Tag Archives: Solo RPGs

Play

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If there’s one thing I’ve picked up from watching more Solo RPG videos, especially from The Grouch Couch, it’s that I should be playing more, not trying to write a novel.

There should be more dice rolling and less treating the play session as a creative writing exercise.

And that goes for any other tabletop games I’m trying to play, like Five Leagues and Five Parsecs.

I’ve found myself lost in simple things like trying to hard to come up with background details for a character I may or may not ever play, or trying to come up with names for regions/cities for my Five Leagues map.

And that’s probably one of the things that subconsciously prevents me from delving more into any of the Solo RPGs that i’ve already set up, all three of them.

I have one campaign underway (Star Trek Adventures/Captain’s Log), and two ready to start (Dragonbane, D&D 5E) but  now I believe that the issue I was having was trying to describe events THAT HAVE NOT HAPPENED YET.

You can’t write a good story without an outline, so how can I describe how my adventure is going without playing out the situation?

For Star Trek: Excalibur, we’re about to continue our mission of exploration.

Irony: the last bit of storytelling for Star Trek: Excalibur was *totally* a creative writing exercise, no dice were rolled, just trying to advance the plot.

For Dragonbane, my character is about to delve into the unknown catacombs.

For D&D, my two-man party is about to enter the forest in search of a lost scouting party from a local town.

Other games will have some sort of after action report as they are played.

Don’t touch that dial!

Star Trek: Excalibur, S01E03

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Ship’s Log, August 3rd, 2154.

The Excalibur has returned us back to our original position prior to our little trip through the spatial rift.  We have resumed course to explore the unknown space before us, and have run smack dab into an Andorian patrol.

The Andorians have not acknowledged our hails and appear to have their weapons trained on the Excalibur.

Commander Saguisag orders the hull polarized and to continue hailing the Andorians.

“Charge cannons?”

“No, let’s keep a defensive posture for now.”

The gambit worked, the Andorians do not fire on the Excalibur.  The Andorian ships power down their weapons.

“We’re being hailed by the lead ship.”

“On screen.”

A male Andorian appears.

“I am Captain Shabaav of the Andorian Empire.”

“Commander Saguisag, Starfleet.  What’s your business here, Captain?”

The Andorian captain furrows his brow.

“You should have received a transmission from your superiors, Commander.”

At that very moment, the communications officer reports a message from Earth, recalling Lt. Commander Riordan back to Earth while the Andorians transfer a member of their race to join the Excalibur crew as an observer and first officer.  This crew change is meant to strengthen relations between Earth and the Andorian Empire.

The message is checked and double checked for authenticity, while the Columbia NX-02 arrives to bring Riordan back to Earth.

As Riordan was a popular shipmate aboard Excalibur, some of the crew are not happy with him leaving, nor the idea of an Andorian taking his place.

A goodbye party/welcome ceremony is held aboard Columbia, where Excalibur‘s new XO, Threvak, is introduced.  He seems less aggressive than the typical Andorians we’ve encountered in Star Trek.

The Andorian and Earth ship crews say their goodbyes, the Andorians go back to their patrol route, Columbia heads back to Earth, and Excalibur continues on her mission of exploration.

“Ready to resume our mission?”

Looking around the bridge, Commander Saguisag gets nods from his crew.

“Let’s Go!”

And the ship goes into warp.

[end credits]

—

Far too long between these sessions, and this wasn’t even a proper session, just an exercise inmoving the plot along.

I wanted to go back to having an Andorian aboard that I had originally rolled up for this crew, oh so many months ago.

I hoping to find the time to expand this campaign, either through actual play or through just simple writing, even if it looks like an outline more than an actual story.

And yes, “Let’s Go!” is Commander Saguisag’s “Engage!” or “Hit it!” or “I would like the ship to go.  Now.”

Beginnings Revisited

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Star Trek Adventures has a new sourcebook, The 23rd Century Campaign Guide, and per usual, they included a new career path option:

NOW I can recreate my original FASA Trek trader captain, Mackenzie Decker, if I so choose.

I’m actually thinking of having Decker as an NPC, and maybe pull a nuBSG and do a gender swap on Mackenzie Decker?

File:Big Wow 2013 - Indiana Jones (8845876192).jpg

I’ve met this cosplayer, Abby Darkstar, and her partner, Keith Zen, both are really nice people.

Anyways.

Decisions, decisions.

Star Trek: ODT

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About 4+ years ago I had an idea for a Star Trek RPG campaign with an espionage twist.

With STA Captain’s Log I think I can run this one as a solo campaign, which a few changes.

It’s still called Outpost Delta Tioga, in reference to my old house located in San Francisco.

It’s still based out of Science Station D-5 on the Romulan Border.

It’s still an unofficial Starfleet listening post, officially listed as a science station.

Originally I was going to run this during the Lower Decks-era  With the California-class U.S.S. Colma.  I may switch to late the TOS-era with a modified Archer-class scout ship, since I already created a Captain’s Log crew for a ‘spy themed’ campaign.

