "minor arcana," minus the courts. Shuffle the courts and major arcana together and add, without revealing, however many you'd like to the Solo Deck (I suggest 3). During the Investigation Phase, all tests utilize the Solo Deck, whether the Solo Player or the World. During the Investigation Phase, the player character is either ignorant of, helpless against, or struggling to comprehend how to approach the Horror. 

Play is much of the same as regular Demon City. Same throws, declared actions, stats, etc. If you've ever ran a game, you know how to be impartial and roleplay multiple characters as necessary. 

Your character *knows* however much you want them to know. Play the Victim mid-trauma and try to escape. Play the Problem already surrounded by an overly generous support group. It's Solo, do whatever. 

Note down somewhere the Demon Factor of your game, it begins at 5, can drop to 1, and can rise to 10. 

Whenever you have a yes/no question about the game world that would be answered by the Host, draw a single card. If it's not a yes/no question, make it one. If the card drawn is higher than or equal to your Demon Rating, the answer is Yes, below is No, the Aces are Extreme No, 10s are Extremely Yes. If your only option for yes or no is 10 or 1 respectively, you cannot get an Extreme result. An Extreme result isn't much different from your normal answer other than it being EXTREEEEME. Whatever you asked, you got it/didn't get it and then some.

At the end of every scene during the Investigation Phase, if your character was in control of what was going on, Lower the Demon Factor by 1. If things got out of hand for your character, Raise the Demon Factor by 1. During the Horror Phase, this is flipped and if a scene is concluded with your character in control, the Demon Factor rises. What defines a scene is up to personal taste, generally moving on from an encounter or engagement worth note during the "cooldown" period is when I consider moving the Demon Factor. 

When beginning a scene, propose it to the Oracle akin to how you would normally ask a question. If the card thrown is at or below the Demon Factor, the scene begins as you expect. If it throws over, the scene is Adjusted. That Adjustment should be derived directly from the card, otherwise utilize Mythic's Scene Adjustment table:

1. Remove a Character

2. Add a Character

3. Reduce/Remove an Activity 

4. Increase an Activity

5. Remove an Object

6. Add an Object

7-10. Make 2 Adjustments  (ignoring duplicates of itself) 

If you have any questions regarding solo gaming or what it "looks like," YouTube is a good place to start for examples and advice.

The Investigation Phase is over and the Horror Phase begins once the Horror Deck is made. The Horror Deck is made once it has claimed a 1-to-10 from the Solo deck's minor Arcana and has discovered all of its Major Arcana. Major Arcana are immediately claimed by the Horror the moment they are drawn in any way, either in asking the Oracle or from a typically thrown test by an NPC or the PC, immediately interrupting and complicating the scene. A minor Arcana can only be claimed when it is drawn when consulting the Oracle. Generally, every *new* minor arcana should be claimed by the Horror deck but if it does not make sense or ignite inspiration in the moment, ignore the claim and just keep playing. Every time the Horror Deck claims a card, it should be a clue to resolving the Horror in some way; a Truth against the Horror at hand. Shuffle the Solo Player Deck as you see fit; reconsider a "discarded" minor arcana after initially refusing it and add it to the growing Horror Deck, possibly manifesting as a response to reconsidering past notes or belated revelations. 

When interpreting what the clue may manifest as in the moment, do the obvious and interpret how the card pertains to the given situation. Use the end pages of Demon City or any other explanation of the tarot you may prefer. If that fails, mix in the Focus/Event tables from Mythic. If that fails and you still have no idea how to interpret a scene or clue, take a break or skip it.

During the Horror Phase, the decks are split. The Game World is now dominated by the essence of the Horror at hand and anything that isn't the Solo Player Character's action pulls from the Horror Deck and we return to a much more traditional Demon City game, the World now using the Horror deck. Whenever the Horror Throws, keep the Highest card thrown by the Horror Face-up in a "discard pile." If you reference the Oracle and the card thrown matches the Horror's top discard, the Horror has interrupted the scene again and has blatantly afflicted the situation.

Conquering the Horror, however that manifests in your game, should not be made a readily available option until the Horror Phase. The Queen Alien has not been made available until all the key codes are accessible. Even if you think you've got the Horror on the ropes before the Horror Phase, introduce a twist or the true horror or something to that effect. You may have crushed the werewolf with a block of solid silver but the mad scientist who created the Uber-Rabies virus is still out there.

For faster games, just begin at the Horror Phase, having either predetermined/selected the Horror or defining its "clues" as the World throws and its deck is revealed. 

