24 Hour RPG

1KM1KT is the official mirror site for 24HourRPG.com. Project participants may submit their work for online publication and view archived 24 Hour RPG submissions.

The 24 hour RPG Project is basically the budding and professional game designer’s equivalent of a triathalon- You put your body, mind and spirit through some major punishment in a race against time, in this case to develop a full, working, playable role-playing game within a mere 24 hours with other peers. Like a triathalon, there’s no “award” for winning; Rather the award is in itself to participate, test yourself, overcome the challenge at hand at your own pace and skill level, and share in the brief glory with your peers. Learn about the history of the project and its creators at 24HourRPG.com

In DEATH’S HEAD, players are dropped in the boots of SS-TV troopers as they administrate a concentration camp. What starts as a relatively routine “day at the office,” however, turns supernatural. Like something out of the most vicious of blood libel rumours, concentration camp prisoners become flesh eating monstrosities. There’s really no easy or  politically correct way to say this, so I’ll just say it: yeah, this is a zombie game set in a concentration camp.

This game is about exploring the three-way pull of Destiny, Duty, and Fate- our individual desires vs. our corporate responsibilities. The tug that we feel from our families, our jobs, our friends, and our supervisors is often compatible with the tug we feel from our ambitions, desires, dreams, and aspirations…and sometimes they are not.

In those moments, when we are faced with a choice, which gets priority? Our desires or our duty? The Knights of Arathess are faced with this choice over and over as they fight for their king and fight for their yearnings.

Facing the End is a roleplaying game for a single player. The point of play is to explore themes of Grief, Regret, and Loss associated with End of Life. This is accomplished in the setting of a fantasy world where the Protagonist of the game is asked to sacrifice himself to save humanity, and in the process he brings about the personal Loss and Regrets pertinent to the Themes.

In this game, you take the role of The Master Wizard, an ageing veteran wizard who is approaching the end of his or her life and now realizes that the accomplishment that made him or her famous was but a fleeting victory. Prior to yet again performing the Ritual that made him or her famous, he or she must vanquish any lingering Grief or Regrets, and overcome his sense of Loss at the prospect of losing his or her life.

This was my submission for the Ronnies and utilizes the ingredients of Old and Soldier. Inspirations come most directly from an exercise I participated in during my palliative care clerkship in medical school, which taught me a lot about Loss, how an RPG might work as a solo experience, as well as how to make game elements intensely meaningful to players. Other inspirations include the boardgame Pandemic, various RPGs including but not limited to Dogs in the Vineyard, The Leverage RPG, Capes, Committee for the Exploration of Mysteries, Apocalypse world, and the 1st edition AD&D DMG!

As a first draft, it needs many things, most especially a little playtesting.

Demilich is my entry for the 2011 Ronnies, using skull and old as ingredients.

You were once an ancient, powerful wizard, your power unrivaled except by the Gods! Your
magic had even preserved you; for a time. Flesh became gaunt; gaunt flesh became bones,
bones became brittle, until finally you’re just a skull on a shelf. Sure, you still have eons of
experience and knowledge at your command, but no hands!

You try and exert your influence over those that come across your paths. You’ve built networks
of spies, gotten comfortable in your new digs when someone starts swiping up all the talent.
Seems like there’s other skulls out there, wielding their power in your turf and that JUST.
WONT. DO!

Demilich is a 2-3 player competitive story strategy game where you will play a demilich (a
magical ancient skull), build their fortress, minions and network of influence and destroy those of your competitors. Explore the angst and isolation of being a magical skull…or just crush your opposition. The game plays in approximately 2 hours from start to end.

The dead walk. A dark master has called the recently buried to serve in his army, to avenge the wrongs committed against him. You are one of these beings. You shamble on, tearing apart anything in your path to achieve the tasks he has given you, his orders tolling in your mind over and over like a bell. A soldier in his army, a skull that sees once more because of his will.

But who you were still glimmers in your mind. Perhaps you can resolve the things left undone. Perhaps you can save those you loved. Perhaps, shattered fragment that you are, you can still make who you were a greater person.

The men all went to war, and the women never saw them again.

The remote farming community of Durum had to learn to make do without its husbands, fathers, and brothers, and 200 years later, things look very different: women run things now, the men all stay at home with the children, and no one can say for sure if the empire, what took the men to war back when, still stands.

But the patrols have brought back word of finding someone not-from-Durum on their rounds. Who could it be? Is there still an empire out there? What became of those ancestral, missing men?

You’re the heroine of a strict, Spartan culture, forced to face the world again after all this time. May you live into your Third Age, sister!

Keen Edge of History is a game developed for The Ronnies, of The Forge fame. It is a game about magical swords and their stories. Players create these swords to be their characters, and then experience quests through generations, building up their legends and guiding the human hands lucky enough to hold them.

This is my entry to the Ronnies award.

My game is called the Knights of Twilight.

It is a game about fencing.

Quite a lot of RPGs have tried to construct a realistic simulation of a sword duel or swordplaying, so far. As far as I understand swordplaying, with almost 10 years of fencing competitions on my shoulders, they all failed. This game, or at least the state of development in which this game is so far (very starting), wants to bring to the players the very thrill of instant-decision that is both tactical and practical; that a “life on the edge” which is the very momentum in the life of a fencer. An edge that is sharp, quick, and deadly.

I added some dark-fantasy color to it, because I always found interesting to explore a character that is a hero, but because of his ties to darkness. A double-edge that is both source of hope and damnation.

Hereafter is a 24-hour RPG designed to explore the many and varied manifestations of the afterlife. Players take the role of the recently deceased from any era, and wander through a shifting landscape shaped by belief. Escape from hell, or go in search of it. Run with the puppies in Dog Heaven, or sit at the right hand of an august and serene God.

Witless Minion is a role-playing game covering the daily lives and travails of the low-level mooks, agents, numberless hordes, administrative staff, and minions of Mad Scientists, Criminal Masterminds, and Supervillains. In this role players desperately try to pull off capers, avoid the bad graces of their superiors, stock away cash, escape capture, and negotiate for a better dental plan.

Witless Minion is a low-detail, high-trust game system. The rules are fairly abstract and assume a group familiar with role-playing games. It is a more narrative-driven game but GMs with a desire for greater crunch can easily expand on the rules presented here. Each player assumes the role of a minion, selects an archetype and picks their own talents and flaws. Depending on the campaign frame, players may be trying to climb the hierarchy in a single organization or move between a number of masters.

Players will need a bunch of d10s, the usual pen and paper, plus a number of tokens or coins to represent drama points.

While the game uses a standard dice pool mechanic for resolution, it does provide a number of new systems tailored to the genre:

• Flashbacks: This mechanic allows players to ‘retcon’ preparation for a caper or operation. This encourages creativity and allows the GM to move forward into heists and the like without having the players spend hours debating the details.
• Limits: A system of drama point rewards for play based on a character’s disadvantages.
• The Hierarchy of Villainy: Minions operate at the bottom of the food chain– with a number of ranks above them. This mechanic simulates the difficulty faced by minions when fighting named characters.
• The Prisoner’s Dilemma: An optional system which offers a tangible incentive for sticking together and at the same time for bugging out on your teammates.