AND a 3D printed ship as well.

We’ll see if I can flesh this one out a bit more over time.

Don’t touch that dial!

Combat in Dragonbane

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If there’s one thing I’ve learned while getting ready to play the solo campaign in Dragonbane it’s that combat is fast and deadly.

I just had Splats run another encounter with a pair of orcs, and I learned how to ‘push a roll’ in order to avoid him getting killed by one orc who was armed with a spear.

He eventually managed to kill the two orcs, with 4 of his 15 hit points left.

MEDIC!

Prelude: The Duck Knight of the Misty Vale

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Splats Gleamhelm stood before the gaping mouth of the cave

The cave where the troll had been spotted the previous night by the anxious onlookers who now stood a good distance behind him.

Go on then, Splats, he thought to himself, what’s the worst that could happen, besides getting killed by a troll?

Upon entering the cave, Splats found it unusually well lit, for a cave that is.  He didn’t need to light a torch or an oil lamp, it was lit as well as the morning was, just outside.

“Boo,” said a voice ahead of him.  It was the troll.

Wasting no time, Splats took a defensive position as the troll strode toward him and proceeded to bite the young Mallard-kin.

“Ack!” Splats exclaimed excitedly, then realized that his armor had taken the brunt of the bite.  The troll then gurgled and spit up a tooth and some foul liquid that barely missed Splats, but did piss him off a bit.

Splats then took a couple of swings with his broadsword at the monster, connecting both times and visibly causing the creature some harm.

Another couple of sword strikes by Splats, and the monster spit up again, this time the stench of the troll vomit causing Splats to waver a bit.  The troll picked up Splats and hurled him across the cave, his armor once again saving him from serious harm.

Now Splat was really mad.  He picked himself up from the ground where he landed, charged the visibly weakened creature while yelling a battle cry, swung for a killing blow…

… and missed, his sword clattering to the floor between himself and his opponent.

Shit, good thing no one saw that, he thought to himself.

Before he could pick up the sword, the monster clawed at him, troll nails scraping against his armor, which protected him once more.

Splats recovered his sword, slashed at the creature once, then twice, and the troll finally fell.

Breathing heavily, Splats proceeded to check the troll for any treasure that it had, but found nothing but a rusty nail, which did actually poke and hurt him and later required a tetanus shot from the local healer.

***

And thus begins the epic tale with the Dragonbane RPG system.

Don’t touch that dial!

Space Cowboys

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Friday night I came across an RPG website, selling mainstream and independent role playing games.

I found one called Orbital Blues, a space western that I remember from Kickstarter that for some reason I didn’t pledge back in the day.

I discovered that a solo play system was added so I took the plunge and ordered the game, which included digital copies in addition to the physical books.

I skimmed though about 50 pages and found it a pretty straight forward game system, one that could be used in a Firefly or Cowboy Bebop like setting.

Which is when I remembered that I already had a Cowboy Bebop Role Playing Game, which I did get from Kickstarter, delivered about a month before I moved from the house to the apartment.

I rummaged through some of the storage tubs that I had brought from the house last year, and found the main book and other accessories (dice, GM screen, woolong poker chips).

After flipping though the Cowboy Bebop book, I reckon I can eventually play/not play (heh) both, along side every other system that I have sitting around here, awaiting my attention.

Had I not stored it away and out of sight, I probably would have had another solo campaign all set to not play.

To be fair, I’m sure I still have the Serenity Role Playing Game somewhere in my offsite storage.

Beginnings

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The first character that I created in the old FASA Star Trek RPG was Mackenzie Decker, son of Matt Decker, brother of Will Decker.  He was ex-Starfleet,  resigning his commission after the disappearance of Will Decker after the V’Ger incident.  He became an independent freighter captain, and was known by his leather jacket and whip, looking much like Jake Cutter from Tales of the Gold Monkey but without the hat, and Indiana Jones without the fedora.

In the new Star Trek Adventures Exploration Guide, there are two new character creation options, Outpost Scientist (ex: David Marcus) and…

Independent Archaeologist (ex: Vash)

I’m not sure I’ll recreate Mac Decker as this new character option, or just make a new Indy-type character.  One of the example Values listed is ‘These artifacts belong in a museum!’ and one of the new Talents listed is ‘Make Your Own Luck’.

Steam コミュニティ :: ガイド :: Indiana Jones and the Great Circle • Achievement Guide

Don’t touch that dial!

The Story So Far – D&D

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I decided to think of a quick prompt to kick off my solo Dungeons & Dragons campaign.

The Adventures of Roy Kent (fighter) and Raised by Minotaurs (barbarian)

As with all great adventures, this one starts in a tavern.

The Grumpy Tortoise

Roy and Rai (he hates that name, BTW) are having a meal.

Yeah, that’s all I got.

Don’t touch that dial!