It cannot be overstated: Use the Fucking Book. 

I already praised about how choice IATW is for playing Solo, and Demon City is on the same level. Use those tables. Print them out. Add and remove to/from them. They're creative-fucking jet fuel but jet fuel is limited, keep the momentum running and be sure to refuel. 

The Glorantha Post

This demon needed to come out. 

Orlanth boldly approached the Dead Emperor, who sat on his throne surrounded by the other dead gods who had followed him. Orlanth made his bid for friendship; Yelm made his demand for atonement. Orlanth made his demand for recognition; Yelm made his requirement for proof. Orlanth made his promise of the future; Yelm made the demand for trial by combat.

Orlanth began with the Song of Truth, and the dead who still cared for him were free to prepare him for the tasks to come. First was the Trial by Combat, where he fought the Keepers of the Gate, the monsters that were keeping the dead imprisoned. He slew them all.

Orlanth made his Promise of the Future, and said it would be like the past. “Which past?” demanded Yelm. Orlanth replied, “Like all of them.”

-King of Dragon Pass 1999

tl;dr, Glorantha is a purposeful mess of a setting that exists to defy definition or canon. Like any good RPG product, it exists to be twisted and adapted to the interests of every table it is introduced to.

Blahblah, Glorantha was """"discovered"""" by practicing shaman and game designer Greg Stafford and first shared with world in the form of a board/wargame called "White Bear and Red Moon" in 1975 and made accessible for roleplaying via "RuneQuest" in 1978 blahhh. 

Glorantha is a "Mythic Fantasy" setting that has claimed inspiration from myriad sources from classical mythology to Elric/Conan pulps. This means nothing, especially in a post-OSR world wherein the praising of "APPENDIX N" as TTRPG gospel induces immediate vertigo in anyone who's actually familiar with the work (just me?). When selling Glorantha, people will be quick to point to it being a "bronze age" fantasy as a measure of its uniqueness. This continues to do nothing but paint a vague image in the minds of the uninitiated. Pulps are cool. Mythology is cool. But I can derive inspiration from those things when I play me elfgames, why would I play some shaman's setting?

There is no True way to just get into Glorantha; even Chaosium's 2019 release of RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha is an absolute fucking mess and its boxed 2022 starter set, while doing an admirable job with incredible presentation, does zero to make you give a shit about Glorantha unless you really love Newtlings (which my players certainly did.) Its solo adventure is pretty rad though.

For me, it's the fact that Glorantha truly is not unique. It will fuck you up. You will get name fatigue and be introduced to strange concepts and confuse the ever-living shit out of you. If you stick with it, you'll un/fortunately find that all of the answers you sought for the setting were always known... Oh, and it has ducks.

This is not a secret. RuneQuest itself abandoned Glorantha once-upon-a-time. Supplements were made for older editions of the game wherein people eschewed Glorantha in favor of Mythic Earth; why discuss the Myths of facsimile Earthen gods when I can just play a game set in Mythic Greece, Ireland, Asia, Africa, etc? Go for it, I'm not here to argue that. If you think of the Roman Empire more times a day than you do your family, chase your RP-Dreams. Ultimately, you know every single trope and theme used in Glorantha. Over the years, the setting continued to be fleshed out, stuffing absolutely every fucking trope you can imagine somewhere in its "lozenge-shaped" world. What gives Glorantha life both within and without the game is Community. 

As Orlanth said, there is no single past. Stafford himself eschewed and actively mocked the concept of canon, willfully contradicting his own work in order to illustrate the diversity found between the peoples of Glorantha and therefore make Glorantha feel more authentic and closer to reality. To make matters worse, Gloranthans can HeroQuest, or the act of interfacing with Godtime. The tl;dr of that can of worms is that it is the ability to experience/relive/emulate history/Myth from a first person perspective of gods and heroes to tap into their might; yes, this can often manifest as roleplaying a dood roleplaying another dood. 

(Katrin Dirim)

Glorantha, from the perspective of the average individual in Dragon Pass (the primary slice of the primary continent of the setting), is a world heavily molded by its gods and strange magic. Most characters will be deeply devout to the cult(ure) of one or more of these gods, some even with goals of becoming their god-made-flesh over the course of their career. This will often require interfacing with their god and their deeds through HeroQuesting. Ultimately, this deep understanding exists to serve the community. The vast majority of worshippers will be those devoted to safety or farming. A niche few (aka likely the player characters) worship gods of War/War-Eternal, Trade, Adventuring, Knowledge, Healing, Vengeance, etc. If a god is simply chosen for the cool superpowers or drug trips and not an acknowledgment to its cult's purpose in the Community or surroundings without consideration about how to evoke the would-be character via roleplaying, a great deal will be missed.

