This is a great story. I found, while playing Ronin last night, I am going through what I hope is a phase. I am not enjoying the “gaminess” of my solo time. Rather I do enjoy creating the story. Maze Rats seems to be a great way to just sit and tell a story. Well done! And thank you.
Thanks for sharing. Also, a photocopy tip for you, place a sheet of black construction paper behind the source page and you will have zero bleed through from the back side of the page. The same trick works for use as an insert between pages inside a binder.
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I’m sorry to hear you had a technical error but glad you rallied to continue. Maze Rats sounds like a fun adventure system when you’re looking less for an expansive trilogy-length epic than for a lighter but still engaging story. Thank you for this look at Maze Rats. :-)
Another excellent video. It was obvious that you were having fun with the tables. I’ve got to admit that they look very good and versatile; I’m sure that you could use them in almost any other game with little work. I love the descriptive spell generator.
Thanks glad you enjoyed it. Yep I was having a lot of fun with this and it’s clear a lot of effort went into the tables to make them so lively and evocative. I’m sure I will be using them again.
I didn't say this in the vid, but actually it seems to me like this would be best for solo. I'd be hardpressed to see how it would work with a GM rolling on all these tables during an actual session. Maybe for prep work I suppose but not "live" as it were--would really slow the game.
Your videos are great, you are a master storyteller. I own Maze Rats and I couldnt find some of the magic tables you showed @28:22. Mainly 'Generate Magic Items' and 'Magical NPCs'. Did you create these? Thank you for sharing and uploading.
Hello and thanks for the continued content during this trying year! I have a question I'm hoping you can help with. I've been running a solo "campaign" at a leisurely pace with extended breaks in between sessions. It's DND 5e with a single main character. The thing that I feel needs to be reworked is my combat/random encounter system. For every 5 days of travel and every single night of travel I check for an encounter (trap, NPC or combat). Then I roll for details regarding the encounter, if I get one. I feel like this just bogs down the game in too much combat that doesn't amount to anything relevant. I'd like to think up or borrow a new system that still adds elements of randomness to my travel. Any ideas? Thank you!
Thanks for the comment and I'm glad you are appreciating the content. Your question is an interesting one: there are a number of ways to solve this issue. First, you could stop the routine check OR rather than a routine check you could make a d4 table that would be the check. The table would be something like: 1-2. roll on your regular encounter check 2. a night of calm--no check even needed 3. fortune strikes: create a new table for something bountiful to happen--something that thematically fits your campaign: maybe you find a stash of provisions or money or you find a map or whatever would work. Obviously this is just a quick example off the top of my head but doing this would cut down the number of encounters (whilst still keeping your 'check' every X days and also enable some other things happening. The other question I'd ask you (given that you seem bored/tired with irrelevant encounters): is what is going on with the way that you are structuring or randomizing the actual encounters when they do occur? Why are they thematically not tied to your campaign? They should be--or at least most of them should be... but that's another question entirely. Hope this helps!
@@GeekGamers01 These ideas are quite helpful. I will explore using something like you've suggested, or just an "intervention" table as opposed to a strict encounter table. That would provide quite a bit more variance for me. I did not think to limit encounters to ones that fit the main theme of the campaign...it seemed like with exploration I would need to risk things like not finding food, running into random monsters and what have you. It would be nice to keep just a bit of this so that the game can be unpredictable. I'll reassess that notion since it seems like it may have been one of my game's blind spots. Thank you!
Something else you could do is add a concept from DUNGEON WORLD... Fronts. Think of your world as a real, dynamic, political world that's always in motion. A "front" is something happening far away, and has an impact on everything that happens in the world. Fronts, left unchecked, expand, and encroach. An example of a front in real life... A plague has descended on the world. Governments are taking it seriously. And they're treating it differently in different places. Now say to yourself, "How does this front impact my character?" Maybe there's no impact yet. But there are rumours that the city you're in will be shut down. What would happen if the city closed? How would your character get around this problem? As time passes, the front gets closer and closer. The impact gets bigger. Police are authorised to arrest those breaking curfew. People around the city start getting the plague. The character has to adapt to the effects of the front. --- A more complex and exciting world has more than one front. (Think about Plague + Police Violence + Black Lives Matter as real life examples.) Some fronts are more distant. Some are closer. Some impact your characters more than others. But fronts are relentless. If your character does nothing, the fronts will profoundly alter their life. --- Instead of rolling a random encounter every few days of travel, roll for how the fronts are developing and encroaching. Hope this helps.
How do you track all this information? When you get back to this after some time do you remember what happened? I can't remember things in the scene itself and I am wondering how DM remembers character details in real tabletop..does he?
Pierre Abou Naoum Keeping character sheets and some notes and sketches helps but over time you do tend to forget. Some people spend hours documenting everything but I’m not one who does.
This is a great story. I found, while playing Ronin last night, I am going through what I hope is a phase. I am not enjoying the “gaminess” of my solo time. Rather I do enjoy creating the story. Maze Rats seems to be a great way to just sit and tell a story. Well done! And thank you.
Sometimes I feel the same way and just like putting together a framework and that’s it…any interaction with rulesets is playing!
Thanks for sharing. Also, a photocopy tip for you, place a sheet of black construction paper behind the source page and you will have zero bleed through from the back side of the page. The same trick works for use as an insert between pages inside a binder.
Thanks for the tip but that’s not bleed through: I’m using recycled paper that has printing already on the back of each sheet.
Although I'm not generally into magic in RPGs, this spell creation looks fascinating 🙂
It's quite enjoyable and could easily be ported into other systems.
you and the guy at Stoneaxe come up with the best character names. Would love to see Meepo, Chumley, Fidget and Rummage on adventure together.