(Jubalina)

In our material+digital world, DriveThru RPG collabbed with Chaosium to put out the Jonstown Compendium; a quarantined corner of DTRPG wherein Glorantha-obsessed nerds can share/sell content that relates to Glorantha/RuneQuest. The content is very good and can range from mechanical ideas, modules, and explorations on the concepts of Glorantha. Those explorations are where the real meat is. The actual adventure modules can be alright springboards but the perspectives on Glorantha as a setting and how to evoke and find purpose in the "mythic bronze age" cultures of the world needed perspective, however niche, in order to understand why the sport of Cattle Raiding should be something to give half a thought. Jonstown Compendium content does that zooming in, providing examples of what Glorantha could look like. The work of Andrew Logan Montgomery is paramount in this regard. His SSiS is the gold standard for introducing mature players into the setting. I liken the Jonstown Compendium to a micro-OSR. There's a general unifying tie but ultimately its creators spread out quite wildly; producing disparate content that remains usable with the strangeness of Glorantha. While most of the OSR expresses different spins on the occupation of dungeon crawling (Classes/Rules) and how they manifest (prefabbed dungeons), the Jonstown Compendium approaches the various angles that one could approach a bizarre myth-infused setting.

BUT WHAT DO YOU ACTUALLY DO IN GLORANTHA. 

I guess the simplest answer is: you talk about and explore YOUR Glorantha.

Dragon Pass, especially in RQG is experiencing a holy war. Time's millennia-old wounds are being torn open. The future has been chronicled by one pair of hands in the King of Sartar. Does YOUR Glorantha follow the fate of that work or does it introduce new Heroes and erase others? 

How do the ever-constant deities of Orlanth/Ernalda/Yelm/Red-Bitch manifest (if at all)?

Are HeroQuests actual magical adventures into the Otherworld or are they just really good psychedelic trips, your clan larping the characters of the tale you're meant to be experiencing (or what even is the difference, maaaaan)?

etcetcetc...

If Glorantha catches your attention, RQG is pretty cool. The Augmentation mechanics are fun and they're an excellent interweaving of setting+game. tl;dr, everyone has Runes. Runes are basically Fantasy-DNA or Fantasy-Pscyhology. You can tap into them in order to fuel your chosen skill for a scene, getting a mechanical boost with the expectation that your roleplay and actions will be fueled/influenced by the Rune or Passion that you're channeling. Many other rules can/should be gutted though. 

Personally, Glorantha is my shit purely because it is truly strange while giving you the means to roleplay within its world. My first love, Planescape, certainly tried. While it is up there for the title of D&D's strangest setting, it is still tied to the constraints and attitudes that surround D&D and the frequent eschewing of roleplaying for the sake of "playing the game" (aka mandatory combat). Zeb Cook has gone on record as stating that Planescape needed to be reigned in to accommodate 2e. Does a part of me wish I lived in that Twilight Zone wherein we had the full unhinged glory of what Planescape could have been. Sure. But I'm glad to know that Glorantha, in its unhinged Mythological glory is there instead. 

To me, Glorantha gives us the tools to live atop its flat dome-covered surface like no other setting out there with added vehicles for exploring Mythic concepts like no mere D&D-derivative or most other fantasy settings can even remotely contend with; with many fantasy creators citing or directly deriving from the occulted annals of Gloranthan Myth when making their settings. Ultimately, within Glorantha, your Character will have an intimate connection with the Myths of the world with a touch of the occult and strange in their every breath. 

It wants the scholars to read its Myths. It begs the scholars to feed it more Myths.

It wants the adventurers to live its Myths. It begs its adventurers to become Myths. 

Glorantha is a hungry demon unsated still after over 40 years.

Glorantha IS Myth. 

Experience Myth.

I AM THE (only) WEAPON.

Or: How Zak S. unknowingly created the greatest superhero/fantasy/sci-fi/anime/literally-any-genre-where-you-kick-ass Solo (and beyond) RPG in existence. 

I work in a call center. Cellphones are uncool in a call center so I turned to solo RPGs (fucking loser). 

(Einar Baldvin)

Anyway. 

Mythic GM emulator is pretty rad and it's what I used in-tandem with Zak S.'s I Am The Weapon. 

Mythic is simple. You've got a d% that hangs out called your Chaos Factor. You "ask" Mythic questions you'd ask, it gives you a yes/no answer with varying frequencies of complication depending on what's rolled and where your Chaos Factor is at. Keeps things exciting. Tons of alternative options to tweak and move the scale of randomness; it gets the game cooking. In theory, Mythic can even accommodate any random answer or idea you'd need regardless of genre. 

BUT. I'm not here to add to that circle jerk (much).

(it neat)

I Am The Weapon's tables are objectively the best for games about scheming dickheads and the gigachads that take them out. Without re-treading too much old territory, I Am The Weapon doesn't get the ball rolling, it takes the ball and replaces it with a snowball already at full mast boulder-level and tells you to kick it down the mountain and see what happens. You'll get the powers of your protag, those who they would oppose and the locale or mystery that needs interacting with. IATW gives you a substantial amount of randomized detail that Mythic only implies or can function to expand upon. Or more specifically, if shit is a question or in doubt, IATW's got you covered; if it doesn't, Mythic's got IATW's back. 

"But I Am The Weapon is a SUPERHERO RPG, what kind of BULLSHIT are you selling here?" 

Let's not pretend that 5e D$D isn't characterized like not!MCU superheroes. Just ask Chris Pine. The burden of playing that fucking system and its strict character classes is a bitch and I don't want to reinvent the wheel to play my action hero games. IATW is rad because it doesn't reinvent the wheel nor does it want you to; IATW gives you a circle-shaped sketch and asks you to invent the wheel in the first place like the caveman you are and put some sick flame decals on that muhfucka while you're at it. Don't sweat it, but do lift with your legs.

(Moore's Promethea)

IATW and its older sister Demon City work on active-conversation-based gameplay. You are expected to always be thinking about the world and where you are in order to discuss/argue for why you've got a leg up over your enemy or whatever is preventing you from being sick-awesome. You cannot play a solo game any other way. If you neglect the world that you yourself are solely responsible for facilitating/imagining, unless you're playing an old school gamebook, what are you doing? The fun part of adding Mythic into the mix is its tables on how potential NPCs or enemies react if ever a-doubt. Depending on your personal bias (read: theming), this may lead to your Protag having an unfair advantage. Which is fine. Most comic runs give the Protag some level of plot armor and it'd be pretty shit to kick the bucket in your first combat encounter. Your game, your rules, Solo-Chad. 

Character creation in IATW, while advertising itself as a superpower, can easily be retooled to operate as: the will of a mythic hero's god, the shots of a blaster in not!Star Wars, or whatever bullshit anime powers you've decided on. In fact, IATW actively encourages all of these things, heavily emphasizing the want to narrow down and define your abilities after choosing/rolling them in order to give identity to your character. That is, of course, if you're feeling up to being creative; shit out of luck if not, I guess.

(top-left, by Philip Gelatt and others) 

My go-to character for solo right now is is my former solider and "fate-cursed" hero "Enbil of Babylonia." Whenever he takes a life, his "Time Travel" power kicks in and he is shunted forward a number of years equal to the number of years that that individual would have lived were it not for Enbil's actions. This has given me a fun excuse to plop him in random situations and locations pulp-style where he tries his darndest to solve shit without killing. Simultaneously his other powers kick in when he manages to travel and protect one with one "pure of heart," further deepening the desire to not be thrust forward in time.

Enbil is the kind of character concept that can only be really explored (in a game at least) in the medium of solo RP. Anywhere else would just be a drag. 

(uh)

With how ubiquitous superhero comics are with solo runs, soloing a superhero TTRPG seems like a no-brainer. IATW introduces systems that do nothing but compliment the solo-process and GM Emulators (like Mythic) facilitate the opportunity to explore characters that would be more of a burden than anything else in a group or even with a 1-on-1 game. 

Solo That Shit, yo.

Cities of Darkness

Unlike D&D, I've got a soft spot for the classic World of Darkness lore. I am too young to have been around while it was relevant but it's always had the air of potential for me. If you think the settings are cool but don't like the execution and think its too cumbersome, take what you want and build from there. 

Don't waste time learning the name of every single member of House Wyrmfoe - make shit your own. I just wanna play as an invincible, hairy eco-terrorist with poor anger management skills; thanks. 