Enjoying this content? You can support the channel by donating on PayPal: paypal.me/geekgamersDeborah
get SOLO GAME MASTER'S GUIDE:
US customers: tinyurl.com/yckpsrxe
UK customers: tinyurl.com/ykarakda
get RANDOM HEXCRAWL BOOK: tinyurl.com/5cj3d4jc
get RANDOM DUNGEONS book: lfosr.com/product/a-place-underground/
I’m sorry to hear you had a technical error but glad you rallied to continue. Maze Rats sounds like a fun adventure system when you’re looking less for an expansive trilogy-length epic than for a lighter but still engaging story. Thank you for this look at Maze Rats. :-)
Thanks, yes I’m glad I persisted too. This turned out to be a very fun little adventure.
Another excellent video. It was obvious that you were having fun with the tables. I’ve got to admit that they look very good and versatile; I’m sure that you could use them in almost any other game with little work. I love the descriptive spell generator.
Thanks glad you enjoyed it. Yep I was having a lot of fun with this and it’s clear a lot of effort went into the tables to make them so lively and evocative. I’m sure I will be using them again.
At work will give this a listen to when I'm home
Glad you got this one up!
Phew, me too! I hate losing video especially when it's totally my own fault!
Looks like it lends itself well to solo
I didn't say this in the vid, but actually it seems to me like this would be best for solo. I'd be hardpressed to see how it would work with a GM rolling on all these tables during an actual session. Maybe for prep work I suppose but not "live" as it were--would really slow the game.
@@DriesV1984 Did you actually watch this vid? The expansion is the reason I made it.
Missing some teeth..she's partying a lot..He he
Yeahhh :)
Your videos are great, you are a master storyteller.
I own Maze Rats and I couldnt find some of the magic tables you showed @28:22. Mainly 'Generate Magic Items' and 'Magical NPCs'. Did you create these? Thank you for sharing and uploading.
There are different versions of Maze Rats.... those tables came from the version I was using. Not sure how to differentiate the versions, however.
Hello and thanks for the continued content during this trying year! I have a question I'm hoping you can help with. I've been running a solo "campaign" at a leisurely pace with extended breaks in between sessions. It's DND 5e with a single main character. The thing that I feel needs to be reworked is my combat/random encounter system. For every 5 days of travel and every single night of travel I check for an encounter (trap, NPC or combat). Then I roll for details regarding the encounter, if I get one. I feel like this just bogs down the game in too much combat that doesn't amount to anything relevant. I'd like to think up or borrow a new system that still adds elements of randomness to my travel. Any ideas? Thank you!
Thanks for the comment and I'm glad you are appreciating the content. Your question is an interesting one: there are a number of ways to solve this issue. First, you could stop the routine check OR rather than a routine check you could make a d4 table that would be the check. The table would be something like: 1-2. roll on your regular encounter check 2. a night of calm--no check even needed 3. fortune strikes: create a new table for something bountiful to happen--something that thematically fits your campaign: maybe you find a stash of provisions or money or you find a map or whatever would work. Obviously this is just a quick example off the top of my head but doing this would cut down the number of encounters (whilst still keeping your 'check' every X days and also enable some other things happening.
The other question I'd ask you (given that you seem bored/tired with irrelevant encounters): is what is going on with the way that you are structuring or randomizing the actual encounters when they do occur? Why are they thematically not tied to your campaign? They should be--or at least most of them should be... but that's another question entirely.
Hope this helps!
@@GeekGamers01 These ideas are quite helpful. I will explore using something like you've suggested, or just an "intervention" table as opposed to a strict encounter table. That would provide quite a bit more variance for me. I did not think to limit encounters to ones that fit the main theme of the campaign...it seemed like with exploration I would need to risk things like not finding food, running into random monsters and what have you. It would be nice to keep just a bit of this so that the game can be unpredictable. I'll reassess that notion since it seems like it may have been one of my game's blind spots. Thank you!
Something else you could do is add a concept from DUNGEON WORLD... Fronts.
Think of your world as a real, dynamic, political world that's always in motion.
A "front" is something happening far away, and has an impact on everything that happens in the world. Fronts, left unchecked, expand, and encroach.
An example of a front in real life...
A plague has descended on the world. Governments are taking it seriously. And they're treating it differently in different places.
Now say to yourself, "How does this front impact my character?"
Maybe there's no impact yet. But there are rumours that the city you're in will be shut down. What would happen if the city closed? How would your character get around this problem?
As time passes, the front gets closer and closer. The impact gets bigger. Police are authorised to arrest those breaking curfew. People around the city start getting the plague. The character has to adapt to the effects of the front.
---
A more complex and exciting world has more than one front. (Think about Plague + Police Violence + Black Lives Matter as real life examples.)
Some fronts are more distant. Some are closer. Some impact your characters more than others. But fronts are relentless. If your character does nothing, the fronts will profoundly alter their life.
---
Instead of rolling a random encounter every few days of travel, roll for how the fronts are developing and encroaching.
Hope this helps.
How do you track all this information? When you get back to this after some time do you remember what happened? I can't remember things in the scene itself and I am wondering how DM remembers character details in real tabletop..does he?
Pierre Abou Naoum Keeping character sheets and some notes and sketches helps but over time you do tend to forget. Some people spend hours documenting everything but I’m not one who does.
@@GeekGamers01 maybe for you can replay a video but in real life ...
Thanks for this vid.
Hello, did you make that spell-generation table yourself? It's not like that in the original Maze Rats. Could you please share it?
There are many different versions of Maze Rats and that table was in one of the versions I have. Sorry I don’t have a digital file of it to share.
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