To that end, let's go ahead and paint over Zak S's Demon City with some WoDness. WoD likes to say it's a horror game. For me, death should always be on the table for a horror game. With how many details WoD characters often demand, the allure of losing a character every session and having to make a new one in the original system makes me not want to bother. Demon City assumes death and chargen is quick and easy and still has room for added flare.

Chargen's the same as Demon City. Pick or Choose your method of RATPACK. The biggest change is to Calm. Things just don't shake the creatures of the night like they do your average Demon Citizen, the biggest hit to a character's Calm is going to come from their use of their respective supernatural powers.  Max Calm now effectively acts as:

Vampire's Blood Potency

Mage's Arete

Werewolf's Gnosis

Changeling's Glamour

Wraith's Pathos

Current Calm is more like current Blood/Quintessence/Gnosis/etc.

The various powers that you would purchase operate like skills but at a base rating of Calm.

A Vampire with 3 Calm and 3 Potence would throw at 6. If the system ever involves a fusing of 2 or more different power skills then only the rating of the lowest is added to Calm. A Mage throwing with Calm 2, Life 1 and Matter 3 would throw 3. The general baseline intensity/difficulty is 5 for most uses of Calm.

It will be assumed when playing this hack that PCs aren't juicing themselves like in WoD but are instead stressing themselves with every use of their powers. You only lose Calm when you fail a check to activate one of these powers (-1 per failure, but an immediate re-throw is allowed if you want to keep losing Calm, perhaps at a higher intensity) and when their archetypical anathema threatens them (fire/sun for vamps, silver for werewolves, etc); otherwise you have an infinite "resource." 

As a trade-off for this ease of use, a player can push themselves into negative Calm. The ramifications are as they appear in WoD regardless of what pushes them over:

Vampires/Werewolves frenzy.

Mages incur Paradox.

Changelings fall into Banality or trigger a Dreaming explosion.

Wraiths enter Catharsis (never personally played so don't forget that grain of salt).

Either have fresh-faced characters enter the game with zero powers and have them earn them through adventuring, not dissimilar to how Demon City already recommends its occult spells be handled. Or give them however many powers out the gate based on starting scope. I would also recommend keeping the spirit of Demon City intact by having the focus of the game be on the mystery of exploring the world. The Motives are also the same. It is worth considering creating gameline-specific Motives if your game extends beyond mystery; likewise, gameline-specific downtime actions like Feeding to recover Calm are worth considering - reskinning existing downtime actions would also work. Doing drugs, for example, could easily be a vampire's equivalent to Feeding with some minor tweaks. 

Play the other inherent supernatural abilities by ear - don't forget Demon City's Supernatural throw when rolling for attacks and avoiding harm as necessary.

KAMEN ENEMY. Setting: CANNIBAL CRUSADE. A world of super-powered monsters dying for it to end.

CANNIBAL CRUSADE. is a setting made using the ideas found in my I Am The Weapon Pitch: KAMEN ENEMY. Check out the IATW Core Rules.

(Nihei's Abara)

CURSE: Reliance on sapient brains. Enemies must consume at least 1 sapient brain a week. If this is done to an innocent human or Enemy, the consumer loses all current XP. There are no innocent Wishers.

THEME: Enemies are a physiological response and/or adaptation to the setting's Antagonist group: The Wishers.

AESTHETIC: Enemies are the marriage between id and ego; flesh and spirit brought together in grotesque fashion. The Enemies refer to their monstrous super-form as their Nature and their human form as their Nurture. When transformed, they appear to be a manifestation of the Enemy's addiction, interest, phobia (whatever is the strongest/most important to the person's identity.) 

A pyromaniac punk’s skin turns to ash and they pop and crackle like a walking firework with a constant aurora-vibed mohawk-shaped smoke cloud looming overhead, an arachnophobe cheerleader turns into a gross arachnid-woman with several crooked leg-like spikes sticking out her back - all topped with adhesive pseudopod flesh pom-poms.

(Devilman Crybaby)

GIMMICK: Enemies can obtain a "Revealer;" a sheet of milky liquid crystal that, when placed on wrapped on an Enemy's body part, partially reveals that Enemy's monstrous form. There exist methods of developing "Hard-Revealers," gloves tailor-made to reflect and be worn on the Enemy's right hand. This can be used to tear an Enemy's skin off and trigger a full, temporary, transformation. 

(Soul Calibur's Nightmare)

ANTAGONISTS: The Wishers were ordinary people given the ability for a single wish to come true and, regardless if there were once good people among them, their moment of absolute power corrupted them completely. Their power now ranges from benign and silly to overwhelming and world-defining based on their insight in the moment of wishing.  A pervert who wished for an army of women to worship them may just well have that and be able to spawn them forever up to a certain number; they would be relatively insignificant compared to the person who wished to be on top of the world and puppeteers all of China at a political and geographic level from inside their secret North Pole base. It's a monkey's paw in the favor of the Wishers to the detriment of the rest of the world. 

The Wishers own the world and know that the Enemies exist to undermine them. They have enacted the global Common Enemy act and have unified all human organizations, government and private, to hold frequent Revealing Sessions on their citizens, customers, and employees. There is mass hysteria in the streets and simply accusing someone else of being an Enemy or consorting with them is enough for one to be taken away or killed on the spot. The Wishers can always make more people. 

(Wishmaster 2)

SCOPE: Enemies cannot sit in one place or else they will risk being found out. Even those living in the country are eventually discovered by drones or roving military/police units. As a result, the PCs must agree on a method of travel. Whether RV, motorcycle gang, horse-drawn caravan, etc. They need to agree on a nomadic form of travel. CANNIBAL CRUSADE. will see the PCs (assumed to be heroic do-gooders that fight for justice despite the circumstance) traveling from place to place, state to state, country to country, hunting down Wishers and dealing with their corruption. It is likely that a weaker Wisher will take control of the power vacuum of the freed city, however, so most of the fighting is bleak but at least an Enemy gets their meal for the week.

(Ben 10)

SETTING ADDITIONS: 

RIGHT-HANDS: CANNIBAL CRUSADE.'s form of Sidekick. Right-Hands are people who have seen the horrors of the Wishers and have been convinced that the quest of the Enemies is the noble course of action. They live to help feed their bound Enemy and benefit from a few powers. The process of becoming a Right-Hand involves both the Enemy and the prospective Right-Hand severing their right arm up to the elbow and the Enemy eating the Right-Hand's severed sacrifice. The Enemy's severed limb then dissolves in a pit of black goo but quickly grows back, now capable of transforming into a Hard-Revealer at-will. The Right-Hand's sacrifice does not grow back but is replaced by an ethereal version of their Enemy's Hard-Revealer. Despite its appearance, it is solid and acts as a normal hand. It's also an eyesore and marks you as a filthy Enemy-sympathizer. Be discreet. 

Right-Hands are available as a playable character option and can be chosen as a Contact but they will not be actively assisting you in battle. Instead they are your caretakers, drivers, medics, researchers, scouts, etc, when between Wisher Hunts.

(Jagaaan)

ADVANCEMENT: XP can only be earned by the killing & eating of Wishers. It cannot be spent on the purchase of new powers, only improving existing attributes, skills, and powers. Instead, an Enemy must consume the corpse of a rival Enemy whole in order to Assimilate their power-set. Doing so also makes the Enemy multiplicatively more voracious. If an Enemy owns 2 Power-Sets, they must consume 4 sapient brains every week. 3=9; 4=16; etc. If an Enemy Assimilates a power they already own, then its Power Level is now equal to the higher of the two + 1. If the Assimilated Enemy possessed multiple Power-Sets, it only counts as 1 when Assimilated into the Assimilating Enemy. You may starve yourself. Lose a level in Calm for every day that passes after the 7th without getting your fill. At 0 permanent calm, you have lost your mind to your hunger and the Enemy becomes Feral. Make a new character. 

REVEALERS: While they are often grown from the bonding of Enemy & Right-Hand, there exist rumors of Hard-Revealers being artificially manufactured in Wisher Revealer-Tech labs. There is always a slight addition to all Hard-Revealers that isn't present on the typical Enemy's inherent Nature: tiny retractable hollow hooks at the tips of the fingers. One may hook into the flesh of an Enemy and pump milky Revealer Fluid just slightly beneath the skin. This permeates the entire body, making the Enemy's Nurture appear to be a giant walking blister ready to pop. The hooker then tears away this veritable skin-suit, Revealing the whole of the Enemy's Nature for a number of minutes equal to the Revealed Enemy's Calm. Enemies recharge their Natural Revealer Fluid once a day but can force-recharge it by consuming a sapient brain or drinking a canister normally utilized by artificial Hard-Revealers. Eating a standard Revealer sheet will do nothing to recharge this fluid. A standard Revealer sheet reveals a body part for 1 minute before becoming inert. 

(2006's Silent Hill)

CHARGEN: 

ENEMY. 

As I Am The Weapon but:

All Enemies have the Secondary Form AND Armor - Husk (Secondary, Roll for Level.) If you randomly get either Powers during character creation, you can choose to reroll the result. If you take Husk a second time, it always upgrades to Primary. Describe the appearance of your Nature and what part of your body needs to be Revealed in order to use a Power at its full strength for every Power. When not Revealed, that Power operates at its minimum Power Level as written. If you rolled its minimum Power Level, increase it by 1 for its Revealed level. Your entire body must be Revealed in order to benefit from your Armor - Husk. Without a Hard-Revealer, it is impossible to undergo a full transformation.

RIGHT-HAND.

You are bound to an Enemy. You always know approximately where they are and are them for the sake of super or magical senses tracking or learning about you. Feral Enemies may not want to slurp your shit if you smell like a badass.

Who is your Enemy?

Another PC? Alright. Pick one of their powers and roll for level. If you rolled higher than your Enemy's Power Level, they raise their level to meet yours. 

An NPC? Why are they not with you? Have the Wishers captured them and you're trying to get them back? Either roll on the First Round Starting table for your Enemy-given Power or build your NPC Enemy with the Host and choose a Power from their list. 

When/if your Enemy Assimilates a new power set, pick 1 of your Enemy's newly obtained Powers to add to your list & roll for its level. 

Have you failed and let them die? You are a Black-Hand and do not have Enemy-given Powers anymore. Black-Hands are effectively ghosts; their ethereal right hand having grown a spider-web of black veins to signify their failure, they cannot be tracked by mortal or super means and cannot not age but have inherited their Enemy's brain consumption (whatever the Enemy's Rate was upon death.) Failing to do so means death.

Both Right and Black-Hands have the Telekinesis power. In their case, they force their ethereal hand from their body and use it to do Telekinesis things. 

(Jagaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan)

HUMAN.

Sure, play a normie. Have 2 boosts. You can spend 1 or both of these on Gimmicks instead. You always suffer a lost throw when resisting the powers of the Wishers. Good luck. 

I Am The Weapon Pitch: KAMEN ENEMY.

Kamen: Japanese for masked. Phonetically close enough to "common."

As mentioned in my I Am The Weapon review, I am a big fan of the henshin hero motif. KAMEN ENEMY. is a list of ideas that help capture the world building tropes and power sets found in dark Japanese superhero media. From here on, "Enemy" is the term I will be using to describe characters that fit the bill of "dark henshin hero." KAMEN ENEMY. exists as an extended Pitch for I Am The Weapon. That game is necessary for not only its base system but also to develop the suggestions found here.

KAMEN ENEMY. assumes PCs still operate as fighters for justice.  

(Nihei's Abara)

Primary tropes include: 

MASQUERADE. 

All Enemies transform into a monstrous form but can safely stay in an unassuming weaker human form. Some may be stuck or unable to revert to their human form but this is a minority of Enemies.

All PCs, and potentially some NPCs, will have the Secondary Form power by default and additional Powers are typically reliant on being in your Secondary Form to be used. Many henshin heroes in media are often assumed to be super strong/agile/durable inherently while in their Secondary Form so consider whether or not that is the case when making your KAMEN ENEMY. setting. You can make it static among all existing Enemies (everyone gets Enhanced Agility d20 when transformed) or create a range (okay, roll your transformed Agility: d12 to d20+d20; d12=not Enhanced but faster than most humans). 

(Kamen Rider: Black Sun)

CURSE. 

There is something intrinsically wrong with being an Enemy that makes them feel that they should not be. This is often something so horrible that all Enemies are hated by society or otherwise could be if word got out

When defining your settings' Enemies, give them a shared curse and decide whether or not the public is aware of their existence. Common dark superhero curses:

HUNGER. 

There is something that your Enemies must do. This hunger is monstrous either due to the extreme quantity that must be consumed (if relatively mundane) or the inherently despicable act of of doing so. Common examples include:

Cannibal. The Enemies are parasites. They must eat humans in order to live, be this blood, flesh, or brains. 

Psychic-Vampire. The Enemies are trolls. They quite literally feed off of extreme emotion and need to cause emotional distress or elation in order to live themselves, this results in frequently detatched manipulation.

Highlanders. There can only be one Enemy. They live to kill one another and the world is their gigantic Battle Royale and damn the human who gets in their way.

Destruction. The Enemies are entropy. They exist to destroy the world. Breaking down buildings, forests, anything that has taken time to build, they feel an instinct to break. 

Gluttony. The Enemies are voracious. They burn calories 1000x a normal person and eat whatever they can get their hands on.

Debt. The Enemies aren't their own. They are being controlled by another party and currently exist to serve it. 

Failure to sate one's hunger should result in death or insanity. 

(Kamen Rider: Amazons)

RAGE. 

Your Enemies are cursed with an extremely short fuse. This could mean stubbing their toe on a bad day can cause them to flip shit and destroy their own home, or it could be triggered by certain weakness. A reminder of the event that turned them into what they are, the presence of their weakness; or yeah, just losing their cool. If going the weakness route, a failed Calm check in response to their trigger means they act as if they've just hit 0 Calm until they can successfully Calm Check out of it; assuming they weren't already at 0 Calm. If your Enemies simply have a short fuse: frequently use Calm checks at being slighted, insulted, or receiving the slightest of set-backs.

PREJUDICE.

The world hates your Enemies and wants your Enemies to hate it. It wants your Enemies to give them a reason to pull the trigger and end them. This could be due to the Enemy's Hunger or Rage if those are a part of your setting or due to bad publicity, a few bad apples, or biological instinct (ex: humans think the natural smell of Enemies is revolting). No matter what it is, the players know it is unfair and they fight for coexistence - other Enemies may disagree. 

(Werewolf: the Apocalypse)

ORIGIN. 

There is typically a unifying origin that links all Enemies of a single campaign. They're all cyborgs; they're all the hosts of alien frogs; they're all amnesiac dimension-hoppers; etc. This should be the bulk of the Enemies of a single campaign. There may be "guest characters" that have a different power origin but those should be an infrequent novelty.

AESTHETIC. 

Like with origin, the aesthetic of all Enemies should have a common factor. They're all cyborgs designed to turn into human-animal hybrids; the alien frog forces a grotesque manifestation of their ego;  the dimension-hoppers adopt a fascination with a mundane human repair tool and meld with it. 

When deciding your Enemies' Aesthetic, consider a Tag that all Enemies begin with that they must pick a starting Power from. The human-animal hybrids begin with the Animal Tag. The ego manifests as Mutant or Psionic-Tagged powers. The repair tool aliens begin with a Tech-Tagged power. 

(GARO)

GIMMICK. 

Your Enemies should have a central thing that they interact with to trigger their transformation. This could be interacting with a (normally) readily available item; shouting of a phrase; striking of a pose; recalling a traumatizing thought; all of the above; etc. Whatever it is, it exists to cement the unifying origin of the Enemies of your setting and could help define their weaknesses. Captain Marvel/Shazam can't transform if he can't speak. Don't make it too painful to do gameplay-wise; a KAMEN ENEMY. game assumes transforming at least every session. 

(Kamen Rider: Amazons)

ANTAGONISTS. 

Like with the Enemies themselves, their antagonists should be unified in Origin & Aethetic. Perhaps they're Enemies themselves, simply unhinged; the Thematic/Aesthetic opposite of your Enemies; the creators of the Enemies now trying to exterminate or control their defiant experiments; completely divorced from the Enemies and their own entity entirely; a force the Enemies exist to purge. The antagonists should all fight under the same flag with a few powerful outliers occasionally causing trouble for the Enemies. They could be limited to a local threat (deranged mole-men terrorizing the local town,) country-spanning (a shady business conducting vile monster-making experiments,) or globe-threatening (dark gods from beyond reality looking to corrupt or replace those in power.)

(The Guyver: Bio-Booster Armor)

SCOPE. 

It is important do define how much of the planet has been changed due to the existence of the Enemies. If the entire world knows that Enemies exist, it does not necessarily mean that the game will go from the US to Japan, it just opens the door for characters to reasonably involve such far away locations in their backgrounds or the threats of Antagonists. Conducting inhumane experiments in a small town and the players dealing with its fallout and protection is a more than valid Scope and game. If the players, in this same example, hear that wildly different things are happening in the big city not far from them and want to take their powers there and deal with an issue that doesn't even involve their Enemy Origin, you're on your way to naturally expanding your setting. 

(Digital Devil Saga)

INSPIRATION. 

JAPAN.

Kamen Rider: Amazons & Black Sun.

Garo. 

Bio Booster Armor Guyver's 89 OVA. 

Digital Devil Saga. 

Nihei's Abara.

Jagaaan. 

Devilman: Crybaby.

US.

Nightbane by Palladium.

Werewolf: the Apocalypse.

The Incredible Hulk '78 TV Series.